Week 9a

Today in class, our final project was due. Our class was split up today, however, so I was unable to be critiqued or give critique to my fellow classmates. I was a little disappointed I wouldn't get to see their comics or hear about their process at all. Regardless, this is my final comic:

I am actually very happy with the final product and am excited to see what others have to say. I think I have made great progress since the beginning of this project.

Week 8 Outside of Class

This weekend I spent a lot of time working on finishing my comic. This meant doing a lot of illustrations to finish it up. Here are the illustrations I did:

This first illustration was done so that it would blend in with the background of the overall comic, obscuring the borders for this particular panel. I really liked these "breakout" panels, so this was my attempt at creating one.

I contemplated the distance I wanted my characters to be away from the viewer in this image. Ultimately I decided to have them semi-close up because I figured that it would give the sense that they were walking away from the convenience store, rather than just standing in front of it. 

This panel is another where there will be a break from the normal panel structure. I plan on having the missing flyer breaking out of the panel in the final comic.

I will post my final comic on Monday, which is when it is due. I think it is coming together really nicely and am excited about the final piece.

Week 8b

For class today I finished the illustration I started last class. This is what it ended up looking like:

I decided to also play around with changing the monochromatic color scheme from black and white to something with more color. I settled on the blue seen above and decided to alter my first few illustrations to reflect the new color scheme. I chose this color because I think it makes the images look more lively and also gives off a more depressing tone which better fits with what I am trying to accomplish.

Today in class I finished another illustration to try to get closer to finishing. This illustration is further on in the story. I decided my best way of tackling finishing my comic was to do the smaller illustrations first and then leave more intensive ones for later. This is the illustration I completed today:

I still have a lot to do for this weekend in order to finish, but I think I will pull through with a good finished project.

Week 8a

Today in class I decided to finalize my first three images. I took away the vingetting in the first panel and drew the mother's legs to suggest she was holding the baby in her lap. In the next frame, I darkened up the silhouette of the kids on the swings and evened up the shrubbery in the background. Finally, I completed the third image and gave it a subtle background. For all three images, I moved a lot of the imagery down to make room for the word boxes I will be using. Overall, I think making these changes made the images stronger as a whole and I feel better about moving on. Here they are:

Additionally, I began another panel on Tuesday. I will continue to work on it, and more, in Wednesday's class. Here is what that panel looks like so far:

Week 7 Outside of Class

This weekend I worked on some more illustrations for my comic. I got about a 1/4 through, although I need to finish the third one I did. I spent a lot of time doing the characters in that particular image. In class on Monday I hope to finish that illustration and then move onto doing more. I also worked on the layout for the comic in illustrator but it is pretty loose right now. There are a lot of big spaces between panels that I want to eliminate. Here it is so far:

Like I mentioned, I am going to play around more with the sizing of different panels, as I said this is loose so far. As I continue it will become more concrete.

Week 7b

Today in class I illustrated the first panel for my comic, which is the beginning of the girl's life. The image is of her being held by her mother as a newborn. Here is the image I made:

I might alter this image some so that the vignette is less extreme. Over the weekend I will continue to work on more illustrations for my comic.

Week 7a

There was no class on Monday due to fall break.

Week 6 Outside of Class

This week outside of class I finalized my overall comic idea by sketching out the whole comic from beginning to end. This is what it looks like:

In my comic there are large jumps in time and so I decided to play on those using age and the seasons for the outdoor imagery. I want to use open panels for two scenes because they are atmospheric and I really want to play on that. For the last panel, I also want to break the poster out of the scene, however I want to make sure that it isn't read before the panel it is coming out of, so I think I will move it down more into the panel. As I progress digitally, I am sure I will continue to make small edits to the panels here and there.

Week 6b

Today in class we had a small lecture and then got in class work time. Here are some images I worked on both between Monday and now, and in today's class:

The above image is an attempt at a scene across a few panels. I wanted to really try to get some difficult poses drawn out. I definitely will be including these three panels in my comic.

The above image is something I worked on in class. After speaking with Professor Pannafino, he pointed out how stiff my characters are, so I really tried to loosen up a little bit in this sketch.

Finally, I worked on another layout but this time on larger paper. Over the weekend I will continue to flesh it out. Here is the progress I made in class today:

Week 6a

Today in class we met up in groups to discuss the sketches we had made. I got some helpful comments from the groups I was in. Pretty much everyone enjoyed the sketches I made, however, would've liked to have seen larger scenes to get a better idea of what they would look like. I also misunderstood that we were supposed to do different full-page layouts instead of just a few scene transitions like I did. Keeping these things in mind, I did a few things in class:

This is a sketch I made of a larger potential background or scene.  

Here is a layout I did, but it was on too small of paper so I was having trouble sketching it out. Next class I will have to get some larger paper.

 For next class I'm going to work on some more scenes and try to do a larger layout.

Week 5 Outside of Class

This weekend I worked on preliminary sketches for my comic idea. These included sketches of characters, backgrounds, objects, and transitions. Here are my sketches:

These are my character sketches. In my comic, there will only be two main characters, the girl and the guy. There may be a scene with some background characters, but they wont really have details. I tried to show the height difference between them, as well as a general idea of what they will wear. I also have one scene in mind where they are outside of a 7/11 eating popsicles together, so I drew that. I also drew the female character as a little girl because there is a flashback scene which shows her at 6 years old.

This is my page of object sketches. Aside from scenery, there aren't really many objects the characters will interact with. I decided to add the girl's pet rat into the objects page because he isn't a major character, but I do plan on having him in a scene or two. Otherwise, I drew the popsicles I knew they would be eating, the girls cell phone, and finally the missing poster, which will likely be blowing around in one scene.

This page shows some background ideas. I have more, since most of the panels will be jumping around from each other. The top left is a forest, which a fallen tree as a bridge over a stream. The top right is the 7/11 knock-off store (which I have named 10/11).  The bottom left is a dock at a lake with some forest in the background. Finally, the bottom right is another part of the forest which is more like a clearing. I also am thinking about a scene where they are walking on the train tracks.

This is supposed to show some transition ideas. The top ones are a transition from childhood to current day. The bottom two are from one day spent together to another, or it could be one day at different times. I'm not really sure what these transitions would qualify as, but I think it would be action-to-action. 

Week 5b

Today in class we went over our ideas. Most people seemed to like either the idea of the girl going missing, or the story being told through the missing poster. I decided to go with the life of a person, in particular the story I wrote about the girl who goes missing through the perspective of a boy who never got to tell her his true feelings. The people I talked to in each group seemed to like the idea. Some suggested a humorous spin, however I don't think it's really what I am going for. Most people seemed to understand exactly what type of feel I was going for, and appreciated the story itself. Our homework over the weekend focuses on the transitions we learned about and working on some of the details of the comic. I am excited to see where this project goes.