A Friend and I are Starting a New Political Comic - Need Some Feedback

[lame54]

We want to comment on current topics - Here is our first attempt - Rec if you approve



Also, we are still looking for a title

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[Lifelong Protester]

1. You've captured those three dolts pretty well

no question as to who they are. Good message overall. I love the 'dragon body and tail' (I hope I have that right).

[lame54]

2. Yeah - it's a 3 headed monster

[denverbill]

3. Good caricatures! Easily recognizable.

[lame54]

5. yes - my friend...

is a great artist

does sketches, paintings, computer art

this is a new direction for him

[lame54]

4. C'mon DU'ers - I'm counting on ya...

need to know if we are on the right track

[Atman]

6. We need to know more before we can just "the right track."

I agree with the above posters (and I do have some experience in this field!)...this is a very good comic. But it's just one. It's hard to give it a title without knowing where you're going with it. Will they all be about health care? Politics in general? Give us some more! I think you're off to a great start. Excellent caricatures!

[lame54]

7. subjects will be random(mostly political) and current...

I only gave one example because we only have one

this is something we just started and we have a couple more ideas - but this is the only completed comic

[Panasonic]

15. I am reminded of a comic called HooCares

and the artist was a DU'er.

I can't remember who it was...

http://www.rmcgcreative.com/comics/index.htm

[edhopper]

8. Pretty good

I like the art but I think the pencils alone leave it a little fuzzy. If you friend could ink it and not use those soft pencil backgrounds (he could photoshop in some grays) it would liook much sharper and cleaner. More appealing.

[Atman]

9. I assumed that was a given.

A hard-line drawing will be awesome. If they can draw this good, I'm sure they have a good inker, too.

[lame54]

16. ink will probably come later...

we're just getting our feet wet

[Atman]

22. If you can't ink it...

Open it in Photoshop, go to Image>Adjustments>Brightness and Contrast and push the contrast all the way up. Save the change as a copy, then re-open it and repeat the procedure. The second time you probably won't have to up the contrast as far. Play with the Brightness a bit, too, until you like the look. Select all, copy it, then past it on top of the gray scale version with "Darken Only" selected. You'll get all the nice gray shading, but with nice dark line work.

[hunter]

23. I always use gimp & potrace.

Using gimp, scale the image up, adjust the curves, and apply a threshold. Then change the mode to one color indexed, touch it up, and save it as a bmp. (Or you can use mkbitmap.)

Then here's the magic -- use potrace to convert the image to a scalable vector graphic. This creates something very much like a hand inked drawing.

You can leave the work in postscript or svg mode, and easily scale it or convert it into any format you wish for publication.

This illustrates the process in a general way:

http://potrace.sourceforge.net/mkbitmap.html

These are all open source programs. There's no reason to pirate Photoshop if you haven't got any money.

Now I'm imaging my dad, an artist, saying, "Um, that's okay. I'll just use ink..."

[edhopper]

24. That is a good solution

but you have to treat you pencil like it's a pen as far as the line work.

Also Corel Painter let's you "ink" the image as well. Though like your dad, I still prefer hand done.

[Xyzse]

10. Very good

Although, I would recommend to simplify.
Pencils don't translate well to scanning, though I must admit, the shading gives it much depth.

Only thing though is that I wonder the turn around time in making that. Which is why I mention, simplify especially when going towards inking.

Any how, good luck.

[lame54]

13. Time was not too bad...

for the first one

we will get faster

they will not all be six frames

there will be one and two frame comics as well

whatever it takes to tell, the story

[Xyzse]

14. I see

Cool, I've just heard how hard it is to keep things in deadlines and such. That's why I mentioned simplify and ink.

[HappyMe]

11. Good work.

[lame54]

12. thanks

[Brickbat]

17. Is the three-headed monster image one you'll be using over and over again?

If not, I don't think it works. It's not clear to me they're all the same "monster" and I couldn't figure out what the dinosaur legs were doing until I read the comments.

[lame54]

19. good feedback - thank you

[Chorophyll]

18. Very good!

You've really nailed those d-bags.

It's hard to suggest a title at this point. If it's gonna be purely about politics, that's one thing. If it's gonna have recurring characters (like in Doonesbury and Bloom County) that's a different thing.

[lame54]

21. maybe recurring if a character resonates...

but right now - anything goes

[99Forever]

20. Nice work.

[lame54]

33. thanks

[unapatriciated]

25. Nice job peter

tell Mark hi for me and he does good art work.

[Lint Head]

26. Very smart cartoon! Nice.

[lame54]

28. thanks...

so far it's been about the art work

[Lint Head]

29. The artwork is great.

I'm in the music business and I always hear that everything is 98% visual.

[lunatica]

27. very nice work!

I wish you success!

[lame54]

30. .

[IDemo]

31. I'll disagree on the ink

I've used both but am partial to pencil. Yes, most of the pros use pen and ink, but that doesn't make it "better" IMO. If you can render a good pencil caricature (you can), then stick with it if that's what you're comfortable with.

[lame54]

32. thanks

[Motown_Johnny]

34. I like it... how about....

"All we did was repeal Nixoncare"


Since the last real reform was the creation of HMOs during the Nixon administration. You know how the (R)s just love to talk about Nixon.