The new generation of American Comic Book artists...

SUCK...


God how I miss our beloved artists that passed away. The drawings of characters are awkward, the stories are mediocre, the placing of text is awkward... I can go on forever. I love drawing and fucking good at it; this generation of artists is horrendous.
"Another... Solwitch thread." AST
Current Games: :::City Skylines:::Elite Dangerous::: Division 2

"...our most seemingly ironclad beliefs about our own agency and conscious experience can be dead wrong." -Adam Bear
Last edited by solwitch on Nov 9, 2020, 12:18:59 AM
Last bumped on Nov 14, 2020, 11:13:05 AM
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solwitch wrote:


I love drawing and fucking good at it;


show your work!
Forum pvp
The first marvel civil war lost comics for me, the writing and plot was so bad, I realized; I'm no longer the target demographic for this drivel...

I recently started following Mikedeodato on IG though, very nostalgic for the artwork from my childhood.

One of my fav storylines and artwork were the first 10 chapters of Punisher:War Zone
Check out mah boy Boon @pikeycamp.com. If you ever go to any comic book conventions in the southern US you'll likely see him there with his booth. :)

Just a lowly standard player. May RNGesus be with you.
"
lolozori wrote:
"
solwitch wrote:


I love drawing and fucking good at it;


show your work!


Any signature worth using is against the rules. Therefore, no signature will be found here.
"
solwitch wrote:
SUCK...


God how I miss our beloved artists that passed away. The drawings of characters are awkward, the stories are mediocre, the placing of text is awkward... I can go on forever. I love drawing and fucking good at it; this generation of artists is horrendous.


But, can you draw feet?

:)

I'm not much for comic books, these days. When I was a kid, though...

A few miles from home was a little family owned "corner" pharmacy. Aside from medicine, of course, they sold... literally everything else. They had electronics and pets (fish, birds, turtles, etc). And, they had a little area for toys, models, and... a comic-book turn-style rack. That store was my first experience in personal economic empowerment. I got pet turtles, models (even those old balsa-wood kits), pet turtles (!), a radio, and of course comic books! When I got older, I bought raw chemicals from them by the pound so I could make home-made fireworks. :)

Comic books taught me something very important - Style matters.

In any frame, or series of frames, you should know exactly what's happening and how its effecting the characters without any text necessary. Angle matters... "symbolism" matters. Color matters. Even the shape of a "speech bubble" communicates something.

True art communicates something more than just the sum of its parts. When someone produces something they call "art" and it's nothing more than what it portrays, they're either incompetent or lying. :)

In grade-school we were introduced to "biology" and had classes with "labs" where students would look at bits and pieces of specimens, maybe look through a microscope, and then among the questions they had to answer there's be a place to draw what it was that they witnessed. That was where I learned I had a knack for "medical illustration." I got good at it. Real good. But, there being only ten slots accepted for medical illustrators a year, my parents basically said... "No." A dream died. (Closest accredited medical university)

/sigh

These days, I still doodle. But, it's in 3D. :)

From some panels I've briefly looked over, there's something of a disconnect between content and message, between character and... substance.

Honestly, it's not a recent thing. It started more with the rise of the "visual novel" (aka: "graphic novel") and higher profit returns per unit. The bigger the 'splosion, the more "awesome" the graphic novel became.

Back in those ancient days, I'd be impressed by "Swamp Thing" or some of the old "horror" comics. (Can't remember their names, atm.)


BUT, considering the context, I absolutely have to plug "Heavy Metal." THAT became the standard, for me, by which all "cutting edge" illustration was measured.

https://www.heavymetal.com/

(There used to be a full collection of all past pubs publicly available, but I think HM pulled it.)
"
Powertrip wrote:
The first marvel civil war lost comics for me, the writing and plot was so bad, I realized; I'm no longer the target demographic for this drivel.....


The Marvel "Secret War" series was a favorite of mine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_Wars

It catches a lot of criticism, but... it was fun. :)
Thank you for sharing everyone.

Okay let’s all download Marvel Comic s app... (I can’t post pictures copyright)

In art we follow principals: "The 7 principles of art and design are balance, rhythm, pattern, emphasis, contrast, unity and movement. Use the elements of art and design – line, shape/form, space, value, color and texture – to create a composition as a whole."

Marvel has literally flooded the last few years with mediocre concepts.

Depth perception in 80% of the comics I’ve come across are uninteresting visually.

If you downloaded Marvel Comics App you’ll find one comic book that misses the Mark. Xmen (2019) #14

You don’t need to buy it, however click on it and you get three pages to review. The first page they show a frame of an island in the sky with a second frame next to it. It’s devoid of any indication of what we are looking at. Plane laziness, we should see apocalypse with his shadow from the aerial view, but we don’t. So wtf is thst frame there for? It doesn’t flow.

Another thing is the unnecessary use of bloom, it’s extremely distracting. Also much of what is written is grammatically horrendous. The use of ; needs to be used rather than commas or periods.

https://writing.wisc.edu/handbook/grammarpunct/semicolons/

I can go on forever...


"Another... Solwitch thread." AST
Current Games: :::City Skylines:::Elite Dangerous::: Division 2

"...our most seemingly ironclad beliefs about our own agency and conscious experience can be dead wrong." -Adam Bear
Last edited by solwitch on Nov 10, 2020, 12:11:13 AM
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The_Impeacher wrote:
"
lolozori wrote:
"
solwitch wrote:


I love drawing and fucking good at it;


show your work!




"
Morkonan wrote:


But, can you draw feet?



Not gonna lie; felt that one.
https://linktr.ee/wjameschan -- everything I've ever done worth talking about, and even that is debatable.
Last edited by Foreverhappychan on Nov 10, 2020, 4:52:37 PM
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solwitch wrote:
...

If you downloaded Marvel Comics App you’ll find one comic book that misses the Mark. Xmen (2019) #14



To try to see a representation of what you're describing, but without using an "app" I hunted around for the artist's work.

https://www.deviantart.com/mahmudasrar

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmud_A._Asrar

OK, so this guy is a professionally trained, educated, artist. He's got a decent stable of work, as well.

Let's take an example of "his" characters:

https://leagueofcomicgeeks.com/people/252/mahmud-asrar

I mean... I guess? They're each pushing a certain impression for their "face" in those pics. One is a little rounder, a little more "baby fat," another is more sharp, more pinched, and another a bit more "sensual."

But, there's not a whole lot that is "striking" about their faces. Their faces don't really appear to tell a story. I know that's not what a portrait necessarily means and these are just clips out of cells, but... it's just a thought.

In the cells I could find and other examples, things just sort of... don't "pop." Some are just an exercise in using pastels.

That cover:

https://www.marvel.com/comics/issue/84428/x-men_2019_14

Rose, light pink, lavender, purple... and someone added some "silver" because it needed... contrast?

WTF?

YOU go find a lavender colored ball that just rolled into a patch of pink, purple, and rose colored flowers and see how easy it is! :)

No. Damn. "Pop." I expect some stuff leaping out of the page at me and I couldn't really see it. Is that what comics are, these days?

There was a good bit of that sort of washy-work in Heavy Metal for certain artists. BUT, in that case, they managed to take muted tones and make them "gritty." That cover looks like muted mutes.

Now that comics can sell themselves online, there's no need to worry about how much "ink costs" or whether or not they can afford glossy inserts. And, comic lovers get "muted mutes?"

"
..Plane laziness, we should see apocalypse with his shadow from the aerial view, but we don’t. So wtf is thst frame there for? It doesn’t flow...


The pictures should be able to tell the story and evoke the intended emotions as well.

That's the opposite of "writing." When writing, no picture should ever be necessary for the story to have its intended impact. Comics are something of a synthesis, but the overwhelming emphasis for "comics" are the illustrations.

Maybe someone is thinking to go off the comic-book rails and try to "write?" If so, they will fail. That's not what the medium is about. That's never been what it was ever about.

My own visual "artistic" skill is "technical." Technical in that I can accurately "draw something." The same applies to 3D - Technical. I can construct and create models in both organic and inorganic forms. However, expressing myself or "evoking" through visual art is not in my lexicon of talents. What meager serving of creative talent I could have been gifted with lies in written composition, alone.

I can draw the heck out of a bone, a organ, some sorts of human figures and other bits of "reality." If someone wanted me to tell a "story" with a drawn picture or asked me to "evoke" an emotion with artistically crafted figures or 3D objects... I'd fail horribly or my attempt would be so hamfisted that it'd be too embarrassing to claim.

"
I can go on forever...


My general thoughts on professions and creative works, these days, goes something like this:

With over ten-billion people in the world and ready access to almost any one of them, there's going to be millions of people that are capable of producing any sort of creative work one could wish for. Out of those, there are probably several hundred-thousand that can produce professionally competent work. And, out of those, a few thousand who are truly capable of astonishing work.

But, astonishing results are rare and cost a lot of money when just competent work will suffice.

Have you seen this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Qc3hNtKJ1k

That's the story of someone who had an original idea. It's someone who had composition and artistic styles that were original, but production demands and "rules" didn't want or allow for...

What you may be seeing is an industry insisting on producing "competent" cheap content that can be cranked out and actively looking only for artists that can managed to do that, but for less money than a truly astonishing talent would demand.

That is, to sum, the "Professional" realm today that has been created by the Internet and legions of desperate artists and cheap publishers.

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