Ball With Hat

[BeamishBoy]

This being my first art contribution here, I'm a wee bit nervous...

This past New Year's I decided to do something that I had never done before: namely, start a webcomic. Based on some ideas I had previously hashed out with my family, I came up with BallWithHat.com, a daily webcomic. There isn't too much humor, and minimal plot, but it's quirky and fun to see where the main character (the Ball) ends up. I'm sure that most of you are artistically stronger than I am, and I would love to have some feedback on how I can make things better (not stylistically, though; I'm pretty much set on that.) You can check the website out at www.ballwithhat.com, but for those of you too lazy to click the link, I'll include two strips that I really like.


Ball With Cane and Hat


Ball With Monocle and Hat

If you like these pictures, please check out the website! Feel free to reply here with crits or comment on the page itself. Most of all, it you like them, tell people. The Ball wants an audience...

Thanks,
BeamishBoy

[BeamishBoy]

It's been almost a month since I posted last... I don't like double posting, but I thought it would be a good idea to include a few more of my favorites.


Ball With Tea and Hat


Ball With Sleeping Bag and Hat


Ball With Lanterns and Hat

Cheers!

[the.crippled.dreamer]

It looks like it's being drawn on a whiteboard, am I correct? Interesting choice of media & style...and flexible with nearly endless possible scenes to come up with.

[BeamishBoy]

Funny you should ask. The concept originated on whiteboard, and I liked it, but it wasn't feasible to scan in/photograph each comic. At this point, first I'm sketching with pencil, then going over with a black marker.Then I lay a transparency on top and use a dry erase marker to add the shading. Scanned in, color edited, post-production, etc.

Here's another I put up on Jules Vernes' birthday a few days back.

Ball With Cephalopod and Hat

[Ravenseye]

haha cute! I don't Know if I agree with white board just cous there is no real way to upgrade in working on values and color theory and such but if its what you dig go for it. More or less the character reminds me of something though a tagger would use to spray different ball characters around town doing different poses or going on different adventures. Keep working with him and make him a solid character of yours. I suggest checking out some other web comics you enjoy and take note of facial expressions and mannerisms that make him look extremely sad for instance or extremely happy. Good luck.

[BeamishBoy]

Thanks for your comment! I know, the style is pretty restrictive when it comes to exploring color. This can get pretty frustrating on some days when I really want some more colors, but on the other hand the restriction simplifies things and allows me to go for a more stylized, cartoony feel.

Your spray paint thought is an intriguing connection... don't be surprised if I take a little inspiration from it!

I have to admit, I was putting off posting here until today... because today marks the 100th comic! 100 days, 100 comics. Haven't missed a day (although I had to post one late once when I forgot to set it up to publish the morning before...) In any case, I've included the 100 day celebratory comic, plus a few more that I think look neat.


Ball With 100 and Hat


Ball With Tablet and Hat


Ball With Phoenix and Hat
(showing some support for Japan)


Ball With Branches and Hat
(on Robert Frost's birthday)

Remember, these are only a few samples of the work that's available online at www.ballwithhat.com! There's 100 for you to see there.

BeamishBoy

[the.crippled.dreamer]

Nice; Let's see one similar to the tablet one in 2012.

[ckilgore]

Just happened across this thread -- the "whiteboard" style has a distinctive look, and something about the one with the monocle really cracks me up.  But my favorite is the one "with tablet" -- solid design, color.  Overall the simplicity of the concept has a lot going for it -- nice webcomic!

Cheers,

CKilgore

[BeamishBoy]

Oh, my, it's been ages since I posted here. Thanks to the.crippled.dreamer (yeah, that's what I was thinking when I drew it ) and ckilgore (welcome to the forum, by the way!) I thought I'd add a few more that I've liked since last time I posted.


Ball With Totem Pole and Hat


Ball With Watches and Hat (Dali reference)


Ball With Silhouettes and Hat (playing around with the media a bit, trying to stretch the coloring style)


Ball With Graffiti and Hat (inspired by Ravenseye's comment above )

Thanks, all
BeamishBoy

[the.crippled.dreamer]

Nice; definitely like the totem & graffiti images. The purple one makes me think of a mosaic; could try expanding on that.

[ckilgore]

The Dali BwH cracks me up!  Graffiti's my favorite from this set -- exactly the right balance between iconic abstraction and realism.  I feel like the peeping-tom image in the upper right corner is an allusion or reference to something -- but I can't quite place it...  Anyway, nicely done!

--CKilgore

[BeamishBoy]

Thanks for the comments! The graffiti in the upper right is Kilroy Was Here, a pretty iconic graffiti from the WWII era.

I have a question for you all: I've been meaning to add an archive section to the website (www.ballwithhat.com if you haven't checked it out yet), but I'm not sure exactly how to lay it out. I've got a good number of comics by now (160 today), so I don't think that I could just have them all in a long list. Maybe I could have a giant scroll bar, but I'd rather something more creative. You can already search by name. Do you think it would be good to search by date? Browse a list of names? Please give input!

Thanks,
BeamishBoy

[ckilgore]

I like the idea of an "archive view" of some kind -- given the iconic qualities of BWH, maybe a grid (or line, or some other configuration) of thumbnail images?  You could shrink/zoom so that each tile would show only the ball itself... ?   Anyway, yeah, an archive would be great!

By the way, I love how the site's interface is also in the whiteboard/marker style...!

Cheers,

CKilgore

[BeamishBoy]

Thanks for your comments! Unfortunately, I'll be going on vacation tomorrow (maybe not so unfortunately?), so I won't be able to implement any archives for a while, but your thoughts are valuable.

I just wanted to share a few of my favorite comics from this past Escher week.


Ball With Stairs and Hat (slinkies going down an infinite staircase...)


Ball With Tessellation and Hat


Ball With Rind and Hat


Ball With Relativity and Hat

All based on the artwork of M. C. Escher!

BeamishBoy

[BeamishBoy]

I realize that my last update was many months ago (I did have one in the interim, but that was removed when the forum reset), and Ball With Hat just hit 300 comics, so I thought I'd share some of my favorites since June.

Oh, and there is an archive that my wonderful webmaster made for me as a birthday present: http://www.ballwithhat.com/archive/


Ball With Cthulhu and Hat


Ball in Glass (3/5)


Ball With Telescope and Hat


Ball With Cannon and Hat

And, today's 300 comic celebration...

Ball With 300 and Hat

Want to see some more but don't want to read every one since you last checked? Here are some more top picks:
http://www.ballwithhat.com/ball-with-mushroom-and-hat/ For the Mario fans
http://www.ballwithhat.com/ball-with-vertigo-and-hat/ Hitchcock, anyone?
http://www.ballwithhat.com/ball-with-guitar-and-hat/ Woodstock Hat
http://www.ballwithhat.com/ball-with-cathedral-and-hat/ Just sort of cool
http://www.ballwithhat.com/ball-with-artillery-and-hat/ Yeah.
http://www.ballwithhat.com/ball-with-logograms-and-hat/ Took me forever to draw all of the characters correctly
http://www.ballwithhat.com/ball-with-table-and-hat/ For Picasso's birthday

Yeah, it's a lot... But I've done a lot! Please leave any comments, etc.

Thanks,
BeamishBoy