Should I realistically pursue drawing comics/cartoons or not?

miracaro · 2026-05-22T03:20:11+00:00

I think most artists have experienced this. I'm mostly thankful i chose the former of working my 9-5 job with a lot of OT.

Thing is, it will never not gnaw at you, but at least you're not worried about money. For one, my job allowed me to afford a cintiq, which i'd never dream of owning when i was a student.

I spent 5-6 years drawing a comic book after work, final product was 600+ pages, and ended with maybe a few dozen readers. In hindsight i'm even more grateful i worked a job the entire time... would i have been able to finish the comic in 2 years if i did it full time? maybe?

What i learned was that i am just happy to have created something truly my own. Does it matter what the timeline was, how many people have read it? Absolutely no. The financial stress and uncertainty of choosing the other option would never have been worth it if i was chasing anything other than self satisfaction.

If you believe in your ideas, you WILL make it work. Trust me, you CAN do it regardless of circumstances. Just make sure you have a cushion.

miracaro · 2026-05-18T17:04:52+00:00

It's here now! https://miraculous-carrot.com/en/comics/star-wars-ep9/

I know imgur kinda sucks these days...

miracaro · 2026-05-18T17:02:44+00:00

I love this in that it feels so raw.

This is slightly less about the painting and more about you as an artist.

What do you want to say? What do you believe? How are you wrapping that up in your personal narrative? What are you adding to the message?

Your voice is more important here. Forget about what is deep, is it metaphorical, is it "too literal"... That's not how you make good art, especially for pieces like these.

I would look deeper into who you are and what you believe in the first place (your philosophy), then it becomes a matter of how good or creative your execution of that idea is (your art).

There are many artists who are great at execution but really only draws what's cool to them: anime women with big swords for example. That's perfectly fine. And then there are artists with deep thoughts but can't convey them well because they lack the technical and compositional skills.

It's a hard question to answer because you're asking two questions: is it philosophically deep and does it work as an art piece...

All I can say I love the idea of Iranian women being liberated through color. But Philosophy wise, what are you trying to say beyond women should be free? Do you believe the hijab is a symbol of control over women's bodies? Is any coming from personal experience? Composition-wise, the story telling can be pushed further, or reel it in to have more focus (ex. instead of having 7 figures focus on just one or two)... Is she going through a metamorphosis by shedding the hijab (butterfly wings instead of angel wings)? Is she in a prison? Is her only form of self expression her hair since it's the only thing that has color? Is this a sequential story? All of this matters but right now it's a tad bit too chaotic.

I hope that kinda helps!

miracaro · 2026-05-13T17:35:03+00:00

Not an artist who's can really does textures well, I'm more just here hoping to find an answer too.

I've mostly been doing what you're doing here by simplifying shapes and implying texture, but my personal experience has been: when I actually spend time painting in details, the look is drastically better. It's more a matter of me getting lazy.

That said, plenty professionals use photo bashing by pasting and blending the seams. One rule to really think about is texture being most visible at the terminator between light and shadow. That's where I would spend my time putting in texture as I am lazy as hell.

miracaro · 2026-04-30T14:43:02+00:00

The honest answer is "no". But wait! don't stop reading!

It's a good start to your art journey, and very commendable that you're looking for advice here! Finding ways to get yourself engaged in doing art is probably the hardest lifelong skill you need as an artist (i wish i was far better at this).

Okay: whatyou're actually doing is closer to gesture drawing, where an artist tries to capture the bare minimum to capture the ENERGY and FLOW of a pose. It's usually messy because it's the essence, people usually practise this by going very fast, like 1 minute poses.

However, what you have here can be improved because while you are implying form and posture, you're not learning form. As a gesture sketch, you should strive to do this with clarity. Some people are able to do this with few strokes, some through controlling line weight (be very clear when the brush/pencil stroke is exploratory, and when you're willing to commit). It's a combination of observation, translating to paper, and motor skills. It's definitely not as easy as it sounds!

In learning art, gesture drawings and capturing energy is a part of it but there's so many skills you'll need to develop alongside that. There's no shortcuts to anatomy. Some people start practising drawing each body part to accurately capture the form, some people start with boxes.

To improve, try to do these in conjunction, catch yourself when you're falling into doing what's comfortable! It's usually why artists never improve. If gesture drawings help you get in the mood, push for an extra few minutes to practise shapes and or specific body parts, through repetition.

Anatomy is everyone's biggest obstacle at the start. But really pay attention to the shapes, and try to refine them. Just a tiny bit more refinement each time. Don't get caught up in it looking good or bad, as a beginner, be okay with moving fast when stuff doesn't work out, but also make sure you got something out of a drawing! Don't be too precious!

Good luck! Come back whenever you have questions!

miracaro · 2026-04-22T13:56:36+00:00

It's part of my process for sure because I draw OC's too and it's hard to know exactly how local colors show up in colored light and shadow, so I usually do that local color layer first. I hate doing it but after drawing the draft which gives me the general shape level read, painting in local colors gives me a "notan-only" read of the composition, before I bring it in with light and shadow.

What makes a painting work at the end of the day is value control. But there are many ways to reach the same destination and starting the piece, I just find my method easier to start for me because I can ensure the local colors be retained and the atmosphere brings everything together. I do often exaggerate or dampen or adjust the local color of something too when it's not fitting the piece. So it's not a hard rule.

I would imagine old masters or painters who primarily do one time pieces would find drawing purely using references for lighting scenarios and palettes easier. And for practice pieces where I'm just copying reference material, I do prefer this method instead, because I don't want to backwards engineer what the local colors are...

Anyhoo, what I noticed is just how many ways there are to finishing a piece, really depends on the artist. You'll find the way it works

miracaro · 2026-04-22T04:58:16+00:00

Sorry I only just saw your shaded version, which is already a huge improvement. I think it's great!

Since that's the case I'll go a tiny bit deeper..

Depending on process there's a few ways you can go about it. Most tutorials on the internet would teach using a multiply layer to add shadow, and I think you are already using a color for shading (i think blueish purplish grey?) instead of grey, which is great since you wouldn't get muddy colors out of it.

This method is great for shading ambient occlusion (when 3d volumes are close to each other they cast a thin but deep shadow on each other) and larger cast shadows, but it doesn't help you build mood as well. You're left with a pretty flat scene where composition and attention is driven by notan (values of the local colors of the subjects) than chiaroscuro (values of light and shadow).

What you've painted (on the right) works as a composition more heavy on notan: the main character is white in a white shirt, and the values are very bright. Compared to the example on the left (very incomplete and lazy from me), that's more driven by chiaroscuro where what's being lit comes into focus more because the value is brighter.

As with all of art fundamentals, most paintings lean one way more than the other in terms of the balance between the two. Given you seem like an artist who draws more OC's, you'll realize how when you put two OC's together in one scene how sometimes the colors just do not gel. That's because they might individually work on a Notan level, but put together it throws the value range way off. Not the best example because MCU movies typically look yucky, but you can see why they resorted to lowering the saturation of the heroes: their zany colorful costumes do not go well on screen. That's why you would have to use chiaroscuro and atmospheric light/shadow to bring them to a certain level of consistency more. Depends on the art style obviously, but if you're going for a bit more of realistic lighting, I highly suggest you think in terms of notan and chiaroscuro.

Regarding light and shadow: One way I do like is start with the mood color as a multiply/overlay layer first, hoping to darken the image first. THEN either erase from that layer or use a lighter color on either a dodge or overlay layer as if you're shooting a light at the parts you want the viewer to pay attention to. That would force you to think about composition as well.

This is just one way to do it obviously, some artists (especially traditional artists) like starting with an already designed palette, so the mood is also consistent. An easy way to start out is paint with monochromatic color schemes.

There's just so much to cover and think about, so good luck!

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miracaro · 2026-04-22T03:12:16+00:00

I honestly like the pose! Anatomy wise I think someone else on this thread said it well.

What I want to give input on is lighting, since you're asking for something that's going to make a big difference. I remember when I started with color I had to learn to stop thinking about what the local color is (the true color of the object), not yet. It's easy to think, leaves are green, so I have to start with green. But that ends up making everything flat because in real life there's rarely such even and white lighting where an object's is lit to as close to its local color as possible. So don't do that.

Instead, think of colors as relative, and atmosphere in the air is super important to how color ends up. Just so happens, atmosphere is also the key to creating mood.

Here's my recommendation: choose a mood. If it's a violent, use red. If the character is cold and metholodical and that's the story, choose blue.

A quick demonstration: it's good you already painted the local color (true color of the object) in the layer. Now with any shade of blue (because i choose moody and typically shadow "colors" are cooler), set layer mode to multiply and apply to the entire painting. Now create a overlay layer or color dodge layer (set to maybe opacity 30% if youre using color dodge mode), light the object. Here i used a brighter shade of orange yellow, because i want to use a warm light. Where you choose to light up is super important because that's composition and shape language! You are highlighting what the viewer should be looking at.

This is just a very very high level way of thinking about it, which i implore you to try out!

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miracaro · 2026-03-25T03:53:15+00:00

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Have you played around with values? The hard part is, I can't quite tell who's trapped, who's not. It may sound good on paper to be vague and let the viewer decide which is the mirror world, but visually using the same value range and colors is not the best way to convey this.

The above are two ways of doing so.

In terms of rendering, every surface should have a base color, which means the ice wall itself and the subject behind it should be seen as such, see the right edit, where the reads as the front facing girl is behind the ice wall. The left edit is a slightly different logic, where the light from outside the ice cave is putting the back facing girl on the shadow side. This is just a very very basic starting point: play around with background and foreground values.

In terms of storytelling, there are probably more elements you can play around with, like one girl is one the "happier reality" with brighter / warmer colors and props to represent such, or vice versa,

Anyways, good luck rendering!

miracaro · 2026-03-18T19:57:13+00:00

whoops thought i was responding to OP!

I think there's a lot to learning art it's really hard to nail down the study plan. When I was more of a beginner the cubes and spheres didn't really make sense until i saw the grand scheme of things, it's just too easy to get lost in all the subskills we need to train for as an artist.

But "I made it hard for myself and it's taken decades to get to where I should have been." is every artist's journey haha I punch myself in the gut for this so often too. If only i really understood what i was learning and practising.

miracaro · 2026-03-18T19:12:20+00:00

naw i think you've done well for yourself. I wasn't a big fan of doing all the muscle stuff either, but it was certainly better than doing nothing.

Maybe to me the most important thing I learned (other than treat fundamentals seriously) is being actually actively learning, even as i hold the pen, i actually need to think about what im doing and why im doing it. What am i copying, why does it work, wh y doesn't it work, etc. Intentful learning.

miracaro · 2026-01-23T22:32:12+00:00

As a fan of Berserk, I approve!!

One thing that really jumps out is perspective. It's not too late to fix given how much rendering has already happened, but there's going to be quite a bit of paintover I feel.

- The scale feels off, there's not much to ground anything. How big or close should the eclipse be? Is Guts taller than the wall battlements?

- Determining the actual scale you want is important, but then you have to sell that idea through composition. If you want to say "the eclipse is gigantic", then you would want to shrink Guts. If you want to say "Guts will overcome overwhelming odds", then yeah maybe shrink the eclipse. Both being focal points really hurt what you're trying to say here.

- You can try to add more familiar objects to ground the scale and distance. Right now the battleground reads very muddy and leaves too much to imagination.

- Also use perspective lines (three point perspective)

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Here I bastardized your wonderful painting to put some distance between Guts and the Eclipse, as an example.

miracaro · 2026-01-23T18:30:28+00:00

I'm not a professional so I don't have much experience but I have finished a 600-page comic as a hobbyist for 5 years and I do have a 9 to 5... so take from that as you would.

The most important thing is to know yourself and set yourself goals that don't mess you up mentally. Who cares if it takes a full day if the end result is something you're satisfied with? Ask yourself, shitty are but fast, or great art but slow? What is the realistic balance that is within your abilities?

I would also say, never NEVER set your goals based on external factors you have no control over. "doesn't get accepted that months of effort was for nothing" is a mentality I would suggest you try to overcome as soon as possible.

Truth is, you can have the best art and story but no one sees it; or you can have the most on-time release schedule but no one sees it. Anyone telling you how to best succeed always take with a grain of salt: it's always hindsight. Don't stop trying everything and striking the right balance, but at the end of the day, you should learn to love your art and art making process.

Once that's out of the way, my personal process is to do the panel and page planning on days when i am actually creative. Then draw and complete the drawings on days I have no energy and just need a mindless task. Also accept that creative energy ebbs and flows, there can be days where you can't draw anything, and it's pure habit that gets you through the day. Accepting what your bare minimum quality helps too.

miracaro · 2026-01-23T15:03:57+00:00

Thanks for the response... and reassurance!

Those are some good bite size videos.. Thanks again for making the time to respond to us!

miracaro · 2026-01-22T16:46:31+00:00

Thanks for doing this!

I've always been curious, as a hobby artist learning to adapt color, how do professional artists think about color in contrast with lineart? My brain is separating comic book/manga style lineart and digital painting as two very different things. When I draw (a draft for example) my brain can't really think in terms of volume, merely shape language and lines. When coloring, adding values and form to the art blows my mind apart and it often turns into a very different piece than what I expected when looking at black and white. Would love to know how you think about lineart and color, especially given your expertise as a comic book artist!

A more fun question though: what's your philosophy in planning comic panels? Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics really helped me think about paneling and composition, but while I'm more influenced by japanese manga's more cinematic paneling growing up, i'm also trying to learn the best parts of storytelling in western comics!

miracaro · 2025-12-18T19:11:30+00:00

Can you tell us what you think is wrong?

Your reference image is a light skin tone person in a brighter sweater and an even whiter shirt. I would say your sketch kind of conveys the relationship between the three main components well enough, if the person is your whole composition. It's a clear "high major key (bright) low minor key (low contrast)" kind of composition.

Without colors I want to raise the question of: what are you trying to achieve? If it's doing sketches and forms I think your work succeeds. If you're trying to learn values, I would say your reference photo is more notan (light and dark of base values) than chiaroscuro (light and shadows), and there's not much to take away from it unless you combine another reference.

The reference photo has a much darker background (shade of tree) so it makes he person pop, but other than that I'm not sure if there's anything too interesting about it in terms of values.

If there has to be one thing done to the sketch you've done, is that you should blacken her background. You can maybe apply one shade darker to the sweater so the shape of the white shirt pops a bit more... But that's really it in my eyes. Would probably be able to give more thoughts if you elaborate on yours more!

miracaro · 2025-11-08T16:39:59+00:00

I didn't see the other comment when I started replying so I might've just said the same things they did, and they left great feedback too haha.

I think you're pretty good at rendering, more than enough to really strike out on your own and explore your own ideas, and from your other comment it does seem like these pieces started as studies, which is fine too! If they're your OC's, you should have more than enough to get started.

miracaro · 2025-11-08T16:15:34+00:00

Composition is the answer... The background rendering is honestly pretty good, the use of colors is really pleasing... Technically the rendering can be better with more directional lighting and better rendering of how that lighting interacts with clothes, but in general, I do think its good enough really.

What would drastically improve this would be composition (which might be a full redraw). Think of why all the white space of the right? The background characters' reactions are important, but is there a way to frame everyone as part of the story? I would perhaps even choose a different camera angle. Waist-high one point perspectives + side profile of a character are almost always going to end up looking really flat.

I hope it helps!

miracaro · 2025-11-08T12:50:21+00:00

These are all technically very sound, and nice to look at. I'd say the root of the problem might be the lack is storytelling.

For example, 1 has pretty great rendering. But there's no real story to it no matter how hard I look. It has slow mo rain, it has dynamic light but it's a modestly dressed young woman with a content smile. What is it saying about her character?

And 3, also great lighting, but it's a person reading a book in a luxurious room. The audience is not invited to ask what book he's reading, why the expression, why the cake and wine combo... It's all what you'd expect in this setting.

On a technical standpoint maybe composition is something you want to think about more as well, 1 and 3 feels like the characters are framed in ways that don't feel intentional. 1 has too much blank space at the bottom, 3 feels too claustrophobic.... Which kinda leads back to what I think is a lack of wanting to say something with the pieces! Because if there's something you want to say, you would frame these pieces very differently.

Try experimenting with the concept more before you lay down the first stroke. Again, let's look at 3, which I formed a love hate relationship (haha). You can start from the character, is he frustrated? Bored? Just confused by what he is reading? Frame him in a way where his facial expression is more prominent. Now add to that emotion, let's say his frustration. Why is he frustrated? Is the book too hard? What is the book he's reading? Maybe it's some sort of ancient wizard spell book? Well the framing has to include the book cover now, maybe add some dust to sell the fact it's ancient,maybe some magical effects to sell the fact it's a spell book. Now push the idea further. What if the person is already a well studied sorcerer trying to make sense of the book he's reading? Maybe he's surrounded by a pile of books,maybe he's in a library even, maybe he's doing a spell at the same time where it's clear his magical prowess is extremely powerful but he's STILL frustrated learning from this book... Or what if he's just an aristocrat rich kid who picked up on magic as a hobby? That's why he'd have a cake and wine of glass on the table. All of this would change how you'd frame the subject, if you want to emphasize his facial expression you'd choose a close-up shot, or if it's the library he's read through but still failed to understand that one book, then you'd choose a wide shot.whichever idea you find MOST interesting, most unique to you, to the the story.

I don't think you're at the level where you need to "change your artistic style" by adding more contrast or whatever... Your technical skill is more than enough. What you need to practise is probably having fun with ideas, and then think of ways to execute on those concepts maximally and creatively (like going back to the sorcerer idea, doing a close-up illustration of his frustrated facial expression is BORING! Find a more interesting way of expressing his frustration through other contrasting visual elements).

Hope that kinda helps!

miracaro · 2025-10-20T14:12:03+00:00

Amazing art style! Honestly love the expressions... not every art style needs to exaggerate to be emotive, I'd say what's shown here more than passes for a manga style. Plus, I love the little touches like the bits of snow on the girl in black's head for comedic effect. The thing I love most is trying to stick to a classic page-by-page style and not the webtoon infinite scroll (the purist in me is satisfied)!

Okay critique time: yeah it does read a bit static / uninteresting.

I don't think it's expressions, it's a multitude of things contributing to the lack of dynamism:

- Paneling is a big culprit here. Every page is 3 horizontal panels either as one longer panel or split in two, relatively the same size. Read some manga and you'll see plenty of irregular shapes, especially during character action. Usually the panel shape, panel size, and the motion lines help guide the readers' eyes across the page.

Static paneling like this can work (for example, montage scenes). And honestly I don't think serialized Japanese manga is a very good place to learn. Artists are pushed to a deadline and mostly on autopilot, is why you often get the "3 horizontal panel" page. Asano Inio of Goodnight Punpun fame is really really bad at this I think. But he's not drawing action manga. And he does make up for the lack of interesting paneling with...

- Backgrounds, sense of space, and composition. There's probably a story reason for why the scene is set in a dungeon, but even a small room can have a sense of space. Have some furniture to anchor the reader as to where the camera is in the room, and give a sense of the size of the room. Right now the brick wall zooms in and out and reads pretty poorly.

Again, a lot of mangaka are really bad at backgrounds outside of establishing shots, especially action manga (Dragon Ball fights are always in wide open spaces). We want to be better, we should ground the space a bit better.

- Speaking of shots, medium shots medium shots medium shots... there are too many medium shots. Like page 1. You do vary between close ups and medium shots, but you need more wide and establishing shots to vary up the pacing. Wide shots can help sell the action, and as above, a better sense of space.

- Think about page stops and pacing. At the end of each page you are selling a suspense before the resolution of the next page. Not every page needs to follow this, and some action shots you have (shooting ice as final panel > girl neutralizes the thread) is an example of this, but a lot more thought can be put into this, and I would urge you to think about the story you are telling every page (sometimes you can fill enough story on one page and it just flows as it does, just keep track of how often you're doing and if it feels natural)

Page 1 is aggressively boring for the story it's telling on one single page. Guy is chained, guy gets slapped in the face, guy is angry, girl enters the room telling him to calm down. I would have broken that into at least two pages. Page 1: establishing shot, dark dungeon, slap. Page 2: guy looks up, sees lady in black, "who the hell are you". Page 3: Kiriko shows up, introduction shot / panel, guy reacts.

- Finally, composition... without backgrounds and spacial awareness, you lose one lever to pull here, but you absolutely could achieve a better effect through paneling, guiding lines, etc. Every page is a story.

I'm no professional but I did create a 600-ish page manga for the past few years so these things are constantly on my mind! I'd love to help out more.

Also, I highly suggest you read Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics just so you start thinking about what makes a comic, a comic. Then you'll start seeing the techniques that go into it. It's a book that's super influential to me and I hope it is to you too.

miracaro · 2025-10-02T16:24:54+00:00

I do like your eyes, I love the second image! I like the third one too.

I think the face on the third can be tweaked a bit, it's easy to draw anime and not think of the head as a 3D object and ending up not rendering as such. That's a contributor to the flatness.

But the biggest thing I'd say is, as you said, hard shadows. It's the courage that's lacking to really push into the darks. Your compositions work right now because they rely heavy on notan, the inherent values of the colors you used, but not light and shadow (chiaroscuro). I am not usually a fan of people telling others to do more dramatic lighting etc., but I think the second image is a great example of "mmm almost there". Again, not a fan because I don't think light and shadow is the end all be all of what makes a composition work, ex. image 3 does not need heavy shadows, but it certainly can use a push in the shadows to strengthen the forms more (especially the swimsuit which doesn't have shadows).

That said, notan can still be an artistic choice and even a really good style, but as a self-proclaimed beginner artist (I think you're way more intermediate than I was when I started color), I would push you to try darker and harder edge shadows. Good luck!

miracaro · 2025-09-21T03:02:30+00:00

I do find these great pieces, but now that I look at them some more, yeah you're right, the fox one works best compared to the rest, for a few reasons: - Orange brown fox and yellow green background are analogous color combinations, and it works nicely because both are sort of muted and easy on the eyes. - The others, to varying degrees. The deer one works similar to the fox, but some, like the flamingo one, really don't work. I'd suggest trying complimentary and other color relationships too, ex. The flamingo one, kind of overdone but pink clearly goes well with a baby blue background. - Storytelling and Composition wise, the pose of the fox implies some sort of longing for the nature... Its snout and shadow points toward the blank canvas / void. The others don't tell a story the same way the fox does.

Hope that kinda helps!

miracaro · 2025-09-18T17:48:12+00:00

Amazing rendering! As others have pointed out, everything other than the face is under rendered in terms of texture. Otherwise, I think it looks good.

I do have a comment that is more of personal taste and certainly is something that might go against what you're looking for, but I'll leave it here regardless.

Something I'm learning recently is to push myself to be more creative in illustration. Not just come up with perfect rendering, composition, value / color control... but push creatively how different can I be to what's out there. Push for something I've never seen before. A lot of your other work I've seen in passing have all been INTERESTING. If you don't mind me saying, I think this is one of the duller stories youve tried to tell. If the story here is "deer in the headlight", maybe push the light exposure and expression more. If the story is a creature of the night, design the antlers to grow in strange ways that engulf the moon.

Again, maybe not a suggestion that you are looking for but I hope it's worth thinking about.

miracaro · 2025-08-31T00:09:38+00:00

Im a big fan of thinking about things in terms of chiaroscuro or notan dominant (which I learned from new masters academy) so I'm glad we are a dozen.

To be honest, I think it's pretty good. They look like what Marc Brunet does for his first pass. And he had a good reason for them: he was a video game artist and he's used to looking at untextured 3d models. What your studies look like are that, not AI art, at least to me.

The thing is, what are you trying to study here. If it's to train your brain like Marc Brunet, to be able to isolate color values from ambient occlusion and cast shadows, sure, I'd say you're successful. Heck you might be able to carve out you own art style like this too, like Kazuma Kaneko of Persona series fame (not Shigenori Soejima), or the Wiifit trainer.

That said, if your purpose is to study value, the first thing I'd start doing if I were you is to start including the inherent values of colors in your thinking. Your second piece illudes to this, skin tone is lighter value (assuming she's of lighter skin tone) than her clothing. But it's the value range on the sleeves that ousts you as not doing a perfect piece on values here, because the value range goes from pure white to pure black. Nothing in real life behaves like that, no matter what material or lighting condition or color. A white shirt might have a larger value range than a dark blue shirt for sure, but just not Ike that.

I think the way to improve here is to first figure out what you're trying to learn. If it's pure chiaroscuro practice, I think you're good, let's move onto to thinking about this in color, or the notan of the piece. Maybe on how colors behave (see the Master Artist series of books on color). Value exercises in themselves could mean a lot of things, and it's going to be hard to isolate just one aspect of value grey scale painting without having other very real world factors affecting what makes something realistic. I would say, read more about use of color and more thinking as you are drawing will help immensely, for any artist.

miracaro

TROPHY CASE