Area 5.1 Comic - Barber'ism
It's a daft play on words I know, but that's the sort of thing to expect from me. Coming up with the title is something that I've always considered to be worth a bit of thought.My level of work has dropped considerably while my life is in crisis mode, but I still have the drawing bug and work *has* to get out there. I started this a couple of weeks ago aiming for a topical event, but this time I gave myself plenty of time to finish it (rather than thinking of an idea that day).
Monsters -vs- Aliens
Yeah it sounds like a video game franchise, but it occured to me that who's to know what's alien and what's monster! I guess it comes down to point of view and level of fright/fear. So this cartoon revolves around the notion of something that appears to be harmless which then turns into a monster when our LGM's they make the wrong assumption. |
| Area 5.1 - Barber-ism (18th Oct 2016) |
I chose a barber shop because I wanted it to look like a jack-o-lantern had been placed on a false torso as a halloween gag. It made sense that much of the detail should be covered over and I couldn't think of anywhere better.
This comic page link is here --- http://area5-1.webcomic.ws/comics/53/
Mirror Mirror
One of my challenges here was the mirror behind the barbers chair. I ended up taking a copy of the main image, reversing the order of the pumpkin and chair, altering the chair so it looked like the back, and then copying it back into the mirror frame.I'm not sure I did myself any favours, it was a bit of extra work, but I didnt see how I could show a barber shop without attempting at least one mirror.
Two-Tone Shading
I had a few issues with differing shading styles at first, I've not long since moved from flat colour to two tone shading, and I had a fair amount of graduation shading in the mix (too much in fact). I reworked a lot of it, but there are still elements where the styles don't quite match.It's still a learning game for me - figuring out how to "two tone" was enough of a problem, and I'm still not confident that I'm doing it right. I imagined a point on all surfaces where a line can be thought of sitting at least 45 degrees to the right of dead front. And then I went over areas where shadows might be cast from arms etc. (But the LGM's still seem a little too flat)
The LGM do look so much better with the celshading. I think you can overthink it. I've found that it makes a big improvement to flat cartoons, even with very little thought about where exactly to put the lines. I guess it's like anything else, the more you do it, the less you have to think about it and the better it turns out.
ReplyDeleteInteresting to hear that such a small (but important) detail as the mirror took so much effort.
The shading has really enhanced things. I noticed a difference as soon as I saw the panel but it took me a minute to figure out what had changed. Great job on the mirror. You have the patience to get technical aspects right. I on the other hand do not. :) Once the idea is in my head I get in a big hurry to finish it.
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