/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

Some western / indie publishers of Manga:

Saturday AM ( https://www.saturday-am.com/ )
> Digital indie magazine, seems to be on the up-and-up
> Open submissions for long-form series; also distributes series currently being published elsewhere.
> Regularly publishes one-shots, making it a good potential outlet for already-finished work.

Noir Caesar ( https://www.noircaesar.com/ )
> Focuses on black (specifically African-American) content, but seems willing to publish anyone good enough.
> Seemingly series-based only.
> No "magazine" style updates; series are updated on their own schedule.
> Seems less regular than Saturday AM, but also seems larger in terms of readership.

Oni Press ( https://onipress.com/ )
> Technically indie, but at this point large enough by comic standards to be mentioned in the same breath as other publishers.

Antarctic Press ( https://antarctic-press.myshopify.com/ )
> Longtime large-indie publisher of OEL / manga-esque books.
> Seemingly taking submissions at present if http://www.antarctic-press.com/html/submissions.php is anything to go on.

Yen Press ( https://yenpress.com/ )
> Started out as a small indie publisher of original / Korean material, and has grown reasonably popular since.
> As of 2016, it is also one of the western arms of the Kadokawa Corporation, with Kadokawa owning a 51% stake.
> Editorial inquiries can apparently be sent to yenpress@yenpress.com, however, they apparently are not open to new submissions at this time.

Viz Media / Viz Originals ( https://www.viz.com/originals )
> *The* western manga publisher.
> Currently in the exploratory stages of setting up an English label.
> Submissions are open and several books have been announced. However, progress on the label seems to be moving very slowly.
> Still might be worth a shot anyway.

Shrine Comics ( https://shrinecomics.com/ )
> Small indie manga publisher
> Seemingly attempting to make the transition to physical volumes
> Allows crossposting to other sites

Other open comic publishers:

Dark Horse ( https://www.darkhorse.com )
>Dark Horse still welcomes your submissions, and all submissions will still be reviewed, just as they always have been.
>All unsolicited story/series proposals must have a full creative team on board. Writer-only proposals will not be reviewed.

Image comics ( https://imagecomics.com/ )
>Image Comics only publishes creator-owned material. They do not contract creators; they’re only interested in publishing original content for which you would retain all rights.
>Image Comics publishes creator-owned/creator-generated properties and THEY DON’T PAY PAGE RATES. Image takes a small flat fee off the books published, and it will be the responsibility of the creators to determine the division of the remaining pay between their creative team members.

Drawn and quarterly ( https://drawnandquarterly.com/ )
>Please email a low resolution PDF with at least 20 pages of comics and cover letter to submissions. Do not send dropbox links, scripts, or proposals. Please read our submissions FAQ.

Fantagraphics ( https://www.fantagraphics.com/ )
>submission page: https://www.fantagraphics.com/pages/faq

Top Shelf Productions ( https://www.topshelfcomix.com/ )
>Regarding submissions, we're easy. Just email us a download link of what you'd like us to review. NOTE: We cannot accept cover letters, plot synopses, or scripts unless they are accompanied by a minimum of 10-20 completed pages (i.e., fully inked and lettered comic book pages).

Additional publisher lists:
> https://jasonthibault.com/definitive-list-comic-publisher-submission-guidelines/
> https://writingtipsoasis.com/best-independent-comic-book-publishers/

Current Contests:

Zenon Magazine:
https://comic-zenon.com/article/entry/2023/05/09/132801

Silent Manga Audition: https://www.manga-audition.com/sma20-memorable-smile/

Magic international manga contest: https://www.shibuya-productions.com/en/magic/magic-international-manga-contest.html,73

4-koma Contest:
https://kitakyushu-mangataisho.com/en/

/mmg/'s very own anon-led anthology: /ic/onography
https://discord.gg/QYnFBves7V
https://forms.gle/d3a2Cwwd44sJYyqv9

Additional community added Resources:
Mangafonts: https://mangafonts.carrd.co/
Hiro Mashima YT: https://www.youtube.com/@mashimaCh/videos

How (You) can help /mmg/:

> Know about a contest or a publishing opportunity? TAG THE OP and post a link.
> Have a new resource? TAG THE OP and link / mention it for inclusion.
> Have a link / DL for a mentioned resource? TAG THE OP and mention what you're supplying a link for.
> SCREENSHOT / PASTEBIN effortposts that help you for posterity.

Some anon in the other comic thread posted this guide on how to make Asano-style BGs, thought it belonged here too

How much simplified should the character designs be in general to be drawn again and again with no issues while still being recognizable and providing variety?
I like the complexity of the armors in Saint Seiya but I realize Kurumada is able to draw them over and over thanks to his own shortcuts and technical flaws. On the other hand, Jujutsu Kaisen has very simplistic designs and characters that blend together due to how samey and bland their uniform is (I don't have anything against uniforms by themselves btw, FMA executes them very well because the core design is good), and while that makes for decent action scenes, it doesn't look very memorable on it's own.
How do you approach this specific aspect?

Is making a manga with no intent to share it a good way to practice drawing?

>>6936103
Why not? I drew 400 pages of manga without showing anybody, and I made pretty rapid progress. All I can say is that it worked for me.

>>6936088
Face and uniform little quirks

DESPAIR the publisher to whom I wanted to apply closed the applications a week before my submission

I'd like to work as an artist for someone else's project (I don't feel like writing) but I wouldn't know where to look

Not knowing what direction to take I decided to grind and do one page a day; regardless of the finishing percentage, it will ALWAYS be one a day. When I have decided to stop I'll go back and complete the work (becoming idk a webcomic or something to use)

Do you guys have any tips for staying on proportion? For example if I drew the same characters face 6 times in a row I guarantee they'll each look different. Not bad or off model but certainly off proportion; maybe the eyes are a little big in one or the mouth is a little higher, hair a bit more dense, etc. I keep telling myself this is me getting better in an unbelievable amount of time but still, it's worrying.

>>6936245
Measure proportions

"The mouth is this far from the chin"
"The eyes are this far from the nasal septum" etc.

>>6936249
What about for more dynamic scenes? Should you just take "creative liberties" for that sort of stuff?
Idk why but Hellsing is on my mind, I swear the proportions for that manga were fucked.

>>6936254
If you don't want to keep the proportions for dynamism then don't keep them ez

>>6936254
Yeah I wouldn't worry about it so much, staying on-model so to speak is why American comics tend to look so dull in action scenes and land so flat on jokes

>>6936245
I don't think it matters that much, so long as you didn't design your characters in such a way that they're primarily differentiated by their proportions. Even ultra famous manga have inconsistent proportions on their characters between drawings. You see it way more than your readers will.
If you absolutely must get proportions right, then yeah measure them.

>>6936254
Okay well you can't have it both ways. Either get over the "characters must be accurately proportioned" mindgoblin or let yourself be loose and expressive. If you're even asking this question then don't try to do both.
>Idk why but Hellsing is on my mind, I swear the proportions for that manga were fucked.
And yet it's great, so clearly it really doesn't matter in the end.

>>6936141
>but I wouldn't know where to look
Might be some writers here looking to collab, if you mean outside this site you can get paid work on Reddit or facebook groups. There are always, always writers looking for artists.

>>6936314
From what I've seen the reddits are full of people offering themselves to the drawings but they are all ignored

On facebook there are only people who quit the moment they have to write something more in-depth than a summary

>>6936324
I think it depends on your art style, art level, and free vs paid. If you're just looking to dick around with a writer for a 5 page story then there's comic collab subreddits. A lot of artists do get ignored because there is so much spam like 3rd worlders begging for work but they have no interior pages and only a few eSports or Twitch emotes.
Honestly the only paid gigs I've gotten were from Facebook. Look for people who have experience or the script finished and ready to go. But even that can fall through, I once worked with a guy who had a complete script but it was so fucking bad that I didn't want to put my name on it.

boys i got my g pen and mapping pen yesterday and i was wondering if anyone can help me, i find it difficult for the ink to flow well onto the paper i have winsor and newtons ink and i was wondering if it might be too thick i also noticed that a small ammount of fibers were getting caught on the nib so perhaps thats why the ink doesnt flow that well im not using a special paper its like 120g holds ink well and to me seems very smooth(i should add that i did get the coating off the nibs) im assuming its the fibers getting caught unless someone has a better idea please tell me what paper i should use instead

>>6936330
Thanks for the honest replay, I'll see somewhere

>>6936245
It's mostly practice, eventually you'll internalize proportions and know what needs to be fixed when you draw something off

But they'll never all be perfect

>>6935545
It's true a westerner couldn't write something with strong Japanese values or spiritual core, and trying to imitate that would fall flat on its face. i.e. I don't think it's possible for a westerner to make something like Kimetsu or JJK in how Japanese they are. However, this doesn't mean a westerner can't write manga, and that there aren't other types of manga they could write. Manga set in European or western settings are also popular. To me the whole idea that only the Japanese can make manga, when both artistically and thematically the industry is so diverse seems ridiculous. There are tons of manga out there, that are made by Japanese people, that don't feel Japanese at all. I think someone who loves Japanese culture enough to try to make manga rather than comics, and even goes as far as trying to 'make it' in Japan, is already influenced so much by Japanese things that the inherent "Japaneseness" of manga will show up in their work, organically. By that I don't mean the deep cultural things present in work like Kimetsu, which are a reflection of the Japanese mindset, but moreso the surface level things that help most people identify something as "manga." The type of onomatopoeia, the humor, the chibi expressions, etc..

>>6936337
Hey it's the girl from Tayu Tayu
I see you're a man of culture as well

Thoughts on heavily greyscale styles vs minimal black ink and white? I personally prefer plain black and white with a little bit of screentone, used sparingly. But the stuff I want to draw has a lot of emphasis on light and glowing, which is hard to depict without more greyscale rendering. I'm trying to find a good middle ground to study from that still emphasizes the stylish look of lines.

>>6936561
i mean why not try to get the effect you want in black and white and see how it goes the issue with having it grayscale is that pages can often just look like blobs of grey shit from afar so you need to be pretty skilled to pull it off

>>6936572
Yeah I don't like how unclear greyscale mangas are and want to avoid it. I have already experimented with purely lines but it's not going great. I'm worried I'll have to resort to just having the glowing parts be illustrated on the cover in color so readers know they're meant to be glowing. Then the contents itself would be more plain.

>>6936330
nvm im just retarded it seems that you are supposed to use bristol paper for inking with nibs
>>6936525
im surprised you could tell given how badly i half assed this, the manga was surprisingly engaging and the art was great

>>6936602
>>6936330 i meant to reply to myself >>6936337

working on the cover for the print

>>6936245
Do model sheets, draw the head from different angles, and draw the head doing different expressions.

Use colors to break down the model into its most simple shapes.

Make 3d maquettes in Blender. If a maquette from scratch is too hard download a free base model and modify it to match roughly your characters.

Mangano Award
New upcoming manga award. The submission will be judged by the editor for 10 different editorial departments and publications (Shueisha, Kadokawa, Shogakukan, Kodansha, etc.).
Open to anyone as long as
>a one-shot
>120 pages maximum
>written in Japanese
>never published in any commercial magazine/website
>color is okay
>not webtoon vertical scrolling format
deadline: until Thursday, February 15 , 2024 23:59:59 JST

>>6936969
https://manga-no.com/mangano_award_1st

>copy one detailed panel completely
>body out of commission for the rest of the night
Mangaka aren't human

>>6936969
>written in Japanese
I'd have to pay a translator but atleast I know some good ones who are fluent. I'll see what I can do. Thanks anon.
Here's the newest Oi! Beach Episode update. I agree with previous anons that the art is looking a little soulless and samey. After this chapter I'll probably go back to black and white with maybe one color splash page per update. I'll also start using a brush again and try water color shading and see what I can come up with.

Latest update:https://tapas.io/episode/3012193
Webtoon scroll version: https://tapas.io/episode/3012193

I started getting more views on the medibang version but it could just be fake/bot views
https://medibang.com/mpc/titles/nv2306180607526800024117550/

Is there a name for this type of effect? The filename gives it a name, but it doesn't seem like it's commonly used. It's often used with bangs or just loud noises in general. It's not like it's hard to draw, I'm just kinda interested.

>>6937150
>It's often used with bangs or just loud noises in general.
It is more about an impromptu realization/noting something

>>6936337

Did you make sure to burn the nib to remove the coating?

Do you think its better to stody oneshots and pilot mangas where the artist is trying their best? I feel like studying panel layout in long running mangas is not helping me because they are phoning it in and anyone reading chapter 100 of something is gonna read it no matter what. Like any random page I open of One Piece looks like shit, but I must be missing something. Isn't it supposed to look good to someone who doesn't know the story?

>got another good idea
>immediately sketch the FemC and her mentor
>promises myself to stick to this one until I am able to produce one chapter.
YOSH

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DO7g48W-GzI

>>6937494
Read a bunch of first chapters, even in serializations the first chapter is always done to a higher standard due to less time constraints

I think that Kentaro Yabuki has really good page composition
Read a bunch of shojo too since they tend to have very different page layout that can be useful to study, look at stuff from various genres and magazines with different target demographics too

>>6936337
I had a friend who bought some W&N for me, but I also couldn't get it to run very well, that's likely due to the presence of shellac in the ink (it's the stuff that makes it waterproof) You can fix this a little by diluting it with water.

Like someone else said too, you need to be conscious of oil on the nib. Right out of the package they come pre oiled to protect the metal. You can burn it off by passing it through a lighter or use an acid like lemon or lime juice, then wipe with a clean cloth (make sure it is free from the oils of your hands or other oils) I prefer lime juice, heat will also warp the metal over time if you do it too much.

If you are digging up fibers with the nib that might mean you are pressing too hard OR you are trying to draw with them like a normal pen. Because the tip is sharp, if you try to do this it will scrape the paper. You have to learn how to mostly draw dragging the pen down and you can do some side to side action, but it requires understanding you need to angle the pen or turn your paper to avoid this.

>>6937150
Flash! I love these.

>>6937666
thanks for the reply satan anon i plan on buying some bristle paper and see if the ink flows better otherwise ill dilute it, i did clear the coating by putting it in boiling water for a bit so i dont belive that was the issue as for the fibers pressure definatelly isnt the issue i had the issue of drawing too lightly rather than too hard i think the paper is just not good for it, i do probably have to get used to how to use nib better and ill have less issues

I've been thinking
Why does this look eastern? Like it's obviously from a manga, but looking at it close, they're pretty realistic faces - ugly ones, sure, but deliberately so. But it's OBVIOUSLY manga. Is it just because of the black ink and white background?

>>6937660
thanks, I will do that

>>6937714
It's more of an old school seinen manga style, it's still stylized to some extent
Western comics that lean towards realism have different style, they wouldn't use this type of paneling or that background effect

Western stuff that isn't manga inspired tends to be either very cartoony and stylized or lean heavily towards realism

>>6937714
Exaggeratedly idealized faces. Non Japanese comics just fall back on humans having realistic facial proportions. Cape comics specifically fall back on the idealization of the chiseled square face, even for a lot of females. The eyes in western comics also fit into the form of the skill whereas in manga they just kind of slap them on usually, only roughly implying the form of the brow and such. Even if the eyes in a manga are realistic, the other facial proportions will tip you off. And then western cartoon styles are a separate analysis entirely.
Oh and inks. The vast majority of western work uses big fat blocks of ink for shadows and such. The use of screentones in place of black inks alone will typically make someone wonder if something is manga. There's a lot of little details you could pick apart about how japs like to render their work, but even the heavily detailed realistic mangas like Boichi will scream "japanese" because the facial proportions are all idealized to their eastern standards. Hairstyles can be a giveaway too. Usually gravity-defying, flowy or spikey with a ton of detail in manga. Westerners don't pay much attention to hair.

>>6937714
This is why I think it is stupid for people to treat anime/manga as a "style." There are so many varied artists and styles and substyles within them, that you can't roll it into one thing. Some go for more realistic approaches, while others go for very cartoony approaches. Some try to stay faithful to anatomy, while others heavily exaggerate it.

I feel like most of the nuance comes down to the treatment of the lineart, line weight, hatching, etc.

>>6937660
I see the common point for every manga is that they have skilled editors making their stuff readable. I realized that my writing and paneling is schizo tier.

>>6937982
It's definetly one of the thing they place importance on even for contests: that the story is readable and clear

As for the writing they always talk about creating interesting situations and portraying the characters emotions well through their expressions

They also have that 4 point narrative structure, I forgot the name, but it I guess keeping it in mind works well for 20 page chapters

This panel composition looks impactful enough or do i try from a low angle but with the same energy (which i tried at first, but it's way harder than i thought)

>>6938116
I think the way you approach the background could help in a situation like this. You could frame it so that the perspective of the background is from the eyes of whoever is going to be on the receiving end of that blow looking up. That way, you could keep that figure and preserve some of the dynamism.

>>6936106
Did you copy another manga first to learn or did you dive straight in?

>>6938208
I was trying to use the top panel as a reference, so i didn't think too much in the background, i mean this is the feeling i'm trying to get

>>6938287
>Did you copy another manga first to learn
No, but that doesn't mean I did it with blinders on.
You can see for yourself the progress.
https://mega.nz/folder/9gcxWaDY#RMewn69ejwWtM9eH06d2kw
This was from ~June 2015 to when I stopped in ~October 2016 (though I started inking the unfinished chapter in August 2016, so it was a slow peter-out rather than an abrupt stop).

>>6938116
I did another try with the composition i first wanted to, but i think that the pose i weird... i have been trying to hit the right pose, but still i can't, if there's someone with good anatomy and perspective skill that could give me advice, i would be grateful

>>6937938
I think it's the storytelling that is completely different than western comics.

I had a fucking great idea for a character dynamic today and I can't remember what it was
anons, please write down your ideas when you have them, if you don't it WILL lead to a real urge to commit suicide

>>6938488
and the styles that are most popular/emulated

>>6938568
If you forgot it that easily it probably wasn't as good as you thought it was when you came up with it

>>6938667
no, that's what I used to tell myself, that's cope, it was a good idea and it can happen to you too
heed my warning

>>6938581
So what do you call the mental illness that prevents someone from just copying their successful competitors model? Is it just terminal pride? Not like they'd have to trash every superhero overnight, but im pretty sure theres not a single domestic mass-produced option that directly competes with manga.
I guess when I think back, when I envied a peer artist, my immediate thoughts weren't to copy them but to stand out even more from them. It wasn't until I dropped that mentality and started studying them instead that I made gains.

>>6938960
They don't have any idea how to replicate manga, they just try to publish a bunch of super generic battle shonen style shit and abandon attempts once that doesn't sell

They're better off just importing what sells in Japan honestly, they only want original stuff for portfolio reasons or to branch off into toys, merchandise and anime

Anthology magazines/sites that attempt to replicate manga magazines are usually attempted by some small publishers but they always do poorly and are like bimonthly which sucks

You also need to expand distribution and build an audience for the new shit, manga is sold everywhere in Japan since the 60s

You need to distribute in newsstands, capture an ageing population which is hard and compete with manga themselves which have had 50+ years to build their industry

>>6939036
So they're just fundamentally mindbroken by generations of tradition? We have a whole generation now that grew up with anime. Many grew up almost exclusively watching anime and reading manga. These new people are the key they're the most likely to realize what makes manga truly manga-like. For a long time I thought if I ever got a ton of money I'd do a shonen-jump style anthology for westerners. Hearing they've been attempted already, I'm wondering if it's a marketing issue or a content issue. Possibly both. It's hard to keep up with the pace of manga but if the content is good enough people would wait. But no one knowing it exists means it's DOA. It's a herculean undertaking but I really believe we can accomplish it with the newer generations who love manga and aren't mindbroken by tradition. That and a hefty investment. Not to mention digital mobile reading is the future.
There's still some elitism with Japanese media but it's gotten very normie-fied as of late. Meaning less people turning up their nose, as long as it's good. Soon we should be poised perfectly to introduce western "manga" if it's done well enough. Which we are also soon poised to be able to do. Tons of foreigners are starting to work in manga and anime now, their experience in it could change the whole western landscape if they wanted

>>6939050
The issue is that non-Japs trying to make "manga" are only able to copy surface-level stereotypes, just one step removed from a South Park parody.

They have never had an original idea or style, they just want -insert popular anime- to have their name on it instead of the creator's.

>>6939036
The only manga you can find consistently at japanese newsstands is One Piece tankobons, shonen jump and the other anthology Mags similar to jump

>>6939056
It's dishonest to say none, or never, or all. There's people making perfectly interesting stories but their presentation is lacking. They don't prioritize the right stuff or focus on the right things. They don't have the training to know exactly how one expresses emotions or impact the way manga does. Possibly they lack the patience of how much work that can be. If japanese mangaka came and opened a school for manga in America I believe we'd get some decent stuff out of the graduates and a handful of great stuff. But only if it's allowed to operate and teach under japanese cultural rules. A big hurdle with the west is us holding ourselves back because of our cultural worries

>>6939060
In Japan there is a real book store on every corner, in cities where everyone walks past them every day just to get to school or work. In America (aside from a handful of metropolitan areas) you have to drive across town or to the next to find a dedicated book store, and then find a dedicated comic book store to find anything that's not Wal-Mart friendly.

>>6939060
>>6939190
Japan is both small and densely populated, it has a respectable population of 130 million people and has THE most urbanized and populated city in the world

Distribution and reaching distribution points is easier, even independent mangakas can reach a wide enough audience with stuff like comiket

The only things that can come close to that in the west are internet and the newsstand

>>6939232
Even japs are reading more digital manga today on their phones. And their country always lags behind in adopting new things. They might have been the tech giants of the 80's but they took their fucking time to ditch email and cash and forums and other daily tech habits. Now their zoomers are plugged in to international social media full blast and they're on their phones 24/7. Expect to see paper manga sales drop steadily much like comics have been falling off. Except it's not for lack of interest in the content, but the format. The sales will simply migrate, unlike comics. I completely expect the manga page print dimensions of the future to be the exact proportions of a smartphone screen. Give it a decade to take hold, then distribution becomes a game of who offers the best service

>>6939250
You really think the current phone paradigm is going to last another decade? Unlikely. It will be phased out as mobile phone sales have been dropping and the manufacturers will once again change the form factor in order to invalidate all current devices, peripherals and software so they can sell you all of it all over again in the new form factor.

>>6939276
Mobile sales are only dropping because nobody can afford new phones so they can't keep making infinite profit. And lack of infinite number-go-up makes investors pull out. The price tags are bananas when the first iPhone was like $400 in 07. They aren't going to be able to sell anything to anyone at the rate things are going. Smart devices are here to stay though. The screen proportions have been more or less unaltered for like 15 years now and people have adapted a fuckton of services to those dimensions like youtube shorts for example.

>>6939250
Nah classic format works well on phones too if your page doesn't have too many panels, even on Pixiv that format stays

Physical sales are still 2/3 of the market

Besides Western comics are monetized terribly on the internet, and with physical still being this big you're losing out on sales by being digital only

Even in the digital space Japan is ahead with all their apps and stores

https://m.tapas.io/episode/3013789

Updated.
I wish I saw more links around here.

>>6939423
sorry no link

Style study

>>6937317
>>6937666
For the record, this is what I meant by the effect. I just used that other image because it was obvious what I was talking about without having to circle it, but I guess it worked against me.

>>6935545
I've wanted to make a story for awhile now, got basic character designs and feel for what I want, but can't write for shit, every time I try it sounds like something a 12 year old made or it's a bleach clone.

>>6939476
You’ll never know if it’s actually any good until you put nib to paper, anon. Just make it.

I'm new, how do i do proper panelling?
Any good tutorials or videos on it?
I used to watch megamikey but found out he wasnt the best for anime styles.

>>6939835
You gotta figure it out on your own. Paneling is mostly about personal style, so tutorials are mostly useless. If you really need help, just copy what manga do.

>>6939835
Start by reading. Look at the comics you like. What pages are your favorites? Figure out what makes them work for you.

>>6939835
Be mindful of reading direction, you usually want actions to follow it

Make sure action follows clearly from one panel to the next, it's usually good to have one panel that anticipates the action and the next shows it (i.e. preparing to throw a punch and the punch connecting)

The above also works for shot-reaction shot type of stuff: show something an then the character reactions

180 degree rule

For action scenes try to have at leas a big panel with background and environment to show the relative position of all characters involved

But also don't be too fixated on following rules all the time, if it feels good and looks good it's good

>>6940025
>>6939906
>>6939866
thanks guys

>>6939190
>In Japan there is a real book store on every corner,
No there isn't, not even in Shibuya. Why are you making things up?

>>6936337
You should be using manga paper (Deleter, IC, etc.) and pilot drafting ink, it's kneecapping yourself by using different ink/paper than the industry standard. Also, I suggest starting out with the spoon nib before leveling up to the G Pen. If you can't find manga paper Bristol paper can be a suitable alternative.

>>6940344
Deleter paper is hot garbage, thin cheapo shit. Get some decent bristol board instead.

I just want to be told what to draw. I'm tired of spending dozens of hours storyboarding only for it to still be incomprehensible schizo babble.

>>6940392
Draw Jiren.

>>6940344
Canson 11x14 mixed media is cheap and greating

>>6940215
i think he's being hyperbolic. There is quite a high density of big book stores though and if you go to Jimbochou, there actually is one on quite literally every street corner

Are there any examples of manga officially colored using colored pencils?
All I can find from searches are people coloring their copies of naruto like a coloring book.

>>6936103
I don't see why not. Every panel is technically its own drawing.

I remember asking before, but i just posted the scketch of the panels, and now i did the whole scketch of the page, but i still wonder witch one looks more impactful this one

>>6941070
Or this one

>>6941070
first one has better paneling

>>6935545
Man, Claymore was so cool. Shame about how it ended.

>>6941214
How, is just one panel that's different

>>6942482
ah sorry poor choice of words on my part I think the word is Framing? gives a better sense of movement of him coming forward and down, plus the shocked reaction shot looks better when she dodges the swing so no need to add 2 of them in my opinion but up to you

Any fast eye movement (in one panel if it's possible) tips?

>>6942667
One way I've seen it done is to draw concentric circles (or half circles) around the pupils, which is meant to mimic the "shakiness" of the eye in fear or shocked expressions.
If you're talking about darting eye movement, that's a bit trickier...
My only thought would be to draw the key frames of the pupils with motion lines all at once, but that may be difficult to make it readable while also not having it look cluttered.

>>6936711
Done

>>6942667
Usually two to three small consecutive panels showing the same character face and pupils/iris in different positions

In a single panel you can draw swirls, scribbled shaky pupils or uncompleted irises but those convey shakiness and all over the place darting rather than specific movement

If you wanna imply a specific eye movement in a single panel you can draw the eyes pointing in a different direction than the face, the movement isn't shown but the reader is gonna assume it happened since at rest you look at the direction you're facing meaning they glanced at something but didn't have time to turn

Sometimes I think about all the shows from western producers but animated using Japanese studios or Korean studios. Sometimes I think about them and feel dread. Style will never be enough. Even being produced in japan like the rwby anime or the new scott pilgrim cartoon is not enough. It's just a western product wearing a japanese skinsuit. An uncanny valley experience that is nauseating to watch because it's only half committed. No one ever fully commits.
And when I sit to sketch out manga pages I'm thinking about it and sweating over how I'm presenting different emotions and situations. I need to commit to make something satisfying. Bur eastern cultures just experience the human thing differently. Same kinds of emotions and ethics as anyone but interpreted so differently through such a specific lens. Getting in their head without becoming delusional about it is a challenge like no other. I can't end up adding another uncanny product onto the pile. I refuse.

>>6943653
Then make what works for you rather than imitating someone in a far off country with an entirely different culture because it's popular.

>>6943088
Lookin' good.

>>6943695
But I like what they make best and want to do that exactly

>>6943704
Thanks, I am now working in the cover for the next saga

>>6943763
Then what are the westerners "doing wrong" that the easterners are "doing right"

today I will actually draw my comic instead of daydreaming about it

today I will daydream about my comic instead of drawing it

>>6941335
Claymore was the first manga I physically collected all of!

Also I'm doing studies of Megaman Zero - would those count as /asg/? I'm always unsure of where to post

Do you anons post your work anywhere or just keep it to yourself (or in your heads)? I saw one anon mention Tapas, but I was curious if anyone self-hosted like on Neocities. You can even set up webrings there like the old days of webcomics

>>6936103
yeah it is, if you're focused on improving while making it.

what is your secret to having confidence in your story? i get bored of my ideas so quickly and i can't help but wonder if it means it wasn't any good in the first place.

>>6944108
Try to think in a story you would like to show to your friends or would please them

>>6944108
Don't know, but maybe it's because it makes me laugh and cry uncontrollably sometimes, i mean there's scene that while thinking of them makes me feel a lot so i hope that people will feel like that when they read them

For example after watching rick and morty last night i imagine a scene with that typical trope of "one of us lies and the other says the truth"
>alright so you can ask only one question
>u sure?
>...alright i will give you another chance
>really? :D
>The guardian facepalms himself

>>6944108
Outline the whole thing (or as much as you can) and read it through. You have to be the no.1 fan of your work and believe in it, honestly. Readers are nice, but you can't rely on them to lift you up
Also nothing wrong with making short stories to get them out of your head. Sometimes I just write instead of making it into a comic.

>>6944330
What is that picture from?

>>6944475
Don't know

>>6944484
Understandable

>>6944475
It's from Emerald by Hiroaki Samura (also known for Blade of the Immortal)

>>6935545
So, if I decide to send something to a publisher, should I sent them a storyboard or a final draft?

>>6944537
Depends on the publisher but usually 5-20 finished pages plus proposal and outline for comics/graphic novels

>>6944548
5-20 pages is doable. Thank you anon

>>6944108
do short stories and one shots until you come along one that really clicks for you

>>6944580
Viz opened to oneshot submissions last month, seems worth a shot since they have a manga magazine editor on board this time

>>6944108
Being a storyteller helps, presumably because imo you just want to write new stuff all the time regardless of whether it actually ends up good bad or even non worthwhile. Writing is fun, so learn to write for yourself first same as drawing. Then learn to write for other people to find success.

>>6936337
show the nibs

are there examples of manga with smooth razor sharp lines done on digital? Everything is gritty and slightly blurry which I like the look of, but is that actually how it looks when they draw it or is that due to scanning pages?

>>6944858
All lines are blurry/pixelated if you enlarge them, but if your page has high resolution it shouldn't be visible

Other than that it depends on the quality of the displayed page which is usually less than the full resolution of the original file

Does this answer your question? I'm not quite sure what you're asking, desu

>>6944939
thanks, it does. Resizing art seems to improve the line quality greatly, but I don't know why.

>>6944537
They need to see what the final work is going to look like and they need to see where you're heading with it, so samples of finished work (ideally inked & finished sample pages of the work you're sending them) and storyboards or at least a synopsis at least a few chapters in is the minimum I'd say.

>>6944858
It's due to scanning pages. I can't share them obv but I've been shown originals from a few artists by my editor and yeah they're as jaggy as yours or mine.

>>6945011
it's for the better lol. I don't need anyone to be zooming in hyperfocusing on the random dust, fallen hairs, or random lines.

This reminds me of when Hirano mentioned the reason he bolds the lines around characters was because he's insecure about his line quality.

>>6945039
Lines that are too thin are bad for print

I remember some judges mentioning this in some silent manga judging, because digital allows you to work with really thin lines

>>6943874
almost there

>>6945048
>Kid Rock's Bizarre Adventure

>>6943891
being honest with themselves and true to their own experience instead of trying to copy someone from a completely different world

>>6945195
Kek

Did a copy practice/study of reincarnation coliseum. Would like to get to this level of stylization/skill with my own ideas but I am trash when it comes to my own stuff.

>>6945250
Nice study anon, I'm the same way. Love to copy the layout of pages in mangas but making my own pages always fails

>>6945250
were the lines of places like his hands drawn in one stroke or drawn over multiple times?

>>6945398
Multiple, but the more I practice the less strokes I find myself using each time.

>>6944108
What helps me is in having a crazy idea that I would find entertaining or funny. I don’t sweat if it’s a good idea or not as I really don’t care much about making readers happy. I just want to tell a story, good or bad, even if the only person who keks or is engaged is me

>>6945419

Do you guys know any publishers that do NSFW comics? I want to get into comic making but my biggest experience is in drawing porn, I've just never thought about actually going to a publisher before

Is it gay to feel shy about using Japan as a setting because you don't want to be the baka-ass gaijin who made a silly mistake in their depiction of Japan?

>>6946067
I've come to a revelation. The less Japan-centric and "anime" a manga, or any given japanese media is (in terms of setting, plot, characters and cultural references), the higher the quality. I'm not even kidding, some of the best manga, anime and games are often the ones whose setting aren't based in Japan (Berserk, FMA, Cowboy Bebop, UC Gundam, Frieren, Nausicaa, Steel Ball Run, Zelda, Metroid). Why is this? What about heavy japanese influences stifles quality?

>>6946086
Reading Umineko made me think how funny it is that the Japanese are always able to make Western culture seem super cool and exotic to me even though I'm a Westerner myself.
And I'd also add Legend of the Galactic Heroes to that list.

>>6946067
not at all. thats called not being a weeb. Learning about any place beyond pop culture is bound to give you a better understanding, respect, or even a surprising amount of disdain for those places.

>>6946086
I agree with this. I think the truth is that japan is actually pretty shit outside of tourist traps. The people can be randomly rude if they can get away with it. The can lie and try to cheat you if they can get away with it. The streets are surprisingly dirty and there's a small but visible homeless problem. Japanese media is at its absolute best when it's depicting an idealistic perfect world. Not actual japan and their actual world. We should learn from that here.
I watch videos about japan from random russians living there and it's kind of eye opening. Euros or americans like me living in japan are always quick to sugarcoat the country or depict it as a cool sparkly fun place, and they really play down just how bad the negative aspects are. But russians have no such pretense. They tell you exactly what they see. One dude filmed himself walking down a regular street, it's got litter and there's tons of old chewing gum spots on the asphalt. He's immediately approached by two prostitutes who try to proposition him in English. He declines but while walking away mentions how he's not sure they're actually women kek. The same guy did a video in a Japanese school after classes and the students are fucking fat. Like every schoolgirl in view of the camera is at least a little overweight. Some woman I watched talked about how she was randomly approached by some jap who immediately started accusing her of thinking she's superior for being white. Another woman was vlogging about how she'll never adjust to Japan's culture of "it can't be helped" because they literally believe if things are bad at say, the office, it's frowned upon to try and take initiative to make them better. You might even get reprimanded for trying to impose your positive attitude on everyone else. It's just not the polite and clean genki land everyone wants you to think it is. They have to take many liberties when the story is set in modern japan and it can make a story feel pretty stilted.

>>6946153
I forgot to add that wherever you live, you can make it look just as pleasant and fantastical as japan. Every place has beautiful features. A good creative can turn a rickety old shack in the woods into a charming cozy cabin with bright inviting foliage flowers and nature. Or a busted old gas station in the middle of bumfuck Utah into a cool piece of modern cowboy americana with lots of liberties taken to depict it better than it is.
Japanese artists literally just live with a sort of deliberate delusion for the sake of making a pleasing result. While westerners have a weird habit of needing to depict reality as reality. We even get angry at each other for being inaccurate. It's weird

>>6946153
I honestly just wish more modern day shounen (and manga as a whole) went the way of One Piece or even early Dragon Ball when it comes to their settings. Neither of those is my favorite series, but I appreciate the fact that they're pretty original (and wacky) in many ways. Like, they feels like a completely different world with its own way of doing things. Sure, they draw influences from real life like every work of fiction, but both are still fairly original. I hate how every modern day shounen is just a setting in a different version of Japan (and not even the more interesting exotic and overlooked parts of Japan, it's always fucking Tokyo and neighbouring places), one way or another. BnHA is just modern day Japan, JJK is just modern day Japan and KnY is just Japan 100 years ago.

>>6946176
I agree with that too. The best juggernaut animes with worldwide acclaim built up these cool interesting worlds, which work great with these fantastical larger than life characters and powers. Because your brain can go wild to fill in the gaps of an alternate reality, and that's more interesting for most people.
As boring as generic versions of Tokyo is, it's still somehow more interesting than capes all being set in cities. Those japs still manage to idealize the setting in such a way that makes it more pleasant and interesting than reality. Capes don't even do that much, it's always just typical skeevy boring city with heroes.
I'm still comfy in the 00's era of anime where series like pokémon or naruto have this big unique world with its own rules, it's own settings. You can borrow from real life, but the winning strategy is to idealize what you borrow and really exaggerate it. That's just narrative gold

>>6946176
It's just a problem of locality. Comic/manga publishers are stationed in the big city, so all the prospective creators move there to work close to the office for convenience (and prestige). This means all their experiences are nothing but the city, which becomes all they can write.

Same reason all American comics take place in NYC or SF.

>>6946153
This is the proof that misery, despair and sadness create high tier enterteniment

>>6946233
Not really, most of the best entertainment comes Frome wealthy countries

It's mostly good economic opportunities and freedom of expression that create good entertainment

>>6946222
How can it be all you can write about if you can imagine anything in your mind? You don't have to write about rural kansas if you don't know about it, but you can create Sasnak, a fictional rural world where people just live however you say they do because it's fiction. I'm more inclined to think city people are just sniffing their own farts about living in a city. Or it's that whole thing where americans shit on each other for "not doing your research" or "appropriation" about the intricacies of how you shoe a horse on a Saturday. It's probably for the best though, I'd rather people only write about stuff they're genuinely interested in or fond of anyway.

>>6946238
low IQ rich kid wishful thinking lul

>>6946153
>It's just not the polite and clean genki land everyone wants you to think it is. They have to take many liberties when the story is set in modern japan and it can make a story feel pretty stilted.

I think people have actually been aware of this for years. At bare minimum, even people within the anime/manga fanbase sphere have always been aware of things like the horrible treatment of mangaka, illustrators, animators, etc. in Japan. Nevermind the harassment toward creators, VAs, etc. if they somehow slight the fanbase.

Most people are aware of how exhausting the work culture is over there, and how the downtrodden get swept under the rug. There's tons of videos on the homeless in Japan, where they get stuck in a cycle they can't break out of (but that happens practically anywhere) then problems like Hikikomori, outcasts, and people who are looked down on and cast aside.

I think a lot of people are privy to the fact that Japan isn't some magical, mystical land of honor and tradition, and culture, and ancient temples and shrines with breath-taking legends behind them. A lot of it is a facade, but most countries and cultures do that.

>>6946053
I don't know any english speaking publishers that publisher porn, no. Plenty of japanese ones do though, and I'm working with one of them.

>>6946244
>if you can imagine anything in your mind?
Anon, not nearly as many people have an imagination as you would like to think, even among people who draw and write.

>>6946315
Do you get in contact with them in Japanese or English?

>>6946320
They type in japanese. I initially typed in japanese back, but now I just type back in english and we just translate each other's messages on our own ends.

>>6946330
Holy shit, that's actually great, my Japanese isn't really at a conversation level. I've been doing 4-8 page comics for a while now, it's gonna be fun to try out something a bit bigger
Did you send something already inked at first or just a storyboard? I'd say they'd need some 18-40 pages?

>>6946351
I initially sent them a complete inked/toned manuscript. They liked the drawings but the theme was wrong for their mags and there was plenty of problems with the writing. I submitted a finished storyboard for a more appropriate work for their magazine, and we began fixing it up over the course of a few weeks. They'd seen finished pages from me, but they had me ink and finish a couple of sample pages anyway, so they could pointed out how I should draw certain things differently. A major change they suggested is that I ink the pages with scratchier, rougher line work rather than aiming for clean lines like I had been doing.
Can I see some of your work? Pretend I'm a publisher and you want to convince them you'll draw your best shit with them.

>>6946287
The point is to take a lesson from what they specifically do with this facade. Manga and their media is so successful because they learned how to dress it up with the perfect amount of flare, wish fulfillment and imagination. Their country is no better or worse than any other, but they're excellent idea and visual salesmen who can cut right through to the heart of idyllic appeal. We can all do that with the countries and cultures in which we live, no matter if they're shitty. Dress up or ignore the shitty parts correctly, exaggerate the good appealing parts correctly, and you've got a great work of fiction. Key word being fiction, because it's pure delusional fantasy even if you're writing about something "real," but it's so very satisfying

>>6946244
people will always be drawing from their lived experiences. that's why there are so many derivative fantasy isekai works right now.

>>6946408
But the greatest stories couldn't have been lived, they're usually batshit insane with superhuman abilities or in some future dystopia or in space or something. People do isekai because everyone hates their lives and themselves nowadays I reckon

>>6946417
>the greatest stories couldn't have been lived, they're usually batshit insane with superhuman abilities or in some future dystopia or in space or something
NTA but you read way too much shounen manga. Or you just have really atrocious taste and think the rest of the world shares it.

>>6946417
You're confusing story with setting. People flying around shooting energy blasts isn't a story.

>>6946427
Remind me, which series are the most famous by sheer number again? Let's not even look at japan anymore. Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Harry Potter? How about bideo game? Final Fantasy, Legend of Zelda, Pokémon? Come on, don't be dumb. These are not stories you could get by having lived them.

>>6946477
>which series are the most famous by sheer number again?
Since when has "sheer number" ever been the determining factor in the discussion of "greatest stories"? This is an /a/-tier argument, which is not praise.

>Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Harry Potter?
Nobody has claimed Harry Potter is among the "greatest stories". Ever.
Star Wars, maybe some overly-enthusiastic fans (actually that may be the case for HP too), but still no.
Lord of the Rings *might* be a genuine contender for one of the "greatest stories", and it's also famously an example of the author using his life experiences to color his work. It's well known that Tolkien's WW-veteran background greatly impacted the Lord of the Rings books.

>These are not stories you could get by having lived them.
I'm with the other anon, you seem to be using the word "story" to mean "setting". Life experience absolutely can inform the story and writing of a work, even fantastical ones. I'd argue you're wrong even if we're just talking about settings, even if you make shit up completely, you still have to base that imagination on something, somewhere. For example, you might know from past experience that mankind is somewhat dependent on water to survive, so it's only logical to you that the village your story is set in is built around a river that they use for drinking water, cleaning so on. Your life experience as an author can absolutely have a large affect on the content of your work, the ideas you have and pursue and how you choose to depict things. I personally don't think that life experience is as essential for creating great work as people like to claim, but it absolutely does play a role in your writing even when you're depicting fantastical subjects and settings.

>>6946497
>life experience
You do realize the entire topic was about people who live in cities only writing about cities right? No shit we write the inner workings of the stories themselves from experience what's kind of argument is this? What point are you trying to make? How else are you supposed to write anything, in general, without using memory recall of whatever stimuli your body has registered in the past?
This discussion was explicitly about cityfags writing nothing but city settings, read nigga. I'm not interested in your subjective opinion of "good"

>>6946512
Right, you're only interested in YOUR subjective opinion of "good".
Alright I'll address the tune you're suddenly deciding to sing: the works that aren't about cityfag shit are also written by cityfags.
And read more fucking manga.

>>6946519
>statistics are subjective
Ok
>suddenly
Anyway it sounds like you're just here to bitch about some point you imagine I'm making. Let me recap for you
>It's just a problem of locality. Comic/manga publishers are stationed in the big city... This means all their experiences are nothing but the city
so I reply
>How can [the city] be all you can write about if you can imagine [any place] in your mind?
To which anon replies
>people will always be drawing from their lived experiences
And I say
>But the greatest stories couldn't have been lived [in]
Following? If I knew some retard I probably wasn't even talking to was going to start giving me a spiel about the esoteric experiences of life being a part of literature, I would have used idiot proof language. I have nothing else to say, so cheers

This thread is inspiring me to write about retards who never post their work.

what I mean by lived experience is, knowing how people act and how life moves- even just how people talk to eachother. The experiences of other people, how it shapes the places they live in, in good or bad ways... A good example of lacking it would be like CWC, with comparatively little life experience and most of that from being around his old parents. The result is a lot of references to whatever they were into or had on tv, or references to videogames or media exposure.

You can write idyllic fantasies without leaving your town or going outside, but fantasies which don't draw any comparison to life or reality might not end up being very compelling stories.

>>6946530
It would be nice to have a monthly one-page theme and we can all share our work that way. For example, this month's theme could be about autists too afraid to post their work
I think some anons don't want to share because they don't want to out themselves that they post on this site

>>6936088
There is no sure fire answer but once you get used to drawing a character, youll get faster and faster do to memory. It will still take a while to draw due to their complexity, but it will be like hitting hitting the highway to go out of town. A long 45min drive, but its straight forward.

To answer next question, there is no solid time frame of when youll get used to drawing them. Its up to you personally. Could take you 1 comic to hit a groove, could take you 5. Up to you.

Shit is frying my brain. Do I directly create a canvas with "main content area" dimensions or "trimmed area artwork" dimensions?

>>6947053
those are SMA's guidelines right?
>Do I directly create a canvas with "main content area" dimensions or "trimmed area artwork" dimensions?
neither, you create a B4 then make guidelines for the main content area and add the trim margins to the sides
took me a while to get it but they give you a pdf doc that kinda explains it, do exactly what it tells you

>>6947090
>those are SMA's guidelines right?
yea
wtf??? no way so I gotta submit my manga with the trim lines showing and shit? that makes no sense...
do me a solid and pass me the one you already made plsss

>>6947090
like it's confusing for no reason. I'm drawing digitally why can't I just create a main area dimensions canvas from the get go. Having to do all this I've got no clue about is crazy, I could make mistakes.

>>6947286
no not at all, when you're done you crop the pages yourself
pretty sure there's a function that lets you automate it on PS, idk about CSP
>do me a solid and pass me the one you already made plsss
if you draw in Photoshop sure I can send you the template
>>6947288
you could do this but it's nice to have a bit of white space at the margins plus I trust the japs to know what's the best for me

>>6947317
>you could do
Then I absolutely am. I mean even if I create a main content area canvas there's still a little white space, I'm not gonna be drawing at the edges
>if you draw in Photoshop sure I can send you the template
just to be sure do send it

>>6946053
Iron Circus Comics publishes NSFW comics and are open to submissions

>>6941335
What's wrong with the ending? I think it was decent enough for a fantasy manga

>>6946362
So which hentai publisher are you working with?

Do you happen to know how much money do hentai manga artists make?

>>6937938
The whole "anime" thing is as loose and vague as it gets, and basically a very modern day american thing to say. If one reads the comments of people complaining about "anime swordsmen" in normie games like smash bros or JRPGs in general being "too anime", it appears obvious that people using the term are not even capable of defining it well. It's all painfully surface-level and can probably only make sense for Westerners who discovered the existence of Japan, japanese culture and entry level series recently.
It's obviously just a vague aesthetic thing for them, and it can only make me roll my eyes (though their complete inability to properly define what they generally mean by the term "anime" always stays amusing, they desperately want that stupid word to mean something, which admitedly is hilarious in and of itself).

>>6948385
TI Net, publishers of COMIC Mugen Tensei & COMIC MILF.
>Do you happen to know how much money do hentai manga artists make?
They have the starting page rate posted clearly on their website, it's 8000yen a page. Veteran authors can negotiate higher page rates.
The basic contract is 10% royalties on print book sales and roughly 25% of the store price on digital sales. As far as I'm aware, this is standard.

>>6948394
Awesome, best success to you! :)

Once you are published in Japan. Have you thought about publishing in Fakku?

>>6948396
I might look into it at some point, but right now I have no idea what that would entail or if it's worthwhile. For the time being, that's counting my chickens before they've hatched. The book needs to be a success in japan before any overseas publisher would be interested, I imagine.
Either way, I'd need to clear it with the publisher -- I own the creative rights of the books I make, but not the distribution rights. I'm not sure Fakku has an existing relationship with TI Net. I can't think of any TI Net book that Fakku has distributed anyway. So I'd need to basically be the guy pushing for this, and I don't know nearly enough about either publisher to know if that's even worth anybody's while.

>>6948394
how did you get in contact with them?

on the topic,
has anyone independently published material before? Particularly on sites like melonbooks or dlsite?
I'm like 50% done the doujin im working on for a certain series and im starting to think about how I release it, but I honestly have no clue

>>6948262
Been years since I read Claymore but I remember it feeling dragged out and rushed at the same time. He also revealed that stuff about the organization/Claymore's world but didn't do anything with it. It felt like he lost interest in writing it.

>>6948463
They have a submission portal on their website. I made something, sent it in and they contacted me.

>>6948893
I've dabbled with dlsite. I haven't really given it a fair shake, I only uploaded something that had already been finished and out there since early 2022, and it sold quite poorly. I don't know if I got the pricing right, or the tags right, but it uploaded without a hitch.
https://www.dlsite.com/maniax/work/=/product_id/RJ01102879.html
I also keep getting emails about sales, but they're all opt-in and you have to specifically tell them that you opt in, I think. It's weird and I don't really know what's going on with it so I haven't bothered with it.

>>6949132
Have you tried publishing for the kindle in amazon.jp?
(Assuming your stuff is NSFW) I have seen explicit works being sold for the amazon kindle in the japanese version of amazon.

Seems like amazon.jp is more open to sell that content than amazon.com

>>6949364
I haven't tried that, no. I just threw this up there to see how it would do. It did poorly, so I stopped paying attention to it and continued focusing on working on non-doujinshi work (see >>6949117)

>>6949132
did you advertise at all on twitter/do you have a social media following?

>>6949519
Nah basically not/none at all. Like I said, I haven't really given it a fair shake.

>>6948394

Intresting, is this the site: https://web.mujin-ti.net/

How can I translate the site? google translate doesn´t work... T_T

>>6949534
Yes, that's the site.
I use DeepL. I don't use it as an extension in my browser, I just copy the text and paste it into the program. Google translate would work just as well for these purposes, and I often use both to translate the same texts.
Keep in mind if you want to have any hope of being able to communicate with their staff then you should at least be able to navigate the website, even if you need to translate it.
The submission portal is the very last link, on the bottom right of the page.

>>6949542
Thanks man.

Best of luck in your project and dreams!

>>6946153
So, real Japan is like Poland with cheap housing and more whores?

Trouble staying motivated bros. I feel like I had my chance when I was young and interested in subjects comics and manga usually address.

Now I'm too old and wasted too much time or other stuff that I have no interest in any mangas. I feel like that I understand what I need to do to succeed but I don't have the passion anymore. I struggle to find anything in manga that seems truly inspiring anymore.

What are the ones really doing interesting stuff these days?

>>6949921
This is the stage of your life where you get into pre-2000 european comics, or things with similar appeal like older mecha and sci-fi anime if you still want to stick to weeb stuff. No shortcuts due to deadlines, bigger narratives, more interesting and high effort art styles and concepts.

>>6949921
How is anybody supposed to tell you what'll be interesting to you, dude? Gonna have to follow your own tastes.
And if there aren't manga that interest you, then make one that interests you. If you think you can't just because you don't have some nebulous "spark" or "passion" then just consider how naive it is to assume that all the professionals today are fueled by such a thing. Or perhaps consider that maybe you simply don't really want to make manga anymore. If that's so, then consider yourself lucky that you realized this before you got locked into doing it as your profession.

>>6943088
1/3

>>6950118
2/3

>>6950120
3/3

>>6949921
>I struggle to find anything in manga that seems truly inspiring anymore
Me too but that's why I want to make manga instead of read it. What I miss most is the more existential style of thought in 00's manga so I will just do it myself

>>6950192
>What I miss most is the more existential style of thought in 00's manga so I will just do it myself
Same.

>>6950120
you should make the card diagram bigger, like dramatically big, I think that would make it funner

>>6932120
couple more sketch pages

>>6950120
Good page

>>6950123
kek the heads on the tongues is a nice touch.

>>6951761
>>6951799
Thanks
>>6951138
Good sugestion. I will do it.

>>6950123
4/7

>>6951877
5/7

>>6951880
6/7

>>6951883
7/7

has anyone heard of comicwalker before? is it a place you can publish your own manga digitally for free like webtoon?

i was following a storytime on /a/ (wizard and the red pilgrim) and was surprised something like this is making a splash. pic related, it's a page from the manga. i honestly thought it was someone on here that was self-promo-ing their work and someone else in the thread thought so too.

>>6935545
What resolution do you guy’s normally begin with making digital manga

any professional manga that uses lowercase text instead of having everything uppercase all the time?

>>6952575
One of the CSP presets at 600dpi,

>>6952635
There is no upper case and lower case in japanese, anon. If you meant manga where the translators use lower case, I can't think of anything (that isn't a really terrible fan scanlation with lazy/amateurish typesetting).

>>6952635
barefoot gen?

Psychokinesis manga

>>6953170
COOL!

Apparently someone non Japanese finally got a Gold award on the MangaPlus thing

>>6954868
I think it's actually the first person ever to get gold in that contest, regardless of nationality

>>6955437

>>6955438

>takes hours to make one page that is read in 10 seconds

where does all the time go?

There's a ton of indie, self-contained western comic books that cover a variety of stories and subjects, its not all regurgitated, byzantine capeshit!

the problem is that they're almost all unsightly to look at and are written by self-centered, smug assholes. there's a reason why indie comics have that nasty, distinct hipster stink or "tumblr incarnate vibe" stereotype to them while doujins and web-published manga and even webtoons don't

>Want to try making a comic
>How hard can it be
>Now have to deal with artist block AND writer's block, sometimes concurrently
>Fuuuccckkkk

>>6955484
The trade-off is that potentially infinite people can read the page

>>6946153
Can you link me some of those channels?

Is Webtoon a good place to publish comics? Dog nigga got really popular on it and it even got printed volumes.

>>6955676
There are a lot indie comics like that but it's just as easy to just host your own Kickstarter or whatever. Go onto the comics section on there now and you'll see all kinds of stories. Mostly NSFW but people fund that shit real fast

>are written by self-centered, smug assholes
This goes for both Tumblr-core and conservative types, though. Immediately makes me think of that guy who writes all those furry comics about rabbits and Trump or whatever. That's also fucking cringe

>>6955678
A good excuse for Find outlets for both

>>6955676
>they're almost all unsightly to look at and are written by self-centered, smug assholes
How do we fix this? Why do these people go into comics and shit up the place instead of like, film making or something? Is it because to make film you need friends? It's still a million times easier just to set up a camera and act than sit there and draw. If they just want to soap box they could make a YouTube channel and do promotional ads for money. Pisses me off that they've made the comics medium even worse than it already was by the 90's.

>>6956216
by drawing something instead of complaining to strangers on the internet

>>6956221
Randoms drawing more good comics will not remedy the situation no matter how smugly you shitpost

>>6956223
shit comics are popular and prevalent, should we stop them from being made or try to stop people from reading them?
>I don't want to stop comics from being made or seen, I want to improve the quality of existing comics!
so make better comics
>I want to change other artists to make comics that I want to see!
become an example, raise the bar
>I want to gatekeep shitty artists!
become someone with the talent and influence to do that
>I want to educate the masses and give comics I think are good more exposure!
then go become famous and influential
there's nothing but circular arguments from your line of thought, the baseline is these people "shitting up the place" are drawing and you are not

>>6956223
That anon is right though, the only real way to change things is leading by example.

>>6956254
Talent and a good product does not immediately give you influence anon. You're on /ic/, you should know better than anyone that most shitty artists don't get inspired by their better peers, they crab and cope with their bruised egos. You only gain influence in the current market by knowing the right people, and the "right" people to get influence from are not interested in the same goals as you. In fact if your goal is to oust the untalented people who currently have influence, they can tell what you're doing, and they will make it as hard as possible for you to do so even if you go indie and self published. You aren't realistic when you suggest to just "draw more." You're defaulting to the "just draw" shitpost because there is no clear answer to my mostly rhetorical question of "how do we fix this?" You could have just ignored my post but it seems you can't help yourself either, why aren't YOU drawing instead of shitposting in response to strangers?

>>6956277
so you want the influence to change the industry, where are you getting the it from?
if you aren't drawing what do you expect to happen? are you going to start a publishing company on your own, or just bribe your way to the top? are you going to lobby the government to do it all for you?
the solution is to go get a job, make connections, and play the game, but first you have to draw
unless you want to become a writer or an editor, or someone's social media manager, the exact path up to you I guess
>why aren't YOU drawing
obviously because I fucking hate myself, duh

>>6956294
When you "play the game" of the western industry you WILL bend the knee in the end. That's why everyone is jumping ship and trying to work with japan instead. Bending the knee to japan is way more reasonable than bending the knee to whatever the fuck is going on with our comics.
Perhaps the only way forward is letting the talentless demagogues run the industry into the ground. Something new will replace it. A better way to word your shitpost would have been "focus on making a product you're proud of, and let nature take its course with the industry." Assuming we're on the same side there's no need to sound like a smartass

>>6956325
then you're complaining about the greater moral degeneration of the west, I didn't want to move the goalposts so I let you do it instead
you're right, if you want to get in on western comics you will have to play along with the narrative, but you can play the game and still be subversive, you have to be smarter
there's need to sound like a smartass when I'm "on the same side" as you, because you're waffling about issues and presenting them as unsolvable while asking for solutions, you're catching yourself (and others) in a loop where the only choice is to do nothing, abandon all hope, try to get published in japan and let the western comic market completely crash

>>6955439
good lord, the first chapter was just le memes in comic format kek. Bring me good memories though.

>>6956339

>>6956342

>>6956336
I don't know that I moved the goalposts. I made it pretty clear in my first post when I referred to people with "hipster stink or tumblr incarnate vibe" as the ones shitting up the industry.
But yeah, it was a doompost, and the question wasn't one you were supposed to autistically take seriously, because on its face "how to we fix this" is a vague and badly formatted question. It's there because like you pointed out yourself, the main purpose was to complain. Nothing wrong here besides the fact that you decided to reply to it with a shitpost about drawing instead of posting on 4chin, while you are also not drawing while posting on 4chin

>>6956325
>>6956336
>>6956353
>>6955676
Are sex appeal and attractive/appealing character designs (both male and female) completely fucking dead in western media?
Even most of the indie projects have 0 sex appeal.
Unless you're into intentionally degenerate NSFW stuff or furry shit like helluva boss.
Literally nothing else is even ok with the concept that people want to look at attractive, cool or cute characters.

>>6956353
if nothing is wrong with my statements, why continue to insist that I'm shitposting when I tell you to draw?
just say you want "the industry" to burn instead of disguising it as some genuine discussion
be honest that you aren't interested in fixing anything, and that your morals are as corrupt than the people you're complaining about

>>6956363
Maybe 95% dead. The 5% is male characters aimed at women and the occasional female side character who is incidentally sexy. Even before the whole "objectification" and "Male gaze" rhetoric of the 10's I remember thinking the best solution was simply to add more sexy men for the ladies to ogle. Instead they just got rid of sexy altogether.
>>6956368
Well now you're just getting mad, it's not that deep anon. I wasn't disguising anything, you knew from the start it was a doompost, but you still chose to shitpost when it was clear I never intended to get a real answer to a question so vague and rhetorical.

>>6956363
>>6956400
Adding sexy men is sort of what Japan has been doing
It had them before but nowadays there's more stuff that's specifically catered to fujos

Other than that I think the problem with Western stuff is that a lot of it is stylistically very safe and boring, it's not that the characters are unattractive they just aren't particularly interesting...

>>6956471
I'd say they're pretty firmly unattractive though. Western styles don't think about accentuating the pleasing features and diminishing the less flattering ones. Anymore. Golden era cartoons did it in the day. I guess because the nature of "pleasing/flattering" is being challenged by people who don't like that life isn't fair in the beauty department. Seems kind of petulant really, like the whole anti-sexy anti-pretty zeitgeist is just a big tantrum. I'm ugly, I accept it, and I like when males and females both look attractive because it's just nice to look at.
But yeah they aren't interesting either. They really got nothing going for them huh? Japanese are batting 1000 though, cuz if they ain't pretty they're interesting and if they ain't interesting at least they're pretty.

>>6956485
oh my god just kill yourself already holy shit are you culture war retards insufferable.
no wonder you're losing...

>>6956544
Struck a nerve there uggo?

What do you guys think about 10 pages every 2 weeks? Would that be worth reading?

>>6956801
depends on the story.

>>6956817
By worth reading I mean compared to something that has 20 pages an update. Professional mangaka struggle doing 40 pages a month so I'm trying to find something manageable that people will be interested in consuming (If they like the story that is). I couldn't imagine an action series having 5 pages every week and gaining a following y'know?

>>6956801
>>6956867
Webtoon chapters are 11-14 pages a week, just for reference. 10 page chapters are doable, I think

>>6956867
>40 pages of "well let's argue about what to eat for 15 minutes" regardless of genre
>40 pages of shitpost fanfiction by some bored teenage fuckup on discord
>5 pages of content that gets to the point and is memorable

>>6956886
MAYBE. MAYBE.

>>6956400
>Even before the whole "objectification" and "Male gaze" rhetoric of the 10's I remember thinking the best solution was simply to add more sexy men for the ladies to ogle.
I've always hated this solution. I want to make comics that I'd myself read and I don't want to see any gay shit in my manga/comics. And I've always absolutely despised this general line of thought that every individual work should pander to all possible groups (that progressives like) by being some sort of microcosm of all diversity (that progressives care about) in the world. It's not really even particularly diverse when everyone makes the same fucking slop.

>>6937714
So masculine.

What is the name of this beautiful yaoi story?

>>6957503
you're obviously a baby, you should post your ramblings in a baby forum, not here. now go take your nap.

>>6957532
Now say that without crying

onions

DA DOOOOM~~!

>>6957552
That's really nice, anon. Also nice job on the background instead of just slapping on a 3D photo.
I also like the implication of bugs instead of showing them in extreme detail

>>6957552
I love this! Nice work!

Excellent expressions and linework is very clean. I also love the onomatopoeia (DA-DOOOM)! What did you use for the backgrounds? You've always seemed to have a good handle on perspective as I remember you posting a fish-eye lens perspective with these characters in a previous thread.

Was this done in CSP? I always struggle to get backgrounds as clean as this with good perspective with just its straight lines tools. What did you use for the textures in the background? More CSP tools or were they done by hand?

Sorry for the bombardment of questions, I just really like your work!

>>6957591
No worries!

I use CSP, the background is all original. I’m not that great at perspective but I’m glad this panel looks alright. The texture is the cross-hatch brush, the gradation I made using the soft eraser tool. Everything else was hatching by hand and abusing the parallel line art tool

>>6957529
Or
How I learned to stop worrying and love the Gun

>>6957503
Sorry anon, but the sexy man police will hunt you down and force you to draw sexy men. Until your sexy man quota is filled you will not be allowed to see your family. The same goes for sexy women. So you gay artists out there better not forget your state mandated cheesecake in your gay porn comics. If we don't see at least a C-cup female in there before those big dudes start porking, it's back to horny correction camp with you

wonder if I should continue

>>6946176
JJK stands out as this strongly, it's the first big series I saw only by its influences, it's entire plot seems to be a mix of naruto and demon slayer, it was so generic I thought it was a webtoon at first.
The great series of the 2010s will be remembered and the subpar forgotten over this next decade, 2000s favoritism fits this age group at present though.

>>6937714
>Why does this look eastern? Like it's obviously from a manga, but looking at it close, they're pretty realistic faces
>t. zoomer who hasnt read any manga before 2000

>>6936088
>How much simplified should the character designs be in general to be drawn again and again with no issues while still being recognizable and providing variety
Depends on how fast you draw but simpler is usually better for both practical reasons (Drawing) and business reasons (cosplayers/marketing/merch)

>>6936969
>written in Japanese
How accurate are deepl translations?

>>6938116
the hips/shoulders aligning take away some of the impact. Wind him up more instead of keeping the hourglass.

>>6958314
>replying to an anon that literally posted a page from a manga before 2000
I believe the question was "what about this makes it look eastern", not "this isn't possible, it can't be eastern"

>>6956344

>>6958963

>>6958966

>>6959095
Dunno what's going on here, but I like her pose and the design of the mech. The linework and shading also came out good being traditional. Nice work, anon.

>>6959095
That under the chin shot needs work
But you actually fucking WENT FOR IT, so good on you.

>>6959095
Hey this is great! Very reminiscent of Dragon Ball without outright copying Toriyama's style. Good job.

Kind of tired going at this alone. Do discord circles exist where i can just pick a role and work on a manga together? As much as i'd like to make something myself, i realize i'm not talented enough for that, and would rather be part of group if it means we can make something successful. No mater how minor.

Or are independent creators too selfish for that?

>>6946086
>>6946153
Japan is not a wonderland - literally nowhere is. But falling for the trap of idealism is why we have a flood of trash isekai.
Personally my favorite manga are exactly the ones that don't shy away from how awful things are.
>>6946160
> While westerners have a weird habit of needing to depict reality as reality. We even get angry at each other for being inaccurate. It's weird
The entire superhero genre exists on idealism. You have a very biased view of things, in both directions.

>>6946086
>What about heavy japanese influences stifles quality?
Heavy Japanese influence are exactly why those things are so good. You can take the Jap out of Japan but you can't take the Japan out of the Jap, in this case.

I'd happily be a writer and storyboarder(panel-maker) for you anon, if you wanted. Want my discord and work on something together?

>>6959517
Sure anon, I can write a script+Storyboard. You on?

>>6946160
>>6959597
> While westerners have a weird habit of needing to depict reality as reality. We even get angry at each other for being inaccurate. It's weird

I think what he's trying to describe is "Rule of Cool". The problem is learning what the cool even is. Rule of Cool works until it offends or bothers someone. Araki couldn't even avoid this fate when he drew the "wrong" kind of train.
But even considering that, it's a generalization and there are a lot of manga that don't apply it.

>>6959517
I don't have much time to devote but i'm curious.

>>6959517
I don't think you could trust a room full of terminally online westoids to run a doujin circle without drama

>>6960269
Honestly doujin circles is what the west desperately needs since we don't have magazines

what the hell even is a "circle"? Do we all just make our own thing and then share with the class (like we've been doing) or is it supposed to be some collaborative project like some quilting bea?

>>6960374
It's literally just friends helping each other out with their works. That can be anything between just giving feedback to inking the whole thing for you. It is collaboration.

>>6959181
>>6959221
>>6959222
Thank you guys for the replies.

>>6960916
No Problem!
Just based on this one page, I'm definitely interested in this and would love to see more. Do you happen to have more pages/concepts to share?

New thread
>>6962076