Obsession Du Jour

The Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan comic for April 27, 2010 has been given a makeover with fresh digital inks and colors and new lettering. Shading by Aggie Janicot.

Aggie also did this:

Silly version of the page. This could become a tradition.

Read it here: Let them stew, I say!. Highlights and shade by Aggie Janicot.

Game plan for the rest of the week: I want to go back to the earliest penciled pages and digitally ink as many of them as I can. In addition, I want to create at least one more new page for Abúi's Travels and maybe one for yet another comic.

Digitally inking those old pencil pages is turning out to be a smooth, easy and fun process now. I am, however, aware that as I gain consistency throughout the series, I'm losing some of the things that only pencil can do. Right now, I'm looking at a silhouette of two characters, but when I look closer, what looks like a flat dark grey shadow is in fact full of nuances indicating shadows, highlights, the hems of costumes, and so on. You can't reproduce that in ink. Well, I can't.

I'm also taking a leaf out of my wife's book and revising as I go. So far, there isn't an awful lot that desperately needs it. While pages 62-70 aren't the very best in the storyline, they are what they are and I'm happy to leave them mostly as they are. But I leave the option to make art changes open on a panel-by-panel basis.

And while we're on the subject of Abúi's Travels, there's a new page up. This is one of the biggest-looking pages I've ever come up with, due to the detailed backgrounds and the shading and highlights provided by Rona. It's also got a ton of cameos from other webcomics. Backgrounds and crowds make for a lot of extra work, but in this case, it was worth it.

Rona's been updating her own science-fiction comic Hekatomb on a weekly basis for almost a year now. Lately, after a catastrophic CMS update, she's also been re-uploading her vampire horror comic American Gothic Daily in a revised version. What she does is she takes each old page and draws/paints digitally over them, expands the canvas size and adds new materials. While reconstructing the site, she posts the old versions of each page as an addendum to the new ones, so you can see how much progress she has made since she started the comic in 2006. It's a very fast, efficient process with staggering results. Go see it.

I have a week off right now, so I've been working on Feral some. I've been inking penciled pages from 2008-2010 and adding color flats to them, which I give to Rona to add shades and highlights to. Yesterday, I gave her the revised version of the page for April 11, 2010 and she sent me back this:

Silly version of page 97 of Feral

The final four episodes of the Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan storyline The Corby Tribe have been remastered.

To read images with captions and all:
Paradise regained... for some! II
A Plain, yet Foodsome Repast I
A Plain, yet Foodsome Repast II
A Plain, yet Foodsome Repast III

The titles are the way they are because at the same time I redrew the final 2 episodes back in 2010, I split a bunch of double and triple episodes up into separate pages. These were originally conceived as extra-large bonus eps to celebrate the ending of the storyline itself, but the flow of the archived comics works better when each comic has its own page.

And with this, the remaster process is done! Unbelievably I started remastering comics in January 2006, while I was still working on Headsmen, Halloween and Feral. Once I got a day job, the whole process slowed down and I had to choose between either producing a slow trickle of new art every other month or so, or remastering the old stuff in the very limited amount of time that remained for me. I wanted to choose the former, but that became immensely frustrating to me because so much time would pass between art sessions. Eventually, about two years ago, I fully embraced the other option and at least got to be a bit productive again.

Now, though, I'm just glad this is done. With some changes to my daily schedule, I think I should at least be able to write and draw daily. I'm not promising new episodes this week, but definitely this year.

The Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan comics for September 6 through 12, 2002 have been remastered. We're still in the dénouement.

To read, including captions:
Impulsive implosion, or impassiveness?
Brush-off and morph-lust
Returns from a job hunt
September 10, 2002
Morph-lust sated
Paradise regained... for some

Watched Desolation of Smaug yesterday and actually enjoyed it. I don't have a lot of time for anything Tolkien usually, but as silly as some of the movie was, the cinematography was beautiful, the acting was stellar and the action and comedy sequences were thrilling/funny. I promised my wife I wouldn't giggle through the serious bits and was able to keep my promise.

Good morning, if you're on CET. I've got a day off, and so I'm a little later posting the morning's batch of remastered Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan comics. Here they are: the comics for August 30 through September 5, 2002.

To read, including the all-important captions:
Exploitation
Disaugiation
Distribution
Oththere saede to his hlaforde
Impiety and impropriety!

"Distribution" was redrawn in 2010. The story is substantially over at this point, but the dénouement takes another 10 comics. So... wrapped up by the weekend?

Two things:

1. I am drunk. Not super-drunk, but much drunker than I should be considering the relatively small amount of beer I've had. Fascinating.
2. I nevertheless managed to post another 7 remastered Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan comics without making any more mistakes. They're the comics for August 21 through 29, 2002.
To read, including captions on the first 4:
Running for it
Coercion
Excorcism
Recuperation
Confirmation
Bovine Faecalisation I
Bovine Faecalisation II.

The last panel of "Excorcism" was redrawn in 2010 or maybe 2011. At that time, the two "Bovine Faecalisation" strips were also split unto different pages; previously, they were a double comic on a single page. I like them better this way, overall.

Here we go again: The Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan comics for August 14 through 20, 2002 have been remastered. To read, including the all-important captions:
Undomestication
Third generation
Visitation
Towards annihilation
Demonization

On "Demonization": more than half a decade later, I'd do a sequence in which Kel, after a betrayal of her trust by her gangmates, would swear profusely at them for several pages. This got some comments, including claims that this level of aggression and foul-mouthedness was out of character for her. No-one ever complained about Kel's slut-shaming in this comic, which looking back at this comic now feels much more wrong than having her say "fuck" repeatedly. Of course, she wasn't quite herself at this point, but still.

OK, so I did in fact post another bunch of remastered Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan comics. These are the comics for August 7 through 13, 2002.

Comics with captions are here:
Admonition
Manipulation
Exhumation
Incineration
Malediction.

Cheery titles, eh? "Exhumation" was redrawn in 2010. "Malediction" has one major cheat in the artwork that you may or may not notice. Have fun finding it!

Good evening! Also, booyah! Ten more remastered Rogues of Clwyd-Rhan comics have been uploaded. They are the comics from July 24 through August 6, 2002, or comics no. 157 through 166 from the The Corby Tribe storyline. 31-ish more to go.

Argumentation
Revelation
Arbitration
Disarticulation
Provocation
Digression
Dissimulation
Apprehension
Proposition
Disinclination

I was home from work early due to a technical problem, but will have to be at work early tomorrow morning to compensate, so I may end up having to skip tomorrow morning's batch. Or I may not. Also, I'm not feeling creative right now, so posting my old stuff from the remaster project may well be the next best use of my time.

The project is getting very close to completion, and that excites me. It will clear my mind to get properly started on something new.