Updates

More silence from me. Terrible.

I became angry with Whisper. It was taking too long to get a page done. I treated Whisper as a learning experience, as it is (as is everything, honestly, but shhh), and I learned after a dozen pages that the way I was doing things was not working. I talked about it earlier, but ultimately, I realized I needed to stop and evaluate.

So I stopped.

It's been over a year. A lot has happened. But I've been doodling in my sketchbooks, practicing, and I'm feeling better about going back to Whisper.

Observations

Whisper is very different from Collide (for those who have seen Collide). Collide was black and white, some screentones, and a very manga inspired style. Now and then hints of the direction my art would take could be found. Whisper is full color, a tighter style that leans toward realistic in some ways.

Basically, Whisper is a lot more work than Collide.

I could do a page of Collide in a day--maybe two, if I had a hard time getting things right. A page of Whisper takes days and days. Perfecting the composition, sketches, inking--that's usually a day (though page 6 took three days to get the sketches right), then color takes about a day and a half, two if it's complex. On rare occasion, I can do a page of Whisper in two days. In fact, at the beginning, I did the first page in two days and it was great. But I started spending longer on each page, getting the lines right, getting everything right. It's exhausting.

Too exhausting to continue forever. Good thing Whisper is only 47 pages.

I'm practicing a simplified version of my style for the next comic, in hopes of speeding things up. I have no idea if it will work. But it's a thing to try. I'm tempted to search my heart for another short(er) comic to try that style on. Will dwell further on it.

Also.

ALSO.

My colors. What's up with them. I like the colors themselves, I think I got a good thing down finally, but they look so shiny. So smooth. It's no good for all of my work. Some of my work needs to look gritty, or watery, or transparenty. I've been studying various artists colors and the thing I have decided that I need to work on for my colors now is texture. I need to start collecting textures to laydown on color to give it a real texture feel. I don't mean, hey, that wicker basket have wickery patterns so it looks wicker. No. The colors and lines that make up that kind of texture will still be smooth and perfect and inappropriate. I mean a background texture. Concrete, smoke, watercolor bleeds--things that look like the paper or the material used to make the art. I'm not making my comics on porcelain. They need life.

Recap on learns:

-Can't do comics the way I do an illustration because it will take the rest of my life to make my first full length GN.

-Must learn fast yet effective style.

-Must learn to utilize textures in my coloring.

2 and something years later!

I'll try to be better about this blog since I'm so focused on my comics again.

Since the last post, I am no longer working at Double Fine (unemployed now wee), no longer living in San Francisco (hello, Virginia!), and working Whisper pretty much every day.

Whisper went through an edit, I went through some depression, and now both are (relatively) done and I am working on it again. In fact, I'm already 6 pages out of 47 pages done, and posting it online.

http://whisper.alliartist.com

Pretty sweet.

Down to a Whisper

Remember, back when I wanted to draw Strung Out because it was a short story and wouldn't be a huge commitment? And then it got bigger and bigger until it grew larger than Collide? YEAH.

I still want to draw a short comic before any of the big ones. Something little, complete, and lovely.

And I think I've hit upon it.

Typed up, it's 9 pages long. II've begun to thumb nail it, and if it continues on in the way it's going, it should run about 60 pages (give or take). That's pretty short! And it'll be very pretty and interesting. I'm stoked.

I work on the thumb nails on the train to and from work. Oh, I got a job. The best job at the best place. I am jealous of myself. I love going to work. Mondays are a joy. My coworkers are the best kind of people. My life is infinitely happier now. I've 25 pages thumb nailed, and am making more every day. It's been going quite smoothly. The website for it and pretty much done and needs only some actual comics. I look forward to sharing it.