thanks for the votes and comments everyone! also, i just noticed i completely forgot regi's scar in this comic, but no one called me out on it... my bad.
The only thing I really have to say is for K.G:
Watch how old Gwen looks. She's 14-years-old and I keep seeing her drawn as though she is much older. Age is an important detail for character, plot and design.
Nice job on both ends!
GREGLY- Always awesome to see this duo in action. Not to mention seeing colors on every page- kudos! I think using your opponents back story to pull him into Void city was a really clever! It didn't seem forced and let us take a gander at some neat magical dimension both these characters no doubt tromp through from time to time. It also groovy to see Hiemium being mentioned and used as a plot device. Here's hoping we get ot see comics with Gwen tapping into that!
K.G- (which incidentally are my real life initials, haha!) You got some nice work going on in your pages. I especially liked the first age and how you kept the environment interesting by including a billboard for Armageddon in the cityscapes adverts. Story wise, I wasn't as pulled in as with Gregly's, but your action scenes- especially in the park were very compelling.
@gregly: I always love to read your comics, man. This one fell a little flat for me, mostly because Hugen Das felt one-dimensional. Maybe that was intentional, but I would have liked to see you give him a little stronger personality. Gwen, on the other hand, was awesome, as always. I loved the Hiemium stuff; "I'm meditating so hard!" should totally become a thing hahah. I'm also having fun seeing you get a little more color than usual. I think you're getting better! I would encourage you to work on making your colors less "out-of-the-tube." Try to limit your color palette, and think about how lighting affects your characters' colors. Don't look at any of my stuff for examples, but there are tons of great colorists *coughangiecough* that you might pick up some tips from. Of course, with your style, maybe those bright, primary-ish colors are good; in that case, you just need more of them, especially in the background. And pay attention to contrast and actual lightness of your colors. It helps to create a grayscale layer above your colors, and toggle it on and off occasionally to see how your colors look when desaturated. You want there to still be good contrast and continuity to your work even without hue and saturation to your colors. Other than that, you need to make another comic with me because I need it.
@K.G.: Go to blambot.com immediately and find a better font. If I see any more of this garbage all-caps Arial-looking font, I will smash your head with a cat.
Okay, now that that's out of the way, let's continue. I'm really seeing a lot of potential here. That background on page 3 is way more than the typical VOID artist will do, although we're getting better at it because everyone yells at you if you don't include backgrounds. I'm proud of you for not neglecting that important part of your storytelling. I also like the variety you've included in how your panels are laid out on each page. I think your weakest point is your writing. This story was completely predictable and felt like fanfiction as much as anything else. I got no sense of character; everything felt like it was happening just to fit the plot, and any of the characters could have been easily switched out with another character and it wouldn't have mattered. In your next comic, take time to really understand your characters' personalities and make that be the driving force behind your story. And stories are much more entertaining when your characters aren't all-powerful like you make Hugen Das appear to be. I want to see your characters struggle; they need to have some obstacle that they have to overcome (and that takes more than one page to resolve). Work on that, and your next comic will be infinitely more enjoyable to read.
@The Bent One
Hey, Thank you for your feedback! I'm getting notes on everything you said and will try to make things better next time! Thank you also for the font site! It has some great stuff there! And don't be afraid to tell what you think would help, me! I believe that's the goal of this site and this kind of criticism is meant for us to grow, right? ;)
@Julz
Thanks for taking your time to read and to comment on my comic! You are right about the dialogues, cliches and character... I'll definitely work harder on writing my stories!
@Bobo
Aye Aye Sir! Thanks for comment! I'll do better next time! :)
@Kozispoon
Thanks! I'll take notes on that too! :)
@Hob
Thanks! I'll kep that in mind! :)
WOO GWEN AND REGIII!!! <33333333
I really liked the pacing that led to G+R's intro here. Happy to see color!! I like backgrounds, good good. Very humorous. I love when there is at least one panel that always catches me off guard and just makes me laugh. Well done.
KG- This is obviously very manga stylized. I'm not really a huge fan of that, and your hero guy is basically Goku. Plus it all seems like it was written by a child. "He is srong! He can be in void!" "your demon may be already pairing up with BAD GUYS!!" oh noo! Try to spice up the dialogue. Give people more character. I just wish there was more you in this. Page 4 made me cringe. So cheesey..
Gregly - I kind of wish there was more going on in your comic. It felt like you were building up to something in the first 2 pages, but it just kind of slides into Gwen and Hugen meeting, and back to the street. The "meditating so hard" line was fun, but they just kind of end up on the street without a transition. She doesn't even wake up form actually meditating. You could have easily had 2 panels where she wakes up and makes a portal for Hugen to step through into the real world. The reference to Heimium wasn't really necessary, it didn't add anything to the story. If this were a longer comic and you were setting yourself up for a callback later on, it would make sense.
I also felt like you could have handled the deamon better. He seemed to have been thrown in just to make an apperance and escape so that Hugen can run off and the comic can end. For 3 weeks, I think you could have at least done 2 more pages, maybe with Gwen helping him chase the demon, or making his escape into more of a fight. Overall, I feel like this comic lacks substance.
K.G. - This felt rushed. The line quality in these pages is rough. I assume you do rough sketches and then work up the complete drawing over them? If so, spend more time on your final lines. It wouldn't hurt to do some research for reference poses for some of your shots. I can see that some of the poses here are done from memory. I'd also advise you to do more anatomy practice. I'm not saying you have to give up your manga influences, but even manga-ka have extensive practice at human anatomy.
As for the story, it was fairly straight forward, but clunky. There was no reason to do a panel fade out from page 5 to 6. If anything, it would have made more sense to just have that last panel take up the bottom of page 5 and then show Regi cuffing the two burglars in the background while Hugen and Gwen start talking. Also, what's up with Gwen not caring about the fact that Hugen dropped magical meteors on her as part of his power test? Did he do it on purpose? Did one fall on her by accident? I feel like you could have added one more page between 8 and 9 for her reaction to getting pummeled by a meteor.
One last thing, you should get some different fonts for your dialogue. I recommend you start at BlamBot.com, they have an amazing assortment of free fonts designed for comics. You can also get away with making your dialogue font smaller. Maybe 10pts or 9pts.
This is a good start! Don't let my criticism get you down. I am eager to see your future battles!
Ok, I'm done! Phew!!
It's not the way I thought was going to be, but as a start here I kinda like what I got...
When it's up,
Please, give me feedback on what did not work and what I could have done better!
Thanks for battling me Gregly! It was realy fun to draw your characters!!
Thank you guys! This site Rocks! :)
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