STYLE vs UPDATE frequency

[LordVincent]

One thing to consider is that while high detail levels may be lovely and well suited for intense important scenes and (as shown earlier in this thread) illustrations, it is not exactly optimal for many long running series with high focus on story.

Sure, there are successful comics out there that have it. Gorgeous art and all, I know of a few and they're some of my favorite art of all time. But I never read the comics in question. And looking at the comments sections, it seems that the same goes for an unusual amount of other people getting involved with the comics in question.

Reason? The art gives so many impressions that words and story have no place to take. When some readers try to focus on the story, they get fatigued.

So this is not only a question of update rate, but also having a balance that works to engage the reader in the way that you want.

This is not a criticism against comics that choose to go for very detailed art btw, in some cases it's preferrable and that's a decision that is up to each artist to make. I just figured I would add another piece to this discussion since I think one thing keeping many people from a "simpler" artstyle and faster update rate is the idea they've been taught that more detail and more time poured into a thing automatically means better. Fact is, more time poured into something is only a positive thing when said time is used doing the thing that is right for the project in question.

Personally I believe in learning to work fast and well. Working fast is a skill, not because it's fast, but because creating an appealing image at a fast rate takes skill. What an "appealing image" is differs depending on who you ask. I aim to make art that is at a level that I myself would like to read, at a speed that will pay my bills and allow me to tell as many stories as possible. Finding the speed and style that is right for you is a matter of considering what you want with your project, how much time you can realistically spend on it and what kind of art you yourself would like to see. Try to find the middle ground that appeases each of these factors as well as you can.

[IdiotWithPencil]

theirs this piece in the book understanding comics by Scott Mccloud

where he shows an artist and writers both wanting to make a great comic book, but the artist thinks he needs to draw like a master be as good as Leonard or Rembrandt to convey the message of the writing, while the writer thinks she has to write like a scholar and be a master at describing the scene with all the best words possible for the artist to not get lost, this makes them end up separated since, on the writers side she has beautiful narration and descriptions that take away from the art and at the artist side the art is so emotional, impactful and beautiful that it takes away from the dialog and story.

just like LV said

beautiful,emotional and descriptive art is great but it exist in service of the story,
and the expressive and emotional narration in writing is perfect for a book but in a comic you need to make it so it doesn't take away from the art or the story.

they are both tools to convey the story and should be treated as such one can absolutely overshadow the other but it shouldn't overshadow the story or the message that it wishes to convey

speed in web-comics is the new and third aspect that Scott couldn't explain (since they weren't a thing back then) in web-comics your consuming a page at a time and we need to make sure that the reader doesn't have to reread our comics(loading times are horrible unless you compress the page for it to be like only 2 mb =/) just cause we take to much time making our comic, this makes the reader leave our comics and wait until we get more pages, or worst until we finish it, and then they forget us which is the death sentence for web comics XC

we all need to find a balance, personal balance for our comic, between these three aspects if we ever want to make a, relatively, successful web-comic.

[UbePie]

I actually work in two styles. There is my comic style which is simplfied and a bit cartonny or animeish. And then there is my "studio style" which is what i draw when i am at school or i have a lot of time or i am doing a painting.

Comics is alot of work and I couldn't imagine having to draw every panel in my "studio style." That would take forever and i would update like once a month if i did, lol.

To me story is more important. I can forgive simple/plain art if the story is amazing. However if your story os boring i wont stick around for just the art.

[dawgofdawgness]

My art style is pretty simple and the color palette's even simpler. I just tried to make my pages as simple to make and pleasing to the eye as possible. What I'm trying to improve on is the lineart so that my art doesn't have to rely on color.

[JeanGuillet]

I've developed a bit of a strange approach as I've gotten better over the years. Since I keep my comic production process highly organized, I can easily update the art in my comic to my current level of skill. So, as I make a breakthrough, and it's turning into a once a year thing on average, I'll go through MY ENTIRE BACKLOG and update it. So no, I don't have consistency right now, but I'm going to have it at some point in the future and I can see that point approaching fast. Just work it in and keep a consistent update schedule, and you can have it both ways. for example, here's a art comparison i posted on patreon it's an iterative process. have your cake and eat it too!

[charliepeppersoap]

aaa, see, this is the exact opposite of what i would do for a panel that expresses such quick information without much emotion- i mean yes you have improved at coloring and a bit at anatomy, but this scene is way too generic to require all that realistic shade and coloring! this looks like an example of what not to do for every panel, unless you've resources and time to spare (i have a dayjob! cryin over here!)

maybe pick a different aspect to improve, now that you have color and lighting down? the thing with visual media is that the human brain can process a lot really fast, so you've rendered with detail and time what took me half a second to absorb and i'd be ready to move on after reading the dialogue, devouring a whole page as easily as fire would devour a tissue napkin or a silk scarf just as easily.

don't paint a silk handkerchief if a tissue will do.

[akemikae]

For the most part, my main comic is about consistency, since it's in essence, a practice comic. Plus the story is intended to be very long, and slow paced, so I feel the need to update more, to move the story along. (So people don't wait for a month at a time to read a few extra lines of dialogue, and that's it.) My style has been heavily increasing as I go, and the most recent pages compared to the beginning are much higher quality, simply from practice.

I have a second series now, and it's going to have a lot slower updates, and focus on quality. It's a passion project with a friend, and we want to have it be as high quality as we can manage at the time. So it's also a form of practice, really. It's also planned out to be shorter to begin with. Also, since it's a collaboration, certain parts will be easier to have higher quality, since we're only working on bits we're strong on. (I do the characters, she does backgrounds...etc.)

[Pandastrophic]

I'd rather go for something in the middle? I wanted to have a consistently good, fully colored comic while also updating (almost) weekly and that's what I aimed to do when I experimented a lot before starting the comic, i wanted to have a colouring style I can actually shade and colour quickly, so my lineart isn't clean, I don't do flats I just paint everything together and I guess it's working since I have a lot of fun working on my comic and my readers seem to like that style.

It really depends on what you want to focus on vs what you can afford to rush, for me I like to put more importance on the lighting and emotions in a panel way more than background, I usually rush making backgrounds and use them several times in the same setting if I can but I do my best when it comes to lighting and shading because that's what's carrying the emotion in the story (idk if I'm making sense lol) but i do know that if I want to make my comic in a timely manner I have to assess where I can take short cuts and where I can work hard when it comes to the art and make sure the decisions I make still work in favor of the comic.

(small example)

[XzynderVexymous]

Simpler style. First, because I’m not a good artist yet and second, better update frequency is a lot more important that art style. I know amazing artist and their comics but they don’t update as frequently and/or they don’t advertise.

Tapastic really cares about update frequency.

[NaamanBlanco]

I actually try to approach my comic as a traditional syndicated artist would with my daily's being simpler and my Sunday's being more detailed. I'm even considering "Splash Pages" on holidays. I've wondered for a while if I should post less to preserve content and not burn the reader out. What do you guys think? My comic is called "Dyeing Liberty". It would probably make more sense to ask my subs, right?

[NaamanBlanco]

When it comes to style, "less is more" in a lot of cases. I'm realizing that witty and snappy writing is better than extreme detail. Don't get me wrong it has it's place, but it seems more people gravitate to good writing. Check out "Dyeing Liberty".

[joannekwan]

I work in a few styles for my comics, but they're all simple enough that I can finish a page in half a day if I didn't get distracted with the internet. I mean, if I'm gonna spend so much time and energy on one panel, it might as well be a stand alone illustration. I feel like there's a certain charm in the rawness of some comics that aren't as polished and detailed as others; it feels more "in the moment." Sometimes really detailed panels can get too busy and clash with speech bubbles.

I think comics are a medium where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

[Rhombik]

I think this depends a great deal on what the comic is for.

My style and level of detail has kind of been decided for me. I'm making an educational cartoon for kids so it doesn't need to be excessively detailed. I also will need a lot of content if I want to promote it as a learning aid (eventually) so I guess I can't spend a long long time on each panel.

I did put a lot of thought into the character and world design and the colour scheme though because I wanted it to be appealing.

If I decided to make a long running, episodic comic, something like a fantasy or a romance, I'd put in a lot more detail.

Coherence and consistency are extremely important for me. I'm probably missing out on some great series because of this but if I can't read a comic where the size of the character's nose changes noticeably all the time or the proportions are constantly out of whack. A little of bit inconsistency is unavoidable but if there's too much, it's very jarring.

[charliepeppersoap]

all good answers, and yep, yeah, yes, style cohesion is #1 important thing, not only for readability and telling the characters apart, but also for IP branding and staying recognizable to your fans.

[jammythebirb]

I try to strike a balance, although it does mean having to compromise in both areas. I'd love to be able to complete more than one page a week, but if I tried, the quality would suffer. Similarly, if I tried to make every page look perfect, they'd probably take forever, and it wouldn't be practical. (Let alone possible!) So I just kinda do my best to try and find new ways of shortening the process whilst maintaining an acceptable amount of quality. Learning along the way!

[Luminosophy]

My comic is a hobby for me so it's very much treated like such. Updates are few and far between and like Vicar_comic, I want to make something pretty. However detail is something that I just really like, it's almost like part of my style if you will. It's sort of like how some people would hate spending forever drawing some wood carving on a piece of furniture, I wouldn't enjoy drawing character or architectural designs that don't have a lot of intricacies to them. I'm not really in any rush to gain an audience and money off of my work because I'm studying for a career that would pay much better, haha.

It's more just a learning experience of finding out what sort of techniques work for me, but it's also a challenge to find a compromise on designs that demand a lot more simplicity as well. I think for my next short story I'll probably do a buffer system, but at the same time I could also see that catching up because I'm always pretty busy irl.

[gpyrus]

Well, re-reading myself I realize I sounded a little more pessimistic than intended! I couldn't finish the story without feeling like I'm aborting something that is clearly evolving in a positive way. After all, progress is really what I'm going for and I think of all my projects as exercises. The artistic journey is really worth it at the end of the day. I have to admit I don't really have the amount of details in mind when it comes to improvement of a comic's visual, though. I actually believe that when I'll have reached the skill level that my current comic requires, there won't be as much inconsistency anymore from one chapter to another, and that the end result will give the impression that the pages are ironically done effortlessly.

[Moxxi]

For me, I update at least a page a week, so I like to pack as much visual information as I can with what little time I have to draw.

[Chronitis]

I try updating as fast as possible but my art does suffer in my comic Bounter's Edge I may actually start choosing the style over frequent updates in the near future though.

[charliepeppersoap]

i'm sort of flying by the seat of my pants rn, no backlog or buffer for emergencies bcos... yolo. one comic is slower, but more refined and the other a fast dumb mess and i honestly cannot WAIT to see which wins out

i mean 20 bucks riding on the fast dumb mess, cos fml, fml and fmcurrent terrifying scramble for affordable housing in post-reagan america wooo