Episode 422 - Positive promotion and controversial characters
Apr 15, 2019
The entire gang comes together today for two topics that were taken from recent newsposts: Emma Clare's Positive self promotion, and Tantz Aerine's Handling Controversial Characters. First up we chat about why it's always a great idea to sell yourself positively, NOT be arrogant or douchey, but rather by talking enthusiastically about what you genuinely love about your work and using that REAL and SINCERE enthusiasm to infect others with your love of what you do. Emma was mainly talking about the way you introduce your comics to friends and family but it definitely applies more broadly to self promotion in general: Don't try and get sympathy through self depreciation (oh, it's not very good…), and don't be an arrogant ass (My stuff is AWESOME!), rather you should just be honest about what you love about it (This story was so FUN to write!).
Topics and Show Notes
There are exceptions. “READ HARKOVAST” become a great catchphrase for the author of that comic ;)
Next up we talk about Tantz's subject of handling controversial characters: Real controversial characters and established characters in fiction that have very different interpretations and views about them can be tricky to use in fiction. WHICH of the popular interpretations do you choose? - The one that says they were an insane dictator or the one that says they're a hero of their people? Whichever you do you'll have audience members who're angry about it in some way. Examples are characters like Jesus (comics linked bellow), and Mother Theresa. Jesus obviously means a lot of things to different people, there's around about 2000 years of culture focussed on him and people during the time he was meant to have lived would have regarded him very differently to the later worshippers. Mother Theresa during her lifetime was almost universally regarded as a living saint, her name was common shorthand for being extremely caring. After her death opinions changed and fractured desperately. To many she was either a monster, a scheming witch, or a stupid naive backwards woman who was used as a promotional tool. Which approach do you as a writer take?
This week Gunwallace has given us the theme to Tusk. Fast tribal beat that makes you want to shake your hips, stamp your feet, wiggle, twitch, and vibrate all over! A nice, stompy, vibrating rhythm booms into the centre and slows things down for a change of pace. This is the ultimate dance track. Get hot, sweaty and show off your crazy moves as best you can. Put the other dancers to shame!
Topics and shownotes
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Featured comic:
Breached - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2019/apr/09/featured-comic-breached/
Featured music:
Tusk - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Tusk/, by Fallopiancrusader, rated T.
LINKS
Positive promotion newspost by Emma Clare - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2019/mar/30/talking-about-your-comic-to-others-and-why-you-should/
Controversial characters newspost by Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2019/apr/12/handling-controversial-historical-characters/
READ HARKOVAST - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Harkovast/
Holy Bible the Albino Ginger version - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com /Holy_Bible_the_Albino_Ginger_version/
Jesus 2016 - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Jesus_2016/
Look who's back (movie) - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4176826/
Special thanks to:
Gunwallace - http://www.virtuallycomics.com
Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/banes
Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Tantz_Aerine/
Pit Face - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/PIT_FACE/
Ozoneocean - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/ozoneocean
kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei/
Episode 372 - Marvel heroes and an infinity war against greyness
Apr 30, 2018
In this Quackcast we use the movie Avengers: Infinity War as an excuse to chat about grey characters and how that applies in the Marvel universe. In truth we don't touch much on that movie but we do chat about a few of the other marvel superhero movies and “grey” characters in general, Tantz is of the opinion that “grey” characters are rarely truly grey.. My favourite quote from Tantz was “It's hard to punch the bad-guy while you're punching yourself”. Do the Marvel movies follow the comics or do the comics follow the movies? We'd love to know! This week Gunwallace has given us the theme to Alienated: This is as if Joni Mitchell wrote a classical adventure anthem. This tune urges you on into the vastness and glory of nature. You are Caspar David Friedrich, A Wanderer Over A sea Of Fog, with the world in all its awesomeness spread out far below you.
Episode 356 - Readers
Jan 7, 2018
READERS are a massive part of Drunk Duck! Actually readers are a huge part of ANY comic. But Drunk Duck tends to focus far more on creators than perhaps we should… This idea was inspired by a newspost of Tantz's. We talk about ways to make DD more accessible to readers, including highlighting comics in similar genres and guest representatives giving us recommendation lists of comics they like from a genre so we can promote them on the front page. Emma_Clare has done some GREAT mockups for a redesign of DD and in those is an example of the DD front page where we highlight comics by genre! We chat about comic listing sites like Comic Rocket, Top Webcomics and the brand new Archive Binge, along with other various topics like who are the best hosts for adult comics, cross promotion etc. This week Gunwallce has given us the theme to Blood and water: Cool, quiet, and creepy. This one will have you on edge from start to finish. There’s an undertone of cool nonchalance that’s surprisingly at odds with the on-edge feel! Please donate to our our Indiegogo drive to raise many for the latest improvement to DD: Comment notifications! We know that everyone wants those.
Episode 326 - changing our look
Jun 4, 2017
In this Quackcast Tantz Aerine, Banes, Pitface, and I (Ozoneocean) discuss the changes that we'd like to do to the look of Drunk Duck! Contribute designs here: - http://www.theduckwebcomics.com/forum/topic/177679/ We want YOU to help us come up with different design concepts for ALL sections of drunk Duck, not just the front page. It has to look good, be modern, be usable, fit within the broad theme of drunk duck (colours, style etc), and the design has to be adaptable to different screen sizes. And that's what we chat about here, rather than functional changes and new features, which are something ELSE and will cost extra. As soon as we HAVE our new designs then we can get a quote and raise money to have them applied to the site! So the sooner we come up with some new designs the sooner we can get this stuff happening!
Episode 324 - The *Bleeping*cast!
May 22, 2017
In this Quackcast we discuss the interesting notion that censorship can actually be a positive force for creation. Sometimes working WITHIN restrictions of censorship can make you more creative and your work a lot more individual, special and more interesting. I came to this subject after reading a review of how Canadian standards forced very specific and particular changes on the TV show Reboot. Had it been made without the censorship restrictions then it would have been more of a generic show, because the methods they had to use to get around or appease the censors helped to differentiate it from similar children's shows. We also discuss how metaphor in song lyrics and symbolism in art and movies are used to talk about restricted subjects like sex, drugs, politics, and religion and how this is another example of how censorship has given rise to interesting creations. Great examples of obvious coded messages about sex are the song lyrics of AC/DC, Led Zeppelin. We also talk about howl ove songs with secret political messages were used in Greece to foment political revolution. And lastly we mention Heintai and ecchi in Japanese comics and anime and the Drunkduck ratings standards. The music for this week by Gunwallace is for Silly Sweetie, it's a dreamlike tour through clouds and wide heavenly vistas, this in turn leaves you feeling warm and refreshed!
Episode 318 - Maintaining enthusiasm!
Apr 10, 2017
The most important thing when doing your comic is to maintain your enthusiasm- THIS is what helps you keep working, not feedback, not praise, not fans, but your own internal passion. Feedback is great, but you can become addicted to it and when it's not there or there's not enough of it your work can die. In order to be able to keep creating your passion for your work should be internal, not external, you need to be self sustaining: A readership is nice and feedback is great, but you really have to do your comic for yourself, not for other people. But there's more to it than that. Bored by doing your webcomic? Why is that? What do you need to change to make it interesting to do once more? What is holding you back? Those are some of the things we talk about in this Quackcast! The music for this week by Gunwallace is for the previously featured comic Numb. This is the sound of a long road trip under the burning sun in the hot, dry, dusty, desert air, and on into a cold night through a desolate city lit by retreating streetlights. Progression, but where to?
Episode 297 - fandoms
Nov 14, 2016
In this Quackcast we tackle the topic of fandom. Fandoms can be interesting, fun, helpful, fascinating, inspiring, or even bizarre and disturbing. Fandoms are frequently great resources for information about their subject and can really enrich your experience of whatever you're into. Fandoms are also a hotbed of creative energy- some of our most iconic literature was written by people who started out as ardent fans- even the great H.P. Lovecraft was part of a fandom of Gothic horror fiction along with fellow writers Robert Bloch, Clark Ashton Smith, and Robert E. Howard. These highly influential writers were influenced by such greats as Arthur Machen, Robert W. Chambers, Edgar Allen Poe, and Lord Dunsany to name a few. And of course Lovecraft and his group went to to influence legions of fans who changed the face of 20th century pop culture. Looking at fandoms gives a cultural roadmap so we can follow influences, where ideas originated, how they changed, how pop-culture was created, and more importantly: they give us great clues about what other stuff we might like to read! No music this week I'm afraid. Mr Gunwallace is dealing with the fallout from a huge earthquake in his native New Zealand.
Episode 254 - Sexism in your OWN work?k
Jan 18, 2016
OMFG you sexist PIG! Heh… today we talk about trying to recognise sexism in your OWN work, what to do about it, and WHY. It turns out it can be very hard to do, and if you DO acknowledged it the instinct is to rationalise it away, justify it, or just try and brazen it out in some kind of old fashioned, largely embarrassing, display. I frequently do all three. How do we spot it? Well the Bechdel test isn't that useful, that's better for looking at broad trends not giving specific works a pass/fail - sexy outfits is one thing, if females are dressed minimally or in tight gear in CONTRAST to the males or vice versa - females ONLY having old stereotype roles (maiden/mother/whore archetypes, secretary, nurse, victim, maid etc), though this is context sensitive, i.e. it's more forgiveable if you're doing a historical story or something stylised like a fairytale or a noire story - Gender balance is another thing, it's context sensitive because certain stories will naturally have more of one gender (WW2 submarine crew, Girl's school, a prison story etc), and you don't have to have an exact balance anyway but it's definitely something to THINK about because there is no reason most stories should feature a majority of male characters and a minority of females. WHY should you think about it? Why should you care? Well the audience for almost ALL types of stories, be they action adventure, romance, Scifi, fantasy, historical, even porn, is getting close to 50/50 between men and women these days (maybe it always was?), it really doesn't make sense to alienate or belittle half your audience just because you like to cling to older ways of doing stuff. Gunwallace's theme this week reminds me of a cross between the Knightrider theme and Gunship- it's VERY retro-future. It's the theme to DDSR, a comic with cool custom “sprites”, AKA pixel-art.
