Tradtional media-does anyone give a crap anymore?

[ZOMG!Felipe]

I was wondering if it's really taboo to do a webcomic in traditional media nowadays. I've tried using photoshop a couple of times to make cg illustrations, but find that my skills are sorely lacking. I enjoy drawing by hand more (considering I can't even draw with a mouse), and inking too. However, it's the adding "color" that really throws me over. I use prismacolor blacks and french greys to add value to my pages. Recently, I even started using bristol board to do the pages on. However....there's just something lacking in my art.
I've been thinking that part of the problem is too much gray tones and not enough black to balance it. Is there a better way to do this? Does anyone use screen tone? I have some sheets of it, but am wary of trying it out so soon...

[Metruis]

Give me a good traditional media comic and I'm ON it. Way faster than I would be for any digital art. It BETTER not be taboo! There's a charm and varience that traditional art has, that digital art is sadly lacking.

I need a link to critique, really, but assuming your homepage is the comic you're talking about....

My first suggestion might be biased, but try something other than anime. Anime is hard to do well, even if it seems easier, and you might consider evolving your style to a more realistic form more suited to your method of creation.

My second suggestion is that your speech bubbles look slapped on and your font is bad. Do them by hand if possible to match your art style.

Now. I LIKE the art, assuming that After the End is your comic. Love the watercolory shading and hand ink. But it's not really suited to that childish manga style--your art is close to chibish, and that just doesn't go with the gritty noir inking. You'd probably want to just ink lines and color digitally with this art style, as it's more suitable to the feel. But I like this painterly and inky style... so I would highly suggest working on evolving your style towards a slightly more realistic manga/anime type, at the very least. Consider more bold lines, which will make the gray seem less overwhelming, and more varience in shading. Screentones wouldn't suit your ink style...

If you're looking for an IMMEDIATE improvement, my suggestion would be first and foremost

-Moar thick lines.

Line varience is key here, to making your shading not overwhelm. Thick on the outlines, thin on the details on clothing and in ruffles and everything. It'll make your shading--which does look good--less big and distracting. I don't think your shading is what's lacking here, or your inking. Both of those look pretty good. You can build up the effect by thicker lines on the outside of figures, and for things like black hair, instead of just making it all black, draw out seperate clumps and work on those.

I don't think you need Photoshop to make it look good. I think the problem, in my eyes, is the clash between the gritty and the manga style.

And, um, the fonts. Letter with something like Digital Strip or Webletterer or A.C.M.E. Special Agent or something from www.blambot.com, not that serif font, looks really out of place.

If I could do anything, I'd just say 'plz don't remove the hand shading and inking'. I like it.

[Nikara]

Yeah, right. Traditional media rocks! I only use my tablet because I'm too lazy to go through the effort of scanning and cleaning ^^

In response to your question, I would most definitely try to keep your work 100% traditional. I agree with Metrius in that it would really enhance your comic if you drew the speech bubbles by hand. I actually think your markers work fine with your manga style. I would even try to avoid screentones, though feel free to try it out.

What I think would really make a difference is if you used your pen to bring out foreground by shading the background--whether you accomplish this through cross-hatching or even just a series of brief, one-way strokes. In addition to making the comic easier to read, it will give it a whole new layer of depth.

Good luck with your comic! Hope this helps.

[ZOMG!Felipe]

Oh yes, After the End is mine. I've just been having issues with my top banner. X_x

Thank you both so much for all the great tips. I never looked at the style as "gritty, painterly magic". I always just assumed it was sloppy. I'd like to go more realistic, like Kentaro Yabuki with Black Cat or the later King of Bandit Jing volumes. My characters look to young and cartoony. X_X What's the best way to make em....less cartoony and move in a better direction?

The speech bubble advice was good too-I never really gave it much thought. My hand writing is kinda terrible, but maybe a font change is what these pages need...

Thank you very much again!!!

[Metruis]

Start with the eyes. None of those big-eyed manga eyes, practice drawing smaller manga eyes, like you see in more 'serious' mangas and anime. Find yourself some reference books or even how to draw books if necessary, but it's not too hard to learn to draw more realistically... there's tutorials EVERYWHERE. Basically, you'll be pencilling in the same sort of face lines as before but the faces will be longer, you'll have to include noses, eyes will be smaller and mouths wider... yeah.

I popped 'drawing faces' into DeviantArt and came up with this... http://evilmark.deviantart.com/art/Faces-14504513 This is a sheet of faces in a more cartoon-realistic style, might be worth taking a look at.

But yeah. Step one is to make the eyes smaller and a slightly more 'realistic' mouth. Christopher Hart's books are well worth looking at when it comes to different styles.

Incidentially, on handlettering--you don't do handwriting. You have to 'draw' each letter seperately, more. You don't just write. It's an art form in itself.

[Fishies]

I like traditional mediums! Me! Me! I use pencil colours in my comic. Sometimes it's hard to get it to do what I want, but I'm not sure how to digitally do what I want either. (I think it would take longer, too)

I don't know much about what you're using though. The only suggestion I can think of would be that since you're doing grayscale you should work on your inking. Good inking will make the whole thing pop more. You know, have shadows and lights reflected in line thinkness and all that.

[Industrialpowersart]

I use traditional media. Well my comic is kind of all over the place. I have done some colored pages in watercolor, but that is really time consuming and have decided to prismacolor the rest of the colored pages. Flashbackks are in pencil, and regular comics are inked. I tried out greyscale markers and decided they are the devil, but for as much grey as you're using, here, felipe, you might like them. The only computerised images we have in Industrial Powers are the filler pages that my writer does. Maybe at some point I'll do a filler in silverpoint just because i CAN.

More advice- well, if youre in love with the shojo/ borderline chibi style, here, then all you can do is practice, practice, practice, and read some mangas that use that style, so that you can pick things up. If you're flexible on that point, however, i'd reccommend checking out more adult mangas, and possibly some Korean comics. The style most of those employ is somewhat more elegant, but not TOO far from what you're doing here. I think that even though I don't draw in that style AT ALL, Lee Eun's Antique Gift Shop has affected the way I will draw hair forever.

[Koad]

I'm completely biased towards traditional media. In my opinion traditional media, when done well, allows a level of expressiveness and individuality that CG still cannot match. For my own comic I use ink... pretty much just ink. Unless you also count water.

Some of the drawing skills and what-not will come with practice. For now I would suggest using the gray shading for shadows, it'll help make things look more 3-dimensional (right now you're mainly using grays as a substitute for colors). Also, since you're doing a story on Robin Hood, you should check out the illustrations done by Howard Pyle, if you haven't already.

[Joel]

I use both traditional and digital for my comic.

I use grays and wash to keep the colors from becoming too pizza-ish.

I'd take it that you're using prismacolors. I'd also suggest trying out the different sides of the chisel tip. Cause for the princess's hair, the shading seems really blocky.

Another thing that could help add depth to the scenes is using darker tones in the background and lighter tones in the foreground.

[Cartoonme]

I also think there is room for both traditional and digital art. I love both, when they are done correctly, and both can bring something a little different to the table.

Keep playing around with different colouring method and experiment with the looks.

[Phalanx]

I use a bamboo/wolfhair chinese calligraphy brush and grind my ink on an inkstone with inksticks. Is that traditional enough?

I stick to computer of lettering and touchups, but there's a charm in the inks that my wacom tablet cannot replicate.

Bottomline is, stick to what suits you. It's ok to go traditional. It's ok to go digital. Just don't do either just because you think all the cool kids are doing it.

[TheSuburbanLetdown]

My comic is all traditional. As of this moment I'm posting, I only have a pencilled page up so click back a few if you're curious.

But I gotta say, I love the look of traditional inking and digital coloring. If I ever color my comic or do a different one in the future, that's how I'm going to do it. My banner is a mixture of digital and traditional.

[Ripnormality]

Traditional media is awesome! I actually work better in it, but I don't have the time or resources to go with it--if you do and it's working, stick with it.

Kudos to what everyone's said so far--plus, why not read some Western comics? I'm not that big a fan of the repetitive plots in a lot of superhero comics, but the art is worth looking at (seriously, anime has killed a lot of potential).

[VinnieD]

I agree. Stay traditional. Digital is much too sterile for your comic. Not to mention there's a sort of focus that comes with using a brush that comes through in the final product that really brings the characters to life. You just can't get that in digital.

[Alexan]

I have to agree with Metrius on line weight.

One of the perks of using a tablet is that pressure sensitivity makes it very easy to vary line weight. One of the disadvantages is that it makes it very easy whether or not you want to (unless you turn it off). But if traditional media is your thing, more power to ya.

Using a brush or quill/fountain pen can also help you with line weight. It never hurts to try something new, even if it's just for a few unpublished experiments.

For inking drawings, I like using a plain old rolling ball pen. Varying line weight can be done with greater precision without requiring an extremely steady hand. But that's just me.

I like your work.

[VinnieD]

I have to disagree. Any pen can vary the line weight by changing the angle of application and the amount of pressure used. It's hardly an advantage of a tablet. In fact a tablet's pressure sensitivity is an attempt to compensate for a previous weakness by emulating the ability to quickly change line weight by changing pressure on the pen, easily done with a good felt tip pen. Try a pack of Fabercastel, Micron, or Copic multiliners and experiment with them. You'll find that each pen still produces a wide range of strokes depending on how you use it.

[Rhenny]

The first page or tittle page of mine was in prismacolor, the rest CG, im considering going back to prismacolor as it has a nice organic feel about it.

[Bobadventures]

I do my comic by hand with ink and pencil. Then I scan it in and use the computer to move things around on the page (i.e., change the arrangement of characters in a panel, enlarge or shrink things, tiny up my lettering). Prior to using a computer, back when this was a print comic, I did these same sort of tweaks with scissors, rubber cement, tape, wite-out, and a photocopier, arranging things exactly how I wanted them before I would run it through the copier one last time for the final version.

So, I use both. But for the initial drawings, I'm always most comfortable working by hand, on paper, and I don't think thats likely to change.

I'm afraid I do use digital color for any color projects I do these days, my webcomic is black and white.

How do people feel about hand lettering? I still hand letter, and I seem to be in a distinct minority. I understand why, too, as it is very time consuming.

[BionicDance]

If the writing is good and the art is good, I could give a toss what the medium is, frankly.

I do my art as CG because that's what I've discovered I'm good at; I wouldn't begrudge a saxophone player their instrument just because I play a synthesizer, nor would I lambaste a hand-drawn artist for not being a low-rent Pixar like me.
Tell a good story and/or make me laugh, and do it well; make it look pretty. That's all I ask.

Just sayin'.

[Killbert-Robby]

I guess I'm just a dick and like a comic's art if it appeals to me, and not just because it was made in watercolors