mikedoeslife

So worth it. I hate my luggage area being visible!

Wikipedia knows all http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emo_%28slang%29

Sulio: Not sure yet! Probably only 4 or 5 regular characters, with various supporting members here and there. Tough to say until I get further along in the writing Re. the gallery, I might do that! I've got quite a lot of webspace myself, but there's no harm in adding it here too. Lurch: Hahaha! They'll be trendy and fashionable, but they won't be emo.

Oh shit! Man. It was okay when it was nothing more than a Japanese manga with no translated equivalent here in the west, but if they're going to make an anime, it's going to become a huge property. I'm gonna have to change the story of my comic! I'll keep using the Z, but I guess I'm gonna have to move any particularly obvious references to Wangan Midnight

Updated the first post with new art and info

Haha, thanks Sulio. The colouring is done in Photoshop, and while the process is technically identical to the process used in the comic book industry, trust me when I say my skill isn't anywhere near theirs yet! I'll get there eventually though, I think. Yours would actually be pretty close to the ideal car for more photo posing, because you've got the bolt-on flared guards that Austin Hoke's got. Only major difference is that he has RS Watanabe Type Rs, but I'm sure I can work out a solution for that. Haven't thought of a name yet! I was thinking about posting a thread here and over at JDM Style Tuning (my "home" forum, haha) asking for suggestions on a name. Thanks for the offer to include it on the front page too, that'd be rad! Edit: Thanks Vlad!

Thanks man! Since I intend to trace all instances of the car, I might have you to get some of you together at some point so I can take photos from hundreds of different angles hehe.

Okay! I've decided I'm definitely going to go ahead with the comic, though it will be a very long process due to other commitments. That said, it's a go! This is the first character I've designed for the story. He's not the main character, but I can already tell he'll be my favourite. He's probably going to be the best friend of the main guy (the main guy being the one who buys the 240Z). He's a smartarse, opinionated, biased, and likes to stir the main character up. He doesn't have a name yet. Stay tuned for more character art, and maybe another drawing of the S30Z! UPDATE: Here's the main character. His name is Alex, and he's now got quite a lengthy backstory. So he's going to be good fun to write and draw. Anyway, this needs some cleaning up, quite a lot of shaky lines on the car. And colouring needs to be done, of course! Photo reference: Yes, that's Ben Affleck. Hey, you use what you can get, alright? ------- UPDATE: 9th Nov 06 The number plate isn't permanent, I want you guys to come up with something clever (and inoffensive non-bogan of course, so nothing like "RACEME or CUL8R or NVMYZ) I just wanted something to fill the plate for now UPDATE: 17th Nov 06 Okay! Here are some more sketches, and these ones are likely to make up the cover for either the first or second issue (second issue? Sheesh, I hope I make it that far! Heh). The first sketch is our hero, Alex, sitting in his Demon Z (absolutely a nod to the Devil Z of Wangan Midnight ). The next sketch is the bad guy, with one of his slags clinging to him. I haven't got a name for him yet, and he's not technically a "bad" guy. You see, Alex and he were racing one night about 5 years back - before Alex got the Demon Z - and the bad guy had his younger sister in the passenger seat of his car. Something happened to Alex's car, causing him to collide with the bad guy's car. The bad guy's car went careening into a power pole after a couple of spins, and his sister wound up dead. The bad guy has sworn vengeance, and in the 5 years since that night, he's become quite the rough nut. Anyway, that's the idea at this point. So these two sketches will be combined into one piece, with the comic's logo mixed in somewhere too. I hope y'all dig it! UPDATE: 18th Nov 06 Okay, some test colours for the bad guy. I used Pantone markers for this, which are an alcohol-based professional quality set of markers, and they're quite expensive. Think AU$60 for a box of 6! We've got 5 boxes so far, heh. Alas, I don't yet have as many colours as I'd like, and the guy's hair turned out a bit orange. He'll have darker brown hair in the comic, but maybe blonde. Not sure yet. Anyway, I hope you dig it! The final colours in the actual cover will be much nicer, I hope. This is all practice. EDIT: 8th June 2007 Here's a progress shot from a different scene, using a photo of Sulio's Z as the model (thanks to Sulio for mailing me a bucketload of photos on disc!). I've decided to use Photoshop rather than Manga Studio. I'll probably still use Manga Studio for doing textures and speed-lines and such (those familiar with manga comics will know what I mean), but the actual sketching and inking will be done 100% in Photoshop. I'm hoping to use no paper at all! Gotta love having a drawing tablet, haha.

The hood's been modified to accommodate the new VQ35HR, lifted from the new G35. Not sure yet if I like the look of it, but if it's functional, whatcha gonna do? Remember that the S30Z had a bonnet bulge, so this is almost a homage to the classic Z

Haha, cool! It's good to have an Off Topic section, it helps everyone open up and get to know each other beyond our shared love for the Z.

I just noticed, we have no Off Topic forum here? Anyway... AdultSwim's take on Mario Bros if it were crossed with Grand Theft Auto (and Resident Evil, towards the end of the vid). Absolutely amazing! http://youtube.com/watch?v=ICoDFooBXpU

Damn, that's unreal. Can't wait to see this thing on the road!

Haha! I'm pretty sure he'll have short cropped hair. The story starts out in the past, and he'll have longer hair then, but by the time we get to the present, he'll have short hair.

After seeing Darius's Z ripping it up and snorting with that V8, it's pretty appealing. I would probably go for an RB of some description myself, or an L28, purely because of the cost difference, but if it came down to preference and if money were no obstacle, I'd get the Chevy.

Thanks guys! I'm pretty pumped about this, so I'm glad to see such an enthusiastic response!

Luke: The car itself is traced from this photo of Austin Hoke's 240Z. Personally I do think I have the ability to draw it freehand, but frankly I just can't be bothered. It's a lot harder to do it freehand, and the amount of work involved would turn me off the idea of doing a comic. I'd rather trace the cars and get the comic done, than try to draw them freehand, get frustrated, and toss the whole thing in the bin! After that, I drew the guy and the background in myself, completely freehand. That said, I will probably use photo reference for some frames, as I like to have realistic poses and photos are the best way for me, as I don't yet have the life-drawing experience to pull off a good pose every time. I then inked the drawing with a brush pen, scanned it in to my PC with my A3 scanner (oh how I love my A3 scanner), and cleaned it up in Photoshop. The shading (known as "screentones" in manga) were added in Photoshop. Toecutter: Thanks man, I appreciate the encouragement! I was sitting around sooking over the fact that with all my financial commitments at the moment, there's just no way I can afford my dream car - the classic Fairlady S30Z, our 240Z - so I'd do the next best thing: draw a comic about it! Having a section here dedicated to the comic would be unreal! I'll make sure that I've got enough work done on it before I go accepting that sort of generosity, so that I don't go wasting anyone's time hehe. You know my main fear? That the comic becomes popular among the Australian car enthusiast scene, and - just like Initial D did to the AE86 Corolla/Trueno/Levin - the value of the S30Z goes through the roof and I'll never be able to afford one! Hehe. As far as copyrights go, look, it's a great point that you've made. I have thought about it, and I've decided to take the risk at the moment. Right now, Wangan Midnight isn't a massive property. There hasn't been a new game developed since 2000, and the manga has never been licenced or published in the west. If the game's distributor or - and this seems very unlikely to me - the original Japanese copyright owner for the manga itself - sends me a letter, then I'll gladly remove all references to Wangan Midnight from the comic. In fact, my hope is that this comic will stir so much interest in Wangan Midnight, that someone will licence the manga and release it here! Imagine if Madman got a hold of it? Heck yeah! The comic isn't going to reference the Wangan Midnight manga directly. It'll sort of be a tongue-in-cheek reference, you know? When he talks about his car, it'll be like "Yeah, some guy in Japan used to race it on the Wangan Highway in Tokyo, but he crashed it 3 times and decided it was too much for him, so I got a really good price for it because of the crash history. Too good to resist! Luckily the chassis is straight, so my dad and I stripped it back to bare metal and rebuilt it from the ground up". Or, you know, something like that. My hope is that it will be a cross between Wangan (simply by the fact that it's based around a frighteningly high powered and mysterious S30Z shipped from Japan) and Initial D (because he'll be reluctant/uninterested initially to enter any races, but eventually becomes known as an amazing driver). There'll be references to other car manga as well, such as Over Rev and whatever else I think of. It'll be like one big homage to the Japanese love for car manga, but with Australian and Melbourne cultural elements mixed in. Anyway, stay tuned for more info!

Sooo tempted to write and draw a car comic, but it would be so much work! Especially with drawing so many cars, urgh! I did this sketch of what I'd love to do. The reason I thought of it is because I'm sick of waiting for the next chapter of the scanned/translated Wangan Midnight manga to come out (which is a manga comic about a dude with a 240Z, for those who don't know), so I'd just make my own alternate reality version of the story. Basically, in my alternate version of the story, the dude in Wangan would crash the car once again, and decide that it's too much for him. He puts it up for sale, and a dude here in Melbourne Australia imports it, and continues the legacy. Whatcha think? I'm very far from being a pro, that's for sure haha. My inking sucks! I also traced the photo of Austin Hoke's Z, because it was way too hard to draw. So I'm a cheating bastard, but ah well.

I'm all about the road. I know what a thrill it is to hit the track, I used to do it in my Supra back in the day. But when I build up my Zed, it's going to be all about night cruising out on the roads. Each to their own, of course!

I think I'm probably the only person alive who doesn't like Jack's Z. I really don't like G-noses, I don't like GT wings on Zeds, and I don't like those rims. Not a fan of the yellow either. Sorta leaves me screwed when it comes to liking that car! On the other hand, I definitely admire the amount of work that has gone into that car, my hat goes off to him and his cohorts for that. RUSS: I generally agree that a sports coupe should have no back seats, but that said, I think the MkIV Supra (1993-2002) was a pretty good example of how you can have backseats without ruining the shape of the car. It's one of the best looking coupes I've ever seen. That said, the seats were absolutely useless. To get an adult in the back (I say an adult, because I never let anyone sit behind the drivers seat - it would require me to move forward and I wasn't going to do that!), the front passenger pretty much had to crush their legs up against the glove compartment. Not exactly ideal! Doesn't change the fact though that the roofline of the Supra is absolutely perfect.

http://www.terra2imports.ca/import-japan113566373688844.htm Judging by that page, I'd say 2000GTs can indeed be imported from Japan. I'd be surprised if there was any sort of law disallowing it, it'd be quite unusual.

Eh, I'll leave that up to someone else if that's what gets decided haha. Took me long enough to do that, I doubt I can be arsed doing another one unless it was a really stylised version.

Jeez, you left out what solar system and galaxy he's in mate! :roll: :wink:

I just took a punt at a design. I don't like the stock Z (I only really like them lowered, larger wheels, open grille, and front lip), so I used the image that Sulio used. The black border around each image is just to square off the image, they wouldn't actually be printed. These would be vinyl cut stickers, presumably in white. So everything that is black would be white, and everything that is white would be removed. If anybody wants to take a closeup photo of their window for me, I'll show you what I mean

G'day Aaron, welcome. Graedat: What engine is that?

Haha, I've already called him, earlier in the week. He won't be home this weekend, he's going away on a holiday. He'll be there next weekend though. I'm planning to check it out.