I'm going to make a single-issue comic book, 22 pages long (the standard for comics), and make it available in print on actual paper. I'll be writing, penciling, inking, coloring and lettering the whole thing. Since I'm doing this in my minimal free time, I expect it to take a year at the least. I will continue updating my blogs about its progress, though some will contain less information than others. Blogspot seems most amenable to posts with lots of words, so I'll be using this space to explain what it is I am supposedly thinking.
First, I should tell you that this won't be a webcomic. To try to be consistent with the art, I'll be drawing this thing non-linearly. That is, I won't draw page 1 and then page 2 and page 3 after that. I'll draw page 1, a page in the middle, and the last page, and then I'll work my way out from the important points. It'll be like animating pose-to-pose instead of straight ahead--get the important pages done first, then handle the inbetweeny stuff. So that precludes regular updates of actual pages, but once I'm done I will put the full book online so people can actually read it.
While on the subject of drawing, I have a clear idea of the direction I want to go with the art, and that's honestly the main reason I'm doing this. I've been inspired lately by turn-of-the-century (or turn-of-the-last-century, really) illustrators like Rakham and Kay Neilson. There's a web gallery on nocloo.com full of that stuff. I'm also a fan of the modern day artist known as Bluefooted (see her(?) deviantart gallery). I'm sure I won't be the first, but I'd like to try this coloring/illustration style in a comic book format.
<--- Here, I tried roughly emulating bluefooted's method - draw and ink on paper, and color digitally. A higher resolution version is on my deviant art.
This is just a test of the picture-making method to see if I could get something like what I want. The actual drawing of actual pages is quite a while off yet. I have to write the script first!
The story is that of Nwain, a reserved, bookish knight who quests through dreamland to follow a star. She sees strange landscapes, meets odd people, and fights monsters along the way. Sometimes, she finds places where she would rather like to settle, but her strict adherence to her quest usually prevents it.
Her requisite trusty steed, Sceadwian, is not a horse, but a bizarre composite animal with wolf and deer traits. As this is dreamland, the creature shapeshifts--sometimes it's more like a wolf, sometimes more like a stag, but never a human. It's slightly sentient, but its still a wild animal dominated by its instincts. Sometimes, Sceadwian will go against the reigns and drag Nwain off track. They have a sort of love-hate relationship.
I've got more specifics for the actual plot, but I don't want to spoil all of that just yet. Mostly, I have to refine the ideas and get that darned script written.
Tally ho,
Terry
