The Experiment Has Begun

Twelve student prodigies...
One national science fair...
No chance of survival...

Thursday, December 4, 2008

Page 39

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Another page of dialogue! Never fear, soon there will be some action. I put so much detail in the background of the bottom left panel that I didn't want to have to cover it up with that HUGE balloon. Oh well. I need to get better at visualizing how big my word balloons will be before I paint the page instead of just trying to cram them in however they will fit, after the fact.

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Sound Effects

I've always taken a very conservative stance on sound effects. I prefer to stick to the simple tried and true sounds, "Ka-boom" "Thud" "Clang" "Blam" "Vroom" rather than try to reinvent the wheel. Comics that create strange looking sound effects often look silly and leave me unclear how they are intended to sound (although generally there's no wrong answer when it comes to interpreting the noise an explosion makes)

The first volume of Preacher is interesting in that it completely forgoes sound effects except when they are essential to telling the story.. There are only 3 instances of sound effects in the 200 page book. Preacher isn't a comic that's associated with showing restraint so I found this choice to be really interesting.

One section of the Scientists where I was forced to really work hard to think of an appropriate sound effect was the scene where Stuart wakes up in the bio suit.
page 32
I wanted to convey that breathing respirator sound effect while it was in the first person viewpoint. My first idea was to check out some Star Wars comics and see how they handled Darth Vader. Unfortunately in all the comics I could get my hands on, they didn't bother to represent Vader's trademark breathing. I consulted with Trent, and the sound on page 32 is what we ultimately came up with.

Friday, October 24, 2008

Page 38 - The threat is real.

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I love that this portion of the script concludes with the ominous yet completely superfluous line that says "There's no denying it now. The threat is real."

*as a side note, up to this point I have been working from an "abridged for the comic adaptation" version of the script that Trent edited. This is as far as the edited version went. From here on out on will be working from the original script and making my own edits as needed.

Monday, September 29, 2008

Page 35

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Wow, its been 3 months since my last post. I guess I haven't exactly been hitting my productivity goals. This project is particular difficult to work on, partly because of the creative demands, but also because of the emotional demands. Its been more than a year, and still, not a day goes by that I don't spend at least 20 or 30 minutes in sadness. I honestly can't say if working on this makes me feel better or worse.

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

progress check

The script is 120 pages... this scene falls on page 25... so by my calculations, the graphic novel will be around 150 pages total... only 118 more to go!

Page 32

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I guess I'm trying to make up for missed days

A modest display of approval

Page 31

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If you'd like to see me pick up the pace, post comments (and send other people here)! Its easy to become lazy without someone to motivate me.

Friday, April 11, 2008

Page 26 - redux

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I think I like the dialogue a little better like this. Also, the overlapping word balloon makes the panel flow a little more clear.

Page 26



I had scanned in a lot more pages, but my computer chose to reset an inconvenient moment, so now I gotta rescan them.

The dialogue on this page has been reworked several times. I'm still not happy with it.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Page 25 - The saga continues

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When I reached page 24... I misguidedly called it a "stopping point". This was on January 16, 2007. Clearly, I had difficulty starting up again.

Well lets get the ball rolling again!