Motorcycle

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Motorcycle

Well, now that I see the comic posted online, it is clear that the red on the motorcycle doesn't work. Chalk that up to another lesson learned. Perhaps, instead of saving these as JPEGs, I should be saving them as GIFs. Apparently, GIFs are a lossless format, which I think means you wouldn't be seeing that fuzz on the gasoline tank of the cycle.

Anyhow, I could have done something else with this comic, but between writing stuff at work and vegging out playing video games (Gallop Racer 2003), I haven't had the time nor the energy to do it. It would have been more interesting to have a couple of panels here instead of the single one, but I guess I will save that for next week.

R.V.

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R.V.

Boy, am I tired. I should have worked on this a little earlier so I wouldn't have been up so late, but I did want to get the comic out on time. I am going to work harder at getting something posted every monday. I think I've got about three in a row here. I've gotten a little better at coloring and character construction, but I am still going to keep practicing. As for the joke of the comic, Easy Rider is one of those movies that I watched in my early twenties during the hey-day of the local video stores. It is "the" classic road movie in my opinion. And, of course, you know...motorcycles.

Bonus Art!

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Zeb and Dana

Somewhat of bonus here. I've been reading several graphic novels, animation design books, and comic tutorials. The end result of all this reading is this little example from my sketchbook. I should have spent a few more minutes working on a background, but on the plus side, I think I am getting more consistent with my character design. What do you think?

I've also figured out how to remove the white little jaggies that sometimes appeared in between my color in GIMP and my scanned-in line art. That is a major, major plus. Stylistically, I've decided that shading is not something I want to explore too much with Angry Bear comics; maybe, I would with something else, but for this comic, I prefer the cartoony look.

Decisions

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Decisions

I've figured out how to color my comics a little better with the GIMP program. I can get right on top of the black linework with my colors, so you should see the little white areas between colors are gone. I think that overall the comic looks a little more polished, don't you? However, one of the things that I goofed on was the penciling. I pressed a little too hard with the non-photo blue pencil while I was initially drawing the scene. And some of the blue managed to get by the scanner because it was so dark. I tried to blast out as much of the blue as possible, but it is still there, even if you can't see it in the final image.

As for Zeb and his losing his purpose, I have been trying to think of a way to pull the storylines into a tighter focus. While I have been personally going through some tough times, Zeb is definitely not me. I just needed something to try and get the comic moving in a more interesting direction, and this was what I came up with. As always, comments are more than welcome.

On Purpose

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Purpose

As my many readers know, (nearly all four of you!), I missed posting something last Monday. I've been a little at a loss about what direction I should take Zeb and crew next. Writing gags is not something I am really all that good at. Therefore, this comic is the inauguration of a new story arc. Maybe I will be better at story arcs than single comic gags. I haven't gotten this arc all figured out yet, but I've got couple of ideas about where I could go. I am also thinking about posting a new comic based on something entirely different, something entirely fictional. I wrote an episode of it on Friday. Maybe I will post that when I get further along with it. As always, feel free to leave any comment (anonymously if you wish) or feedback.