I hate webcomics

Sinfest

anything at E-sheep, especially the telling of the Book of Revelations using Pokemon.

Creased Comics

"When I am King", the free one, is great.

i like Dirt Farm:

http://www.bendependent.com/dirtfarm/comics/081.html

(slighly nsfw?)

Someone in chatz linked to one webcomic where there were a bunch of pulpy paperback bookcovers followed by a strip playing out the situation depicted on the cover, but I didn't bookmark it and don't remember the name. Does it ring a bell?

do you mean kate beaton from hark a vagrant? http://beatonna.livejournal.com/

Yeah I linked that IIRC.

http://www.harkavagrant.com/nonsense/nancydrew2sm.png

I really thought beaton could be a champion for webcomics as a medium that could uniquely summon quality comics rather than being just a more convenient delivery system, but then I looked into the bio and found she had been publishing on paper before doing web stuff.

It was the same with the guy who does perry bible fellowship, so in a world without webcomics, we would still have the pleasure of these dudes making excellent comics.

but surely there must be someone out there who can make fantastic webcomics, whose talents could never find expression except for as webcomics!

Yeah Beaton and PBF are delights. I love them.

I barely even consider Beaton and PBF "webcomics" because they draw every panel by hand

i mean i guess they technically are because they're on the web but still

Ahh, thank you, Phil/corey!

"webcomics" are just comics that are native/exclusive to the web, no?

there is a new-ish pbf by the way

I barely even consider Beaton and PBF "webcomics" because they draw every panel by hand

So if someone like (yr gonna hate me for using this example) Jeph Jaques does his work drawin with a Wacom, does that diminish his cartoon style?

(admittedly his early work was shit, but he's gotten better).

(I am not neccesarily bigging up QC, but at least it fucking isnt XKCD)

'"webcomics" are just comics that are native/exclusive to the web, no?'

i think that's a good definition, but maybe not in the way you meant it.
being native/exclusive to the web means they would be out of their element if rendered as a pre-web comic.

it seemed like there was a time when people were trying to really take advantage of this
like having panels that scrolled infinitely to the horizontal, stuff that would be impractical to do on paper,
but now it seems like immediacy and catering to a very specific audience are the only distinctions webcomickers employ.

Jeph Jaques does his work drawin with a Wacom, does that diminish his cartoon style?

I mean, it honestly does for me! There's a warmth involved with drawing by hand that is instantly recognizable to me.

And I don't mean drawing it once and c&P-ing it either! :)

QC looks like absolute garbage to me.

i still read QC, but never for the art. it's pretty tedious most of the time, but it can be really moving.

You've all seen the Birthday Skeleton right?

http://www.meh.ro/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/meh.ro4561.jpg

I mean, it honestly does for me! There's a warmth involved with drawing by hand that is instantly recognizable to me.

And I don't mean drawing it once and c&P-ing it either! :)

― kenanpolaris (Whiney G. Weingarten), Saturday, September 18, 2010 10:27 PM

"There's a warmth involved with listening to vinyl that is instantly recognizable to me."

don't doubt it, though -- although I wonder if stuff will eventually look the same due to advances in technology? like, someone will make hardware/software that will make it possible to perfectly replicate what regular hand-drawn stuff would look like

IDK you will see some pro stuff that's done on a compy (the example that immediately comes to mind Scott McCloud's last 2 books) that does not scream "I was done on a compy." And I think there's some web comics that are doing, at the same time, "I look really warm and nicely crafted" and "looks like I was done on a compy" at the same time. I am thinking Happle Tea, which I don't really like or read, but which looks good:

http://www.happletea.com/comics/2010-04-16.jpg

Part of why it looks good is it has nice color schemes, usually.

I have a Wacom and I hate using the thing sooo much. It just never felt right to me. Plus my real pen doesn't make .aiff sounds when I use it, thank god. OTOH fixing mistakes is just laughably, shockingly easy on a computer. I wish my bottle of India Ink had ctrl + z, you know? Ink is cruel.

i still read QC, but never for the art. it's pretty tedious most of the time, but it can be really moving.

Yeah this. And I agree digital drawing isnt as natural and warm as actual drawing (and i hate using my wacom too). But need it always be about the art? Haters gonna hate but I think QC has had some entertaining story lines. It is painful when he band-name-drops for no reason but he's stopped that shit for the most part.

I think the difference is just one of low sill levels/self-taughtness looking better in one realm than the other. Low skill level hand-drawing can be charming, whereas low skill level web-drawing just looks like they dropped out of digital illustration school early.

In the hands of the highly skilled, trained, etc, digital drawings can look just as pleasant as hand-done ones.

I think the problem is a lot of the popular computer-drawn comics have fuck-off huge anime lines around every object.

re: comic posted upthread

as soon as i see those computery letters, i tune out. it's probably just me.

QC is so terrible at the moment. There is nothing redeeming about the strip (artistically or narratively) and all the characters are the most vapid boring fantasy stock characters for the author. It's basically fanfic level writing atm.

It has got that way now yeah. Ugh I read it on an RSS feed on livejournal and the fanboi comments on there make me want to hurt people.

I do like the Sven character tho.

(the example that immediately comes to mind Scott McCloud's last 2 books) that does not scream "I was done on a compy."

wait, whaat? Reinventing was nowhere near Abraham Lincoln-levels of complete incompetence (wherein he managed to get "visual typos" into print because he was so bad at computer - I remember a table leg going right through a character's leg in one panel) but it still looked incredibly computer-drawn iirc. though I've not read it since it came out bcz it was not good, in other ways.

Maybe because it's printed on paper so it is distanced from its roots, or maybe I am a lazy assessor of things. The only thing that will really get my goat is when artists don't thoroughly erase their pencil lines and you can still see these ghosty pencil halos. I'm looking at you, Dave Berg's "Lighter Side"!

The number of Nathaniel Dusk's I've hurled across the room bcz of that...

just when i thought QC couldn't get worse, he starts playing with a new fucking ugly font. what an abortion that webcomic is.

A bit derivative of Perry Bible Fellowship, but pretty good IMO:

http://maneggs.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/mario.jpg

PBF is a total classic and maybe the best comic ever made
Other than that most webcomics are generally totally awful. Lots of great art but few who can actually write.

PBF is maybe the best comic ever made

smh

perry bible fellowship isn't really a webcomic, unless you also count fox trot or life in hell as a webcomic.

haha garfield is probably a webcomic for an entire generation, now.

http://maneggs.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/merry_xmas.jpg

i beg to differ