The DGmag in black and white? - The future that almost was...

Many of you DGmag followers will have no doubt by now figured out that I am indeed, a comic and zine creator and illustrator. My main childhood hobby from around 2004 has been making comics entitled DGmag which in short, stands for The Dominic and Ginger Magazine. That is of course what this website and it's brother website (thedgmag.weebly.com) is strictly based on. However, what many of you will not have realised by now, is the odd thing regarding the recent issue Down With School...

You see, my Instagram account (Dom’s Illustrations (@dominicdavis1995) • Instagram photos and videos) document down the thought process and behind the scenes of nearly each and every DGmag. There, you can see how the comic is structed and built, although I do post things that aren't DGmag themed there too, such as a Garfield parody entitled Tableclothfield. Sorry Jim Davis! I also post other humorous and interesting things there too, things like, Sonic Screwdriver concepts which I've built. (I do that in my spare time too.) But alas, the main thing my account does, it to show you my illustration work. And that means, behind the scenes of DGmag.

"So! What's so interesting and odd about this recent issue?" I hear you ask. Well, dear reader. Let me tell you. You see, it's to do with the cost crisis! As I like to print out the comic for the benefit of myself, family and friends, as well as events and shops, I need to keep an eye on how much it costs to print out a DGmag. Hint, if it's regularly then it's a lot! So, to keep the prices down, I pondered on the novel idea of having some strips run in black and white.

But that was just it you see. It wasn't the same. It just wasn't DGmag! DGmag's main routes run like that of The Beano and The Dandy. The Phoenix and Monster Fun! All these bright fun filled colour comics for children is exactly what DGmag is fundamentally supposed to feel like. A full brightly coloured read for the consumer! So, when you have some strips in black and white, you risk losing the reader's focus. Especially if this is a children's comic. And I feel that children might not take well to a comic is some strips are run in plain black and white. It could risk them finding it perhaps too weird, outdated or retro. Sure, retro is all well and good. But as DGmag is mainly an online read, it doesn't really need to be in black and white at all!

Perhaps, over time, the child readers might've warmed to some black and white strips, but I felt that if it was just as easy to make a strip in black and white in Procreate on my iPad Pro, then why not? Why not just keep that colour? But I know what you're thinking dear follower, "What DID, those strips look like without colour?" Well, ponder no more. Because it was only for two of the strips. Mainly Bad Babies and Jone the Bouncy Ball.

Bad Babies would be run in pure black and white, while Jone the Bouncy Ball had some colour added. Still, let's see what the strips would've looked like. Roll the strips...

Ok. Ok. So quite a drastic change to what DGmag is used to. But still, it could've worked. Who's to say it couldn't have? But this is a strip about babies! It's also a kid's comic strip for goodness sake! So, let's add in, that glorious colour!

Ah, yes! Much better!! For a comic strip about babies, you need those colours that a baby would be associated with. Calm blues, oranges, pinks. All colours which otherwise would've been completely and utterly wiped out from DGmag. Also, look at Max's angry rosey cheeks! What a laugh! And that would be no fun for anyone without the colour. Still, notice that the strip's dialogue and drawings were untouched. I wanted the strip to still work even if their wasn't really any colour, hence why the text boxes were black with yellow emphasised text, instead of the white boxes with red emphasised text.

With that in mind, let's look at Jone's strip. With red boxes and yellow emphasised text...

What's surprising here, is that the background colour would be white, but the rest of the colour would remain. This is because I wanted the idea of white being used where possible to cut down on those printer inks. This felt like a good choice to go with. Only, well, again, if it's an online comic mainly, then why bother removing colour in the first place? With that in mind, let's see the final published version...

Oh yes! A lot better! And now we can see that calm purple wallpaper too!

In conclusion, while it's nice that we can now look at what could've been, it's probably better that we got the full colour strips as normal. Because at the end of the day, again, this is a full colour online read. So, the audience can enjoy their normal read, in all the glorious DGmag full colour glory. Besides, what harm is the occasional DGmag print out now and then really doing? I do it for friends and family if not for myself. And also, I'll always be able to show off my work to anyone if need be. And as The Dandy once said, "Always keep a Dandy handy!" And that's actually, not to dissimilar to DGmag in my world!