Shamine Athena King
A certain user on this website called DeviantART has been and still is mocked by people on Encyclopedia Dramatica’s forums. For the uninitiated, DeviantART is an art and image sharing website whereas Encyclopedia Dramatica deals with memes and profiles of users in a snarky way. ED began life as a community on LiveJournal dealing with such users but began to attract people outside of LiveJournal immediately after its inception around 8 to 9 years ago (practically a decade ago).
Shamine Athena King’s user name is Canadian Rainwater and the users on ED’s message board criticise her for having bad anatomy in her illustrations, bad way of writing and pacing stuff (they beat me to that but I learnt from them). A critique deals with the blond pirate known as Louis of her webcomic (and half-hearted short) called Honour Amongst Thieves. Louis in here is annoying and too much of a bad gay stereotype, some users say that he could’ve been more interesting as a female character given his appearance and characterisation.
DeviantART attracts a sort of mindset that doesn’t lend easily to being properly examined as an artist. Not that there are no good artists on DeviantART, Elfwood, Zerochan, 4chan or Sheezy Art but the lack of being able to actually critique the cartoonist’s skills readily lends itself to overreacting and stuff. Shamine King is a good artist in some places but when it comes to writing comics, all what she needs is a better writer and someone to help her out with her illustrations. Her sister has posted her take on Shamine’s characters, including pictures that depicts Louis in a more serious light. That Louis, despite his androgynous face, actually is shown to be an imposing figure with a gun pointing at you. The sort of depiction that seems closer to what Shamine could’ve done for him.
His flamboyant appearance might cover up a more serious, calculating personality. Louis could’ve been an excellent trader, ruthless sailor and plunderer. He could have used his flamboyant veer to impress people as he might lead to their nasty fates in battle or for other situations. But Shamine ended up turning him into a joke instead using his innocent appearance to veil a darker, smarter character. He could still work had he been written as a more calculating character underneath the makeup (literally and figuratively). On the other hand, the character of Louis resembles another pirate from a Nickelodeon cartoon involving pirates stealing underpants (or pants as I can freaking remember). It’s called “Those Scurvy Pirates” and it used to air on Nickelodeon some time ago. They look kind of similar: blond hair, pale skin, French stereotypes, skinny and blue jackets.
It could be coincidental or a sign that it unintentionally anticipated something else. That SAK could have seen it before on telly but with the two other characters, Santiago and James she admitted that two of them were based on existing characters from other cartoons. She’s something of an aspiring animator but her online profile shows her as being preoccupied with making comics. I have a feeling that she’s more interested in doing comics since she doesn’t do well in animation class (I think).
Shamine Athena King might be on her way to becoming a good animator and cartoonist but I think it’s best she should settle for something she enjoys doing or is good at as well as needing some inspiration to make herself into a better cartoonist (or animator). I won’t comment on her animating skills since I’ve written a couple of comics before (including a Power Puff Girls fan comic with a brother when I was younger) but when it comes to writing comics, she needs to do something about the panels, do some research and figure out a way to cut down on or pace the dialogue/speech balloons in the panels. While I’m not a fan of bright digital colours, I feel that when it comes to characters like Louis she needs to learn more anatomy to make his very skinny body work when it comes to movement and the like. Otherwise, she won’t improve as a cartoonist if she continues to write this way.
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