chokoland comic process (Patreon)

This whole idea started all the way back in July when Milk and Choko won the monthly poll, I was having a lot of fun coming up with sketches for them (that are still unfinished :, ) ) that I eventually ended up doing these little strips with them:

They were going to originally stay as only 4koma-ish comics, since back then I didn't have the time to make something bigger, I decided to expand on them during November since I thought it was a waste to not take the chance to introduce who these characters are in a more proper way. Which led to the first big challenge, knowing how to naturally expand and connect those 3 strips!

I say it was a challenge, since the originals were in my opinion, way funnier, due to them just being set up and punchline, the longer adaptation has a lot of fluff in-between that lessens the impact of the jokes, they're not the main point of attention anymore, now they're just comedic bits that are thrown into the mix. Hell, I don't even think the brain part even reads as a joke anymore lol, since it's tone ended up being way more somber in comparison to how it was originally depicted.

I was also sad that this little joke had to get cut in the transition, it still makes me laugh:

The structure was also changed a bit, with Boss and Milk talking in the middle rather than the morning of the next day, I felt like if I had left it as is Boss' role, which is already extremely minimal would be bogged down to just a ratatouille joke, instead of setting up some sort of connection with the other two through some of his dialogue.

Writing the characters was also surprisingly tougher than expected, with Double Dealings I had 0 issues, those character's have been in my head for years, so it was extremely natural to know how they'd speak and act. With the Choko cast however it was a different story. 2 out of these 3 characters didn't even exist until a few months ago! So while I do have a general idea of their relationships with each other, I don't think I have a clear "voice" for them in mind just yet. I feel like the dialogue at the start of this comic started out a bit rough but it ended up flowing more naturally as it went on, so that's nice. Thinking about it I feel like writing characters that don't get along with each other super well is easier than writing characters that are supposed to be friends lol

In regards to visuals I don't really have any issues with it, I'm very happy with how it came out! There's a lot of funny drawings and it was nice to do some more traditional paneling in contrast to the previous comic, which due to being hosted on Webtoons had a structure that was easier to read on mobile. Also the last minute addition of grayscales turned out way better than expected. I knew I wouldn't have time to paint the panels like I'd usually do due to time constraints, I also happened to be rereading Akira at the time, the color spreads are suuuper neat, so it gave me the idea to go for something similar, limited flat contrasting colors. I tested how some panels would look and really digged it! 

But again this is as far as that experiment went, I definitely would like to go back to color it up and polish a few panels here and there, but again overall I was satisfied with how it turned out overall!

I proooobably sounded more negative than I usually do about my work lol, but I don't mean it to read like that! Comics are still a very new territory for me, so I'm glad I have the chance to be critical of my work and acknowledge the shortcomings to learn from them and make the next one better. Good drawings can only get you so far when the writing's not at it's best!

I hope this was a bit insightful, thank you for reading and your continuous support!