The Stuffed Animal Sagas
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A monster, a little girl in trouble and a teddy bear who shows its not the size of the hero in the fight but the size of the fight in the hero. The monster from under the bed has snatched little Tina and its up to her stuffed teddy bear to save her. Teddy’s quest takes him to the strange land under the bed (a dark and mysterious place) a realm far from the ordinary world. Teddy must use all his courage and toughness to reach the dark abode of the monster and overcome the sinister brute. Teddy may find out that to save Tina he may need to make the ultimate sacrifice. This is a tale of friendship, loyalty and sacrifice that illustrates why our childhood toys are so dear to us. Often toys are battle scarred and worn out by the rigors of childhood and usually there is a story or two that goes along with those scares. The series will focus on several self-contained childhood tales of Tina (an 8-year-old) and her teddy bear during that magical time when anything can and usually does happen. Not only showcasing the imaginative adventures of youth but also how important a good friend can be growing up. Teddy and Tina’s friendship, love and loyalty for each other will be illustrated during the course of this series as well as the magic of the childhood memories they make together. Created for the children of all ages Teddy and Tina’s adventures is aimed at conjuring up our past memories of childhood friends as well as making a few new ones.
Some rough spots, but a nice concept, strong sense of design and its own unique flavor. Hope to see the whole thing some day.
Hey all just wanted to say thanks to all you guys who voted and enjoyed my comic! Also thanks for all the feed back about the project. This was a great experience and I had a lot of fun. Oh and one final bit some of you were critical of the comic and that's cool but you only viewed a small part of a larger story. Hopefully the whole story will be seen in the future and I feel many of the critical issues people had will make more sense seeing the story in its complete version.
thanks for reading the interview dash and sorry but i didn't use any savannah ref material for this project. I do see what you are saying the house does look like alot of savannah type houses especially out on tybee island and such.
great interview, Tom! You mention Savannah and now I'm sort of curious if the house in panel one (love that panel) is referenced from somewhere around there--maybe a place out towards the islands?
This makes so much sense the all mighty Teddy Bear great. But sorta makes Gi-Joe look like a wimp.
Dear Zuda Competitors/Creators,
I recently started a Zuda fan blog, and I would love to interview all of this month’s creators. If you would be willing to answer 5-10 questions, to be posted on the Zudafan blog, please contact me at: zudafan@gmail.com.
Feel free to check out the blog: zudafan.blogspot.com
Thanks!
I really love the overlaying of images. I really want to see more. So does my 3 year old,as he keeps asking where is page 9?
Some stories seem to be too out there for a win others too nice i.e. aimed at younger readers -more on this later. When I was a kid I had 3 my pet monsters that watched my back when I was sleeping. My little sister has a whole horde of webkinz -they may look cute, but there's enough of them to make a plush roman legion they could weigh you down in numbers alone. I got a smile on my face from this kind of like lamison.
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screen 1 the art/words/letters/colors/ really reminded me of somethng from fantagraphics/ or slave labor. I mostly enjoyed the art you seem to have your style down pat Tom and 'street' 'sleep' could get a little old is using this to tell your story but it worked for the 8 screens in question.
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screen 2 nice art and a nice way to explain the set-up to your comic, good synopsis too by the way.
**********************************************************screen 3 kind of rhyming kind of not, but a well laid out panel. I'd like to see some more panels would be a common gripe from me -hate decompression- but too many and you spoil the impact your full screen shots really packed a punch, so you pulled off being -a little- panel-lite with a very enjoyable story.
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screen 4 i lied seeing all the toys debate what to do and the way you put the panel together. In panel 2 it looks like we get a toy soldier, superman, and a transformer among others. Panel 5 a pirate face, and we see the exact same pirate face a few screens later -reused art doesn't trill me at all.
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screen 5 loved the way you laid out this panel and the way you showed teddy. I think I can figure out how he ended up with only 1 eye. 'there' 'lair' i kind of liked it and teddy talking. Loved the little bolts for his words to show how he was speaking.
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screen 6 the cut paste pirate is a wuss and worse -didn't like seeing him again. Other than that loved the way you laid out the screen.
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screen 7 the toys look the same art-wise. Really liked the way you mixed up the colors on teddy fighting past the dust bunnies. Liked the panel of teddy going down the stairs.
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screen 8 I enjoyed the art in this scene esp. the crayons, and black hills. A fairly good spot to end on cliff-hanger-wise.
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It seems like a younger reader geared story and I don't know how well that will play on Zuda -ever. Pirate heads aside it was a very good read, with a lot of promise going forward. 4/5 stars and a fav.
He he he. This story makes me chuckle!
my son (two years old) has a whole menagerie of animals protecting him at night from monsters. the leader of the pack is a lion named, Roary. this one made me smile.
I tried to give it a shot but the Comic Sans jumped from the screen and stabbed me in the eyes... Good luck, though!
Well I really like the story-- overall. Call me whacky but I kinda felt that this was a complete set-up for the teddy bear's adventure. Yeah the art was reused a lot but it got past me the first time...partly because like Mighke, I was busy trying to force the rhyming in some places. The biggest trouble for me was the cropping of the font...at first I thought it was my viewer acting up until I read the comments. Com'on Tommm9, why didn't catch this?
But still I liked it...so g'job & g'luck m'brother
cool stuff man!!!!!!! me and my little bro love this one!!
hey gang glad to see some familiar faces and thanks for all the comments and
input about the comic. I realize that it's hard to get a sense of the whole story with only the first eight pgs to go on, hopefully you will all get a chance to see the turn the story takes later on.
It's fresh, warmhearted and creative. It draws you into its convincing, lushly illustrated fantasy world. I applaud you for doing a children's comic rather than falling into the superhero/action rut. If we expect comics to continue as a medium to bring in new readers, more chances like this need to be taken.
i forgot to say: this comic remember me about a Tom Strong's short tale by Alan Moore. it was about a kid that dreams with somekind of adventure, and he travels in his bed.
very good! i like the narrative very much. i agree that the font has some problems, but it's a small part of a very good comic, a very smart comic. congratulations!
The coloring is cool, and I liked the panel with the action figures, but the story itself isn't doing too much for me, and I see that some of the art was used more than once. I guess my main problem is that interesting coloring is used to hide so-so art.
cute, and i like the effects on the art and coloring. font/lettering could use work but hey, whatev.
I like the rhyming scheme where it appears, and am disappointed that it isn't more consistent throughout. As I was reading, I was trying to force your words into a rhythm that sometimes just wasn't there, and that diminished my enjoyment of your submission. Good luck though, I'm always pulling for the fairy tales.
screen three is pretty cool, and you have a fabulous mini-pic (the bear from screen eight)--I love that this is aimed at kids!
I think this is a fine concept - I don't think it has much of a focus though and I think that might be the issue. It is very random in its images, which is fine but it makes it harder to follow and it takes you out of the story. Neat idea but I think it needs some focus.
I think this is a fine concept - I don't think it has much of a focus though and I think that might be the issue. It is very random in its images, which is fine but it makes it harder to follow and it takes you out of the story. Neat idea but I think it needs some focus.
I think this is a fine concept - I don't think it has much of a focus though and I think that might be the issue. It is very random in its images, which is fine but it makes it harder to follow and it takes you out of the story. Neat idea but I think it needs some focus.
This is a bit visually disjointed for me. There are times when I think the art looks good and times when I don't. It would be a fun children's book, I think but there needs to be some work on the text (aside from the Comic Sans issue which seems to irk everyone). The rhyming wasn't cohesive to me- it seemed almost ambivalent. On the subject of typos: figurers
This is what nightmares are made of! haha. Love it!
I like that it reads like a childrens story, but I have to concur with a couple other people about the font choice. I also agree that it doesn't always flow well from one page to another. Another criticism I have is that very little happens on a page. It feels more like someone telling a story than allowing us to be immersed in the story. I think if this was presented a little more like a children's book it would do very well. But as it is, I agree that the execution is very much killing alot of the potential it had to be a solid draw
I thought this was pretty well thought out. It would be like Toy Story meets Little Nemo in Slumberland, except it's own "beast". It's a little too cutesy for me, but for kid me it has outstanding potential. Everyone seems to not like your font but i thought it gave the story personality.
I agree with Caanan and Grifter. It's a very awesome idea, but given the format, a book might work better than a weekly-updated strip.
I keep singing Rock-a-bye-a-bear by The Wiggles every time I see that teddy on the main page.
mmmmm, the idea and the writing are quite average....
the graphics are a bit more interesting
I liked the Dust Bunnies too.
well the whole design and concept is more children's book style than comic book style. Which is why the font so so big and "blocky simple" it's geared so a young child could easily see and read, This is also why the art is simple or basic as well as in areas repeats. I realize it seems like a cop out to say I meant to make this way(basic and big) but that was my goal all along.
I honestly think you should take this and make a children's book with it, not a webcomic. It's got some cute ideas. The rhyming caught me off-guard because the story didn't start that way and all of a sudden it went into it.
Well this is the first comic that I read for this competition, I hope you the best luck with the Teddy beard quest :)
I don't disagree with your thoughts on the fonts and positioning Rob. If you were going for something that would work on a cell or something this would work. I think my point was more to the actual font tops and bottoms being cut off in certain places. That distracted me for some reason.
I'm just reading the synopsis and already I have to point this out:
The contraction for it is = it's (you use the apostrophe)
I know that will be read as bitchy, but it's just a thing I have with someone submitting professional work.
haven't heard from the creator on this yet, so it's just supposition on my part, but I and some other creators I know have been playing around a lot with iPhone formatting for awhile. This font size and style, not one of my personal favorites mind you, is one of the types people have suggested for readability on handhelds.
I don't know if this was a clear decision on this artists part, but we may start seeing it on Zuda submissions in the future. It's something worth considering.
-Rob
Neat idea. Not so sure about the execution. There is some pretty neat design going on in places, though Troy makes some good points. There is something up with the text being cut off at the bottom in places, and the re-using of art. I like the rhyming. It is a little clunky in some places, but works well in others. When you have rhyming text sitting alongside art of what it's actually describing, though, it comes out less like a comic, and more like a kid's story book. However, I realise that's probably the style you were going for, so it ain't a bad thing at all.
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Dust bunnies, though. Ha ha! Now that's a keeper... ;o)
I agree with troylbowen in that the font is really bad, and the size of it is overwhelming. It distracts from, instead of compliments, the artwork. The other thing I found jarring was the disjointed styles throughout the comic. I understand that there are different mixes of toys, but the style of the art itself was mixed, from simple negative line art to more developed shaded work. In general I thought it was a good effort - the idea, something really fun, and I do like the variation in your line weights and textures - this was a nice touch throughout. Not sure if this one gets my vote yet.
The text on this really bothered me. The look of it that is. It looks clipped in places and looks like it was placed as an afterthought. The overall story is ok but I would have liked to have seen more of the story by page eight. The art is heavily re-used throughout the story. The pictures of the teddy and some of the others look really nice (if basic) but they are overwhelmed in my opinion by the stock backgrounds and figures. Those are my initial thoughts. I might have more later.