/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

>>3318911
I go my ManlySpirit on most social media. But it's probably better to follow me on Medibang if you're interested in reading the manga, as that's probably where it's gonna be released.

Here's the two pilots for this project in case you wanna give them a read:

https://medibang.com/book/0o1712240724059010004309649

https://medibang.com/book/1n1801041429027430004309649

>>3318988
I've been drawing my whole life, but only seriously for about 4 years. I found /ic/ like back in 2013.

>>3319215
Well, what do you mean by everything? Those poses are obviously not traced, otherwise MC's anatomy wouldn't be so botched lol.

If you mean the background. Well, I've only been to Tokyo once. You can't draw that which you don't understand. Story's set in Tokyo, so I'm obviously gonna have to rely heavily on reference for urban backgrounds.

As far as tracing goes. I've edited the image, both in terms of composition, and colors. And I'm only gonna use it for the perspective and colors. This is perfectly fine, and the way you should be using BG references. If you read Scott Rob's book on perspective, this exact method is described in Chapter 5 if I'm not mistaken. The grafitti and such I'm gonna design my own, as I want the foreground to have a grafitti that says "Tiger Square." The end result will look very different from the photo. This is not my photo, so obviously I have to heavily transform things to the point where the end result is totally different from the original to avoid potential legal issues in the future.

There will be plenty of BGs I have to draw entirely by hand. And it's just part of finding that balance. However, using photos for reference or even for direct tracing in manga is common practice, so long as the photo is yours, or free stock footage, or you have legal permission to use it, you're fine.

Watch the Manben episodes on YT. You'll see plenty of methods mangaka use to directly use photos for BGs. Yusuke Murata also does this a lot for OPM.