All about Comic Artist

Amik dari pergh (nanti post kat situ lak)
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General Information
Name (or nickname) : VulpineNinja/VieN
Place of Birth/ Date : KL
Hometown : KL
Education : Taking degree
Comicography or working experiences) : none


Artistic background.
1. Were you particularly artistic when you were child?
I like to draw since I was a kid, yes. I'm not sure what it means by artistic though.

2. When did you discovered yourself as a talented (artist/writer)?
Although I've been drawing all my life, I think I finally realized my talent when I was in form 1 (13 years old) where I started to get serious.

3. Did you study art formally? Where or when and for how long?
3 years when I was in form 1 - form 3, but I really sucked at Visual Arts Education. Then I took the subject for my SPM.

4. How do you become interested in comics? Did you read them as a child? And did it inspire you to create comics?
I think it started off with Sailormoon. First it was the anime, and then I found the manga and bought it. The manga was like 10 times better than the anime, and I fell in love with the art. Yes it did inspire me to draw a comic. I drew a stupid mahou shojo comic LOL.

5. Did you read many different genres of comics?
Mahou shojo - Sailormoon, Magic Knight Rayearth, Cardcaptor Sakura (I don't like this one though).
A bunch of shonen manga starting from Rurouni Kenshin. But most shonen manga now are getting more and more absurd + draggy (like Bleach and Naruto) so I dropped them. Shonen that I still read is Fairy Tail and Soul Eater. Sports themed aren't my cup of tea, but I do read Eyeshield 21 mainly because of Murata Yuusuke's artistic skills.
For light reading, I read some simple shojo manga.
Other than that, there's Josei and Seinen, for more complex mindfakking.


6. What are your favourite comics?
Rurouni Kenshin, Magic Knight Rayearth, Eyeshield 21, Soul Eater, ARMS


7. Who are your favorite comics artist/writer?
Nobuhiro Watsuki, Murata Yuusuke, Modoru Motoni


8. Story and drawing are the most important elements in comics. Which one do you prefer should be the best at the first place - drawing or story?
At first it's the art that attracts me. The story is judged later. But even if the story is good, with not so good it's a turn off. But i've seen not-so-good artwork with promising story. But then if u wanna enter a competition you art HAS to be PRETTY NO? And to publish the comic in magz editors will criticize your drawing and tell you to make it prettier NO??

So i say it's a balance of both, and both needs to be high quality.

9. Did your favorite comics both in art and story influence your style in any way?
clothes - RuroKen
Expression/emotion - ES21

10. Inspite of comics stuff, is there any particular influences to your work, such as literature, music(song), movies, animation or perhaps famous people?
I havent exactly drawn comics, but I did design the characters and plan the story.
Literatue - from fairy tales, especially brother's Grimm
Music - mostly from my fave bands; Linkin Park, My Chemical Romance, Nightwish, Within Temptation... and other titles.
Movies - Pirates of the Carribean!
Animation - too many to list XD

Working Process
1. Where and how did you get the ideas for your comics?
If you see my Twin Paradox, it's based on life experience.
Other ideas are from mythological stuff and also based on what I learn in my course.

2. What do you think about telling story through pictures? How complicated it is?
It's more complicated to draw it than read it. And it's complicated if readers don't see the way you do in from certain perspective and angles.

3. Do you make dummy or raw sketches first? Then go on to detail artwork?
Yup I draw from the base. I draw simpler clothing before adding any design i want. But it takes time...

4. Can you describe your working method from story content to finished drawing page?
write the plot or outline of the story first. Depending on what genre, I list down key items and describe them. Depends on the number of characters, I write sidestories for them (flashbacks, specials - development purposes). Then I write the dialogues - tentative. I may decide to add something else in the drawing process. Then draw out the panels, do base sketch for characters and background, later add the details. Then ink... finally do some touch ups.

Opinion and self-refelexivity
1. Do you see any differences between cartoonist and comic artist?
Yes. Cartoonist draw and animate cartoons. the person behind cartoon drawing. It could either be responsible for animation or posters. Comic artist draw comics.

2. What are the advantages and disadvantages of comics medium ?
Advantage: Conveying a message visually is more effective.
Disadvantage: You dislike reading wall of text.

3. What qualities make such a good comics?
Most importantly; the message and moral of the story.
Then comes originality, creativity and skill.

4. What do you think about the global comics scene? Are you up to date with their issues?
I'm pretty much ignorant about most things....

5. Did you think comics reflects the life of their times?
It may not look like it, but deep down it could be.

7. At what degree did you agree that the way of thinking or the people lifestyle reflected through the comics?
uh i dont get it but I think it's a good idea. you know, to tell the world how it is like to be in a particular oppurtunity and see how weird people view things.

8. About our local comics, does it reflecting the lives of most Malaysians?
Barely. M-komik has the potential. Lawak campus also reflects our school life, same goes for under-18. But the newest school themed comic in Gempakstarz doesn't because I don't feel related to the theme and story at all.

9. Amid the influx of foreign comics and its popularity amongst local reader, is it enriching or threatening creativity and/or identity of local comics?
Threatening. because most comic artist tend to be more influenced on foreign culture and styles rather than be inspired by their creative mechanism. I don't mind if we wanna adapt manga style, but c'mon... the concept! For instance, the Japanese mangaka took historical elements or 'retell' history in their own way (Samurai, ninja, etc), but Malaysians take the influence as 'copying' the samurai characters instead of be inspired to write about something based on our own history. Some Malaysian comic artist like to 'pretend' that they know all about Japan, but isn't it better if we use our own roots and origin and lifestyle because we understand them much better? So we already saw a few glimpse of Japanese lifestyle from Japanese comics, how about we give the world a glimpse of our own lifestyle (be it in a negative or positive aspect)?.