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.