I’ve been running Fruit Incest long enough to have a weekly routine now, and at this point I’ve got enough comics uploaded to see which ones are the best quality. There are several factors both physical and electronic that affect the quality of these fine art squiggly lines we call comics.
First is the drawing of the comic itself. There’s just so many things to draw with, and they all have their benefits. For now I’ll discuss two methods I’ve commonly used in the past: straightforward penciling out the comic, or inking it with pen. Now no matter what, no artwork should be done entirely in pen. I always sketche out the comics before hand and then go over them, but this is where the question shows up. By simply going over the sketches in pencil, I save a lot of time and effort on my part since I’m essentially just making my light practice sketches dark enough to see. As you all should know though, pencil isn’t the best material to work with sometimes. It makes the paper seem dirty and smudged and is sometimes too light or thin to show up. Opposing this is the inking method, which requires more work, but makes the image seem nicer, allows for more detailed backgrounds, and minimalizes digital refining, which is good since this is a homemade comic and I want to stick to my word. As you all know though, one wrong move, leak, or twitch of my arm and the entire image is ruined and almost beyond repair without being noticeable. And once again, pen requires me to go over each comic longer and slower, which is sometimes too much for me to handle in one night.
Next we have the uploading and file type. Currently, my scanner is very limited and doesn’t even support the file types I prefer for this site, so I have to convert these scanned images at least once. While I’m reworking these files, I also have to do basic cropping and contrasting, which can be very good or almost unnecessary depending on how I drew it in the first place. Any conspicuous or easily noticeable smudges must be removed, but remove too much and you lose the personal human touch I like so much, which creates yet another dilemma. Finally, I have to decide how much to change the tone of the image. I have to make sure the image isn’t too dark or filled with smudges while also making sure that lines don’t mysteriously disappear and the ones that stay don’t become jaggedy at the sake of removing said smudges.
The point of this little lecture is because I keep switching. I’m a difficult person and it’s hard for me to make decisions, so every time I switch one method, I suddenly miss the benefits of the other. Aside from me wanting to actually use my blog for blogging, I’d like to let it be known just how much work and care goes into these comics. So which do you prefer? I wont say which comics were made under which method, but if you notice certain qualities you like, feel free to point them out so I can tell which benefits are worth the trouble.
Love your lolis.
