group protagonist

i had a look at western comics too, to compare notes, guys like batman who work alone get pride of place on the front cover like in eastern comics but group protagonists all get a spot, just look. also, fantastic four is a dvd cover (in case you didnt see the movie), i wanted to see how different it was to the comic covers again, i reckon it follows the trend, more focus on the faces though than in the comics. i think i'll try the cover a few ways and see what people like.

cover research

looking at covers for other comics that are manga or anime stuff, i also looked at the bleach and naruto dvd covers. manga and anime is multimedia territory so i wanted to see if they did it much differently between dvds and comics... maybe i should have looked at games too...

anyway it looks like mostly one character gets pride of place on the front cover and the dvds and sharknife have not much of anything else on there, but the comics look typically more decorative. cool custom fonts too, gotta be hand drawn.

ashley wood practice

just messing around trying on someone elses style, i cant touch ashley woods work but i thought these looked ok. also i've been toting my draft comic pages around and people seem to be liking the anime / manga art style i've been going with, it is a pretty good fit for a comic based on a japanese game though. from what i've found (check out some previous posts) fans of the game tend to be fans of animes too.... (or even hentai!)

doomed!

more ashley wood stuff, this time out its all his gear though. i told friend about swallow (previous post) and he showed me doomed. i'm loving ashley woods heavily inked style, it might not be appropriate to this project but i've been practicing any way, (i'll show you in the next post) what is relevant though is that doomed is a series of very short comic stories, each just 15 pages so i figure a little study of it might help me with getting a short story onto the ten pages i gave myself in the brief i wrote. also he has this cool section in the back thats just a little gallery for his work.... not a bad idea. x

swallow

swallow is a great book put together by ashley wood i think. it features many great artists from all over (mostly america though i think) its got a great blend of eastern and western styles and even features frazer irving (mentioned in previous posts) nicolas nemri and bengal (works pictured)are especially worth mentioning though because they work in more eastern styles like anime and manga so they are good reading for this project.

the book features work by:jason alexander
jo chen (you might recognise his work from fable)
ashley wood (more on him later)
nicolas nemiri
bengal
glenn barr
jim mahfood
james jean
frazer irving
and kent williams (not really relevant to comic art though)

just give their names a quick google if youre curious about them. x

art direction

purgatory kabuki is currently my favorite manga. its got amazing artwork and takes the art more seriously than the story, or at least in my mind it does. i think its evident that the quality of the images is prioritized when you try to read it. it is such a hard read because while each piece of art is beautiful to look at, it doesnt always follow comic conventions for visual communication like drawing your eye along the story chronologically or having simple images.(i've read it lots of times and i'm still not sure i get all of it) it has strong inkwork and beautiful composition though.

i dont think i'll make mine like this, obviously you've already seen that i've been learning techniques to make pages that are different in style, i just thought it was worth mentioning because it has been a great inspiration to my work nontheless.

i couldnt really find images online of pages that are tough to decipher like i mentioned and i dont really want to bend my copy but maybe i might have to take it into college and get some scans for you.

read purgatory kabuki if you like amazing artwork and samurai action.

page 10

the last page is the aftermath of sky's little visit in djinn's hunt.... its just a dead monster, i guess thats not very interesting to look at though now that i am looking. the proper version might have djinn or his team in an inset panel looking shocked at how sky killed kutku. it might help to round things off a bit better.