Page 1 of a webcomic I am working on and hope to launch soon. The title as of now is "The Sparrow" its a superhero tale in a fantasy setting (nerdy genre mashing) and will have Christian undertones and themes. Anyways, I would LOVE to get feedback before I start the website so let me know what you think. Feedback that does not come from friends and family will be much appreciated. I drew this on 11x17 bristol board. Inked with Illustrator and colored and lettering with Photoshop. Fonts came from blambot.com
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Comments
oh wow this is looking really nice! I absolutely love the colors and the background! The boy looks like he's falling off or floating or something weird, but otherwise I really like it. Keep up the good work and keep moving!
You've got the right attitude Nathan. And I agree with you at this point; just keep moving forward. And as you go tweak the kids face until it morphs into what you are looking for.
Tintin didn't end up looking like Tintin until about book 3. Asterix and Obelix also end up changing over time. If you ever see a long run on a book, and you look at the start, and compare to the end, you can see how the artist becomes more comfortable with the characters, and how they end up becoming more their final shape.
And keep that "starting high" going. You're doing good so far. I will love watching your growth as you continue your work.
Hey Martin. Thanks for the feedback! You gave me a lot of great things to consider. I am definitely learning as I go. I admit that this being the first page, I had that "starting high" when you set your mind to a project and you get all excited and rush into it. I did not do any character studies for the kid. In fact that was one of my biggest complaints to myself was the kid kind of shifts how he looks as I have continued with my pages.
Also the colors. I finally got a new computer and had the "starting high" again to do the colors probably pushed through some things I should have spent more time on.
I sincerely hope to improve as I go along so all of this feedback is great! This is the first completed comic page I have done so I pray page 5 looks better than page 1 and page 10 looks better and so on. For the longest time I kept putting of trying because of the "I'm not good enough" mentality. But hey doing is how you will grow. I always figured my second comic story will turn out a lot better. "The Sparrow" is my learn as I go story. My friends and family while great for support, don't offer much constructive feedback to help me grow.
I have not read your blog post yet but I will be sure to read it today and let you know what I think! I want to check out your art some more too, what I have seen is fantastic.
God bless.
Aaaaaaaaah. Look. Bright colors. Trees and foliage. Happy characters. Well then, what's not to like? I have minor nits to pick, but in the grand scheme of things, they are trivial when it comes to seeing something that looks this pleasant. (Nathan, if you aren't aware, I kind of lambasted the current state of comics in a blog post here on CCAS - and this is a perfect example of a counterpoint to what's currently in comics and this is exactly what I've been looking for in comics.)
The minor nits: A little bit of anatomy issues - but the issues are so slight that I can give them a pass. Plus you have shown you got the chops to grow, so you'll figure it out as you go.
The boy's face - this is probably the biggest issue for me - his face looks a little wonky. You did a fantastic job on the girl (does she have lips?) so it's kind of jarring to see his face next to hers. Maybe adding some slightly stronger defining characteristics to the face would help - he looks a little generic at the moment. Also watch the placement of the ear as it pertains to the rest of his head.
Colors - I like a lot - but the rock in the foreground is blending into the background -it's not really distinguished from the tree, and blends in with the grass- perhaps make the grass behind it darker, and the dark of the tree a little darker and that rock would pop more. You could probably ground the characters a little more with some stronger shadows - the boy does look like he's floating.
All in all, good shape, good form, nice clean art, bright fun colors, and spunky characters. Keep up the good work. Very likeable.
Hey Brien, Thanks, for the feedback! I want to improve however I can.
Regarding 1)
I like your idea. My attempt was to illustrate the character going from unconscious to conscious. I guess it is not very clear. I will play with that.
Regarding 2)
I see what you are saying about the legs. I was going for a Disheveled look, leg bent to the side from a fall sort of thing. I will play with it a little for learning sake, I don't know how much I will change at this point because of the time invested, got to keep moving forward! :) I will do an overlay layer in photoshop to so how it could be improved. I need to play with the face a little too hehe.
Hey Nathan, Eyecatching lead page! The colors are good, the two characters look interesting and personable. The lighting and shadows are soft, but skillfully applied. You look like you know your tools.
I like your learner's attitude; I also am a new comic-creator and really covet any advice I can get.
1) The Character point-of-view should stay constant on a page. Frame One appears to be from Sparrow's point of view but Frame Two and three are from outside looking down on her. I would recommend redrawing the first frame. Since moving from frame two to three has the 'camera' pulling away from Sparrow, Frame one could be a close-up of some part of her...her hand or the penant on her chest.
2)Sparrow's mouth and closed eyes on frame two appear to be from different perspectives. Her lower legs are bent at different angles and bug me a bit.
Good stuff Nathan. Looking forward to more posts.
Hey Marcel Thanks. I will try not to delay! I am hard at work finishing the colors of page 2 as we speak. I have the pencils done for the first 10 pages, but I just about 2 weeks ago got a computer that can handle photoshop. But I will keep my progress posted on here until I get the actual domain purchased and site up and running. I would like to release one page a week once the site goes live so it will be nice to have a surplus of pages before launching.
Thanks Miabu. I checked out your stuff on deviant art. WOW very talented. So, thank you for you compliment! You seem to have some experience, so if you have any tips or advice I'm all ears!
and I like the colors....so no critique...good job
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