Attempts at the sample scripts

[Nick Shepherd]

Cheers for the feedback guys!!!  Much appreciated.

[Darren Stephens]

Wow, really strong stuff, Sparkonaut! Like Crazyfox said, I'd love to see some inks n colour splashed on that. Just love the grimy crossed with cartoony style you have going on. 

[Sparkonaut]

Thanks, chaps Trust me, I'm itching to wrap this one up.

[staticgirl]

That's bloody great that is. I love your MC-1. It feels real. The characters are great too - there's a lot of expression.

[Sparkonaut]

Thaks very much, Staticgirl

Ok,last page and that will be the last of me before the inks are done.
Btw, does anyone know if Tharg will be doing portfolio reviews at the London Super Con? I think I read on here that PJ said it's no good going the slushpile route, so I was hoping to take the direct approach.

[Nick Shepherd]

hey guys,
I just have a question about inking.  I was wondering what the industry standard is for traditional inking.  What I was going to do was copy this page by onto bristol board and ink it which will be labour intensive. But I can't trace onto Bristol because it is too thick. 
Also, this way of inking wouldn't work if I was inking someone elses work.
Any feedback would be most appreciated.

[Nick Shepherd]

Sorry, you can ignore the above post.  I just tested it out and I can trace through onto Bristol.
Silly me. 
Also, should I have posted my Dredd work on the submission forum for sample scripts rather than start a new thread?

[El Chivo]

Lovely stuff, Sparkonaut, let's see it inked!

Cheers

Chi

[pauljholden]

Thaks very much, Staticgirl

Ok,last page and that will be the last of me before the inks are done.
Btw, does anyone know if Tharg will be doing portfolio reviews at the London Super Con? I think I read on here that PJ said it's no good going the slushpile route, so I was hoping to take the direct approach.

I think RELYING on the slushpile route was the act of a madman. Much better to get a straight forward portfolio review, and back it up (if tharg is ok) with further samples.

Top notch Dredd in that sample page, btw. Much stronger showing of Dredd than those earlier pages.

-pj

[TordelBack]

Sparkonaut lad, if you can produce this kind of work consistently and to a schedule, you were meant to be in my Prog.  I love it - Ewins cut with Hewlitt and McCarthy, right up my street.

One, just one, criticism:  your sealife could be mutified by oh, say 15%.

[pauljholden]

One minor/major note: I think you need  to redesign that gun, the handle specifically, looks like it'd be impossible for Dredd or anyone to hold.Something to think about before inking...

-pj

[Sparkonaut]

Top notch Dredd in that sample page, btw. Much stronger showing of Dredd than those earlier pages.

Thanks,PJ. I was more careful this time round.

One, just one, criticism:  your sealife could be mutified by oh, say 15%.

Good thinking!

One minor/major note: I think you need  to redesign that gun, the handle specifically, looks like it'd be impossible for Dredd or anyone to hold.Something to think about before inking...

Will do. The inking is a refining process for me when I've already distanced myself from the first pages and rethink everything. Hopefully I'll iron out most of the clumsiness.

[Proudhuff]

I Agree with all the good stuff said above Sparky, there's a great variety and life about your pencils, the BG detail are well observed but don't detract and I'm liking that fish (+15% mutie of course!)

well done sir!

[Emperor]

Just in case you still need it

There is a thread where we've got some general reference images for the Cycles of Violence script:

http://www.2000adonline.com/forum/index.php/topic,26304.0.html

Steve Cook's blog often posts production snippets and he has a colouring guide to Dredd and Anderson that also gives a decent guide to Dredd's uniform:

http://secret-oranges.blogspot.com/2011/12/dredd-specs.html
http://secret-oranges.blogspot.com/2011/12/dredd-specs-2.html

And Anderson:

http://secret-oranges.blogspot.com/2011/11/anderson-specs.html

Which come from one of the Judge Dredd "bibles":

http://forums.2000adonline.com/index.php/topic,17566.0.html

The Starscans also contain useful information:

http://www.2000ad.org/?zone=covers&page=scans

Front view of characters:

http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=700
http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=701
http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=702
http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=703
http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=710

As well as cutaway technical diagrams of various bits of a Judge's kit:

http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=991
http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=995
http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=997
http://www.2000ad.org/functions/cover.php?Comic=scans&choice=998

As has been said, don't worry too much about the details (as everyone draws their eagle at a different angle or the shoulder pad a different size) but those should help avoid the more basic errors which make people wonder if the artist has ever read a Judge Dredd comic

I'll add some of those links to the sample scripts thread as they might be useful.

Also, should I have posted my Dredd work on the submission forum for sample scripts rather than start a new thread?

I'm a lumper not a splitter* so I'd lean towards the first option (I can still merge the two threads if you like) - more people keep an eye on that one so you'd possibly get more feedback and it is pretty useful resources for people looking for tips, especially as "Cycle of Violence" is the most popular script (the final panel on page 1 is a bugger and there must be a dozen permutations of it on there by now). However, the world is not going to end if there is a separate thread, it'll just make my brain itch

* Although when it comes to taxonomy I find myself more in the splitter camp - make of that what you will.

[pauljholden]

I don't usually do this, but as I think you're art is pretty damn close to being there, I've rejigged it to show where I think you can give more room for the letterer/writer/editor to breath a bit. I'm glad to see a bunch of balloon placements in the pencils, but I don't think you've been generous enough with the space - the old 2000ad 10 commandments have a couple of guidelines for balloon/dialogue/caption placement - leave 25% of the top of every panel free and character speaking order is always left to right.



Panel 1: I've shifted the action over to the right a bit, this gives room for any captions required and doesn't take away anything from what's happening. Your eye reads left to right, and the space from Dredd's feet to the panel border was pretty much dead space - not contributing anything to the story telling. (BTW Nice sound effects!)

Panel 2: I've moved everything down again - cropping dredd a bit more heavily - normally not a great idea, but here it adds to the claustrophobia and gives more room for dialogue.

Panel 3: I've shifted Dredd down and a bit to the right - the aim here is to take the dialogue away from the bottom of the panel and shift it to the top - I prefer my dialogue above the art - read story then look at picture. How it's done in my house

Panel 4: No chance (though you could stand to move the gun further from the ship to give more lettering room) If I were lettering this, I'd want to have a LARGE balloon and teeny tiny text, which I don't think there's room to do here - making a balloon big enough for dialogue alone isn't enough - sometimes the balloon will be larger than you'd think.

Panel 5: No change, though I don't like balloon placement on the guy. I'd probably have made panels 4 and 6 a bit thinner to give panel 5 a bit more room - more dialogue means larger panel.

Panel 6 - moved gun down a bit, giving more room for dialogue.

As I say, I don't normally micro suggest like this, but this is the sort of lettering pass I've often done on my own pages, keeping the art as intact as possible but giving letterers room to do their thing. Which is why I'm called LL Cool PJ*.

-pj
*Letterers Love Cool PJ.