Self Published Comics

Recently, I decided to participate in Indie Comix Fest Delhi. I had some creator owned comics with C G Salamander and we decided that we will Self publish 'Breakfast for Nausea' and 'Madly in Love' under collective name 'Ravi & Salamander'.

Indie Comix Fest was a learning curve as it taught us little about the market and economics of selling comics. (Note: Indie Comix Fest is a comc festival across several cities in india. It is the celebration and the creation of a dedicated space for small press and self-published comics. For more information about the festival, please visit their website: indiecomixfest.org)

If you were unable to atttend the Indie Comix Fest at Delhi, you may still buy it from us at www.ravigupta.me/shop.html

Children's Graphic Novel: Colored Samples

In the previous post I shared few thumbnails and finished line-art from the book.
You can visit them here: Children's Graphic Novel: Thumbnails and Pages 

As there were large amount of pages to be finished, we got a designer on board for coloring the pages.
However, the colored samples were not approved by the client. So, we had to send in new samples.
I asked another artist to do the coloring and I myself did a sample. And, we both got rejected on the coloring samples that we sent.

I am sharing my part of the samples I created.

Children's Graphic Novel: Thumbnails and Pages

This is continuation of the post Children's Graphic Novel: Visual Development

After the Visual development of the characters, we went in to thumbnail stage and then to final art.
We had around 50 pages finished line-art and color when we came to know that the project has been abandoned.

Below I am posting few thumbnails and 10 pages of finished line-art.
Note: I have omitted the lettering from pages to avoid giving away the story.

Thumbnails for first three pages:

10 pages of finished line-art from the comic:

Children's Graphic Novel: Visual Development

This is continuation of the post Children's Graphic Novel: Pitch

What I earlier posted was just the pitch and hint of the treatment that we were going for.
The characters had to be developed according to the story and script. Story and script were to be developed as well. There was a central character that needed to be developed, around which other copyrighted characters from the client would have come into play.

I am posting the design of the character below and the turn-around.
Note: I am changing the name of the character in order to keep the anonymity.

Children's Graphic Novel: Pitch

Around the end of 2016, me and one of my writer friend worked on a pitch/samples for a Children's Graphic Novel. The Comic/Graphic Novel which we were proposing this pitch for, contained the copyrighted characters from the client. We won the pitch and what really happened to the book will be unfolded in next posts.

However, below are the two pages of comic-art which we sent along the pitch.
Note: I have edited out the lettering from the pages to avoid giving the story out.

Comic: Breakfast for Nausea

I am happy to announce that a comic titled 'Breakfast for Nausea' written by C G Salamander and illustrated by me was published in Jan-March 2018 issue of The Indian Quarterly.

Below are two of the finished pages of the comic.

 I have talked about this comic in my previous posts on thumbnails and second drafts. (If you wish to know more about the process or just compare the finished pages with the thumbnails, do check the links.)

Thumbnails: Second Draft

Thumbnails, second draft.

A little while ago, I wrote a blog post about the first draft of thumbnails for a comic that I was working on. I also mentioned about the second draft, refining the ideas and concept.

Above is a closer look at the second draft of the thumbnails for the comic.

The thumbnails are not in order as they will appear in the print. The thumbnails have little more details than the first draft and were done keeping the lettering in mind. Also, I have masked out the words so that I don't give out much of the story/script.

Thumbnails, the beginning of a new comic.

Thumbnails, first draft.

I began with a new comic recently, and here's is the first draft. Thumbnails (not to confuse with the nail on a person's thumb), as the name suggests, are tiny little sketches that help planning the pages, panels within pages, composition, staging the characters, etc. Thumbnails could be compared to scribbles/notes for a script.

These are very loose and sketchy and might not mean much to other people. One could often write few notes on the side of thumbnails for better understanding. Most importantly, making the second draft helps in making the thumbnails clear and ready for the final pages.

Portfolio Website

Hi everyone,
Recently, I build a portfolio website for me.
I felt a need to keep the work little more organized for the visitors.

Although, this blog would still be active and I would keep it updated. 

Below is a screenshot of the portfolio page on the website from a desktop screen.

You can visit the website at www.ravigupta.me

Madly in Love : Cover Page 2

And here is the cover page 2 for the Comic Madly in Love. 
You can visit the Cover 1 here.

Madly in Love: Cover Page

I am clearly not the best of illustrator here, but I tried to communicate the way the character felt and acted. As the story is king, I tried to stay true to it.

I realised that I have never posted about the comic on the blogger, though there are few posts about it on the other of social platforms.
So, here goes little information about it.

Madly in Love is a 22-page short comic illustrated by me and written by C.G. Salamander. It was part of Mixtape Volume 3 ( a graphic anthology) published by Studio Kokaachi.  Below is the list of creators who were part of Mixtape Volume 3:

C. G. Salamander
Dhanya Thambi
Nimisha Jose
Prabha Mallya
Pratheek Thomas
Praveen Nair
Rosh
Sandhya Prabhat
Soumitro Datta
Vishnu Madhav

I am thankful to Tina and Pratheek for having me on board.

To know more about Mixtape Vol. 3 visit the following link: https://store.kokaachi.com/products/mixtape3

Space Orphans: Character Designs & Sketches.

'Space Orphans' a comic illustrated by me and written by C. G. Salamander was published by The Pulpocracy in the year 2015.

 The Comic was a part of the graphic anthology 'Antarikh Tales', featuring the following creators:
Adhiraj Singh, Anupam Arunachalam, Ashwin Kalmane, C. G. Salamander, Debangshu Moulik, Dinesh Ram, Dyuti Mittal, Kailash Iyer, Ketki Jadhav, Pia Alize Hazarika, Somnath Pal, Sudeep Menon, Ved Iyer and me.

 'Antarikh Tales' is an anthology of comics based on outer-space. (You can get your copy from here.)

 Below are the designs and sketches I did for the comic:

I would be posting more on the thumbnail designs and final pages later.

You may look at these past posts on 'Space Orphans' for now:
-Space Orphans - Poster
-Space Orphans - Motion Video

See you soon!
-Ravi

Bollywood Villains Stickers

A few months back I was commissioned for designing the few sticker packs for Bobble Apps.

The project was different from the usual work I do. It was a change and I had fun doing it.
These are few of the designs from one of the sticker pack. This sticker pack was based on the Old villains from Bollywood films.

An Older Pitch

Page 01

Page 02

Page 04

Here are three of the pages from an older Pitch done a little while ago. Page 04 of the pitch is almost the same as the last panel on page 01. I thought this was an unusual layout from what I normally do, so I shared it as well. Page 03 was the exact copy of Page 02 but with little changes to the opacity of the artwork and lettering above it.

The pitch was done for a longer format comic project. The Pitch contained artwork from other artists as well. I contributed 4 pages for the pitch. Initially, the book was supposed to be written by a single author and drawn by different artists. The story was divided across various chapters so that would have worked well.

For some reasons, I won't be part of the book. I hope that the book turns out well and probably I might even get some mention in the book.

Sketches from Pondi & Chennai

Here are few sketches from my Chennai and Pondicherry (Puducherry) visit a little while ago.
First set of sketches are from Pondicherry and in the second set is Hazel.