FLIGHT

Woah... awesome comic.

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http://boraah.deviantart.com

I agree. The diversions are part of the appeal.

I am stunned at how you can have so many overlapping panels and have it still flow together. Very innovative work. Once in a while it gets a little confusing though.

The color work is beautiful!

Page 11 is up. I've quit my non-comic day job now so hopefully I can actually get some pages out more quickly.

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While I've enjoyed your comic for well over a year now and I hope you're able to successfully make your comic your job, I need to get some things off my chest. First of all, from a girl's POV, the Kimiko fanservice you've been using more and more in DC (and its advertisements) is making me uncomfortable. The latest examples in Hob #11, especially the butt shot, make this point well. True, it's relatively tame compared to the sort of fanservice you typically find in mainstream print comics, but I find it sad that I have to make that comparison to make myself feel better about a comic I otherwise like.

In my opinion, the way you handle Kimiko is less like a fleshed-out character and more like a cross between a mouthpiece for your own "gee whiz" science-y tidbits and a 2-dimensional Nerdy Dream Girlfriend. The fanservice ties in with that last part. I don't know if you're projecting your own desires onto her or if you're trying to appeal to an audience of nerdy guys without dates. For examples of the former, well, your Hob storyline is full of it. The last part of this one, about neoteny, is particularly bad. I mean, it's interesting stuff, but it's an aside that doesn't really add anything beyond that "gee whiz" factor. I'd love to see a DC one-shot strip based around the concept of neoteny, actually integrated into the story, but the Hob storyline mostly prevents that. I'm looking forward to your going back to the one-shot way of doing things because that's when I think DC is at its strongest.

My favorite strip from the Hob storyline has to be this one, and for two reasons. A) It portrays Kimiko as a sympathetic character. While it's still very much in Nerdy Dream Girlfriend territory, she feels more like a 3-dimensional character with internal struggles I can relate to. B) It stands up as a funny, cute strip completely on its own. It doesn't need to be a part of the Hob story to be enjoyable. In fact, it barely counts as a Hob strip at all, except for the last three panels.

One last thing: Why have you been messing around with Dmitri's character design? Did you make a decision that all the main characters must now be attractive? I liked Dmitri better when he looked like a lunkhead at first glance. Now he's just another pretty boy.

Anyway, this is all my own opinion, but I care enough about DC that I thought I'd type it all out in hopes that it could help you improve your comic. I'm looking forward to seeing what the future brings, as long as it doesn't dissolve into a series of Kimiko pin-ups with textbox narration explaining how the concept behind the Schrödinger's cat thought experiment could be used to create zombies. But I'm sure that won't happen.

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<--ART!

Actually the butt shot in the most recent one was partially motivated by accusations of "fan service" in the past. Also, I like the composition of her body eclipsing the time travelers, and doing it over the shoulder or with the torso wouldn't fit. The biggest reason, however, is that I thought it was funny.

People like to project their own feelings onto webcomic characters, it's very natural. Kimiko in the past was more or less a blank slate, so it was easy for people see her as anything they wanted, whether it's a personal mouthpiece for a scientific agenda, or in your case, a mildly sexist nerd fantasy. As the story progresses, however, her actual character will become more concrete and her motivations for doing what she does will come to fruition. Kimiko is, in some ways, a deeply disturbed individual. She is not an idealized person in my mind, nor is she a mouthpiece for my personal views. Part of the Hob story is dedicated to exploring differing views on the direction of the future, and she is one of them. If you're looking for a "right or wrong" approach to specific conclusions in future comics, you won't find them.

As for the axolotl story, it's highly relevant to the story, specifically the last two strips. As explained by the Time Travelers, Hob is essentially a neotenous machine, transforming into a more ancient state (the "mother"), though instead of being shipped to a zoologist Hob's transformation occurred over billions of years, as was a similar case to the Huxley story of the ape-man.

I hope you keep reading, and I'm sorry you take issue with certain elements. I can say at least a portion of your complaints will be addressed in future pages of the story.

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I think this still rubs the wrong way when you're reading the story, because she bursts into a page of exposition without much dramatic need for doing so. I know it's eventually relevant to the story (I would hope so!), but it seems a little too coincidental. There are a lot of stories that I enjoy which make use of a liberal amount of synchronicity, but in those cases I think it's usually more of a poetic device.

And the character does have a lot of spontaneous cheesecake ("fan service"?) poses--I don't quite get how it's supposed to be funny.

Anyhow, the comic is obviously interesting for people to be taking a closer look at it. I hope this career change will be exciting and fruitful for you.

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@rumrug
neilcomics.com

Kim's bottom eclipsing the Time Travelers is a symbolic composition of her asserting dominance and control over the situation, not to mention a rejection of the potential future that has just been presented to her. She's been almost entirely passive throughout the story until now, and it was important to visually signify her growing relevance in the decision making process. The fact that it's her rear end shows how dismissive she is of their views, the tasteful equivalent of her mooning their beliefs and slapping her own ass. To me, this is funny. Also, the visual lines created by her silhouette are very important, because it has to draw the eye appropriately backwards, against the commonly accepted direction of panel flow.

As for Kim bursting into exposition for no reason, that's the kind of person she is. I admit the transition was a little clunky, but she is the kind of individual who is just waiting to talk, at length, about things nobody else is likely to care about.

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You can have a mountain of justifications for the awkward things in the strip -- that is, assuming you're being serious in your defense -- but that doesn't make them un-awkward. They are things that should be addressed if you want your comic to improve. The butt shot is awkward. It doesn't read as an ironic statement about past accusations of cheesecake or whatever. It just looks like a giant cheesecake-y butt shot.

And the walls of text are still walls of text, even if they're the sort of thing Kim would be prone to. If she's rambling about stuff no one else cares about, shouldn't that be indicated in how you present her ramblings? As in, she's shown from the POV of another character, going on and on about some random scientific tidbit, in her own little world, instead of being given center stage, as she always is? When Kim goes on a rant without any reasonable counter against her, it just comes off and obnoxious and preachy, which I know can't be your intention.

Show, don't tell, as much as you can. That's pretty standard advice. When I see a big bunch of text like that, I'm less likely to pay attention and more likely to just go somewhere else. The only reason I've read through all the text you've put up -- using Kimiko as your mouthpiece -- is because the comic has entertained me in the past, and I give it the benefit of the doubt. But the way things are going, my interest is starting to wear thin. Since my two top problems with the comic are directly related to Kim, I think maybe it would be a good exercise to focus on another one of your characters as the main protagonist once this Hob thing is all wrapped up. If you did some more Rupert & Hubert or Old Man-Man strips, I doubt there would be any issues at all with random cheesecake or walls of text. At least, not ones that could be so easily written off. (Old Man-Man cheesecake? Ewwwww.) If you took a break from Kim and came back to her, that way when you worked with her with new perspective, you'd be able to use her less awkwardly. It doesn't have to be Kimiko: The Comic.

As long as I'm giving constructive criticism, the last part of Hob #11 just doesn't make a lot of sense. They have lightning bolts on their shirts, so they throw the future people out a window? So lightning bolts equals super strength? Are they supposed to be part of a family of low-key superheroes? Is that what you were going for? The gag just felt flat and confusing. Also, if you're going to relate neoteny to the robot, it would be best to do it at a time in the story when a more direct connection can be made. Done as early as it was, it just seemed like a random aside, especially with the time gap between updates. By the time I got to the part explaining what Hob was, I failed to make any connection, even though I knew that's probably what you were going for.

And I STILL like Dmitri better as a lunkhead than as a pretty boy. Just sayin'.

I'm going to repeat what I said earlier: most of your complaints will actually be addressed in future pages. Be patient. You shouldn't take everything at face value.

For example:

Maybe it will be addressed in the next comic, eh?

As for showing more than telling, I pick my battles. The first third of the story (the last ten comics) have mostly been exposition for the upcoming action, and if I were to draw out exposition too much it would kill the pacing. Most of what they're talking about is fairly technical, so a lot of times it becomes too convoluted to use too many images, and it takes too many pages. I absolutely hate decompressed storytelling, which is why I try to be as economical with every inch of the canvas.

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I think I've been pretty patient up to this point. I've followed the Hob story since you started posting in February. That's patience. That's being a fan. I look forward to seeing how you're going to improve the comic in the coming weeks and months, when the quality of the storytelling has been steadily dropping the past several strips. Hopefully you making it your job will allow you to do that.

As far as "taking things at face value," I don't see how that's a bad thing in this case. I see problems with your comic. I comment on those problems so you can fix them and make the comic better. Am I supposed to read your mind to know exactly which ones you're already aware of? The quality of the comics you've already made should speak for itself, and that's the definition of face value.


Maybe it would be better if you included some bit of explanation in the first place so that the gag would make sense. You don't have a page length limit, unlike print comics. How hard would it have been to add another panel or two to explain the lightning bolt thing? Seriously.

Lastly, the amount of text doesn't seem to be so much a problem of wanting non-decompressed storytelling as it is that your comic is better suited to short one-offs instead of a longer story arc. And you know, you don't have to totally decompress your story to avoid the walls of text. Had I been in your position, I probably would have taken a couple of strips (or one extra-long one) to show the future story, with narration, as well. It would have been more engaging to the reader, but not have dragged on forever. As it is, the narration looks almost crammed in. Don't be afraid to decompress when it will make a key part of the plot more rewarding to read. My work isn't what I consider very decompressed -- or very good -- but I use it sometimes when I want the reader to feel more drawn in. I hope you'll be a little more open-minded about that in future stories.

Nothing I will say or do at this point will please you. The direction and scope I have in mind for Hob will not entertain you, nor will it live up to the "glory days" of older strips that you believe to be superior. Most of the changes you want to the strip are out of line with what I want to do with it, and those that aren't will develop as they go along.

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Gee, sorry, I didn't mean to be such a big bad meanie with all my advice and constructive criticism. It would please me if you would consider my opinion instead of dismissing it. If you're really planning to go in the opposite direction from where I've been advising you to go, then, yes, I think the old strips will be better than the new ones because they have that effortlessly fun and whimsical quality to them that drew readers to Dresden Codak in the first place. It's what attracted me.

I'm going to keep tabs on DC for a while longer while you get settled into treating it as a job, and I'm going to hope for the best. If your strips continue to get wordier and cheesecake-ier and more confusing, I'll just stop reading. But I can guarantee that I won't be the only one.

My consistent exponential rise in site traffic since the Hob story began would indicate otherwise, but that's neither here nor there. I'm not dismissing your criticisms, I'm disagreeing with them. I'm doing what I love, and if that's out of step with where you think my comic should be, then we'll just have to disagree.

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Okay, first of all, I figure that your rise in readers is more from people linking to you based on your strong archive and the promise of something shiny and new at the beginning of the Hob story, rather than people being attracted by what Hob has actually become. Maybe I'm wrong. I'm just making an educated guess here.

Secondly, popularity doesn't mean anything. Celine Dion is popular. Friends is popular. Megatokyo is popular. No offense to people who may like one or all of those things, but they turn my stomach. Popularity is no guarantee of quality. More readers does not make your comic any less imperfect or above criticism in any way.

And yes, you are dismissing me. I think the two lengthy posts defending the deep symbolism and wry commentary of Kimiko's giant butt shot pretty much prove that. My guess is that you're so used to getting heaps of praise -- and don't get me wrong, there's a lot to praise about the work you've done -- that my criticisms just sound ridiculous to you. It's a common syndrome among webcomic creators.

You don't have to take any of my advice. I'm not the boss of you. All I was hoping for when I first commented in this thread was a simple, "Oh, I hadn't considered that. Thanks for your perspective." But instead I got dismissal after dismissal. I'm mostly just disappointed that you didn't think to respond to my criticisms in a professional manner. You know, since a professional is what you're endeavoring to be. I'm making my attempt at being a professional cartoonist myself, and I'm grateful for every person who offers me constructive criticism, even if I don't agree with it or ever use it. If nothing else, criticism keeps me humble and prevents me from being satisfied with my work, so that I can continue to improve. The longer you draw and the more skilled you get, the harder it is to find honest criticism, especially online.

Anyway, this is my last post in this thread. I've said my piece. You don't want to hear it, and I've got better things to do than offer perfectly good advice to a brick wall. Good luck with your chosen path. I'll be watching.

Yikes... He's putting up these comics for FREE, there's no reason to be so insistent.

I hate to say anymore for fear of piling on after all that, but... I didn't read the panel flow correctly at first (there are a few strips here that cause the same confusion). I recently tried a zig-zag layout on 1 page, and found that it's easier to lead the eye with the speech balloons rather than composition and overlapping, when you're using a potentially confusing layout. It also helps to ask a few friends if it's working. (I'm glad you're trying to find ways of compressing a lot of information on the page, though.)

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@rumrug
neilcomics.com