Java 098
on February 13, 2019
at 8:00 am
Experimenting with a new look for the strip. Converting to black and white format and also changed the ratio to 13:4 to match most conventional comic strips. Also trying out a different font, and weight on the speech bubbles.
Comments, please! Java needs scone money!
If you want to see black and white done well, see El Goonish Shive. In this the contrast is too sharp. The image always makes sense to you because it is your artistic vision. It has to make sense to people who haven’t drawn it too…
I shall be frank. To my eye, it is far better with colour. I appreciate that might not be what you want to hear, which is fair enough, but I would rather get a genuine response, good or bad.
Anyone who reads and keeps up with this strip. Comment. Even if you agree. If people are out there who love this, he needs to hear it. If you feel I’ve covered your opinions well, it does *not* mean you have made them. 🙂
I wholeheartedly agree with the criticisms of the newer art stlye.
Yeah, me too!
Thanks for the input. I looked up El Goonish Shive, very nice use of gray scale. I’ve always preferred to use color, I just need some black and whites to submit for syndication. So, yeah, still experimenting. It just occurred to me that I could probably still color the online strip and then just convert it to gray scale later. Of course I’d have to make sure the color shades aren’t that close, like Matt’s shirt, pants, and apron may look identical. I’ll go back and color this strip and re-post it so as not to mess with the flow of the comic. But I’ll continue to post experimental strips.
As an experiment, it is instructive. If you want to go B&W, I think you need to do some shading and fills. Otherwise, it looks unfinished. The line weight is too mono, also. You need thick and thin lines to make B&W work. Color obscures this lack and replaces it with other dimensions.
If you had filled in Matt’s hair and the young lady’s blouse with shading, for instance, the art would have more dimension and feel more real. It doesn’t always take a lot of extra work. Look at how much more alive Java looks in this style because he has a black nose and a coat pattern.
Good work keeping up the experimenting with improvements. 🙂
Sorry, this was me, the browser did not autofill.
Thanks, Joyce! I’m still working on muh style! I think I’ll try some shades of grey to fill up the empty whites spaces. I actually tried reducing the image size down to about half because that’s what it would be in print in newspaper and the characters fade away and the font turns to mush.
Agree that it looks better in color. Any reason why you would rather doB&W? Is color that much more trouble?
Nah, not so much. Just see above comment.
Also, if anyone has a recommendation for a font to use for this strip I am open to suggestions! Most comics use all-caps Fonts but the teacher in me shudders at that. I can’t remember the name of this one, found it while searching for free comic fonts, but it’s a little too heavy and the letters disappear when they are too small. I’ve been using just Calibri since forever.