Secondlina's Panels

Unpleasant surprise this morning : there was some dudes fixing the apartment's outer wall. Right outside my bedroom window. Where I sleep. With very little clothing. I had to develop a ninja strategy to roll in a blanket and close the drapes without flashing anyone. It worked. But yeah. That was unpleasant. 

In other news, still reading Inuyasha. I was kinda surprised at first. The first couple of books are actually quite good. The story is well paced, the characters are fun. The stakes are high. But now I just entered the part where the series got really popular and the artist is stretchignt he crap out of it. Aka, the boring part of Inuyasha. Aka, book 18. Aka, that part where the same stuff happens over and over. Sesshoumarou whines. Kikkyo plots. Naraku is more slippery then a toad covered in Vaseline. Inuyasha learns that his sword has superpowers by doing the most contrived stuff ever.Yep. I'm hoping things get exciting soon again. The only really interesting stuff at this point is Kagome and her identity crisis.

Bring the plot back, books. C'mon. 

I'm also a bit disappointed by the French translation that is honestly... weird. A lot of the sentences don't make sense, and all of the honorific were translated literally. Meaning that you see stuff like Kagome calling Sango "little sango" or "cute sango" all the time. I get the feeling they just got someone to translate, but then they took it as is. Usually, you need someone to translate, and then someone to adapt. 

Anywho...

I kinda wish I could be somewhere warm and sunny right now. The weather here can't decide if it's spring or not.



- Isa

Inspiration is a funny thing. I didn't have ideas for sketch comcis for like, ever. And now that i'm working on Jabberwocky and have no free time to speak of, I have a TON of ideas. Muse, you sneaky bitch. I noted all the ideas down though. So hopefully when i'm done... COMICS!

But for now, you guys get Jabberwocky! Page 1 :



I almost replaced the text with "Oh hai. I'm just here with mah sword. Being EPIC"

The art on my Jabberwocky pages is okay. If I had a whole year to work on this project, it totally would have been better. But for something done in a single month, it's quite good. Not bad, but not perfect either. Definitely got the woodcutter style down at least. I really hope people will find this comic pretty and pick it up. argh, so nervous. "Psychopompes" will definitely have better art. This is slightly above "Namesake" level. Don't get me wrong, "Namesake" still has some dang good art. But it's not perfect.

I'm a perfectionnist-obsessy-face-workaholic.

YES.

My art has levels and layers. Just like ogres. Or cake.

In other news, i'm happy. I love manga and anime, but I haven't had many series I was really excited about lately. We have more series and books being translated, but it kinda feels like a lot of it is crap. But, I found a few things I feel in love with. First off, FLCL. I'm falling in love again because they just re-realeased this OAV on blue-ray and despite being rather down on my cash right now, I bought it like it was on fire. I'm so happy.

My second great love of Japanese origin right now is Otomegatari (by Kaoru Mori), the story of a married couple living on the silk road back in the 1500's. Why do I love it? Well, first off, despite being manga, it feels like anyone could read it and understand the cultural aspect. The focus on the every day lives and characters is gorgeous. And finally : THE DETAILS.



HAVE YOU SEEN THIS PAGE?

This is an example of how I want my inking to look one day. So...so awesome.

This book is getting translated to English and French and should be available for pruchase in May. For now, I read the scanlations online. But I really want to buy this printed. To really take in the lavish illustrations.

Gaaah so awesome.

- Isa