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One of the better parts of a story in comic strip form is that they're less continuous than comic pages, so one strip doesn't necessarily have to start with the other ended. I bring this up because I really wasn't sure how I was gonna get the five of them at the locker Khristie disappeared from (I'd have to double-check, but I think my notes on the story for this point just say something like "they somehow get together").

Anyway, now that they ARE all here, it seems like the plot might actually be going places! Now if only had a more consistant update schedule...

Speaking of updates, I polished up some of the character profiles. Also, you probably can't tell in the actual comic, but I paid more attention to proportion this time--see the previous post for a (slightly) better look at (some of) them!

Head Practice

Up until recently, I didn't really pay attention to proportion when drawing cartoon characters, opting instead to wing it and go with what looked OK. When Dan Pertierra did the inking for ES 28, he took it upon himself to correct the proportions of my original lineart--and I could see the level of difference between them. So with ES 30, I tried drawing the characters five heads tall (except for Khristie, who I drew about three heads tall to cover the non-spider half). I'm kinda pleased how some of them came out, to be perfectly honest, but I still have a ways to go.

nb: The drawings are scaled to how they appear in the comics, so the reason the left Madelyn picture is smaller than the right is because the left drawing is further away from the "camera." The proportions, as far as I can tell, are the same if not close enough not to matter.

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And even after doing a bit of line quality practice, I still have no clue how it's supposed to work (and before anyone says anything, yes I know it'll take more practice than that. I'm just saying).

As for the comic itself, we see why Lucas usually prefers not to say anything.

On an unrelated note, I got an Xbox 360 and Lollipop Chainsaw for my birthday this past Wednesday. The similarities between Juliet and Raiko are uncanny.

Line Practice

It should be pretty obvious, but just in case it isn't, Dan's lineart is on the left, mine is on the right. In my head, I was going to draw them like I would've done them, but with the line variation (and proportions, I guess) the way Dan did them. That didn't really work out, since more often than not I ended up tracing Dan's lines. Still, considering I only spent about 30-40 odd minutes on these (total, not each), I think I did pretty good with showing line variation.
Jya
Jya Again
Raiko

Dan's Deviant Art page is linked in the previous post.
Also, the next comic is sketched and scanned. I'm hoping to have it done by about Saturday.

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Surprise update time!

Looks kinda different, doesn't it? No, I haven't suddenly become awesome or anything like that. Dan offered to ink a comic back in February, and after doing heaps of juggling our respective work around, this is the result.

Didn't realize they'd be so small, though. Which is a shame, because the lineart for these are amazing. I actually plan to practice my line quality over the summer using these as a reference (which I'll post here). Hopefully in doing so I can get a better feel for where to have thinner and thicker lines on a drawing.

Plotwise, we see Jya using her healing magic and Raiko's witch attire for the first time! ...The latter of which more or less amounts to what we saw her wearing in comics 21-24 plus a hat and cape, but still!

An Occasional Update

After doing some supplementary writing for ES over the past couple weeks, I finally got around to retconning out a couple of references to the year the story takes place--as I had mentioned in other places, the jokes that I was attempting to make with them weren't funny and would long since have become dated by the time I finally got into a position of updating more frequently, and in general didn't really contribute anything to the story anyway.

So What Happens Now?

Unfortunately, this is where the comics stop for now. While I still won't be going back to school for another couple weeks, it's at a good stopping point and, really, I'd only get about two or three comics out until then anyway.

Either way, during the semester, I need to prioritize my class assignments and projects over any personal work, and I can't be working on art of some kind constantly--I'm only human, I need chances to have some down time. I don't think only updating between semesters is practical either.

So then what? Well, I don't know how I'm going to do this, but hopefully I can use this blog to further develop the story--concept sketches, outlines, stuff like that--so that ES becomes stronger forit when I finally have the chance to focus my energy on the comic year-round.

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This seems like a good place for the story to stop for a hiatus of an indefinite time, wouldn't you say?

By the way, I'm well aware that the lockers in the background are disproportionately huge, but hey, if you can do better, drop me a line and we'll discuss making you my new background art monkey.

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The guy in panel's one and four is Khristie's dad. There's really no reason he's in here, aside from havng an excuse to not have Raiko upside-down anymore and to add a bit more visual diversity. Same thing with Madelyn and Lucas getting cokes, it just gave me a reason to have something else happen than everyone sitting down again.

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This and the next few comics are me making fun of myself for having trouble coming up for how the story would be structured for a while.

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You can probably guess where the story is going from here, but the it's not meant to be earth-shatteringly original anyway; just something simple that can serve as a vehicle for the humor after my previous comic stagnated into nothingness due to a lack of a story.

Funny thing I found out last week. The dialogue in the first panel is a reference to the SNES game EarthBound (and if you haven't played it before, I highly reccommend it, even if you don't play video games): at the beginning of the game, the player encounters supernatural aid du jour, Buzz Buzz, an insect-like alien from a decade into the future that is initially mistaken for a bee, which he responds with, "A bee I am... not." Anyway, one thing I tried to do with the Eternal Light's dialogue in the comics he's in is give him a kind of "sophisticated as hell"-type of speech pattern, where he seems to slide in and out of a "wise mentor"-type of behavior. I'm not certain how successful I was at doing that, but as it turns out, in Mother 2 (ie, the original Japanese version of EarthBound), Buzz Buzz does the exact same thing.

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Madelyn's line in the last panel is an example of what I like to call "Clevinger's First Law of Comedy"--humor trumps continuity. Yes, Madelyn only knows about those last two, but there'd be less impact if those were the only ones she mentioned and it felt more like a Madelyn line than a Lucas line anyway.

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This is pretty much the exact same joke as the last comic, but it at least demonstrates traits of all five characters.

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The teacher in this comic is named Mr. Weisskopf (it's German) and based off a teacher I had the misfortune of having not only for World History, but also Homeroom. For two consecutive years. He was a douchebag, and even the rest of the faculty knew of said douchebaggery.

Does he deserve getting mauled by a bear? I'm not entirely sure what the honest answer would be, but given the circumstances surrounding the bear, it was going to happen anyway.

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"As you are probably aware, this is our first comic. And as you know, first comics always suck. And of course, our first comic will be no exception."

Raiko's Cast Profile

Khristie's Cast Profile

Madelyn's Cast Profile

Jya's Cast Profile

Lucas' Cast Profile