The Art

[Nina]

The art was always a problem for ATF, there are people who refuse to read the comic because of the art (their loss, puh!). Who is your favourite of the three artists (Urru, Runge, Mooney) and what for kind of art would you love to see?




Some people would love to see the same artists as season 8 has. And I agree that I like that one more ... but I doubt that I'm waiting for those colours and the style, where characters who look like they aren't older than 17 years old, on Ats. I prefer the more dark and adult art for Angel. Somehow it feels better.

From the three artists we had, I like Runge and Mooney the most. I prefer Runge's style, but he has some really bad panels. Mooney uses a bit too much shadows, but his art is more consistant and I love how much the characters look like their actors. I think that Runge needs more time than what he gets to make an issue (it's why he stopped), if he gets the time ... it would be amazing. But right now I'll go with Mooney. Urru's style isn't really my style.

Edit:
And again the wrong subforum ... *sigh*

edit:
Thanks for moving the thread.

[NileQT87]

another fan of runge/mooney.

i happen to be a bit of a realism-styled artist myself and artistically have always preferred realism in art (i'm fairly portrait-obsessed).

urru can be okay at times and is very consistent... but i am not a fan at all of the look. he's a nightmare when it comes to taming his proportions back down to the human race, much less the actors. also, seriously lacking in fashion knowledge. the art is always consistent (a few dud panels--one where angel had a flattop), but never amazing. he draws angel, illyria and connor the best... nina and wesley are the characters he's rather bad at (vinyl & spandex-nina and anyone wearing a g-string bikini suffer from his awful fashion sense). wesley looks so generic i want to cry. spike is actually not his best likeness. he is very good at drawing action, but everyone always looks very vague with thick lines and no detail. he's the artist i end up playing photoshop on while trying to remove sideways butt shots (someone give this guy a victoria's secret catalogue to get some more varied ideas for lingerie) and breasts that would make ilona costa bianchi (the ceo of the roman w&h) jealous. the biggest thing that his art really hurt was nina. urru is usually good at physical action, but her body language was just so bizarre that she came off completely unlikable and inhuman--it took runge to correct the werewolf/human hybrid physicality. urru has improved (and lynch even moved up the date of spider's girls getting a costume change because of complaints about urru's women)--particularly in the spike spin-off. urru has gotten a little bit more character conscious, imo.

runge is fantastic at covers (some of the absolute best--the angel/connor and wesley covers are amazing--they really show just how good he really is) and any panel he is given a lot of time with is gorgeous. his wesley, gunn and some of his angel panels are all kinds of awesome. he has a better fashion sense than urru for sure (thank you for nina's blue tracksuit! runge single-handedly salvaged nina's character in that panel just by changing her body language.). runge's problem is time. when he doesn't get enough time, the panels occasionally get quite frightening, strangely proportioned or even cartoony (one wesley looked like something from a silly, cartoony hallmark card). some of his rushed expressions often seem very off (that panel of angel pointing and doing the "bippidy bobbidy boo" and the open-mouthed expression are examples of utter strangeness). the colorist did him no favors by being in a brown phase when runge even drew the correct background (wonderful) to the lobby of the hyperion hotel. you can tell the poor guy was unsatisfied and frustrated by time constraints. he just can't work fast enough for a monthly comic and it's too bad. i hope he continues to do covers and guest panels, though!

mooney is the most consistent and is similar to runge at his best. mooney is the one whose drawings most resemble the actors (which i prefer). he is by far the most aware of actor proportions and really seems to have the best knowledge of the feel of the show and what looks right. and yes, i prefer mooney way more than jeanty (jeanty is great, but realism isn't his style). the shading can be quite strong and i would like to see the inker find a different way to put the shadows in (runge uses a lot of crosshatches). by far the best continuous likenesses with expressions that really flow well with what is going on the scenes (some of runge's are off). just find a new look for that inked shading and he would be almost flawless in my eyes.

something i've noticed is that a lot of spike fans love lynch and urru, in particular, because of how spike-centric their projects have been. angel fans seem to prefer runge/mooney for the most part. an interesting observation.

my one criticism of lynch that hasn't been soothed much is the fact that his humor misfires a lot for my tastes (the angel/slayer chanting was horrid and uncomfortable. wesley saying "chase that rainbow" and "big guy" was very out of character.). he's doing a wonderful job, but i'd actually prefer a bit less of the ill-timed jokey stuff (please, let there not be any more puppets--UGH!).

i have no problem with him using the asylum characters and he has managed to integrate them quite well. it was a good call to use betta george in a very morally ambiguous context (with the slayer). i would say that was the moment i really accepted that character as more than brian's self-serving self-referencing (one of my early fears) and actually an important piece that was used well.

also... lynch and ryall need to work on that spelling.