/ Comic Crit - Cottonfluff Hollow /
I may have to commit to twice a week if this keeps up. Not complaining, but the backlog is almost half-a-year-long, or will be. I don’t have any real problem with that, but it’s fucked up to skimp on proper research just to bump the turnover. I’ll work with it.
One a week or more. Both halves of that statement being important.
Here’s the list of those requesting reviews who are waiting, and some personal picks to pick through. It’s linked on the nav bar, and will be edited as I go.
Roomies gave me a link the other day, which not only makes this blog more visible, but made their review more visible. I encourage that for obvious, symbiotic reasons–but heaven forbid I get on a combo-count of positive critiques.
That being said:
Here we go – Cottonfluff Hollow.
Oh, ye gods, Cottonfluff Hollow. The name itself invokes my ire, to which on the very first page I am presented a teddy bear with an eye patch named Cuddles.
And I puff my cheeks. My forehead develops deep furrows. And I read.
Self-described as angst-ridden, these are the forgotten/abandoned friends of our youth. Toys. It’s not a common take on imaginary friends, our pre-adolescent placeholders for future bonds and betrayals. Clever concept in itself. The execution?
Cartoony art, well defined, simple, shaded. Always colored, it’s easy on the eyes with soft tones even at its brightest. The story itself is rather slow moving, which makes me wonder how rapid the update schedule is. With as much depth and characterization they put into every strip, each one feels short. It makes me wish they’d abandon 4-panel and go hog-wild, which they occasionally do. Mark enough of good plot that I’d actually care.
Not often funny, it’s always cute, the pancake breakfast showdown being a notable brain-fuck in how much adorable I can take. As Cuddles embarks on a quest to find his place in the forgotten world there’s more philosophical banter and development about what it means to be left behind by reality. Simple stuff that goes deep. An easy parallel to life after death along with a metaphor for any abandoned friendship.
The webdesign is cluttered crap, but at least it fits 800×600 (not that I use it). I’d feel a lot better about it if it were more organized beyond cons and pimping their other projects. If I’m reading Cotton-fucking-fluff Hollow, I want to know more about Cotton-fucking-fluff Hollow, not where the artists will be and the other shit they’ve done. Hook me up with some link-buttons, cast, wallpaperz, and a clear chain of command with CH’s blog-links. If this stuff exists on the site, it’s not inviting, and I’m not about to play hide-n-seek for Easter eggs.
This is an easy sell because it’s good. I’d just like better site presentation with a clear release schedule. Convince me your invested enough in the project to go con’ing and sell t-shirts. With Diesel Sweeties there’s not a doubt in my mind, and not just because it’s familiar presentation.
5 Comments so far
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I followed you here from Miss Snark. I made a huge snort when I read your comment and just had to tell you right on!
It’s the writing stupid! (to paraphrase bill clinton. So many writers obsessing about font, size, paper, widows…
How about the premise?
Or those pesky little wtf’s?
Anyhoo neither my agent nor my editor have ever taken me to task on any of this…I must admit it was fun to comment in a furious debate over chapter length.
Too funny.
By Patricia Wood on 02.08.07 10:00 pm
“…I’d just like better site presentation with a clear release schedule. Convince me your invested enough in the project to go con’ing and sell t-shirts. …”
“I’d feel a lot better about it [the site] if it were more organized beyond cons and pimping their other projects. … [Aarin is] not [interested in] where the artists will be and the other shit they’ve done.”
Apparently you can’t have your cake or eat it, because…
Where will we be? At a con.
What will we be doing? Selling T-shirts.
Or did you mean that we aren’t committed enough to be “qualified” to go to a convention?
I mean, there has been (and will be for awhile) a lot of site issues. If you’d like to see wallpaper, LJ icons or whathaveyou, hey, that can happen- as soon as I get the time to make it.
The comic updates 1x/week, and is only 4 panels because I don’t have the time to do any more than that.
If you’d like to see more CFH, get everyone you know to link 15 people to it, and read it regularly, so I can actually start making money off of it, and hire a web technician to rebuild the site, because this isn’t my only job.
(This is the same thing that I tell everyone else who complains about the “lack” of updates.)
Thanks for reading, and I do appreciate the review. I think that you liked it, assuming that the cuteness wasn’t too much for you.
-C
By cottonfluff on 03.05.07 5:52 pm
[If you’d like to see more CFH, get everyone you know to link 15 people to it, and read it regularly, so I can actually start making money off of it, and hire a web technician to rebuild the site, because this isn’t my only job.]
I think 95% of webcomic creators can say this. I’ll never argue with ‘this is the best we can do’ but understand that the appearance of selling stuff without any apparent devotion to a project comes off wrong.
I’m not talking about wallpapers and icons, I’m talking about a clear presence on the comic site itself–easy-to-find news and blog-links about CFH, character pages, author bio–some indication the author is invested in the project on a personal level.
Your web-presence feels detatched from the work. Is this about money? I hoped it wasn’t. Show me on the website that you, as a creator, are enthusiastic about CFH for the story itself. Then, I’ll feel enthusiastic.
By Aarin on 03.05.07 6:59 pm
If it were about money, there are more lucrative internet things that I could be doing than a webcomic; I’d just do porn. Money is an object; but it’s a means to an end as opposed to the purpose of this endeavor.
I’m not entirely sure that the displays of enthusiasm that you’re talking about are all that indicative of being behind the story or not; personally, when I read a comic, I ignore the blog postings, and just read the comic, because that’s what I’m interested in.
Even for my own comic’s livejournal, I don’t have much to say a lot of the time, because I’m not sure that I have anything that’s really worth taking the time to read that has to do with the comic. Chatter isn’t enthusiasm, in my opinion, and I feel that that’s all that I would really be doing a lot of the time.
The other accoutrements (FAQ, cast page, etc,) are in the works, and I’ve wanted to have them for awhile, and just never completed them. I had grand schemes in place for them, but a strange combination of laziness, overwork, and je ne sais quoi prevented me from implementing them.
I do appreciate your points though; the site needs to be redone, and more importantly, organized.
Believe it or not; I’ve been saying this to the others I work with for about a year, but there always seemed to be something else that needed doing.
So will there be more peripheral stuff? Yes. Will it be indicative of the fact that I think about the World of CottonFluff Hollow as often as I am able? Possibly.
And that’s the best I can tell you right now.
By cottonfluff on 03.22.07 2:40 pm
Thank you for the thoughtful response and taking the time to address my opinions. I’m not trying to be argumentative when I say words like those in an LJ/blog or FAQ would squelch the concerns of people like me before we had the chance to truly consider them. That’s what I mean about the value of accessible web-presence/personality.
I’m really not trying to bust your balls here, I’m just giving an individual account of one member of your audience. Remember, I actually did like CFH and wish you the best.
By Aarin on 03.22.07 5:28 pm
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