Back and Fore

Characters and Backgrounds … and Compositing Different Styles


when I started putting my webcomic out I'd been drawing for most of my life already, and knew the characters and setting really well. The stories I would figure out as I went…and still do.

As far as the art goes, it's changed over the years in terms of what kinds of backgrounds and foregrounds I try and use. Actually, it's still kind of in flux, probably; I'm just updating more slowly these days so there might be more gradual…fluxing.

I've done 2d backgrounds, 3d backgrounds, and played with photographic backgrounds - I remember some comments that mentioned not liking photographic backgrounds in comics.

There are endless ways to compose the visuals of a comic - I've seen comics done with unaltered photos, where the creator and their friends would run around and take all these pictures. Easier as far as drawing, but still plenty of effort required, especially if it's trying to tell a coherent story. Our friend bravo does photo comics with dolls, enhanced with actual props and clothes as well as green screen backgrounds and finishing in photoshop.

Cartoon-like characters against a more realistic drawn background is a very common style for webcomics. The reverse, a realistic 3d character style against a hand-drawn background: I think that's less common, and would give an unusual, stylized look. I think that would work for some specific comics but it would certainly stand out as different!

What interesting compositions of different styles for characters vs backgrounds have you seen? Have you tried anything unusual yourself? How to you put your characters and backgrounds together?

Okay, that's it for me! Chow for Now,

Banes