Density: Literary and Artistic Density

Another word for detail and kaleidoscopic imagery, is density.

Density simply means filling up a whole page with lines, words, or detail. It's a little trick I picked up when I was teaching myself how to write (&) draw. 

Artists. Some artists are famous for their artwork's density:

Todd McFarlane. Moebius. Katsuhiro Otomo. Jim Lee. Joe Mad. Frank Frazetta. Syd Mead. Corey Jackson.

Modern art and science fiction in particular are highly equated with raw density. Cramming every space on the page with texture and form.

I can do this only a quarter of the time with my art. It takes a lot off concentration and labor of the arm. Not two of my strongest traits. 

But there is a writer's equivalent of artists's density, which is a hallmark of my own style. I believe online young people have decided to refer to it as "wall of text" and/or "tl;dr" (too long, didn't read).

I'd label it things like that, too....if I was illiterate and didn't know how to read. Which I'm NOT illiterate, and I DO know how to read. You have to know how to read in order to write. Makes enough sense, right?

Word Density is a HUGE part of my literary composition page style. 

My favorite young, up and coming artists online

Fung Chin Pang (http://cellar-fcp.deviantart.com)

Raynart (http://raynart-tradnor.deviantart.com)

WXY Zell (http://wxyzell.deviantart.com)

In terms of polish, the artists listed above are some of my all time favorite peers.

New Comic I Finished Drawing Today. "The Intruder": Story by Tom Hart, Illustrated by Me, J.M. Matthews

"Intruder"

Story 

by

Tom Hart

Artwork

by

J.M. Matthews

The Florida Law That Says It's Illegal to Feed the Homeless in Florida is a Disgusting Law to Me....So I'm going to do SOMETHING ABOUT IT

I'm contacting the Central Florida Homeless Coalition in hopes of getting hired to work for free as a volunteer at a Central Florida Homeless Shelter.

If we're not helping other less fortunate people, God clearly stopped doing his job.

-JM

Lessons

So I'm in the midst of pursuing my online education. 

I had the opportunity to get my work critiqued by a working comic book professional.

Among many comments he left me upon seeing my various artworks, two of the most notable critique comments he left me with were the following:

"First let me say that there is an energetic line and action in some of your drawings. I don't mean that you are drawing "action", I mean that there is action in your line drawing."

"The next thing I want to say is an obvious point. That you are  enthralled and beholden to other people's visual style, namely mainstream manga, with a little McFarlane, etc."

I found both those statements to be full of useful insight.

Sequential Art Mentorship

So I finally found a comic book mentor to help train me in the field of comics. Mr. Hutch Owens himself, Tom Hart of SVA and local Gainesville-based Seqential Artists Workshop (SAW) fame.

I've never been so glad to have a comic book school right here smack dab in the middle of Central Florida, where I live. 

Looking forward to those online lessons. Counting down the days until I get to have a "Let's Do This Thing!" moment again.

JM

Indie Comics, Manga, and a Millennial: The JM Matthews Story

First of all, manga and indie comics never used to be so friendly and integrated as an art form, medium, and hybrid genre as they are now. Simplified or abstracted and surreal artwork in black and white, with manga-oriented storytelling techniques, constructs and methods.

Not all books stay in the crossroads successfully. Some tend to gravitate more towards manga than indie comics. And artists like Frank Miller never classify their work as "manga", and instead simply acknowledge Japanese aspects to their works influences, so it's a loose interpretation and adaptation.

I prefer to stay right in the middle. It's where I am most comfortable. Well, that and being a millennial self publisher.

·        Frank Miller

·        Scott McCloud

·        Todd McFarlane (who didn't draw actual manga but always showed it love. Definitely not a playa hater)

·        Fred Gallagher

·        Adam Warren

·        Kristy Lijewski

·        Paul Pope

·        Bryan Lee O'Malley

·        Chynna-Clugston

·        Dirk I. Tiede

·        Faith Erin Hicks

My work reflects my interests. In other words, while yes I can appreciate hypercomplex visuals, in some ways I lack perfection in that area, but that doesn't bother me as I'm here to make indie comics with manga elements. Not just manga with hyper-detailing.

So I am an indie cartoonist with manga influence.