Hey, late critique here. Already gave you private talk, but whatevs gonna post more here
Something I recommend for your work is to find multiple artists with styles you like, and understand why you like them. Don't copy them (unless you really want to), but just understand why you like that style of theirs and implement it first.
I like the story, it was solid from beginning to end. One thing I recommend is learn to draw people of all different shapes and sizes. I don't mean just fat people, but old and wrinkly. They look too 'clean', like a barbie doll. Kind of hard to explain, but as an example, the bad guy looks like he can fight, but he has so little meat on his body. The badass guy looked like a businessman shaved his head before he went to the scene. Not sure if I'm explaining correctly.
Perspective wise, I think it comes out of practice, but you may want to trace actual live people posing to see how it's properly done. Find some pose books, or stock photos, and trace the poses. See where the elbows bend, see how things look in different angles, etc. It will give you a better understanding of how bodies move.
I've told you the other things in another chat, so good luck making more comics!
Ok OS Rikun first I like to say, good job doing something short and sweet here.
I like how you palyed with the angles and some of your compositions aren't bad in regards to directing your viewer to the next panel.
I do feel like you should experiement and improve on the way you draw body language and facial expresions.
Mostly to make them look more convincing. Look up favorite cartoonist and artists, do some studies, see why it works compared to your own drawings.
Your Bg's I feel like they needed more life. mabe cause all the lines were so uniformed, no change in weight due to persepective or nothing, lacking texture. I feel like even some of your action scenes need some hints of enviornment like page 4.
Also I recommend you draw in pencil tool before you shrink your page cause you loose a ton of detail and also draw with your arm and not with your wrist when doing long curves on hair or uniform lines on walls.
Plot wise, its understood that they're in a movie that's being filmed so I can't tell you what could be better, except really think about how people would actually certain things, or watch your favorite films that have similar scenarios and study the dialog and delivery.
The ending coulda been better.
If your goal was to get Itami fired by the end of the shoot, it woulda been better if she go fired over broken equipment or knocking the director on accident instead.
Something that does a lot of damage to your action is your foreshortening. You don't always suggest it as much as you should with your contours or internal lines. The style you're drawing your people in doesn't leave you with a lot of internal lines to show the dimensions of their bodies, but there are still a few spots, at joints especially, where you should totally be using more internal lines with more subtlety. Like on page 3, with Itami's double-palm strike. You should be able to see the curvature of her bicep where it begins going into her elbow joint. With the more simple style you're using though, it's probably more effective just to be careful of how you're suggesting structure with your contour lines. Like look at the dude-cop's arms in that same shot. Both of them are kinda lumpy and flat, you can't really get a sense of the mass. Try using a mass gesture after you get the general action of the pose down. Just put your pencil and start drawing lightly with spirals, trying to feel your way around the outside of the form. Also, be really careful when you want to use concave lines. They can be fun and add a lot of graphic action to a pose, but they can also make a person feel flat and paper-like when used on a human body.
I really like some of your framing! You keep it fresh throughout the whole comic. I especially like page 2. That initial, low, dutch angel looks p hot. and I really like the lone spotlight on her at the end, because I imagine there's some jerk lighting engineer right off screen shining that light down.
This is like the first complete, polished comic I've seen from you dude, congratulations! I hope that doesn't sound like a backhanded compliment, I really do mean it! And it really is an accomplishment, making comics is hard. Everyone on this site should just ooze pride at the amazing work ethic they have, like you guys have no idea.
I've been keeping an eye on this one for a long time, so I'm ready to give my verdict on the final outcome.
Action Lines: I'm aware that you're still new to action lines, and that you'll need more opportunities to practice, so I'll point out areas in which you could improve. Some of your lighter motion lines are fine like on page 2, but from page 3 and onwards your lineweights are all over the place. They're thick where they should be thinner (zoomlines on the frame, for instance), and thin where they should be thicker (impact lines, heavy attack motions, etc). Action lines are about weight, emphasis and movement; the weightier the motion or impact, the heavier it should feel. Therefore, things like moving (running, jumping, etc) or zoom lines in the background shouldn't be thicker than the action in the panel. It's a little difficult to explain, but you need to determine what's a "WHOOMPH!" and what's a "FWISH!" and weight your lines accordingly. Then there's the matter of your impact lines: I feel like you're treating them too 'softly'. You use these really delicate, tiny strokes that are thinner than your character lineart so it looks more like fur than anything. There are also a few panels where the action lines fail to suggest any sort of shape, and thus the weight of the motion is lost (the arcing leg motion of Panel 2, Page 3, for instance). I know you have at least some background in animation, so think about action lines like smear frames; a motion so fast that the image appears blurred or smeared on camera. If her foot is in motion, the action lines should be 'outlined' to the edges of the foot, since the outline is what would have been smeared. Page 4, Panel 1, your zoomlines are scattered and unfocused; zoomlines in backgrounds are meant to frame actions, so they should be closer together at the edges of the panel and then fade towards the center so that Itami stands out more (this also has the adverse effect of taking away the emphasis on the motion of Itami's kick, which could have also been averted with a different method, which I'll cover later). The same goes for panel 3 on the same page. Because the lines aren't tapering and fading as they approach Dude McCopbro's fist, it literally looks like he's grabbing the action lines and punching Itami with them next panel. Also in the last panel, the arcing motion of Itami's head has too many lines; it's not an especially heavy motion, so it doesn't need to look like a solid rainbow. Her pose already suggests what direction she's going, so a few light lights would have done the trick, and that takes me to my next topic:
Posing and Staging: Getting good at action lines is important for fight scenes, but posing and staging can also help to properly convey motion. Which is probably why Itami's landing pose in page 2 just strikes me as odd; is she landing on the complete flat of her ankle? It looks like she broke her leg! I was informed that you were referencing a pose from Kill la Kill for that shot, but it doesn't seem to me like you really understood that pose well enough to construct it properly. Moving on, I know you were struggling with panel 2 on page 3 for the longest time, but it needs to be addressed: the posing on this panel could have been stronger, and would have helped to convey the weight and impact of the action. If you had staged it in such a way to provide more negative space between Itami and Dude McCopbro, you could have afforded to have Dude bend over more, as he is being struck by an attack from above (and also to avoid looking like Itami is simultaneously headbutting him. The fourth panel is okay, but I feel like it could have complimented the final panel more if it had shown her hand in motion as it swings for the next attack, rather than that weird ki energy that wasn't even conveyed in the next panel (I also think that panel could have better served as anticipation for the next panel if it were a wider panel to show DudeCopMan reeling back from the last attack, but that's just me). Revisiting Panel 1 of Page 4, I feel like this panel is lacking tension and dynamism when it should feel more important ("She's about to deliver the final blow! What will happen to Cop McDudebro!?"). As it is, the shot looks very two-dimensional; we don't really get a sense of height, and it's ambiguous as to how high Itami is above the ground, which makes her jumping kick look really weak. It also produces a composition problem: because she's so high on the panel, we lose emphasis on the motion of her foot because it's basically being cut off by the panel border. I would have personally re-angled the shot to a worm's eye looking towards the ceiling and posed Itami to follow that perspective; it gives a better sense of height in relation to Dudecop, and it would make the panel more exciting. Remember, as a visual medium, it falls to you to convey to viewers what they need to see, and what they should be focusing on.
And one last note:
Panty Shots: Just to reiterate on what Julz mentioned, you gotta work on your panty shots. It's cool that you want to include them, but you gotta learn how to draw some good panties. Most of this comes from learning how the crotch and the lower body works, so that boils back down to fundamentals and anatomy. It boils down to two (broad, but challenging) things; you gotta learn the topography of the crotch region, and you gotta learn how cloth behaves around that region. It's a lot of work, but good panty shots are their own reward. Gotta do your bookwork so you can level up your cheesecake game!
This is a really big step in the right direction from you! I'm happy to see you finally finish this, because it really shows that you've come a long way. I would have liked to see a bit more toning, because it would have added a lot more depth to your figures and backgrounds. The action is nice ad readable, just work on beefing up that toning and adding some more complexity to the backgrounds so they don't feel so empty.
Haha wow that was quite creative. I really like how fluid everything is, and the straight lines on the arms, everything is so dynamic and interesting and CLEAN. I can follow it so well, great pacing!! Page 4, first panel, what kind of panties are those?? Is she wearing a diaper? Those panties are too wide!!! Otherwise great comic :D
Ahahaha!
That was absolutely amazing!
I loved the dramatic angles of the main characters while they delivered their intense dialogues, and the action sequences were stellar! Love the way you use motion lines, it really brings a great sense of impact and speed to your story. And the ending was just brilliant, wasn't expecting it at all.
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