http://projectwaldo.blogspot.com/
Not mine but my jaw dropped when i saw the pages, very impressive colors and detail, plus a style that's a bit cartoony:



The guys inks are even awesome:


edit:are the images showing...? well just go to the site i guess..

Holy shit that's pretty. Interesting idea for a blog too, there's a lot to learned from this.

See, I get discouraged seeing stuff like that. I'll never be that good.

Tokoyoto
See, I get discouraged seeing stuff like that. I'll never be that good.

I always thought this was a pretty pathetic attitude to take. Surely it's something to aspire to, rather than be jealous of?

Having your art style stagnate for multiple years tends to be frustrating, though I was exaggerating my attitude a tad.

Oh wow... ligne claire to the Nth power. This man is crazy... I dunno, but he seems to think he's texturing the models for a video game. When you're texturing models, you can go nuts because once you're done, you're done and you have a moving work of art that chugs along by itself.

But this is a comic. A comic is a compromise between quality and quantity. It's nice that every panel looks like a beautiful cover, but he has to do this for 25 pages each month, every month? Can he keep that up, or is he going to burn out like Joe Mad and go back to video games?

He says he's gonna punch himself once he learns how to shorthand things rather than draw out every single leaf. I agree, and I say he should start learning now.

I clicked first page without looking at the blog itself.....
and... ok, I am speechless now, haha.

I can't imagine it being a monthly book either. Bimonthly sounds doable while quarterly is quite more likely. Or go to France (or Belgium) with it.
Although quick glance through the blog tells that he doesn't have much visits from France. Well, yeah, cause they speak French and not English. From my observations Germans are much more keen to learn foreign languages, thus more german visits. Most likely no one in France is aware of this blog at all.
Still, French publishers and readers appear to be open for foreign comics, as long as they're translated. There were even a couple of Polish comics that did pretty well over there.

Anyway... Great lineart (clearly made with coloring in mind), great colors (chosen in such way that they enhance the lineart and not obscure it). If he goes with Ka-blam, I'll probably grab it :D

It's pretty, but... I'm not seeing what's so amazing here?
It's nice clean art, simplified fantasy drawings with a mix of high detail and no detail, and very basic flat colour.

All in all it's plain and pleasing, very well done, but nothing that you've not seen elsewhere...?

-Not to talk the work down in any way since it's really quite good, but people's reactions seem out of proportion to what's there.

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It's not ligne claire either mlai because that style is all lines with the same weight. You'll notice the outlines are darker. ;)
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It's very good looking work, the images have a good feel to them, Nate should be proud. His trees and figure drawing are admirable! I hope he gets a deal on the strength of the pages he's done so far.

Oh sure we've all seen the wow-worthy fantasy pin-up on deviantart but rarely in a a refined comic form, in fact 99.9% of all those artists doing the pin-ups would suck ass at sequentials (and end up with some random character dump like Leviticus cross or have hackneyed/useless splash pages sequentials like joe mad in ultimates 3)
*for the record i love joe mads style but the guy doesn't know what to do with page layout, it's sexy and cool for sure but getting down to the basic 'can you follow this page' it goes horribly wrong.

So like what mlai says, this is a comic and it's mainly impressive how well everything works together (it doesn't need complicated color or overly complicated creatures to look great)

If you know of some print comics that look like this, share 'em :)

Sorry, ozone, but in spite of its "familiar" style, the level of skill in technique is nonetheless phenomenal.

Especially when this guy is pursuing sequential art, of all things.

It is ligne claire, or a derivative thereof. The outline lines are uniformly thick, while the detail lines are uniformly thin. There is no line weight based on light source or thickness/texture of object. And the colors are intentionally flat and smooth.

While I like comics with awesome art, I don't really like the trend of "I'll give you awesome art in exchange for infrequent issues." I think you should save that for selling artbooks.

Skullbie
and end up with some random character dump like Leviticus cross or have hackneyed/useless splash pages sequentials

OoooooH I HATE that! >:[
Bloody character and splash pages... When a comic peters out into that it's very frustrating. There were some potential features that I would have LOVED to feature, but with so much non-comic it would've been embarrassing. :(

As for print comics with that style- I've never followed print comics, so I don't pay too much attention, but I have seen comic work similar. In fact, back when I did I thought that's what ALL comics these days looked like and was extremely disappointed to see that they weren't. It's definitely not art-book type work because although the art is very good, he stints on detail and colour work enough that it's simplified.

mlai
It is ligne claire

From what I know of that style, it's not. In that style (from what I know) ALL lines are the same. No thick at all. What he's got there is standard, text-book, well done line-art.

Which is great because linge claire looks a bit crappy unless it's something like Tin-tin.

The light colours remind me of Mucha. It's very pleasing to the eye. :)

I think it is more on the end of Mucha-style Art Nouveau linework than ligne claire. It's a derivative of both points I think. The coloring is definitely Mucha. That's probably a good thing for him if he wants to break into European comics.

Oz says he "stints" on detail and color, which I disagree with. There's a deceptive amount of detail there (especially when it comes to the landscape and foliage) and I think the limitations on some detail and color are deliberate. firstly, because too much would take forever to do, but secondly because much more of either would make the pages look heavy and overworked. As it is the pages seem clean and light. I don't think that good-looking comics need to be realistically painted or overly detailed (in fact I hate many modern comics for that very thing). The design he's chosen has made all the panels seem more iconic and illustration-like.

He's a slow storyteller though, which I can find frustrating sometimes. Lots of scene-setting panels and meaningful looks gets old pretty fast. He's only 8 pages in and things could speed up, but he does seem very fond of decompression. With some action pages coming up I would worry that they feel 'rushed' in comparison to the drawn out conversation pages.

It is a gorgeous comic and skimming the blog it looks like he's learning a lot about his process etc. I was interested in the story until it looked like it's actually about some MMORPG rather than something purely fantasy, that pretty much shut me off completely.

skoolmunkee
I think the limitations on some detail and color are deliberate. firstly, because too much would take forever to do, but secondly because much more of either would make the pages look heavy and overworked.

That's what I meant on stinting- that it's a deliberate choice for comic pages not a failing. If he was doing them as "art" pages he'd do them differently. -most likely.

I didn't realise it was MMORPG based though...?
I suppose that's part of what he was talking about with his game industry background. I'd prefer a totally original story myself, like you, but if he was just using the game property as influnce that'd be ok, maybe. Even if he was doing the comic to sell the game.

The two people who are attacking the caravan on the last 3 pages talk to each other like they are in the middle of a video game. Talking about killing an NPC, people in Korea not being on, etc. I don't know if it's based on a specific game, but I think it's definitely about playing a game somehow.

if you fall back far enough in the blog post to before the project starts, he mentions that it's basically two worlds, one fantasy and one near future. My guess... the technology advanced so far that the fantasy world lives with its own life perhaps? I don't know, maybe I'm reading too much into it, but that's the impression that I got.

Anyway, I don't think it's based on any existing game.

Edit: Instead of editing I quoted myself, heh.

Wow, that guys art just makes me want to get even better lol, he's really good!

mlai
While I like comics with awesome art, I don't really like the trend of "I'll give you awesome art in exchange for infrequent issues." I think you should save that for selling artbooks.

...Only this is free. It's awesome art for free, man.

He's trying to sell it (or at the very least, himself) to European publishers. So this story won't be free for long. Or it will be dropped as soon as he gets a paying gig.

I agree with Skool's "decompression + slow issues/updates" comment. This basically means that he's selling a comic book which you would buy for only the art, not the story. Because nobody can get immersed into a story that's updated quarterly rather than monthly.

If the story is what I think it is, then it has merit:

MMORPG players descend upon this digital fantasy world with the intention of playing games. But this fantasy game-world is so advanced, its inhabitants have developed sentience. This story would be about how these inhabitants deal with the scourge of the amoral horde of players who care only about loot and random violence. Some mature players may also realize the situation and try to help this game-world (sort of like Greenpeace).

The above is something that I've never seen before.

However, if this is just another derivative of .Hack/Sign (a Japanese RPG/anime about MMO players delving into a fantasy game that's become "all too real", like The Matrix)... then it's gonna be been-there-done-that.