comics
want to make a comic book?
good! get your hands dirty!
pointers:
good story + good art = great comic book
good story +bad ar t= great comic book
bad story + good art = o.k comic book
bad story + bad art = bad comic book
check storytelling and mthyology section for story pointers
check painting and drawing section
for art pointers
rythm is extremely important
more important than the artwork
comics books with great rythm:
blame! hellboy, scud. tmnt leonardo solo adventure+ no. 10, akira,
charcter design.
look at old stuff. look at how it has aged. is the design still apealing even
if it is old?
kay nielsen art is 100 years old, the horses look great, the women are beautiful,
but the men have lip stick(?)and look a little too feminine...
matsumoto leiji draws very interting charcaters. captain harlock is for me the
most interting: if someone had a hair cut like that in real life it would look
tacky.
but when matsumoto leiji draws it. it looks great. that's the secret of good
charater desing. great on paper, tacky in real life...
compare hair design in an old 70s anime with the hair desing in st-elmo's fire.
i think the hairstly in the anme is better even if it is older. time is irelevant.
like picasso said. time is what determines what good art is.
personal favorite old art: druilet, mobius, kay nielsen, fenninger, little nemo,
matsumoto reiji
mechanical desing:
keep it realistic. build yourself a sculpture. this will force you to make it
mechanically acurate. dont cut corners. as time goes by it will show.
compare: grendizer vs gundam five star stories
great mecha desing doesn't have to be complex. check out akiras motorbike, macross
valkirie vf-1s, mospeda cyclone armour, bubble gum crissis knight saber armour
evangelion.
but mechanical accuracy is a must.
stuff to look at: e2046 mecha web page, matsumoto leiji, five star stories,
michitaka kikuchi, shoji kawamori
dialog:
i reccomend plays by harold pinter
and any woody allen movie
sit down in a publuc space and listen to how people talk.
image size is important. build it so the reader can get lost in the picture.
it'll help pull the reader into the story
great since fiction and fantasy have a ``i-wouldn't-want-to-live-in-that-universe
feel to it (enki bilal, akira, si-fii art by melwyn)
the greater the feeling, the more detached the work is from our current reality.
recommeded readings
h.p.lovecraft's notes and suggestions for pulp fiction writers
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