Oculama

A fun little comic, I'm a fan of scrappy ne'er-do-wells! There's room for improvement in general, a lot of which can just come with more practice as y'all keep drawing and learning and improving your craft. There's two things in particular I would love to see some work on in future pages:

1) Taking the time to really nail your word-balloon/typography skills will make a big difference for your overall page's appearance. It's kind of how even a messy room can give the illusion of looking quite clean if you at the very least make the bed. I would recommend sticking to a single easy-to-read font (sometimes it's good to start with all-caps as is done with more classic comics, legibility is king), take the time to get your line spacing and a standard font size so it's packed just right, and then practice your word balloon art. It's an often overlooked/undervalued part of making comics but trust that it'll be something you'll be glad you figured out early

2) Keep practicing with your line width, something about the character art gives a sense that there's something nice bubbling just beneath the surface from the sketching and penciling stage that is being held back in the lining phase. This might have been a side effect of a tight deadline but if you get the opportunity, practicing slower more methodical and more deliberate inking (focusing on quality over speed) during your off time, timing yourself and checking your speed, can be a good way to both improve your linework while also staying fast with the clock.

Good job all!

I'm afraid I have to be honest that I had trouble with this one, I had to re-read to catch what was happening. The shame is that it seems like y'all did extensive work on the script, there's something here with meat, but with as incomplete as it is in many places I got lost figuring out who was speaking, where it was taking place, etc. My condolences for anything unexpected that got in the way of your work in the drawing period. I hope to see other opportunities from y'all in the future with work showing off the best of what you can do

This was a fun comic! Your teams characters dynamic plays really well together!
I also really liked you guys experimenting with your panel layout with that page 7 four way split!

One critique I would give you guys is how you do your text bubbles. I'd give the text and the inner edge of the speech bubble a little more breathing room, it doesn't look as cramped and can help with readability. Along those lines, I'd also try breaking up your text bubbles a little bit, so it's not just one big chunk of text.

Example would be page 5 panel two with sif, you could break that text into 2, maybe even 3 speechbubbles, "Viewslog?" one bubble," The Gang Leader?" Second Bubble, "what's your affiliation with him?" and have them decending downwards in the panel,leading the readers eye. It also helps even out the visual composition of the panel it's self, and helps the reader with flow.

Great job guys, I look forward to seeing more!

It was a fun little story.
While I understand it is mostly sketched out, there where a few panels where it took me a little longer to parse out exactly what was suppose to be happening in them, and had to rely heavier on text clues to figure out what was happening.
I did really appreciate the coffee mug jokes, that was a good chuckle.
Thank you guys for still submitting something for all of us to read!

Ah! A title page! Always a treat when the story kicks off with a name drop~

There's a lot to like about the construction of this comic; you establish the character of your own OC duo - both as a pair and as individuals - really tidily on the first/second page; folks who get into trouble by default, and who are both barely covering each other's respective incompetences/quirks.

I like also the set-up of Toni and Rod nabbing the key component from their opponent/ally OC's vehicle. You do sort of see it coming from a mile away, but in a way that makes it feel narratively fulfilling when they do make off with it.

Overall clear compositions bolstered by a bold use of color - your action flows nicely both visually and re: the macro series of events that make up the story. There's some really nice perspective work going on here too. I especially like the panel of Toni and Rod jumping the railing at the repair shop; probably my favorite in the entire comic, just barely beating out the initial shot of them in the dumpster.

A worthy R1 entry. thank you both so much for sharing this comic :)

(Also, was that Ragost from MtG on page 2??)

The cold open here is really well done. Not every comic can throw four characters into a situation so promptly and clearly, but you succeed in doing so here, and it feels right for all four OCs in question.

LOVE the dialogue in this comic. It feels punchy right out the gate, and the character's interaction carries the narrative clarity of the story almost effortlessly.

There's a nice mix of comedy and tension in this comic as well. Toni and Rod feel like they lend themselves to that naturally, but your writing highlights it, and working in the little gags like Rod's romantic misadventures and the "spit in the mug" panel add some wonderful levity that elevates the entire space misadventure.

Good job also on creating a varied flow of compositions from panel to panel. The pages here have a nice mix, helping the visual interest of each page. The angles on the space panels and the interior panels alike show off a nice amount of depth for both.

Congrats on a completed round one! Hope you are enjoying a bit of rest during the voting period :)

I am really loving the energy and chemistry between Galaxy Rod and Toni. The little backstory and brief introduction for each character is something I very much appreciated. It makes it easier for a new audience to get on board with your story without any prior reading.

There are some improvements with the art side of things but nothing that cannot be resolved by more practice (hint: I want to see more from you hehe). More dynamic poses/panels, shading/lighting, tones/spot blacks etc are stuff you can experiment on and study to give your comic that extra oompf.

Overall, this is such a fun comic! You made all the characters shine within the premise of the tournament. Well done!

It was such a shame that this was not finished but from what I can tell from the sketches/thumbnails, this had a lot of potential. I do love the expressiveness of the characters. I am glad the last pages were complete though! While the speech bubbles could use a bit of polishing (among other things), I am glad that you guys added the text for us to read. Needless to say, this comic left me wanting. Sif and Biggs are very cool characters that I would've loved to see more of!

This comic is fun. These characters are a great pairing and both of their personalities shine through perfectly. Great jokes, good sense of adventure and daring, which makes for a great first round. For whoever did the art, you did a solid job. Really love the angles tackled and there was some attempts at some more interesting angles. It'd be rad if in the next rounds we could see that pushed a little more! It'd also be great to see some more shading in general, it'd really help give this work a good pop, either with deeper ink shadows or coloring. For whoever handled scripting, this was also really well done! You incorporated your opponents well and we got a great first taste of your characters. It'd be cool if in the coming rounds, we could learn a little more about them. This doesn't necessarily mean we need to go more serious or anything, but if there's more depth to either of them to explore, it'd be cool to explore it! This was a great first comic and Oculama's happy to have you! Hopefully this is the start to many more comics in the future! Great work!

It's always difficult with an unfinished comic because one has to speculate on stuff they don't really know. You two have a fun pairing of characters and there's something here that would make the further adventures of both of your characters interesting, but either Hatter needs to take the lead on the art when they're more free during the school year or a much, much longer deadline needs to happen. It's unclear if this is a time management issue or if it's simply just general inexperience on your part, johannhawk. There's a lot of factors here that would need to be worked on to get your comics up and running in a stronger way. Perhaps different medium, perhaps having a simple tablet to use on the PC, or maybe even a different program. This may be a good sign to take a moment to review fundamentals or to figure out a process that would let you make comics with a more consistently quicker pace. That being said, the story is readable and we got some finished pages which deserve their own comment.

The comment "Hang on, guys. I have an idea" on Page 4 being over someone who's not the speaker but being in a close-up of that other person is very confusing. You would ideally have that speaker be the focus there and the other two be in the last panel next to the mugs. The diagram look would work in the previous panels, but there's not enough to differentiate it from "diagram view" vs. the real world. Also, the machine in the penultimate panel is focused on for a reason, but it's ultimately unclear what this machine is. It'd also look stronger if a person was next to it, so we had some idea of where it was in space and location to our heroes.

The last page is pretty solid in terms of layout. Seeing the explosions is good and demonstrating it's bombs going off is good as well! The 3rd panel has some issues in that a lot of the character real estate is lost to draw your opponent's space ship when getting in close would be a much stronger moment. Your characters interacting there has a lot more value vs. the background in that moment. You also should give some consideration to how your speech bubbles will be laid out since you end up with very awkward positioning as a result. The last panel works well as a closer, but maybe having some more characters shots there would have work before going into that last panel.
Besides all that, there's always next time to knock it out of the park! Good attempt!

I'm very amused at the mismash of sci fi and mundane normalcy from the get. We get a star warszy opening scroll getting us up to speed and setting the stage only to see some Wild West wanted posters held up by tape. On the side of a dumpster our duo happen to be thrown into XD The fact you didn't go with a holographic log or data look up on a computer as one would expect in a setting like this, I think lends the moment to the funnies. We don't even make it into space proper as most of the misadventure takes place on land. These two as partners are really charming and I found myself rooting for them as I read along. If I had any notes, it would be to push your action scenes. The impact of punches and phaser blasts arent really connecting. You've technically drawn the attack connecting, but there isnt much weight to a punch or swing to elicit that its connecting in a way that would knock someone out. I'd recommend looking up reference or even recording a slo-mo of yourself laying into a pillow or semi soft surface to see the weight of punch and/or emulate that dynamicism

As someone familiar with johannhawk's art style, I was very curious to see them in the sketch/penciling stage as their work lends itself to providing a pre production framework for a partner to flesh out- which hatterthethird seems to have the technical prowess for and would translate well into inks and color. I'm left completely puzzled that you two did the opposite. Its' my opinion the aim of a collab like this is to showcase each artists best points into an entirely new iteration that is better than themselves alone. I feel this wasnt factored or possibly considered as it feels like you two just did your own thing and hoped for the best. I hate to admit it, but to be honest, the panels where we simply have hatterthethird's pencils and sketches are clearer to follow instead of the content that's been 'inked' by johannhawk. I think as reader we have to factor the fact this was incomplete as a reason for the confusion, but what is complete doesnt seem to be a collaboration. I'd highly recommend checking out Movin' Right Along by Lucky Nothin and Cro-Iba within this very tournament. These two artists have very distinctive styles, but I have a good guess the feedback given will be that their trademark look is absent as they've created somethin entirely new, which I think is the aim of collaborative work.

Very good effort! Although I think some cel-shading here and there could have pushed it a little further, it was nice to see this colored. I like the energy of these two characters together and look forward to more of their shenanigans. Another thing to consider is fine tuning the word bubbles just a smidge more. There were some parts where the tails weren’t fully connected, so just taking the extra time to tend to those would be solid!

While it’s not much art wise there’s still a story here and there was something submitted so good on yall for that! I would definitely say try a more steady hand with the text bubbles next time, they needed some fine tuning. Something you could try next time is to see how the professionals in the industry do their bubbles and go from there, see if you can find a style or two you jive with.

A solid first comic showing! I LOVE LOVE me some goblins giving off the strongest of golbin energy lol Toni's got that in spades and the eternal space scoundrel underdog that G rods got going on compliments the duo very well! The only real criticism being that the dues ex machina with the vslog kinda does come out of no where a bit. I think a little bit more of a reason for him to have been there just around the corner near a place that the space police officer would be I think would have help but a good funny use of the turnaround for the pair lol. also sorry for missing Rod lol ill draw him laters im sure!

I love to see you improving in your comic making and im glad a partner helped you get more panels completed and clear this time johann. hatter this is the first time I think ive seen a comic from you and I like what you guys were able to put to paper! i think probably with a little more time just getting the inks done would have been super nice from the look of the blues. A nice use of your opponents sketchy nature to have the pair already together with yours and giving a great setup for the comic!