American Elf

"American Elf" by James Kochalka are a series of semi-autobiographical comics; they usually contain four panels, and he attempts to create one every day of the year. He takes the persona of an elf, and often represents his friends as animals or mythical creatures also (such as a vampire, a half-fish lady, or a dog).

Here are a selection of his comics from his compilation book, "American Elf: Book Two":

Here is my own doodle of American Elf:

 

This is a drawing of myself in the style of American Elf (as: British Imp):

 

Here is my own comic in the style of "American Elf", drawn by hand with India Ink, then scanned and coloured in Photoshop:

Evaluation

My 4-panel comic strip "Thirsty" was greatly influenced by "American Elf" artist, James Kochalka.  Both the semi-autobiographical nature of his comics and his simplistic, pen-straight-to-paper art style can be recognised in my "American Elf" inspired comic.  I studied a selection of his work before I made "Thirsty" to get an idea of the kinds of topics he chooses for his comics, and doodled the main character to get a feel for his style.  Although already aware of how his style was simple, I was still surprised about how few details he includes in his character designs in order to make them as abstract and quick and easy to redraw as possible, and yet is still able to retain such unique, recognisable characters.  


Although I originally drew an imp-version of myself (as Kochalka draws himself as an elf) in very much the "American Elf" art style, I did draw in a style a little closer to my own for the final comic.  When creating the comic, I tried to choose a silly and relatable subject matter just as Kochalka does, and used an India Ink pen to recreate the same kind of line quality that his comic has.  Then I scanned the comic in, in pure black and white, and coloured it in Photoshop.  After studying Kochalka's comics, I noted that within individual comics the colours he uses tend to keep to a scheme of about two or three colours.  I was not used to keeping to such a small range of colours but found that doing so made the final product look consistant and visually appealing.  I also realised that he colours his lineart in a colour that contrasts with his chosen colour scheme, so I did the same.  


Although I felt I could have arranged the placing of my text better, I feel pleased with the result and feel I learned a lot from studying and emulating Kochalka's work, particularly about using Photoshop, colour schemes, and simplicity effectively.