It’s kind of strange that I haven’t done this yet. As a kid, I loved comic books, and really wanted to be a comic book artist when I grew up. I made up all sorts of superheros that were rip-offs of my favorite Marvel characters. Superheroes were how I first got interested in drawing the human figure. Yet at some point between junior high school and now, I stopped collecting, reading and drawing comics. I never lost my appreciation for them, but chose to consume them in their feature film format. I think I would have still considered making my own stories, but the idea was daunting. Since I stopped reading them, I lost touch with the current comic art styles, and forgot how the rhythm of graphic story telling worked. My own painting and drawing styles didn’t seem practical for sequential art, and I figured it would take me a month to do each panel in that way. Also, I never liked prospective drawing, so drawing exteriors and material environments for my characters seemed tedious and unenjoyable. Plus it didn’t seem realistic that I could pitch a graphic novel idea and get someone to publish it. But recently, I discovered Webcomics. Obviously, these aren’t new, but I was always prejudiced against them. I moronically thought that any comic worth reading would be in print format, and that digital publication was for amateurs. Now I realize that nothing could be further from the truth. The freedom that comes with self-publishing on the internet means artists are limited only by their imaginations (and not by this cliche I used to describe it). And since opening my mind, I’ve discovered comics that are way more wacky and original than anything I’ve ever seen printed on paper. One pleasant surprise was the huge number of different art styles out there. I was especially happy to see that some artists totally get away with fudging perspective lines when drawing backgrounds! They don’t even use rulers sometimes. Most webcomics are much more raw and unpolished than printed ones, partially because web artists have to do everything themselves, and often churn out multiple finished pages in a week. I’m still not sure if I can work as fast as these other artists, and I’m not even sure what style I will adopt to tell my story. Come to think of it, I don’t even know what my story is going to be just yet. Or even what kind of story. Oh, and then I gotta build another website. And then I gotta maintain that website. And find a way to get people to it. And find a way to make them keep coming back! I guess I have a lot of work to do…
Tags: Webcomic