On vacations, however...

Hey bros, what’s up? Sorry that I didn’t make a sneak peek of the next page of the Equestria Girls adult comic; I’ve been busy doing other things besides my chores with my family and other important things in my personal life. But also, I’ve been trying new things during my vacations.

As the title says, yes, I’m on vacation from my full-time job since August 31, and I will return to work on October 5. You may think that this is a great opportunity to draw my Equestria Girls adult comic, right? Well, I was going to do that, but I made a change of plans. But don’t worry! I’m not canceling the comic or anything like that.

You see, I’m taking this long break to learn new skills and change the way I work on my Equestria Girls adult comic. And during my first two weeks of vacation, I was taking an online course of Blender in Domestika website. You know? That program that makes 3D models and animation? Lately, I’ve been interesting to learn hot to use that program for a long time, so I decided to give it a try.

And let me tell you about my first days learning Blender as someone who has never worked with 3D programs before: The learning curve is high!  But I’m starting to understand the tools, the working modes, and how the 3D models are made. The only thing I can not do is 3D animation, not in my laptop. If my laptop crashes every time I try to make a 3D model or sculpt an object in 3D, making animation gets worse. I have had this laptop for almost a decade. God, I need a new PC!

Now you may be wondering why I’m wasting my time learning 3D? It’s because of a video that I watched on YouTube that made me think a lot about how I made mangas lately.

There’s a YouTube channel called Shonen Theory, and one of their latest videos is titled “7 Speed Hacks to Draw Your Manga Faster”. After watching that video, it made me realize that maybe I’m making my mangas in the wrong way. And after watching that video, I decided that after finishing the 4th page of the Equestria Girls Comic, I’m going to test and try these 7 hacks starting on page 5.

Just a disclaimer here: don’t try these hacks if you’re a beginner; these are for people who have a little more experience making comics or manga, or for professionals.

One of those hacks that I’m going to use is making your manga in a batch workflow. What does that mean? Well, do you know the process of making a manga page? You do the sketch, then the ink, then the screentones or colors, then the effects, then the text, and then the finishing touches; and then you do that same process on the next page.

Instead of doing that process page-by-page, try doing that with all pages. For example: instead of sketching one page, sketch all the pages; instead of inking one page, again, ink all pages; and so on. Making the manga page by page is a very slow process, but if you make your manga in a batch workflow, it will be faster.

Another hack (that I was already using before this video) is using 3d models. Whether for characters or objects, if you’re making your manga digitally, this hack can be very useful. Clip Studio Paint has a library of 3D models that you can download for free or to purchase on their website. I’ve been downloading and using 3D models from Clip Studio Paint from time to time when I can't visualize a pose of a character, or I find it too hard to draw an object with my imagination.

However, the problem with this hack is you can’t find the models ot objects that you want to use for your manga. Or, in some cases, the backgrounds that you need for your projects. And this is where Blender comes in.

Sure, there are websites where you can download 3D objects for free. But the ones that I see are not the ones that I need for my manga. And this is why I want to learn Blender to make my own 3D objects, backgrounds, and who knows, maybe my own 3D models.

Maybe I will model my favorite characters like Fluttershy in 3D in the future… but let’s not go there (yet).

There are other hacks, but so far, these are the ones I want to try out for the Equestria Girls adult comic.

So, yeah, during my vacations, I’m learning 3D with Blender and changing my workflow for the Equestria Girls comic.

But also, I’m preparing something for this November, too. Something that I will announce this next Friday.

And that’s it. Thank you for reading, and as always, keep making something awesome!