Hats: YEAAAAH i really struggled with that whole towel situation, eventually i was so close to being done that i kinda just...left it whoops. yeeeeee i look forward to a future battle!

Puzzlething: THANK YOU AGAIN seriously your crits are probably what i most look forward to when it comes to comics getting posted, always so thorough! i'm so glad you appreciate my experimenting with my storytelling and i can't wait for you to see whatever i do next hehe

Bent           -

                I think your colours don't really add to or heighten the mood of the comic.  They're totally applied fine, and they're not ugly or anything, but they also feel a little straightforward. You could've used your colour and rendering style to really build and affect the mood/tone of the comic.

            I actually think you did a great job with time management! More dudes need to be willing to turn in super short, well done comics. I really like your panel layout. I've always wanted to try the whole single-uniform-panel thing, and you do a great job with it here. The one large panel in the center is stylin too.


CatDuchess           -

                      If you're gonna have your brush strokes and stuff visible, they totally need to be pretty. There are a few spots, like the blood in the water, and the sand on the beach, where it just feels like you took the basic photoshop brush with some opacity and threw some stuff down. You also still need to work on having the directionality of your strokes define the form and texture of your stuff, be more precise and mindful. You can only get all devil-may-care with your mark making when you have an incredibly strong sense of form.

        Your line quality gets a little rough in spots, kinda like you're making your lines with many tiny lines. Like a sawing motion when you draw. Try using longer, single strokes, and keep your pen on the paper. When you use hairy lines like this, it makes it harder for intentional overlaps to stand out, and using overlaps is a huge part of drawing an interesting human figure. It also slows the readers eye moving across your characters form, making it feel less dynamic.

         The internal contour lines your using here are a little uniform, they need to be just as expressive as any other lines you're making. They're super cool though, I've always loved those kinds of shape-defining lines. Right now, they really really bring out any errors in your sense of structure and form, but I totally don't think you should stop. They'll look amazing as you improve, and anything that makes you so aware of your mistakes will most def help you improve faster.
                   
              Maaaaaan, I just love the way you tell stories. Your shots and angles, the slow leisurely pacing. My own sense of pacing is waaaay too slow and boring, and it's wonderful to see someone who can tell a more sedate story so well. Awesome, beautiful work dude. You put so much into these comics, and it's always the best seeing peeps experiment and try new things.

B-B-B-BENT: Even though you only turned out one page it's still pretty strong and not half arsed - so good on you for that one! Time management can be a bitch but I want more Zedan in my life.

C-C-C-C-ATDUCHES: I like Fee a lot, your style if very interesting but I think that it could do with a little tightening up (but that's just my opinion) some of the poses are a little off, like where she picks up the towel, you just WOULDN'T look like that (for one you'd stand closer to the towel). But Fee is one sexy fishlady that I wouldn't mind battling in the future

AWYEAH.

yeeeeeeee thank you kent!

BenT, bummer that you couldn't get more pages done but you made the most of it with a great little comic! i super love the color palette and zedan's classy nautical shirt is grrreat, also any time fee gets to do some good old fashioned boat destroying is a good time. i agree with kent about our styles going nicely together, any time you want to collab on one story i'm totally down~

BenT - Sorry you didn't get more pages in, but I like the style you used here. Colors were really vivid, so I am interested to see what you can do with more time/pages. Your style has really developed a lot.

CatDuchess - This was a lovely comic--your delicate and intricate linework reminded me of rotoscope animation (as seen in the movie A Scanner Darkly, for example) There are some anatomy parts that are shaky (Zedan's shoulder/arm pose in his first panel is a bit off) but Fee looks great and the dream scenery is pretty cool. Fee's really become the character to watch! Great entry!

I think your two styles in both line and color are so complementary--it would be awesome to see what it would look like if you collaborated on a single story. I bet it would be awesome!

I got caught in the middle of my move up to Maine while working on this (plus I dropped the ball on it), so I don't have nearly as many pages as I would have liked on it.

for future reference, all dialogue in my comic should be read in voices like that dream sequence in twin peaks

GOOD LUCK YOU TWO!