Thorvald said:
I hardly use PNG anymore since I found that put's excessive strain on the bandwith. Thats why I kept with JPEG.

Also, Photobucket doesn't like images more than 1mb big. It compresses it way down unnecessarily if you go one byte over the line.

In a sense, yes; it's not that they're long, it's that they're unnecessarily long. Part of the problem is that when it comes to scale, you tend toward the maximum: large font and showy pictures, and so the comic itself becomes larger than it 'has' to be. (Aside: As I recall, you once mentioned that you're running at 1920x1080 res? That might have something to do with it.)

Indeed. Although I don't make my comics fit that resolution... at least not any more :lol:

Additionally, your characters talk waaay too much. While on the one hand they're a goldmine for quoteworthies, oftentimes it feels like an episode of Seinfeld. (Which, given that your comics have a sitcom-y feel, is probably not so coincidental.)

I'd say the art medium I use limits me from cool action scenes, but also... I like the sitcom approach. The Soap Opera feel.
DYOS isn't all about action after all, it's about people you don't know talking to each other about things you don't care too much about, and yet you watch it anyway... for what reason? I dunno, it was on television wasn't it? Hey did you know -insert female lead- is having a baby? And the father is -insert male lead's rival-?

But yeah, unfortunately my style of writing focuses on dialogue a bit too much. I guess when I was told "Show, don't tell" I accidentally did the opposite.
I think even my stories do that. Because I was told not to describe things, but have characters explain it or something like that to make it flow more into the story.
 
I'd say the art medium I use limits me from cool action scenes, but also... I like the sitcom approach. The Soap Opera feel.
DYOS isn't all about action after all, it's about people you don't know talking to each other about things you don't care too much about, and yet you watch it anyway... for what reason? I dunno, it was on television wasn't it? Hey did you know -insert female lead- is having a baby? And the father is -insert male lead's rival-?
That's odd coming from the Styles I knew who loved explosions galore and was bored of a desert scene with a tumble weed going by :p.

But yeah, unfortunately my style of writing focuses on dialogue a bit too much. I guess when I was told "Show, don't tell" I accidentally did the opposite.
I think even my stories do that. Because I was told not to describe things, but have characters explain it or something like that to make it flow more into the story.
I motion that Thorvald teach us the better way of comicing...in any medium.
 
So what is the happy range for a comic length? While were at it width as well?

Depends on the scene. I typically focus on one scenario at a time, although if I feel a comic reads a bit short I'll do a double-bill. It's also influenced a lot by how one plans ahead: since my shift to pencil my process has been as follows: 1) Conceive the scene, figure out what I want to say. 2) Mentally break the scene down into panels. 3) Based on the number of panels, plan the number of pages. It's a reciprocal process, but essentially I start by defining my work space and then fitting the comic to it. One of the easiest mistakes to make when doing cut-and-paste is to 'wing it' and just keep upping the dimensions to fit the new content. "Sydney Counterhack" was (barely) done on purpose; "The War of the Steppes" wasn't.

As for width, it depends a lot on the resolution of the output. I've stuck with ~800px for consistency, but it's also about the smallest that my tiny handwriting remains legible. A wider page can fit more detail (read: panels) horizontally, but that's really a subset of the overall layout. I only get upset if I have to adjust my browser to fit it.

Yours is fine.

I motion that Thorvald teach us the better way of comicing...in any medium.
Whoa man, I'm just a hobbyist! Dae's the guy who's gonna make a career outta this!
 
One of the easiest mistakes to make when doing cut-and-paste is to 'wing it' and just keep upping the dimensions to fit the new content.
I think that's my issue. Though I paste all my screen shots in Paint Shop Pro where I can arrange them in order and almost gotten them down. Though the thing I don't like about it is that It reduces the detail.

Whoa man, I'm just a hobbyist! Dae's the guy who's gonna make a career outta this!
I miss Dae :(.
 
Sincerely, I apologise to CG. I simply don't realise I'm criticising, so I just point out something and 'leave' the room. Width is fine, but yeah, it's basically what Thorvald says. There is not an ideal length, but a necessary length. Maybe you are trying to be more cinematographic than you need to, like the fight in your last comic, which are cool-looking pictures but half of which I really don't get. Also an example of this is the "Deal getting worse" joke, which is unnecessarily overextended and could use less panels.

It's difficult, but you have to go to the roots of it all, to the essential basics, the minimum necessary. I haven't written or drawn my third page because every time I start thinking I realise I'm going to overextend it and thus I wipe it all and rethink it from scratch.
 
My comics are probably also too long, I'm just not sure how to shorten them.
 
My comics are probably also too long, I'm just not sure how to shorten them.
We shall learn togeather. I just finished my "For the Republic" comic page (in a long time) using three panels!

There is a panel that I wish I could do, but don't know how.

 
Depends on the scene. I typically focus on one scenario at a time, although if I feel a comic reads a bit short I'll do a double-bill. It's also influenced a lot by how one plans ahead: since my shift to pencil my process has been as follows: 1) Conceive the scene, figure out what I want to say. 2) Mentally break the scene down into panels. 3) Based on the number of panels, plan the number of pages. It's a reciprocal process, but essentially I start by defining my work space and then fitting the comic to it. One of the easiest mistakes to make when doing cut-and-paste is to 'wing it' and just keep upping the dimensions to fit the new content. "Sydney Counterhack" was (barely) done on purpose; "The War of the Steppes" wasn't.
This sounds like storyboarding, which is extremely useful for working out problems before they happen in the final product. :)

Whoa man, I'm just a hobbyist! Dae's the guy who's gonna make a career outta this!
There's no reason hobbyists can't give great advice, if they know what they're talking about. :yup:


CivGeneral, and everyone else: Please understand that I don't have a problem with the content of your work. My problem is that it's just too big and I can't even go into the thread without risking my computer freezing/crashing because it can't manage. That's why I suggested using spoiler tags so all those Very Large Images aren't all trying to load at once.
 
Both our plot lines are sort of self-contained with the ocassional crossover yet we've not moved on beyond the initial start of the plot.

That's one issue. The sheer volume of comics where very little actually happened of consequence. The reader loses interest quickly.

Plus also the use of referance that few of us understand (the the quirp on the Yogscast).

Yes.

My frustrations with drawing mean that I'm ruthless when it comes to economy: in my explanation to CG in how to get out of one-panel-per-row, good comicking is providing as much information as needed in as little space as possible.

That's my view too.

Additionally, your characters talk waaay too much. While on the one hand they're a goldmine for quoteworthies, oftentimes it feels like an episode of Seinfeld. (Which, given that your comics have a sitcom-y feel, is probably not so coincidental.)

Maybe it needs a laugh track.
 
It's funny because when I look at how I script, it's a lot like film.
Back when Script Frenzy was still running (a contest run by the same people as those doing NaNoWriMo), there were some links to some excellent storyboarding programs. I found them quite useful, even though my script bogged down quite quickly (note to self: when trying Script Frenzy for the first time, do not get overambitious and attempt to adapt God Emperor of Dune :crazyeye:).
 
CivGeneral said:
That's odd coming from the Styles I knew who loved explosions galore and was bored of a desert scene with a tumble weed going by

Yeah but they're a real pain to animate and keep together.
And then I lost Fallout 3 functionality and I'm too lazy to re-install it.

Tailless said:
That's one issue. The sheer volume of comics where very little actually happened of consequence. The reader loses interest quickly.

Well we're having a bit of trouble starting the arc proper. There is no real bad guy to face yet... or a global artefact. It's all little items and little bad guys and each person has their own.
We need a Monkey Statue or a Hacker to get this convoy rolling!

Maybe it needs a laugh track.

And this for transitions


Link to video.
 
Well we're having a bit of trouble starting the arc proper. There is no real bad guy to face yet... or a global artefact. It's all little items and little bad guys and each person has their own.
We need a Monkey Statue or a Hacker to get this convoy rolling!

Don't worry...I'm working on something that could fit that criteria. :p
 
Speaking of Mangoes, which is the current DYOS Wiki? Should I bother editing it, or should I wait for the move?
 
Wait, are we still moving?
 
Wikkii appears to be stable, and given I never actually received any input, I'm thinking no.
 
Well we're having a bit of trouble starting the arc proper. There is no real bad guy to face yet... or a global artefact. It's all little items and little bad guys and each person has their own.
We need a Monkey Statue or a Hacker to get this convoy rolling!

At the moment it seems like the internet regulation comes off like an inconvenience. The way I thought how it could work, is for the characters to try and discover the real cause behind the regulation. Who will profit the most or will gain the most? Who wants to control access to information? Is there anyone who wants to keep themselves hidden so much that they take control of the internet? The ideas I had could lead to a conspiracy based plot.
 
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