Snager: I fun little comic! It feels like a saturday morning cartoon that I would've watched growing up :] The concept of a kaiju school sounds very fun, lol.

Snowy: I know that it can be difficult to make something more personal like this. It came out fantastic and like a proper glimpse into a life. The usage of textured brushes here is interesting - it brings to mind stained glass for me.

Pizza: Great work! You managed to get that old comic PSA look down pat. The switch to a more modern setting was an interesting choice, and it all feels like a setup to an episode of a show.

Dr. Salt: Such an interesting and gut wrenching comic, especially for one this short. I was honestly expecting a horror comic at first, so having it be something so bittersweet instead caught me off guard. The heavy texture added so much to the atmosphere as well.

Fowlie: I absolutely ADORE your work here! The way that you manage to combine such a simple and cute character design so smoothly with such detailed backgrounds absolutely blows me away. It makes this an absolute visual treat to flip through!

Snowy: Very brave doing a diary comic here. good art, as always.

to all y'all: Hey, OP. are you ok?

Thanks for the nice comments, everyone! I'm glad it resonated with people so much.

For those curious on how I made the tones, I first coloured the page in greyscale, then randomly distributed dots using geometry nodes in Blender, with more dots distributed on darker areas of the image. The dots themselves have some variations in shape to make them look a tiny bit more organic.

Thanks for the battle!

I liked the colours and patterns on this. Reminds me of a stained glass window or a mosaic.

Thank you so much to everyone who commented and voted! I really appreciate you all! And congrats to Dr. Salt for winning, you certainly deserved it! •ᴗ•

The way you illustrated the intrusive thoughts was very creative and the texturing was a nice touch. Nice work!

Fowlie - This is so cool! I love how you stylize your pages! Your knowledge of panel composition is something I aspire to have someday. The only crit I can think of is that page three is a little overwhelming. I think it has to do with the speech bubble tails not leading the eye down the page but it’s still a fantastic page to look at once I got my bearings. My favorite page is the fourth one. It’s so sudden and bizarre I wonder if it was inspired by an art piece in real life.

Dr. Salt - That's a really awesome effect! I have some guesses but I'd love to know how you did it. It does feel like there's something missing about it but I can't for the life of me figure it out. I do wonder what this comic would look like with color, muted, mono or otherwise. There's a good chance it wouldn't make any positive difference but it could be worth experimenting. The story was gripping and somber, a perfect representation of a good fever dream which are incredibly rare.

Snowy: I like the personification of 3 AM being a set of hands that slowly suffocates the page that was a neat touch! I definitely get a similar feeling at 3AM when I'm drawing for a morning deadline or a 24 hour battle. The only thing that’s worked for me is going to bed before 3AM or telling myself that I don’t think this way 90% of the day and I should see how I feel about it in the morning. It IS weird that the feeling usually goes away after 4AM hits at least for me.

snager: Glad to finally see this comic pilot from you! I'm sorry I didn't see the Ed Edd n Eddy inspiration right away. It took me a little bit to understand this word was created with both humans and kaiju in mind. Really crack down on the world building of your story in the backgrounds it'll give your story a big boost! As it is I still love the concept and it was fun seeing the monster designs and expressive characters.

I know you’re not 100% set on the main character you have currently (who really reminds me of Ada now that I’m seeing it) I’d recommend trying changing around the gender, race, height and hair color first and seeing if it makes you feel any different. Maybe give them an outfit that makes them stand out more since they’re a normal guy in a monster school. You could make them a real monster nerd and have them gush over each monster they see regardless of if the monster wants to beat them up or not. Or you could go the opposite and make them originally afraid of monsters and have them slowly learn that most kaiju don’t intend to destroy property, they just emerged in a world that was too small for them. Either way, establishing your character's opinions on kaiju will also really give your story’s world a huge boost!

Wow, I needed that. I’m working on a pilot myself with a missing protagonist and I think I just answered some questions about it for myself lmao

The horror mystery is cool!

Thank you so much for the comments on this! To answer most of the questions - it's not really about going back to those times, they were when I was younger and didn't have the same problems and anxieties as I do now. I'm okay, but I appreciate any concern. ❤️

Linclair, I'm really happy you noticed the shift in the arm styles! I wanted there to be a visual shift somewhere, and that was the best way I could think of it.

I love how clean your lines are and the overall shapes you used for the comic! The hatching pattern was super tasty, and my favorite detail has to be that the arms are softer when the night is kinder, compared to how much more intense they become when it’s dread. Thank you for sharing something so personal. You did a great job!

Y'all did amazing work here! these were such a joy to read and I really like all the different stories that were told here

Cute and soft style shift! I loved the use of texture too. I hope you can find some peaceful times in the witching hour sometime soon

I used to feel like this all the time. I hope you find a way to get back to those peaceful 3am times.

Dang, what a treat from all of you. This was really difficult to vote on because each of you had some great work.

The art is incredibly good here regardless of how somber the theme is. Those intrusive thoughts are very relatable to a lot of us I'm sure. I hope that peaceful 3AM time returns to you Snowy

Awesome art and interesting theme! What would you need to do to return to those peaceful 3am nights?

Snowy! This was so good, so somber. I really love the coloring! This is why you sleep at 2 instead of staying up till 3

Though I do appreciate any feedback I get on comics, due to how personal this one is I would prefer if people didn't critique it harshly. Thank you in advance ♡

HOLY SHIT???