You'll want to click this thumbnail to enlarge it. I mean, if you want to read the page.
You can see the fancy special effects I used to indicate the panel where Stepan steps into Serkja.
I'm planning to get to work on the lettering as early as tomorrow, and to work gradually on the inks over the weekend. No sense rushing this thing now. If you've got any comments, please let me know. There are a couple of panels where I'm not a hundred percent happy about the composition of the image, but I also feel like the page is at least mostly good enough.
Did I miss anything? Have I made any dumb mistakes? Does this count as an ending? Why do I feel less certain about p. 10 than I did about p. 1, when we had no idea what the comic would even be about?
Hey, look at that!
ReplyDeleteI for one like this page, Isaac. I really like the wordless sequence: the parting from Kalbi & the junkmen has a nice valedictory quality to it, and Stepan's got a nice sense of wonder as he steps into the shadow realm (and I love that half in/half out effect you get across the gap). It's nice to see Herbert from _Donjon_ in Serkja, though he might be a little crowded alongside the Basque man. I also like the background in the penultimate panel; there's not much to it, but the perspective lines give it a sense of depth that I appreciate.
If I have a fault to find with any of the drawing, it might be in the panel where Stepan's wagging his finger at Ipthorin. I'm not sure the space is being used to best effect there. Maybe that's because Ipthorin is largely cropped out of the picture; maybe it's because there are so few details in a really spacious panel. Stepan's expression is good, but I almost wish it were bigger: there are a lot of little drawings on this page, and I would probably try to work in at least one larger image if I were drawing it (larger and uncropped, I should say, as Stepan in panel 3 is of a good size). I am NOT saying that you should redraw this panel, however!--just trying to offer a little of that critique that you crave.
Finally, you've got a typo (hando?) on the sign in the last panel, which currently reads "ombudsmem" whereas "ombudsmen" is probably what you meant. Though I'm more confused than enlightened by what is meant by a mystical ombudsman, to tell the truth...
Anyway, all of the above is secondary to the main response, which is hearty congratulations and thanks! It's great to see the last page pencilled, and I like what I see very much.
Back to you and to our other kibitzers...
Oh, Herbert's not really going to be there in the street scene. That was just an experiment; I've already cut him out again, but that printed version was easy to hand when I needed to cut something up.
ReplyDeleteHerbert is, however, in the last panel on the page.
As for the finger-wagging panel: you're totally right. That was the one I was least happy about. I'll give it some more thought.
What do you think of the names Swane and Teetch?
What I like most about Swane & Teetch is not their clever anagrammaticity (which I hadn't noticed at first, though that's one efficient way of working in our cameo), but rather their punning homophony: the young lover and the pedagogue, the Swain & the Teach. (So what's Ipthorin, then? A rhino pit?!)
ReplyDelete