Extended Evaluation:

Creating a digital comic was the most appropriate medium to use, especially being out of the studio with lockdown. I could still produce a high quality level of work from home. The benefits of using digital drawing software as my main tool to work with is that it is easy to copy and paste features. These small details I can creatively cut corners on will accumulate a lot of time saved that I can put towards more work elsewhere in the comic.  

By using digital software to produce my final major project, I feel as if the final outcome will be much more crisp, neat and professional looking, compared to producing a traditional, hand drawn comic book. It also demonstrates the knowledge and application of tech based skills, besides just showing the general format of a hand made paper comic. 

The main effective processes I found during my comic book final major project, was to utilise the digital available tools and methods within my drawing software. I chose to create my whole comic piece in the popular, digital comic creating software 'FireAlpaca'. 

The programme has great comic book features and tools, including the advancements to customise all page and panel measurements; along side using pre-made comic panel compositions. I decided to create all of my own comic page panels which helps to emphasise key features and events in my narrative by having the ability to shift and morph my visuals to achieve the highest impact. If I had used pre-existing formats, my narrative may of seemed flat or unclear. A good set of visuals in a comic can easily speak for itself. 

In the image above, I've demonstrated an example of my visuals emphasising the narrative through creating my own panel composition. Here, I also evidence my layers and work in progress on this particular narrative page.

I found this specific page panel set up to be the most challenging, however as I wanted to portray a combination of: a time jump following the global progression of Covid-19, including different news reporters in the majorly hit countries, as well as documenting on the physical stages the virus impacts on the human body. By producing the news anchor panels on the top and bottom of the page, it creates a type of symmetry reflecting similar narrative slots. 

Utilising the middle section to change up the narrative visuals, I split up the main panel into three, to start to insert the processes of how Coronavirus impacts the body. The middle panels will emphasise the whole composition from the differing visuals, compared to the surrounding sections. The main impact of this is due to the central eye position, encouraging the viewers/readers to focus onto the centre of the comic page. 

Cross hatching in my character illustrations was one feature I wish I could have included more within my comic. It was a creative and executive decision not to use this method as I was taking too long on producing narrative comic pages anyway. This would have just impacted my progression, and possibly would have resulted in producing lesser narrative pages.

 The hair technique, demonstrated within my comics and the family dining scene above, is another example of a time consuming process. However, with this process, I feel that it's an attribute to the overall comic authenticity, instead of a hinderance. The pay off is worth the time put into the technique and process. When reflecting back over all the pages within my final major comic, the hair feature always stands out and I am glad I took the time to add that style of detail. 

The lesson learned, is to be careful with which battles I decide to choose or not within my creative process. Meaning, sometimes having a battle may turn out in my favour, becoming an attribute. Other times, the battle is not worth it and you lose instead of gaining anything. 

Along side my evaluation, this video created by comic book and cartoonist Lars Martinson, addresses and identifies a lot of my reoccurring issues throughout my own project exploration. In a way, I found this video comforting as I made the same mistakes along side another fellow artist perfectionist. Despite the duration of my final major project not matching Martinson's 13 years of working time; I still feel like I could of adapted. Notes from his video by selectively choosing and picked my battles and knowing how to cut corners without sacrificing any narrative factors.