Circling Around

 Alo, Alo!  

Here we are, on a scary Hallow'een and with two new pages! Scary action too!

Let's get right to it.

Page 80

Page 81

You will recall in the last installment, we saw the young boy and his father heading for home.  The father challenged the boy to race him home, while a few short blocks away there some vehicles were racing along.

I like these pages. I think they're really dynamic.  I think my favorite is the first panel on page 80 showing the truck with the machine gun in the back, and that same truck getting blown up on page 81.  (Mostly) good camera angles, the drawings are good, the action (mostly) understandable.

The action was hard to stage because I wanted to show the tank thing (it's supposed to be a LAV - light armored vehicle, James.  Oh, right.  Thanks.  It doesn't look much like one... do your reasearch!!! Sheesh, you're tough!!) shooting at the truck, but then firing across the courtyard and "tagging" the father.  I do think it is clear, but I wonder if bullets into the father should come more toward camera and less from left to right.  

 These images show the pages as I originally drew them. If you can't see it so well, click on it and it will enlarge in the window.

I decided on the first page, last panel, to move the camera and the father's pose so that he is running toward the camera.  I was hoping to make his death more surprising.  

And on the other page, you can see I was trying to figure out how to show the LAV gunning down the truck and then the dad.  I think the final is a little less clear, but far more impactful.

Ooh, and how do you like the circular panels? Cheesy?  Do they work?

Going Back

Hello Readers.

I hope you will remain readers after today... we shall see because, well... 

Did I ever mention I'm terrible at telling jokes, and by extension, stories?  Well, yes.  Unlike you, IG, I'm one of those people who get half way through telling a joke or story when they realize that they missed delivering some pertinent information that is required to make the punchline or the story really work.

More on that after the pages.

 

Page 78

Page 79

Ok first, about the artwork, composition and panels on these pages.  I love them.  I think they turned out great.  Great drawings, interesting angles, especially the last on page 79.  I know it is kind of hard to see the people in the bottom right of the panel, but whether you do or not, I think the composition provides a sense of foreboding.  

I get that the man in the longer tunic looks a lot like Lawrence and I agree, it can be confusing as to who this person is.  I hope that will come clear as you see more pages.

I also get that there isn't much info delivered here.  This sequence takes a few pages.  Hang in there!

But about my deficiency as a story teller... I got to the start of page 78 and realized that I hadn't given ANY backstory to Lawrence and to make his actions clear and understandable, I was going to have to. Remember, the storyteller who didn't give pertinent information soon enough?  Yep, that's me!  I did it again!

Much as I didn't want to do a flashback, I couldn't see how to tell his backstory in any other way.

Ok, so for these pages and the next few, it's not a big deal, and the telling is fairly straight forward... but... UG... I gotta go back and add more backstory, which means inserting pages between ones you have already seen.  I'm not sure how I'm going to do that.

I might just post those pages as usual and then tell you where they go, and then after  a few weeks, add those panels into the posts so it looks all seamless like.  Who will know the difference?  Just you and me, IG!

Dancing with the Stars

Hello Hello!

Funny thing... yesterday I got a comment on my blog... from someone new!!  I was jazzed, I thought, WOW, I'm finally getting an audience... not that you aren't audience enough for me, IG, but still!

But the comment was about using a particular sort of saw to do some special woodworking. 

I kinda think it was a scam.

How does that relate to today's installment?  Well, let's look at the pages first...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Page 76

Page 77

 

Well... ROMANCE! and by that, I mean SEX.  We've finally gotten to that part in the relationship!  It was hard to put this off so long, which I tried to do to make it a bit more realistic and also, I hope, build the chemistry between the characters.

I had the flight sequence in mind for some time, and knew I wanted to use that "Fly me to the moon" song. I think it all worked out well, and what could be more romantic than flying around an actual sky with a special someone than around a dance floor wearing patent leather shoes?!

And the sudden jump from the flight to them in bed, the song still playing, worked out pretty smoothly.

I really like page 77.  Nice drawings, no nudity (sorry, IG) but suggestive enough, and then the change of scene - he's going out to get groceries.

Oh boy, if you thought we'd changed gears suddenly here, well, hold on to your butt!  The next turn is a doosy!  And did you say "scam"?  What sort of trickery might be afoot?!  Hmmm!

Taking to the Skies

 Hello Readers!

Happy Thanksgiving!  Hope you're having a great weekend and filling up on potatoes, yams, cranberry etc and leaving the turkey to gobble up some bugs outside!

Speaking of flying nonsense, here's another couple pages!

Page 74

Page 75

Well, unlike some other posts when I show you some mistakes or missteps, I'm not doing that here. I did a complete Page 74 but it was SUPER cheesy, I just couldn't post it here, it was embarrassing. Let's stop taking about that, and talk about these ones here.

Pretty clean, pretty too the point.  Character designs look good, the action looks good and is understandable.

Two little issues: Lawrence in the top of Page 75 should look a bit "ghosty" because this shot is from Fancy's POV, and since she's wearing the AR goggles, she's looking at a projection or image of him.  Maybe that whole business about what are the pilots really seeing is coming clear?  Maybe not.  Anyway, this was a fairly challenging drawing to do - to make it look like you are where Fancy is and show Lawrence there, but of course the cockpit is so small, there's no way he'd fit. I think it works.  

The second issue is the jets.  Turns out that since the design is so un-remarkable, they aren't so interesting from different views, especially the final one.  They don't really look like anything from that angle.  That's a pretty good reason to come up with a different design.

Anyway, there you go!

Untangling the Knots

 Hello Readers!

From the comments it became clear that last week's installment was a bit confusing.  Hmm... Dang.

Well, maybe this week's pages will clear some things up or move the story along so the confusion is quickly forgotten. Here we go...

Page 71

Page 72

Ok, so, let's go back a bit.  Fancy, Marcel and Jake were in the flight simulator, Dave was watching out the window as they piloted the real jets through the flight simulator.  Fancy's foot suddenly hurt while doing a maneuver. Dave suggested Fancy look out the window at the remaining flying jets.  Moments later, Lawrence took over and ended the simulation. At least that's how I'd hoped the scenario would play out.  Maybe I mixed up the last page's panel order a bit.

I like all these panels, all of them... except maybe the last on page 72. It's cute, it's romantic and I just don't like it.  Maybe it's too "cute-sy". It's a drag because this is one of the first moments we see how the characters feel about one another. 

Jake and Marcel are funny and well drawn in that first panel, Lawrence and Fancy are pretty consistent throughout.  The jets look really good in all but the last panel.

But that last panel... maybe it's the flat perspective or that the jet looks so boring and not really like a jet.  I dunno.  What do you think?  Can you suggest a better angle?  Maybe some better, less obvious action that still shows how they feel.