I don’t design my pages. It has never been a thing that I do. I just draw and fit it to the page, occasionally I’ll put some text into a bare area and call it good. In a way the lack of design is design.

As I was working on a video about drawing cartoon faces I stated (paraphrasing here) that when I create a cartoon face I am drawing on all the experience I have drawing faces from photos and life. 

​The kids I work with complain about drawing from life, arguing that they need to work on their manga style rather than drawing stuff from life. They hate to hear that all the greats drew and still draw from life on the regular. Every time we put pen(cil) to paper it changes and alters our ability to render for the better.*

I did a vibey realistic drawing of a face today with pen and ink wash, a favorite technique. Then I went on to draw 7 different version of him with a few different materials. It was and is a great exercise in character design but also in seeing exactly how drawing real but with a focus on vibes and from “life” really informs my cartoon faces. Those characters can feel more REAL because I draw vibey realism.

I tested it with a fude nib, 2 types of gel pen, and a brush pen. Each gives a different feel to the cartoon face. 

As a further test I’m definitely going to test this idea out with the drawing tablet in Krita.

​* We can discuss what I mean by better in a future post.