I was just wondering about this as i was drawing. Personally i like sexy, there's a mystery to it. Once you get to see everything, i find that it becomes an entirely different thing. No magic, no mystery. Unless its done in a way that appeals to you.

What do you think?

first SEXY then SEX
then video games

Depends on the story's formula and what/how it offers I would suppose.

Though mostly sexy. I also guess it depends on your definition of Sex and Sexy =p
Sex = just nudity or the whole boom shacka lacka?

If the comic is going to show the whole act it might as well just be a porno comic. I guess there's an exception to this rule each time though. I read a 3d comic on here long ago that showed the act itself and was pretty pornographic at times. Yet the whole thing was written in a manner that made me think it was an extension of the Friday movies. It was really good and the pron actually seemed to fit.

But that's the only comic I found so far that has a decent balance.

Not that I wouldn't mind seeing more of Hocusha :3 But for your comic I think the shower scene you had showed as much as should be shown. Well, maybe you can find a way to sneak bare backside in sometime XD

Personally, i really like Bouncing Orbs of Beauty. There's sex in it but there's also great development of characters. It's not porno for porno's sake (Introduce scenario e.g Pizza delivery, corny banter between characters and let's get to business)

Sexy wise, that shower scene was kinda risque for Hocusha but i had it in to foreshadow the chapter's theme.

Now, bare bottom. Hmm…

It might just be me. BOOB is good, but it doesn't make me think about it's story =p

That's the trouble with balancing. One theme usually overshadows the other. At least with me. That's with fanservice as well. If it gets too overly blatant too often then it seems to become more fluff than substance.

Either that or I'm distracted way too easily by both to notice stories ;-)

Sexy. Aside from age restrictions and all sorts of loopholes about explicit sex that can make it a harder sell, the sex itself has to be sexy. My current comic is two or three pages into a sex scene, but I don't think I'd call it sexy. In my case, there's almost no fan service and even though I don't show anything explicit there isn't much air of mystery to it- no evocative titillation, just to the point facts. The sex is a piece of evidence for the plot's resolution, nothing more and nothing less. In other words, it won't sell :-p

You know what sells better than just plain sexy? Sexy that appeals to both genders. Hard to do, but well worth it.

Sexy can be tasteful, if done right but it can also look rather cheap. There are many ways to portray sexy atmosphere. It can even be subtle. A confident female character can look sexy even though she's not wearing anything revealing. Two characters can have a strong chemistry between them that makes people fawn over them even if they've never acted on their impulses.

Sex is just… sex. It's scenes of people doing the hanky panky. You can do PG version where the act is never shown or go full frontal nudity with hard core scenes.

There are people who will be drawn to one but not the other and some who will be drawn to both. There's no way of loosing really. I think you're guarantied readers as long as you do either well.

Sexy. Attraction is more personally interpretive and therefore, potentially exciting.

Sex is, eh, too mechanical sometimes.

Sex isn't always sexy. Sex can be funny. Not actually showing (or suggesting) the act, but the whole innuendo and double entendre thing – any jokes about it or people being clumsy and naked is what I find grabbing my attention.

Sexy isn't usually funny. I have not found myself drawn to any story, artwork, or product advertised through “sexy” – unless the sexy is broken by something silly.

So, to me, jokes about sex is what sells.

I also find naked people funny. I love to see PG renditions of naked people running around, censored by silly things.

(Sorry. Guess I'm not very sensual.)

Hmm… yeah. Sex probably work best with jokes. To name an example, we can point out the webcomic Least I Could Do. All the sex scenes are very PG where fornication usually happens off screen or under the covers.

Yeah. Sex and Humor. My favorite combo. Naughy fun.

Isn't it called ribaldry as well. Maybe i'm wrong here.

For me It's sexy that sells, look at commercials and movies. If you see a picture of an enlarged — then you might want to look away. It's just not that pretty, a completely nude woman loses some of her attraction. that same woman coverd up a bit makes it a lot more attractive.

think of nuns or streakers… I know which I like :nervous:

The number of people who enjoy looking at “sexy” is much greater than the number of people who enjoy looking at “sex”.

“Sexy” is like waiting for the meal to be ready to eat, listening to the sounds in the kitchen, smelling the smells of the cooking, admiring the table setting and the presentation of the food.

But “sex” is like watching the food go into somebody's mouth and get chewed up by their teeth while their saliva gland squirts spit on it and their big pink tongue pushes the mush down their throat.

Lookis
But “sex” is like watching the food go into somebody's mouth and get chewed up by their teeth while their saliva gland squirts spit on it and their big pink tongue pushes the mush down their throat

That's disgusting…
seriously, nightmare material…

but yes I agree.

It definitely depends on the genre, and your audience, and really just what you're aiming for. With a story like Hokusha, I don't think it would ever be a good idea to show full nudity, at least with your protagonist. The sex element for a comic like that is supposed to be a tease. Keep your readers drooling, but never feed them, even if crazed fan boys hound you for months. Because once you feed them, they're no longer hungry.

I think, as said, it depends on the audience you're aiming for, and also on what you want out of the comic. There's definitely a market for both. I think if you're doing shorter, one-shot type comics, say 10-20 pages, sex sells better. You're creating for guys with ‘special needs’ as they say :-) The 10 thousand or so hentai doujin created every year are obviously tapping into a very popular market. On the other hand, sex would probably ruin a several hundred page comic since you have so much more going on, and sex scenes usually close doors instead of opening the story up.

I enjoy reading both, just depending on my mood, though I do prefer nude scenes even in ‘sexy’ comics… I feel a little cheated if I can't at least see ‘the goods’ occasionally :-) Teasing is fine up to a point… but too much teasing without any reward will drive away readers in frustration. I prefer manga and there are literally hundreds of manga that are sexy, with nudity, but not crossing too far over the line, and still keep their fun or romantic qualities.

Personally, sexy is better.
Simply because it leaves a little to the imagination.
Or, as we might think, if you see a really hot boy/girl, rather than have everything done for you in the comic, you get to use your imagination and picture yourself with them instead :D
In the end, it's down to personal preference, but I rest my case.
The cat gal in my avatar is an example of my preference and is in my new comic
(SHAMELESS PLUGGING)

Hahahahahaha! This is a funny thread. ^___^

It really depends on the audience. In my comic, Pinky TA, The characters are clothed, and even when they aren't you can't see anything. The female bodies tend to be very curvy with nicely rounded bottoms. Now to some people that is “sexy”, to some it's just surface, after they're used to it they ignore it, and to others it is pure sex- in the sexual physically turned-on sort of way. And to still others it's very gross. :D

It mostly depends on the audience, not just what you show them, but how they “read” it.

When i was in my teens, I had a friend who said that people getting turned on by comic characters(or anything drawn) are demented.

I used to think he was right. Then i found out about an entire industry churning out drawn pornography in Japan called hentai.

I felt alot better.

Sexy. You can't have sex without sexy. A lot of stories can have sex but usually it's pointless and has no…well point to the story. *cough*hentai*cough*. Anyway, with sexy you can lead your readers to fantasies, I mean without fantasy's we wouldn't have 4chan and Rule35 which is basically just sex.

Yes..I have gotten into everybody's head lol.

Vig Starmax
When i was in my teens, I had a friend who said that people getting turned on by comic characters(or anything drawn) are demented.

Yeah, your friend was just ignorant. Same with people who say things like “wah, people get turned on by video game characters? They're just pixels!”.
That's a sort of primitive literalism, more at home in something like a dog, rat, mouse or monkey etc that doesn't have a sophisticated for of visual communication and symbolic vocabulary. Those forms of visual communication and the reactions to them are extremely basic and fundamental in our culture as human beings, to deny that is either cretinous or adolescent contrary foolishness. ;)

GameCargo
A lot of stories can have sex but usually it's pointless and has no…well point to the story. *cough*hentai*cough*.

Some stories are like that, but that's because they want to get right in on the “action”, because that's what the audience for those particular stories want as well.
Other forms of porn have quite elaborate stories because that's what their audiences want. I don't think either is less “sexy”… it just depends on the audience. I think the “sexy” part comes from getting you turned on, no matter how explicit (or not) the stuff is. For example, I could get turned on by a well drawn hardcore hentai, but I wouldn't find the same sex scenes very interesting if they were done in the cold medical, scientific way they depict people and bodily functions in a medical text book for example.

But that's just my take on it. :)

ozoneocean

Vig Starmax
When i was in my teens, I had a friend who said that people getting turned on by comic characters(or anything drawn) are demented.

Yeah, your friend was just ignorant. Same with people who say things like “wah, people get turned on by video game characters? They're just pixels!”.
That's a sort of primitive literalism, more at home in something like a dog, rat, mouse or monkey etc that doesn't have a sophisticated for of visual communication and symbolic vocabulary. Those forms of visual communication and the reactions to them are extremely basic and fundamental in our culture as human beings, to deny that is either cretinous or adolescent contrary foolishness. ;)

I think I see where his friend and similarly minded people are coming from. It's probably the fact that drawn character (and computer characters as well) are figments of our imagination and not real in the literal sense. Therefore the idea of being attracted to something that doesn't exist may sound to them like a utterly futile and pointless thing. At least, when it comes to photographic pornography, model magazines and hot movie stars, the people in those forms of medium do actually exist, thus edging the possibility of an actual physical contact slightly towards achievable levels, regardless of how marginally small of a chance that may be.

Product Placement
I think I see where his friend and similarly minded people are coming from. It's probably the fact that drawn character (and computer characters as well) are figments of our imagination and not real in the literal sense. Therefore the idea of being attracted to something that doesn't exist may sound to them like a utterly futile and pointless thing. At least, when it comes to photographic pornography, model magazines and hot movie stars, the people in those forms of medium do actually exist, thus edging the possibility of an actual physical contact slightly towards achievable levels, regardless of how marginally small of a chance that may be.

That's where they're coming from but it's inane.
It is childish literalism.

The fact is that as human beings we DO communicate through visual media, both our brains AND our bodies respond in certain ways to certain imagery, no matter what some adolescent neophyte attempting intellectualism would like to think. Those “demented” would be the ones who evince no reaction, indeed I would go so far as to call them functionally abnormal or at the very least mentally of socially underdeveloped. :(

Equally as bad as those who manifest an abnormal obsession with a video game character, celebrity model, tv personality, cartoon character or whatever. It's the other extreme sure, but it's part of the same problem of not understanding the role that those forms of visual media and communication have within society.
:)

This reminds me of a story I read once about some anthropologists who were showing photographs to a recently discovered tribe and the natives didn't get it. They didn't understand what the photographs were. They didn't understand that photographs were small 2D representations of what the eye sees. To the natives the photos were just flat objects with bright colors on them.

I think they learned fairly quickly what photos were, but when they first saw them they had no concept in their head to appreciate them.

And that reminds me of how kittens first encountering a mirror go crazy, but they eventually learn what a mirror is.

Cats watching birds on TV and trying to catch them?

Birds flying into the side of glass buildings that reflect the sky?

Man has introduced all sorts of artificial imagery into the biosystem.

I don't think it's the sexy drawing that we find arousing. It's our imagination creating fantasies based on the sexy drawinge that arouses us. It happens so quickly we attribute it to the drawing.

But someone with no imagination probably would find it very odd that anyone could get aroused by a drawing, because he needs the smell, touch, sound, and sight of the real thing to get aroused. He doesn't have any fantasy arousal, just direct biological arousal.

Hah, not from what I've read, heard and seen. The old thing about various tribal people thinking the camera was steeling their souls if it took photos comes from real encounters with peoples who hadn't seen cameras before. They had no trouble recognising themselves and other people in the photos and film and in fact thought the people in there were real.

As for cats, dogs and mirrors etc- they can't recognise themselves, according to all the studies I've read. And when they chase things on screen it tends to be for the movement, nothing else.

It's a case of people finding sexy pictures in men's mag arousing rather than sexily drawn pictures arousing.

Even if they are aroused by sexy drawings, it depends on the art style.

ozoneocean
Hah, not from what I've read, heard and seen. The old thing about various tribal people thinking the camera was steeling their souls if it took photos comes from real encounters with peoples who hadn't seen cameras before. They had no trouble recognising themselves and other people in the photos and film and in fact thought the people in there were real.

I doubt that would be a universal response of everyone who'd encounter a camera for a first time. Some old cultures believed in sympathy magic where you could affect people by creating a shrine or a statue in their image. That's what woodoo magic is based on. Someone with similar beliefs could easily make the assumption that a photograph could greatly affect a person or that it possibly steals his soul. However, not every culture shared such a belief.

When we've never encountered something before and have no comparable experience to draw from, it can be hard for us to realize what we're looking at. There's this old story where this native American wise man was informed of strange sightings around the ocean. He was told that the clouds could sometime be seen moving in strange way around the horizon. Curious the wise man traveled to the beach and spent few days down there trying to spot these strange clouds. Eventually he found one of these clouds and after careful observation he came to realize that they were some sort of large boats. The people who reported their sightings to the wise man had witnessed European exploration ships but since they had never seen a boat with large sails before or anything similar, they had no idea how to interpret what they were seeing.

I can easily fathom the idea that a man who has never encountered a photo or a mirror (apart from seeing reflection from a body of water) who might need to think for a minute before realizing what he was looking at.

There's a ocean of difference between the human form and the sails of a ship :)
Man knows man, there's no difficulty there at all. Maybe a few minutes hesitation as you say, but that's all.
———-
Voodoo is a mixture of Christianity and the original African religions imported over to Haiti when the slave peoples were shipped there.

ozoneocean
Voodoo is a mixture of Christianity and the original African religions imported over to Haiti when the slave peoples were shipped there.

It's still based on the idea of sympathy magic, regardless of how it was formed.