This here tablet thing I have

[ntw3001]

There. Now you all know how Panda Pete got to Miguel's hovel.

Looks like I've made Panda Pete's head about the shape I want, but I need to enlarge his face a little on the fourth page. Bah.

[jvcc]

Hahaha. Lithe and supple.

[James]

Currently the question mark looks quite Twitter, but I like the sound of shading it as though it's a real-world object. I'd still probably suggest changing the colour, but I really like the notion of all his thought symbols looking entirely consistent with and integrated into the rest of the art.

Besides, who has a character in the banner rotation line-up?

Yes, that was quite a surprise.

Speaking of which, are you going to send me that zip file or not?

Here's the story: First my Internet broke. Then I forgot for a couple of days. Then I downloaded it to make adjustments, but it doesn't work at all on my local machine. I don't know if it's a PHP 5 thing or a Windows thing or an IIS thing or an extensions thing or some combination of those or what. I'm currently having difficulty convincing GD library extension to work. As I understand it, all I have to do is uncomment the relevant line in php.ini, but doing so seems to yield no result. Perhaps I should have stuck with Apache.

[DaVince]

That last picture is somehow really cute and at the same time somewhat scary. The writing is the work of Ye Gods.

[Null]

I drew this but decided I shouldn't post it as an image. I drew it because I lack patience and wanted to see shading, but then I got carried away.

[MysticalDescent]

Ahahahahaha. I, too, often dangle a severed head for emphasis.

[ntw3001]

AGH

Actually there's a page later that should look pretty similar to that. Not with the blood, but with the ferocity.

[Binkatron5000]

HAHEAHAJKHHAHAHA yes yes yes YES! BLOOD.

[Null]

So, I must ask this question: will there be a tapir in this story?

I figure there should be, given your oft-documented fondness for tapirs.

[ntw3001]

Well so far I have the first story all planned out and am some way through the second, and there are no plans for a tapir. I hadn't thought of it actually.

[ntw3001]

Ech, I'm tired of trying to use this silly drawing program. WHEN I RESIZE THE LASSO I ALSO WANT TO RESIZE THE THINGS CONTAINED WITHIN THE LASSO I wonder if GIMP works better. Let's try that.

That doesn't seem to do what I want. So, I'm in need of a painting program that works well. Does anyone have a suggestion?

[Null]

I guess it depends on what sorts of features and superpowers you want in a paint program. I'm trying to learn PhotoShop CS4 which is like trying to learn Japanese without using your eyes. The paint program I use most often is Picture Publisher 10, which is so old it can be found for free (on the web).

[ntw3001]

Free, eh? I like those numbers. For their absence, that is.

[ntw3001]

Right, right right. I'm tired of waking up at 3.30 and spending my day trying to figure out which video game I least want to not play. I'd rather do something like this thing here in this thread. My problem is that I am easily discouraged when drawing Panda Pete, because I can't get his face to look right with the rest of his body (see the image at the top of this page, or the previous page if this post starts a new page). I suspect much of the problem is that his body is basically a big blob with limbs, drawn with a single continuous line and with the head clumsily jammed on top. I redrew that frame over ten thousand times, and eventually gave up. Panda Pete is undrawable.

Actually, it's not his fault. I'm just extremely poor at keeping characters looking consistent between frames. Panda Pete is the scapegoat because the only other character who has appeared in more than one frame so far is shaped like a big teardrop (and it is difficult enough to get his dimensions right). I am not sure what to do about this. I'm pretty convinced that there is no secret technique to keeping characters on-model, and the main trick of it is to be better than me. I may have to pretend it's a stylistic choice and I definitely, definitely want my anthropomorphic bears and SPOILERS vegetables END SPOILERS to look like this.

[chrismachine]

Have you thought of trying to make a 3d model of it, just to keep the dimensions? you could spin it this way and that for a layer, trace over it and adjust it, then remove the layer. Maybe Low-Tech would have some advice...

[PonderThis]

All I can say is: Practice, practice, practice. The more you draw the better you'll get. The nice thing about doing everything digitally is you can always come back and edit earlier pictures when you finish.

The real key here is just plugging away at it. One thing every successful writer says to aspiring writers is: WRITE! If you never finish you'll never know what you can accomplish.

[ntw3001]

Instead of doing more of this story, I have finished the first page of THIS Pokemon comic.



I found drawing like this much much much easier and less time-consuming than the stupid time consuming inconsistent method of shading I was using in Miguel's adventures. I'm thinking to redo those in a style more like this so I can actually get them done reasonably quickly. Not that that helps with the Panda-Pete-proportions problem, but I'm sure that small issue will resolve itself completely as long as I do nothing about it.

[Null]

I like this in pretty much all respects.

[Skimba]

Hahahaha...whaat?

[ntw3001]

Have you thought of trying to make a 3d model of it, just to keep the dimensions? you could spin it this way and that for a layer, trace over it and adjust it, then remove the layer. Maybe Low-Tech would have some advice...

I never replied to this suggestion. The problem with a 3D model is that I really don't have a clue what he might look like in 3D. I sort of like him looking like a cardboard cutout that's only ever seen from a direct angle, but it's then a question of making that work properly. I think it's his head/body ratio. It's hard to make a bear who's tall and lean but with a huge face.

[CelestialBanana]

Awww, I wanna see more of Miguel and Panda Pete!