Did this today. Yah, it's another re-draw of an earlier promo piece. But it's important, at least to me in two ways. First, it shows the new style working with the old pose. Second, it shows what some of the vegetation is likely to look like. It's alien and has the right level of detail for what I want to do. All in all, I'm pretty pleased with this, including the intermediary low opacity magenta filter over the background. Each page/panel will be composed like a poster/woodblock print. I've got a friend who is a pro artist helping me with the stylings for the backgrounds. All I need to do is actually START this damned thing and then follow through. Easy, right?

Another one of these, this time with the elf. I think he kind of looks like Iggy Pop. I might want to do more with exaggeration of the body with him though I think he makes a decent counter to Crow's broader, squatter build. I -think- I can sustain this style for a comic. It means a lot more drawing and surety of anatomy, which I don't really have. I've received a few compliments from artistic folk, which kind of surprised me. If I can do this, I will also have to be careful of things like proportion. For some reason, I tend to draw Mikilo's legs too short, as can be seen here between the pencil drawing and the finished one. Illustrator is my inking stage, so I have no trouble making corrections along the way.

So more of these. An artist friend of mine, who generally doesn't say anything about my work, though it's usually nice when she does, said she'd love to see a comic done in this style. And really, the drawing part of this is easy enough. For some reason, abstraction comes easily to me and these caricatures are just fun. Cartooning is always a challenge for me. While I think I was onto something good with the other styles, this is indeed something different. Grotesque, even. So can I make a comic in this style? Well, we'll see. Crow is still the easiest to draw, but I think the elf was the best portrait of the three. Francesca came out far better than she has in any other version. And the full body versions here of Crow are, well, twisted and interesting to my eye. Another artist friend of mine is offering to help me bring the style of the backgrounds into focus as its his fortè. This project has, really, been something I've been working on for like seven or eight years and there's NOTHING to show as of yet. I can trace this back to the original Ghiroy and tons of work done then. Delve Deep came long after, and there was tons of that. I really need to make this a STORY and not just study after study. I hope this is the kick in the ass I need.

Did these today for fun, and because I was messing about with PS and some brushes I never really take advantage of. I'd done a caricature of me just to test the brushes out and then got in that mood and, well, did these. They're grotesque but also have a certain something to them. Anyway...