This is the lastest two page spread of Fite. the story has been leading up to this since I started. While I'm pretty happy with the pages in general, two years of anticipation have sort of felt unfulfilled. It's points like this that storytelling is, for me, the hardest. Between this and the next episode, there aren't many bigger moments in the comic. We'll see how it goes. In the end, Fite has to be for me, I guess. Perhaps the next comic will be more for other people. Probably not. Besides, I like the work. It makes me happy.

Another bit of practice emulating Art Lozzi's work from HB cartoons. This one is from a Yogi Bear cartoon. The top version is a screen grab from the cartoon. The second is my recreation using AI and PS. While it's not utterly identical, it's close enough for what I want which is to learn the technique. Thanks to some new brushes I was given for PS, I was better able to copy the overall feel of the original. Next step is to design my own background using the same techniques. It's all good practice and research.

Here's another quick and dirty Art Lozzi background recreation. I think this one is a tighter one than the last, but now I want to branch out and do one of my own. The brushes in PS are still eluding me to get a complete match, but that's ok as it's more about learning the ideas behind the textures than the actual textures themselves.

Digitally recreated Art Lozzi background (from a Huckleberry Hound cartoon) and a character from the comic make a decent pairing, I think. I tried to copy Lozzi to see if I could get something close to the same effects he had with AI and PS as they're easier for me to use than real paint for a comic. This was a quick and dirty recreation but I learned a lot by doing it.

More color tests. I also want to make sure that this more lineless style will emote enough, and will accept the stretch and squash I've worked on in Fite. So far, I think it works just fine. I suppose this is more or less what not "keeping to model" means, and that's fine. While I love some modern animation and some UPS stuff, it seems that in many cases, the characters didn't drift out of model so much and so energy was lost. I want to do both. We'll see if I can manage it.

Working more on Ghiroy, the next comic. I've been in love with the black line on white, the thick and thin inkbrush that I've used on Fite. I'm no master but I've come a long way. And there's something utterly enticiing about the tool and the ink itself. Last night, I was playing around with some comps, one of which was meant as a simply color palette test so I could get one of the character's generals down. For whatever reason, I dumped most of the black lines out and rather liked the results. So now I have to wonder if I shouldn't move the comic's style more towards this kind of thing as it's not only a departure from Fite, but because it may have a slightly more serious edge to it which would better fit the story. Hmmm...