Attempts at the sample scripts

[CrazyFoxMachine]

I don't know what script you have used here, but have you considered the needs of the letterer? There doesn't look like there is too much room in that Dredd panel, which is fine if he only says two words (or nothing).

Agree with the positive sentiments your work is consistently amazing Mr Lynch and it's always lovely to see it - but SimeonB's statement (while it may not be relevant in this case) is ALWAYS worth re-stating to anyone readin this thread and doing sample scripts and that. Think about the poor letterer - as many folk don't - !

[IanSchofield]

Almost done with this now, There is one panel blank I have drawn it but yet to scan it in.
It's the Holed Up script, Crits welcome thanks for taking the time to look at my work

[Simon Beigh]

Hi Ian. I'm not an artist, so I view the pieces on this thread as both a consumer of comics and a collector of original art. Overall I like the style very much. The sparse use of colour reminds me of Shakara, and that is no bad thing. The last two panels of the first page - is there room for the lettering. I will probably spend my life on this thread saying this, but there is no point in having a stunning panel if there is no room for the letterer to work with or the lettering impacts the essence of the panel. Another example is page 3 and the panel with the red eye chap. Looks to me like the speech bubble with cover the incoming droid or the panel above.

There are some excellent lettering guides on the forum, and some excellent letterers. I also enjoyed the recent thread celebrating good lettering. I will search it out and post a link here.

I'm sure the creators will help you more with the style and construction and so on, but overall I like it, I would want to read the story and I would definitely consider acquiring a page for my collection.

Also, thanks for sharing the process of creating the pages on this thread. I enjoy seeing how all that stuff works.

[IanSchofield]

Many thanks SimeonB, much appreciated. Having a quick look at the submissions page looks like I fell foul of one of the ten commandments
NEVER BLEED THE IMAGE OFF THE LAST PANEL OF THE STORY - LEAVE ROOM FOR 'NEXT PROG' LINE

I will fix that

[Steven Austin]

Some great stuff on here (damn I hate the competition!)

Lovely work sir - love your inking style and figure work, great layout etc etc - certainly print worthy.

Have you submitted before? Still awaiting a response on my 2nd submission and interested to know if you have submitted previously what the feedback was from the Mighty Tharg.

[Steven Austin]

Almost done with this now, There is one panel blank I have drawn it but yet to scan it in.
It's the Holed Up script, Crits welcome thanks for taking the time to look at my work

Very nice work Ian - very polished. Story flows well and page layouts are great. Well  done sir.

[SuperSurfer]

Not sure that I can comment on whether there is enough space for lettering, Ian as I don't know how text heavy the script is.

Certainly is very accomplished work and very interesting seeing it from sketch to (almost) completion. Very impressive.

I do like your alien space tech and your layouts but if I was to criticise:

I wonder if the layout of page 3 interrupts the flow. My eye goes to panel 3 before two as it is higher. I find the border of panel 2 a bit confusing as the elements on the left blend into panel 1 and the tone of the panel 2 space craft is the same as the building on panel 1. I think you should either box off the entire panel 2 or bleed it off the left side of the page. I initially thought the space craft was part of panel one architecture. Also, it seems as if the landing ramp and troops seem to be floating rather than on the ground.

I also wonder if you need a tad more contrast in the greys – but that might be a subjective thing.

But just to say again, very impressed with your work.

(Note: Comments of an amateur but hope it helps. If one of the pros or experienced artists come along hopefully they will give you their thoughts.)

[IanSchofield]

Thanks Steve much appreciated.
Supersurfer Many thanks, I have been working on my own comic for a while now based on Journey to the West (Monkey Magic) so this is my first venture at a sci-fi strip but I am glad you like the tech designs, I think you are right about panel 3 I have fixed that and I have added more depth to the greys too, thank you for taking the time to crit.

[SuperSurfer]

Great stuff Ian. Wish I had time to have a go myself.

[Jake Lynch]

Have you submitted before? Still awaiting a response on my 2nd submission and interested to know if you have submitted previously what the feedback was from the Mighty Tharg.

Hi Steven - Best of luck with your second tryout!!  Tharg does indeed know me and regularly sends me  hotshots in the mail.  I would also say that whenever you get any feedback from the Green Guy, have a good read as there are always little gems in there to learn from.  A great deal of what your seeing here is as a result of that feedback.

A couple (off-hand) that come to mind:
1. Don't send just poster work, they want to see your storytelling style.
It's worth doing a little research on this.  Look at your favourite artists and how they make you flow around the page.  There are also some great books on storyboarding that can really feed back into your stripwork regarding framing/composition - personal fav: 'Framed Ink' by Marcos Mateau-Mestre.

2.  Send Black and White samples.
By all means send 'em coloured as well, but they are judging your technique and colour is seen as something you can 'hide behind' and that may worry them as you are not demonstrating how you can 'express' yourself in simple old ink!  Best thing that helped me is looking at my favourite artist (particularly their older stuff) and instead of just looking at their 'big strokes', look at their 'throw-away' marks.  Practice those marks and add them to your 'library'.

For what its worth, if I can be of any assistance, feel free to PM me, dude...

[Jake Lynch]

The low rez copy of the completed tryout can be viewed on the link below:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/7258534/DreddSEALEDlwrz.pdf

[junox]

JTPegg   
Thanks for posting all that ART in  PDF.... LOVE your Dredd and helmet... your ART reminds me of reading  BAD Company in the old days


will there be colour being added ??

[Steven Austin]

Have you submitted before? Still awaiting a response on my 2nd submission and interested to know if you have submitted previously what the feedback was from the Mighty Tharg.

Hi Steven - Best of luck with your second tryout!!  Tharg does indeed know me and regularly sends me  hotshots in the mail.  I would also say that whenever you get any feedback from the Green Guy, have a good read as there are always little gems in there to learn from.  A great deal of what your seeing here is as a result of that feedback.


A couple (off-hand) that come to mind:
1. Don't send just poster work, they want to see your storytelling style.
It's worth doing a little research on this.  Look at your favourite artists and how they make you flow around the page.  There are also some great books on storyboarding that can really feed back into your stripwork regarding framing/composition - personal fav: 'Framed Ink' by Marcos Mateau-Mestre.

2.  Send Black and White samples.
By all means send 'em coloured as well, but they are judging your technique and colour is seen as something you can 'hide behind' and that may worry them as you are not demonstrating how you can 'express' yourself in simple old ink!  Best thing that helped me is looking at my favourite artist (particularly their older stuff) and instead of just looking at their 'big strokes', look at their 'throw-away' marks.  Practice those marks and add them to your 'library'.

For what its worth, if I can be of any assistance, feel free to PM me, dude...

Cheers buddy,

Just checked out your PDF's, really great stuff - hope you're accepted as I would certainly dig to see your stuff in print.

Thanks for the feedback - following my first submission the feedback from Mr Smith was very short and to the point (which I don't mind at all), it basically said, 'Storytelling is good, drawing is good but you need to refine your inks', which I have been working on and think I certainly achieved an improvement with the second submission - you may have seen it on earlier pages.
I am still awaiting a response (only been 4 months so early days really) and am looking forward to hearing what advise I receive next. I am under no illusion and don't expect to be accepted on the submission but will continue to plough on based upon the feedback received.

I have a couple of questions for you that aren't really for advice but more out of interest - what is your procedure when pulling a page together, do you go straight for it or do a lot of preparatory work? And on the back of that question whats your timescale for a page?

All the best sir.

[Jake Lynch]

Have you submitted before? Still awaiting a response on my 2nd submission and interested to know if you have submitted previously what the feedback was from the Mighty Tharg.

Hi Steven - Best of luck with your second tryout!!  Tharg does indeed know me and regularly sends me  hotshots in the mail.  I would also say that whenever you get any feedback from the Green Guy, have a good read as there are always little gems in there to learn from.  A great deal of what your seeing here is as a result of that feedback.


A couple (off-hand) that come to mind:
1. Don't send just poster work, they want to see your storytelling style.
It's worth doing a little research on this.  Look at your favourite artists and how they make you flow around the page.  There are also some great books on storyboarding that can really feed back into your stripwork regarding framing/composition - personal fav: 'Framed Ink' by Marcos Mateau-Mestre.

2.  Send Black and White samples.
By all means send 'em coloured as well, but they are judging your technique and colour is seen as something you can 'hide behind' and that may worry them as you are not demonstrating how you can 'express' yourself in simple old ink!  Best thing that helped me is looking at my favourite artist (particularly their older stuff) and instead of just looking at their 'big strokes', look at their 'throw-away' marks.  Practice those marks and add them to your 'library'.

For what its worth, if I can be of any assistance, feel free to PM me, dude...

Cheers buddy,

Just checked out your PDF's, really great stuff - hope you're accepted as I would certainly dig to see your stuff in print.

Thanks for the feedback - following my first submission the feedback from Mr Smith was very short and to the point (which I don't mind at all), it basically said, 'Storytelling is good, drawing is good but you need to refine your inks', which I have been working on and think I certainly achieved an improvement with the second submission - you may have seen it on earlier pages.
I am still awaiting a response (only been 4 months so early days really) and am looking forward to hearing what advise I receive next. I am under no illusion and don't expect to be accepted on the submission but will continue to plough on based upon the feedback received.

I have a couple of questions for you that aren't really for advice but more out of interest - what is your procedure when pulling a page together, do you go straight for it or do a lot of preparatory work? And on the back of that question whats your timescale for a page?

All the best sir.

Hi Steven -

I have looked at your stuff and REALLY enjoy it - nice moody shots and good angles.  Sorry you've not heard back in 4 months.  I confess I've never had to wait that long and if it were me, I would consider re-submitting with a (polite) letter explaining yourself.  Tharg can be extremely busy but generally he does get back to you.

Regarding your other questions... A bit of both if I'm honest but generally I ALWAYS THUMBNAIL:

Its actually one of my favourite bits of the process.  I always thumb in pen as it helps me for some or other reason.

When I read a script a few panel descriptions will instantly bring an image to mind.  I'll then re-read it a few times to make sure I get it.  Normally, the other panels are forming from this.

Rate the page:  is there anything on it that stands out / is important / is just damned cool!?
Consider making that your main image and working the other images around it.  There some superb examples of this (Henry Flint for starters).  But the absolute master (for me) is Mike McMahon, see 'Block Mania' or 'Sky Chariots' to name a few and prepare to have your eyeballs melted!

Flow and pacing:  There are 'invisible' lines that pull you round a page so try to consider how to make people look where you want them to look.  Layout is king not just the images in it, McMahon (again) makes a page 'beautiful'/a piece or artwork to be admired.
Pacing is what occurs from size and detail.  The longer the eye has to rest upon an image, the longer the 'beat' - what are the 'beats' of the story?  Try listening to some music with a steady beat.  For each of those beats look at a panel of your story - does it still 'read'? If you are no longer in time with the music it because you are dancing to your own tune!

Stay fluid:  Sometimes you gotta ignore a thumbnail and do something else.  I used to be one of those idiots who would come up against a panel that I could not crack and the whole process would come to a halt. These days, I skip it and move onto the next, continually trying to move forward then coming back round to it.  Normally, by the time I'm back to the problem, the answer has revealed itself.

Time?  Hard to say as I thumbnail, pencil and ink in batches.  I don't tend to move on to each stage until the previous is sorted.  Sometimes I can get trapped on one panel that seems to takes ages, but will often return to these over time in an effort to get the mass done (stay fluid).  Generally I would say I can do 1 page a week, part time, or 1-2 full time.  its very much dependent on what is required.

Hope that helps?

[Steven Austin]

Hi JT,

Thanks for taking the time to reply so fully.

I think  will take your advice and resubmit - I think the 1st submission took about 3 months before I received a response but quite a bit over that now so resubmission couldn't hurt.

Thanks for sharing the sketches - really enjoyed these, I love seeing the thought processes and prelims.

I too thumbnail first and always in biro, I think it forces me to be a little more decisive with what I am putting down on paper - not sure but prefer sketching this way.

Let me know how you get on with the submission, be interested in finding out.

All the best sir.