I'm happy to say I have a new addition to the comic artist's library today! It is a ferocious critque of a Steve Rude Jonny Quest Comic by Alex Toth.



Below I've done my best summarize what seem to be Mr. Toth's main issues with the comic storytelling. But first don't take my word (or Alex Toth's) without a little test - download the pdf and review the art yourself before you read any of the commentary. Make notes about potential improvements in the margins. Finally, compare your thoughts versus "the pro's".

How did you do? Being able to find mistakes in flow and design will make or break your own comics. Chances are if you are missing a major flaw in this piece, you are also missing this idea within your own sequential art.

Alex Toth's Critique (Quick Summary for buzy folk who trust me to translate to the best of my ability):

- When creating the layout of a page THINK before, during, and afterwards about what you want to emphasize and why.

- Never get in the way of telling a clear story. Some common mistakes can be to include superfluous, distracting, or confusing images or dialogue.

- Understand that establishing shots are vital to comprehend a change in scene, character, or emphasis. Mis-using an establishing shot is equally as bad as not using one.

- Your main characters need to carry the story, so as readers we should always have a clear view of their actions and attitudes.

- "Fake art" is used abundantly by Toth in this article. It seems to mean art that is based on weak archetypes within the artist's head.

- Comic panel design is the act of corralling a reader's eye without their knowledge. Unfocused shots are the byproduct of lazy or ignorant artists that ask their audience to do their work for them.

- I can't even begin to summarize the last few pages. Go read them now and draw something worth remembering.

-Josh

Great resource via Drawn and ConceptArt.org. Thanks!

Those of you kind enough to stop by (thank you!) may have noticed a new tab floating in the navigation that mysteriously appeared last week. If you have been too afraid to visit it is merely a collection of cartooning notes and "how to's" by famous comic book and animation artists. Each one has been featured by my favorite blog Seven Golden Camels by Mark Kennedy. Feel free to peruse and enjoy the library as I'll be adding more pieces as I stumble into them.

The library currently contains the wisdom of the following artist's/books:

Carson Von Osten - Comic Strip Artist's Kit Famous Artist's Course - Composition Famous Artist's Course - Distribution of Space Glen Keane - Notes Illusion of Life - Natural Forms Marbury Hill Brown - Curves Mark Kennedy - Appeal Mark Kennedy - Attracting the Eye Mark Kennedy - Twins & Tilts Preston Blair - Rhythm Rowland Wilson - Layout & Light Rowland Wilson - Painting Willard Mullins - Character Exaggeration Wally Wood's 22 Panels

If you happen to have any ideas or suggestions for other essential cartooning resources please shoot them my way. Kennedy's blog has inspired me to pick up the torch he started, but explore it with much less class and subtlety. While his obsessions seem to revolve around rhythm and line of motion, mine are closer to comic design, character design, comic pacing, and staying motivated. I hope you'll spread the word if you dig what you find.

As a matter of fact, I think I hear my next post coming...

-Josh

I hate Dave Sim the comic artist.

If you're not familiar with his particular style it like taking Dungeons and Dragons circa 1975 and mashing it together with a rambling drunk telling long-winded fables. Rinse and repeat for 10,000 pages. And while I think he is a solid character designer, his art is nice but lacking to me. If I had to choose something it would be spirit and passion. Although the man drew nonstop each day for thirty years, does it matter if I don't care to read anything he has written?

But this is just one guy's opinion. This said, I do think Dave Sim is that special kind of genius though that stumbles into being a one-of-a-kind teacher. I love Dave Sim the teacher. His book "Cerebus guide to self-publishing" was my holy grail as a kid. I squeezed each and every once of my four dollars out of it until I could recite it backwards. And today I still can recite most from memory. I hear his voice (or a fictional one I'd created of him) chiming in when I don't connect lines, or try to be Lee Trevino. (Read the book!)

In this guide Dave Sim says that the most important thing for a comic artist is to be able to draw one page comfortably a day. This was his benchmark for barely existing. If you couldn't reach this limit you might as well stop right now.

I always felt this was harsh in that not many folks are built to be as obsessive as Mr. Sim, but I understood his point. And with a medium that takes so long to draw and so little time to consume he is essentially correct. A few months back I began this effort once again. It worked very well when creating Nothing Left to Lose so it might work to revive my latest graphic novel.

I'm now doing 2+ pages a day, and the art that I'm making here is just blowing my mind. Being a designer so much of my time now it so easy to sit back and just escape through drawing. This freedom is translating into the best story and art I've ever done by tenfold. "Welcome to Pixelton", the name of the new-new thing, is going to be an enjoyable unique experience that will be unlike anything I've heard of.

Today's point is that momentum is about forcing your weak monkey mind to do things it doesn't want to. It wants to be lazy and full and content, but it is your job as a human to find ways to force the weak flesh towards it's next goal. If you can lead the monkey one day it gets easier the next, until a few months in you have him scooting around wearing a tuxedo and serving cleverly named drinks.

-Josh

So I'm reading Chuck Jones' great autobiography "Chuck Reducks" where he simply pours his thoughts on life, passion, and animation into the page. If you aren't familiar with Chuck Jones (How?) he was an animation director at Warner Bros, Studio that worked on many of the fondest remembered Looney Tunes shorts. Jones is a startling likeable guy because of his constant self-effacement and compelling staunch opinions on any number of topics he strolls through. It also doesn't hurt that every drawing he does has the ability to speak directly to your heart and soul. Last night I came across a wonderful passage which I'd love to share with you (paraphrased by someone much less likeable):

Chuck Jones admired Walt Disney a great deal and while under Fritz Freling at Warner Bros he decided to write Walt a letter.

His letter mentioned Jones' admiration for what Walt had done for animation and for what he had continued to do by inspiring animators. Chuck sent the letter off and by his surprise received a response. Walt told Jones that he wished him great success as well and that he hoped he too would one-day inspire young animators.

Chuck Jones was so proud of this letter he kept it with him in his back pocket for years. Anytime he had an opportunity he would pull it out and show a friend. Soon the paper wore out and the cherished gift was unrecognizable. Jones mentions that he wrote to Walt Disney 4 or 5 times afterwards, and each time he had a response.

In the final day of Walt Disney's life he lay in a hospital bed like the lucky of us do. Jones' happened to be near by and visited the hospital in hopes to pay his respects to the animation legend. Jones was ushered into the room where Walt was waiting for the end. Chuck Jones mentioned his letters and thanked him for always taking the time to write back. But it had always puzzled him, why?

Walt Disney said "You're the only animator that ever wrote to me." He died six days later.

-Josh

While older folks simply remember video games as strange objectives for tiny block creatures, anyone who has played a video game since the Nintendo Entertainment System can better understand their power to create compelling stories. The August 2006 issue of Game Developer has two excellent discussions about effective storytelling. The first article is "The Power of Pacing" by David Sirlin. It touches an important question for all writers: Is it better to open with your best material or sprinkle it throughout the story?

While we'd all love to create powerful stories that resonate with readers on every page, as people we have deadlines to meet. David's question is an important one but it is one that I see uniquely echoed throughout the gaming community. In "Game Creation and Careers", a book that features interviews from over 150 of the videogame creating aristocracy, this topic is mentioned over and over again. Sid Meier (creator of the Civilization games) says:

"A game has to have a great first 15 minutes."

And this just makes sense - when was the last time you picked up a book, read a few pages, and set it down only to never read it again? Your first 15 minutes must plaster your reader to their seat or you have failed.

In the same Game Developer issue there is an interview with Riley Cooper, creator of the new Tomb Raider game. He matches sids words above but in respect to the game as a whole:

"There are two factors which affect how much fun people have while playing your game [or reading your story!]: the frequency in which they can have exciting and memorable moments and the infrequency with which they are genuinely stuck and have to decide whether to keep trying."

Back again to the "Power of Pacing" article - it goes one step further and looks at the sales numbers as well. They give examples of Grand Theft Auto and God of War as games with interesting hooks that give the player reason to keep playing. In Grand Theft Auto's case it is the realization that the player is in absolute control of their actions. With God of War it is a mixture of unique setting, storytelling, and fun gameplay. An example David uses where a game failed the 15 minute rule, and went on to low sales was the acclaimed Xbox, PS2, and PC title Psychonauts. The first ten minutes are spent listening to dialogue. (Though Psychonauts later sections are among the finest that gaming storytelling and character design has ever seen.)

What is most interesting about this comparison is that Psychonauts went on to win many "Game of the Year" awards. It was regarded among the finest platformer games ever created - but even with all these medals and accolades it couldn't pull the average Joe in. While Psychonauts is one of my favorite games ever made it is clear that this 15 minutes rule caused it to go from a potential "classic" to a cult classic. And that is just a damn shame...

Note #1:
If you are even vaguely interested in compelling character design I recommend checking out THIS POST where I link to a speech by Psychonauts creator Time Schafer. It is packed with A+ info.

Note #2:
Would you like a free subscription to Game Developer Magazine? Click here!

-Josh

You really have to be a cruel hearted ogre not to love YouTube. I hate everything and yet I always seem to find something that brings a smile to my face.



Psalty over at YouTube has been videotaping his flipbook creations and this kid can draw! View the above for a taste or you can always visit HERE to flip through his full catalog of amazing handcrafted work. Amazing work man.

-Josh

You know "For Better or For Worse", the daily newspaper cartoon right? They get 1,500,000 hits a month on their site and it reaches over 220 million readers each day.

If info like that isn't enough to put a bullet in your head I don't know what is.

I know when reading their fairly intensive overview on how their strip is made I should have walked away with grander ideas. Something along the lines of "Why would they choose to split 55 hours of work across 5 different people?" or maybe "How does the inker's creepy fetish glove protect her artwork from smearing?" but I keep gravitating on the fact that a group the size of the United States has access to this daily.

Did you know: People will eat crap and smile if you let them. The masses expect comics to be bad and we cartoonists do a great job of matching expectations. "For Better and For Worse" exists on the sole principle of being something different. It isn't an animal strip, it isn't about kids, or politics, or non-sequiters - it is about a flawed family. And on that sole principle alone it reaches 220 million readers a day.

I don't mean to rag so heavily on FBoFW. I'm sure many, many people enjoy it each day, but I can't think of a weaker example of the comic model to strive for. How?

1. The comic strip has a writer.

This is a very bad sign as comic art is a very visual medium and creating a harsh divide between the two disciplines ends up with stilted comics. I'm very happy to say this isn't always the case (Alan Moore and Warren Ellis are great examples) but it is a strike against it from the start. I never knew this about FBoFW but I always felt the disjointed nature between each aspect. This also tends to create text heavy strips that feel more like illustrated short stories as they are compelled to stick to the script as to not offend the writer.

2. There are multiple people working on a strip.

Since writing, directing, and painting are respected as solo arts since when is comics the only form in history to benefit from multiple cooks in the kitchen? I don't believe comics are a group activity.

3. This is a day job for them.

Have you ever loved something with all of your heart? Now imagine that you are asked to work with a team of 5 others with varying viewpoints on the subject. Now imagine that you need to work with them to find a clear vision even it isn't the one you had in mind. Now do this 9-5 everyday for the rest of your life. Did you enjoy what you loved more before, or after the change? Imagine how this affects the quality of the work and their love of it.

4. It feels like someone crapped on face after reading this comic.

Yep, re-read the above. I get less than nothing from this strip. It makes me wish they printed patches of blank newsprint just to save the potential.

The lesson I'm trying to take away from this is that if these... artists (shiver)...can do it any one of us can. In what ways did they succeed and how can we do it one step better?

Josh

So I paid the price of being an early technology adopter last night. My Xbox 360 died a painful death while placing down $20,000 on a hand of Texas Hold 'Em.

Oddly enough, I caught the whole incident on video and made a little opera out of my misery. Hope you enjoy...I had to find a way to stomach losing $400. The best stories come from tragedy, right?




I suppose this is a sign that I ought to be focusing on comics more? Or maybe God just prefers the Wii.

UPDATE: Microsoft announced free repairs for all Xbox 360's made in 2005. I get free repairs all on their dime. Finally a reason not to revolt against our evil monkey overlords.

Had to share a few ink/color shots from the completed pieces of an earlier thumbnail. Enjoy!

Until I get my act together and post a proper blogroll I had to call out two blogs which make my heart soar on a daily basis.

Drawn! &

Temple of the Seven Golden Camels

Please take a look and enjoy! Sincere thanks for all of their hard work.

I have a bit of a confession to make: I'm not that big of a fan of Understanding Comics.

Blasphemous I'm sure, but this is just how I feel. Reading Understanding Comics made me feel like I was watching an autopsy of my beloved art form. Sure it is the best book on Comics and Comic-theory, but I prefer to let the magic live instead of dissecting what I'd fashioned through blood, sweat, and tears up to that point. I've even read it religiously every year hoping that I'd be mature enough to gleam the true magic I'd been missing. Each year I'd walk away disappointed.

Don't get me wrong - that didn't stop me from trumpeting it as a must read to comics fans or artists. And the sequel, Reinventing Comics was an equally compelling and exciting argument for the future of the artform. But I never felt they lived up to the pedigree they'd received. When I heard Scott MCloud's latest book in this series (called "Making Comics") was due for a September release I made a note to investigate out of industry obligation.

With all of that weighty confessional said, Making Comics is the real deal. Go out there and pick this up right now.

Maybe my excitement here is because I wasn't expecting much. Reinventing Comics didn't fall far from the first book's point of view. Making Comics feels like a better, cleaner, more intense experience then either of his previous titles. This is the kind of book that makes you want to draw non-stop for days on end. It makes you want to pour your soul onto bristol. I makes you want to thank goodness for people like Scott McCloud.

There is something special in these pages that isn't inside any other comic creation overview. It does what it does with wit and precision, and makes me look back at Understanding Comics in a new light. That book is very good, but it was the stepping stone to the masterpiece that is Making Comics. Without a doubt, I will re-read this each year and I can be sure that I won't walk away without learning something exciting and new.

Sincere thanks Mr. McCloud.

So a severe cold has been close to taking my very life this week, and I've been farther away from my computer than I'd like. The good news is that I've had more time to enjoy my new tablet and I'm still smitten. Below are a few samples of cartoon art that I've cooked up. I'm enjoying experimenting with a few styles that my previous tablet wouldn't allow, and I'm definitely liking how things are cooking.

Funny thing is, I'm currently using dual tablets. One is the new beast for precise visuals, and the others is for general chicanery. The 9" x 12" is closer to 12" x 16" with the extra tablet space. Watch out John Woo, king dork is in town.






The funny thing, for a blog about comics, motivation, creative refreshment, and all of the shiny things in between, I really don't show much art on my site! Well this will be changing very soon. Maybe even today... .

Happy Labor Day folks! It most certainly is for me. While stepping up "Welcome to Pixelton" production, I decided to finally pick up a 9" x12" Intuos3!

I can't stress how in awe I am of this thing. While it is completely going to change how I work from here on out, it has already changed the projects I'm willing to take on. I tried a fun little comic for my first use of it. Let me know what you think!



So far my thoughts are:
+ This is the most fun I've had on a computer. Ever.
+ Amazing response and fluid lines
+ Touchpads are so useful
+ Everything is programmable!
+ Haven't tried the pen tips, but the option is sweet
+ The "feel" and weight of the pen are perfect

- It may be too big. Trying to fit this on my desk is impossible.
- Price. It is already worth it but isn't this fairly inexpensive tech?

If I could go back in time and pick one of these up a year or two back I would have. Not investing in equipment that allows you to really enjoy what you do is self-defeating. Long live my shiny new toy!

My previous post about "Forever Learners" brings up another very important point: Long Ideas.

Back then, in my professor days, I was working on an infant of a book called "Welcome to Pixelton". I had most of the characters, setting, a general "go" at the plot, and even the big as of yet unrevealed super-secrets. I had a vision of what the book needed to be and was confident I could reach it.

Today, each and everyday I'm still working on this book. I'm a bit older, and the book is too. I work on it on the train into the windy city, at lunch in Union Station, and at night at home. I'm now doing 2 pages a day in hopes to catch the next round of the Xeric grant. The initial vision was a major help, but it wasn't the real thing. Only 6 months back did I finally stop working on a few other books and say "I have it."

The point here is that in every dream you are willing to hold onto, there comes a point where it changes paths. All of your heart goes into fueling a project and once you make it over the crest you know that it isn't what you expected to see.

From first-hand experience, many people stop here out of fear. Or worse yet they refuse to budge from their original idea perverting the careful and deliberate decisions they'd made along the way. It can be debilitating to feel that your time was wasted and you aren't quite sure what you have just ushered into being.

If you have these feelings this is a very good sign. It means that you are invested in what you do. It means you are focused on birthing something magical. Nothing worthwhile has been created by someone who punches the clock from 9-to-5.

There is no quick fix here. I'd love to say "Deal with it" and hope for the best. But if you believe in your idea hard enough,and your willing to deal with the fear of your own lumbering creations, then you have no problems. This is simply another part of the journey with a unique point of view.

Two years back I worked weekends as a cartooning teacher at a local college. It was a fun job that I enjoyed profusely. I was also not at all qualified for the job (but we'll get to that in a bit). I was twenty-two and would be standing in front of a class that was largely older than me. I had planned for months that I was going to sit in the back and call the infamous "ten-minute rule", in which the class leaves when the teacher is tardy. Then with a flourish I would get up and pretend to start teaching. Only I wouldn't stop...

It was a fun ride. While there I coined the phrase "Be a forever learner, not a forever student.".

It means that reading and planning are wonderful helpful tools, but once placed in a real-life scenario you need to be willing to learn again.

Ironically, I taught the class as a learner. I was trying to ignore the convention. I was praying to spark anger. I begged that they apply their life to a page. And like most first experiments, it probably was a failure. While I was walking a tight-rope re-learning how to verbalize what had only been between my arm and my head, they had nothing on the line. They were in planning mode.

In my life I've had the experience of being around far too many who look to the skies for rain instead of listening to the trees. Experience dictates everything, knowledge is just the blueprint for experience. This is rule number number one in my book.

So next time you hear yourself or someone else say the phrases below keep this in mind, these are stalling techniques plain and simple.

- "I'd love to learn but..."
- "I'm reading a book about it..."
- "I have it on the to-do list..."
- "Once I complete the (blank) I'll..."

Throw away the book. Stop the 12-step course. Just sit down and dive into the pure terrifying thrill of the unknown.