merboy comic

 Fionn's house. He calls it the Castle, a word that comes from home. No one else where he lives uses it; they just call it the Magician's House. He doesn't get too many visitors.

My first attempt at a comics page. It's pretty hard to draw comics without guides! Luckily the Internet came to my rescue once again. I experimentally 'trimmed' my page myself, as my paper wasn't big enough to accommodate the full bleed.

I had a little trouble getting the brushwork to match the tone of the pen work at first, even though I'm using the same ink (Noodler's Eternal Luxury Blue). Also I think I should add a little land mass further back there over Fionn's right shoulder (no, his right, your left), with a glimpse of the town.

Almost done with my latest chapter of the Book Project, too! Very exciting!

a kingdom by the sea

This isn't even the palace; this is just the magician's house.

Because I am not an architect, I have haphazardly mixed a bunch of different levels in one plan, based on the places where my characters will be spending the most time. (To be honest, I would like to see romantic leads spending more time in the kitchen, but I'm afraid I'm defeated by the write-what-you-know thing.)

Why is it that although I know nothing about architecture, I insist on doing these every time I want to do a comic? The answer is because the art needs to flow properly, and to achieve that I need to know where everything is, and get used to it. Also, I am obsessed with production design.

Some more 'setting' sketches:

(What is going on with that roof...?)

page a day: villa

Pen and ink wash is both an exercise in completion and in restraint. You have to be careful about what you end up emphasising. In my mind the water was the focus of this picture, but my contrast control needs some work. Also I didn't use rulers or vanishing points, and I only started using pencil a third of the way through. It shows.

My advice? Unless you are an architect and can do this in your sleep, pencil your damn architecture in first. Even when using a reference.

page a day: water, water everywhere

I have a new dip pen! It was super cheap and it's very good with Noodler's Eternal Luxury Blue. Have some water gardens and a Roman bath to celebrate.

I am trying to keep my hand in with dip pens as the Book is entirely done in pen & ink with some washes, and I'm planning to make some comics in the same way. It's a good thing I'm moving back to where I can get heavy cartridge paper with relative ease again; it seems to be the best fit for this technique.

page a day: calligraphy

Playing with Speedball nibs and pen ink. C0 & C4 broad tips, B5 round, orange Calligrapher's that I got in a Kate's Paperie warehouse sale and Noodler's Eternal Blue. I used a syringe to mix them on the second page and splashed them around a bit.

My work seems really halfhearted lately. I will step things up in coming weeks.

page a day: hysterical romance, in colour

Prang watercolours, Quink and Waterman inks, and blue pencil.

page a day: hysterical romance

See last post.

page a day: merboy and magician

So I've been writing a Little Mermaid retelling in which the mermaid is male, the Sea Witch is also male (and in love with him) and instead of being set in pseudo-medieval England, it's set in pseudo-medieval Moorish Spain.

Anyway, have some wistful angst and pretty boys in flowy robes. Pentel brush pen and Caran D'Ache aquarelle pencils.

page a day: pen tests

(Last entry blurred for personal details. Fun fact: it was written in my mutant Futhark before I blurred it.  If you grew up with a guardian who reads your journals, you'd be paranoid too.)

Main conclusion: Hunt and Speedball nibs = decent; Joseph Gillott = horrible. Except for #303. Don't do it.

Also, I redid the mint tea illustration:

That's better, I think. I've also changed my settings to reflect the proper times of posting, and to enable anon comments (which I'd forgotten I'd disabled--sorry!)

page a day: the (human) stain

 

I'd wanted to experiment with this method of colouring for a while but I didn't get a chance to do the blotchy parts till today. It's pretty hard to control, and I didn't at all expect the way the shellac-infused inks interacted with the water-based ones (see: ugly spots in top illustration). 

I quite like the way the latter two illustrations look, but it still seems lazy to me. This could be my weak Photoshop skills, too. Well, back to work.