Comics!

A Day of Loneliness Spending Quality Time With By Myself:

I've been working on a few personal projects recently; this one being a two-page comic which I intend to be part of a series of short narratives based on introversion and socially awkward situations.

Below are my initial thumbnail ideas before creating the final artwork on Photoshop. I also wrote out the dialogue in a sort of script/timeline which enabled me to organise my ideas for each frame in a more coherent order. Initially I was going to drag out the story for 3-4 pages, but seen as it's a simple and repetitive dialogue I decided to refine it into two.

This was my first page of thumbnails I sketched out as I was thinking of compositions
for each frame and ideas for the dialogue between the character and her 'other self'.

This comic is based on the first few weeks/months I started my full time job as a greetings card designer. 

It is very much an exaggeration of my experience after leaving home to move to an unfamiliar place and renting a room in a big empty house, where I did feel suddenly quite lonely and isolated until I'd gotten used to the area and my first full time job. 

I'm quite a shy, quiet person before I get to know people, and a bit of a home-bird, so moving to a totally new place on my own to live on my own was a bit of a scary change for me…but I did it! And I'm so glad I did! I love my job and it's giving me valuable experience in the industry - as well as improving my traditional media skills…still love my Photoshop though! ;)

Exploring new places on my own was a bit daunting and lonely when I first moved up; I'd much prefer to have someone to explore with than wander round on my own usually, it makes it more fun! 

I wanted this comic to play and exaggerate on the idea of just 'having yourself for company' in a more literal way and convey that feeling of loneliness and boredom that sometimes comes with living alone - certainly in my experience in those first few weeks before I settled in.

The final artwork:

Although only two pages long, this comic took forever to complete! Purely because of there were so many layers and little details involved in the making of it. 

I layered up mono prints, sketched details, painted textures, and digital painting in each frame, and it was a bit of an experiment to see what the final aesthetic of the comic would look like with all those different elements. 

This is the first comic I have attempted since my graphic novel project at Uni so I'm still experimenting with what works and how to adapt my style to this type of illustration. 

It's definitely something I've been re-inspired to try! 

The story and dialogue could do with a few tweaks, and positioning of text is something I'd like to develop and improve on in the future, but I'm pleased with the hand-rendered look it has with the elements of drawing and print textures. I think the wonkiness of each frame works well and also adds to the hand crafted look, making it a bit quirkier. I still need to work on how I draw people (and hands!) but hopefully that will improve with some more life drawing/reportage sketching.

I also have another illustrated narrative in the making and will also be creating some more of these short, themed comics to compile into some sort of printed book/zine eventually - so be on the look out for future tweets and posts about those!