46 page Graphic Novel WIP

silky

Would like some critique on a graphic novel I have been working on. It is a WIP!! (46 pages)Comments on the DAZ artwork and storyline would be much appreciated. It is an external link.
https://www.panotour.com.au/DD/

Griffin Avid

I know I've seen this before, somewhere.

But I'm not sure what this is.

Is this a comic book (Graphic Novel) or a ....the other kind of novel where there's lots of text and a few pictures?

All I see are images and they are HUGE - and take a long time to download.

-

I like the color lean towards brownish colors.... makes it feels old. Nice work.

Looks pretty cool so far.

 

WendyLuvsCatz

click on open text to see the story

Linwelly

I don't see an "open Text" button

Griffin Avid

I'm using CHROME browser. No buttons. Only a NEXT button

WendyLuvsCatz

LOL I typed a spoonerism

click on open story to see the text 

third page onwards

mbonafede

Hello

I do have some comments that I hope are helpful.

I am developing some stories and am struggling with how to present the text of the story with its images. I have no answers — still struggling, but I'm concluding that the format we use may depend on what is the primary element for telling the story — text or images. (Since we are in electronic media other features may also come into play: video, sound, music)

If the story is primarily images, then the "comic book" style may work. This style has panels of images laid out on a page, with speech bubbles for the text. The story is carried primarily by the images and the layout of the panels. The speech bubbles are an aid to understanding the story, but not as important as the images.

Text becomes more important when we add narration and description. Then we need more than the bubbles. I like the "Prince Valiant" format. The story is still told through the layout of the panels with the images, but the text: the narrative, descriptions, even the speech of the characters is overlaid on the image. This style works well where images are still the main storytelling element, but the text is also needed to fully understand and enjoy the story.

Both styles, bubble or Prince Valiant, overlay text on an image — so detract from a full view of the image. I see you are trying to solve that by requiring the reader to click on an "Open Story" button to pop up a window that has the text. I say "requiring" because it did become a chore. It took me out of the flow of the story and required that I do something --- click a button. Every time we ask the reader to leave the story, we take away their enjoyment and risk losing them.

I would prefer to see the text presented on the image, even though that means seeing less of the image. Where there is a lot of text that would cover an image, perhaps do a few more images to distribute the text, so there is less on each.

Using the "Previous" and "Next" buttons is easy enough to go through the story page by page. But I would like to be able to move about more freely, go back a few pages to catch a piece of information I missed, for instance. That is frustrating with just the two buttons. It would be nice to have a way to skip through the story --- go to a specific page, go to the beginning, the end. Perhaps a slider bar with thumbnails and links on the bottom would work.

Your images are wonderful. The coloring, camera angles, attention to details are excellent. They do need to be optimized for web viewing. They opened fast enough on my computer but were slow when I tried to read your story on my iPhone. There was a lag time that became annoying.

Another problem with your story on a phone is the small screen size of the phone. Your images with the darker tones (most of the story takes place at night or inside dimly lit rooms) that look so good on a larger computer screen become more difficult to see on the smaller phone screen. I have had to lighten my images for my story more than I would like just so they could be viewed on the smaller screens.

Also, the images are in landscape dimension, so are best viewed by turning the phone sideways—not the normal, comfortable way we hold our phones.

There are a lot of potential readers for our stories that just use phones for their reading of stories, so we need to format our stories for that use as much as possible.

I believe we are seeing an advancement in the art of storytelling. Writers, on their own or in collaboration with others can create images and illustrations for their stories, as well as video, sound effects, and music.  Electronic publishing allows for the low-cost addition of those elements as part of the story. How do we put it all together? Pretty exciting.

One resource I would recommend is "How to Tell Stories in Small Spaces" presented by Peter von Stackelberg. He has done a lot of research and thinking in this area. It is put on by Digital Art Live and available in the DAZ store at:
 https://www.daz3d.com/how-to-tell-stories-in-small-spaces--illustrated-narratives-for-mobile-devices

See you on the trail.
Mike Bonafede

silky

Hello and thank you for your comments. In particular Mike's comments for taking the time and efffort to go into detail about the story. I too am struggling with how to present images/text to the reader. Do I ditch most of the story(text) and just make a commic. Or do I remove all the imagery and just publish a text based story on KIndle. I like your idea of collaboration with others. Maybe a Facebook page that a group can contribute too. Thanks again for the feedback, its given me some more to think over...

chris-2599934

Here's my 10c, maybe not even worth that much.

Your pictures are stunning. I recognise a lot of the Daz assets you've used, but you've done a great job of integrating them together into a coherent whole, so bravo on that.

I'm not wild about the way the story is delivered: that extra click to display the text, which then plonks itself on top of your lovely picture. I think I'd prefer just having a regular page with the picture at the top and the text below it. If you're going to have the text pop up over the picture, could it perhaps be white text on a semi-transparent dark background, so we still see the picture below?

The writing is excellent in places - I liked the action sequence with the orcs near the end particularly - but problematic elsewhere. I'm not getting a great deal of characterisation. Your central pair seem pretty interchangable, anything said or done by one of them might equally be said or done by the other, I don't get a sense of their distinct personalities.

I'm not keen on some of your names either. "Lord Luvely" Really? I'm sure he's a very nice man, but that name isn't doing him any favours. "Mick" just sounds too modern to me, or maybe it's because (like a lot of your potential readers) I have a friend called Mick, so each mention of him pulls me slightly out of your fantasy world and into the real one. A more archaic name wouldn't have this problem. Maybe find a historic period/people whose names you like and use them for all your people, if it's good enough for Tolkein... Your central characters' names are really cheesy. In particular, well, this is a world where you can actually end up eaten by trolls. Are you really going to name your daughter "Delicious"? Then there's "Mr Cat." I'm not saying you have to go the full T. S. Eliot, but a little more inventiveness wouldn't go amiss.

On the subject of Mr Cat, what happened to him? Last seen heading towards Lord Luvely's kitchen (cats, eh?) and not since. And what about the wyvern? It flew on "ahead" when they left the cottage and presumably it's waiting there for us. I think you need to decide whether you want these characters in your story, and definitively write them in or out. Personally, I find a talking cat a bit too whimsical, but he could be made into an interesting character if you work at it. After all, a cat will have a radically different perspective on the world - literally and figuratively - than a human will, which could give him interesting things to say.

I wouldn't personally describe this as a graphic novel - that would have to be in comic book style in my opinion. An "illustrated story" would be the term I'd use.

Sorry if the tone of this critique seems overly negative. I took a long time to decide whether to write anything at all if I couldn't be nicer about your stuff, but I think it's better to tell you what I think and give you the chance to make improvements (or to reject the useless opinions of some random guy off the internet about your work of genius, if you prefer).

mindsong

Lots to like here - I especially like the decision to keep the 'interface' simple/minimal.

Like others, I like the renders - coherent and quality, with a realistic and yet illustrative style that bypasses uncanny-valley issues for me. Nice choices.

My own personal graphic-novel struggle is tied to the screen-based story-flow that we all face now. Lots of choices in tools, lots of audience interfaces (desktops, tablets, phones), and lots of historic precident to both respect/leverage and to fight with, as we try to establish new story-telling paradigms. It's hard to keep it simple when the options are so sexy and novel.

Sound or no sound? swipe or click, hunt for hints, or auto-flow?, multiple threads or guided tour?, static or mixed animation?

Your story and presentation works for me - mechanically it's safe. I'm curious where experimentation will take us all from this kind of foundation. Sometimes the story's context encourages 'effects', other times I think such effects distract from it. No certain or safe answers - conventions don't yet exist here.

One specific opinion/aesthetic comment that was mentioned before - the text/story windows are not bad/wrong, but to my sensibilities, they could *somehow* meld into the illustrated backgrounds to good effect - the current text on white seems abrupt, for lack of a better term, compared to the warmth and aged style of the great images. I think you could find a good way to 'blend' these elements if you explored it a bit - no specific advice, but something to consider and play with - blurs, transparency, era-based fonts (but still classic/readable like now), etc.

Thanks for trusting us with your work and ego!

cheers,

--ms