Another stylistic sketch. I think I have the look I want down except for the word balloons. I want them legible but more different from those used by the mice. And I still have to get those little assholes off stage. Dragging feet and having fun.

 Another quickie as work is kicking my ass. No background, just more playing with the character to see if I like what I see. So far, so good. I want his word balloons to feel different from the mice's so might adopt a more flowing style. Not totally sure.

 This is a quick and dirty test of sorts. The background is totally made up. I took a photo I had of a brick wall and one I have of a cinder block wall, put them in perspective to form a fake corner. Then I made graffiti in Procreate and put that in the same perspective as the walls I'd just made and layered them on top. I had to adjust a little transparency so it looked a little more like the graffiti wasn't just sitting there. Then I shoved it through SuperVectorizer. I spent very little time on this but it did what I wanted to. There might be one too many colors, and I might avoid TOO much texture in the future but as a proof of concept, I think this is solid enough to move on with. I threw yesterday's fox on top just to see how it worked and adjusted the colors. What will matter is the details, such as pipes, wires and the like, so I'll need to take more photos. I think this will work.

 Another one done for the day, and something that will, I think, prove the concept. It might be almost TOO solid a kind of background for the comic, but we'll see. The background  image is a photo I tool of some graffiti while in Italy in 2012. I think it proves my concept idea, that I can mix and match textures, background set pieces and graffiti to 'build' a set for the comic. The one thing that worries me is that this will look a LOT more solid than the rest of the comic and will make it look kind of shabby in comparison. The only way to know for sure is to just do some pages and see. So far, I'm happy with how this is working out.

 Still playing about with this mix of lineless shapes and photo backgrounds. I think it works and I was damned lucky with that "Dogboy" tag; it was in the photo all on its own. I did have to change the position of it and the graffiti below so "Dogboy" would show. Not a big deal, and SuperVectorizer helped hide a lot of the very fast and bad photo editing it took to do that. Thinking on it now, I might use elements from various photos and kind of 'build' a photographic background which might look more interesting and make me feel less guilty about directly using photos in my work. Thing is, while I like it a lot, I still don't know that it would work for City Silent. It's SUCH a diversion from the existing style. Then again, the mice's section doesn't look much like Silas', either and not much like Howard's. Hmm. Maybe I'll give a few pages a try and see how it goes. Otherwise, I had fun doing this. I need to take more photos as I'd really want to use my own, Pop Art be damned.

 One more last minute test image yielded a surprising result. The character is done only in greyscale. There's a red-orange filter over everything with a harsh light chosen for the layer. Makes it look like he's done in color, since he's a fox. Again, don't know that this will work for the comic it might for various illustrations.

It's a morning of character and style design. Digby, my fox character who was supposed to be in a comic that never happened is going to be the lead on the next track. He might have a partner, I haven't decided yet. The style of "The City Silent" changes because I change and have a real problem with consistency. I get bored and, I hope, I improve. So it means that, over the length of this "graphic novel," things will not look the same at the end as they did in the beginning. The thing is, how far can I push that? I did some quick sketches in pencil, took a photo in Procreate and inked as usual. This is the top image. Then, after vectorization, I did some coloring in AD. That's the second. I played around with the palette, starting with a more or less "realistic" version in the upper right, changing to something utterly off-key next, trying some bright versions of the "realistic" and finally just greyscale. Of the four, I like blue/purple and the greyscale versions the best. Then I tried another inking style, which is the fourth image. (I actually tried a few different brushes but didn't like any of them.) Fifth image has me scanning the original pencil, vectorizing that and using that as an "inked line." While I like the effect, I don't think it works for this comic. Next, the inevitable lineless version which, sadly, I like a lot. Finally, I decided to take a random city photo I'd taken, throw that into the vectorizer and place it below the lineless images. Now the greyscale really stands out. Again, will the comic withstand such a dramatic shift in style? Probably not but the inked version is just starting to look 'old' to me. Well, that's how it goes. I'll keep pushing to see where I can go.
 

 Just a little fun this morning, playing with the shapes, using an older drawing to mess with. Also played with filters at the last moment and got something kind of glowing, kind of autumnal. Could probably have been better balanced but for a quickie it works ok.

 So, I kept the double page spread, more or less kept the characters where they were and what size they were, redid all the paint cans, added some texture (which was dead easy; all I did was take photos of my driveway and then shove them through the vectorizer), added a spotlight effect and just messed around with it til it was feeling done. All that said, it doesn't feel at all as dynamic as the rest of the track which might be a problem. Thing is, if it was anything but a straight on shot, the whole point of the mice having painted over someone else's graffiti would have been lost. So, it is what it is. Just means that the last page will have to be wild and distorted. I have GOT to get the damned mice off the stage.

 Update from late night: Looking at it again, the characters were too small. I think they need to be redrawn as their poses aren't quite right but this is a step in the right direction.

 This was what came out today. I like the wider size and ratio and the sizes are a lot better for scale. But it seems so...dull. There's still some detail missing, such as the cinder blocks, empty paint cans and such. I'll sleep on it. So annoying that a page where nothing big needs to happen is kicking my ass, especially when I'm so close to the end of the track.

Slow progress. This page has been a pain in the ass. It started with just the graffiti the crew was painting over the piece they found. But the straight on angle was boring. So I stretched it out and put the guys in front of it. It worked better until I looked back and realized the original piece was a lot bigger than was shown originally. And again, the guys, who have done 'singing,' look kind of boring. So I warped them, redrew Rooster and re-imaged the graffiti to more match. Still having some trouble but I guess it's progress. Just have to get the little bastards off the stage and I can move on.

 

 Once in a blue moon, you find someone that just happens to resemble a character you made up from nothing. This guy showed up in my tumblr feed today and if he isn't a slightly older version of Crow from Ghiroy, I don't know who is. I mean damn, look at those freckles!