Monday, November 12, 2007
Some New Recomendations
I'd like to start out this post with something of a plug for a friend of mine's comic. Enjuhneer is a comic that pretty much focuses in on jokes about life at a techie college. While many of the jokes come back to the artist/writer's being a student at RPI (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute), much of the humor is not lost on any student of a technical university. The comic is new and the artist updates it as often as she can being a full-time student but I recomend to anyone that reads this to head over to http://www.rpi.edu/~blancj/enjuhneer/about.html and read up on the comic. She's a newbie to this game, so be gentle folks.
Next up is another entry to the world of webcomics by the utterly prolific artist of the now ended comic Boy Meets Boy. Friendly Hostility. A comic that focuses in on a few characters that were introduced in her first comic. Primarily Fox and Colin, but also the rest of fox's family, who were not mentioned in the old comic. But an unnamed character that eerily resembles Fox's uncle Raffi was seen in the previous comic. The new comic is a great deal more out there than the old, and while it does some with relationships, this theme has a much smaller focus than than it did in Boy Meets Boy. The relationship plots are usually relegated to being subplots. Which usually just makes them all the more intense when they do come up. The comic is utterly hilarious and if you've never read her work before, this is a great place to start. The comic can be found at http://friendlyhostility.com/.
While the term "Diary Comic" is thrown around a lot to describe a lot of semi-autobiographical comics that have long since either become much bigger than that or have become a whole new genre that can't really be defined with any of the usual genre handles. Planet Karen on the other hand is a true to life diary comic. The author makes a point of explaining this early on in the comic's archive. These are the real experiences of the artist. And while there are other real diary comics out there. To at least this writer, there is something different about this comic. Give it a read sometime, perhaps you'll find it as enjoyable as I have. The comic can be found at http://planetkaren.girl-wonder.org/
Now I encounter my fair share of odd, enjoyable, but rarely updated comics around comic genesis. Then every once and a while I come across a real gem, something original, regularly updated, and with art that's not too shabby. One such comic is this, Weregeek. The comic is about a guy that does not consider himself a geek, yet is brought into the world of Larping, tabletop gaming, and general hardcore geekery on a full moon and a group of geeks. The comic chronicles his experiences. To many in his life he's not a geek by any stretch, his girlfriend for one has no idea of this. And part of the comic's charm is his attempts to find a way for him to get people to accept his new interests and friends. The comic will make any geek remember their first steps into the greater world of geekdom. The comic can be found at http://weregeek.comicgenesis.com/
Next up is another entry to the world of webcomics by the utterly prolific artist of the now ended comic Boy Meets Boy. Friendly Hostility. A comic that focuses in on a few characters that were introduced in her first comic. Primarily Fox and Colin, but also the rest of fox's family, who were not mentioned in the old comic. But an unnamed character that eerily resembles Fox's uncle Raffi was seen in the previous comic. The new comic is a great deal more out there than the old, and while it does some with relationships, this theme has a much smaller focus than than it did in Boy Meets Boy. The relationship plots are usually relegated to being subplots. Which usually just makes them all the more intense when they do come up. The comic is utterly hilarious and if you've never read her work before, this is a great place to start. The comic can be found at http://friendlyhostility.com/.
While the term "Diary Comic" is thrown around a lot to describe a lot of semi-autobiographical comics that have long since either become much bigger than that or have become a whole new genre that can't really be defined with any of the usual genre handles. Planet Karen on the other hand is a true to life diary comic. The author makes a point of explaining this early on in the comic's archive. These are the real experiences of the artist. And while there are other real diary comics out there. To at least this writer, there is something different about this comic. Give it a read sometime, perhaps you'll find it as enjoyable as I have. The comic can be found at http://planetkaren.girl-wonder.org/
Now I encounter my fair share of odd, enjoyable, but rarely updated comics around comic genesis. Then every once and a while I come across a real gem, something original, regularly updated, and with art that's not too shabby. One such comic is this, Weregeek. The comic is about a guy that does not consider himself a geek, yet is brought into the world of Larping, tabletop gaming, and general hardcore geekery on a full moon and a group of geeks. The comic chronicles his experiences. To many in his life he's not a geek by any stretch, his girlfriend for one has no idea of this. And part of the comic's charm is his attempts to find a way for him to get people to accept his new interests and friends. The comic will make any geek remember their first steps into the greater world of geekdom. The comic can be found at http://weregeek.comicgenesis.com/
On Webcomic Cosplay
Cosplay. It's something we as geeks are all to some extent are familar with. We've all got that friend that's very much into costumes for cons, and is likely built perfectly to go as various characters. Most of the time people go as some anime character, or maybe something from a recognizable sci fi series (the stormtropper 501st anyone?), or perhaps some video game character. But today we are here to talk about a less known breed of cosplay that usually doesn't get as much attention at conventions: the webcomic cosplayer.
The problem with most webcomic characters when it comes to cosplay is that they are for the most part average joes. I mean there are the more recognizable ones like Gav of Nukee's or Dominic of Dominic Deegan. But most webcomic characters aren't that unusual looking. Which is the the bane of the webcomic cosplayer. A perfectly done costume of say Dave Davenport of Narbonic Labs is basically jeans, a plaid shirt, glasses and a husky cosplayer with a scruffy beard. Which to anyone other than a reader of the comic is pretty much unrecognizable. Which brings me to my next point, the limited audience of a webcomic cosplayer compared with an anime or video game cosplayer.
Well done Anime and Video Game Cosplayers enjoy a wider audience of fans at a con compared with a well done webcomic cosplayer. The audience of a webcomic is just by nature smaller than that of an anime or video games. Probably the only place where the webcomic fan has a larger audience is when dealing with a character from perhaps one of the biggest comics such as Megatokyo or Penny Arcade. And even then you'd have to compare with a pretty obscure anime or game. Which is a rarity since few conventions are big on webcomic fans.
But what can be really done about this? Not much honestly, while every con or so you'll see a really really well done say, Agatha Heterodyne or Helen Narbon, but you'll have had to have searched around for the webcomic fan amongst the hordes of Naruto, Full Metal Alchemist, and Kingdom Hearts 2 cosplayers. This is for you, the guy that goes to Otakon and dresses as Gav, or the girl that goes to Conneticon dressed as Helen Narbon, or Mell for that matter. Keep at it!
till next time, I'm addicted to webcomics.
The problem with most webcomic characters when it comes to cosplay is that they are for the most part average joes. I mean there are the more recognizable ones like Gav of Nukee's or Dominic of Dominic Deegan. But most webcomic characters aren't that unusual looking. Which is the the bane of the webcomic cosplayer. A perfectly done costume of say Dave Davenport of Narbonic Labs is basically jeans, a plaid shirt, glasses and a husky cosplayer with a scruffy beard. Which to anyone other than a reader of the comic is pretty much unrecognizable. Which brings me to my next point, the limited audience of a webcomic cosplayer compared with an anime or video game cosplayer.
Well done Anime and Video Game Cosplayers enjoy a wider audience of fans at a con compared with a well done webcomic cosplayer. The audience of a webcomic is just by nature smaller than that of an anime or video games. Probably the only place where the webcomic fan has a larger audience is when dealing with a character from perhaps one of the biggest comics such as Megatokyo or Penny Arcade. And even then you'd have to compare with a pretty obscure anime or game. Which is a rarity since few conventions are big on webcomic fans.
But what can be really done about this? Not much honestly, while every con or so you'll see a really really well done say, Agatha Heterodyne or Helen Narbon, but you'll have had to have searched around for the webcomic fan amongst the hordes of Naruto, Full Metal Alchemist, and Kingdom Hearts 2 cosplayers. This is for you, the guy that goes to Otakon and dresses as Gav, or the girl that goes to Conneticon dressed as Helen Narbon, or Mell for that matter. Keep at it!
till next time, I'm addicted to webcomics.
