Week 16a

Today in class we finished our critique and I gave feedback to my fellow students. Whenever my half of the critique was done we went downstairs and helped Jeri's class with their HTML.

Here is a picture of the feedback I received last class, the typed version is on my blog post last week:

Week 15b

My prompt: "The night before the wedding, a hypochondriac hostage negotiator wakes up in a strange house."











Feedback from the critique:
- Color is visually consistent
- Nice use of textures
- Creates emphasis on emotions
- Nice panel shapes
- nice perspective/ point of view
- Background in one panel needs a little more work
- Doesn't have consistent border breaks
- Font choice could be different
- Action lines in last page first panel could help show that his head is moving
- Get rid of "thinking" part at bottom of page three
- Action lines in place of text for certain elements
- The "Rub" part goes on for too long
- Fire looks a bit like pig ears
- Visually separate the ooze from the clever 
- Penciled in texture look good, use them more

Week 15a

Today in class I put the finishing touches on my Comic. The first thing I did was to complete the little bit of text that was missing from the page. I need to add the rubbing sound effect to a couple of panels. In my script I had a "fwoosh" sound effect in the last panel when the ropes catch fire, but I decided to cut that because I just couldn't work it into the panel I had drawn. Plus the fire didn't look like a fwoosh kind of fire.



Then I went through and proof read all of my text on the page. I didn't really find mistakes, but I found places where I could cut words out, or reword things to bring down my word count. I wanted to do this because a lot of my word balloons were looking pretty full and needed trimmed down.



I was struggling for awhile with what to do with the panels where I had characters interrupting each other. I tried to have the balloons overlap each other in a bunch of different ways, but none of that worked. After talking to Professor Pannifino I ended up not having the balloons overlap and it still looked like the characters were interrupting each other.



Finally I lowered the opacity on the comic pages by ten percent. This was another change I made after talking to Professor Pannifino. He felt that the colors might be overwhelming when printed out, and after seeing the colors dulled down a bit I agree that it should look better this way.

Week 14 Out of Class

   This week out of class I finished drawing my comic pages between Monday and Wednesday and then over the weekend I finished coloring them in and got most of the word balloons completed.For my type faces I picked two, one for the word balloons and one for all of the sound effects. I think both go well with my drawing style and the thick lines of the comic. One trouble that I had with drawing the comic was keeping it clean since I "inked" it in pencil, but adjusting the levels in Photoshop got rid of almost all of the smudges. For awhile when I was making the balloons here I had a black outline on the balloon shape and it just didn't quite look right. Eventually I tried seeing what it looked like without the line and it was much better. Since the balloons couldn't match the drawing style they looked better as flat shapes sitting on top of the comic.

Week 14b

    Today in class I worked on coloring in the first two pages of my comic. When I was setting them up in Photoshop I left the black levels down a little lower so as not to make my pencil lines look solid black. I wanted the pencil to still look like pencil. This was important to me because I think the pencil creates a very expressive line that add excitement to the comic. Where as a solid black line does not express as much feeling. Also I enjoy the rough feeling created by the pencil lines because it isn't perfect and this lets the reader connect with it more. It breaks the illusion a little bit. For my colors I have a tannish yellow, an orangish red, and a teal. I picked colors that are all nearish to primary colors so that they contrast strongly and clearly separate the elements on the page. I think after I'm done coloring all of the pages in I might go pack and bump down the opacity on the colors a tiny bit to make them a little less intense. 

week 13 out of class

Thanksgiving break, see Week 14a

Week 14a

     Over break I made my first finished page for the comic. I decided to use pencil to "ink" the comic because I liked the more organic look of it. Also the pencil creates a nice soft texture that makes the comic look a little friendlier. Another good thing about pencil is it really reinforces the hand drawn element of the comic with its lack of a solid black. In class today I started and finished the second page of my comic. For all of the pages I'm doing a half inch gutter at the large scale because I think keeping the gutter constant will help with creating unity across the pages. To draw the final pages I'm sketching them in non-photo blue pencil first and then going over them with a  6B pencil. One challenge I'm having is keeping them smudge free, but if I'm careful I can keep them fairly clean.

week 13a

Today in class we had a small fire in the art building that ate up a bunch of class time, but after that we had some free work time. I started by practicing in more detail a drawing from my sketches that I knew needed so work. After practicing it I feel a little more confident about doing it for the final comic.

After talking to Pannifino I had to go back and rework a couple of panels. The first one was where Arnold gets his idea to burn the ropes. We both agreed that in it’s current form it was a little cliche. So I decided to expand on the lightbulb idea in a new way. First I tried turning Arnold’s head into a lightbulb when he gets the idea, but that felt dumb. Then I messed around with lightbulbs in his eyes and different lightbulb background patterns. Also I tried a beam of energy to represent the idea, but this just didn’t feel right. Eventually I moved away from the light bulb entirely and did a pattern of Arnold’s heads. I really like the pattern idea because it emphasizes time passing and breaks away from how I’ve shown Arnold before.

The next scene I need to rethink was Arnold calling out John Turner. Before I showed Arnold’s face, but I’m already showing his face a lot so I needed something new, and not showing John Turner’s face right when his identity is revealed  kills the drama. So drew what that panel will look like and practiced what sort of face John will be making.

week 12 out of class

    Outside of class this week I finished up doing drafts for the comic pages. I had two more pages to do and I did three versions for each before I was happy with them. I played around with dynamic angles and fun shaped panels to add a bit more excitement to the page.

Week 12b

Today in class we started with an exercise where we had to do a moment to moment comic in 16 panels where our face disappeared and revealed something inside of it. I had my face melting away Indiana jones style and revealing a spoon in the center. After the exercise we

had in class work time to keep blocking out the comic pages. Between classes I did page two so now I’m working on page three.

Here’s my 16 panel face melt comic:

Page 3 v1:

For this page I started with panels 1,2 and 4,5 being smaller and having the 3rd panel being really large. The 3rd panel is the one where it shows the cleaver/knife in the puddle and Arnold in shock in the background. I wanted this panel to be large so that it dominated the page and really emphasised that the knife being in the puddle is a problem. I think that having the other panels being smaller works but they shouldn’t all be the same size.

Page 3 v2:

For this page I started by making the first panel being smaller to emphasis how quickly john is leaving the room. Then the second panel is larger and Arnold is looking down to left where the clever would be. This helps make a connection between what Arnold is saying and the image.

After I was working on these pages a bit I realized that I needed practice the forced perspective in panel 3 more so I drew it a few more times.

After talking to Pannifino I tried to curve the edges of the chair more and to make the cleaver larger. This really helped with forcing the perspective and adding to the drama of the shot.

Page 3 v3

After practicing doing the third panel a couple of times I returned to the third page. I kept the changes I made for the first two panels and drew my new version of third panel. Then for the fourth panel I made it larger and zoomed in on Arnold’s face more and added more stress lines around his eyes. This helped make Arnold’s reaction more dramatic. With the final panel I’m having a bit of trouble making it engaging. I’m just worried that I’ve got way too many shots of Arnold sitting in his chair and it’s hard to change it up. So I made this panel a little smaller because it’s just one that the viewer can glance over really quickly.

week 12a

Today in class we had an hour and half to start blocking in our pages for the comic. Some things that we were told to keep in mind where, room for word balloons, Dynamic camera angles, and interesting compositions

Page 1 v1

I’m not happy with the first three panels just showing the eyes, they’re floating and flat. Also there is no place to show the dialogue. I’m not super happy about the ceiling tiles either.

Page 1 v2

I shifted the head to the side in P1 and this helped give a place for the word balloon and establish the character earlier. I also made P2 and P3 show Arnold's head and this helped add more action to when he looks around. I’m still not happy with the ceiling tiles and I tried to move Arnold to the left in the last panel but I don’t think this works. It’s better to read over to him.

Page 1 v3

Started but abandoned after talking to pannofino

Page 1 v4           

After talking with Pannofino I decide to move the first 5 panels up to the top third of the page. This compresses the action when Arnold first wakes up and adds more of a sense of drama. Also by putting the panels where Arnold is looking around in between the ceiling tiles and and the watch help balance things out. The 6th panel now dominates the page and gives more of an impact to Arnold being tied up in the chair.

Page 2 v1

For my first version of the second page I just started with getting things down to see what they looked like. I’m a bit worried that the panel with John in the doorway will be read incorrectly since it has two panels to the left of it. Also the panel layout feels a little bland so I might try to spice it up a bit.    

Week 11B

Today in class we started out by having the people in our row look at the scripts we wrote for today. One really good idea I got from everyone was to exaggerate how dirty the water is in the panel where the knife is in a puddle. They said it’d be okay to go over the top here and have the water be bubbling, and maybe even a dead rat is partially in the puddle. After we met with our group we took turns partnering up with people and drawing each other's characters.  A good idea that came from this was that John is wearing a butcher’s apron. From there it evolved to Arnold being held in the back of a butcher’s shop instead of a generic ruined building, and now the knife might be a clever in a puddle of blood instead of dirty water. I found that describing Arnold to other people really helped me get a better feeling for him, even if their drawings weren’t quite what I pictured. Here are the drawing from my classmates:



After drawing the characters we started making revisions to our scripts. 

Week 10a

Today in class we started off with an exercise in which we made a 16 panel comic. To do it we made up 16 plank panel and then drew a first and last panel. Then we split into two groups and passed the comic to the right. We would have two minutes to draw the next panel and then pass the comic. At first it was easy to come up with something to do next, but as you approached the end you had to think about how you would get the comic to that last panel. I had one tough challenge where I had one panel to tale the story from a hot dog factory to a large speech by a nice looking man.

After we finished that exercise we played Mangaka, My group was Vance, Kyle and Max. Vance and I ended up tying with 29 points at the end. Our theme cards for this game were Cyborgs, School Clubs, and Super human skill at a Mundane thing. So most of my comics involved the Cyborg Club and the punch line would involve some lame power. This game is always super challenging, but I definitely feel like it was easier than last time we played it, but this time some of my cards felt like they worked better together.

Week 11 out of class

This week out of class I had to choose a section of my narrative and write a script for it. I decided to do the section where Arnold is first waking up and meets John Turner. I thought this would be a good section to just jump into since it's a transition and you don’t really need to know what happens before it. Also I thought it would be fun to play with the tension of him being tied up in the chair.


Page 10

PANEL 1: ECU tight shot on arnold's eyes as they are partially opening as he wakes up. HE is very groggy and his eyes won’t be focused.

Arnold: UGGHH,

PANEL 2: ECU thin panel about half the size of panel 1. Arnold’s eyes glance up and to the left

PANEL 3 ECU Same size as panel 2. Arnolds eyes glance quickly over to the right.

Arnold: Where am I?

PANEL 4:  Worm’s eye View of the ceiling. The ceiling is made up of numerous dirty and awfully stained ceiling tiles that look like they’ve been neglected for years. Some of the tiles are completely missing and loose wires dangle from the openings. A couple of dark pipes with chipped paint come down through.

Arnold: These disgusting ceiling tiles aren’t the lovely eggshell plaster ceiling that I’m used to seeing in the morning...

Panel 5: ECU very tight shot on a digital watch face where only the watch face is visible. The time shown is 11:15 PM. The watch is well used, but loved. Slightly scuffed up and has one or two scratches on the screen.

Arnold: ... Cripes, It's not the morning. It isn’t even past midnight!

PANEL 6: Establishing shot of INT. Arnold is sat tied to an old wooden chair positioned on the right third of the panel. The chair is of medium size, not too fancy, and the kind that would be for a dinner table.  The room is an old office that has been abandoned for a long time and is illuminated by a lamp on the floor in front of Arnold. This cause a long shadow to be cast on the floor and the wall behind Arnold. Several other trash esq items are on the floor casting shadows. The room an average ceiling height for an office and several chairs and desks are stacked on the left hand wall in the FG. Arnold is wearing a two piece PJ suit with a repeating pattern of leaping sheep. The top buttons down with long sleeves, and the bottoms are just a little too short for him.

Arnold: Clearly something is wrong here (Staring directly out at the viewer)

Page 11

PANEL 1 Worm’s eye POV of Arnold from the waist up. Arnold is trying the glance behind him as a loud creak is coming from that direction. Arnold isn’t panicking he’s calling out in a loud and clear voice.  The dirty ceiling tiles are slightly visible above his head but not enough to be distracting. The area behind Arnold is cast in strong shadow.

Arnold: Hello? Who’s there?

spx : creeeeeaaaak

PANEL 2  FS of an open doorway. Standing in the door is a man wearing grey trousers and an oversized flannel shirt. The man is cut in half in about a 30 degree angle sloping up to the right by a strong shadow from the doorway so that only below his waist is visible in the light. Everything else is silhouetted.

John: Hello there Arnold, Who I am doesn’t matter to you right now...

Arnold : Got it!

John: um excuse me?

PANEL 3 Shoulder up shot of arnold’s head. He’s looking very smug with his eyes closed and a slight smile on his face as he talks. BG is solid black to focus on Arnold and his face.

Arnold: You’re John Turner who had ten hostages held up in the quickie clean laundromat on the corner of  Nuebry and State Street eight years ago ...

PANEL 4 This a long panel with Arnold positioned on the left hand side. He’s still making the same face as he continues to talk.

Arnold: I remember it was a clear sunny day except for a few clouds off to the west. I think you were arrested and given about 7 years time. That must mean this is your terrible revenge upon me. Let’s see hmmm, That’s right you have a mother named Mary-ann who’s all alone in Manhattan. Who’s birthday is on june 14th. Would you look at that it’s June 14th today what a funny coincidence John ...

John : (from off panel and so that his bubble overlaps the end of Arnold’s cutting him off) Crap!

PANEL 5 American Shot of John and Arnold in the room. John is on the left while arnold is on the right. John is smacking himself on the forehead he doesn’t notice that his knife falls out of his pocket. Arnold is looking up at him concerned.

John: I can’t believe I forgot that Mom’s birthday was today. Geez she’s gonna be so heartbroken that I abandoned her.

Arnold: Well if you left now you could probably get a small present and make it to her apartment before midnight.

Page 12

PANEL 1 Eye level shot of John running out of the door, he’s already mostly through the door so only his legs are visible. He calling out over his shoulder back towards arnold so the speech bubble will being coming out of the doorway.  

John: You’re right! Thanks Arnold, now stay right there for a bit.

Panel 2 shot of Arnold from Mid chest up looking smugly off to the left (the panel where john left the room) Dark BG not to distract from face.

Arnold: Ha! The fool left his knife on the floor getting out of here will be supremely easy.

PANEL 3 Large wide panel, Worms eye view of the knife laying in a small puddle. The knife is in the foreground and Arnold is in the BG and distorted by forced perspective he has a horrified look upon his face. The room is also showing extremes of perspective.

Spx: gasp!

PANEL 4 CU of Arnold's face, he looks incredibly stressed out, far more than he should be for the knife just being in a puddle. Maybe some sweat is rolling down the side of his face.

Arnold: Standing water! I can’t possible get the knife from there. Drinking or coming in contact with standing water is an extremely easy way to catch all sorts of diseases.

PANEL 5 FS of Arnold  in his chair. His face is screwed up tight and he is clearly thinking incredible hard. Maybe some action lines are coming in from the edged of the panel to make it more dramatic.  

Arnold: Thinking!

Also out of class this week I worked on developing characters and scenes for the comic.

Arnold:

Arnold is a middle aged man who is slightly balding and a little gangly. I decided to make him tall so that he’d look weird tied up in the chair. This will really emphasis how out of place he is. Also he is in his PJ's to again make him look out of place.

John Turner

John Turner is a large stout man. Although the comic is modern I decided to give him the look of an old fashioned gangster. This will hopefully help make people see him as a bad guy even though I don’t give him much back story

Jane Rogers

Average middle aged white woman. Blond hair with a bit of a funky cut so that she’ll stand out. She’s wearing a sweater because I love to make people wear sweaters. Also it hides her body desexualizing her a bit. I thought that her and Arnold need a relationship built on helping each other emotionally.

Mary-ann Turner

Old lady with a similar build to John Turner

Scenes:

Butcher shop interior where Arnold will be tied up.

Shot of the ceiling tiles from when arnold is first waking up

Butcher shop exterior, I'm not very happy with this one so I would definitely rework it if I were to include it into the comic.