Order of the Stick: The Manga

[Killer Angel]

Really awesome!

Quite simply epic.

*hopes the Giant will also drop in to voice approval*

As far as I know, this is the most official position we have 'til now.

[Kaytara]

I don't mind this particular style so much except in the subjective sense that I feel it takes away from the comic in this particular instance. As an example, the anime (and I guess the manga as well) Slayers is, much like OotS, a heavy blend of drama and comedy, and the stylistic devices used tend to vary accordingly. The characters may suddenly be chibified and start sweatdropping or, on a famous occasion, exasperatedly hitting someone else with their sweatdrops, but those times are reserved for comedy breaks. When it's about drama, the style is, well, dramatic. And maybe I've just grown accustomed to it that way, but I feel that this is appropriate.

That's what I'm talking about it. On a more comedic occasion, I wouldn't have minded the exagerrated open-mouthed shaking sweatdropping at all. I just felt that in that one comic where Elan is trying to leap off the ship to go back to Haley - particularly given that it's part of a very depressing and dramatic book climax - the comedic depiction didn't quite belong.

Of course, once again, all a matter of taste. The reason I feel the need to nitpick about small things like that is because there really isn't anything LARGER to nitpick about. :P I'm also not asking to change your style, I'm just commenting.

[Lubirio]

This art leaves me beyond speechless...

After taking about half an hour recovering, I noticed you have two spelling mistakes, possibly typos, I wouldn't know: in 449 (1), Hinjo says "There are some secrest that are..." and in 482, Durkon says "... than ye are fer 24 round, fancy shmancy..." I presume you didn't mean those mistakes to be there, but I love your art and would enjoy more of it if you do keep it up. Specifically, I would like to suggest you drawing strip #1, because that's the introduction to all the characters and it should convey their characters as it is the first time we see them.

All in all, if it hadn't been requested before, I would love to have a tsukiko avatar, pretty much like the one in the banner, shouldn't be too hard I think.

[LuisDantas]

Wow.

Elangune, you definitely have talent.

[Turkish Delight]

As far as I know, this is the most official position we have 'til now.

Here's to hoping the Giant remains as 'tolerant' of this as the link suggests he might, because this is great stuff and not meant to be destroyed by lawyers.

[Brickman]

Wow, you made me dig up my account here just to say how impressed I am with this. Amazing. I especially love Haley; sure, this interpretation of her has no resemblance to her likely canon appearance, but I'm not here for stringent accuracy. If she had looked like that for the entire run of the comic I'm pretty sure I'd be more attached to her than the entire rest of the cast combined.

Everyone else is impressive too. The only one whose design I don't love is Xykon, who I don't think really looks evil or scary enough, but I guess that puts me in an extreme minority. I like how both the characters and action look. I especially love the detail given to the ghosts on the last page of 449 (especially that girl under Soon's sword arm). I certainly hope you're able to continue these without upsetting Rich, because the best case scenario I can see is him quietly looking the other way as long as you don't get too big (he'd have to be insane to actually endorse you, since some people would probably take that as a precedent).

As for future scenes, I'm gonna vote for anything involving Haley. That and I'd like to renominate 611, because we ought to see Belkar in action at least once and that is the most "in action" that he (or anyone in the comic) has ever gotten. Though I'm also curious about what he'd look like during the time when the Mark of Justice was active.

Side note: Oh my goodness, with six pages partially reenacted you're this close to being a whopping 1% of the way towards recreating the comic... or would be, if those were the entire pages (by length you've adapted a little under a fifth of strip 200, 3/4 of 61, less than half of 468, a third of 482, and one panel of 439. The only one you done in its entirety was 449, and that took three manga pages for a standard-sized OOTS page). Rich is probably quaking in his boots.

edit: Hmm, in light of all this "There's a million different manga styles", can anyone name a few that have a style similar to the one you're emulating? I think I'd like to read those.

edit2: Just a little funny side note, if that's how Haley thinks you're supposed to use a rapier, maybe there is a reason she doesn't carry a sword.

[Hacktor]

THAT IS AWESOME ... how could I miss this? I can only dream to draw like this with more and more years of training... Mine don't even compare.

[Elagune]

Haven't dropped by this thread in a while. I don't even know what's going on right now. Am I allowed to continue with this, I think? Sure hope that I don't end up getting busted up with a cease and desist.

Anyway. Yeah. I've decided that if I can continue, I'll probably be sticking with my designs. I really don't want to spend too much time worrying about things - this little project was supposed to be a stress-reliever and practice on my manga drawing while I was at it. If I get too worried about sticking close to the source material, it'll feel more like work than play. It'll probably last longer if I enjoy working on it too.

As for the exaggerated facial features... I grew up alongside manga, you see. It's completely different in Asia as opposed to Western cultures. Every bookstore you went to had manga in the aisles, and every kid reads it. I grew up alongside these exaggerated facial features (the facial expressions in children's manga are even crazier), and so don't cringe at all when I see them. I can understand why some of you might feel differently, but please realize that manga originated in a different culture, and people have different experiences with it. If you want to read more mature manga, which lacks the exaggerated emotions and have deeper emotional depth, there are plenty out there. I personally suggest Pluto, which is totally awesome. It's one of the best Seinen manga I've ever read.

As for works similar to my style... I can't say for sure, but I have been inspired by a variety of works. My number one inspiration is One Piece, secondary Fairy Tail. If you take a look at them, especially their latest chapters, you can see just how far I have to go. A couple others that I enjoy include Negima, Hajime no Ippo... Well, I read way too much manga to list it all out here.

[Kobold-Bard]

Haven't dropped by this thread in a while. I don't even know what's going on right now. Am I allowed to continue with this, I think? Sure hope that I don't end up getting busted up with a cease and desist....

IIRC Roland said you're ok until Rich says otherwise. As long as you're not planning on redoing the entire strip.

[Mercenary Pen]

Haven't dropped by this thread in a while. I don't even know what's going on right now. Am I allowed to continue with this, I think? Sure hope that I don't end up getting busted up with a cease and desist.

Well, the official line from Roland is here. Basically, don't do too much, give credit, don't distribute it anywhere else (which probably includes don't post it on Deviantart).

[Horatio@Bridge]

If I understand the copyright law correctly, you're fine until you receive that cease and desist order unless they can prove some sort of blatant violation of the copyright (such as you selling your versions of his work). Fan works have a fair bit of leeway, mostly because it's not worth the author's time to go and shut down the myriad of non-profitable works out there (unless you're TSR, in which case the activity will destroy you as a company). Until Rich asks you to stop, you should be fine as long as you don't try to profit from his work or try to prevent him from profiting. In the meantime, your fan work serves as valuable advertising for the primary inspiration!

[FrozenOcean]

I can haz Xykon banner?

[Dusk Eclipse]

I am sorry but it seems you missed my last post elagune

Can I please get a avatar?

[Lubirio]

I don't think he missed it, he just chose not to respond.

Speaking of which, the requests on this page as I see it (at least the most recent posts) were a Zykon banner, Redcoak avatar for DuskEclipse, a Tsukiko avatar for myself, and some strip drawings. I'd love for elagune to work on these, but I doubt he has any time to spare, so I'll practice my patience and wait. Patiently of course.

[Kobold-Bard]

I am sorry but it seems you missed my last post elagune

Can I please get a avatar?

Too many requests, so he stopped taking them. But if he ever starts again my Oracle avatar is first damn it

[Elagune]

I was actually working on that Redcloak avatar, before I realized that the image I had already was too low in resolution. If I put it into an avatar format, it's gonna look really, really terrible.

I'll wait until I have some better images before I get to work on anymore avatars. The Tsukiko one should be fine, though.

[Dusk Eclipse]

I was actually working on that Redcloak avatar, before I realized that the image I had already was too low in resolution. If I put it into an avatar format, it's gonna look really, really terrible.

I'll wait until I have some better images before I get to work on anymore avatars. The Tsukiko one should be fine, though.

Again sorry I looked too demading
I will wait patiently

[Lubirio]

I was actually working on that Redcloak avatar, before I realized that the image I had already was too low in resolution. If I put it into an avatar format, it's gonna look really, really terrible.

I'll wait until I have some better images before I get to work on anymore avatars. The Tsukiko one should be fine, though.

Thanks, I was hoping that would work out, and I guess I should thank (most charmingly so) you for the very prompt response, and to maybe point again to the typos I pointed out earlier? (*cowers in corner and balls up* "trying to help, trying to help...")

[FrozenOcean]

Elangune, I really like... Most of it, actually, but your Redcloak is cool. Just promise you won't start doing freaky Redcloak X V art. Please. Why do people think that's a good pair!?

Also, I requested Xykon is a banner because he's too smexy not to get one. He's not even in the 'Team Evil' picture! (Which is completely whored by Tsukiko...)

EDIT: The typos you pointed out, (I merely speculate here), I believe are supposed to show accents. Maybe. Elagune?

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Elangune, I really like... Most of it, actually, but your Redcloak is cool. Just promise you won't start doing freaky Redcloak X V art. Please. Why do people think that's a good pair!?

A good writer can make any pairing work, and there are some very good writers going Redcloak/V.

It's also because they're actually fairly similar. They're smart, they have reasonable goals, they willingly sacrificed all they loved in attempts to reach those goals, and they have suffered greatly before and will again for refusing to admit error. The only tough part is getting them to not kill each other for the first 5 minutes.

[Haven]

I always thought Roy and Redcloak were more similar. The voices of common sense, with some persistent errors despite their otherwise high intelligence and wisdom, very strong emphasis on family, got into their quests for the wrong reasons but later had a revelation that motivated them to continue nonetheless, and so forth.

Back on topic: I linked this on the TVTropes forum, everyone there flipped out at how awesome it is (though there was some concurrence that it's not a style that would work well for the entire comic, so maybe it's just as well that that's not going to happen).

Also! My avatar is still awesome.

[FrozenOcean]

Also! My avatar is still awesome.

Totally agree. With both parts of your post.

[TheSummoner]

Know what strip would be absolutly hilarious for you to recreate?

Oh my gods, Yor, I swear, you do NOT need to keep shouting out your attacks! This isn't manga!

[Kumo]

i LOVE this fight scene. Kinda curious how you'd make it look.

[Asta Kask]

Have you not come across the vast number of disturbing schoolgirls in manga?

Nope, I haven't read much manga. But if it's a convention of the style I accept it, of course.

[Mercenary Pen]

Nope, I haven't read much manga. But if it's a convention of the style I accept it, of course.

It certainly seems to be used a lot in some sub-genres.

[Elagune]

Whew... Sorry about the wait, guys. Haven't updated this thread in a while because I've been preoccupied with others things, like submitting my fancomic. I've decided to take the plunge - looks like comics will be up either twice or thrice a week, depending. Hope you guys decide to check it out.

Anyway, that doesn't mean I've given up on this thread. I'm actually starting work on the next page already. And as for the avatars, give it time, guys. If I like a piece of artwork enough to colour it, chances are it's going to end up as an avatar.

[Jaxon]

Elagune: YOU. ARE. A. GOD!!!

This is one of the most awesome things I have ever seen. Love Tsukiko.

[Athaniar]

Whew... Sorry about the wait, guys. Haven't updated this thread in a while because I've been preoccupied with others things, like submitting my fancomic. I've decided to take the plunge - looks like comics will be up either twice or thrice a week, depending. Hope you guys decide to check it out.

Link, please? I can't seem to find the thread.

[The Rose Dragon]

Link, please? I can't seem to find the thread.

You need to wait for Alarra to approve it first.