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Moonlight meanderer

Comic Talk and General Discussion *

Backgrounds

Posted at 8:10PM, Oct. 5, 2006

Working with backgrounds is a bear, for me. But i noticed something on Wapsi Square today (2006 october 05). he used the same background, greyed out, and just changed shelly's position in the panel. if you looked carefully, you can see he didn't alter the background angle at all.

what do you guys think of that kind of shortcut?

how do you handle your own backgrounds?

Corvin

Posted at 9:10PM, Oct. 5, 2006

I draw every single background no matter what.

(even if the background is the same in every panel.)

Posted at 8:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

I keep my backgrounds minimalistic, and focus more on lighting. Usually the excessive ammounts of black make up for it anyway.

Posted at 8:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

Yeah, a lot of comics has done that (take pre existing pics and blue the hell our of it). I try to make my backgrounds look okay… but I guess the more I work on the comic, the better accustomed I get to a style and the more faster I can get done with the characters to leave extra time for nice backgrounds.

Posted at 8:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

Currently, I have to do a background of the inside of a bus, and oh, it was HARD! So I did a bit of magic and just dumped one colour onto it as a background, then say it's to reflect the mood. Yeah.

Posted at 8:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

i always like to put more work on my bgs

Posted at 8:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

i always like to put more work on my bgs

Yeah I could tell, your stuff is crazy beautiful! You need to go ahead and work with Neil Gaiman or something, your whimsical art style seems to somewhat match his narratives.

Posted at 9:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

Working with backgrounds is a bear, for me. But i noticed something on Wapsi Square today (2006 october 05). he used the same background, greyed out, and just changed shelly's position in the panel. if you looked carefully, you can see he didn't alter the background angle at all.

what do you guys think of that kind of shortcut?

how do you handle your own backgrounds?

Corvin

I don't think that method is too bad. after all, we don't need to have an new "camera angle" EVERY time there's a panel, you know? if people felt that was super imporant then just imagine how ridicous it could get!

for example, picture on TV there's those newcasters… as they talk, the camera angles changes every time they change the topics of the news. so first you got thier faces, then thier sides… then thier back…. then zooming into parts of them such as their hair..eyes.. mouth… chest.. feet… bleh. that sounds silly, right? well, just think of the panels the same way.

of course, changing camera angles can make a comic great, just as long as it doesn't get overused to the point of ridicousness like in my example above. the trick to that is finding the right balance for your comic, depending on what kind of comic it is… so that it doesn't get underused, but not overused.

if you find my "camera angle" angloy a little weird as in strange that it's being appiled to comics….that's just how I picture things. I imagine my characters to be actors on an stage of sorts, and that I'm seeing them though the lens of an camera… only I'm not really using an camera, I'm drawing it.

Posted at 9:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

thanks, shea.

aurora:
the newscast is a bad example because they want the information out there, it's not about being artistic.

crazy camera angles is best used in comics. you can get away with putting the camera in places where it is difficult if it was done in real life. that is why i most admire risso's style.it gives the comic flair and makes a boring scene more exciting as if you were a voyeur into that world. you can see the world in all angles and gives the author more ways to tell the story.

ex:
underneath the car, reflection, inside trunk

I've used different angles to sharpen the story. this is from my comic "Dreams in Synergy"

view from behind, from a person POV, wider shot, inside toilet, water side

Posted at 10:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

XD All I do is solid color backgrounds in colored pencil. It's actually pretty hard to pick a color that matches and amplifies the panel's emotion, though.

Posted at 11:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

The angle on that Wapsi square is the same, it's just zoomed out, they're both pofile angles

I tend to do similar to WS in that I draw a background and then edit characters on top of it instead of drawing a new background for each panel.

Finalized backgrounds for my comics can take anywhere from 4 to 16 hours per, when I get them vectored with my digital crayon texture and everything, so there's no way I could draw a new background for each panel, especially when some comics go way further than 4 panels.

Posted at 11:10AM, Oct. 7, 2006

The angle on that Wapsi square is the same, it's just zoomed out, they're both pofile angles

I tend to do similar to WS in that I draw a background and then edit characters on top of it instead of drawing a new background for each panel.

Finalized backgrounds for my comics can take anywhere from 4 to 16 hours per, when I get them vectored with my digital crayon texture and everything, so there's no way I could draw a new background for each panel, especially when some comics go way further than 4 panels.

Posted at 12:10PM, Oct. 7, 2006

When time is an issue and you want to get your update out, I see nothing wrong with background shortcuts when the background is not an important part of what's happening. I've reused backgrounds before. I do appreciate those who take the time to do every background, though.

Posted at 2:10PM, Oct. 7, 2006

Backgrounds are always a challenge for me :P

Posted at 3:10PM, Oct. 7, 2006

Backgrounds are easier when you don't have to color them. I shouldn'ta chosen to do Ialus in color. I COULD always go to black and white, but then there are some other things I'd have to be able to do by hand…

…but backgrounds are NOT my strength.

Posted at 5:10PM, Oct. 7, 2006

World building through backgrouns can be incredibly important, especially if you want to set yourself apart from the crowd. I highly recommend it. I should've done more backgrounds when I was doing my comic.

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Moonlight meanderer

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