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| the many adventures of alison wilgus |
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| Final tones + Spot Blacks?!?! |
[25/06/09 | 11:53] |
Thanks so much to everyone who took the time to help me out in my last post! You had a lot of really useful advice, and it definitely made some decisions much easier!
I sent a test page off to my editor, and one of his comments was that he wanted to see some spot blacks. Now, I have a DEEP FEAR of spot blacks and feel very self-conscious about using them, as they always look weird to me in my own work. I've added spot blacks to the test page, but if you have any suggestions or opinions (even if that opinion is "it looks fine!") I'd appreciate it!
And to be clear, I have no issue at all with the download-and-scribble method of illustrating a point -- draw all over this thing if you want to!
( large-ish image behind the cut! )
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| Moving into the final stretch! |
[10/06/09 | 22:14] |
Wow, okay. SO. In order to have promo material ready in time for ComicCon, I basically have to stop doing new pages for the time being and concentrate on cleaning up the old ones. Which is great...!
...Except that now I have to figure out what the final pages will look like.
I've done two tests of the approaches I'm considering, neither of which would be prohibitively time-consuming. If you have a minute, I'd love to hear some opinions on this!
( Two test pages behind the cut! )
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| Building a Japanese house for a Victorian gentleman |
[03/05/09 | 18:37] |
I try to keep the locations in Chronin as close to reality as I can, given my limited resources and the fact that many of them no longer exist. But Gilbert's house in Kyoto provided a chance to do some creating, rather than recreating. I wanted him to live in a typical Japanese building, but I also wanted the interiors to look like the home of a Victorian gentleman, interested in Japanese culture but ultimately unwilling to sacrifice the comforts he's accustomed to.
There were several steps to building Gilbert's house, and then drawing pages which take place there. So I thought I'd talk about it a little here, for anyone who might be interested.
( Kyomachiya -- Kyoto Townhouses )
( Gilbert's House, in particular )
( Using the model in a panel )
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go scrounge up some reference for Tenryu-ji.
(Oh, and while I'm here: If you want to read about my struggles with comicking or interesting links I turn up during my research, you can follow me on Twitter!)
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| Out with the old... |
[28/03/09 | 00:37] |
Way back in the winter of 2007, I finished the original pitch for Chronin and sent it out to publishers. Now, two years and ~170 pages later, I've finally caught up to the scene that pitch was from, which thankfully hasn't changed too much since then.
I decided I could use the old pitch pages! However, I was also kind of mortified by the state of them, particularly the characters' faces. I'll finish tightening everything when I go back and do the final inks, but ( here's the old and new versions of one two-page spread, just so you can see what I mean... )
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| Chapter 04 roughs via 24-hour-comics day |
[19/10/08 | 00:38] |
Much as it might be fun to work for 24 hours straight, it would just end up zonking me out for the next couple days, which is sort of counterproductive. So as a compromise, my friend ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) gallo_de_pelea and I decided twelve hours was a little more realistic.
I only managed to finish three pages, alas, but they were pretty complicated as pages go! And because I'm a dork, I also kept a log of my activities for later reference and the amusement of others.
ETA: Four pages show up below, now, but that's just because I updated the image on the server since posting this!
( Pages behind this cut! )
( And the log behind this one! )
Many thanks to EK for keeping me company via txt messaging (SO MUCH ASS DID WE KICK!) and to Clio for physically sitting in the room with me and thus preventing me from watching anime instead of working. ;3
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| Making the best of things |
[05/09/08 | 23:04] |
I'd meant to do more public posts here anyway, and as my webspace is currently not available AND the fonts on my computer are all messed up, I can't post rough pages at the moment.
As you've probably figured out, this story involves timetravel! The problem being that I then had to design a time MACHINE. And I really really really hate designing anything remotely mechanical.
But I tried my best! And I thought I may as well share what I came up with!
( Time Machine Panel of Doom behind the cut! )
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| And so it begins. |
[08/03/08 | 17:28] |
(For real, this time.)
The script's been approved by my editor, so now I can finally get started with the meat of the work on this book: actually drawing it! The plan is to thumbnail the book first, see how long it ends up being, and go from there. It's written as one, long story, but if it gets too unwieldy we may chop it into sections.
So! Not much to show for myself, yet, but a start is still a start!
( Extras, villainy and the inaugural thumbnails behind the cut! )
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| Pinups and Character Designs |
[02/08/07 | 16:14] |
*dusts off journal*
It's been kind of a crazy summer, but my lack of posts here is largely a result of the fact that I've been plugging away at the script for Chronin. While useful, in the long run, it doesn't make for very good LJ updates.
However, I haven't been neglecting my sketchbook entirely! A little while back I drew this pinup of Mirai, after realizing that all the color art I had for her was old or terrible or both...
( Full version behind the cut... )
I also ended up adding three more characters to the cast, which was a little traumatic as everyone else has been banging around in my head for years. After spending some of my Comic Con downtime doodling them, however, they feel a little more familiar.
( Character sketches within! )
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| Comics are delicious! |
[22/06/07 | 10:38] |
The MoCCA Art Fest, independent comics show of destiny, will be taking place this weekend! And just my luck, I have comics in TWO anthologies this year! "Advanced Frame" will be in volume two of Combination Platter, which premiered at NYCC but has a spiffy new printing for this show; and "Turnabout Marathon" will be in volume two of Life Meter, available here for the first time and with over a hundred pages of content! CRAZY! If you're at the con, come visit me at table A60 -- that's the room on the ground floor closest to Houston -- as I'd love to see you!
Previews of both comics can be found below.
( Advanced Frame, pages 1-4 of 10 )
( Turnabout Marathon, pages 1-2 of 4 )
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| On the job |
[19/04/07 | 13:38] |
As it turns out, my first couple of weeks at TMNT have been a little on the slow side. I started earlier than I really had to, which means that I've had plenty of time to get my feet under me and take lots of notes (which is great!) -- but it also means that I have lots of empty afternoons to fill while I wait for the heavy lifting to start.
This week, they let me try my hand at inking a background so I could make myself useful during the lull. ( And I'm really pleased with how it came out! (images behind the cut) )
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| Onward to greener pastures! |
[11/04/07 | 10:19] |
This Monday I started my now job at 4Kids Entertainment: assistant editor on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Fast Forward. Basically this means that I'll be helping out with the animatics and related administrative tasks. It may not be glamorous, but I'm really excited!
Those of you who know me well may recall that I was a giant Turtles fan when I was younger -- the cartoon and movies in elementary school, the Archie and Mirage studios comics in middle school and early high school -- so it's a little weird for me to find myself working on the latest incarnation. I think it really settled in yesterday, while I was looking through design reference. One of the alien races on the show, the Triceratons, originally appeared in the black and white TMNT comic. To give the artists an idea of what they're supposed to look like, there was a scan of the cover of TMNT issue #5, in which the Turtles battle a POed Triceraton...and as I OWN that issue, which is now sitting in a box in my apartment....yeah. A little weird. Cool...But weird.
I already miss KND, but the people here are awesome and the work is more interesting that I was worried it would be. So! Wish me luck, and we'll see how it goes!
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| My baby's out in the world |
[03/04/07 | 00:24] |
Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15
~*~*~
For those of you who haven't listened to me blather on about it for the past three years, these pages are part of a pitch for Chronin, a graphic novel series set in 1860's Japan. This sequence is taken from the middle of what would be Volume Two, and isn't meant to stand completely alone -- it's just supposed to be a "hook" that convinces prospective publishers that 1) I can actually draw comic pages and 2) this is a story that people will be intersted in reading. They'll also have a full series outline and character profiles to refer to.
I started penciling these pages last summer, and have been picking away at them ever since. It's been three years since I first came up with the idea for Chronin, and BOY HOWDY...I'm so glad to have this thing out the door! Let's just hope that I'm not alone in feeling that Timetravel + Crossdressing + Samurai = Love.
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