Feb 2021
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Feb 2021
Feb 2021
aqua03Party Planner
Feb '21
nathanKmcwilliams

I think you're right there. it still really hurts to drop such a massive project I've had so close to my heart for so much of my life. there just feels like there's a bit of a void now akin to losing a close pet or friend almost if I am to make such a bold comparison even if I do end up picking it up later on after some amount of time later like what you did with DragonSparking. A void I'm probably trying to rush to fill right now it seems by trying to force something out of the blue.

You're also probably right about finding a new purpose outside of comics and art as well. I guess I've mostly latched onto that due to an unfortunately toxic mindset i have that I need to be working on something constantly in order to be seen as "worth something" as a person by just keep working on something in the background so I'm not wasting time or resources not doing anything if that makes sense. Art and comics have kinda felt like a bit of an instant gratification of that "Hey look guys! I'm producing things! I'm worth something!" if that makes sense.

I should probably look more for other hobbies and things outside of comics and art to supplement things (I know I've been taking some online courses about marine biology and other things right now to help with that.) Unfortunately, the job situation in my state isn't looking too good thanks to Covid, so that's a little bit tight on the job front.

thanks again for the advice. i definitely need to learn to be more comfortable in my own decisions and find more of a purpose and worth and interest outside of my comics and work harder on accepting my general worth outside of my ability to produce in that end of things.

darthmongoose
Feb '21

Well that's a big mood. I constantly struggle with a burning need to produce things and achieve in order to prove that I'm valid, so I know how hard it can be. I'm currently in the middle of developing a pitch for a print comic for publishers and my own impatience to get it done and need for whatever I make to be not just "good" but to go the extra mile can be a difficult thing to handle.

I can't tell you what's best for you, but I can outline what goes into coming up with a new comic concept, because I've had to do this a fair bit when entering competitions, pitching and creating webcomics.

  • First thing: You might not have the best idea in... what has it been like a week? Last I saw you were talking about Drachenseele as if you were making that, and now a week or so later you've canned it and you're bummed you haven't had a better idea? Listen... I am so good at coming up with ideas on the fly, it's literally a large part of my day job, but even I wouldn't trust myself to come up with a concept for a long-form comic that I was happy with in a week. It takes time and iteration!

  • The first thing I do is to list out the things I want from the project. Where do I want to publish? What's the audience? It's a good idea to look at what sorts of things that you like are successful in that market. Errant is a poor example because I mostly made it as a passion project and it's really not that well suited to Tapas (though better suited here than webtoons and definitely better suited to web than print), but with my other project, I first went and looked at Middle Grade and YA graphic novels with similar vibes to my work; stuff like Lumberjanes, Witch Boy, Unbeatable Squirrel Girl.
    Make notes of anything important about the format, themes, art style, colour palette etc. So if I wanted to try to succeed on say Webtoon, I might go "Okay, it seems like action comics here that succeed are long scroll, drawn in that generic webtoons manga-esque style and they have this distinctive kinda anime colour palette, and a lot of them are things like isekai genre..."

  • Then I start listing cool things that I like that also overlap with what my audience likes. For example, if I was making something aimed at a mostly queer female audience and planning to make a romantic GL Fantasy story, I might write "Witches" "Lady Knights" "JRPG esque Fantasy setting".
    I turn this into a spider diagram and start branching off things I might associate with these, finding links if I can, like say "crystals" could link to both witches and JRPGs, or "quests" connects to both knights and JRPGs. I might go "Knight- chess piece - knight piece moves in a strange way - a knight who always does the unexpected".

  • I also make myself a Pinterest board and I start collecting images and references that nail the look, atmosphere and colour palette I want. For example, Errant's had a lot of old X-men covers because I wanted that bold inking and lurid colour. I've had another project where I was collecting loads of examples of classic abstract art, and another where I was looking at moody fantasy digital paintings from stuff like D&D. Every comic I make I try for a different tone to the art to suit the story.

  • I start to make notes on things I think I'd like. I keep an open mind to change. Like my current project I started with three characters, then was like "this setup with three characters is boring!" and wrote ideas for five characters, before realising some of the characters I'd come up with could be merged, so now I have three again, but two of them folded in characteristics for other scrapped characters, so they're more fleshed out. The plot also changed significantly as I started making notes about the story and joining the dots. The theme that emerged wasn't what I expected it to be! It's taken weeks, but now I have a good grasp of what the story is to the point I've been able to actually give it a name. (It's rare for me to know what the name for a project is until well into development. I tend to just give them vague working titles).

  • I start doing style tests in the aesthetic and doing doodles of the characters. Test panels, character designs etc.
    So like, Errant is bold and lurid because it's Fantasy Action with over the top characters, and I knew it'd have influences from older comics colour palettes for a "pulpy" look, but it still took some refining, like the early designs were too scruffy and complex:

    rekki_kid_design.png806x1747 403 KB

And the early style test with a much more gloomy, lurid look closer to western comics, was too time consuming and too dark for the tone of the comic.

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So there was a fair bit of iteration before I hit the look of the comic! It took months! The logo design alone took a couple of weeks, and I agonised over the name!

In other comics, I always experiment with the style to make sure it's a fit with the tone, so when I was making something in a more real world setting, I used a more muted colour palette and hand-drawn speech bubbles and slightly wonky backgrounds for a more naive feeling:

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Or when I made a sci-fi short with a simple message, I went for this very stark look with super chunky inks and minimal shadow, almost like a wood block print.:
ABOVE_CLOUDS0001.jpg544x757 94.6 KB

You might notice even the fonts used are different between each of these and Errant. This exemplifies my approach: Every comic is different, so every time I plan and make a comic, it's all about "what is special about THIS comic? Why is THIS comic awesome in a unique way."
It's very important not to think of the project being not Drachenseele as this bad thing. You need to look for the opportunities this gives you. What exciting story can you tell here that you just couldn't there? What cool aesthetics could you use? What pulse-pounding scenarios could happen?

And most importantly, don't expect a perfect idea overnight. You have to keep chipping away at it until the shape of the story emerges.

writercynknapp
Feb '21

Keep an idea file/book/notepad. Write down all the ideas you like (even the ones that do not work for your story).

Occasionally create something out your main story with those ideas. It stimulates creativity.

migxmeg
Feb '21
LCT_m_a_d

I'd argue that luck is a factor but lessons learned and skills honed from the first "failure(s)" are also a factor.

If your definition of success is astronomical but you're only willing to attempt one all-or-nothing try, you almost certainly will fail, or put too much pressure on yourself to start. The do it again part ups the odds more I think than anything else.

That said, Aqua, it seems like you're struggling more with yourself than with comics and it doesn't look like worrying about the details of your next comic is helping you. You may have tried this already, but when I'm putting unreasonable pressure on myself I look at people I care about and think if I would consider them "worthless" if they had the same struggles or issues I'm beating myself up about. Of course not. People you know that never create art/writing or don't meet a definition of success that you're thinking about for yourself are still awesome. You are worthwhile when you're not working - when you're sitting around playing video games (or "non-productive" other hobby) or literally doing nothing you are still awesome! It sounds like you are still hunting for something productive as a hobby to fill the void... but I bet you'd be happier if you can internalize that there's nothing wrong with doing some unproductive things.

I hope you get through this and at the end of the day, whatever you contribute will be cool because of you, not the other way around. :+1:

Rhonder
Feb '21

Big agree on this point! Luck is always a factor but it should, ideally, never be the factor as it's not actionable. There are a lot of other aspects that creators can and should be trying to "course correct" towards a higher success probability, for lack of a better word, between projects to give the next one even better odds :slight_smile:

aqua03Party Planner
Feb '21
darthmongoose

Thanks for sharing your process with me. You're right, I just need to be patient and iterate and also rest a bit. I'm just so tired i need a break i think.

@migxmeg

Yeah, I think the struggle is more with me fully internalizing that i need to rest and do stuff for myself. because I've realized that also that often times I feel deep down that with my "big" projects it's merely not enough to just do it, I need to be the bestest and most stand out thing in the genre. Because if it's not the thing everyone needs, then why do it because there will be better stuff people choose over you even if you are really good, there will always be someone better than you that people will choose over you. At least, that's how it's always felt to me deep down it seems. It's one of the reasons why I always got all nervous when something even remotely similar to what i wanted to do with Drachenseele would come up like kamen Rider Saber, Raya and the Last Dragon, or heck, even something as simple as another webcomic here that has some surface similarities to what I wanted to do if that makes sense.

I hope I can get over it soon as well. because this seems to be a big brick wall I keep running into and i'm just tired of hitting brick walls with my stuff all the time.

migxmeg
Feb '21

People have room in their hearts for more than one story (and often seek out more stories with similarities to their favorites) - it's not one project vs. others :slight_smile:. Good luck!!

WillowTree
Feb '21

This :heart: The people on this site are our peers, not our competition

aqua03Party Planner
Feb '21
migxmeg

@WillowTree

thanks guys. that's something i need to work better on internalizing deep down. because i know that's the real case, it's just that there's somethign deep inside me that can;t accept that for some reason in the same way there was something deep inside me that couldn't let me work on Drachenseele even though I knew what i had was good. i hope i can get to the bottom of those issues soon...

DiegoPalacios
Feb '21

you need to know what you are doing.....it's your story. If you dont know, nobody else will. Instead of just adding things because "it worked for that author" figure WHY it worked under that specific situation. When you understand the reasoning behind storytelling you will be better at telling stories.

Any idea is a combination of sources of inspirations. Not all said combinations have been done, so mathematicaly speaking there is an endless world of posibilities.

And about sources.....ANYTHING can be a source.....yes ANYTHING.

i once got an idea for a monster for my game by watching some grapes and imagining them as eyes.

LCT_m_a_d
Feb '21
migxmeg

I agree. I apologize if this wasn't clear about including that, I didn't know you would quote that line from my response.

I know the context isn't included in that sentence, but the whole reply to him was centered around being willing to commit to something because you think it's worth doing. Learning to trust yourself, so you can be comfortable with making mistakes and treating failure as information and sometimes just bad timing and not giving up.

Regardless we are in total agreement probably.

migxmeg
Feb '21
1

Oh yeah! I totally agree with your entire response. I pulled that line because I think the phrase "I can do it again" is sooooo important! I agreed with that part extra and wanted to expand on it because it's so key.

Edit: Honestly my life changed the second I realized I was going to go for it with all I've got on something I know isn't going to be a whopping success. But getting to that took years of being unsatisfied and fumbling around with trying safe things. I think the thing that makes it worthwhile and exciting for me is what you said about it making an impact for someone.

antonioIII
Feb '21

Ironically, i found new ideas by watching and reading old stuff.
To be clear, there's no thing like "Original" everything is inspired. Of course, there are the ripoffs, but those are the ones when you took too much elements from something.
So just see how things are made and try to incorporate to your narrative. after all, these days we have patterns that were created by old stuff as well. There are still elements they didn't recreated too much(or at all) yet. So give a try.

thedude3445
Feb '21

Research!

One thing I love to do is try to find a "bibliography" of fictional stories to consume, study, and then use to inspire myself for stories that I am working on or planning. Sometimes the stories aren't actually that related to what I'm working on, but the little things can catch my eye and give me ideas. On example is a bunch of movies I watched in order to help inspire me on my novel The Gay Gatsby: here's the Letterboxd list. Some of these movies are vastly different from one another, but they all inspired me in one way or another.

Research through inspirational fiction, or actual research on science/art/history/etc., can be a powerful tool.

R.n.P
Feb '21

find something you really hate and try to write a story about it in a way that you will like it
It's tough but if u can do it, the idea you come up with will be interesting cuz u have to make your brain work hard to make you like something that u hate

TedGravesArt
Feb '21
therosesword

It's true, look at how many times the hero's journey has been told and people who aren't writers usually have no idea.

I don't think most people want new things. They want repackaged old things that rekindle the feelings they enjoy. People listen to the same albums over and over and over, and get upset when the band changes their style.

Honestly, your thing doesn't have to be original, just make something you enjoy. Don't overthink it, just create stuff. Haphazard, wild creative energy often leads to something interesting that you can whittle down into something truly special.

therosesword
Feb '21

Agreed, look how many times Miss Marple is produced. Each production a little different, yet the same and it feels like your favorite fuzzy sweater on a cold winter's day and is so very satisfying.. Agatha Christie stories are "redone" in France and you have to hunt but at the end of the story you realize which story and which character it's from.

WillowTree
Feb '21
TedGravesArt

Yep! This is why some 'overused tropes' are so overused - because people love them! I've mentioned it before I fell hard into a 'fake dating' reading binge. I'm not kidding when I say I read through PAGES of AO3's faking dating stories and it did not get old. And so many of them were in the same fandom and pairing. I lost count of how many I read and I still wanted more because it's that enjoyable 'who is going to break first? Who's going to call it off because of completely misreading the situation and not properly communicating?'

I listened to 'Brand New Key' every night while getting ready for bed for months. It got to the point my husband begged me to pick a new song lmao (then begged me to go back because I chose a Posty song).

People love having those warm fuzzy feelings where they know what to expect that's what makes it enjoyable. It's why reading a romance novel that sticks to the usual romance novel beats is so satisfying, you know what to expect at every turn :heart: Different characters, settings, hole-hearted reasons, but same satisfying 'in love happy ending' in every novel :heart:

Maps
Feb '21

I find that driving and listening to lyrics of different music can inspire different ideas and stories in my mind. Sometimes when I hit a roadblock, I take a drive and listen to music for some inspiration.