Heya Gang– Welcome back for our penultimate Issue 3 page!
Team16 put together a pretty stellar page here– so let’s not waste any time and pop ourselves right into a Process Bullet Point writeup!
PROCESS!
* Great layout this week from DJ Keawekane! I knew coming into this page that we were fairly short on dialogue, which meant that he’d have room to play (particularly in Panel 3), and play he did! The amount of background detail that DJ put into the backstage area of the theater is fantastic. Particularly in the sense of adding dimension to the room.
If you bounce back and forth between this page and page 8, you’ll quickly notice that DJ is treating the theater/Jock’s lair as a real “set piece”– in the respect that the room is consistent throughout– you’d be surprised how often this doesn’t happen.
* We’ve talked in the past about how DJ often uses his “camera” to “dutch” angles– creating a sense of movement or action on the page. You can see it at work in Panels 1 and 2.
Now, something to keep in mind if you decide to start using Dutch angles in your compositions: Notice how DJ adjusts the angle and reverses it between Panels 1 and 2– In comics, you’ll never see two dutch angles repeating the same orientation– it just doesn’t look right. However, flopping them (but maintaining the same degree of tilt) creates a sense of movement– even when there is none.
* I’m not sure who’s hat that is at Sears’ feet belongs to. I can kinda see him rockin’ one of those though. (and thinking he looks really cool…)
* Cool Lisa “author” moment on this page– During our weekly production emails, I noticed that I never called out a time of day in the script– Obviously, the “telling” is that Sears has just hung up with Cally, so those two events are nearly concurrent– And if we backtrack from that scene, it was late-night when Cally was on her “spy-double date”– So, how long was she at the QUAD HQ before placing the call to Sears?
Granted, I don’t think anyone would ever call us out on a sky/time inconsistency– (I think it’ll zoom right past most people in a collected edition)- but I was wrestling back and forth with what the time should be.
Ultimately, I just decided to let Lisa handle it– which she did by creating a fantastic ambiguous sky effect. You can’t really tell if it’s early morning or evening– Heck, even now, mid-October, I’m starting to see this kind of sky at 5pm!
I’ve always been a huge fan of Lisa’s sky/atmosphere coloring– combine that with the interior lighting glow in Panel 1– and you’ve got an awesomely moody kickoff to the page!
* This might have been one of the easiest pages of S16 for Brant to letter yet! Well, until that silent sequence coming up next issue! Teaser?! TEEEEEASSSSER!
SPYING ON THE NET!
Since I haven’t been really following up on Blog@16 (time has not been my friend, of late), I’ve decided to take a crack at combining our Process writeup with News and Notes–
I’m going to keep Blog@16 going, although it won’t be subject to any particular schedule. In the meantime, I did miss posting quick-hit links and reactions to the flurries of the Digital/Web news going on these days…That, and since we’re moving into Bullet Points for the Process pieces– I figured there was room for a little more content.
So, that’s said– Here’s some stuff:
THE BROADCAST OF COMICS
Warren “him talkz smrt” Ellis fired off a rather brilliant (although self-admittedly rambling) post on Web and Digital comics. Warren is the guy who brainchilded FreakAngels– so when he posts on the topic of comics, you should read.
Within the article, Warren articulates a gripe of mine re: digital editions–A big problem I have is that I can link you to Graphic.ly’s Spy6teen page but I can’t provide you with a button that instantly and automagically pushes that issue to your I-Reader.
That said– reading Warren’s piece reaffirmed and resparked my flame for the webcomic format– with a simple little phrase:
There is no experience of broadcast in digital comics. Digital comics are, in fact, the closest digital emulation of the store experience: they’re flung up on a virtual shelf.
Webcomics are broadcast. From the moment they’re uploaded, they’re surrounded by an expanding sphere of URLs and shortcodes, of RTs and Likes and +1s, and are being opened on desktops and laptops and tablets and phones.
Like I said, go read it.
STEVE NILES PIRATES HIMSELF
Horror writer, Steve Niles (30 Days of Night) recently ran across a pirated version of a one-shot comic he did called “Pieces of Mom”– the original sales of the comic were around 5k– but the pirated edition had over 20k downloads. So, he did the only logical thing one can do:
He made it digitally available on his site for free and added a donate button.
Hopefully he’s made a few bucks off it by the time you read this– It’s a perfect story for this time of year, so do yourself a favor and check it out– and, if you dig it, drop a few coins in his bucket.
I’ll probably be taking the same approach here– It’s nice to see that our own “Pirate” edition is still hanging on (down to about 8 seeders)– but perhaps it makes sense to make the issue available here as well. I’m still toying around with all the distribution methods available to us these days…stay tuned on that front.
WRAP UP!
Well, that closes out this week! Next week we’re back for our big conclusion of Issue 3– and then it’s BREAK TIME!! Well, to a degree. As I mentioned last week, we’re scheduling a rest/recoup break between issues 3 and 4– We’ve been having a blast bringing you guys the last 3 issues– but I think as a whole, Team 16 is in need of a short break to recharge our creative batteries.
So, after next week, we’ll be off for the month of November– We’ll return for a short stint in December, but then be out again for the holidays. Although this sounds like a massively long break, I’m sure between Thanksgiving and the Holidays, it’ll fly by. (both for us and for you!)
That said, I won’t be leaving you guys in the lurch. I think given the extra time, I’ll finally be able to get a few of those Blog@16s off the ground, as well as spending some time setting up some promotional stuff– something I’ve been feeling a little sluggish on lately.
Well, more news on the break next week!! Please remember to drop us a vote on Top Webcomics:
And we’ll be back next week for…
