This week’s new Dustinland comic is about the steady devolution of my wardrobe during pandemic quarantine times. I do like the title quite a bit… in case you don’t get it right off the bat, the classic illustration of ape evolving into man is called “March of Progress” and it’s March, but the progress I’m talking about is not quite as positive. More like, progressing into extreme comfort yet ultra-laziness.
Additionally, the strip is in a bit of a different format than my usual downward scrollers, harkening back to the olden days of horizontal comics meant for the desktop. However, in this case, it’s more horizontal than ever before… one long image, scrolling left to right. I did this really to test what’s possible on mobile (sorry desktoppers). I’ve been looking at a lot of comic art lately and feeling a bit constrained by the tiny boxes we have to fit our art into these days in order to be seen, since most people are looking at everything on their tiny phones. So everything is a square. Content for squares. Which is fine. I like being read. And easy — just cut and paste a ton of square templates and go to town. But it certainly does limit storytelling. In some ways, it would be like telling a cinematographer you can only use one lens for an entire movie.
We’ll see how this works. If people enjoy it, maybe I’ll try a few more experiments in the coming weeks.
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