NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

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Bego
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NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by Bego »

Here it is!!


Image

:44 :44 :44 :44 :44 :44

THE BEST ARIETA WITH A GREAT STORY BY ROBINJA!

Please, let us know your comments :D

You can find the comic at:
http://www.dofantasy.com/english/USAFC3 ... rtyCop.htm
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robinja
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Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by robinja »

I am delighted to see this published! I really hope you guys like it!
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robinja
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Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by robinja »

Some lovely feedback! :D :D

"a formidable writer with a wonderful talent of bringing out the sexy... it really came alive with Arieta's exceptional artwork...this is not your run of the mill BDSM comic. It has a very cinematic feel to it" - Erenisch

"It's terrific. Dark and fascinating and very sexy... It has a very different more complex atmosphere with emotional dynamics much more subtle than we're used to seeing... The characters have interesting, unpredictable personalities and the situations don't always go in the familiar arc. The art is lovely and the sex is exotic and fascinating...an excellent piece of work and recommend it highly" - Ernest Greene
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triona_b
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Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by triona_b »

:D
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robinja
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Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by robinja »

Thanks hansmoleman!

There might be more gagging in BL2!
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Naj
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Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by Naj »

Always good to see another fellow writer. Hope it does well!
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robinja
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Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by robinja »

Thanks Naj! :D :D
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Naj
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Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by Naj »

Well, I took a look at it, and I felt like giving some pointers which you might find useful (I know as a writer I'd like that):

As far as the story is concerned, it's not exactly an easy thing to give constructive criticism for. While it doesn't exactly have a paper thin plot like other comics, it's a bit light on detail also. Then again, this is not exactly a bad thing; I understand that most of our readers come for the action and look for high literature elsewhere. In my experience, I tend to use archetypes more than actual characterization which often takes too long and is simply glossed over for the money scenes. Still, it was not terrible. The pacing seemed a bit disjointed, with vast stretches of open space in some segments and giant infodumps in others. Ordinarily, since I have to piece together something coherent from given scenes and have no control over plot or pacing, I would give that a free pass, but since you're ostensibly directing this, the pace at which plot is distributed could be a bit more even. Now as I say this, keep in mind that it's not horrible. The pacing is fairly decent, but it could stand to be smoothed out a little more.

In regards to helping this would be some improvements in panel layout. I think the main problem with the "pacing" is that you tend to dump all your text in a single, enormous narration or dialogue bubble when you have so much panel to play around with. I've found that basically anything not-human is fair game for bubble placement, provided it's not a key prop of course (whips, firearms, etc). Corners and panel edges are also great places to put bubbles since those areas tend to be overlooked or intentionally left open by the artists for us writers to come in and fill-in-the-blanks, as it were.

The most egregious example of this "bad" placement is the scene where Darika talks with Palmer at the cafe and proceeds with the flashback. The panel from which you take your avatar itself is the best example: the narrative bubble is enormous and covers O'Malley's legs, which I would not have personally done. Breaking it up into two or even three narrative bubbles following the left side of the panel (beneath the floating head and parallel to the body) would both smooth out the pacing and not cover anything important.

I've posted an example here: http://imgur.com/rSY4qVj

Playing around with the full panel to place your bubbles instead of shoving them into the very overcrowded center might help a lot both with pacing and to improve the comic visually.

Finally, some of your Sound FX fonts seem like odd choices. Some of that might simply be due to a lack of variety. I've personally found blambot.com to be an excellent source for free comics FX fonts and would encourage you to download a variety of fonts for different needs (sizzle, smack, snap etc).

Hope this helps! Once again, it's pretty good and definitely different from what I've been seeing lately. Keep it up! 8-)
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robinja
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Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by robinja »

Thank you Naj for all your comments and for taking your time to post this.

Naj wrote:
> Well, I took a look at it, and I felt like giving some pointers which you might find
> useful (I know as a writer I'd like that):
>
> As far as the story is concerned, it's not exactly an easy thing to give constructive
> criticism for. While it doesn't exactly have a paper thin plot like other comics,
> it's a bit light on detail also.

There was some stuff that was important to convey, hence the "infodump" in places but I wanted to leave certain things implied or unsaid. I think the careful reader would fill in the blanks and the not-so-careful reader doesn't care either way.

> Then again, this is not exactly a bad thing; I
> understand that most of our readers come for the action and look for high literature
> elsewhere. In my experience, I tend to use archetypes more than actual characterization

I did try to do a bit of this but from cop shows, noir crime stories etc.

> which often takes too long and is simply glossed over for the money scenes. Still,
> it was not terrible.

well that's a relief! :)

> The pacing seemed a bit disjointed, with vast stretches of
> open space in some segments and giant infodumps in others. Ordinarily, since I have
> to piece together something coherent from given scenes and have no control over
> plot or pacing, I would give that a free pass, but since you're ostensibly directing
> this, the pace at which plot is distributed could be a bit more even. Now as I say
> this, keep in mind that it's not horrible. The pacing is fairly decent, but it could
> stand to be smoothed out a little more.
>
> In regards to helping this would be some improvements in panel layout. I think the
> main problem with the "pacing" is that you tend to dump all your text in a single,
> enormous narration or dialogue bubble when you have so much panel to play around
> with. I've found that basically anything not-human is fair game for bubble placement,
> provided it's not a key prop of course (whips, firearms, etc). Corners and panel
> edges are also great places to put bubbles since those areas tend to be overlooked
> or intentionally left open by the artists for us writers to come in and fill-in-the-blanks,
> as it were.
>
> The most egregious example of this "bad" placement is the scene where Darika talks
> with Palmer at the cafe and proceeds with the flashback. The panel from which you
> take your avatar itself is the best example: the narrative bubble is enormous and
> covers O'Malley's legs, which I would not have personally done. Breaking it up into
> two or even three narrative bubbles following the left side of the panel (beneath
> the floating head and parallel to the body) would both smooth out the pacing and
> not cover anything important.
>
> I've posted an example here: http://imgur.com/rSY4qVj
>
> Playing around with the full panel to place your bubbles instead of shoving them
> into the very overcrowded center might help a lot both with pacing and to improve
> the comic visually.
>
> Finally, some of your Sound FX fonts seem like odd choices. Some of that might simply
> be due to a lack of variety. I've personally found blambot.com to be an excellent
> source for free comics FX fonts and would encourage you to download a variety of
> fonts for different needs (sizzle, smack, snap etc).

I take all these points and I'm grateful for such detailed constructive criticism. I just wanted to set out the way the process worked in this case:

I wrote the script first, this included descriptions of the scenes, the action, images to help convey what I was getting across, almost all of the dialogue and all of the narration (at least in first draft form). The full script package also included general notes and style guide about the action and depiction of characters as well as character sheets for the important characters. I envisaged quite a bit of back story for the main characters not all of which made it into the comic (intentionally so). Also, the whole story covers much more than the 50 pages here. The story as originally plotted out is probably going to take three parts to tell. I originally intended a different cliffhanger to happen a couple of scenes later than this but it became clear as the comic progressed that we wouldn't fit that into the 50 pages. Arieta is already working on part 2 which will start to payoff some of the setup in BL1.

I didn't do this on a panel by panel basis, that's up to the artist. I don't know when I'm writing a scene whether it will be done in one page or take three or more pages. There's only so much control I would have over the pacing in that sense. I would describe the action the same way as a film script with the way it comes across on the page being the responsibility of the artist. This would include suggestions of particular images but not the number of panels required to show the scene. Personally I think Arieta did a wonderful job with this and I'm so pleased at how it turned out. The stage of the artwork went from sketch to line drawn to full colour and as this process went on I would see the work and comment if there were any mistakes or changes or tweaks needed. There were some adjustments and additions in this process.

Once the artwork was complete I edited the script down to narration and dialogue for the lettering process. I didn't do the lettering, speech bubbles, or sound effects myself but I worked with the writer/letterer during this process who also edited the dialogue and added additional dialogues, particularly during the sex scenes. Again, perhaps I'm too close to this but I was personally very happy how this turned out, in particular the colour coding of the narration blocks compared to the dialogue boxes and I think the additional dialogues and edits to my text really helped convey the story better. I do see the points you're making about the large blocks and this is perhaps my fault with the amount of information in the infodump narration, there's only so many ways to get this across and I should probably have condensed that into shorter, punchier blocks


> Hope this helps! Once again, it's pretty good and definitely different from what
> I've been seeing lately. Keep it up! 8-)

Thank you and I really do appreciate the discussion on this. I have written a few comic scripts now but I'm quite new to this and eager to learn and improve.
darkfist
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Posts: 175

Re: NEWEST ARIETAL is NOW online!!! Great story by Robinja

Post by darkfist »

I really enjoyed Bad Liutenant 1 Robinja, definitely a good story, well drawn, all around great comic. I love those situations where women in power get put into those kind of situations. I think it's a great first chapter, and now that the "origin story" has been laid down I hope we get to see our good Liutenant in more humiliating situations not only with her "owners" but in her day to day activities as detective as well. Keep up the good work.
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