In the mean time, a friend contracted me to do a comic book piece about their wedding... since her husband loved comics. I obliged since it was a chance to push myself to find time to draw. It was a bit rushed for time... but I was really happy with how it turned out. When I was done, I stepped back and noticed a lot of anatomical issues I didn't like (Breasts, some facial features)... but regardless... it was the first time in a long while that I attempted a piece this big (17x22). It is just ink on paper.
http://action.mancubus.net/files/weddingcomic.jpg
I always got really good critiques on Pixelation... which is why I always came back Tear it up... but do note that it's not going to be changed... but I will note it for further study.
Hello.
I will segment my critique in two sides. Storytelling/pace is one, and draftmanship/anatomy the other. In places they overlap, but it's easier to look at it like this. First the storytelling critique:
This is a husband and wife, so we should see both their faces by the first few panels, not just the girl and the guy only at the end of it. You have relatively little space to establish the characters, so starting with the back of the head of the husband really doesn't work. For example, in the dead space under the 'holy matremony' panel, I'd add a profile shot of the two lovebirds longingly looking into each other's eyes a bit more, so we could see the husband as well, and we can know he's returning her affection.
This is a problem generally with this page. There's wasted space. It's an often-encountered mark of people who don't draw a lot of comics, to not know how to keep their panels only to the relevant and to achieve a flow. The first thing I'd suggest is to not play with 'artful' sequencing until you have the oldschool 'pictures in panels, gaps between the panels' down right. The gap between the panel signifies sequence, and time passed. Right now this is a collage of images, much less a comic. The drama of the ninja entrance is undermined by the drowsy dream-like pace that a borderless comic page always has going about it. This is a strength for dream-like recollection pages and such, but it's not good for snappy action.
The middle sequence with the chapel is the better one. The ninjas come from the left, they lead the eye, the scene is established (a bit of background in the first panel would be best to at least foreshadow the scenery, but alright, I can understand wanting to focus on faces.) However, the panels aren't placed in a sensible manner. The eye reads the first strip of the comic and then it is called on the ninja on middle left, as well it should (that's how westerners read comics). However, the panel is rotating clockwise and pulls the eyes over to the right edge of middle panel. This creates reading confusion. You struggle to understand the visual input, but the words get in the way. This is anathema for comics. The panel should follow the action. I'd place 'for better and for worse' under the left ninja, leave 'in sickness and in health' where it is and put 'til death do you apart' on the third row where the ninja underlines the severity of the situation.
Now, the third row would best be three panels, not two. One, ninja face, two, the dramatic pose of the couple serving as empty anticipation beat, and then a last panel of the couple entering the fray against the ninjas with 'we do' underneath it as the punchline.
The space is underused. 4 panels for a big-ass page like this creates a very slow pace that doesn't fit action. Small panels for small happenings is a good rule to keep in mind. Not too much, but not so little either. Right now it's almost a collection of drawings, it doesn't have pace cohesion, and that's one of the worst things that can happen to an action comic page.
That's it about structure. About the drawings:
I feel in lack of fundamental study, you've devised some personal artistic tropes on how to draw human faces that you might or might not be comfortable with, but which for me as the viewer feel upsetting. The girl's face is unattractive to me, and checking on the last panel where you drew the guy too, they share facial characteristics. I am led to believe that this isn't so much a likeness issue, but how you draw human faces. In which case, I can only suggest fundamental training in facial structure. There aren't many ways about this, as far as I'm concerned. Style will come after you've gotten a good grip in representing reality.
Anatomically, most figures are stiff or out of balance, but the ninjas and couple in the last strip suffer the most. The woman's prominent leg is misshapen, the knee disconnected and the ancle nonexistent. You know about the breast placement. The sword-weilding arm is a collection of contrasting curves in a 'batman animated series' fashion, which however masks a lack of understanding of the muscular structure of a real arm. You can stylize, and simplify, when you know how to render realistically first. The dude is better on the whole, though there's some priority mess-up on his far leg/edge of dress where the eye can't make out what's going on very well. The hand holding the sword is totally invented. You should take pictures of your hand holding something and abstract from there, not from memory. The way you drew the open mouths on the couple in the last frame is frankly a bit disconcerting for me, it stretches believability to the point of being unsettling. That we have two face shots of the girl and she's in the same angle and almost the same facial expression (besides the eyebrows) doesn't represent her emotional range as well as it could be doing in the space of a big comic page. This is about them, right? About how happy and determined they are to be together. We don't see this much in the comic right now. What we see is that they're about to kick some ninja ass, and that's a good punchline on its own, but it could be much better.
The ninja on the last panel isn't looking at the couple, he looks distracted, we feel distracted as well. If it's ment to be a separate panel, then draw the brackets. Fancy 'breaking glass' panels and stuff are to be used very sparingly and only when you have a good hold on the pace and are enforcing it. This isn't happening here.
Perspective and construction is improvised, but not terribly. The problem is that the chapel scene looks amateurish, not broken. Everything's where it's supposed to be more or less, but it's that 'more or less' that hurts this. You should have constructed with proper vanishing points and a ruler. At least for the pencilling. You could free-hand the inking if you wanted it to not look too clynical. And yes, you'd have to look for chapel references online, but that's how you become a better artist. Not to say that the currect chapel is bereft of relevant props, you've done pretty well.
On the rendering front, your black and white contrast spaces are okay, mostly. You're using the wrong types of hatching for the wrong surfaces. linear strokes for face shadows make faces look tired and strung-out, and hair looks made out of fabric on the girl. You should invest some time in learning and controlling line width variation to create more lively figures that pop out of the backgrounds. At some cases, compact lines are fine, if backed by bodies of darkness (the groom's suit in the last panel) but not so much when they separate white from white (the woman's silluette in the last panel). The way you rendered the ninja face on the last strip is the place where your choices of hatching match the materials at hand the most.
Hope I helped.