Ugly Clothes Comic
2yr
Kevin Labaziewicz
Hello everyone! This is the first official comic I've made. The story follows a college student walking into their dorm for the first time and checking their roommate's fashion tastes. I was hoping to get feedback on the following... 1. Is the punchline understandable without context? 2. Do the forms feel solid? (Does the perspective/shading feel right?) 3. How is the panel layout? (is the layout messy/organized) Thanks for taking the time to read, and I look forward to your feedback! (Read from left to right)
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Kevin Labaziewicz
I revised my original comic using the feedback I was given. It's not the best, but I hope it's better.
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Liandro
Hey, @Kevin Labaziewicz! I second @João Bogo’s words about you taking the time to bravely share your work to get feedback and get better. And not only that, you really took the time to study João’s critique, revise your work based on it and create an improved version of your comic. That’s the kind of attitude that makes you stronger. Taking in consideration that this is your first comic work ever, it’s even more commendable. Way to go. Since João gave you such a broad and rich feedback, I’ll just try to go straight to your questions and reply them as objectively as I can. But since you already updated your work, I’ll discard the older version and reply to your questions considering the new pages, if that’s fine. Truly hope you find my comments helpful somehow. 1. Is the punchline understandable without context? - The drawings are clear, so the actions per se are understandable: the first girl comes in, snoops around the room, the other girl arrives afterwards and takes the blouse off her hands, the first girl feels somewhat surprised by looking at her... But the narrative context, I only understood it because you explained it in your post: the fact that it’s a college dorm, that it’s the first time she’s there, that she was trying to figure out her roommate’s wear style, that she thoughy it’s ugly… none of this other stuff becomes clear to me when I look just at the panels, sorry. Also, I didn’t feel like the end came as a punchline - at least to me, it doesn’t feel so powerful as a joke, and I kind of feel like there should be more story to be told after the second girl takes her blouse: wouldn’t she be angry that the first girl was going through her stuff? Are they gonna introduce themselves? Is the first girl gonna pretend to like the clothes or dare to give her roommate unwanted fashion advice in their first encounter? 2. Do the forms feel solid? (Does the perspective/shading feel right?) - In some panels, there are perspective improvements to be made, but it’s not hurting the clarity of the story, so I’d say it’s not something to worry about too much. If you do want to improve your perspective drawing skills, my suggestion would be that you try to do it separately from your creative work: first, study perspective until you comfortable with it; then, later, you can feel free to just apply it in your comics creatively, while focusing on the story, without needing to worry about “technical perspective stuff”. If you need recommendations on resources to study perspective from, please let me know, I have a few to suggest. Aside from that, I’d recommend grabbing some visual reference to draw the furniture style, their details and the room decoration - it really helps. 3. How is the panel layout? (is the layout messy/organized) - The first page and top half of the second have a clear reading flow, but the last row of the second page feels a bit confusing to me, it’s hard to tell where I should look first, what’s the intended reading order or the sequence of actions. The bottom right of the second page also feels a bit empty with a margin larger than all the others. Also, I feel like the first panel of the first page should be bigger, as a way to introduce the story, draw attention and create some suspense. Perhaps it could be almost as big as half the page? Of course, this would also mean re-thinking the organization of the other panels, which I have no ready-made suggestions for right now, it’s a problem to be solved through thumbnailing… Have you ever read any of Scott McCloud’s books? I personally think they’re awesome. They’re fun and full of hands-on insights about how comics work as a language and how we can visually and verbally communicate through them. If you haven’t, try googling it, and if possible, take some time to read them. The third one (“Making comics”) is especially useful for us creators, but make sure to also read the first one (“Understanding comics”), which shows some interesting fundamentals. Truly hope this helps! Please let me know in case you have any questions. Again, congratulations on your courage to show your work and ask for feedback, this is the path to growth. Keep on creating and feel free to count on this community for help! Best of luck! 🙌🏻
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João Bogo
Hey, Kevin Thanks for sharing your comic. One problem that a lot of comic book authors have is they never share work. Afraid of the criticism, they wait until they write the next Watchmen or Akira to show something to others. The irony is without feedback you don't grow so is very unlikely a groundbreaking story will appear in this conditions. So congratulations on taking the first time. Whatever I say, don't take it personally. Remember, I'm criticizing your work, not you. I don't think I can evaluate all your questions separately so I will answer them all at once Whenever your doing a story without balloons your images have to do the heavy lifting. they have to make it clear where we are, who are the characters and what are they doing. What you show and what you don't have weight telling story. In general, your story doesn't give enough visual information and the narrative is very confusing. That undermines the understanding of the history Let's review your story panel by panel together and I'll point what I think it's problematic and try pointing directions you can take. Page 1 Panel 1: You said that it's the first time she's being there. But Someone already has her name tag on the door and someone wrote that's she's the best fashionista? Did she wrote that? Did her roommate wrote that? Did someone wrote that ironically? Also the name tag is almost the same width as the door. This is very forced exposition. Panel 2: Here you lost me a little. You said that this is a dorm, but this it more like an apartment. Panel 3: It's ok but kinda unnecessary. Normally after turning on the light, the next panel needs to reveal information that's in the dark. Panel 4 - 6: This is very problematic. You rapidly changed camera angles creating a disorienting feeling and a sense of urgency. The way you did, it looks like she HAS to go that room. Also, dude numbered door in the inside? Panel 7-8 here the drawing is not communicating well. I understand that she knocked and the door was unlocked but the image don't show it well Panel 9: This is kinda weird. You go to a strange place and the first thing you do is go through your roommate stuff? Is she supposed to be the heroine of this story or a bratty entitled teenager? Page 2 Continuity errors from panel 1-3. She changes direction from one panel to another, clothes changes from one panel to another and then color scheme of the character changes inexplicably (I thought at first that it was her roommate). panel 4: The hand turning on the light is kinda creating a weird panel because it looks over sized in the wall but rest is ok and so is panel 5 Panel 6: I didn't understand if she was calling her roommate's ugly or her roommate herself. Also compared to the protagonist's clothes I didn't feel a gap in style that big to consider her roommate's clothes horrible. In fact they look very on par So, ok. We have a lot of problems on location on this page but also who is our protagonist? Did you noticed that it's the first page and we didn't see the face of our girl? Isn't she a fashionista, then why is she using a generic dress? How do I know for sure that she is a student goes for the first time at a dorm and not someone returning from a trip? Writing comics is a constant job of asking why. Characters never do stuff just because. And even though you're not going to put everything you know about them on the story you better have all of their background on your head. OK. Suggestions. First: Do a thorough visual research. Find how dorms look like, the bedrooms, the corridors, etc, find pictures of fashionable girls. Clothes, accessories. Read interviews, discover what they like, find reference on those if you think you can enrich her character... just with the character design you're telling the viewer who the character is. Don't tell me your character is a fashionista, show me she is. No matter which kind of comic book you do, reference is always primordial. Now let's work on your narrative. First of all start by showing your character. Let her face be visible. Show her arriving in the dorms, show the environment. show her reactions to her surroundings while she searches her room (it's important to know who the character is).Show her arriving in her room but cut panels like 4-6. If you don't need extreme angles, don't use it. Now, Instead of going to a living room, have her open the door and arrive directly on the shared bedroom. Dorms normally are just bedrooms and no living rooms (look up floor plans, sometimes you don't even have a window). Instead of her breaking her roommate's room have her just see a hint of the clothes under the bed. And when she goes checks out she find the horror. She's not being invasive, she's just curious about something she saw. You can even use it as a tease. She can find something that she doesn't understand what it is and them her roommate shows up using something really atrocious missing the part that she found. The clothes are essential to your story to works. You really need to sell the difference. Draw something very fashionable encountering something out of fashion. I probably forgot a lot of stuff, but written critiques are tiring to write. If one day this site has voice chat ask me again about thins and I probably give you a more complete and more understandable answer. But until there this is all I have to say. Good luck and Best regards
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Kevin Labaziewicz
I really appreciate the effort you took in writing this post. I've read it three times actually because I think this is helpful, and I've formulated a new approach based on your critic. As you said, there was a problem with the design of the character. The girl was not appropriately dressed for being a fashionista, nor did she look trendy. So, maybe I can sell the look with a pair of sunglasses, some interesting patchwork on her jacket, and a stylish coat to top off her look. Basically, make her look like a modern fashion designer like you'd see on "project runway". That I think would work better. Page 1 Panel 1: Have her approach the door as normal, and shrink the nametag down to size. Delete the "best fashionista" writing on the tag. Panel 2: View of her standing in the doorway to her dorm room Panel 3: Turns on the light Panel 4: View of the room in its entirety. Maybe hint at the ugly piece of clothing under the bed that she wouldn't notice until later. Panel 5-7: Images of her unpacking her things. Maybe show her hanging up her flashy clothes in the closet or setting up a study area. I don't know if I would have to switch to her reaching back into her suitcase for things, but it might be necessary. Panel 8: As she's going back to her suitcase, she notices something underneath her roommate's bed. Panel 9: Shot of the thing she's looking at (not fully in view, but just a hint of what it could be) Page 2 Panel 1: Goes the pick up the item Panel 2: Shot of the item she's holding - A tiny leather jacket that looks like it's for a toddler. Panel 3; Her reaction to the item - confused. Panel 4: Her roommate walks in Panel 4: Her roommate notices the object in the fashionista's hand, and is excited to see it. Panel 5-6: She puts the jacket on. It obviously doesn't fit. On top of that, she could be wearing overalls which could make for an unfitting look. Panel 7: Roommate walks out all happy, but in the background, we see the fashionista with a ghastly expression. Panel 8: A close-up of her expression. End Thanks again for the feedback.
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