Posted June 08, 2020
...Only to have it ruined nine pages in by the introduction of a character who doesn't even fit the style or even within the artists own style?
Hi, welcome to Darvond rambles about a special interest webcomic, where today I just get my thoughts out about some things that have been weighing on my mind, since it's been about a week since I sent off a constructive critique to the author to no reply so at this point I'm just going to lay it on the table.
A lot of this is down to my own opinion and preferences in artistic stylization, but even considering those factors, I still feel the artist has made a major mistake by allowing their SO to include a mooching cameo by one of their characters.
And the reason I seek to bear is simple: They don't fit. The character introduced on the page specified simply clashes with not only the style of the comic, but is entirely outside of the artist's style, too. Now, I admit, I have some biases.
I really don't like Bara/Bear/Strongmen types. If the chest is bigger than the legs, consider me signed out. But I wouldn't be complaining about this particular aspect if it was just one little aspect I didn't personally chime with.
The thing is, a barrel chested character could have easily visually blended into things, but that simply isn't all. Compared to most of the other characters this artist draws, this character is a mutant freak.
This artist tends to draw flowery characters. Feminine males with big eyes, soft features, and a petite height. They have drawn larger, built male characters, (And IMO, they really don't succeed.) but the thing is this just looks like they took the reference sheet from another artist and pasted it in atop the page. A standout in the worst way possible.
Compared to what the artist normally draws, this character has: Huge hands and treetrunk arms, teeny tiny head proportionally, absurdly tiny ears, no hair, unidentifiable species, tiny eyes, offputting color scheme, weird nails, and towers over everyone else in terms of sheer height alone. They look more akin to a Muton than anything befitting the artist's talents.
Now while I would advocate tossing out this cameo character and redoing the story a fair bit, this isn't the point of the thread.
I'm sure their significant other means a lot to this artist, so what I'm instead advocating is a stylistic blending. (As much as their appearance has completely ruined the future intrigue of the comic because I can predict the next several pages and the mystery has gone out the window.) See up to this point, the protagonist was following orders from someone in hopes of meeting them, and did some silly things accordingly. They get caught, and I was hoping it was the Mysterious Benefactor who had finally approached.
ANYHOW, just a few edits would have to be made; to wit I have already prepared some possible components accordingly: zap him with a shrink ray, shrink his huge arms & hands, give him a semblance of hair, change the head shape, get rid of the lantern jaw, embiggen the eyes a few decibels, maybe make the ears hang over and change them to match, give him abs, shrink his chest, fix up the nails or just eschew them entirely, and adjust his coloring.
It obviously isn't and therefore...screw it, my interest has fluttered away. I was hoping for emotional connectivity like another comic author or something wholesome like yet another artist, but this just puts it down the path to unemotional predictability. I know what is going to happen to the protagonist.
Thank you, but that's not what I'm looking for.
Thing is, I'm not an artist. I'm a writer. "A lumbering barrel chested hulk who towers over others; whose species is plainly unidentifiable, with small eyes, the arms of a behemoth, and hands which could not grasp simple objects, whose very digits exemplify and compound the issues of fine motor skills, whose face is eerily lacking any attractive features, leading up to a massive round forehead" is about how I'd describe this newly introduced character as they currently exist.
Like I said, I have biases.
I'm sure some of you are curious enough now to see what exactly set me off on this rant, and so to the point, I have attached an image of the character in question. I can't link to the artist's social media feed, and in fact have cropped the image in question because of what the artist draws in specialization.
I've mostly written this out here because A: Discord has a 2000 character limit and B: I don't want to contact the artist with a spiteful, "I know I said you could do with what you will with the critique, but I would have at least given a reply of some kind." Even "Thank you for the feedback, I'll file this in the circular file" or "Ampersand dollar sign at-symbol exclamation mark off, kid."
Now I should note that while I used perhaps vitriolic and perhaps inflammatory wording here, I tried my best to be careful with my words and tone neutral in the direct message I sent to the artist. I'm just uncorking at this point in hopes of getting over this. My original critique to the artist before I edited it at least 10 times over, was far more blunt and brutally honest.
Hi, welcome to Darvond rambles about a special interest webcomic, where today I just get my thoughts out about some things that have been weighing on my mind, since it's been about a week since I sent off a constructive critique to the author to no reply so at this point I'm just going to lay it on the table.
A lot of this is down to my own opinion and preferences in artistic stylization, but even considering those factors, I still feel the artist has made a major mistake by allowing their SO to include a mooching cameo by one of their characters.
And the reason I seek to bear is simple: They don't fit. The character introduced on the page specified simply clashes with not only the style of the comic, but is entirely outside of the artist's style, too. Now, I admit, I have some biases.
I really don't like Bara/Bear/Strongmen types. If the chest is bigger than the legs, consider me signed out. But I wouldn't be complaining about this particular aspect if it was just one little aspect I didn't personally chime with.
The thing is, a barrel chested character could have easily visually blended into things, but that simply isn't all. Compared to most of the other characters this artist draws, this character is a mutant freak.
This artist tends to draw flowery characters. Feminine males with big eyes, soft features, and a petite height. They have drawn larger, built male characters, (And IMO, they really don't succeed.) but the thing is this just looks like they took the reference sheet from another artist and pasted it in atop the page. A standout in the worst way possible.
Compared to what the artist normally draws, this character has: Huge hands and treetrunk arms, teeny tiny head proportionally, absurdly tiny ears, no hair, unidentifiable species, tiny eyes, offputting color scheme, weird nails, and towers over everyone else in terms of sheer height alone. They look more akin to a Muton than anything befitting the artist's talents.
Now while I would advocate tossing out this cameo character and redoing the story a fair bit, this isn't the point of the thread.
I'm sure their significant other means a lot to this artist, so what I'm instead advocating is a stylistic blending. (As much as their appearance has completely ruined the future intrigue of the comic because I can predict the next several pages and the mystery has gone out the window.) See up to this point, the protagonist was following orders from someone in hopes of meeting them, and did some silly things accordingly. They get caught, and I was hoping it was the Mysterious Benefactor who had finally approached.
ANYHOW, just a few edits would have to be made; to wit I have already prepared some possible components accordingly: zap him with a shrink ray, shrink his huge arms & hands, give him a semblance of hair, change the head shape, get rid of the lantern jaw, embiggen the eyes a few decibels, maybe make the ears hang over and change them to match, give him abs, shrink his chest, fix up the nails or just eschew them entirely, and adjust his coloring.
It obviously isn't and therefore...screw it, my interest has fluttered away. I was hoping for emotional connectivity like another comic author or something wholesome like yet another artist, but this just puts it down the path to unemotional predictability. I know what is going to happen to the protagonist.
Thank you, but that's not what I'm looking for.
Thing is, I'm not an artist. I'm a writer. "A lumbering barrel chested hulk who towers over others; whose species is plainly unidentifiable, with small eyes, the arms of a behemoth, and hands which could not grasp simple objects, whose very digits exemplify and compound the issues of fine motor skills, whose face is eerily lacking any attractive features, leading up to a massive round forehead" is about how I'd describe this newly introduced character as they currently exist.
Like I said, I have biases.
I'm sure some of you are curious enough now to see what exactly set me off on this rant, and so to the point, I have attached an image of the character in question. I can't link to the artist's social media feed, and in fact have cropped the image in question because of what the artist draws in specialization.
I've mostly written this out here because A: Discord has a 2000 character limit and B: I don't want to contact the artist with a spiteful, "I know I said you could do with what you will with the critique, but I would have at least given a reply of some kind." Even "Thank you for the feedback, I'll file this in the circular file" or "Ampersand dollar sign at-symbol exclamation mark off, kid."
Now I should note that while I used perhaps vitriolic and perhaps inflammatory wording here, I tried my best to be careful with my words and tone neutral in the direct message I sent to the artist. I'm just uncorking at this point in hopes of getting over this. My original critique to the artist before I edited it at least 10 times over, was far more blunt and brutally honest.
