Friday 29 October 2010

Hello, comics, etc.

Hello everyone, assuming that someone actually checks out my blog every once in a while.
I have not been updating in long time, but it is not like I am sleeping either. In fact I am working on a "comic related project" which I will show here, when the time is right (when I actually have something finished). As I am pretty much a beginner at this it is taking me a while and I am trying to attain "a certain skill level" and practice a lot. I am pretty bad at this whole comic thing still, but worry not I have firmly decided to become a lot better!

Here you can see a short comic I made for practice purposes (non related to the one I am working on) :





Yeah, rather bitter sounding "comic", but it just was some stuff that came to my head, not my opinion of the world or something, hehe :)



I have also been reading/looking at a lot of comics and especially manga (even though what I am making does not try to be manga or something, ok?)
Anyway I want to tell you here and now that there are some works that I respect so much it goes way beyond just "liking" them!
The first time I felt like this when reading "Yu Yu Hakusho". I enjoyed a lot the absolute "freedom" of the art, that one frame might be incredibly detailed and "realistic" looking, while the next one could be minimalistic and sketchy. Another good point is that the story is great! The characters are very likable, both the "good guys" and the "bad guys". The only thing I can really say "against" it, is the I am not such a huuuge fan of the ending, but that's ok, if that is how it was intended to end by Mr. Yoshihiro Togashi, that's fine with me.
I read a lot of good manga after that, but the only thing that managed to topple down Yu Yu Kakusho from it's throne of "my favorite manga or even comic in general" is Iou Kuroda's "Japan Tengu Party Illustrated". Wow. You know, this is simply a great work of art! I love everything about it: the freaky (yet rather human) characters, the odd "otherworldly" story but most of all the messy while simple, deep black brushy-inky look!
I rarely can afford to actually buy books, but this manga is something that I really want to (or even need to) have (physically, as printed books).
It is a sin/shame that despite the big number of people I found proclaiming their love for this work on their blogs and web-pages it is still not available in English (only unofficially as "scanlation")!

Yes, so that's all I'll say for now, wish me luck and endurance for my own comic project...