Wednesday, July 31, 2013
AAAH
Had a scare where I thought I had forgotten to take a picture of my whiteboard before I erased it.
Labels: manga
3ish progress ⇑date
Only about ⅔ of the way through another page. It has a lot of panels on it, though, so whatevs. Also been doing some more character work on the mummy, working on ways to make him expressive despite bandages over his mouth most of the time. Also did some modeling earlier for things using my old camera's timer setting.
Also the hood is inside out :(
PS: I horizontally squished this picture because everyone in my manga is stylized that way. My hope is that it will affect the standard of beauty and make everyone feel inadequate because they are too broad/have too-small heads/eyes/aren't mummified. (Srsly, though, why did nobody tell me I look like a funhouse mirror from the back?)
Labels: manga
Inspiration
It takes a lot of hard work to live ur dream. I want to be a mangaka, but it won't be easy. For instance, Jessica Alba's dream was to found a company that sold baby products, but to do that she had to act in a lot of TV shows and movies and win golden globes and stuff. Always strive toward the thing you want, no matter where it takes you (maybe prison? Uh oh, who am I inspiring here? Internet people maybe shouldn't be inspired?) NEVER MIND GUYS, KEEP GIVING UP AND BEING ON THE INTERNET! COMMENT ANGRILY ON A YOUTUBE OR NEWS ARTICLE OR A TUMBLR! THAT WAS YOUR DREAM ALL ALONG!
Labels: inspiration in general, manga
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
10 pages (9 pages) planned out!
I put the first ten pages I've roughly sketched up on my whiteboard onto Google+, so please check them out and give me some feedback please? Ugly please? We have to be friends on Google+ for you to see it, but I imagine if you're reading this then you are either in that circle or you should be.
But there they are! Some of them are rougher than others. (You many notice I'm still zeroing in on what I want that mummy to look like.)
Labels: manga
3ish update
now with embedding!
Okay, I'm about a page behind where I wanted to be by now. In my defense, I went out this afternoon to help set up for a funeral. I drew this face today:
It's in the middle of a page I don't plan on using it in, but I hope I find a good panel to put it in later. I think I make this face a lot in real life? Also I just realized her nose is pointing down instead of up, so that needs to be fixed...
BACK TO WOIK
BACK TO WOIK
Monday, July 29, 2013
How manga will my manga manga?
From probably most definitions of manga, what I am making is not going to be manga? Some people think manga has to be made in Japan. This makes a little sense, because comics from other places are called "comics" or "manwha" or "manhua" or "képregény" or whatever depending on your language. But I'd be kind of outta luck in that case, so I'm going to inventory here what I'm doing what's different and similar to my understanding of what makes a manga.
1. Reading Direction
My manga will be read from right-to-left. There was no specification that it had to be in the contest, and I thought about it a bit, because the words will be in English, so the words will still be going left to right. But in the drastically unlikely event of me winning, the manga will be published in some form by the English version of WSJ, all of which is read right-to-left. I'm just going to have to find ways around the (I can think of relatively few) problems this might create.
2. Color
Manga doesn't have to be all black and white. Most of it I see is, what with it being cheaper and all that, but there are full color manga, and special color pages are pretty common, especially in Jump. I don't plan right now on having any color pages in mine. If English Jump wasn't all digital, that would be a fairly obvious choice, but the real reason is just personal preference. I like the black and white. Mainly because I like sharp, simple style, and possibly because I'm partially colorblind. If I finish with plenty of time, I might try to do some watercolor on a page or something, but I'm not going in with that in mind.
3. Ink
I don't know what the exact case is, but I'm pretty sure most manga is still done analogue. Mine will be digital. I'm very lucky to be born in this time, since I can't imagine myself making anything remotely worthwhile without the aid of an undo key. Plus all the supplies involved; big paper, ink, pens, whiteout or something, maybe one of those french curve rulers it seems like the mangaka in manga always have. That is not my plan.
4. Screentone
One of the biggest identifiable features of manga, I think, is the use of screentone. If I didn't try out some rad patterns to give some texture to my manga, I would be doing a bad job and also not liking the end results. I'm doing this digitally, so I don't have to go out and buy actual sheets of the stuff, but I don't want to just go google image search it and copy and paste stuff either, so I've been working on making some of my own screentone. Um, mostly in MSPaintXP. Yesterday I made some herringbonish ones, and I've already decided I'm going to need some houndstooth, too.
1. Reading Direction
My manga will be read from right-to-left. There was no specification that it had to be in the contest, and I thought about it a bit, because the words will be in English, so the words will still be going left to right. But in the drastically unlikely event of me winning, the manga will be published in some form by the English version of WSJ, all of which is read right-to-left. I'm just going to have to find ways around the (I can think of relatively few) problems this might create.
2. Color
Manga doesn't have to be all black and white. Most of it I see is, what with it being cheaper and all that, but there are full color manga, and special color pages are pretty common, especially in Jump. I don't plan right now on having any color pages in mine. If English Jump wasn't all digital, that would be a fairly obvious choice, but the real reason is just personal preference. I like the black and white. Mainly because I like sharp, simple style, and possibly because I'm partially colorblind. If I finish with plenty of time, I might try to do some watercolor on a page or something, but I'm not going in with that in mind.
3. Ink
I don't know what the exact case is, but I'm pretty sure most manga is still done analogue. Mine will be digital. I'm very lucky to be born in this time, since I can't imagine myself making anything remotely worthwhile without the aid of an undo key. Plus all the supplies involved; big paper, ink, pens, whiteout or something, maybe one of those french curve rulers it seems like the mangaka in manga always have. That is not my plan.
4. Screentone
One of the biggest identifiable features of manga, I think, is the use of screentone. If I didn't try out some rad patterns to give some texture to my manga, I would be doing a bad job and also not liking the end results. I'm doing this digitally, so I don't have to go out and buy actual sheets of the stuff, but I don't want to just go google image search it and copy and paste stuff either, so I've been working on making some of my own screentone. Um, mostly in MSPaintXP. Yesterday I made some herringbonish ones, and I've already decided I'm going to need some houndstooth, too.
here's some now!
.Labels: manga
Catching up?
Lucius "Hey, Doreen"
I didn't do too much the second half of last week, drawing-wise. In order to discourage such junk, I'm going to update every day at 3(pm) or so to show I'm making some kind of progress. Also I'm going to put what I'm listening to at that moment BECAUSE THAT'S THE KIND OF PERSON I AM/why not?
Note: My laptop battery and power jack are colluding to keep me on my toes by not doing their jobs in such a way that I have to keep a constant eye on the power level and make sure the power is actually connected so it doesn't randomly power down. I got some more dry erase markers for my birthday, though, if I didn't mention that before, so that's good.
Anyway, the actual update is that I'm doing pretty well today in that I've got rough sketches of a few pages done now. At this pace, by this time tomorrow I should be about a quarter of the way done with the rough sketches of the story. Finally, last week I started a big post about contrasting my manga and manga in general, so I'll probably put that up tonight sometime after checking to make sure it isn't too stupid.
I didn't do too much the second half of last week, drawing-wise. In order to discourage such junk, I'm going to update every day at 3(pm) or so to show I'm making some kind of progress. Also I'm going to put what I'm listening to at that moment BECAUSE THAT'S THE KIND OF PERSON I AM/why not?
Note: My laptop battery and power jack are colluding to keep me on my toes by not doing their jobs in such a way that I have to keep a constant eye on the power level and make sure the power is actually connected so it doesn't randomly power down. I got some more dry erase markers for my birthday, though, if I didn't mention that before, so that's good.
Anyway, the actual update is that I'm doing pretty well today in that I've got rough sketches of a few pages done now. At this pace, by this time tomorrow I should be about a quarter of the way done with the rough sketches of the story. Finally, last week I started a big post about contrasting my manga and manga in general, so I'll probably put that up tonight sometime after checking to make sure it isn't too stupid.
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Important
Realized today that before I get too much further, I should start designing the characters a little. Mainly today I've been working on my main protagonist, although I also still need to give her a name?
I have to be finished in like a week and 2 months aaaaaaah
Labels: manga
2-8
The first dream I had as a twenty-eight year old guy was all about a reality TV show called "Celebrity Guns vs. Knives."
Here's what I remember of it:
Here's what I remember of it:
- It was really intense for the celebrities, since half of them got guns and half of them got knives and they could kill each other.
- The two celebrities I recognized were DL Hughely and Rik Smits.
- The paramedics had a code for when somebody was in serious condition. It was "Tom Bruised" for some reason. (Tom Shanks would've made more sense, although still not much at all)
- The knives team seemed very unhappy, but at the end of the episode, who got to have knives and who got have guns was switched.
Monday, July 22, 2013
Bye Cross Manage : (
Was totally blindsided by Cross Manage on the way back from Rochester. Probably my favorite sports manga and I will miss it.
Labels: manga
Going into town to see a movie!?
I think we're going to see a movie for my birthday. The only thing worse I can think of than having to choose between The Conjuring and Pacific Rim would be not seeing either of them. Anyway, I don't think Pepap will want to see the former. Most importantly, I'm sketching out some characters in the car on the way because I'm IN IT TO WIN IT.
Labels: manga
Saturday, July 20, 2013
this took 3 dry erase markers
I might have to restock thems. But first, I gotta go help Pepap chop down another tree, because he is a lumberjack trapped in a second-career pastor's body.
Labels: manga
However much dry erase you think is inside that marker, it will be much less than that. Science has no solution for this.
Labels: manga
To do:
design villain
-sexy, but not so sexy that everyone realizes I just wanted to draw a sexy mummy
Labels: manga
0 progress post mortem
Yesterday, instead of working on my manga, I did the following:
-sat around looking at the computer screen waiting for something to happen on the internet
-played with that ad for The Conjuring where the noose swings when your cursor rolls over it
-went out to eat with my parents¹
-pooped while trying to figure out why the list of spaces on the monopoly board that I made in excel had only 39 spaces
1. This was a fitting punishment for the day's inactivity. Normally, going out to eat is nice, but Friday nights at The Willows, the special is "steak and shrimp" which means Pepap did this routine three times.
-sat around looking at the computer screen waiting for something to happen on the internet
-played with that ad for The Conjuring where the noose swings when your cursor rolls over it
-went out to eat with my parents¹
-pooped while trying to figure out why the list of spaces on the monopoly board that I made in excel had only 39 spaces
1. This was a fitting punishment for the day's inactivity. Normally, going out to eat is nice, but Friday nights at The Willows, the special is "steak and shrimp" which means Pepap did this routine three times.
Labels: manga
Friday, July 19, 2013
0 progress
This morning I was lazy and now I am cleaning the house! It would be helpful if you could leave a shaming comment to curtail such behavior.
Labels: manga
Thursday, July 18, 2013
Just re-broke my ruler
The first time it broke, it was because I was taking an excited-dancing break and slapped it on my leg too hard (listening to https://soundcloud.com/fatpossum/dropla at the time). This time I just sat on it during lunch with my bunnybuns (listening to http://friendsonfacebookpodcast.com/post/55483127152/nathans-dad-gary-gotsch-talks-about-his-own at the time)
Labels: manga
Welcome to the new blog about me as an aspiring mangaka
NOTE: I've bold-bracketed the part that's just me talking about myself as a service to those of you who care enough to read this, but, geez, not all that crap!
"The term manga (kanji: 漫画; hiragana: まんが; katakana: マンガ;
listen (help·info); English /ˈmɑːŋɡə/ or /ˈmæŋɡə/) is a Japanese word referring both to comics and cartooning."
-The wikipedia page on manga, in case you don't even know what manga is, dope.
Hi my name is still Josh Wehrheim-Gegel, but now I'm a different Josh Wehrheim-Gegel. The old Josh Wehrheim-Gegel was, well not legitimately anything, really, and I murdered him and replaced him with Josh Wehrheim-Gegel: an aspiring mangaka ("aspiring" is a big clue that I am also not legitimately anything.)
I love (♡) manga and I read it so much that if I made a pie chart of how I spend my time, it would look like this:
"The term manga (kanji: 漫画; hiragana: まんが; katakana: マンガ;
listen (help·info); English /ˈmɑːŋɡə/ or /ˈmæŋɡə/) is a Japanese word referring both to comics and cartooning."-The wikipedia page on manga, in case you don't even know what manga is, dope.
Hi my name is still Josh Wehrheim-Gegel, but now I'm a different Josh Wehrheim-Gegel. The old Josh Wehrheim-Gegel was, well not legitimately anything, really, and I murdered him and replaced him with Josh Wehrheim-Gegel: an aspiring mangaka ("aspiring" is a big clue that I am also not legitimately anything.)
I love (♡) manga and I read it so much that if I made a pie chart of how I spend my time, it would look like this:
"if"
[I read a ton of manga. I read my first manga in junior high sometime (I think it might have been Parasyte? How terrifying is that?), about the time I was getting into anime. Then, over time, more and more manga became available over the internet, and I began acquiring manga by more respectable methods that involved the authors getting paid (I assume?) Now I have a fledgling manga shelf, although it's still pretty lame. (I mean lame as in it doesn't have enough manga, not lame because it's blue and has a red choo-choo train painted on the side.) I read all kinds of manga. Manga for kids, manga for adults, fan manga (dojinshi), manga from outside of Japan, manga that I decide to stop reading because, yikes, ALL KINDS OF MANGA. I read manga, read news about which ones are being animated, reread my favorites, buy it, listen to podcasts about it, tweet manga panels that I pretend my followers will like. Last month, I read Old Boy one weekend just because I figured I should since Spike Lee's adaptation of the Korean movie adaptation is going to be a thing.
Ever since I was a kid, before I knew what manga was, I wanted to draw comics. And to be a comedian and a musician and make films and to play in the NBA and to have a twin etc. But comics were a pretty thing. When my Dad was a kid, he lived in Sparta Illinois, (I should probably donate next wikipedia drive http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sparta,_Illinois#Printing_industry) and at my grandparents' house they had rubbermaid containers filled with old DC silver age, Archie, Casper, Hot Stuff, Little Dot, etc. I read and watched X-men, Batman, Spiderman, the whole gang, and especially Sonic the Hedgehog. I'm a proud owner of a comic where Sabrina the Teenage Witch meets Sonic the Hedgehog, one where Sonic meets Spawn, and one where Spawn meets Batman. (Not the one where comic Sabrina meets TV Sabrina aka Melissa Joan Hart, though yet) In college there was a period where I read too many webcomics, but I still read Qwantz and Megatokyo, and reread my personal copy of The Great Outdoor Fight every once and again. I also have the comics I tried to draw as a kid in a box in the basement with X-KIDS written on it big block letters with crayon. The problem was, drawing is hard and as a kid, hard things were TOO FRUSTRATING! But now as an adult, hard things are (still frustrating) things that I try until I run out of patience and then return to later to try again.]
Anyway, Shonen Jump (here's the wikipedia page for it http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sh%C5%8Dnen_Jump uggggh you're so ignorant of my interests) is celebrating its 45th year and its increasingly global scale by holding a worldwide contest and I am going to participate in it. (No link because in a worldwide contest everyone is my competition and I'm definitely not talented enough to risk helping anyone in the slightest if that will add to my odds.) So I'm going to participate! The prize for the best English-language one is 500,000 yen (yen are just about cents), which is pretty rad, but more importantly, I could share a story I made that people can enjoy or hate and have something concrete to show my confused and worried Grandma Eunice.
So anyway, I've been working on it for a while, and wrote half a script for one before I realized the story I was telling was longer than the maximum length for entry. (The titular octopus hero didn't appear until page 16?) Now I've restarted. Here's a rough sketchout I made yesterday of the first page!
So anyway, I've been working on it for a while, and wrote half a script for one before I realized the story I was telling was longer than the maximum length for entry. (The titular octopus hero didn't appear until page 16?) Now I've restarted. Here's a rough sketchout I made yesterday of the first page!
This is a right-to-left manga!
Labels: manga
