Mjau! in Portuguese magazine Banzai

Yay!
This is the first time Mjau! is published in another language, but hopefully not the last.
I have tried to get it into the Nordic countries, but no luck so far.

In the coming year, my plan is to get the manga to the international market, and try to get it published in more and more countries. The contracts with NCreatues in Portugal is a big first step though, as they take care of the whole Portuguese speaking part of the work, like Brasil and a lot of African countries, trying to get third party publishers there to take it in. That would be crazy good!


The reason to my long delay of updates here is because I have been working hard on finishing Hooked On You, my short story manga for the next Nosebleed Studio anthology. And I did it this week, now doing the last stuff for the book and helping out getting it ready for print. It will be awesome!
More info here soon, I promise!

Until then, here's a chibi-mermaid from the manga, it's the main character Mina:

My first babysteps in Japan's Manga industry

Time have flewn by and I have, thanks to by fellow artist friend Åsa Ekström recieved some early photos from Ribbons February issue.

Åsa is in Tokyo studying Japanese and working on the third book of her manga Sayonara September that will be published in Sweden next year (so looking forward to it!!). Check out her blog! (it's in my bloglist)

Here's the pictures:





Oh My God!!! This is so unbelivable!!
Wow, I'm amazed over the fact that I made it to these pages. I have had a subscription for Ribbon since 2010 and checking these pages in every issue. To reach one of the spots in the magazine with about 250 000 copies in print is crazy!
Ok, I have (with help from a newfound friend at Deviantart) translated the text:

Circus Romantique, 32 pages
By Natalia Batista from Sweden, 25 years old

Story: Karin works at a cirkus. Every year when the summer arrives, she brings her pet Monki-chan and travels around the country and performs. There's also a lot of acrobats, magicians and beautiful entertainers [at the cirkus], but Karin is always the clown. Is that all that she is...? Is it because she can't do anything else? Karin doesn't have much self esteem. One day during show, the lighting breaks and Karin needs to climp up hight, but falls...?!

Critique: This is a work from Sweden. We can't believe that this is a work from outside of Japan, both the images and the content looks like Japanese Manga! The level is so high, the Editors were surprised. The pictures were cutely drawn but the story was a bit dull. The last scene where Karin confesses her feelings to her friends is very less dramatic and lacking. We wanted to see more of Karins own evolution and growing. Next time we want to see a story that only you can make, Natalia, because of you living in Sweden.
Art: 15
Story: 11
Overall feeling: 29
Total: 55 (out of 100)

The critique is fair and teaching, I love that! This is the kind of critique you want, it's honest and fair and also nice without being soft-soap or anything. I feel like making more and more manga for them, showing them that I can learn and improve and that I have something to give!

I have allready started inking the mermaid manga Hooked On You that will be my next entry to them (Japanese title is 友達バブル). Here's a little sneak peek:


I have taken their comments into account, by making the main character's personality stronger and more refined, and also to make the story make place for her own developement an inner growing. Also, I think the art is getting better and I already can say that this will probably be my best work EVER (art wise).

Well, back to work, see you later!

As always, I've got a sh*tload to do!

I have been working hard for the past month, becasue I have a supertight deadline with everything I want to do!
Here's a quick review of what I've achieved so far and how much I have left:

A Sword Princess Tale
I have been working on the 40-pages long first chapter of this fantasy shojo manga since December, but started drawing in January. Finished the fine drafts of 23 pages so far and almost done with the action scene. This project will be fun, it will have a lot of action in it, and that will be interesting since I havn't done an action manga before. I have a bunch of nice reference books though, so I will be fine, i think.
My plan is to have it finished by March, and I hope I can make it!

Sneak-peeks!

A Song For Elise: Remix - Memories
This 13-pages long short story manga is based on my manga A Song For Elise (Ein Lied für Elise, TOKYOPOP 2010, Germany). I have finished the inking of all the pages, and right now I'm doing grayscales on them. Why not screen tones, you might ask. Well, because this one is going to be a part of an anthology with several other artists, I want to slow down the reading and make the reader stay on my pages and not just flip through it. Screentones are so one-dimentional so they make the reader speed up. Grayscales with details and shades make the reader slow down. At least I think so...
Have finished 6 pages so far. Deadline is end of January, so I'm doing my best!

A W.I.P. of page 8.

Hooked On You
This 32-page one shot is both for Nosebleed Studio's next anthology, planned release in April, and also my next entry to Ribbon's rookie competition. It need to be done in mid-February for the anthology, and I hope to send it to Ribbon in March.
So far I have 18 finished fine drafts done, so I've got lots and lots of more work to do!!

Sneak-peeks!

This is what I feel like right now:


At the same time, I'm also working with the editorial work on Swedish Comic Sin 3, e-mailing and booking the print shop etc. And did some economy paper duty for Nosebleed Studio the other day too, I feel so responsible!

Ok, back to work with me! No time to lose!!