So there it is! And now I have to get back to work and start on page 27!

I want to thank everybody who stopped by to read about this project. Your support is what keeps me going. A lot of you that came by probably were new to seeing this webcomic and for that I need to thank the following fine websites for their linking to this blog.

JK Parkin at Blog@Newsarama had this wonderful post:

Tom Spurgeon at Comicsreporter.com posted this notice:

And John Martz at Drawn.ca was kind enough to post this:

Now there’s only a couple more pieces of business left to attend to. First off, if there was something that you found interesting, insightful or irritating, please let me know. I doubled my overall traffic for this site in just this week and that means a lot of visitors stopped by and only one of you posted a comment. I get such a buzz out of hearing what people think that I am going to once again ask that visitors please drop me a line. It doesn’t have to be much. A little goes a long way with me.

Secondly, I would just like to solicit visitors to consider purchasing a T-shirt from Bountee. com or making a donation to me through paypal using the link on the sidebar. Two of my designs are currently the most wanted designs there are so get on over there and check ‘em out! Even here, a little goes a long way with me. I get a very small sum of money from each T-shirt sold but it’s always a thrill for me when I do. If you would be interested in a piece of original art, please consider making a donation of $25 or more for an ink sketch or $50 or more for a full color drawing! I promise you won’t be disappointed whether you purchase a T-shirt or make a donation and receive a piece of original art. Satisfaction guaranteed!

Enough of the hard sell! Thanks for stopping by and I look forward to having you visit again in the weeks to come as I bring Chapter 2 to a close and usher in an entirely new experience for Chapter 3! Thank you!
Joe

So here we are at last, the final step! By this time I’m psyched to have gotten to this phase. Throughout this process, I’ve scripted, thumbnailed, penciled, inked twice, colored and by now I am so relieved to be here adding the finishing touches on the computer. Before I dive right in, I’m going to warn you that I’ll probably get a little technical so hopefully you’ll have some familiarity with Photoshop and Illustrator.

I scan the page for print in CMYK at 600dpi. In Photoshop, I’ll add a levels layer and a hue saturation layer and make the appropriate adjustments. The aim is to find a nice balance of tones as well as give the colors a small boost using the hue/sat adjustment layer. During the scanning process, the texture of the blank paper gets lost to white so to bring that back I take a previous scan of the paper texture and add that as a separate Photoshop layer. I use the layer properties to make the paper texture visible only where the image is white and that restores the look of the actual page. Unfortunately it also gives the page a bit of a yellow cast so I use some more hue/sat adjustment layer(s) to bring the greys closer to a neutral color. Speaking of hue/sat adjustments, the very first thought balloon’s color underwent a number of changes. At first I tweaked the color to be more like the teal color of some of the other balloons but after looking at it again I decided to change it to match the rust color of the balloons from Page 25. You may also notice that the thought balloon in the third image has also been darkened. I used a multiply layer to darken it so that the letters would have enough contrast to be legible.

Sometimes, I’ll adjust the drawing itself. Page 26 was one of those occasions where I added some new elements. For the ‘panel’ where I open the fridge door, I added some shaky lines around the arm and by my head to carry over the shakiness of the other images. Lastly, I added a few more ’stars’ around some of the thought balloon edges. This is what it looked like at this point.

Now that the image is done, it’s time I sorted out the letters. Originally, I don’t think I had any intentions of having any dialog for this page. I was just supposed to straggle over to the fridge with a buildup of tension until I finally opened it with the ‘CHUK!’ sfx. After looking at it some more, I decided to play with some internal dialog to slow down the reading of each image and to make more clear what was going on with me internally. The shaky lines around the character are one indication of some of the symptoms of a low blood sugar reaction but the casual viewer might not pick up on this so I added some redundancy by having the words, “feeling shaky” drawn out over most of the page. The idea was to have the words stretch out time so that it would elevate this mundane moment into something special. That inspired me to actually manipulate the text itself to visually give the cue that my ability to process language has slowed down as well. I did this by first laying out the text in Illustrator and then applying a flag warp to the type. When I was satisfied that they looked good, I copied them as smart objects into Photoshop. Once in Photoshop, layer masks allowed me to create the illusion of the words swirling behind some of the scrit legs and later to subtly vanish into the atmosphere in the second-last thought balloon. This is an important detail because it integrates these purely digital elements into the image. Whenever I see lettering in comic books where the sound effects and text all clearly float above the art, I get a little peeved and taken out of the story. Having no real script for a lot of these pages requires that I keep things open in the lettering phase. Adding the text digitally is therefore a must but it doesn’t have to be obvious! That’s why I take these measures to try and bring the analog art closer to the digital elements. Here are the finished letters.

And there you have it! Phew! It’s been quite a journey to get here and it always feels great to finish up by flattening the image, scaling it and prepping it for the web. Once it goes online, I feel a great sense of relief and accomplishment and then it starts all over again! But before that happens, come back tomorrow for my final post where I thank all the fine sites that have linked to this series of posts and those who have shown their support to this project along the way. See you then!

To recap, I’ve given the thought balloon areas a first go over with color, removed the masking tape and softened the hard edges with a little transparent wash. The next step is simple. I just flesh out these colored areas with more watercolors until I’m satisfied. I do a lot of adding and subtracting of color using paper towels until I have the forms, light and shadow developed. It’s very difficult to be very comprehensive in my description of this phase because it happens very intuitively. I go into the whole thing with a rough idea of what colors to use (as seen in last post) and eventually become more and more specific as I move into the more rendered watercolor and pencil phase. I try to maintain a harmonious balance for the overall page while also giving the individual elements a certain veracity. I pay attention to the color of light hitting the objects (in this case a boy in a cave) and the resulting shadows as well. The more fully rendered page 26 looked like this.

At this stage I think I am ready to move onto the next phase of coloring the image and that is to go in with some colored pencils (or pencil crayons as I’m known to call them). I use Staedler Watercolor pencils as well as Prismacolor Premier pencils. The pencils help bring out some highlights, add details and activate the surface by rubbing them to pick up some of the paper’s texture. A technique I enjoy with the watercolor pencils is to apply the areas with the pencils dry and then modulate them by going over the area with a quick swifit swipe using a wide damp brush. This tends to unevenly darken and saturate the watercolor pencil color and adds a nice effect. There’s a bit of randomness to it that I enjoy. I continue with the pencils bringing out the highlights, deepening shadows and softening the balloon edges. Let’s take a look at the end result while I describe the remaining steps.

When I feel I’ve got ‘it’ with the pencils, I then take the white Prismacolor pencil and begin to add some of the ’stars’ that float around the edges of the thought balloons. I’ll also use other light colored pencils but primarily use the white. In some cases I’ll soften the edges of the balloons as well. Next up, I take process white paint to correct errors from the inking step and to add any bright whites and highlights. I take a small brush and a bit of Winsor & Newton Process White and dab around the edges of the balloons. This adds a little depth to the ’stars’ since this application of white is more opaque than the pencils. These brighter ’stars’ appear closer while the penciled ’stars’ appear to be deeper in pictorial space. Any mistakes in the black and white areas are touched up at this point as well. I seem to remember touching up the corner of my mouth in the third image. The process white can be tinted with the watercolors to add colored highlights as well. Most of the highlights on the scrit’s legs are a mixture of ultramarine blue with the process white. Lastly, I take a light grey Faber Castell Pitt brush pen and add a few lines to describe the rain seen through the cave entrance.

And that’s all of the steps that happen on paper! We’re now ready to scan the page and begin adding some digital effects and letters. Come back tomorrow when I finish this page in the final step, Digital Tweaks and Letters!

Once the inks are finished, I give the whole thing an erasing while being mindful of not losing the outlines of the thought balloons. They’re important for the next step which is laying a piece of vellum over the page and tracing these balloons onto the vellum. This sheet will become my template for where the balloons will be when I cover over the pencil lines with painter’s masking tape. That’s the next step. I lay down the masking tape to cover the balloon areas and once the whole page has been masked, I lay down my vellum template and trace the penciled balloons with an Xacto blade. The last step in the masking phase is to pull away the tape to expose the areas to be colored. Here’s what page 26 looked like at this point.

I enjoy the look of the pages at this point. The blue masking tape against the white of the balloons is somehow very appealing to me and I think it helps me get a sense of how the shapes work (or not) with each other. Now, onto the first step in coloring this page. I use three sets of watercolor pans by Lukas, Winsor & Newton and Yarka. I grew up using watercolors in trays and have always stuck with them. When I’ve tried the tubes, I felt there was too much waste and no real tangible advantage. At this stage of coloring my goal is to get some of the basic colors down and to bring out the edges of the balloons. It’s pretty simple and this is what it looks like after laying down these preliminary colors and removing the masking tape.

It’s not much yet but it’s a start and the next phase will really start to bring things into focus. For that, you’ll have to wait until tomorrow when we see what happens in Colors Part 2! See you then!

So once I’ve got a final pencil drawing on vellum, I transfer it to the watercolor paper. I trace the image on the opposite side of the vellum and then rub this onto the paper. This is helpful because I can also check how the reverse of the drawing looks as I trace it. It’s like the old mirror trick to see if things still look ‘right’ except I do it by flipping the vellum. Okay, once I’ve got the drawing transfered onto the paper, I then go over it again to strengthen the lines before I begin to ink it.

The first areas that I ink are usually the ‘real-world’ areas that are going to be in black, white and greys. I use the Faber Castell line of Pitt artist brush pens to do these areas. Depending on how I would like to create the ’space’, I ink the things that I feel should be closest to the viewer in black first and then choose some of the darker greys to draw the outlines of other objects further in pictorial space. Once I’ve got all the objects outlined in their respective shades of grey and black, I begin to fill in the areas with the lighter greys to create the shadows. With this page I had all the images from the ‘real’ world inked and began to fill in the grey tones when I became a little unhappy with the way things were going. This often happens where I start to ink a page and find things that I think could be improved. Because I am using the Pitt pens, I have only a certain number of grey tones to choose from and I don’t always get it right the first time around. Images like the third ‘panel’ weren’t as effective as I thought they could be so I decided that I would try another approach on a second page. This first attempt starts out with the best intentions of being the final page but alas it ends up being a guinea pig and that’s why this first scan is a bit of a mess! I put this page aside and retransfer the drawing onto another piece of watercolor paper and start the whole inking process over again. Once I know that it’s not going to make it to the final round, I really am free to practice things before doing them on the second page. As soon as I have all the grayscale ‘frames’ inked and toned, I move onto the thought balloons. These areas are inked using a Pentel Pocket brush because the ink is not water soluble once it’s dry (I need to use watercolor over them) and the brush is great for fine line work as well as dry brushing over the paper texture. I’ll test out a few approaches on the first page and then eventually move onto the second, final inked page. Here’s what the second page looked like at this stage.

That’s better! You’ll notice that the balloon of the boy recoiling at the end is not inked at this stage. I thought I would wait until I had that ‘frame’ colored before I would go in with a black line. I knew that I wanted to have a spray of blood so I thought it best to ink around whatever paint spatter I got.

That pretty much covers the inking phase of things! The next step is to mask and color the thought balloon areas. Come back tomorrow for Step 4: Masks and Colors Part 1!