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felassan · 4 years ago

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Dragon Age Library Edition Volume 1 annotations & additional pages/art compilation

Dragon Age Library Edition Volume 1 is a hardcover collection of some pre-existing Dragon Age comics that was released in 2014. It comprises of all issues of The Silent Grove, Those Who Speak and Until We Sleep. In places, it includes additional annotations/commentaries by the illustrators and authors, as well as a few additional pages with additional art. iirc these additional annotations and pages/art aren’t featured or available anywhere else (in the franchise I mean; other people have probably put them online at some point I’m sure).

From what I can see at least, Library Edition Volume 1 is no longer in print, and as such listings for it on resale sites etc are.. price-inflated & prohibitively expensive (~£100+, which I’m sure we can all agree is just not reasonable or accessible to most people). Due to this, I’ve compiled the additional annotations and pages here in this post. Thank you and credit to @artevalentinapaz, who kindly shared the material with me. This post has been made with their permission. The rest of this post is under a cut due to length.

These commentaries are in the context of The Silent Grove, Those Who Speak and Until We Sleep. If you notice any errors or annotations missing, or need anything clarified, just let me know. I think the annotations are in chronological order. In places I elaborated in square brackets to help explain which part of the comics an annotation is referring to. A note before you proceed further: some of the topics referenced in the annotations/additional pages are heavy or uncomfortable. The quotes here are word-for-word transcriptions of dev/creator commentaries, not my personal opinions or phrasings.

(Also, I do recommend always supporting comic creators by purchasing their comics legitimately. I own each issue of these comics having bought other editions of them all legitimately. The reason I put this post together is because this specific Library Edition volume has been discontinued and the consequently-inflated cost is so high, rendering the additional material inaccessible to most.)

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The Silent Grove annotations

Illustrator Chad Hardin: “I used to be an environmental artist for video games, so I built a 3-D model of Antiva City using the program Silo. Many of the buildings are simple cubes, but a few are more detailed. Overall, I spent the better part of a day building it, but I used it again and again throughout The Silent Grove to maintain continuity in the backgrounds.”

Script Writer Alexander Freed: “Even working with David Gaider, it took me several drafts to find Alistair’s voice. His narrative had to convey his humor and self-doubt from Dragon Age: Origins while suggesting a newfound weariness earned during his years on the throne. For readers familiar with the character, he needed to seem like a changed Alistair - but Alistair nonetheless.”

Chad Hardin: “If you read a lot of comics, you might wonder why the majority of the heroes wear skin-tight suits. Well, I can tell you: they are easy and quick to draw. In video games, you build the model once and then animate it, so details don’t slow you down. In comics, everything has to be rendered by hand. Varric and Alistair’s outfits were quite detailed. It took me a long time to get used to them, and even longer to memorize the designs until drawing them was second nature - Varric’s knee armor in particular! Oy vey!”

David Gaider: “One of my favorite scenes in the entire series [when Varric and Isabela are disarming traps and picking locks together while Alistair looks on]. Isabela and Varric, doing what rogues do. I had a suggestion for how to put it together, but Alex managed to make it fit and did a great job with it.”

Chad Hardin: “I never used to keep any of the artwork I created for comics. I would just hand the pages over to my agent to sell. This page [when Alistair, Varric and Isabela are in a tavern together, with hookah in the foreground] I kept for myself. I love the hookah-smoking elves in the second panel and Isabela’s face in the last panel. I rendered the first four chapters of The Silent Grove in grayscale using ink washes, gouache and Copie markers.”

David Gaider: “For a little while, Varric [in these comic stories] was supposed to be Zevran from Dragon Age: Origins, which would have made sense, Zevran being Antivan and all. I know that some fans would have loved to see him, but the dynamics of the group just didn’t work as well. Then a planned cameo later had to be cut for space. Ah well, Zev, another time.”

Alexander Freed: “Isabela at her most dangerous [climbing up the side of the cliff]. This scene - featuring a scantily clad, dripping-wet woman who tends to flaunt her sexuality - could easily have come across as exploitative, but Chad did a lovely drop portraying Isabela as purely focused and deadly.”

Chad Hardin: “Isabela rising out of the water and scaling the cliff with the knife in her mouth is one of my favorite parts of The Silent Grove. It is one of those moments where the writing really inspired the art. Hats off to Alex and David. This is another page I kept for myself.”

Colorist Michael Atiyeh: “This is one of my favorite Dragon Age pages. Chad is such an amazing artist; I feel very fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with him.”

Chad Hardin: “I love that this page [when a guard spots Varric and shouts ‘Intruder!’] made it in uncensored. So many times in comics, I draw something and some stuffy lawyers come out of the woodwork and tell me to tone it down. Dark Horse and BioWare always let me have fun, and this turned out to be one of my favorite pages with Varric and Bianca. Any guesses to which word he is mouthing in the second panel?”

Alexander Freed: “Note the simple decency of Alistair as he gives his cloak, without comment, to Isabela. For all his flaws, he’s genuinely kind at heart - a rare enough trait in Isabela’s world that I think it’s much of what she values in him.”

Chad Hardin: “I love the opening panel to this chapter [the opening panels to Chapter 3, when the team are on a ship at sea]. It’s the image I use on the homepage of my website. This page was a gift to my cousin Wendy, who loves pirates. Seascapes with sailing ships might be clichéd in fine art, but for me it was a first.”

David Gaider: “I wanted to have this story center on the group travelling to a Witch of the Wilds other than Flemeth, and originally I had set it somewhere else - until I remembered a Codex entry from Dragon: Age Origins that offhandedly mentioned a witch in the Tellari Swamps. Brilliant! It’d look like I planned it all along. I didn’t.”

Michael Atiyeh: “I love opportunities where I can show a change in the time of day as you move from panel to panel [when the ship heads towards and the team arrive in the Tellari Swamps]. I feel the palette of each panel is very distinct and beautiful.”

Alexander Freed: “Why did Alistair choose two people he barely knows to be his companions on this quest? We never make this explicit, but of course Varric is on the right track. Alistair wants to surround himself with people who don’t know him and won’t judge him, yet it’s Alistair’s idealism that Isabela and Varric work to preserve.”

Chad Hardin: “Another page where the writing inspired the art [when the group suddenly encounter a dragon]. I love the dragon bursting onto the scene and Isabela’s stare. Some writers will try to cram six or seven panels on a page like this and the pacing just doesn’t allow the artist to give each moment the right punch. Can you imagine if the first panel was crammed into a single square inch?”

Chad Hardin: “Yavana was one of the only characters that we did no preliminary sketches for. I don’t know how that happened, but thankfully it worked out.”

David Gaider: “I love how Yavana looks like a cross between Flemeth and Morrigan. Flemmigan? She’s totally Chad’s design, and it’s great. Typical for these witches, she never says things straight. In my mind, this Alistair is the one who did the Dark Ritual in Dragon Age: Origins - and I was half-tempted to have him lose his cool in this first scene [opening panels of Chapter 4] with her. Too early, though.”

Alexander Freed: “Through this whole sequence [the page when Varric aims Bianca at Yavana], Yavana is dropping cryptic hints and Alistair is refusing to play along. He’s met Flemeth and Morrigan - he knows Yavana won’t give him a straight answer, and he won’t give her the satisfaction of asking needlessly.”

Michael Atiyeh: “Sometimes it’s the little things on a page that spark my interest. Here [when the team navigate vines and mud to get to the temple], the sunset panel came out great and the mud looks really thick and gooey. It’s fun to focus on these details and make them stand out.”

Chad Hardin: “I hated drawing this scene [when Isabela gets kicked] where Isabela gets the boot to the face. Call me old fashioned, but I was raised to believe that only a coward would ever hit a woman (even a battle-hardened pirate adventurer). I draw at home, and my girls often watch me work in my studio. This was a page I didn’t want them watching me draw. I do like, though, that Isabela gets up, yanks the arrow out, and then soldiers on (and later extracts brutal revenge).”

Michael Atiyeh: “Poor Isabela. It seems I gave her more bruises and black eyes than any of the other characters. [when Isabela is yanking the arrow out]”

Chad Hardin: “It’s always interesting to go back and look at artwork because it reminds me of what was going on in my life at the time. I inked this page [opening panels of Chapter 5] at a ‘draw night’ session at an anime convention in St. George, Utah. I was one of the special guests, but I missed the first day because I was at my grandfather’s funeral in Las Vegas, Nevada. Seeing this page brought back those memories.”

David Gaider: “‘Bianca says hello.’ [quoting the panels being referenced] I adore Varric. I was tempted to have him narrate the entire series [in reference to these three comics], but then again I liked the idea of having each series center on one of the trio’s viewpoints. This book belongs to Alistair, but that doesn’t stop Varric from getting all the best lines.”

Alexander Freed: “Claudio, of course, is not a terribly sympathetic figure. But I wanted to emphasize that he takes this fight as personally as Isabela - he sincerely loved Luis and blames Isabela for the man’s death. I think it’s important to give every character, even the most loathsome, some dignity. [when Isabela and Claudio are fighting]”

Chad Hardin: “Payback! Here is where Isabela extracts her revenge on Claudio [when Isabela stabs Claudio]. I never enjoyed killing off a character so much. I particularly enjoyed putting the look of shock in his eyes. He had it coming. There is something satisfying about killing a ‘made man’.”

Chad Hardin: “Every now and then when drawing comics, I wish I could animate some panels and watch them as a cartoon. It would be great to see this sequence [when Yavana catches Claudio’s soul] in full motion as Yavana snatches Claudio’s soul, makes it reenter his corpse and then extracts information from him until he bursts into flame. It was a very Hellboy-ish moment. I enjoyed the movie that played in my mind while drawing this scene. Hope everyone liked the result.”

Chad Hardin: “As I mentioned on page 17, I rendered the first four chapters in grayscale, which made the black-and-white art look great, but had a neutralizing effect when it came to colors. By the time I drew chapter 4, I had seen the effect it was having and decided to stop using the grayscale so the colors would pop. When I saw this page [when Alistair says to Yavana ‘And we helped you find it’] in print, it confirmed to me that I made the right decision. I honestly feel this art was the best of The Silent Grove.”

Chad Hardin: “I practically painted these pages [when Yavana says ‘It is permitted. Tonight and only tonight’] in thumbnails hoping it would help me choose how to render them in ink. It is so hard trying to figure out how to get a full range of value out of just black and white. There are some artists and inkers that make this look easy. Mark Schultz comes to mind. Michael saved my bacon. Colorists really do so much work when it comes to rendering; this page came out awesome because of him.”

David Gaider: “Here we reveal the existence of Great Dragons (as opposed to High Dragons), and also that Yavana was the source of the return of dragons to Thedas after their departure for so many centuries. But why? There’s the rub, and not even Alistair can trust that she’s telling him the truth.”

David Gaider: “Here’s the controversial scene [Alistair killing Yavana]. I think some fans don’t like that Alistair did this, and have said they consider it out of character. I don’t. From his perspective, Flemeth and her daughters have been toying with the world for reasons that can’t be trusted. They dragged Maric away from his family, from him. One might think his judgement foolish, but considering what Alistair was capable of deciding even back in Dragon Age: Origins, it’s certainly not out of character.”

Chad Hardin: “[same scene as above] This was a controversial page, and there were a lot of people who thought it was out of character for Alistair to kill Yavana (I didn’t see it coming - I mean, you just don’t kill a Witch of the Wild), but here is the thing: this page is Alistair acting as a king. Yavana has been manipulating him, trying to play him like a pawn, and he just can’t allow that. There’s too much at stake, for himself and for his subjects.”

Alexander Freed: “The end? An end, at least [the trio walking off into the distance]. The series needed a note of closure while leading into Those Who Speak (which wouldn’t arrive until many months later). David tweaked the ending in the outline several times, and I did my best to balance resolving Alistair’s emotional journey without resolving the quest. It’s not as clean as I’d have liked, but fortunately, now it’s all in one volume...”

Those Who Speak annotations

Alexander Freed: “Capturing Isabela’s narrative voice was much easier for me than capturing Alistair’s - partly because I’d already written The Silent Grove, and partly because of my own writing proclivities. Rereading now, I wonder if I laid on the (mild) profanity a bit too thick. I’ll leave you to judge.”

David Gaider: “I like the additional detail Alex and Chad put in, letting us see more of Qarinus and more of Isabela’s crew. Alex wanted to give her crew more of a presence, and let her first mate have some face time, so they weren’t just parts of the scenery. Good call on his part.”

David Gaider: “I’m really fond of the formal getups Chad made for the party. Isabela’s actually comes from a concept we didn’t use from the cancelled Dragon Age 2 expansion, if I remember right. And Maevaris came from me asking for ‘someone who looks like Mae West’ - with the wonderful outfit all Chad’s doing.

Chad Hardin: “Maevaris. I love Mae. When David and Dragon Age art director Matthew Goldman spoke to me about designing Mae, they wanted her to be fully female with the exception of her biology. They told me to think ‘Mae West’. Well, when I think of Mae West, I think of her... womanly shape. So, drawing Maevaris was always walking a fine line between portraying Mae’s identity and her biology. The process endeared her to me.”

Michael Atiyeh: “Just like in The Silent Grove, we are introduced to another gentleman from Isabela’s past [when the team meet Lord Devon and Isabela threatens him]. As was the case with Claudio, he will meet his fate at her hands.”

Chad Hardin: “When I was drawing Titus, my kids asked me why I was drawing ‘angry Jesus’ or ‘evil Jesus’. I can’t remember which term they used exactly, but it made me chuckle. I was going for a mix of Rapustin and Joe Stalin, but ‘evil Jesus’ would do.”

David Gaider: “I’m not sure it’s apparent here [when Alistair says ‘I’d really rather not’], but Alistair was supposed to be using one of his Templar powers on Titus (that’s why Titus recognizes what he is on the next page) and disrupting his magic.”

Alexander Freed: “Isabela is witty and charming enough that it can be easy to forget that she’s not, in fact, a nice person. Even after finishing the outline, David was concerned about making her too unsympathetic - but I loved his approach in this series. The dark deeds Isabela commits - this murder included [Isabela killing Lord Devon] - are what make her guilt tangible and no easy matter to overcome.”

Alexander Freed: “I thought the notions of Isabela’s pride in her captaincy and dedication to her crew were some of the most interesting aspects of her character in David’s story. In scenes here [when Isabela is on her ship saying ‘Keep them focused and keep them sober’] and elsewhere, I did my best to emphasize their place at the core of Isabela’s world.”

Chad Hardin: “Most of the time I draw from imagination, but because of the complexity of this page [Qunari trying to board Isabela’s ship] I decided it would work better if I had photo reference. On this page are my nephews Jared (Varric) and Adam, my niece Melissa, my kids Erica, Tasey Michaela (Isabela) and Chad (Alistair), my friend’s daughter Amy, my wife Joy, and the neighborhood kids as Isabela’s pirate crew. (The crew member mooning the Qunari is out of my ol’ noodle.) I paid their modelling fee in pizza and root beer. Also, I had originally drawn cannons on Isabela’s ship, so if there are parts of it that look slightly wonky, chances are there was a cannon there.”

David Gaider: “Ever since the BioWare artists finally did a concept for female Qunari, I’ve been itching to include one in the game. It’s always slipped through my fingers, so I was going to be damned if I’d have a Qunari plot in a comic - without the same technical limitations - and not have one present.

Chad Hardin: “I had no idea this was the first time anyone outside of BioWare had seen a female Qunari.”

Michael Atiyeh: “I really like the lighting in this sequence [Isabela in her cell thinking ‘I haven’t eaten in days’], especially the strong white light and the characters in shadow.”

David Gaider: “The entire sequence of Rasaan interrogating Isabela was something I plotted out in detail when this series began. Here they discuss names - something treated in a manner peculiar to the Qunari, considering how much importance they apply to what things are called (and not called), because it forms the core of their identity. Isabela brushes it off, but as we find out later it’s also at the core of her identity. I liked that parallel.”

Alexander Freed: “To balance out the relatively static talking pages elsewhere in the issue, I hoped to make the interrogation and flashback sequences beautiful and full of information. I proposed an approach to Chad, and he wisely reshaped it into what you see here [the page with the scene where Isabela says ‘I’ve made a lot of stupid mistakes’]. Anything that succeeds on these pages should be credited to him; anything that fails is my fault.”

Chad Hardin: “Probably the most challenging spread I have ever done. My friend Stacie Pitt was the model for Isabela on this page, and my wife Joy was Rasaan. I saved these pages [around the scene when Rasaan says ‘Mistakes can be corrected’] for myself.”

David Gaider: “Sten from Dragon Age: Origins becoming the new Arishok of the Qunari was something we'd planned even during Dragon Age 2. This was a great opportunity to show that, and also to show that Sten didn’t acquire horns even despite the makeover the Qunari received in DA2. Hornless Qunari are considered special, and Sten is no exception.”

Michael Atiyeh: “I think that David, Alex and Chad handled Isabela’s flashback [to when she was sold by her mother] in an interesting way, and it created a nice flow to the story.”

David Gaider: “This was a controversial scene [what happened to the slaves Isabela was transporting], the end result of a lot of discussions between me and Isabela’s original writer on the team, and it went through a lot of revisions over that time. It needed to fit with the story Isabela told the player in DA2, but fill in the blanks of what she didn’t tell. We didn’t want Isabela to be someone who became who she is because she was ‘broken’ but instead as a result of her own actions - yet also not be completely beyond redemption.”

Chad Hardin: “These were hard pages [as above] to draw. It was difficult knowing that events such as this are part of human history, such as the Zong massacre in 1781, where the British courts ordered the insurers to reimburse the crew of the Zong for financial losses caused by throwing slaves overboard when faced with a lack of water. Horrifying beyond words.”

Michael Atiyeh: “Here, Isabela visits here crew, and I wanted to play up that she was in the light and they were in a dark cell. The light streaming through the bars gave me the opportunity to highlight Brand, who also had dialogue in the scene.”

Alexander Freed: “I struggled to find a way for Varric to contribute to victory without distracting from Alistair and Sten’s big fight. I’m happy with the solution: a brazen lie seemed appropriate to the character without taking away from the main show.”

David Gaider: “I believe my original plan had Isabela’s and Alistair’s fight scenes happening separately, but I like how Alex intertwined them in the script and I especially like how this ends up highlighting the differences between their characters when their fights are resolved. Isabela is defiant, revealing her name not because Rasaan demands it but because it’s her choice. In both cases, mercy is strength.”

Michael Atiyeh: “The brush I created for the clouds really gave them a nice watercolor effect here [on the deck of the ship, Sten calling Alistair ‘kadan’]. That brush has become a staple in my toolbox.”

Alexander Freed: “With the strong theme of names running through these issues, I liked the notion that Isabela had outgrown being, well, ‘Isabela’. When her name comes up in Until We Sleep, it’s largely played with ambiguity.”

Until We Sleep annotations

Alexander Freed: “The story of ‘Arthur’ is one of my favorite minor sequences [Varric infiltrating and fighting his way into the fortress]. It tells us something about Varric and it delivers plot information - and it’s also a reminder that our heroes kill an awful lot of people during these series and cope with it in their own ways. In general, writing Varric let me skirt the edge of metacommentary, which I greatly enjoyed.”

David Gaider: “Varric, as always, is my ‘voice of the narrator’. Here he’s expressing some of my own amusement at Alistair’s growing list of peculiarities [‘Your majesty is quite the special snowflake’]. To think, back at the beginning of Dragon Age: Origins he was just the player’s goofy sidekick who grew up in a barn.”

Michael Atiyeh: “By the third series, Until We Sleep, I really started to have a complete feel for what I wanted the final art to look like. As an artist, it’s important to continue to evolve and grow. The close-up of Sten’s face [same page as above] is a perfect example of how I wanted the rendering on the characters to look.”

Alexander Freed: “David’s outline called for a short, somber reveal of the Calenhad story by Sten. Fueled by my desire to avoid ‘talking heads’ sequences, I scripted it as a full-on storytelling flashback. David made sure the history worked (at least from the Qunari point of view), and Chad did a beautiful job handling it in a mere two pages.”

David Gaider: “Blood is important in Dragon Age, as a theme. Here we tie in the dragon blood that was mentioned all the way back in The Silent Grove and explain what it means at last. I was a bit hesitant to tarnish the legend of Calenhad the Great in this way, but I comfort myself with the knowledge this tale is but a viewpoint and not necessarily the entire truth.”

Michael Atiyeh: “Titus melting the attacker is a great example of classic comicbook storytelling and exactly what made me fall in love with the medium.”

David Gaider: “I was really happy with how Chad handled the reveal of Mae as transgender [the scene with Mae in the cell]. My worry was that Varric finding her disrobed might be potentially titillating, but I think he handled it nicely. I only wish there was more time to have Mae properly respond to being exposed in this manner, even to a friend.”

Chad Hardin: “I originally drew Mae as female [same scene as above], then changed her anatomy, so the psychological violation and humiliation she felt would be the focus. Hope that came across.”

Chad Hardin: “When in doubt, have Bianca shoot it [Varric shooting the artifact].”

David Gaider: “This scene [Varric and Bianca the dwarf] with Varric was one I wanted to do for a very long time. We’ve hinted that Varric’s crossbow was named after a real person, someone he never wants to talk about. Now I finally had the chance to show why.”

Chad Hardin: “Of all my Dragon Age pages, this scene was hands down my favorite, because Varric is my favorite. It was awesome to get to draw Bianca in her dwarven form. These scenes give you a glimpse of the love Varric and Bianca shared. It doesn’t tell you the whole story, but you can assume plenty from what is shown. You get to see Varric mostly naked (you’re welcome), but most of all you witness Varric’s heartbreak. I felt privileged to draw it. I got so obsessed with drawing this page I did an entire watercolor painting based on the last panel [Varric gets up to leave, ‘This isn’t right’ - ? or perhaps the scene where he opens the door to leave].”

Alexander Freed: “Unreliable narrators are always tricky - done wrong, they can just confuse the reader. But I’m fairly happy with Varric’s lies throughout this series, most of which are used to downplay the emotional cost of events rather than whitewash the events themselves.”

Michael Atiyeh: “This palette worked perfectly [Varric standing in front of the doorway/portal in the Fade proper], but I can’t take all the credit because BioWare provided reference for the Fade. I added the hot orange energy for the doorway, which looks great with the sickly green sky.”

David Gaider: “This scene [Isabela’s Fade nightmare] was actually inspired by a fan named Allegra who did a cosplay as a Qunari version of Isabela. I knew I wanted something like this for Isabela’s Fade section of the comic, but it didn’t really solidify until I saw the cosplay.”

Chad Hardin: “Isabela is more affected by her encounter with Rasaan than we were led to believe. A portent of things to come?”

Michael Atiyeh: “I love this shot of Mae in the fourth panel [on the page where Isabela is affected by vines]. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention what a great character she is in the series, and Chad captures her beautifully in this shot.”

Alexander Freed: “I saw this issue as a sort of downbeat victory lap. Over the course of the previous series, our protagonists largely came to terms with the inner demons the Fade confronts them with here. The fact they’ve come so far lets them win this last battle... but they still have scars that will never completely disappear.”

David Gaider: “Maric was in the first two novels I wrote for Dragon Age. Seeing Chad’s rendering of him as a regal, grown-up version of Alistair made me incredibly nostalgic. Some characters you just never let go of.”

Alexander Freed: “I feel Varric’s lines (‘tell yourself the stories you need to tell’ but ‘never live your own lies’) are the natural endpoint of all the exchanges he’s had with Alistair, starting from the end of Chapter 1 of The Silent Grove. And of course it plays off the story of ‘Arthur’, as well.’’

Chad Hardin: “I’m happy with the way Titus came off in these pages [Titus attacking and saying ‘The last magisters of Tevinter were so close’]. He looks threatening and powerful when fighting Alistair, Isabela and Varric, but genuinely confused by his inability to defeat Maric. Bye-bye, evil Jesus.”

Alexander Freed: “I can’t help but feel for Titus. He was unthinkably corrupt, but I see him as genuinely motivated by Tevinter’s glory. (The fact Alistair reads zealous ideology as a lust for power says a lot about both characters.)”

Michael Atiyeh: “I love the seamless transition of color from Titus’ magic to the dragon breath and then back into the orange remnants of his magic in the smoke. This was a really fun panel to color [Titus saying ‘Die by what wrought you’].”

David Gaider: “‘You are not the dreamer here. I am.’ I always have a scene or a line that’s in my head when I begin a tale, and this line of Maric’s was one I wanted all the way back when I started working on The Silent Grove.”

Chad Hardin: “I love this page [Maric and Alistair clasping hands]; Mike’s colors are spot on. We get to see all our heroes in an ideal state for the last time. This is the last Dragon Age page I saved for myself.”

David Gaider: “This scene kills me [Alistair destroying the Magrallen]. I knew it needed to happen; I knew I wanted it to happen even back when I began the story. Alistair lets Maric remain in the Fade rather than dragging him back to a world which has moved on. Alistair’s ready to move on, but forcing him to give up that hope... it makes me feel like a bad person.”

Chad Hardin: “Heartbreak for Alistair as he realizes that once again, as a king, he must kill: this time, his own father (granted, the Magrallen did most of the work). I really like how Maric crumbles away in the end. This was my last page, and the emotions on the page and in my studio were very final. Altogether, this was a year of my life in the making. On my last page, I wrote a thank you to everyone involved, the crew at Dark Horse and the crew at BioWare. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank them again. It was a thrill. Finally, a huge thank-you to the Dragon Age fan community, whose support was overwhelmingly awesome.”

Michael Atiyeh: “As the story came to an end, I knew I was going to miss these characters. Writing these annotations reinforces the fact that I hope to work with this great creative team again one day. Many thanks to Dark Horse and BioWare for the opportunity to work on Dragon Age.”

Alexander Freed: “The tension between the art and the narration on this page [the one with Alistair sitting on his throne while nobles argue] is something you can only pull off in comics. Neither tells the full, bittersweet story alone. Similarly, these issues wouldn’t have been possible without everyone on the team; thanks to David, Chad, Michael, and everyone I lack space to list!”

Additional pages / art

Library Edition Volume 1 also came with some additional pages, with additional art and commentary. These are as follows (I’m including them for the sake of completion, click the links to see):

1. Alistair and dragon concepts

2. Rasaan and Maevaris concepts

3. Sten, Titus and Yavana concepts

4. A series of cover pages 1

5. A series of cover pages 2

In case anyone has trouble reading the notes that accompany these images, I’ve transcribed them below:

1. Dragon Age Sketch Book

Alistair Concept

Dragon Age / Dark Horse

Chad Hardin: “The headshot of Alistair is from a finished sketch with a rejected armor design. In order to save time, the redrawing was completed on the computer, where tweaks and changes are quick and easy, if somewhat less glorious.”

[Dragon] Head #1 / Head #2

Chad Hardin: “Everyone liked this dragon sketch so much that Dark Horse printed it for signings at conventions. You can see I did multiple proposals for the dragon’s head. It was more effective than drawing the body over and over.”

2. [arrow pointing to Mae’s sleeve] concealed [I think that’s what it says anyway] daggers / shurikens?

Chad Hardin: “When designing Rasaan and Maevaris, I wasn’t exactly sure how their roles would play out in the series. Maevaris’ outfit was inspired by brothel madams of the Wild West. I thought it would be cool to have some weapons concealed in the formal wear. These never came into play in the series, but they were there in my mind.”

3. Chad Hardin: “Although we only see Titus in his battle garb in one issue, I really liked the design of his armor. The sketch of Yavana was done on the fly and served as both a rough preliminary sketch and as a panel layout. You have to work hard and smart in comics to keep up with the deadlines.”

4. Cover Artist Anthony Palumbo: “This was my first assignment for Dark Horse, and I was both excited and nervous. I drew pencil sketches of the main characters, scanned them and played with different arrangements, poses and color schemes in Photoshop.”

5. Anthony Palumbo: “Fellow illustrator Winona Nelson helped me by sitting for photo reference. I created the mock-jewelry with gold-painted Sculpey. That’s a quick photo of my own gaping maw, to help with the image of Varric.”

#dragon age #bioware #video games #artevalentinapaz #alistair theirin #fav warden #morrigan #queen of my heart #long post #longpost

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yourcoffindoor · 4 years ago

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Bulletproof Heart Pt. 3

Pairing: Gerard Way x Reader

AN: Without further ado, here’s part 3! Sorry if there’s any typos that I missed, I kind of speed edited this one. I have one more part planned for this series, so the end is coming up soon. Hope you enjoy!!

From city to city, crowd to crowd, the tour continued on, and you went on with the show, your unwelcome encounter with Alex only making you more tenacious, more determined to outperform every band there.

You put on an unaffected front, making it seem as if you couldn't care less that he was playing Warped tour as well. Gavin was the only band member who knew about your history, and he fluttered about you like a mother hen ready to offer comfort or homicide at the drop of a hat. He would regularly attempt to gauge your feelings, but it only served to make you withdraw deeper into yourself, denying that could ever be shaken by his presence.

But the truth was you were shaken. You were scared. Scared that you would one day see that face smirking at you from a crowd and freeze, unable to ignore a presence so heavy and halting like a storm cloud threatening a downpour.

And then there was Gerard. You hadn't seen him since your first show, but your thoughts turned toward him again and again. What must he have thought that day, when Alex forced his way between you? When you stormed off alone? If he had tried to come and speak to you since that day, you hadn't heard anything. Did he think that there was still something left between you and Alex?

It was that thought that caused the most pain every time it crossed your mind, and you hated yourself for it. At night when you were alone your thoughts went around and around in the same infuriating cycle, from not caring what anyone had to think about you, to anxiously wondering if Gerard had someone else he was sharing that crooked smile with. You never let the words cross your mind or leave your lips, but your heart beat constantly with the hopeful thought: Please don't think that I could have feelings for anyone else.

Meanwhile, the Parties never ended--in fact they seemed to grow in boisterousness, picking up attendees like a tornado gathering wind. Your band mates went every now and again to socialize, but They held no value for you. Primarily because the chance of running into Alex was far too high-- You knew he would never miss an opportunity to get shit faced, and he would probably be skulking around in hopes of seeing you there, ready to latch on and torment you further. But beyond that, the chance of running into Gerard was likely to be less than zero.

That didn't stop your band mates from encouraging you to loosen up, hoping to pop the contemplative bubble that you'd encased yourself in for weeks.

"I'm gonna head out. What are you up to tonight? You should take a break from everything." Gavin suggested before heading out one night, despite knowing full well you'd die before you'd agree.

"I'll find something to keep me busy."

"I'd tell you to come with, but I know a certain someone you're crushing on won't be there."

"Oh really?" You flipped through a book on the table in front of you, playing dumb and failing miserably at it. "I do not know to whom you are referring."

"Yeah poor guy. Frank told me that there's too much pressure to drink here, so he's always in the bus alone. Bored. Desperate for human contact."

You gave Gavin the side-eye. "Alright alright, we get it."

He laughed. "Their bus is five down on the left. Y'know, if you feel like it. Thank me later." He said, darting out the door before anything could be thrown at him.

You rolled your eyes and flipped through the book, trying to read and forget the information that was just dropped in your lap. You remembered when you and Gerard had last spoke, how shy he looked when he attempted to invite you over before being cut off by Alex's sudden arrival.

Maybe a quick stop wouldn't hurt, you thought to yourself. He was in the middle of asking me to anyway...

Before you knew it you were on your feet, flinging on a jacket and taking a step outside. It would be the nice thing to do after all, since he can't leave the bus...

It took a bit of searching, but you finally found a bus with My Chemical Romance painted on its side in large black letters. Your heart did its familiar flutter as you walked up to the door, raising your hand and giving a rapid succession of knocks.

You heard a slight shuffle from inside, and after a few moments Gerard answered, his face changing from one of confusion to a soft smile as he shook the hair from out of his eyes.

"I hope this isn't a bad time," you said sheepishly, "I was told I could find some good comics here."

He flicked his spent cigarette to the ground, blowing smoke from the corner of his mouth. "Is there ever a bad time for comics? Come on in."

You followed him inside, and he stopped suddenly. "Aw shit." he muttered.

"What is it?" you asked, concerned.

"I just realized we're fucking slobs."

He wasn't wrong, you observed with a laugh. The interior of the bus was divided into piles of organized chaos; clothes tossed into piles on the floor and empty chairs, makeup left open and scattered amongst soda cans by every available counter space. A few stray guitars sat soundless, happily resting until their next performance.

Gerard was obviously a bit embarrassed by the state of the place, as evidenced by the faint red blush that clouded over his nose and cheeks.

"Yeah, so its not exactly Buckingham Palace in here..." he joked, one hand anxiously running through his dark hair. His bashfulness only endeared him to you further.

"Well my bus actually IS Buckingham Palace, and it looks just about the same so don't feel too bad."

"Perfect. Anything to make you feel more at home." He mused, relocating some crumpled clothes from a small sofa nearby. "Have a seat, your majesty."

"I haven't seen you around in awhile." You noted as he hastily shoved things into cupboards.

"I've basically turned into a hermit when I'm not performing. Since I can't step outside without seeing a bottle, I don't really have much choice."

So Gavin was telling the truth. Hm.

"Well, the hermit lifestyle is probably underrated anyway."

He laughed softly. "Oh for sure. And I'll show you whats been keeping me busy this whole time."

Gerard shuffled to the back of the bus for a moment before returning with an armload of comic books, laying them proudly on the table in front of you. "These are some of my current favorites," he began after taking a seat beside you, close enough for you to admire the look of sheer happiness in his expression as he spoke. He was clearly in his element. "This one here has some of the best coloring I've ever seen."

You must have stared at him for a bit too long because he caught your affectionate glance and paused.

"What is it?"

"Nothing," you said, immediately breaking eye contact as heat flooded your cheeks. "Its just nice to hear you talk about them. You're so passionate about it."

He laughed. "Well its also nice to talk about them with someone who gets it."

You felt like you could fly right out of your skin. Everything about him made you feel a sense of belonging that you hadn't found with anyone else before.

"Hey when do I get to see that comic you said you were working on? I think you mentioned that the last time I saw you."

"Oh you remembered! Uh, one sec, I'll pull it out."

He wandered back into the unknown void that was his bunk, and came back with a folio filled to the brim with concepts, sample panels and character sketches.

"I'm pretty proud of this. Its a work in progress so uh...be gentle."

You knew Gerard was talented, but you were taken aback at the skill and creativity that had gone into this endeavor. Here he had created a world entirely his own and you were drawn in immediately.

"Gerard this is fucking fantastic! Seriously I need a full length comic right now."

"Right now? I'd rather talk to you."

You and Gerard talked as if you'd known each other forever. You found him to be witty and charming, but most importantly sincere; and the conversation flowed with ease.

"You know I'm a little surprised. I wouldn't have expected a guy like you to be alone in his bus on a big tour like this."

He laughed. "What do you mean?"

"I mean there's a lot of bands here that seem like they're only motivated by the attention they can get from girls. You're not like that."

"Its never been about that for me. I find those guys just as annoying as you do." He paused for a moment, hesitating as if he was unsure if he should continue. "Speaking of annoying...That guy, Alex--"

"Oh, yeah, sorry about him. I didn't even know he was gonna be on this tour since I haven't spoken to him in ages. I'm doing my best to avoid him."

"You seemed pretty upset when I saw you last. Just wanted to make sure he wasn't bothering you or anything."

You paused for a moment, replaying his words in your head to process them. Gerard not only noticed your reaction to Alex, he remembered and was concerned?

"So you guys aren't like...a thing anymore?"

"NO," you said a bit too eagerly. "I mean no, definitely not. I'd have to be crazy."

"Good," he replied softly, "I mean, I'm glad as long as you're happy."

You realized you had been making eye contact with his lips, the pair of you inching closer to each other with every syllable.

Your breath slowed, and you tucked a strand of stray hair behind your ear. "And...there's no one that you're involved with?"

"No," he confirmed without missing a beat, "but there is someone I have in mind."

If there was a speed limit for heartbeats, you would have been violating the law. Your next words came out almost as a whisper. "And who would that be?"

Hazel eyes flashing, Gerard cupped the side of your face with one hand, and you instinctively moved closer to meet his lips. The kiss felt like it was part dream, too good to be true as endorphins flooded your veins, a heat kindling in your stomach. You couldn't begin to tell if it lasted seconds or minutes, but still when your lips parted, it felt too soon.

"Oh." was all you could say, and the pair of you merely grinned, satisfied to be silent in the aftermath.

You caught a glance at your watch. 1:05 AM.

"I can't believe I have the willpower to do this," you began reluctantly, "but If I don't head back now I'll end up living here."

"I don't see the problem." he remarked, and you punched him in the arm.

"Thanks for a great night." you pecked him on the cheek, and before he had time to react, you jumped up and made your way towards the door.

"Come back anytime for more talk about comics!" he called after you with a laugh.

Your cheeks were buzzing and a warmth spread through your veins, giddy from your night with Gerard. You paused outside of your bus door, taking a deep breath to try and steady your heartbeat. You didn't want to rouse any suspicion from your band mates-not yet anyway. You just wanted to keep this moment to yourself for awhile.

After you cooled down, you quietly opened the door, hoping nobody would notice you sneaking in and that you could hop straight into your bunk. Instead you were met with Gavin and Liz sitting down on the sofa, looking very concerned.

"Hey," you said with hesitation, "Everything alright?"

They shared an uncomfortable look.

"Y/N, I'm not sure how to put this..." Liz began, fumbling with her fingers in an attempt to find the right words.

"What's going on?" you felt the blush from only moments ago drain away into cold dread.

"Its Alex," Gavin explained, "He and his band have been going around with a camera getting girls to flash them in exchange for backstage passes..."

You rolled your eyes. "So he's still trash. What does this have to do with me?"

"Well, the thing is, he's been telling people he has video of you. And him. Together. And that its gonna be included with the rest of the fucked up footage they're recording."

Your pulse started racing, erasing your giddy buzz from only moments before. You slumped into the nearest chair, trying to gather your thoughts.

"I never even knew I was being filmed..." you said softly. Nausea bubbled in your stomach as you were unwillingly dragged back into your intimate memories, a place you had successfully moved on from in recent years but whose impact you could never truly erase.

"Are you ok?" Liz asked, her voice low and gentle as though she was afraid you were about to shatter. Those words were all you needed to be set off.

"No. No I'm not fucking okay." You stood up suddenly from your chair, pacing. "Do you know how hard it was to leave that situation? Do you you know you much I struggled to make a life an a name for myself? How I had to rebuild myself after him? And now this?" You were shaking, your voice trembling with pent up emotion. "This was supposed to be an amazing, once in a lifetime experience. The beginning of everything for us. So why can't I just be left the fuck alone!"

Your band mates called after you as you stormed to your bunk, pulling the curtains tight behind you and burying your face in your pillow. For the first time in a long time, you let yourself break down, your unhindered sobs turning your pillow into an ocean.

#gerard way fanfic #gerard way x reader #gerard way imagine

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mcrmadness · 4 years ago

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I know I am constantly talking about this but I won’t stop before I get answers, which means I’m probably gonna talk about this forever: arts and especially being an artist on social media platforms. And how it sucks.

I don’t understand what I should do to feel seen at this point? If I draw something fandom related, mainly the people within that fandom will react to the art but not others, and still that is very little amount of people. If I draw something completely original, NO ONE reacts to that and I don’t understand why. And it’s not just me but so many others too.

I still cannot understand why comics and cartoony styles are so much less appreciated and liked than photorealism. It’s not actually any easier really. Just last night I spent a couple of hours on my sofa drawing panels for 3 upcoming comics, that was just 3 A4 papers but it still took me a couple of hours to do. Because I draw traditionally and I draw everything, including the lines, myself. I’m not getting any help from computers even if I could. I’m getting better and better at that and finding things that work for me the more I do this but still, drawing comics is not as easy as it might look like. Before I maybe just grabbed a pen and started drawing but that never actually led me to anywhere because I had no plot. So I have tons of old comics here that I started but never ever finished. Then I figured I have to start writing plots first and that way I could also finish something finally.

^This is what it takes to prepare and do a base for a comic. There’s three pages with the panels’ edges sketched. I use rulers to measure how big areas I want there to be around the panels and then measure and count (which I’m really bad at) how long and tall each panel will be. Before I struggled a lot with getting the lines to be at the same distance from both ends but lately I’ve found myself a way to do that, and it’s relatively quick to do now too.

^Here I have written down the digits from the ruler to know where to draw the little dots that I know to follow with the ruler when I do the lines of the panels. Normally I do just one comic at a time but this time I was feeling like doing all 3 upcoming comics’ lines at one go cos that’s always the most annoying part and after that I don’t need to worry about that anymore (until the next comic idea happens) and I can just focus on the fun part: drawing the stuff inside those panels.

Nowadays I do a whole lot of planning before I get to working, too. Usually just the planning takes about 4-5 pages from my bigger sketchbook and I will write down alternative stuff as I go if I can’t decide over something or am not sure if it’s going to work. Sometimes I write the same dialog a few times because something isn’t working or I can’t fit them into the amount of panels I need, or because there’s not enough activity in the panels and need to discard some parts of the dialog. I usually see my comics in the form of video in my head that I then have to convert into still images, from there I then start to build the pages and try to make all them to match.

I do storyboards in both stick figures, sometimes more than once, as well as in quick sketches. I will plan carefully how many panels I need so that I know how many papers I need and which way I can fit all the panels in the paper(s). That often means either adding or dropping panels to avoid having too much empty space on a page - something I didn’t do before, I just drew the panels somewhere and never really stopped to think about the aesthetics of the comic itself.

^This is an example of my latest comic and how do I do the page planning. I couldn’t fit the events into 3 panels. Originally it was going to be like a comic strip but it was too long for that so I ended up doing a full page (A4) with 4 panels instead. I found this is a working method for me: to draw the paper and see how the “panels” would look like on that. I drew these along with the stick figures and I will often write numbers into the panels to know which part of the dialog/event happens in which panel.

When the actual drawing process starts, I still actively use my sketchbooks (I have two) to practice something I’m not sure how to draw and I will also use reference photos for that. I will also try out things if I only have a shady image in my head and need to see how it really looks like so I might e.g. draw a similar posture a few different ways to see which one of those matches the one in my imagination the best. I will also test colors, layering, blending, shading and all that jazz as well.

^And this is what some of those “studies” look like, these are to the previous comic as well. I usually am not entirely sure what I want until I see it on the paper as sometimes the images in my head are not as vivid and bright as I would want them to be and something might look good there but terrible and wrong on the paper instead. Here I struggled with the coloring because as you can see, I know how to do the proper “night shading” in black and white but it was very tricky to do in color!

So that’s just a quick look at how I do my comics and it really is not that I just grab a fineliners (anymore) and draw and that’s it. There’s pages and pages of careful planning and testing in my sketchbooks, there’s lots of measuring and losing my mind during the measuring-the-lines-for-the-panels part... I sketch the stuff to the panels often two times with pencils, first with just human shaped figures to see the overall pictures and then turning them into characters and adding all the details. After that I move onto the finelining, erase pencil marks and start coloring and doing shadows. When all that is done, I will do the finelining one more time so that the lines are actually black and not faded under the colored pencils.

In the end I do this all basically for myself but I also want to draw “to other people”. No one’s paying me anything so my only payment is to see or hear other people reacting to it. The biggest reward ever that I can get is to hear “that made me laugh!” because that’s why I draw comics. I want to make people laugh. And it isn’t working if no one looks at them, and when no one tells me why no one looks at them. Or at least people don’t let me know they have looked at it, they don’t let me know what they think of them so I am just left with the assumption that people don’t like my art at all and that it’s not worth commenting.

It’s incredibly dishearthening. It feels the same as when a child does something and goes to show them to their parent and the parent is just “yeah whatever”. Or when you are a teen come up with and show or tell it to your friends and everyone is like “I don’t care”. You might have the passion there but slowly it starts to die because you have the need for sharing but everyone is only caring about themselves and not other people anymore. It’s really sad actually.

#mcrmadness' art talk #art #arts #drawing #comics

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comicteaparty · 5 years ago

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March 28th-April 3rd, 2020 Creator Babble Archive

The archive for the Creator Babble chat that occurred from March 28th, 2020 to April 3rd, 2020. The chat focused on the following question:

How many hours do you work on your comic per week, and how do you manager to balance that with other responsibilities?

Holmeaa - working on WAYFINDERS

heheh So we are.. cheating a bit Both me and my coworker are unemployed, and is working on hour comic, like was it a full time job. It is our passion project, and dream that we can work and live of makeing comics. In Denmark you can apply for grants from the government, but you need to have releashed a book before that is possible. We are useing the comic, to show potentional clients in the future what we can do. For now we are working on it from 09:00-17:00 ish (with a long lunch break) while applying for other kinds of grants, and also does all the things we are supposed to to get our unemplyment money, and searching for jobs, and freelance gigs, gathering the courage to start our own small company (not right now though) and yeaah time will tell

carcarchu

@Holmeaa - working on WAYFINDERS that doesn't sound like cheating to me? more like using the tools at your disposal to turn your passion into a viable career

Holmeaa - working on WAYFINDERS

hehe it feels a little like cheating! there are some debates about if it is okay or not, but we think that strengthening our skills is a good use of our time

eli [a winged tale]

Haha also not cheating! It’s great you’re using the time to chase the dream I’m curious what’s your breakdown for those time working on the comic? As for me, usually 1-2 hours a day with a bit more on the weekend if time permits. These days with the quarantine it’s about 2-3 h a day

DanitheCarutor

Since I'm unemployed until who knows when I've been working on my comic between 40-50 hours a week about 6 to 7 days a week... most weeks. Some days, like update day or chore day, I hardly work on the comic or don't work on it at all. Admittedly I'm not the best at balancing drawing with other responsibilities, sometimes I get so into it that I forget about daily house chores, other weeks I do the opposite and only do house chores which makes me totally behind of comic stuff. I can't seem to find a good middle ground, it always turns into completely focusing on one or the other.

eli [a winged tale]

Yeah when I get in the zone, time flies and life gets put to the wayside

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

So I have no school or work, so the webcomic has become almost a fulltime project for me

I average about 10 hours per day working on it, not counting on chores and exercise

Another thing I worry about is the possibility of carpal tunnel syndrome, which is why I've been relentless with exercise, too

I guess it's just a combination of relentless reminders and also sheer willpower that gets me to do other responsibilities haha

@eli [a winged tale] also I know that feeling

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

So since my school had to cancel, I have to be more responsible for my online course. Sometimes I give myself 2 days off each week to work more into my upcoming webcomic but I have to switch my mind for school work, online classes. Also extra time for food. I need to get back into exercise or I feel exhausted more easily. I keep a wall schedule so that I make it a routine to write what I'll do every 3 or 5 days, to keep my active brain reminded(edited)

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I spent the majority of last year (fun)employed (partially by choice, partially not! my previous job let me go rather unceremoniously... and I needed a hiatus anyway... so it worked out) so I poured a lot more hours into that chapter of Phantomarine than I usually did. I worked on it almost every day - at least for a couple of hours, but sometimes up to a full eight-hour day. That number has dipped tremendously since I’ve gone back to work, but I’m spreading the same amount of time out in a broader way. I’m trying to get a good buffer during my hiatus, so I can work and draw in a healthy balance. I don’t have crazy overtime at my current job like I did at my last one, so that’s already a comfort. I’m confident I’ll be able to hit a good stride once the comic returns in June (edited)

eli [a winged tale]

Can’t wait Lady!!

Feather J. Fern

Two part time jobs, and school killed my comic, but I been working on getting one panel done a day, which is around 30minutes to an hour if possible.

eli [a winged tale]

My routine used to be rendering on the commute but now just once in am and once pm until this limbo time is clarified

That’s awesome Feather! It’s so rewarding when everything comes together after putting effort everyday

Feather J. Fern

Once school is done in two more weeks I will be more free to do things so I hope to get maybe two panels done in a day XD

Online school, stupid quarantine

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

Due to the pandemic im mostly off school and my part time job so i spend like 4-5 hours on my comic per day. Still would like try to get a page done per day but lmao digital painting is slowwww

eli [a winged tale]

What’s everyone’s tips for breaks/stretches/balance? I feel like I certainly need to revisit these to avoid burnout and continue feeling motivated!

Feather J. Fern

Actually there was a cool manga artist who's tip was literally he only worked working hours. His mornings are free and since manga was his job, he worked form 12-6, giving him 2 hours to do other work he needs to get done, and takes morning walks and stuff.

Another person I know had "No working weekends" as a thing becuase they are a freelancer.

I personally have try to make sure I ahve a routine, and actually, stretch before drawing.

Streetch before, during a break, and then after, to keep that body nice and warmed up

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Health-wise there's this hing for your : every 20 minutes, look at something 20 feet away for 20 seconds. I'm not good at following this, but when I do it, it helps a lot.

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

Despite the current pandemic, my work-life hasn't changed much (unless you count stress getting in the way). I am currently "unemployed," but I do consider comicking my full-time job. I am also not very good at balancing work and life. Something's always gotta give. Last year, I worked at a job that basically ruined my ability to work on my comic. I worked 30-40 hours typically, ruined my sleep schedule, took work home sometimes, and was constantly exhausted. This is what resulted in my year and a half long hiatus, and it's what drove me to work like hell on my comic when I quit. Now (when I'm in the groove and not suffering from art block), I typically spend 60-70 hours on my comic and get 2-3 pages done: - 30 hours sketching (I know, ridiculous) - 5 hours filling in base colors - 20-25 hours painting - 5 hours adding text, speech bubbles, sfx, and finishing touches - 1-2 hours formatting for Webtoon I also spend some time throughout the week typing up the script, doing concept art for things coming in the future of the comic, and preparing for conventions, but I can't tell you exactly how much time.

eli [a winged tale]

Thanks for the breakdown! I’m always keen to learn from everyone and seeing how the workflow is like for different people

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

oh don't forget to do wrist stretches!

eli [a winged tale]

Ahh formatting time is always so tedious for me!

Yes wrist exercises! Any recommendations?

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

hmmm well the easiest one is literally just shaking it out

like every hour

and I also like to hold my arm out parallel, point my fingers up and using my other hand to pull the fingers back so i'm stretching the wrist

then I point the fingers down and pull on the fingers until my wrist is stretching

eli [a winged tale]

Awesome. Will be adopting those!

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I'm pretty fast. 2-6 hours per page, depending on how detailed it is. Average of 3-4. I could probably do 2 pages/ week easily enough, but don't want to do more than that. I'm the kind of person who always needs to be doing a million different things. I need to leave time for my other hobbies and my paintings and my academics and extracurriculars. Otherwise I'd get burnt out doing one thing only

Holmeaa - working on WAYFINDERS

@eli [a winged tale] So since it is both me and @Q (Wayfinders: Off Course) working, we start with working on a rough each, our goal is one step (so rough, ink, color) for two pages pr day, pr person. So in a weak the goal is four finished pages a week, and then we upload 3 pages per week. So it is divided that in the morning we start at 09:00 in the morning, maybe checking mail, being practical or whatever. Then we work until 12:00 were we eat lunch, go for a long nice walk and then we go back to work between 13:00 and 14:00 ish and then work until 17:00 when we begin to prepare dinner. Then of course breaks inbetween

Q (Wayfinders: Off Course)

It’s pretty wild to be able to dedicate your entire day to comics like that

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

damn you all work fast

do you guys have any tips on how to work on a webcomic faster?

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

Lol, I wish!

Still looking for those magical secrets

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

@shadowhood (SunnyxRain) You know the 80-20 rule? You can get 80% of the result with 20% of the effort? My comic is very messy if you zoom in. I don't spend time making sure the linework or the coloring is perfectly clean. Also, I'm pretty fast at drawing figures. I used to practice figure drawing a lot by rushing to draw strangers irl before they moved, or by drawing a bunch of fast figures from the free figure drawing model websites online. I've also taken a figure drawing course (didn't even have to pay because it was part of my university! Even if you don't have that option you can probably find free life drawing sessions on Meetup or similar!) which really helped me streamline my process for drawing people

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

Oh I see! Yes, I used to take life drawing classes too! And your response makes me feel a lot better

I tend to be a bit messy with inking, and since i'm a perfectionist a lot of my time is wasted on editing/clean up

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I've seen cronaj draw, and while I think the results look excellent, I think her method is a kind of inefficient. She draws like a printer, nearly finishing one detailed body part before moving on the the next. I think maybe if she drew in a more classical way, going from a gesture drawing to progressively more detailed, it might help her be faster and her poses more cohesive and dynamic. Maybe working on 1 or 5 min figures would help? Practicing things like this?

eli [a winged tale]

Yeah I try to do figure practices for efficiency

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

I heard that there are some online life drawing vids you can follow too

but what are your experiences with online life drawing vids versus the real thing

like is there a real difference?

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

found some of my old 1 minutes

To me there's not too much difference

I've heard some people say that life drawing is either way easier or way harder though. Because of your depth perception when looking at a real person

But the bruises on my legs can attest to my horrid depth perception haha. That might be why I don't notice a difference

Actually those previous sketches might be 30 seconds? I don't remember

I would recommend you try both but right now we pretty much only have the online option haha

eli [a winged tale]

Yeah I’ve done both and I think irl creates complexity with depth and the interactions with others etc is helpful but online is my go to for flexibility

I think having a process streamlined will make things more efficient. The downside is that it might feel tedious and I do switch it up from time to time for variety

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Might feel uncomfortable but that's how you know you're improving

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

There is a TON of difference for me. I HAVE to look at a physical model in front of me.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Can't get better if you always do the same things

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

This is what my brain does.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I wonder- could drawing yourself in a mirror be a decent substitute?

If youre lucky you might also be able to ask an SO or roommate to model for you. Should probably pay them back by cooking for them or something though

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Brain: sees a real model in front of me Brain: translates 3D to 2D, result: drawing Brain: sees a photo/video of a model Brain: SHIT. That's supposed to be 3D, isn't it? Brain: Translates 2D to 3D (basically re-constructing it in my head, or attempting to re-construct) so that it can translate it back to 2D Brain: BSOD

There's some online resources out there that have "3D" photos... you know, two near-identical images side by side, so if you look at it cross-eyed, it becomes 3D?

But I can't do those because I get a headache X'D

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Just thinking about drawing from that makes me dizzy

eli [a winged tale]

Oh interesting!

Yeah maybe looking out the window to draw people would be the way to go...

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

But maybe figure drawing in VR exists?

eli [a winged tale]

Balcony figure drawings

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I live on the top floor so those are going to be some very small figures

eli [a winged tale]

For ants

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Once this coronavirus thing is over, there's lots of ways you can do gesture drawings from just random people -- bus stops, cafes, museums (I have not done this, but people who have done this report this is really good because others assume you're drawing the artworks. XD)

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I've done this a lot

Sometimes I've even shown people drawing of themselves if they've turned out particularly nice

They've always taken it well

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

I like drawing my professors because they use hand gestures a lot when they talk

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Airport was REALLY good for finding people stuck in one pose indefinitely

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

they alwayas laugh when I show them

eli [a winged tale]

Shadow omg I do that too

Draws classmates

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

yeah the only issue i have with drawing classmates

is that they're always doing the "i'm using my phone" pose

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

Become the master of drawing people on their phones

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Maybe try drawing children on the playground?

This works better if you're a woman

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

oh thank jesus

I also like going to the zoo or the museum

or the aquarium if i'm feeling adventurous

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I am a University student so I also have some pretty interestng drawings of people asleep in weird poses

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I really need to start going to weekly figure drawing sessions once this is over (there's one here... 20 min drive... 8AM Saturdays )

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

ditto or just go to the park and draw

and @Eightfish (Puppeteer) I've had some.....weird poses from all my profs

one guy was incredibly hard to draw; he was VERY enthusiastic about showing us knife skills

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

The parks here are too spacious, to a degree where it's weird to get close enough to people

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Bring binoculars

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

Don't worry ma'am I'm an artist

nothing sketchy

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

(except my sketch)

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

A+ pun right there

another place to go for figure drawing

theaters

like.....opera/plays

I once tried drawing the men dancing in the Newsies musical

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Tried that once, but it took me out of the performance

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

same i was dazzled by dancing men

aaaaand then i abandoned sketching at all when they started throwing newspaper strips into the audience

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

But they were giving you free paper!

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

THEY WERE

i'll take what i can get

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

@Eightfish (Puppeteer) While I agree that my method of drawing is "inefficient," I do not draw like a printer. There are videos of people drawing like a printer and it's not what I'm doing. I have done gesture drawing before, but it always looked incredibly abstract, and not quite like people, which is fine, but not what I'm going for. I treat gesture drawing like a warm-up exercise. It doesn't really do anything for my end result, but gets my drawing muscles stretched out.(edited)

eli [a winged tale]

Gesture drawings are definitely a good warmup!

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Perhaps it was an inappropriate analogy. What works for me I guess wouldn't work for everyone. I was trying to offer advice because whenever you talk about how much time you spend on art and you work life balance it's commendable but also dismaying. I hope you find something that works for you in the future

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

Oh god.. I sometimes work 6 hours a day. I guess thats like 30 hours a week? Crazy to think about, it's like a full job

Oooh you guys are sharing figure drawings... I swant to show some of mine

Behold

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

My figure drawing usually breaks down into like, medical anatomy study. I feel like I understand body shapes better by including the muscles & bones

carcarchu

ABS the most important figure study

Deo101 [Millennium]

ah figure drawing? I love figure drawing ^^

I do like a lot but this kinda thing is most of it

anyways as for the question at hand, I do a lot of different things for my comics weekly. My millennium pages take me 2-6 hours i would say, but I also have patreon things I need to do so I'd say i spend 10-15 hours on it a week. for my other comic, I spend about 6 hours an update, and it updates every other week. but honestly, all of my free time goes to assorted comics. If i'm not working on school work or chatting with people, I'm working on things for patreon, potential merch, or other comics I want to start sometime.

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

Oooh nice poses!!’

Deo101 [Millennium]

thanks!! I have a ton of gesture/figure drawings but these ones are my most recent that I have saved to my computer i think

10 minutes im pretty sure. very good for speeding up

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

Those look really nice, good values

Deo101 [Millennium]

thanks ^^ I really hate working in charcoal honestly, it kinda always winds up hurting my body somehow, but its very quick sooooooo

kayotics

My answer for the prompt question has changed a lot since I started quarantine lmao... I used to do about 10 hours of work throughout the week on my comic page (usually after work, I have an office job) but ironically it’s gotten harder while I work from home. I’ve been struggling to find time since I don’t have a separation between work and home now, and putting the boundaries up of “I’m not always available” to coworkers is difficult.

Also on figure studies: they’re a great way to practice speed. I use the concepts of figure drawings all the time.

RebelVampire

@kayotics As someone who always works from home doing remote contract work, I have to say I think this is something a lot of people underestimate about work at home life. In that it's sometimes really difficult to establish boundaries with ppl and make them understand you aren't always available and also aren't gonna work billions of hours of overtime. So I'm sorry to hear that's affecting your comic work.

Shadowmark Productions

I work anywhere from 6-8 hours a day on comic stuff. That’s an average though. Sometimes I slack and need to pull all nighters to make up for it. Yes, I am terrible at time management. They say entrepreneurs are the only people willing to work 80 hours a week for themselves so they do not have to work 40 hours a week for someone else. I guess webcomic creators are the only people willing to work 80+ hours a week so that they can... go to work for someone else afterwards

AntiBunny

4 days of procrastinating, 1 of procrastinating and hating myself, and 2 of actual comic drawing seems to make up my weekly comic making schedule. :p

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

I can only imagine how stressed I would be if I forced myself to update weekly

Cap’n Lee (Flowerlark Studios)

This is a hard question to answer because it varies a lot depending on my energy levels. Ideally I’d spend several hours a day on comics, but realistically I draw as much as possible when I have the energy (5+ hours a day for as many days in a row as I can handle it) and then go weeks or months too tired to do comics. On average, barring any long periods of exhaustion or other interruptions from RL, I spend about 20+ hours a week making pages for my comics.

sagaholmgaard

I prefer to work on my comic for about an hour ever morning and maybe 2-3 hours in the evening, that's the ideal routine for me. Right now I sadly have a lot of schoolwork to do (writing my thesis) so i might get less than 30 minutes in the morning and then feel rlly tired in the evening so I dont get as much time then either. but oh well!

I can still work for 4-5 hours on the weekends so I manage ^^(edited)

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

The whole stay-indoors order's currently completely wrecked my pattern, but before that I did between 3-4 hours a day.

Shadowmark Productions

Can’t imagine the stress of a daily or even weekly posting schedule. Hats off.

#ctparchive #comics #webcomics #indie comics #comic chat #comic discussion #creator babble #creator interview #comic creator interview #comic tea party #ctp

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teamyellremade · 5 years ago

Text

my actual comic process goes something like this though:

[slight body horror CW for some of the examples!]

STEP 0: SCRIPTING

(aka i only do this step when i actually have the motivation to write)

this step isn’t actually necessary in my process, but if i want the page to look super polished OR if i have a vision for a comic that i don’t feel like drawing right away i’ll try to write a brief script for it so i don’t forget it.

the script varies in length and detail from stuff like:

PAGE ONE:

Panel 1:

Overhead establishing shot of (protagonist).

to something along the lines of:

PAGE ONE

Panel 1:

A quiet hush over a modest-sized two-story house. It’s the middle of the night, and the entire world seems to stand still. The stars are very clearly visible overhead, though no moon can be seen. The house sits on a quaint street in a small city. Cobblestone streets weave through the array of other homes that surround it. A faint glow from the candlelight that illuminates a room on the bottom floor can be seen.

CAPTION: It was a clear winter night when I died.

STEP 1: THUMBNAILING

preferably, i like to do this step traditionally. there’s something about it that’s easier for me to get my thoughts down when it’s on paper. but i can also do it digitally when i am too lazy to work with pencil and paper.

i try to work very vague and loose with thumbnails, just to get a sense of the composition and how the page will look as a whole.

STEP 2: ROUGHS (part one)

this is where i start adding in a bit more detail. defining characteristics and features for the characters, a loose sketch of the background, maybe some tones and shading.

i still try to keep it fairly loose however! there is plenty more time to refine later on in the process, and i don’t want to get too attached to one composition because i spent so long detailing it!

STEP 3: ROUGHS................................2!

this and step 2 are sometimes interchangeable to expedite the process. this is where i start to finalize the compositions for each panel by adding even more detail.

STEP FOUR: INKS?

sometimes i skip this step for my lineless comics and go straight to flat colors. it’s pretty self-explanatory though!

STEP FIVE: FLAT COLORS

again, pretty self-explanatory. this stage blends into my shading and polish stage when i am working with lineless comics, since i do both as i work on each panel.

STEP SIX: SHADING AND POLISH

and now we have a finished comic page! the amount of polish i add depends on how detailed i am willing to be, and how much time i want to spend on it.

#wips

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franeridart · 7 years ago

Note

Me: *has notifications on for when you post something* Also me: *checks your blog every day in case I missed something*

Ahhhhhh thank you!!! I’m sorry lately I’ve been less active, haven’t I orz a mixture of being busy and uninspired #rip I’ll try to do better!!

Anon said:I love how you draw kiri in casual clothes he looks so cool and cute! Eventhough it's canon he's a fashion disaster haha

Thank you!!! But actually I base my designs for Kirishima’s casual clothes completely on his official casual clothes (which is to say, his shifuku) and the stuff he’s worn in canon already ( x x x x x ) - people consider him a fashion disaster for the crocs, mostly, and I guess the patterns of his shirts? Ah, personally I don’t dislike either so I guess he doesn’t come off as a disaster in my doodles hahaha

Anon said:Idk why, but theres one panel of that one comic where bakugou and kirishima are little kids in the fantasy au and bakugou takes kirishima home and Mitsui is just like "..... " but her expression says "well shit" just makes me laugh. It brings me great joy. Idk why I'm telling you this, but have a great day! Ily and your art!

Thank you so so much!!!!! Mitsuki was so much fun to draw there, I’m really glad the expression came out right hahaha

Anon said:Dopo aver letto le FAQ, ripeto tutti i complimenti in italiano, visto che meriti decisamente un elogio multilingue :-P E tra parentesi, inglese eccellente! Mai avrei sospettato che non fosse la tua lingua madre.

AHHHHHHHHHH GRAZIE MILLE!!!!!!! Anche per il complimento sull’inglese hahaha scrivere fic in inglese mi ha probabilmente aiutata un bel po’ in quel senso lmao

Anon said:Another abuse of the "ask" function, but boy, your Kiribaku art makes me feel so happy and fluffy and giddy and they are even in-character!! Thank you so much.

THANK YOU !!!!! it always makes me so incredibly happy to know my characterization is okay!!! ;^;

Anon said:i finally got to the bottom of your bakushima tag and lemme tell you: it was totally worth all of the time spent.

MAN that must have taken way longer than it deserved hahaha but I’m glad you enjoyed it!!!! Even if I’m sure the further back you went the worse everything was..... rip lmao

Anon said:THAT RED SHIRT BAKUGOU S L A Y E D ME!!! GOTTA LOVE BAKUGOU IN HIS BF'S COLORS!!!!!

I dunno which one this is about but hell yes the more red Bakugou wears the happier my heart is!!!!!

Anon said:i can’t believe i’ve been following you since haikyuu!! era. like,,,, ily a lot bro

Knowing that you’ve been following me that long I gotta say I love you a whole damn lot too??? thank you so much seriously !!!! ;^;

Anon said:I found the mug from one of your Kiribaku dad comics! (The one that says "Welcome to the Gun Show")

I genuinely hope you didn’t make the ill decision of buying it, anon lmao

Anon said:Todomomobaku gives me life aaakskglh

It was absolutely not meant as romantic but thank you for liking it!!!!!!!!!!! That specific doodle got so much love and I’m so glad for it cause that friend group makes probably little sense by canon but I love it so much? Drawing it made me super happy so I’m happy you liked it!!

Anon said:I just came back from watching the Incredibles and no matter which AU you are, you'll always find politics messing with the job of the heroes. BNHA heroes and TI heroes need a coffee break to chat tohether 9_9.

I still haven’t watched TI2 but hell yes I feel this ask ;-;

Anon said:(Bakushima kids thing) did mako get into UA? If so did she make some new friends right away and/or fall head over heels for a scary/angry looking girl in the new class(fallowing in Pappa’s footsteps)? In either case, what were Bakugou and Kirishima’s first impression on them/her?

Mako’s seven lmao she barely started elementary school, she definitely didn’t get into UA just yet hahaha

Anon said:Awh Sero looks so lonely in that pic

He isn’t! He’s waiting for Ashido, they’re going on a date he doesn’t know it’s a date but it’s definitely a Date™, Ashido will make sure he realizes by the end of it *thumb up*

Anon said:Do you have any ideas for gender-bend Bakugou and Kirishima? Like what they would look like, how to their personalities would change, stuff like that. Sorry if I’m bothering you

I’d lie if I said I don’t have a couple of doodles saved somewhere in my art folder, but to be fair my gb Baku and Kiri are... exactly like Baku and Kiri, I wouldn’t really change them all that much, so I never find it much worth it to talk about it? I think Bakugou might have been a bit different in backstory since being a girl would have made people less, uh, sure he was destined to beat All Might or whatever, but in general he’d stay the same imho. Kiri too, he wouldn’t change all that much either. Their designs also, their quirks require them to be buff after all. I dunno man I just don’t think them being girls would change all that much about them so my ideas on this specific aus are always a bit eh, sorry!

Anon said:Fran! Don't read if you didn't see episode 11! How do you interpret that Kirishima try to hold the hand of Bakugou aroud the end of the ep? I mean: objectively?

That was actually a small variation of a scene already present in the manga (central panel here) so being as objective as I can be I’d say it was just bones playing on how much fans love the ship - that said, it’s still canon to the manga that Kirishima didn’t trust Bakugou where he couldn’t keep his hands on him and make sure he was there and safe? That’s adorable and I’ve been crying over that for two years now ;^;

Anon said:During a time I've been too depressed to make it to my counseling appointments or to my follow up appointments to get back on my meds, your art, quite especially your doodle comics, makes me smile. It's not really worth much, and I wish I could support you more, your sketches and doodles and full pieces and everything you draw, just really helps. You don't have to respond. Just please don't stop creating.

Thank you so so so much for this ask, anon ;-; and I’m really sorry you’re going through a hard time right now, but let’s be strong together okay? *holds*

Anon said:I’m so happy to see that you don’t draw noses because I can’t draw them and I never add them to my art and it makes me feel better knowing that I’m not the only one😭😂

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! noses are hard to draw aren’t they? they’re so hard!!! so incredibly hard!!!! I keep on trying to find a way to go about them I’m satisfied with but it just isn’t working!!!! Until I find one it’s noseless art for me hahaha

Anon said:Your art made me realize I’m bisexual so........ thanks bro ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜

I don’t know how that happened but this is the best ask I’ve ever gotten ever?? you’re very very welcom my friend !!!!!!!

Anon said:Your art makes me so happy whenever I see it. The style is just so soft and sweet and comforting and I love it a lot. I have no money rn but soon I would love to buy some of the stuff you have for sale 😄💖💖

AHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thank you so much both for the compliments and the nice feeling, anon!!!!!!!!!!!!!

#fran answers #look at me staying on top of this whole asks deal like someone with their life put together #go me #!!!#talking about fashion disaster kiri #i think whether he is or not is too tied to personal tastes for it to be canon or not #unless someone in canon told him he doesn't know how to dress i guess?#anyway what i mean is my answer up there wasn't meant to say people are inherently wrong when calling him a disaster #i mostly just meant i don't share the opinion lmao #i actually really really like his style it fits him so nicely!#anonymous

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onthestraightandnarrowpath · 7 years ago

Photo

JayTim Week Day 7: Space AU.

Or Secretly Dating AU. Or for the free prompt day, Historical AU. Leave it to me to give myself three opportunities to post, but really know that it was totally going to be on the last day possible.

Guess how many other responsibilities that I have shirked today? 😃 (But nothing that can’t be fixed tomorrow. Because, honestly, it’s gonna have to be fixed tomorrow, oh boy).

Apologies for the quality - I have really got to work in smaller image sizes - please full view for crisp (ish) lines! Also any tips for making large files smaller would be very helpful (in Photoshop).

Read more for ramblings, because let’s face it, I love deconstructing my work (which is an open invitation for someone to dialogue with me, hey hey 😉).

Watch out, I didn’t mean for this to be 1000ish words long, but here we are anyway…

First up, I visited Houston uuuuh, two months ago ish, and went to see Space Center Houston, got some tours around NASA, listened to some people really excited about space and the history of space exploration, and what do you know, I was enthralled.

I’ve always really loved space, and stars, and that movie Apollo 13 with Tom Hanks in it, but I’d never really gotten a full understanding of what the “Space Race” really meant, against the Russians and everything. 1960’s America poured literally everything in to go to the moon, spending what would have been trillions today to make that 1969 moonwalk happen.

A few people died to do this because space travel is dangerous, and I was low key going to put Jason in Apollo 1, which, ahem, was the one that suffocated it’s crew due to a fire that broke out in the capsule one the landing pad – the fire was put out quickly I believe, but because the Velcro in there had melted, the fumes made the air toxic – but I didn’t really want to do that just because we all know Jason dies.

So I decided to put Jason in Apollo 10 – Apollo 8 was a milestone in that it was the first time humans had orbited the moon, and Apollo 11 was the “Eagle has landed” (first man on the moon) and also too much of a milestone to touch by clumsily inserting in DC characters. I’ve set this in like an alternate history very similar to our own, so Apollo 10 – the mission that was a trial run for walking on the moon – seemed like a good compromise. That’s why Tim’s saying “Don’t go into the [Lunar Module]” – not because they didn’t fill it with enough fuel to get back off the surface of the moon, but because they didn’t want any fame-happy astronauts walking on the moon (or being on the surface on the moon via the LM) before NASA was ready (what if something goes wrong?).

I think that also captures, to me, Tim – definitely willing to lie to the person he loves to keep them safe. Tim here is Capcom, capsule communication – I’m pretty sure I got his desk position correct. He would be the main guy in the astronauts ears throughout the mission (it’s easier to listen to one person giving you instructions that a roomful) – so he’s got his oracle-like role like fanon likes to have him – so that’s why he’s telling Jason he’s going to bring him home, because he’s going to be the one to lead them in what they need to do. NASA liked to have other astronauts as Capcom, mostly because they’d use the same ‘language’ and be understood easier as they’ve trained together, so I like the idea that Tim is probably slated for Apollo 12 in this AU.

(I wrote LEM on there for Lunar Module – I liked LEM because that’s how it’s pronounced, but wasn’t sure whether to keep it upper-case – LEM stands for Lunar Excursion Module, and I can’t think off the top of my head whether LEM was first, or LM was first in terms of terminology).

The other guy there is in the PR position, publicity or something. I’m not sure who it is, might just be some rando, but I put a blonde head there because I like Gar (Beastboy) and his aspiration to be an actor. 😊

Also, like the thing I’m most proud of in this mini comic is Jason’s right hand. He’s placed it on the console because he wants to casually lean, but he also really wanted to touch Tim but stopped himself just in time because what a scandal it would be if it were found out that one of America’s top hopes, an astronaut, were gay (again, I don’t know much about the climate with homophobia in 1960s so I’m just supposing). So Jason just is kind of flexing his hand in panels 2 and 3 waiting for the other guy to leave. Then the hand indicates that Jason’s stepping forward, he’s ready to reach out to Tim, but tentative at the same time. Tim isn’t shy at all, and comes straight up to place his hand on the Apollo 11 patch, thus giving Jay to confidence to finally pull Tim in, in such a public place.

Uh, yeah, this is set the night before Apollo 11 launch, May 18th 1969, honestly I have no idea what they would be doing to prepare for the launch the night before, so this was my best bet.

Most of the rest is that I just ran out of time for anything else – the consoles in the background should all have monitors and buttons and shading on them, but I didn’t draw them in my traditional-medium inking phase, and I literally spent 2 hours on word bubbles and 4 hours on photoshop washing and shading in the past two days so, I’m just happy it’s finished. : D (I’d done the sketching and inking for like 30 min bursts in like 2 weeks, back a month ago when I had tiiiiiiiime…..they still came out derpy though omg).

Also like to point out what a learning experience this was – I’ve done a few comic layouts before, but never cleaned them up to this extent, and it was so different cause I had to keep in mind Tumblr’s scrolling system – I didn’t want to put up a layout that was 8 panels in one picture and impossible to read, so I hadn’t ever done that before. Still not convinced I have great linking action or anything, but I am confident that it gets the point across. (Maybe not so confident considering the length of this ramble, but thank you so much if you’ve stuck with me this far XD).

#jaytimweek #jaytimweek2018 #Tim Drake #Jason Todd #myart #Space AU #Historical mission control #digital art #comic panels #mini comic #this took too long to write #why did I do that to myself #I did enjoy the drawing process though #I know all the positions are static and not all that great #but small steps to action scenes okay #spaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaace

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bucketofchum · 7 years ago

Text

So I had this kind of strange, elaborate underwater torture experiment testing mind control dream. It was through my perspective, so I was…consciously me? But I was supposed to be Atumu. Like it might have been his body, but it was me in there. Idk. [Dream under cut]

I don’t remember how we got there, but it was the three of us brothers, me, Atemu, and Yumi. I remember Atemu entering with us, going through the beginning of the process, but by the middle of the dream, I don’t know where he went. Yumi was with me until the .. actual torture scenes.

There was a large pool – like a swim tank. By this point, we were already more of less under their control. But it was a loose sort of control. Like our will was under their control but our thoughts were relatively free? All I could recall regarding that was that we were allowed to roam free around the premises – when we came to this place, we thought that was strange. That there were so many people just walking around, freely being experimented on. I think we got caught snooping and that’s how this all started.

Anyhow, it seems that all the subjects are free to walk around, without shackles or guards, because they don’t have the will to escape. They have only the will to be compliant and to help continue the steps of the experiment, and so they continue about their path like clockwork. Numbly going from one station to the next, completing tasks as they should, and getting checkups.

I think it started with an initial health screening. We laid on a cold metal slab of a platform and they took our fluids to assess the levels of…idk. A lot of things? These were values they would check up on and update after every round of testing. Possibly to see what effects their experiment had on the human body – for various endpoints.

The task at hand was timed. We were to go underwater – had a minute to swim down to the other end of the pool – at the bottom, there was a sign – an image. Usually a series of images. We could bring down a notebook to sketch out or take notes on the image. And when we got back up above water, we had one minute to recount in explicit detail all the things on the image/series of images. There was also a component before the underwater part. There was an above water set of images that primed us for what we’d see at the bottom of the pool (the pool was some 25-30 feet deep [~10 meters], so it wasn’t a shallow pool at all – and standard length).

I can only recall the first image I did – it was some images in a 4 panel comic format; 3 of them had content (image and text), and the 3rd was explanatory (it also had image and text, but was in a different format). The text was scratchy block letters in yellow with green accents, and the background was black. The picture was of a disturbingly veiny cat – just the lineart of it. The text read something explaining the experiment and the three other panels (which were just kind of lineart). I had to essentially recall enough of this poster to describe it with enough detail to recreate it completely when I was above water.

I remember when I first hit the water, I was struggling to get a solid breath. Because apparently we don’t have control over when our bodies are dragged under water – it happens automatically with incredible speed (because tbh to be able to swim the length of a full Olympic sized swimming pool AND swim down 10 meters, that would take up… the entire minute and then some).

I’m almost certain I spent a lot more than 1 minute under there. And by almost certain I mean absolutely certain. I was underwater for probably close to 2.5 minutes if not more.

Somehow, I had a little bit of air still trapped in one of my nostrils – I could “breathe” underwater with this little bit of air, but if I inhaled too much, I’d inhale water and get water in my lungs and…die. Still, I knew I was running out of air – and fast. I hadn’t even gotten to the image by the time I thought I’d run out of air twice.

Maybe being physiologically Atumu took over once I got to the image because I stopped thinking about air. Just the task at hand. It was incredibly stressful. I had to draw and write down with incredible detail the many aspects of the set of images I was seeing and there was… so much. I ended up completely reproducing the first image on my notepad before I realised I had used up a lot of time doing that. I hadn’t even begun to look at the other 3 panels. I was getting light headed as I scrawled out some words in terrible handwriting for the other three, as well as some hard-to-decipher shapes and scratches that were supposed to represent the position of the parts depicted in the image. Like a storyboard. It felt like I was down there for close to 5-6 minutes, idk.

When I surfaced, I gave my account as prompted, and proceeded to another room for a physical examination/another health checkup. It was this room that I had vaguely recalled from earlier – this was the room we had seen and contemplated why the subjects were not leaving. I realised now. We were those subjects. We weren’t leaving. Hm.

This is a bit of a tangent but… I had… kind of like sheets of glass/ice coming off of my body? Idk why or how. But like attached to my foot was a decently thick sheet of glass/ice that I broke off and tried to sort of file down to make it smooth again where the surface of my skin was. Yumi walked over to remark that he had seen me crying? And I made a sheet of glass/ice from crying? Earlier, that is. Around the time of the above water task. I can barely recall it but I guess it must be true. I’m feeling alright now – a bit numb maybe. I remember cutting off a pretty big chunk of the glass/ice and remarking how clear it was to look through. Idk. Irrelevant.

Yumi and I compared notes (our underwater notebooks) and he was amazed at the amount of detail with which I replicated the first image. Yes, but that was why I ran out of time and I should have planned my time better.

It seemed okay.

But then the “flashforwards” started happening. Incoherent scenes, snippets, just flashing. It wasn’t a narrative set up like the previous portion of the dream.

The tests get significantly harder. Instead of a series of images, they become videos. The videos become increasingly long and complex. It is very difficult to recall with tremendous accuracy every aspect of the videos. The colours, the characters, the moving figures in the background, the text.. it’s just a lot. And there are repercussions now too. As I am unable to come up with all the details required, I am punished with shock treatment. This too progressively worsens. As far as I can tell, Yumi is not facing similar treatment, and I am grateful for that I guess.

But anyhow, it’s around this point that I wake up.

Mm, like I said, I tend to be able to feel physical pain in my dreams and often times the pain is enough to wake me up. So there’s that.

#dreams #hello welcome to my Hellish Atumu Dreams

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lk-mitogen · 7 years ago

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I’ve been thinking about my comic making process lately.

(just a rant for myself -- I’d post it on livejournal but I forgot my password =w=)

I love drawing comics. Sequential art is something I genuinely love above all other story telling forms. You can be artist, writer, director, producer — every single job in one. In a single panel you can reveal what would take paragraphs in a novel, or minutes in a film. A single microexpression and you convey oceans. I love it, I love it.

But it takes time to create. An expontential amount of time relative to how long it takes to consume it. A panel that took you hours takes less than a second to digest. The creation:consumption ratio is massive. And I have a life outside art -- I’m a med student entering fourth year. Time is not something I have in spades, y’know? I have to be realistic in how much time I can invest in a hobby.

I’ve had the same concern before, so over the years I’ve gotten extremely efficient at every step of the process. I am very, very fast at what I do. I remember a single page of my DMC comic taking me 4-6 hours, and I was already very fast for I updated four times a week when most webcomics updated once a week (if even that much, then).

Hell, I remember drawing my Kingdom Hearts comic in 2006 and spending HOURS per page when each page was functionally a tiny 350x450 panel. And!! I used to thumbnail stuff. I used to write down the dialogue and doodle concept thumbnails — the whole shebang. To get from idea to delivery, it took so much time compared to how long it took to glance at it and understand.

Now? I crunch everything. I come up with an idea and I immediately start drawing the final lineart. Sometimes I quickly ghost a sketch but it takes me seconds. I can draw a panel in 10 minutes. I can create dialogue on the fly. I have an end goal, but I let my hand wander on how to get there, so the story becomes organic, more natural to consume instead of carefully tailored. I like it! I like what I’m doing.

It keeps me entertained, too. Before, I used to micro-plan every single line of dialogue, every single nuanced change of expression, hours before I ever put my pen to paper. I was already exhausted and bored of the story before I had begun, because I knew how everything would work out, and then it was just a chore to draw it. It was work with no fun. And then posting it gave me feedback of course, but it was never proportional to the amount of energy I’d expended to put it out there.

Now I fly by the seat of my pants and I learn the story as I show it to my readers. It’s super engaging, it’s fast and snappy and the payoff is more equal to the amount of energy I put in, sometimes even greater. Plus, I can juggle it with my studying and class. I can handle it and do well in life outside art.

But.

Because I don’t plan my stories out well, because I let my hand do whatever if wants at the moment it touches the tablet, I don’t thread the story together as coherently as a well planned final product would be. And always, in retrospect, I wince and want to change things but it’s already done, it’s already polished and posted. This is what the planning stage is for, I chastise myself in frustration. You’re supposed to iron out the kinks and tie together threads ages before you start drawing so you don’t have to erase so much work.

But my brain is like a train — either you keep going or you fall off the rails, and good luck trying to get that lazy mammoth back on its tracks.

And I know my brain — it’ll come back within 3-6 months with the same fervor, and I’ll chug along for a while before burning out and rinse and repeat. It’s how I’ve been drawing the same DMC comic for 8 years going on 9, now. I wax and wane and slowly something coherent is crafted, something I cared for and raised and enjoyed creating.

But webcomics can’t be done like that and keep an audience engaged. You can’t post at a dumbass unpredictable rhythm if you want your readers to keep reading while your work is a WIP.

So my mantras are “you have to be fast, consistent, efficient — plan just enough to have a goal but not too much that you lose interest” and “if you fuck up, you can’t retcon, so try as hard as you can not to fuck up — else, from your gamut of options, make the best of your mistake: just be decisive and stick with it”.

But what if your fuck up is such a dumb cockup? I’m fully capable of erasing hours upon hours of work with just grit teeth for the sake of the story, but I’ve already posted it. I’ve already strung people along for a good long while with it.

It’s a dumb frustration, honestly. I’m the master of my own story. I can do whatever I want...

I’m losing steam. Where was I going with this again? Haha, you can start to see the flaws in my creative process just by reading this semi-coherent rant that was ill-planned and executed on the fly.

Let’s stop writing prose and start writing bulletpoints. Maybe that’ll help.

Don’t sacrifice good planning for speed, or you’ll regret it in the future. Be okay with sinking in the time to thumbnail and dialogue before you open photoshop. Use your school square notebook, like you used to. It’s okay. It’ll save you time in the long run.

Set realistic update speeds. You could do daily over the summer, but you can’t anymore. Be okay with that. When you were a kid you read webcomics that updated one measly page a week and you were hooked for years. If the story is good, folks won’t lose interest. Make sure the story is good.

Be okay with indulging yourself in however dark you want to take it. Not everything has to be kept pure simply because a lot of people have become invested in it and you’re worried about their feelings. Your primary audience is YOU. What would YOU like to read?

If you cockup and you’re losing steam because of the cockup, RETCON IT. This is YOUR story. You don’t have to delete what you fucked up from the internet if you don’t want to, since you spent time on it and its otherwise good; you can just label it as “unused” or “reworked” and cut it off from the index and it can exist as a discarded draft.

For fuck’s sake, have fun. This isn’t a job, you dumbass, this is what you do during your minuscule amounts of free time. Don’t tie yourself into knots over it. That’s what pathology homework is for XD

#doodle diary #(no art in this diary entry)#(just a stream of consciousness type word vomit)

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templeofgeek · 7 years ago

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Artist Caleb King, sat down with us and spoke about art, cons, books, and all things Geek!

When did you first realize you had a talent for art?

My father wanted to be an illustrator. Growing up, I would see him draw and paint tanks, and airplanes, and World War II vehicles. I thought it was awesome watching him draw an paint. Around 1993, I met with a friend who introduced me to comics for the first time. I had heard of characters like Batman and Superman, but had never read a comic. Suddenly, I wanted to draw like that. I wanted to make characters as cool as the ones I saw on the pages of these comics. Combine that with the wonder I felt watching my father paint in watercolors for a little project he had to do, and the spark was lit. I started sketching all the time. I rarely went anywhere without a sketchbook and pencils. I would copy panels out of comics, or trading cards I collected. I started devouring anything I could find that was in the comic book realm. Flash forward several years, and I had been touring with my band for a number of years, and we were beginning to wind down our touring schedule. We had been playing 200+ shows a year, and were burning out. But through all that time on the road, all those tours, I had been sketching, and drawing. I began making up stories and creating characters, and wanting to bring them to life. I decided to use the down time from touring to go study at the American Academy of Art in Chicago. Four years later, I walked away with a BFA in Illustration, and began sketching the characters, and writing the story that would become Surreality, my first comic. So, long answer to a simple question. Ha! I guess I never really thought I had a talent for art, but I had a determination to make it happen. I work hard at my craft, and I desire to be better. I’m always chasing that elusive image in my head. Hopefully I never catch it.

When did you realize you could take you talent and turn it into a career?

I learned in school that we need to be driven to succeed at being an illustrator. We needed to go out in search of clients, as they were extremely unlikely to come to us, especially as new artists in a market like Chicago. I had mentioned my travels with my band. I spent the years between 1998-2005 on the road with them. It started slowly, with maybe 25 gigs in a year, and then blew up into a full blown 220+ days on the road for 3-4 years solid. It was nuts. We had a tour bus with beds, television, fridge, the works. We would drive to a gig, load in and set up, play, tear down, and drive to the next gig. We slept in the bus, and had hotels for the down days between gigs. It was awesome and terrible. I saw so much of the country in those years. Met a lot of cool people. I figured out who I was on the road. Part of the gig was hanging out at our merchandise table after the show to meet fans and sign autographs. I learned how to interact with people, how to talk to them. I learned how to be a real person, and still be a professional. I learned the ropes of making a merchandise display, and a bit of retail flair. When I graduated from the Academy, I took those same skills and applied them to my convention display. I had to learn the ropes of the convention circuit, but that was easy enough. Selling CDs and t-shirts at gigs was essentially the same thing as selling illustrations at a comic con.

Were you always into geeky things?

As far as I can remember, I’ve always had a love affair with Star Wars. I’ve never known a time when I didn’t love it. My father introduced me to all kinds of things growing up. Star Wars, Star Trek, George Romero’s movies, Mad Max. The list goes on and on. I’m grateful for those things.

Which Characters/Universe do you prefer painting the most?

I tend towards drawing Star Wars characters, and the Endless from The Sandman comic series, my all time favorite comic series, by the way. I can always find something new and exciting to draw from these sources. It usually sparks my creativity to work on something original.

You’re also working on a couple books, like Verse/Chorus and Cradle, which comes more naturally for you writing or painting?

I’ve always been a natural storyteller. I’ve been making up stories since I was a kid. In a way, it’s my first artistic language, though I have had no real training as a writer. I’ve read a lot, and I still read a lot, so I feel I’ve learned by absorbing the work of other storytellers. Hopefully it informs my writing on a subconscious level as well as in a tangible way. Drawing and painting is another natural language, but one that came from more work and focus. Music/Writing/Painting, they all seem to have chosen me.

illustrated by Nicolas R. Giacondino

Tell us more about Verse/Chorus and Cradle, where did it all start, where did the vision for each come from?

Verse/Chorus is a collaboration between myself, and my good friend Nicolas R. Giacondino. Nic and I met several years before while he was working on a creator owned project with fellow creator David Pauwels called Free Mars. David and I met at a comic con in Chicago, and he had asked me to do some work on Free Mars, though that never came to fruition. What did come of that, however, was a collaboration between Nic and myself that eventually led to him being the full time artist on Surreality, and the beginning of our first creator owned project, Verse/Chorus. Nic had posted an image he created on Facebook one night that was inspired by the Guns N’ Roses song “Estranged.” I loved the image, but also loved that he and I had a common musical interest. The chatted about bands for an hour or more, and Nic then made the comment that we should make a story about a rock band in that late 80’s, early 90’s period. Almost immediately, I came up with the concept of the book: A rock band that sells their soul to the devil for fame and fortune, only to lose it, and their lives, as fast as they got it. It is slated to come out in early 2018 from Source Point Press.

Cradle is a collaboration between myself and fellow creator Andrew Day. We both love outer space. We can talk stars, planets, black holes, and all manner of heavenly objects for hours. I had this concept that is based partly upon Fermi’s Paradox, which simply asks that if the universe is teeming with life, then why can’t we see evidence of it in space? Where are the colonies? Where are the structures? We could argue about the “evidence” of alien life, but that’s not the point. I like that question. I like that concept. I also had been reading about the concept of The Great Filter: a moment in the evolution of life/a species/a civilization whereby said life/species/civilization must pass through this filter and come out on the other side, or else perish. This filter can be many things, but it is a theoretical moment that all must pass through. The reason that we don’t see evidence of life in space, as one theory states, is that the have all failed to pass through this great filter. They all died out before they could become anything. Life failed the test. Cradle takes place in the far distant future, where humanity has colonized a majority of the Milky Way. They have long forgotten Earth, and out little part of the galaxy is empty. Cradle details the last days of mankind in a universe devoid of all other life forms, save humans. They only wish they could have seen it coming.

#gallery-0-5 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-5 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-5 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-5 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

illustrated by Nicolas R. Giacondino

You also have “Surreality” your on going web-comic, about a daydreaming slacker. Did the inspiration for Sydney come from someone you know?

Surreality is the most personal story I’ve ever told. It is based on life experiences, fears, situations, and hopes I’ve had. All of the characters are based on aspects of my personality. Each of them are true parts of myself. When telling a story, you have to selectively edit reality, and distill it into something meaningful. It needs to flow better than reality does. I a very real and tangible manner, Surreality is my life. It’s also your life, and the lives of the readers. That. To me, is the essence of telling a tale based in reality. Most of the time I am selling copies of Surreality to people who have never heard of it before, and they are taking a chance on it. Often, they come back to me, or email me later, and tell me how personal the story seems to them. They feel like I’m writing their life. That, to me, is the power of storytelling. The power of story.

You are on the road going to a lot of cons, what do you love about con life?

Con life is awesome. I love traveling and meeting new people, and fans. The road never truly leaves you. The community, the fellow artists, the crowd, this things are always good. I love it, even when it’s bad.

And what do you hate about it?

Con life is terrible. Con life is a lot of work. Booking shows, booking hotels, flights, managing expenses, renting cars, or arranging for transportation, etc. The actual exhibiting and selling your work is always a work in progress. I’m never truly satisfied with how my table is set up, so I’m always tweaking and re-working how I set it up. All of this distracts from, and often plays too big a role in, the development of my work. I am often basing what I’m creating around a con tour schedule, and that even dictated the content on some level. The two sides need each other, however. Without the pressure of having shows to have new work for, I might not be creating or working as hard as I am. It’s good to have pressure like that. I thrive on it, even when I dislike it.

Is there a con that you look forward to more than the others?

There are a few conventions I love attending. WonderCon in Anaheim, California is a personal favorite. The atmosphere, the crowd, the people, Disneyland (I’m a HUGE Disney nerd). It’s hard to beat. New York Comic Con, C2E2 in Chicago, and the New Orleans Comic Con, but I must confess, I go more for New Orleans than for the convention itself. Ha!

Are there any other projects you have lined up?

I’m currently finishing up some work on the Star Wars Masterwork trading card set for Topps, and continuing to work on Verse/Chorus, Surreality, and Cradle. It’s a lot of juggling, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Check out Caleb’s work and all updates here and Caleb’s Patreon.

Artist Spotlight: Caleb King Artist Caleb King, sat down with us and spoke about art, cons, books, and all things Geek!

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