Popgun 3 - Breath

[Spenny]

Total rehaul.

Why would I use a professional comic to experiment? Naw... here's a nice inky style and simple comic. I just sent this new script to the editor.

I've got it sitting at 8 pages, and here they are.


Title Page:
Red headed girl breathing in snow.
http://www.monkeyslunch.com/zenphoto/index.php?album=illustration&image=breath.jpg

Page 1:
(3 horizontal panels)

1st panel:
Red headed girl all suited up in white tromps through snow, left to right.
2nd panel:
More walking, different scenery, now there is a beeping in the background.
3rd panel:
The beeping in the background is much faster and she brings out a small device and looks at it.


Page 2:
(5 panels, 2 top, 1 middle and 2 bottom)

1st panel:
Her head raises and she looks into the distance, squinting.
2nd panel:
Her eyes grow huge and full of fear.
3rd panel:
We can see a large mountain range with a few figures in the distance. A focus box clarifies this is where we should be looking.
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/mountains.jpg
4th panel:
Closer up we can see that its a very hairy, white creature. It look ferocious and horrible. Its fur is stained red in places.
5th panel:
A closer up view, its sharp and gnarled teeth are gnashing, and putrid stale breath comes from its mouth.


Page 3:
(5 panels, 2 top, 2 mid, and 1 large bottom)

1st panel:
The woman is sneaking across the rocky landscape from boulder to boulder. The wind is blowing her hair and snow around. She has just reached another boulder.
2nd panel:
She crouches and views the beast seen a page earlier in the distance, waiting to make her break to the next piece of rock.
3rd panel:
A shadow looms over her as she watches.
4th panel:
She turns and notices.
5th panel:
A dynamic perspective shot showing the beast looming over her, her hands up in fear and it ready to attack her..


Page 4:
(3 panels over a large background shot, 1 top left, 2 bottom. Reads top left, background, 2 bottom)

1st panel:
A close up of her hand retrieving a tool from her side and we can see it is cleverly labeled “popgun”
Background shot:
A large dynamic shot of her zapping the creature with the gun, electric like currents coming out, and she is clearly winning because of this. It is knocked back.
2nd panel:
the creature is knocked out in the snow. Its eyes are rolled back in its head and it makes snoring noises.
3rd panel:
The woman smiles.


Page 5:
(5 panels, 2 small top, 3 horizontal)

1st panel:
Beeping as we look at the same device as before only closer. Here we can see that it is a locator of some kind and she is in immediate proximity of what she's looking for.
2nd panel:
She looks up and smirks an unimpressed but loving smile to one side of her mouth.
3rd panel:
A man hangs unconscious upside down against a rock face, held around the ankle by a bit of rope.
4th panel:
A knife cuts the rope.
5th panel:
She is right over top of him, breathing in his face, almost nose to nose. She says “Wake up, silly.”


Page 6:
(6 panels, 2 top, 2 horizontal, 2 bottom)

1st panel:
A close up of his eyes open and in pain, nose twitching.
2nd panel:
He coughs violently, disgusted.
3rd panel:
He sits up and speaks, still groggy: “Oh baby, I'm glad to see you... I had this horrible dream that one of those snow beasties was lying over top of me breathing in my face and its breath was absolute garbage!”
4th panel:
He looks confused and says “What? What'd I say?”
Inbetween panels 4 and 5/6 there is a Growling GRRRRRRRR sound effect.
5th Panel:
He gestures over his shoulder and to the right, saying “you're almost as cute as those things when you use your angry face!”
6th Panel:
Her face again this time. She smirks and says “If you're okay, we better get going... dear.”

Ending page:
Like title page only in the top left there is the mouth of one of the snow beasts hanging open. It looks as though its the one passed out in the snow from earlier. A putrid stench wafts from its mouth down from the top left to the bottom right. Where it reaches the corner it says “Breath” by Spencer Goldade.



Concept sketches:
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/character_ref.jpg
http://monkeyslunch.deviantart.com/art/Snow-Storm-83747995
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/lantern_small.jpg
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/final4_small.jpg

Unused Quick Concepts:
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/exterior_inks.jpg
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/interior.jpg
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/map-1.jpg
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/transport.jpg
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j277/Monkeyslunch/dogsinks_small.jpg

[Spenny]

And Mark says its badass and to get going (deadline is in 3 weeks), so I hope you guys are around to give me a healthy push every now and then.

This is old hat for everyone, but this is what these were for:

Opening page:

Mountains from page 2:

[Spenny]

Page 1 inks
to be colored by Rico Renzi

[satek]

Awesome Spence! I like the style you have going for it and the story sounds short and interesting. Should be fun to see how you illustrate the snow beast. *POKE* Keep at it!

[Spenny]

Thanks Stew! Right now its mostly a white gorilla with longer legs and a much wider mouth and more teeth. We'll see where it goes though.

[Soethe]

Neato I say -

the only thing I can think of at the moment would perhaps be the first panel on the first page.

while the hair is fluttering freely there is no sign of wind in her cloths, but they seem wrinkly enough to be affected by it.

[Spenny]

Her clothes are a heavy cordoroy type of material inspired by one of the uniforms I wore in Aikido that was so stiff -I- could barely move.

If you guys have any crits, try and direct 'em towards future panels and things I might do, the ones I post here are already finished and sent to the colorist, Rico Renzi. Spanks!

[Soethe]

Ah! sorry -i didn't see the post date ^_^'

Do you have any in works though? Uhm, or, rather how much has the project progressed since? ...wait, now I see the edit. ah ugh, never mind I'm too tired for this -__-'

It looks solid - good job! will it be done soon?

[Spenny]

Sorry! Its going to be rough with the crits on these ones. I'll have to keep it so that if anyone can offer anything I apply it to the next page, unless its super major importantly important. I can't waste time or my colorist, the amazing Rico Renzi, won't be able to finish... well, neither will I!

Anyways, page 2:

[X-Symmetry]

Haha, sorry, I usually tend to neglect unfinished section.
I assume they are just seperate illustration shots from a story until today.

[Scott]

this is looking really good so far Spencer! Keep pumping this stuff out man. Post your pencils for future posts too!

How is the process going? Quick? Slow?

One thing i think you should watch out for is to remember your thin lines too! They show up in your earliest tests but are lacking in the sequential stuff you posted. I think the thin lines are really important, they are nice and delicate and could work well with those nice chunky brush marks you have in that last page.

Good stuff dude!

[Spenny]

Hey buddy! I miss you!

Thanks for the heads up, I'm going to be inking another one soon so I'll try and keep some of the thin stuff. I think I was experimenting with the brush pen and got carried away and forgot a little bit.

Its been a little slow just because I hadn't done a few things like concept out my yeti guy and then ultimately I decided he'd just be a gorilla with an extended head, enlarged ears, and an elongated jaw anyways. Things are picking up now, thankfully, and I'm almost at the splash page which I hope to have fun with (where she shoots the thing with her "Popgun").

Process wise, I sketch out the proportions and framework of the panels in red pencil lightly so that I can work things out a bit, and then I start making marks over top in regular pencil and ultimately refine it the rest of the way when I ink on my crazy Bum make-shift light table:

I've shown a few people already, and Chance keeps coming upstairs and laughing at me for it. Its my area lamp balanced on a chair and shoved under the glass of the coffee table which is raised a few more inches by old VHS tapes! har har

The most important part of my process I would say is the darker pencil on top of the red. Not for refining things but because, like every project where I set something aside for myself to learn, I'm really trying to learn how to make more interesting marks and textures and work on my drawing overall.

I'll try and show some of the pencils in my next post!
Glad to hear from you bud!

[Spenny]

Some process:

I constantly remind myself what's going on, on the page. That's what the top left scribbles are. I usually do 2 panels on the same page just to help me remember there's supposed to be a flow to them.
This is her just arriving behind a large boulder that she'll be peaking around and will be present during her "popgunning" of the yeti. There's a few minor things that I'll tweak later, but I have to keep drawing!

[Spenny]

rest of the pages. These are pretty quick... didn't have much time in the end. No crits needed.

[Spenny]

Colors for the first 3 pages from Rico. Keep in mind, these are his colors, not mine, but I can pass on any major crits. Also, the editor, Mark, has suggested I might want to redraw most of page 3. I may do this, admittedly its far from my best work.

I really dig the first page. I've already gotten some crits on the 2nd two concerning the color on the girl's face getting a little overwhelming, the purple of the monster being a little much, the rock should be the same color as the mountains, and a couple more. The 1st page is pretty close to done, and we'll keep tweaking the other two. Have at 'er.

[Spenny]

Rico and I weren't sure if he could finish the colors before I left for San Diego, thus leaving me screwed for communicating with Thomas for the letters and getting things sent off for printing and whatnot as well, so I'm continuing with the colors myself. I've had to touch upon some of Rico's stuff and retranslate it to my own style so I can keep working, but its going pretty smoothly now.

I didn't have to alter much he did on page 1 at all. The new pages 1 and 2 have been sent off, but here's the new look of number 2 that I did:

Will be continuing with the others for the rest of the night.

[andrea]

Woo, it's coming along very nicely! I'm glad you cleaned up a lot of the ink lines in the color versions, I noticed that a lot of your panels got soooo heavy with lines. Remember Dennis Budgen; your compositions should be either mostly white or mostly black in a black-and-white image. Lots of lines without a lot of true black or white translates into a monotone 50% grey, which makes it hard to understand the image sometimes.

Watch out for your rightwards slant too that abominable snowman head is slanting to the right a little more than the tilt would allow. Try flipping the paper over on your light table to keep it in check.

Looks really good so far, I like it a lot better than your old story.

[Spenny]

Woo, it's coming along very nicely! I'm glad you cleaned up a lot of the ink lines in the color versions, I noticed that a lot of your panels got soooo heavy with lines. Remember Dennis Budgen; your compositions should be either mostly white or mostly black in a black-and-white image. Lots of lines without a lot of true black or white translates into a monotone 50% grey, which makes it hard to understand the image sometimes.

Watch out for your rightwards slant too that abominable snowman head is slanting to the right a little more than the tilt would allow. Try flipping the paper over on your light table to keep it in check.

Looks really good so far, I like it a lot better than your old story.

Wah! That's some of the best crit I've had in a while. I was completely blind to most of that. Thanks a lot, Andy! Dennis is my hero. I miss him. Its funny how many times I think about his stuff or something he's said when working. Definitely one of the instructors that's gotten through to me.

The last of the comic was a little hurried, so now checking it with what you've critted I'm hoping its still somewhat up to par.

I like it better than my old story too. The old one was a whiny piece of poo poo.