In a corner, under a chair

“When everything was ready, Overse, Ratthi, and Pin-Lee climbed in, and I stood hopefully by the cargo pod. Mensah pointed at the cabin. I winced behind my opaque faceplate and climbed in.”

That one platform decay scene. To me 👍

Stills of MB's signs ⬇️

Compiled some basic information I know about drawing fat characters for beginners since I've been seeing more talk about absence of really basic traits in a lot of art lately.

Ah, intrepid traveler, you've done well to journey to this secluded mountaintop spire, in search of the answers you seek. I indeed can provide such forbidden comicmancy knowledge... at the cost of your mortal soul...

coughs. anyway, I'm going to warn you immediately that what works for me does not work for everyone else, and in my experience the way I do things can prove very slow and discouraging for anyone who is more interested in the actual "drawing the damn comic" part of the process. I only do it this way because I enjoy weaving a narrative web that feels not only fully contained but re-readable, but my projects are often so long and my memory so shitty that I can't just keep all of it in my head! It would spill all over the place and make a really embarrassing mess of brain-juice. Not ideal.

but as for my own process, uhh... I suppose a comic would be fitting, right?

a little choppy but you get the idea.

as for turning words into art, I've been experimenting with figuring out the best way to do that for a little while now. Originally what I was doing for something like Ad Astra Per Aspera was to take my "script" and sketch it out on paper very loosely, before transposing that onto my canvas and working from there:

...but, I've found that can make it kind of difficult to space everything around on your standard page-size, and the thing I'm having the most problems with currently seems to be finding the sweet spot of panel-size proportions. So, I've taken to printing out standard thumbnail templates (you can just find these on google) and sketching very tiny panels in those, which seems to give me a slightly better sense of scale... (mild chapter 5 spoilers, sorry ad astra fans)

but I have yet to totally pull through on this, so who knows, maybe I'll try something else in the future!

As for advice, this is probably most applicable to me, but as a disabled artist I have a very hard time managing my workload without literally working myself into injury. I don't think I talked about this publicly but when I was working on that ten year anniversary comic I was literally drawing every single day for 3 solid months. Sometimes, in my case, I really can't bring myself to stop once I've latched onto an idea, and sometimes I find the most rewarding thing I can do with my time is to draw- but I seriously cannot overstate: Do not fucking do this.

You will fuck up your wrist, your back, your neck, your eyes, and probably your mental health. It's a well-known fact that mangaka have a lower life expectancy than the average japanese person due to the intense workload imposed on them by deadlines and personal expectations. Comics are a very demanding artform, and even though I'm not on any sort of mandated schedule there are times where I've toiled away at something when I likely should have been exercising or taking vision-breaks. Therefore the best advice I can give you is to chill the hell out.

Namely, find parts of the process you can be lazy about, and embrace the laziness! You don't like digitally sketching? Don't do it! Skip it, or maybe find a way to traditionally sketch things out in advance like I do. Hate lineart? Don't fucking do it. You really don't feel like wasting your time writing 72k words of comic scripts? ...then, don't be like me. skip that part. I'm a flawed human being and what works for me might not work for you.

The second most important piece of advice I could give is to read comics. Of all kinds. The reason for this is pretty self explanatory: In order to figure out your own comic-making style, you should first pick out bits and pieces from the artist's buffet to add to your plate. Manga, graphic novels, american comics, european comics, weird niche little webcomics, funny papers, anything and everything. This advice rings true of pretty much any art form, but I find it to be essential to honing comic-making skills because so many things you feel will just come intuitively often don't. and that's okay! nobody is born knowing how to leave space for speech bubbles or shape their panels in a way that imitates stretches of time. The best way to figure out stuff like this, in my experience, is to study the "masters", and then after becoming well accustomed to the basics, figure out what rules you want to bend or break to create your own style.

I consider myself to be in equal parts a writer and an artist, which lends itself well to making narrative comics, but maybe you're a bit more of an artist and want to focus on panel-by-panel visual storytelling. Or, conversely, maybe your talents lean closer towards writing, and the art itself is more of a secondary skill. Regardless of your unique blend of talents you can and should make a comic, you should just also be aware of your strengths and try to hone in on those- there will always be opportunities to build up skills you lack, but focusing on what you do best will always lead you in the right direction.

Anyway, that being said, here are some recommendations in no particular order:

Monster, Naoki Urasawa (!!)

Bone, Jeff Smith

Witch Hat Atelier, Kamome Shirahama

The first IDW run of Transformers comics (namely More Than Meets the Eye and Lost Light)

Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi (!!)

Through the Woods, Emily Carroll (really any Emily Carroll comics)

Kill Six Billion Demons (webcomic) (!!)

Akira, Katsuhiro Otomo

The Third Person, Emma Grove

Tintin, Hergé (can be super racist please be wary)

Dungeon Meshi, Ryoko Kui

Calvin & Hobbes, Bill Watterson

Maus, Art Spiegelman

Cucumber Quest (webcomic)

Jellyfish Princess, Akiko Higashimura

Golden Kamuy, Satoru Noda (!!)

Note that I did not grow up with manga so I am seriously behind on a lot of extremely influential japanese comics such as Dragon Ball, One Piece, basically any of the original Shonen Jump comics, but they're widely considered building blocks of the genre so if you love the artform I think you should give them a try! Same goes for classic non-shonen manga genres like various Shoujo, Josei, Yuri, Gekiga, ETC.

same as above applies to a lot of classic DC and Marvel works, I unfortunately am just not a big fan of superhero comics... but I'm sure there's good stuff in there. a couple of my mutuals talk about booster gold and the blue beetle all the time so I'm assuming there has to be something worthwhile.

...and many, many, many more that I'm forgetting! I noticed as I made this list that, to my knowledge, hardly any of these are made by black or just non-japanese-mangaka BIPOC artists, which makes me sad about the gaps in my own comic collection. Therefore, anyone is welcome to add their own recommendations in the replies!

now go forth, and combine images with text!!!!!!!!!!!

To start off with I almost always try to write my script first. after the script, what’s most important to me is the expressions on the characters faces. I think more than anything that gives me the best direction to my writing. As you can see with my first image, sometimes it can be as simple as just drawing stick figures this just gives me a directional idea of how my paneling’s gonna look. I’d say on average. I do up to three drafts the first draft direction. The second draft is a better idea of that direction and the third draft is all the cleanup so it’s ready for line art 

I usually separate my characters by specific color. This is so when I go into color, it’s easier to see which characters need what.

You can call me a bit of a cheater, but I like to use closed lines when I draw my characters. that way I can use a reference layer to just fill in the colors instead of having to do it manually or using my magic wand tool. 

I also utilize the pallets on Procreate to pick their colors

When it comes to shading, I like to use multiplayer layers and erase out the lighting. I might use some ambient lighting here and there with a dark pinkish purple this is going to depend on where your scene is taking place, but since mine is an alleyway, my multiplayer layer is at 40 opacity. For the characters, I usually use my syrup brush to blend in some of the less harsh shades. When it comes to my backgrounds, I like to use my glowing brush to erase out the lighting.

I still myself have a hard time drawing backgrounds I struggle to find where to put my characters in place some people find it easier to draw the background first and then the characters and although I do agree, that’s easier to establish the shot, I need focus on my characters. So what I usually do is draw my characters in a box and then draw that box in a space and that space becomes my background.

 I play around a lot with the Procreate effects that they have I use a pen called, burst for dramatic feelings, like a burst of energy or a burst of emotions I might use a comic dotted layer for something more comedic or action based. 

When it comes to brushes, I use a pencil for the sketch, a gloaming for the shading and syrup for the outline. Those are the main pens I use and everything else is effects. 

My organization isn’t always the best either, but this is how I usually do it. Panels and bubbles are at top, including the special effects like for example if I were to write the word ‘shake’ If Helga was shaking or blush, if Arnold was blushing, this would be in the bubble layer.  under that would be panels under that would be characters and in that folder I would have line art, then lighting and shading then color and that follows the same formula for background. 

agere crafts ♡༅

paw print: i tried to do some crafts you can do alone n some with a cg! and im pretty sure theres tutorials online for most of these things if needed!༅🐾

♡ clay ──୨ৎ── air-dry clay is wut j use! and you can use colored air dry clay or paint it when its dry!༅

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♡ sticker making ──୨ৎ── draw or print cute designs, then laminate them or use sticker paper to make your own stickers! there lots of tutorials online!༅

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♡ make a wand ──୨ৎ── but howw? well first pick a base for your wand like a stick, dowel, or anything that works!! then paint it if you want before adding maagic details like wrappin' a ribbon round the base, gluing on tiny gems, or drawing lil designs! then lastly...the top! glue a big star, heart, charm, etc. to the top! and if you wanna do a lil extra you can make up a fun spell for your wand, like “this wand brings happiness" or whateva you wan! or im pretty sure ive also seen already made star wands at places that you can just paint and add details to!༅

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♡ sensory bottles ──୨ৎ── fill a clear bottle with glitter, beads, charms, whatever you wanna add!! and then add water to finish the sensory bottle!༅

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♡ scratch offs ──୨ৎ── i mentioned these in my tips for littles without a cg post, but im mentioning them again!! they can be used as a reward system for yourself or you can put positive messages on them, whatever you want!! to make them you outline your scratch off on a piece of paper, so a star, circle, heart, box, etc!! and write what you want inside! then you put tape over it before mixing paint and dish soap together to paint onto the tap afteer youve placed it down! thats all! if i didn't do a good enough job explaining, there are lots of tutorials online too!!༅

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♡ make a fish ──୨ৎ── get a paper plate and then cut a triangle out! then glue the triangle on the opposite side for the fin! you can get paper to make more fins to glue on as well! then color your fish!༅

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♡ finger painting ──୨ৎ── prettyyyy self explanatory and already pretty well known but i still thought id mention it! id recommend getting an outfit you don't mind getting messy before though ofc, and then paint to your hearts content!༅

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♡ mini garden/terrarium ──୨ৎ── get a bowl or a flower pot and you can paint it if you wish!! then add some soil in grass or moss and thennn add cute lil decorations! you can add fairys, just lil characters, a mini house, anything! and even a real flower or smth! you could also do it in a mason jar and make it like a terrarium!༅

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♡ juice popcicles ──୨ৎ── anotherr popular one, get an ice tray, pour juice in, and then add a popsicle stick, put in freezer over night, n boom!! juice popsicles!༅

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♡ pom-pom popsicles ──୨ৎ── you can look up how to do this one too, but you just get a card, pom poms ofc, a popsicle stick, and some double sided tape, and cut out the card into a popsicle shape, glue it to the stick, then use the tape to add the pom poms! you might need some help with this one! but you can use your favorite colors, your flag colors, whatever you wana do!༅

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♡ paint a rock ──୨ৎ── another self explanatory one! you can look up some ideas for inspo though if you wish!༅

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♡ paper bags ──୨ৎ── you can use paper bags to make puppets or lil houses! if you're confused on how, you can again look it up!༅

Since this is gaining traction again, here are the final ones. These had been on separate posts but I suppose they'll be more likely to be noticed here.