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Anatomy

Most everyone will say that anatomy is important in comic art, but how far are you willing to go in your own art to ensure that you have a proper grasp of anatomy? If your answer is "however far it takes," read on. Otherwise, give Rob Liefeld a call.

There's a dangerous phrase that gets brought up alot when discussing comic book artists, and that phrase is "self taught". "Self taught" should be the exception that proves the rule, however in reality, it is the rule and this is not How Things Ought To Be, this is How Things Ought Not To Be. I'm not sure what "self taught" really means because no one learns to draw inside a vaccuum. I think that colloquial use usually indicates a person with no formal education in art. So for the most part, it means someone who is underqualified.

I once e-mailed Renee Gearlings, an editor at Top Cow, asking for advice since she was the editor for Aspen at the time, before the cancer and the lawsuits. I suppose I could have approached Michael Turner on the subject, but it was hard enough for me to e-mail the woman who's friendly and generally amusing comments I read at the back of two comics every month, say nothing about the superstar penciler that drew one of them. Besides, at that time Turner wasn't in a position where he would be recruiting artists of his own. Renee was, making her advice more relevant. Anyway, she told me that her best advice was life drawing. It sounds pithy, but it's true.

As some of you know already, I'm taking continuing education courses at a local art college with the intent of building a portfolio and going there full time. I talked to one of my current professors about what I wanted to get out of his anatomy class and he truly understood where I was coming from. What I had said to him was that I wanted a solid background and understanding of anatomy so that I could abstract effectively from there. What he said was that with time I would be able to build a model of the human body inside my head that I could pose as I liked and draw from, which would virtually eliminate the need for references unless you want to be Alex Ross, but like I said above, you're in the wrong place for that. My intent is to graduate from art college with a complete understanding of how to draw the human figure and the skillset to apply what I've learned to not only comic books but any other medium that I so choose to use to express myself and hopefully make money.

...hmmm....not much I could say per say to add to keyframing...but some of what you said about Spiderman's abstract posing. I'd actually refer that action to gesture as opposed to key framing. I suppose I'll talk on gesture a bit later, but for now, I've digressed and will move on to key framing.

It is true that, unlike animation, the reader has to "inbetween" the action with his imagination, I find of late that it is also true that many people don't seem to know how to do this properly. I find that a lot of artist's (none specifically come to mind at the moment) often make three major mistakes that, in the film world, would be frowned upon. Theses mistakes are listed below.

1. scene cutting--this is what happens when something changes to drastically from one setting or background to another. If a scene shift is done incorrectly (especially if, per say, between your action scenes, are 3 or 4 pages of advertisements) you get the all-too-common scene cut. This also happens a lot because of problem #2, which is...

2. timing--...for shame...despite the fact that artistically you may have the talent, you never really studied how well things move (this is where a good knowledge of film and animation would help illustrators and cartoonists) and thus you get things that seem to move to quickly. not like superspeed like the flash. What I mean is that you get effects that each frame seems to be moving to quickly for the reader to comprehend unless he/she reads it some 2 or 3 times again.

You can see this happen in film as well. Batman Begins did this a lot in the final fight scene on the train between R'as a Ghul (Spelling) and Batman. Just...watch it. You'll realize that the movement of the camera and shifting of shots makes the scene rather disorienting....while that may be an effect you may be going for, most artists do this accidently, so your sense of timing is very important.

3. The 180 rule--this applies no matter what you're doing...film, animation, video. The 180 rule states that you can't shift from one view to another if you break anywhere past 180 degrees. think of it as a circle. go past the half point and you're confusing the s**t out of your viewer/reader. your best bet to avoid this is to put another "keyframe" scene, showing that you intend to switch views between one person and another.

If I have access to a working scanner, I'll put up good examples on these mistakes and how to avoid them...

oh...one more thing just came to mind.
the amount of action...don't have too much going on at once...I can't stress this enough. it's not as bad a problem in cartooning as it is in animation and film...but to get a good idea what I mean, just rent a copy of Who framed Roger Rabbit and watch it. There's way too much going on in that film at any one time, especially in Toon Town. I literally almost had a ceisure when I was watching it last semester in my History of Animation class last year...and I'm not ceisure prone nore do I suffer of epilepsy or any other disorder...I should know, since I've watched that pokemon ceisure inducing scene more times in 8th grade than I should.

just keep this tips in mind and remember: The mole knows a lot about one thing, while the fox knows a little bit about everything...sometimes, it's better to be the fox. So don't limit yourself to what you choose to study. Read books, comics and watch lots of films, cartoons and play lots of videogames. know enough about everything so that way you're ecclectic enough to use your experience from each field to make something beautiful. I can't stress just how bad narrow-mindedness is for artists.

good luck and God Speed, fellow dream makers.

Adam

ps. sorry if I wrote too much, Harley...just had to get it all out.

As a note, the "180 rule" as you've listed it doesn't exist in comics. All you need to establish in comics is a single shot that has both characters (or more) and a good description of the background. Then as long as you include those characters in proper lighting, the 180 rule doesn't exist. This is especially true of Talking Heads (scenes of almost exclusive conversation). Excellent examples of this include Hellblazer, Lucifer and Sandman. Comic readers have a leg up that most other people don't. In film, it's not a stylization or an abstraction. If you shoot out of location, or you start moving the camera into odd places, you confuse the viewers. Comic readers have been trained, however, to understand shifting viewpoints without problem. In fact, it's something that has to be stressed because, in order to keep something like a Talking Heads scene interesting, you have to keep the visuals interesting, and this very often means breaking whatever rules you can. Comics have the bonus of being able to use non-seqiuitors, which makes the shift in views almost entirely arbitrary.
As for the second rule, that's not an art issue, that's a pacing and story-telling issue. You have to speed up and slow down the story as it's required. Yes, it becomes and artistic issue but that is in no way, at all, whatsoever, where it starts. You have to know how to write and tell a story because you can commit pen to paper.
I would advise people to NOT read comics for inspiration. Or play video games. Get as far outside of the medium as you can. Read novels. Big, thick, tomes. Lot's of old melodrama will give you more information about how to pace and set up a story than 99% of the bargain bins, back issue stacks and new releases. The closer you can get to the Bronte sisters, Dumas, Dickens, and of the serialized authors, do it.

don't get me wrong. Reading the old books is great, as well. HG Wells will definately keep an imagination ticking. that being said, you still do need the modern media there not only for inspiration, but also for the fact that it's necesary for you to know what is out their now, so that way you don't accidently step over stupid legal bounds or make a coincidental duplicate of another person's work. plus, you need to make sure that you don't repeat another person stylistically. Gotta get going. can't elaborate more but will later. bye