"Metal Spider" - Comic book for children
This is a comic book for the youngest readers - "Metal Spider". I created it as a graduation project at the NAA 5 years ago (2015). I am uploading the front cover and the illustrations that I like from it. The spider's look is inspired by musicians I love and have made an impression on me, like Slash, Gene Simmons, Angus Young and others. I purposefully wanted him to look intimidating and/or unfriendly at first glance as it is essential to the plot. When we had our graduation exhibition, I loved seeing little children walking up to the book and excitedly going through it. This filled my heart with joy (and I also felt relieved that I didn't make our main character TOO scary for them, haha).
Official back and front cover of "Metal Spider".
An outcast spider is about to go on a journey to find true friendship!
Alternative back and front cover of "Metal Spider".
After being rejected by his own "friends" for being different (he just doesn't want to catch flies like them, plants are all he needs for breakfast!), the spider leaves for a walk in the forest, sad and alone, until he hears a strange melody.
He runs into a beautiful singing butterfly, who really wants to dance ballet with a partner, but unfortunately doesn't have one.
Our hero comes to the rescue and offers to help her! When she sees how he dances though, she get utterly terrified and runs away to look for someone else to dance with.
Brokenhearted, the poor spider continues his walk, until he notices a cricket, playing his violin, hidden in some tall grass. He approaches him, accidentally scaring him at first, but then he offers him to play together and the cricket agrees to try.
The spidey shows off his electric guitar, but the cricket has never even seen this instrument and asks him to play for him first. But the sound almost deafens the poor insect and he refuses to play with our MC...
Out of nowhere, he barely hears someone screaming. He looks around, then down and sees worker ants crossing his path. As one of them screams at him to be more careful where he walks, another, terrified, shouts at the metal to turn around!
Water from the nearby river has overflowed and is now towering above them all like a huge tsunami!
He notices that everyone he met on his walk has been swept up by the wave! The cricked almost drowned and passed out, the butterfly's wings got soaked and she couldn't fly away! Quickly, he catches them and the ants in his net and moves them to safety!
After everything calms down and everyone is safe, they all apologize about their previous behavior and thank him, promising to pay attention to others' hearts and deeds before throwing around harsh judgments!