Nobody's much commented on these (even the guy who drew them) but I'm really happy with the colour job I've done on them, and I think they could be a useful set of characters for complex face-to-fice dialogue strips. I have them saved as multi-layered photoshop files, so I can easily give them multiple facial expressions and moods. I was thinking about four moods each, these being neutral/bored, happy/excited, angry, and sad. I'll draw the expressions manually for each character, so they won't look the same.

As this will be a fairly complex job, I've started this thread for posting images and getting feedback.

Here are the four characters as they stand:

Remy's baseball bat looks a little odd without the frame to cut it off, I know, but he's just too wide if I draw in its whole length. I tried - he needed to look about four and a half feet high to fit in frame.

There's still time to change the colouring, too, if anyone gives me a good reason to.

Four? Uh, that's five.

Oh, and their names, in the order above, are Amy, Harrison, Jer, Kim, and Remy.

I think they look great the way they are. Very sexily done.

One should be named Fellatio.

Or atleast Cunt Dracoola.

Two done, but it's now 4am and I should go to bed.

Amy...

Harrison...

Feedback welcome and encouraged.

Harrison?

Harrison is actually Cunt Dracoola.

i think they're great characters

They don't look anything like me.

Back to the drawing board.

To be honest I've been too busy drawing my own stuff to pay much attention to what you guys have been doing (the 5 days of R&R I took off work are now gone and I didn't get off this damn computer...).

I'm really not a fan of the anime style (although it should bring in more people to the site who are)- but that's in general; not these guys in particular. Otherwise they're awesome. The shading is superb, aesthetically they're all excellent, and the large range of facial expressions will be very useful.

I <3 DexX

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They don't look anything like me.

Back to the drawing board.

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I did draw a gigantic nutsack

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I think things are yes it's huh?

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I think things are yes it's huh?

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All done.

Jer...

Kim...

Remy...

As before, feedback welcome and encouraged. I put an end on Remy's bat so he can turn around, but I had to make it rather stumpy to fit it in frame. It's more a tyre whacker now. Oh well, it looks okay.

If nobody gives me a good reason not to in the next day or two, I'll post these in the finished art thread and ask Brad to put them up and put a link to Idle Thoughts in the "uses art from..." links.

Yeah. Brad has no fear of legal repercussions from me. I know full well the sort of things these characters will be used for and I wouldn't have submitted them if I had a problem with that.

Plus, when the legal fees are added in, I'd lose money by suing.

And my art languishes without comments. Sadness... :(

Well, I thin that means nobody hates it enough to swear at us, so it's ready to post.

Completed art thread, here we come.

Is it really worthwhile to stick more ordinary-looking people up there? Don't we have enough of that already?

There's nothing wrong with your art... it's just that we don't need it. How about something new? (Check that: new AND reasonably versitile.)

By all means, feel free to draw your own if you are not happy with our offerings.

I think that a set of five ordinary-looking and versatile characters with a consistent look and with a range of facial expressions will be very useful.

If you disagree, well, there will be nobody forcing you to use them.

Someone seems a little sensitive that someone didn't like the boring characters.

*gives crabby a wedgie*

I don't mind having some new boring characters in addition to the old boring characters that we've been using to death. In fact, I'm grateful to anyone who attempts to imbue a little life into the static boringness of the character selection we've been using day in and day out for years now. Personally, I get a little tired of having to resort to "Blue" or "Maura" every time I need a character who expresses two or more emotions.

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Someone seems a little sensitive that someone didn't like the boring characters.

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Someone seems a little sensitive that someone didn't like the boring characters.

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I've had a shitty day, too, so I'll take your bait. It will be the last time.

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I thought not_Scyess's post was just plain unhelpful. He told SC.com's volunteer artists that a large portion of their new art is useless, but offered not one atom of useful feedback.

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Well, that was fun.

DexX rules

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And with that, I'm going to eagerly await the next time you sulk off for three years.

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Bringing in new characters with different facial expressions is long overdue, IMO.

Also...

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If you disagree, well, there will be nobody forcing you to use them.

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I know you didn't just go there!

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Bump.

I hate to say that not_Scyess was right about the usefulness of characters, but he was. That's why I asked DexX to put my forumusers character in a tuxedo, because I knew it could be used for a great many things (waiter, groom, M/C, butler).

That said, not_Scyess could have been a little more diplomatic. And DexX could learn not to respond to the bait.

Can't we all just get along?

I will concede that Jer and Harrison might not be very useful here. However, as I have stated, I believe having more characters with multiple expressions is a good idea. We don't have many female characters compared to the number of males, therefore Kim and Amy have a usefulness to improve variety for female characters. Remy can serve various purposes as well: Bouncer, Thug, athelete on downtime, violent rascist, etc. It's all in how you use them.

As far as the thread's gone, not_Scyess and you are the only ones who have voted against them, the majority in favor of having them added. I didn't see the use in some of Injokester's material, and I rarely have use for Squabies's stuff, but I'm not going to say they're not useful. And I will reiterate what has been said several times already: No one's forcing you to use them.

And I'll reiterate what might've been missed: There is some advantage of keeping the character count down. It's easy to find characters to use if you don't have to scroll through 4 million identical pieces of art. It makes the comic maker bulky and cumbersome if you do. (Even with the new thumbnail button.)

I'll also reiterate that there's nothing WRONG with your characters. But they don't do anything new. I agree with you that some of the new art isn't very useful, but that doesn't justify adding MORE useless art. And at least the squabies category is full of art which is different. You can chalk the fact that we can't use it up to our own lack of creativity. 8) We already have TONS of people, some of which have more range of emotion than others, granted. But we still have tons of them. No need for more!

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But they don't do anything new.

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But they don't do anything new. I agree with you that some of the new art isn't very useful, but that doesn't justify adding MORE useless art.

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I agree that if we're going to add "characters" then they need to actually have "character". Doctors, nurses, surgeons, firemen make sense because they are useful for playing a role, adding more humans just seems like a waste of time.

Apart from the drawing style, hair-colour or choice of clothing, I fail to see what difference these characters would make to selecting any other generic male or female character.

If you're going to make more normal humans, at least have them in chains, on fire, with ripped clothes, holding a gun to their heads, down on one knee...etc etc

The list is endless, what we don't need is more characters that look slightly moody, slightly happy or slightly interesting.

Im inclined to agree and disagree at the same time.
I believe there is a lot of scope for new characters with more than one expression, as within the constraints of the site this can actually aid the joke/storytelling process. Some of my favourite characters to use are those that have more than one look or expression. I also really like the look of HCRoyall's characters lovingly coloured in by dexx and can see their potential.

Having said that I also think that the changes are too slight, and too samey between the characters. Perhaps if some were posed differently, or had more exagirated expressions, for a good example look at the dieselsweeties maura, as each emotion is very well pronounced, or the Kaddar characters(blue especially).

I think with a little more work, these new characters could fit in well, although maybe take on board the suggestion of giving them a bit more unique characteristics (eg Make one a pirate, you can never have enough pirates, and put one in a suit, you know that sort of thing)

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If you're going to make more normal humans, at least have them in chains, on fire, with ripped clothes, holding a gun to their heads, down on one knee...etc etc

The list is endless, what we don't need is more characters that look slightly moody, slightly happy or slightly interesting.

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How many different men and women do you need for a 3-panel comic? I'd say 6 of each would suffice.

I think it's good to have a wider selection of characters that aren't quite so specific, since their uses aren't as limited storywise (although specific characters are useful as well). I also think the HRC characters would also be used a lot by people whose comics are more about interpersonal relationships than just wacky stuff. I wouldn't mind seeing them made available at least on a trial basis in a seperate category. Unless this presents a problem for Brad in some way then I see no reason not to do so.

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How many different men and women do you need for a 3-panel comic? I'd say 6 of each would suffice.

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This may be off the topic, but I really could've used a bride character a while back. Or any woman in somewhat formal attire.

One word:

Corpsey!