Don’t worry about Megan, she has been through far worse. She has put that all behind her, dyed her hair, and made a fresh start. A faux-Briton like Sean isn’t about to get her down. Like my dear Nicole, she also has Gowan to cheer her up. Speaking of Nicole, I was amused by her colour choice of Sean’s sweatpants, because as we all know, stains on blue sweatpants don’t “read” as well as on gray (link is NSFW.)
Anyway. In the last week or two I talked about process, and the slippery snake of trying to work out an art style on this comic that I am (1) happy with and (2) can turn around in a reasonable time without making myself crazy. I’m not Chris Ware here people, I don’t sweat over every line to create a grid of sequential, silent isometric views of a decaying shed. Don’t get me wrong, I (sometimes) love what Ware does. It’s just not for me.
The comic art styles that I love the most have a different kind of energy, usually the kind that comes from a strong and sure brush line combined with loose embellishment: Milt Caniff’s Steve Canyon, Harvey Kurtzman, Will Eisner, Jack Kirby, Alex Toth, Gil Kane, Joe Kubert, and more modern examples like Bryan Lee O’Malley, Faith Erin Hicks, or Darwyn Cooke. At the same time I also love a really clean, sharp line, like those of Wally Wood, Lou Fine, Herge, Dan DeCarlo, Tezuka, or Steve Rude. One of my favourite newer artists in that vein is Gisele, who draws the delightfully naughty Ménage a 3 (link is also NSFW, just get a new job already!) and who also recently draw a fantastic issue of Archie in which the main characters had their genders reversed.
My own style, such as it is, has always tended toward the latter, but I sigh and wish for the former. And so you see this week, Where I have combined elements of a pencil layer (mainly the shading of Megan’s hair) with another pencil layer where I discovered I could use the Manga Studio fill tool to replace the lighter pencil lines with solid black and a bit of antialiasing. I liked how that was looking in black and white, but as always, colour changes everything and then I need to add shadows to calm my mind. That may be the story of my life now that I think of it.
See you next week, friends, and thanks as always for visiting. Happy Halloween.
great as always Scott! i love your style,..the story is easy to read and entertaining, keep doing your comic it is fantastic!
I just wanted to say you have a brilliantly titled webcomic
Thanks.
It’s the title of a Nick Lowe song, which itself was taken from a Groucho Marx quote I believe.