(Process) RaiLeon comic (Pokémon SwSh)

Here's the process behind the raileon/kbdn comic! There was a lot of experimentation with this one so I'm quite proud of how it came out!

Usually I do thumbnailing on paper only and go straight to sketching digitally, but this time around I tried doing some vague colorful shapes on the canvas to know where figures and speech bubbles would go in each panel and it helped my process. I'm a mess at paneling for someone who likes drawing comics so much, so figured it's time I step up my game.

I also picked up the habit to "recycle" panels thanks to drawing so many posts for ask-protoheroes - which can be useful and it's not inherently bad if you want to work fast and not be too serious about it, but I reckon it's not helping me grow either. So for this one I challenged myself to not repeat a single panel! I'll try to keep doing it for future comics.

Another challenge in this comic was drawing these two characters in the same panel while paying mind to the height gap. It was EXTREMELY important to me that their 20 cm / 8 inches difference was apparent. I oversee trials in my future when I draw Raihan next to other people who have regular freaking heights.

As for the subject matter... the idea struck me almost randomly as for the past month my brain is Raihan 24/7. I'm OBSESSED with this character and the ships, and some other characters in the cast of SwSh. All the fan content on my feed convinced me Raihan is completely my type and now I'm deep in this hole. If you pick up hints of proto!Katsuki-ness on my characterization of him, it's not a coincidence- I am a simple bitch with 2 character archetypes I like.

I enjoy any flavors of kbdn but if I have to pick, I probably go with Raihan being deliberately in love with his rival (ten years!!! Obsessively losing to him!!!!) and Leon being a happy, oblivious golden retriever who much appreciates his rivalship and friendship since they were kids. Childhood friends + pining :'D I am Very predictable.

So my hc for this comic is that Raihan Will bashfully look up fantasy fueling material of Leon online, and be too much of a bisexual disaster to seriously approach or find out by himself if Leon actually likes guys. He does try, though (notice him nudging his knee on Leon's on the first panel). ALSO, Leon has the technology comprehension skills of a facebook aunt, AND is too dense to notice Raihan's crush.

As you see, this ship has my by the balls at the moment so expect to see more of it if I have any free time to do more personal art - if I don't, at least one spicy Leon art is definitely coming your way for the NSFW poll of this month ;D - but either way, it's been a long time I don't draw something for me for the pure joy of it and it was very liberating! One of my resolutions for this year was drawing more personal stuff, so I'm kicking off to a good start!

Hope you enjoy it as much as I did <3

UPDATE 23.01.2020: revisited this comic to change Raihan's hair as my eyes have been opened to the fact his little dragon spikes are supposed to be locks/braids! Also changed the composition on the last panel with Leon to a more readable one. You can see the changes in the final post - the original version remains here!