Well, I have always been bad at any form of loose, or free-form artistic endeavour. I have a background in computer animation but lack any physical skill to bridge the gap between my mind and the screen. I've tried to combat this a few times to varying degrees, but never to any real success. This being said I have noticed that my previous endeavours never came with much in the way of pressure or bursting creativity.
In an attempt to combat this, I have come up with a storyline for a comic that I quite like. You know, super heroes and their ilk. I won't reveal the plotline just yet, but it revolves around a down and out graduate with no real prospects. He comes to find out about his super powers through fairly traumatic means, which I intend to eventually be able to show you all.
Unfortunately the lack of afore mentioned skill is something I am going to have to use time to overcome. An unrelenting swathe of improvement, even on a single panel. I am cheating a little by making the absolute most of the line tool. Which is essentially where my first panel is right now. 6 hours, and 1,000 lines later I currently have the beginnings of an alleyway. Now the real work (AKA freehand) begins.
I'm fairly happy with the perspective of the piece so far, and I suppose becoming overly detailed and perfect would cost me in terms of continual quality. As you have probably noticed, there is a lot missing. Most of these areas will be filled via freehand, if I can pull it off.
I've been working on concept art for characters, as it's a big struggle for me. Using a lot of reference images and taking a few hours just to make sure what I design looks relatively human. So, here is Vixen; a character from the comic. The text is totally stolen, but it won't be published at any point so I will use it for the effect.
This is a slightly more shoddy version of Vixen. The theory being that she just needs to lose the jacket and leggings when she decides to gear up. Hopefully my ability to draw mouths will improve soon!
And one last update for the day, this is Nathan. He is the protagonist, a rather boring individual who's life is irrevocably changed for good or bad. I suppose we'll see!
For the colour of the composition, and the comic in general really; I am going for a gritty semi-realistic approach. How that will affect the drawing of the characters, I am not yet certain and believe that it will be my biggest challenge.
If anybody has any suggestions or tutorials on helping my skills grow (especially with character design and posing), it would be great to see them!
Thanks.