#The cover is a panel from a comic I'm working on~

[demaparbat-hp]

Zuko was a child when he met Agni. Then, the spirits started coming to him. Eyes hidden in the hallways, voices pleading for help, for recognition, for remembrance.

Zuko could see Agni. He could see the broken remains of a Great Spirit and the empty smiles of amnesiac ghosts.

And they could see him in return.

[ckcomics]

The City Imp & the Country Imp

[autisticcassandracain]

What are good stories for the new gods. And sorry for my last and my mind just thinks stuff randomly sometimes sorry

Don't worry at all, always happy to give comic recs! Sorry for the late reply, I wanted to read the Forever People miniseries I hadn’t read yet to see if they were worth recommending. They were not.

Please keep in mind that this is not a reading list, but rather a rec list of New Gods comics I’d consider good. Unfortunately that’s mostly Mister Miracle. Please pour one out for the Forever People and their complete lack of good comics aside from their debut.

Of course, the original fourth world trilogy — The New Gods (1971), The Forever People (1971), and Mister Miracle (1971) — forms your base and is required reading. (Kirby's run on Mister Miracle ends after #18, and that's when you should stop reading because Englehart's Mister Miracle sucks.)

Others are:

The Hunger Dogs, a graphic novel continuation of the New Gods by Jack Kirby. Kirby was forced to cancel the comic prematurely and this wraps up some (though sadly not all) loose ends, although likely not in the way that was originally intended. Better ending than the original, imo, though far from perfect.

Orion, the only Orion solo run to date and one of my favourite comics of all time. Truly can't overstate how good this one is.

Justice League of America #183-185 isn't solely about the New Gods but I really like Scott and Barda in it. Pre-crisis.

Mister Miracle Special, a oneshot that was intended to re-establish the Mister Miracle canon post-crisis, but really ended up just being a stand-alone story. My favourite Scott outside of the original series.

Mister Miracle (1989) is Scott's second and longest running solo. I have my issues with it, but it's still very much worth reading.

Mister Miracle and the Source of Freedom is a post-flashpoint Shilo Norman miniseries. Again, I have my issues with it, primarily my hatred of N'vir Free as a character concept, but it's a very interesting take on Shilo and has by far my favourite Thaddeus Brown and Oberon.

Also, I’ll rec the Jack Kirby 100th Celebration Collection, which is exactly what it sounds like. As in all collections, the writing varies between stories, and I recommend some but not others, so here’s a quick overview of the New Gods-centric stories in it:

The first one, about Shilo Norman and the Black Racer (unsure of the name), I really can’t recommend because I absolutely loathe its take on the Black Racer. While it keeps to the letter of the canon established by Kirby, I do not feel like it keeps to the spirit. The little ‘Soul of Willie Walker’ blurb by Mark Evanier that precedes it is interesting, though.

The second story, The Resistance!, I very much do recommend! I really adore this story, focusing on resistance efforts on Apokolips, because I feel like it’s one of the few post-Kirby stories that actually does a good job engaging with the fascism Darkseid and Apokolips represent. This story is essentially a better version of the one from the New Gods Secret Files, which I don’t necessarily recommend because it’s far too sloppy to actually be good, but it’s not bad either, so you know, it gets a mention. 

The third New Gods story, focusing on Orion (I also don’t know this one’s name), is like, fine? It does that thing where they make specifically Orion xenophobic towards the Bugs, rather than the entirety of New Genesis, which I strongly dislike, but aside from that its characterization is decent and it focuses on Kalibak and Orion, so if you like that dynamic this might appeal to you more than me.

The fourth New Gods story, Teeth of the See: A Tale of Young Orion, I do recommend. It’s short and quickly read, but it’s a fun look at an adventure from a younger, less experienced Orion.

[zosanbrainrot]

part 06!! and the end of Act 1

01 02 03 04 05 06

OK SO THAT'S THAT

I don't have anything else storyboarded right now, I have the dialogues for Act 3 written down, but for the 2nd Act I'm gonna have to rewatch parts of WCI. I'm also thinking of a different approach, more like a series of illustrations not a comic, but idk yet, I'll have to rewatch and see!

It's not like I'm actually using a 3 Act structure as in 'a method of writing a story', I don't know how to and I haven't tried learning that (YET). I just think its neat and reflects how I divided my artistic process. I've always seen this story in my head as 3 parts.

And before I delve into part 06, I can't stop myself from saying that....... part 05 really needed another closeup on Sanji's face. If I ever try and repost it to another site then maybe I'll add it (between the panels of Ichiji & Zoro and the closeup on the spear, it would help the rythym but also strengthen the emotional connection, before Sanji shuts himself off)

Anyhow part 06

Most panels were a breeze, but the last two, my god, I just couldn't get them right for the longest time. In the end my favourite panels are the closeups of Luffy and Nami, I should really draw them more.

Here's how this panel in particular went:

I did like how the pose was looking in my first rough pass, the face is scrunched, the shoulders are high with tension, the direction is consistent

Couldn't execute it though... I think in the first rough sketch the camera is looking at Luffy slightly from above? Like he's leaning into it. That's why the shoulders can be so high up, but I didn't realize what it was when trying to clean it. So when cleaning the sketch I drew the head on the same level as the camera which made the whole pose look flat, also in this weird angle, like it's not fully 3/4, but it's not facing forwards either.

I didn't know what wasn't working, so I doubled down and tried with the lineart, but it didn't magically help. It just looks like he's slouching.

4. so I tried to rethink the pose and commit to a 3/4 view. I like that more of the neck is visible now, you can feel that he's leaning forward with the scream, but I think I could have pushed it a bit more still

5. with linework I made some small changes, like a bit shorter hair, smaller nose and the eyes pushed back a bit. I also added the scratches and filled in the black parts

6. added flat colors & shading!

Last panel with Sanji was even harder to draw hehe

so I thought this would be easy bcs I wanted to basically redraw the panel from the anime

that's why my rough sketch was extremely rough, I didn't think about it much

and then I had so much trouble with it lmao You'd think that it would be easier when you're covering the character's face, but I was in this undecided space of on one hand wanting to show the pain on Sanji's face and staying truthful to the anime scene on the other. I also found it super diffucult to show the emotions without the eyes

4. The pose in 3. also wasn't working so I tried to make him more slouched, like he's curling in on himself more, it was definitely a better direction. I tried going into lineart from here but I didn't like how the fingers were turning out

5. So I decided to get a new ref and took a picture of how I'd make this gesture myself. With this pose I also changed the position and angle of the face slightly, bcs it would have created a very small space between the hand and the nose and I wanted the two shapes to connect

6. I really liked the hand, but was having trouble with the hair, it felt too short, still couldn't get the face right either

7. so I elongated the hair and worked on the face some more and was finally happy with what I had!

8. added colors! At first I had it colored like the other panels, color just on Sanji then gradient on the bottom helping it fade to black, but it wasn't sitting well with me. Maybe because the space above his head was too big and I didn't want to have a background here and also wasn't adding the little floating pieces to the carriage scene (these were reserved for the grass battlefield)

9. SO! I made Sanji's figure darker and also added a darker shade to the whole scene and I think it ended up working really nice. Like he's drowning in the darkness, the only element piercing through it are Luffy's words. It also just fills up the space better lmao, feels less empty visually

Its gonna be A WHILE, before I have updates for this, I'm gonna have to start with the rewatch anyway. Right now I'm gonna have to focus on finishing my extra pieces for the @rdtriozine !! If any of you read this far you may as well check it out lmao I have a full illustration spread there and gonna have spots for a fic too ❤️ I just need to draw them!!! AGHHHH

[natalieriess]

FIRE ALONE...CAN SAVE OUR CLAN...

Full illustration from the hardcover jacket cover of WARRIORS: THE PROPHECIES BEGIN Volume 1 + some details!

Process, WIPs and detail rambling under the cut:

Sara and I rarely get to do detailed, non-comic page illustration work, and wanted to get some painterly texture to set this apart from regular comic panels. We did some tests early on in the process:

(inked lineart on the left and graphite lineart on the right)

Sara used some soft, chunky (8B!!!) graphite pencils to get the storybook texture we ended up going with. I also used a gritty digital "gouache" brush to softly paint the whole illustration, and used a watercolor texture overlay I had on hand for added crunch.

These are the rough sketches I sent in to our editor and designer- I normally do a rough color pass at this stage. It's a little extra work, but it's worth it to not feel totally lost on color later in the process.

(Pencils by Natalie, printed and handed off to Smo, who "inks" with a heavy graphite pencil)

More WIPs...I think it looked pretty good in black and white too, honestly!

Thanks everyone for all of your kind words about the book so far! I'm already drawing volume three ;w; see you in a year!

[fox-guardian]

[ID: An eight page digital comic featuring Sam, Celia, and Alice from The Magnus Protocol on a gray background. The characters are all colored with a single color each. Sam is red, Celia is green, and Alice is pink. Sam is a fat Arab man with short curly dark hair, a mustache, and a small goatee, and he is wearing small black earrings, a cardigan, a turtleneck, trousers and loafers. Celia is a taller Korean woman with short dark hair and she is wearing rectangular glasses, piercings including an industrial piercing, an x-shaped earring, and snakebites, a button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up, a vest, trousers, and black wrist cuffs. Alice is an even taller white woman with long fluffy hair and crooked teeth, and she is wearing cat eye glasses, three pairs of earrings, snakebites, a flannel shirt, a hoodie tied around her waist, a patchwork skirt, bracelets, and a lanyard.

Sam and Celia are stood at a table covered in papers. Celia urgently turns to Sam. Celia: Alice is coming! She can't catch us researching, we need a diversion, QUICK! How can we make her think we're not doing what we're doing? Sam, shrugging really hard: UHHHH she thinks I have a crush on you?? Celia, sweating, turns back to where Alice is coming from, panicked, and turns back to Sam, shrugging and reaching for him. Celia smiling a bit manically: Yeah, that'll work, sure!

Sam, with Celia's hands grabbing his cardigan: Wait whaAAAA- He is pulled out of frame. Alice walks in: Hey Sam, working hard or hardly woOOOAA She leans on the doorframe as she holds a hand to her chest in shock.

The next panel is rendered with soft pink shadows and "shoujo sparkles" in the now pink background. Sam is sitting on the table holding onto Celia, whose face is buried in his neck as she wraps one arm around his back and the other holds up one of his legs under his knee. Neither of their faces are visible. The rest of the page fades back to gray from there. Sam and Celia look over at Alice, hair ruffled, Sam is now blushing. Sam: ALICE!! He pushes Celia away and they look at each other for a moment, panicked. Sam: It's- .... exactly what it looks like! Celia: Aw, you've caught us! He rests his hands on her shoulders and they both look in opposite directions as though embarrassed. Celia is also blushing lightly. There are red and green neon signs pointing to them reading "Totally Ham-Slammin'" and "GAY! (in an M/F way)" respectively.

Alice looks to be in shock with a vacant expression and a computer pop up over her forehead reading "Alice.exe has stopped responding". In the next panel she is fine again and back to smirking. Alice: WOW SAM, didn't know you had it in you! Now I'm no snitch, so I didn't see anything, BUT- you lovebirds should cut it out before Gwen catches you. Celia and Sam look at each other anxiously, cheeks pressed together as she speaks. Alice: You KNOW she'd tell Lena. Celia, pulling back and smoothing her hair out: Oh, for sure. Sam: Th-Thanks, Alice. Alice: Don't mention it! I'll give you crazy kids a minute to straighten up, TA-TA~ She waves as she leaves.

Sam and Celia listen to her steps fade before going "phew" and finally pulling away from each other, now holding hands at an arms distance. Celia: You alright? That was kinda sudden.... Sam: It's fine! Just a bit caught off guard. Celia: I can't believe she actually bought all of that! Sam: Me either! Works for me, though.

Celia: Did you want to get down- Sam, pulling away suddenly, blushing again: NO! He crosses his legs and looks away sheepishly, scratching his head. Sam: I wanna stay here another minute or so.... Celia, concerned: You sure you're alright? Sam: Yeah! Just, er.... Celia looks at him, confused. Sam, blushing increasingly harder: Ahem. (He folds his hands in his lap politely.) I am not immune to being thrown on a table. Celia, smiling and politely stepping away: AH! .... Noted~

She walks away casually, still smiling. Celia: I'll give you a minute to collect yourself. Sam, head down in his lap, embarrassed: Thanks.... He looks up after she leaves. Sam: Wait. He straightens up, slightly panicked, face entirely red. Sam: What do you mean by "NOTED"?!

end ID]

~~~~

i am SO glad this episode didn't entirely debunk the silly headcanon that birthed this comic. initially i wasn't convinced sam actually had a crush so i made this like "well if he didn't before, HE DOES NOW" so.... here's this silly comic thing <3 i just think they're neat <3

[pakhnokh]

House of Gentians Arc 2 || Pages 163-168 END

Wei Ying: Sorry, I can't let Lan Wangji hold me by the waist like that again ;___;

Me: Goddammit, alright, have it your way, but I'm going to draw the most intense panels of you putting your hands on his shoulders. Is Lan Wangji flinching cause it's Wei Ying who's touching him so fiercely? Is it the fact that his scars that are barely healed yet hurt from that grip? You decide!

ARC 2 EXTRAS FOR PАТRОNS Extra mini comic: The Dog Art pieces Extra mini comic: Cornetto commercial

ARC 2 Complete PDF with extras ARC 3 (TBA)

PREVIOUS PART

ABOUT+TABLE OF CONTENTS

IMPORTANT NOTE: Always be sure to click on my profile and check for updates because if you see a random part reblogged IT MIGHT NOT BE THE EDITED VERSION WITH THE WORKING LINK TO THE NEXT PART ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Arc 2 has come to its end! Yes, I can't believe it too. It's been 11 months since I posted the arc's cover image. I've been through so much since then, so much of my life has changed and yet working on this project, providing 4 pages every week, was somewhat of a blessed constant and fairly, I'm going to miss it.

I have to say that I'm very grateful to you, the readers, because your excitement with this story and the wonderful comments and questions and interest and insights you left on each part is what kept me going and also helped me understand my story better, so THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH! A HUGE THANK YOU TOO FOR MY PАТRОNS!!!! I wouldn't have been able to do NONE of it if it weren't for your amazing support. You have no idea how grateful I am that you are giving me the opportunity not only to create this story for you and for others, but to also develop myself further as an artist (this is the first time I do a long comic of such a scale and by thinking about you when I make updates every week, I think how much better I can make my work). Your support is also a huge help with my daughter, not only because you help me provide for her, but also because in spite of the fact that taking care of her gets more and more difficult, you being there keeps me motivated to not give up on drawing and succumb to 100% life of a mother and a housewife. You save me <3.

So what now? Now I will work on extras for members of the peke-king tier on my Pатrеоn. I will create extra comic pages, a few more arts, and a funny comic strip. When all of that is done, I will create the PDF and upload it to the shared drive (I think this arc+extras is going to be about 200 pages!!) after that, I will take a break from HoG to finish other MDZS projects I halted, and after those are done I will take a break entirely to reread MDZS and consume all its media again, so I will remember forgotten parts and get that spark ready for Arc 3! So absolutely stay tuned! Thank you all again for being with me in this journey, and hope you enjoyed the story! <3

[zexapher]

Vacuan Nights, Like Vacuan Days

They’re just so great together! I’d love for Jaune and Weiss to get a little downtime in Vacuo to live out a moment like this. They really deserve it, and I’d love to see Jaune’s guitar make a reappearance.

The comic here was inspired by u/Silverstar1243’s excellent piece of art, A Serenade Under the Moonlight. Send some love to them on their twitter, commission some art if you’re willing and able, they’ve made some great stuff.

You folks may have noticed I threw in a couple of references for those in the know; the Golden Oreos behind Yang (double stuffed, I might add) for the trio’s ship, Weiss liking it rough for Mallobaude’s great fic, and of course I made a whole theme around the Arabian Nights Disney song. A song, along with its Aladdin compatriots, which I spent the better part of a day finding covers for just to listen to on repeat while I worked.

This one’s now officially my longest comic project, with 14 panels, two over the past record since I added the White Knight kiss at the end. I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. Not sure I’d say it was more difficult than my Vanity of Vanities post, but for this one I actually knew how to use my editing software going into it (at least somewhat).

Put a lot of work into this one, been working on it on and off since February. Took a few breaks for vacation, to make my memorial post for Rooster Teeth, and another five meme edits or so, but I came back around to it. First half was pretty easy, relatively minor edits inserting characters into scenes and so on. The second half with Jaune and Weiss was tougher though, with color correcting, merging poses, redrawing features, drawing Jaune’s entire head to fix some lighting issues, etc. Really like how the edit to make Jaune strum his guitar turned out.

The time it took to make the whole comic got me down a little, until I did a bit of math. Including my side projects since starting this, all the scripting and editing and all, I’ve been pumping out a panel every two days. That seems pretty good to me, that kind of accomplishment makes me a little proud of myself.

Really need to get around to watching the second part of the Justice League Crossover movies. It’s got a few Vacuo scenes that might make things a little more authentic instead of me just using Saphron’s house and pretending it’s a suite in Vacuo. I do love taking yet more character stills from Jaune and friends experiencing deep trauma and turning it into something positive, been making that a bit of a personal habit. And I’ve got to say, the background for Jaune and Weiss’ scene is really beautiful, pulled it from when Sun and Neptune hear Ruby’s message about Salem. That’s just a really good shot all on its own, I even saved a copy for my computer’s wallpaper after editing out the two.

Posting a big RWBY White Knight edit, watching not one but two RWBY Beyond episodes, and all on the trail of the news that RWBY’s found partners that they’re negotiating with and that the creative team is expected to stay on. And I'm sipping bubble tea. Life is good.

Anyway, pardon the long write up. I’m invested in this one, and am quite pleased with how the comic turned out. I hope you all get a kick out of it as well!

[muffinrecord]

Saw the ask about magical boys and your wish for magical trans kids: may I introduce you to Zoe from Sleepless Domain webcomic? She is one of the main secondary characters and she's super sweet and tries her best! (If you haven't read Sleepless Domain, try it out! It has a ton of fun concepts, pain and suffering, world cold girlfriends soft, parents know what is going on but are powerless to step in and have to let their kids fight, three mysterious gals, wholesome team(s) and survivor's guilt~

I love Sleepless Domain! I've actually backed both of its kickstarters. It's easily one of my favorite post-Madoka magical girl stories out there and I'd also highly recommend it to anyone who's looking for a good story in general.

Also imo CubeWatermelon is REALLY good at compositions. Seriously, if you like comics and can appreciate a good set of panels, check out her work (note that the first two chapters had their art made by a different artist, but Cube has done the art for the rest of the comic). I reread the comic once every few months just to study her pages. Like, take note how often she doesn't chicken out and will just make sure that excellent establishing shots and good backgrounds are included-- you never feel lost reading her work and always know where everyone is. The flow and movement are really good too. Fight scenes can be really hard to portray but you can easily tell what folks are doing.

I know that sounds like the bare minimum but you'd be surprised by how many comics out there really struggle with making sure that the reader, like. actually knows what's going on. Finding an artist that prioritizes clarity is a nice treat. I'm also always impressed at how much character and personality she can pack into a page. Off the top of my head, stuff like Tessa's room being full of her own merchandise:

Anyways yeah, Sleepless Domain is amazing and anyone who likes magical girl stuff should read it.

Edit: All that and I forgot to link the comic. Derp.

[ikroah]

I pushed my soul in a deep dark hole, and then I followed it in, I watched myself crawling out as I was a-crawling in. I got up so tight, I couldn't unwind, I saw so much, I broke my mind… —“Just Dropped In (to See What Condition My Condition Was In),” The First Edition (1968)

It Keeps Right On A-Hurtin’ #28 - Ring-a-Ding-Ding VII

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Read IKROAH on Archive of Our Own

Notes / Transcript:

Notes

Do you have any idea how long I've wanted to type those words? "End of Volume 2?" We have been on Volume 2 for just over three years. Obviously it's unfair to compare it to the breakneck pace of Volume 1, because... I got burned out (I got better), I got divorced (I got better), and most importantly, I've spent all three of these years overhauling my approach to art, which is to say, I got better. My canvas size doubled because my initial naive approach of "smaller pages means less art, which means faster art" was holding me back: I wanted more art, and the subjects of too many panels had gotten flubbed due to what was basically a pathetically low rendering distance. I revamped my approach to coloring entirely, leaning into a vibrant, saturated, and faux-comic halftone style that I vastly prefer to my more grounded, gradient-driven work beforehand. I changed IKROAH's font (Unmasked!), I changed Agnes's appearance slightly (she's far less gaunt, which was an early design choice I've thrown away, plus I think I'm much better at drawing her consistently now), and so much more. Comics are a time-consuming artform and while a lot of what made this volume take so long was out of my control, and well worth not pushing myself through, the total reinvention of how I actually make comics was the single best thing to come out of Volume 2.

It's a lot of lessons and groundwork that I'm very eager to take into Volume 3, which I have spent every single one of these years viciously impatient for. Now, it's finally here. See you at the cover reveal.

Original Pencils

Something that I have been working a lot harder on with my art lately is inking: actual inking, not merely "outlining" and figuring out the rest by the seat of my pants digitally. I've come to realize that the fewer steps of my production process that I try to do digitally, the more fun it is to make art as a whole, and inking was something that I was very intimidated by for the longest time. What happens if I mess up! It's permanent marker, after all! But after all the practice that I've done, I'm really happy with how bold and confident the shadows are on this issue, and they're perfect for how moody and dramatically lit the whole thing is. You can compare the pencils to the inks to the final products and really see how I planned out the overall composition.

Transcript

INT. LUCKY 38 PRESIDENTIAL SUITE, VERY LATE AT NIGHT. The lights are all off in this luxurious, distinctly pre-war abode. It is almost empty.

RADIO: Welcome back to the program, folks. This is Mr. New Vegas—and I hope I'm not coming on too strong. We've got some news for you, coming right up.

The only real light in the suite comes from the glowing screen of the Securitron VICTOR, standing in front of the private elevator.

RADIO: Tops Hotel owner Benny has been killed by an unidentified assailant. According to his fellow Chairmen, shots were heard in his private suite, and his body was found inside. They are urging all visitors to please keep an eye out for suspicious individuals and behavior on the New Vegas Strip. The new head of the Chairmen, Benny's former right-hand man Swank, consoled mourners: "If I know my pal Benny, he's swinging with the Big Cat Upstairs as we speak. Or he's chasing some angel broad with cans as big as her halo!"

RADIO: In other news—

In a guest bedroom off to the side, ROSE OF SHARON CASSIDY is sound asleep. Her belongings are neatly folded on the dresser, except for the cocktail dress that she was wearing, which has been thrown onto the ground.

RADIO: —refugees at Bitter Springs are giving startling accounts of the legate known as Lanius, who is said to be Caesar's top field commander. One refugee told us the legate took over an underperforming squad of troops by beating its commander to death in full viw of everyone. The legate then ordered a tenth of his own force be killed by the other nine tenths. And you thought your boss was a pain!

RADIO: You know, I think all news, whether it's good or bad, brings us closer together. Don't you?

Directly across from the elevator, across from VICTOR, are the shut doors to the master bedroom.

RADIO: These headlines, brought to you by Vault 21...Vault 21! Everything is better when you experience it...in a vault.

Inside the master bedroom, AGNES SANDS sits on the edge of the bed, wide awake. The RADIO plays from her PIP-BOY, which provides a slight amount of light in the dark room.

RADIO: Gonna play a song for you right now—it's about that special someone, that you can only find once...in a "Blue Moon."

"Blue Moon" begins to play from the radio. AGNES's head remains lowered in rumination.

Suddenly, the radio broadcast cuts out.

SFX: KZZRRRSSHHTTZ

RADIO: Has your life taken a turn?

A NEW VOICE speaks on the radio. It's dreamy, seductive.

RADIO: Do troubles beset you? Has fortune left you behind?

AGNES remains in thought.

But then: she lifts her head.

And she looks over at the radio.

RADIO: If so, then the Sierra Madre Casino,

The PIP-BOY displays: 11.09.81, 4:13. <<Signal Unknown>>

RADIO: in all its glory, invites you

AGNES listens.

RADIO: to begin again.

AGNES is now somewhere else.

EXT. MOJAVE DESERT. At sunrise, AGNES SANDS is perched atop a ridge somewhere in the desert. Her overcoat billows behind her, and her shoulder-mounted flashlight beams straight ahead. She looks manic. In one hand, she clutches her duffel bag, full of every belonging she has. Her other hand is wearing her PIP-BOY, and the radio broadcast continues:

RADIO: Come to a place where wealth, excitement, and intrigue await around every corner. Stroll along the winding streets of our beautiful resort. Make new friends...or rekindle old flames. Let your eyes take in the luxurious expanse of the open desert, under clear starlit skies. Gaze straight on into the sunset from our scenic Villa rooftops. Countless diversions await. Gamble in our casino, take in the theater, or stay in one of our exclusive executive suites that will shelter you...and cater to your every whim.

Below the ridge is a pile-up of wrecked shipping containers. One of them opens up toward the surface like a gaping throat of metal. It leads somewhere, deeper into the earth.

RADIO: So if life's worries have weighed you down—if you need an escape from your troubles—or if you just need an opportunity to begin again—

The source of the broadcast signal is coming from INSIDE.

RADIO: —then join us.

AGNES descends into the container, revealing a makeshift staircase of sheet metal that leads into darkness.

RADIO: Join us, let go, and leave the world behind...

The signal from inside the tunnel is now audible. It overlaps with AGNES's PIP-BOY...

RADIO: Join us, let go, and leave the world behind...

Until she sees it.

RADIO: ...at the Sierra Madre Grand Opening.

A pre-war, art deco type radio, sitting on a metal pedestal. It speaks to her.

RADIO: ...at the Sierra Madre Grand Opening.

AGNES stares at the radio, bewildered.

She barely notices the HULKING FIGURE about to grab her from behind.

RADIO: We'll be waiting.

END OF VOLUME 2

[fernsnailz]

Yo, this is the sickest shit I have ever seen. Big ups. This rules.

thank you! to be transparent though, that panel was HEAVILY inspired by this variant cover of Archie Sonic #253 by Tristan Jones (T. Rex). this cover fucking rules, and to be honest many of the best elements in that panel of Shadow came from this.

while that panel was intended to be a homage to this cover, paying homage to something as niche as a variant comic cover from over 10 years ago is. a bit tricky and can quickly turn disingenuous. so i'd like to be honest with this reference so you can see which parts are wholly my own (like the teeth- shadow's teeth are one of my favorite things about that panel), and which parts are basically just taken from this cover (their eyes are SO similar. good lord what was i thinking).

while the easy in-universe explanations for these x-rays being similar is because Eggman designed both of them, i do want to make sure i'm not taking full credit for how that panel is designed. it would not look good were it not for Jones' work.

[jesncin]

Chimera Constantine breakdown, refs & nods mega-post

Welcome to the master post of behind the scenes for the Chimera Constantine comics. In the style of the Sons of Mars ones I made, this post archives our research and process. So here we go! This will be a mix of showing references and personal anecdotes for how we cobbled this project together.

I'll be repeating some things I've mentioned across blog posts because I like having all this info in one place.

So! There's a lot of ways to go about re-interpretation and re-imagining a story, and one of my techniques is to not get overly attached to research. While it's good to be informed about a character, sometimes knowing every little thing about them can make one hesitant to innovate and try something different with them. So I'm purposely mindful about how much material I research.

But how does something like that work when the character in question has only 2-3 total appearances, one arc, and a quick revisit several years later? We play twin telephone.

For this project, Cin read the Hellblazer Golden Boy arc and vaguely retold it to Jes, who would then write a story based on assumptions and half-remembered memories of the story. Letting personal experience, influences and bias fill the blanks. We're inspired by how Naoki Urusawa wrote Pluto based on his mis-remembered memories of reading Astro Boy. Also when I was a kid I used to look at book covers and summaries and make up a story based on the limited information I was given. It's fun for me. Part of why I love obscure characters so much is that the lack of content about them lets the reader fill in the blanks about their lives and try telling new stories about them that aren't constrained by a saturated canon.

The original Golden Boy arc written by Jamie Delano (#39-40) is about John Constantine coming to the realization that he strangled his twin in the womb. After taking some 'shrooms, John...manifests into another reality, it's very surreal. There, John meets his twin from a universe where John had died, and his brother gets to live. The twin (taking on the name John Constantine, we'll call him Golden Mage to keep it simple) is John's opposite in every better way. They decide to merge their souls to restore...the universe. You kind of had to be there.

John's twin returns many issues later (#249) to wrap up a different arc, there he and the story are written by Andy Diggle.

The first panel of our full comic references the tarot cards John gets from his reading with Zed.

This panel is a direct reference to this scene where John sees his own shadow on a curtain after his reading with Zed. I like the imagery of this arc, even when the dialogue describing twins is really cringe. We changed it to a mirror to reinforce the mirror imagery throughout the comic. Speaking of which...!

Through Jes' reworking of the story, mirrors were streamlined to be the main way alternate universes were portrayed in the story. They'd be the main motif that paralleled the twins too. In issue #249 of Hellblazer, John uses the mirror to confront his twin who resides within himself after their soul-merge years ago.

The line "He's so beautiful, he frightens me." is spoken by a doctor witnessing the Golden Boy's birth in his universe. We repurposed it to be John's dialogue for when he's describing the man he sees in the mirror.

John's twin uses a sacrifice involving these candles to summon his sickly twin. Jes repurposed the use of candles to a magic salt circle that contains spirits like the Golden Boy (he's nicknamed "Goldie" in our take).

The Golden Boy! Even though he died in the womb, he's portrayed as a boy. Probably because a floating fetus wasn't what they were going for. We wanted to give him a distinct look that foreshadows how much he would grow his hair out. I like that his mouth isn't visible! We use the shape of his eyes and posing to get across how he's feeling. It gives him a vacant-toddler-stare I find really endearing.

We made some minor adjustments to the Golden Mage's design. Initially, we followed his canonical pulled back long hair. But since he was a challenging character to emote when we had one less arm to work with, we decided to part his hair so that it could carry how he's feeling. I like when I can get it to cover a part of his face for intense moments! If it was animated, it would 100% be expressive Ghibli hair.

Our main goal for Golden Mage's characterization is to make him feel like his own person. In the original arc, he's less of a sibling and more of an au of John Constantine himself. He doesn't get his own name. Despite gloating about having a better and more fulfilling love life than John, he also shared the exact same love interests John does. Being a twin is less about a family story and more a vehicle to talk about self hatred and potential here. Which isn't fair to the individuality of the characters!

(note, this is not how the panels look in the og comic, I've rearranged them so that they display on this post better)

So we characterized the Golden Mage to still have his canon charisma (albeit with the dialogue toned way down from his original appearance), but to have a thinly veiled temper under all that bravado to foil his con-man trickster brother. The Golden Mage was vaguely described as not being particularly attached to the love he receives. Golden Mage is also dismissive of his womb twin's death, saying it's something he shouldn't grieve since he never really knew him. We reinterpreted these lines as him being in denial over his brother's death, thinking himself as above his own feelings of grief.

Also as a tiny note, we kept the Golden Mage's name ambiguous to keep with the vibe of the original comic, but in my mind I headcanon his full name to be Marigold "Goldie" Constantine. The yellow flower is culturally associated with prosperity, but also grief and jealousy. It's perfect for him! So we made references to the flower in the cover and first panels of the comic. I also headcanon that as a kid he called John Constantine's ghost "Johnny".

My influences for how this whole beginning meeting scene is staged and played out is E.M Carroll's When I Arrived At The Castle. The "animated" panels of Golden Mage looking back at John and breaking through the mirror is a direct call back to the keyhole sequence in that comic! The premise of daydreaming about how your life could have been and not realizing that you're staring at an alternate universe is loosely inspired by Junji Ito's Hellstar Remina. I really like the concept of staring into the unknown and then something sentient staring back from that. "What if our day dreams are just other realities we're dreaming of" kind of deal. I don't see that sort of thing in the saturation of multiverse stories these days.

Next reference is the Dead Boy's Heart! While I like that this story's its own thing, I was surprised it wasn't linked to John's dead brother in any way. It felt thematically relevant, so we brought it over as a device to trap Goldie while the brothers merge souls.

Twins can be positioned in a bunch of ways in the womb. I think canonically, John and Golden Mage were positioned like they are in the cover for Hellblazer #39, ideal for strangling I guess! We changed it to echo the motion of yin and yang. I do think the inclusion of yin and yang is a little cringey in the original comic even though I get what it's going for (balance and all that, it's just kind of simplistic to the philosophy). But I do like it as a way to echo card imagery we established in this comic. We combined the imagery of the tarot cards featured in the Golden Boy arc and King/Queen/Joker playing cards. So it felt right to bring back that whole upside down twins in the womb thing. Special fact, this is how my twin and I were vibing in the womb.

The scene where the twins hit Ctrl + E to merge layers! It's a pretty iconic pose! I like how their heads peaked out of the panels so I brought it back for our comic too. In our version, the twins fail to merge their souls entirely. In the revisit to the Golden Boy character in the comics in issue #249, it's revealed that the merging "failed" in some way, trapping the Golden Mage within John's soul.

For John's ghost counterpart from Golden Mage's universe we took Dave McKean's portrayal of him very literally haha. I know he doesn't literally have one eye, but we thought it gave him a really distinct look for us to stylize. We decided to keep the ghost kids consistent with no mouth and vacant pupil-less stares. We gave ghost kid!John a sort of bedsheet ghost form to contrast against Goldie.

Speaking of one eye! That's another motif we decided to emphasize throughout the comic. It's not in the source material at all, but we liked it as a way to both hint at chimerism and visualize how the two brothers serve as incomplete halves of each other. Special fact! Heterochromia can show up in chimera twins. Of course in the case of identical twins like the Constantines, their chimerism isn't as detectable since they have identical sets of DNA. But! It's still fun to stylize in a supernatural way. For our take we show the glowing golden eye as the soul of the Golden Boy manifesting in his brother. I like to think that John takes advantage of how undetectable his chimerism is to have an upper hand in any soul-related deals he makes.

This stylized heterochromia is inspired by @ratblazer 's Constantine design! I made a subtle nod to it with young punk John's make up echoing the scar in her design too.

For John's dynamic with Goldie the Golden Boy, we built the conflict of the story around making him doubt his attachment to his dead brother. There's a line of dialogue in the revisited Golden Boy arc about John needing to "let go", so we repurposed it into the Golden Mage assuring him that his attachments make him weak.

Even though the Golden Boy doesn't show up nearly as much as I think he should in canon, John has been shown to be really sentimental about him. John wants to be the Golden Boy's friend because he's so beautiful John mistook him for Jesus as a kid. Canonically, the Golden Boy ghost rejects John's friendship, likely still not over the whole strangulation in the womb thing. It still breaks John's heart though, he's a sobbing mess about being owned by a dead kid.

We changed this whole dynamic! The twin murder in the womb felt very X-men Xavier vs Cassandra Nova, and it's hard to get behind babies having that much motivation before they're even born. In our version, Goldie is a vanishing twin absorbed by John, the sickly twin. Infants being accidentally strangled by umbilical cords does occur in reality. However, we changed their origin to being that of Vanishing Twin syndrome because it was more specific for the ideas we were going for.

I feel this crucial change is more in tune with the overall themes of Hellblazer. John always cheats death at a cost. People are constantly sacrificed for John's continued survival. But the Golden Boy's case would be special, because he sacrificed himself out of love before he even knew what it means to love. Unlike the other ghosts that haunt John Constantine, Goldie isn't resentful of John. I think it makes more sense for the Golden Boy to be attached to John because he's all the Golden Boy's ever known. As a chimera twin, John is like a horcrux holding his brother's soul in his body. This reaffirms survivor's guilt to be something John experiences since his birth.

Canonically, although the Golden Mage initially feels sorry for the ghost of John that haunts him, he rejects John as well. John's ghost in canon is like a nuisance that keeps bothering Golden Mage. There's an instance mentioned of Golden Mage trying to recreate his murder in the womb? It's cryptically written. But Golden Mage does keep using the phrase "banished" to describe his brother.

We took this and made it so that he performed an exorcism on himself to remove his supernatural chimera-bond to John's ghost. The Golden Boy arc is pretty unique when compared with how saturated multiverse stories are nowadays since it doesn't share the science fiction sensibilities. Grief comes up a lot in multiverse stuff, in these stories characters use parallel universes to save a loved one as they're bargaining with their loss. For our take, we wanted a character to use the alternate universes to hurt and lash out at the loved one they're grieving. I pulled influence from Everything Everywhere All At Once's concept of a self destructive character on a search for the one familial connection who could understand what they're feeling.

References! The first panel is a nod to issue #36 where John is sleeping with Marj. We changed her to Kit. The second panel is a direct callback to issue #67, an iconic visual for his break up angst era.

Trivia; this page was added at the last minute! I needed something to bridge the birthday cupcake page and the final panel of Golden Mage's breakdown, so I linked them through candles! In this weird case, I reference my own work! This is a callback to Birthdays, a short comic we made for John Constantine's canonical birthday. It sets the premise for his relationship with Goldie based on the habits and experiences of survivor twins. The pages referencing this comic are meant to re-establish that John shares meals with his twin.

I wanted this page to feel like John's lighting an incense for his dead brother, and to contrast it with the snuffed out candles from Golden Mage's flashback. The candle has a yellow and blue intertwined spiral pattern that calls back to the color of John and Golden mage's dialogue boxes and speech bubbles, along with how twisted they look when they merged. Implying that in this universe, they're together in some way. I really wish I did this intentionally but it was by complete coincidence of making the cupcake pink and balancing it out with pastel primaries. But I sure can acknowledge how cool it looks symbolically okay???

The dialogue here is a nod to John's monologue in issue #19 where John is comforting Simon Hughes. It's re-contextualized a bit to be about sharing grief together in our comic.

This is a really goofy one but- since Golden Mage is supposed to be the fully realized potential of John, we thought that he would have a successful career as a musician and singer where John didn't. I don't think Golden Mage would be a punk singer though, he probably does something he'd consider more elevated.

BUT-! In the 30th Anniversary edition of Hellblazer, Sting (the guy John's appearance is based on) wrote an introduction for the edition while roleplaying as the Golden Boy. Which is nuts. The Anniversary edition basically canonized Sting as being a Constantine variant in our universe with the soul of Golden Boy. Sting, as Golden Boy, describes himself as a musician and singer too. Absolutely bonkers for Sting to throw me a bone this late in the game since no one's touched this character in ages.

Another E.M Carroll influenced panel sequence. This is from the digital comic Out of Skin.

So that brings us to the end of the comic! We've had the ideas for this comic cooking for some time, and it's people's continued interest in our takes on these characters that gave us the chance to finally bring the story together.

I'm very fascinated by the Golden Boy story, not because it's particularly strong compared to other stories in Hellblazer's run, but because its intriguing premise is bogged down by its surreal take on typical Evil Twin tropes. og Hellblazer's strength was always in its raw humanity. John Constantine's character countered the sensational spectacle of his superhero contemporaries. He may be able to outwit a vampire but he's can't fight back against being brutalized by the police. In one of his most iconic arcs, he finds out he has cancer- not because of any supernatural shenanigans, but because he literally smokes too much. In another arc, John's long time girlfriend breaks up with him, and he lashes out by saying the cruelest things to her. When he hears that his abusive dad is murdered, John still cries about it.

I think the Golden Boy arc and the retcon that followed his brief return actively undermines what makes Hellblazer special. Suddenly John's having X-Men-level evil twin escapades in the womb. Suddenly, merging with his twin will help save the universe. Suddenly, it's not smoking that caused John to have cancer! It was actually because he merged with his twin and his twin became the cancer from inside him! Suddenly it wasn't a moment of lashing out that caused John to say all those cruel things to his ex upon their break up, that was actually the Golden Boy controlling him from within, so you see it's not really his fault! Also what followed the break up was extra devastating because of the Golden Boy, somehow.

Often I hear in fandom that when you change a character too much from their canon counterpart it's basically "just an oc" at that point, but in the case of characters who get to be re-imagined and passed through many creative teams, I think that kind of mindset is deeply limiting for transformative work. The line I draw between "just an oc" and an interpretation is if the changes involved engage with their source material in any way or if they're just superficial. Big changes and 180 flips can work because they still respond to the history of said character. It's why we see that kind of thing in canon a lot. These characters are inherently built to be passed through many hands in meaningful ways to varying degrees of success. So I hope that by showing all this process that goes behind big changes to a canon character, people better understand what can go into transformative creativity.

Our thesis for this re-imagining is to take what makes Hellblazer special and re-examine the arc that we felt undermined that. Despite the grief John has for many characters in his cast, mourning isn't brought up at all in the Golden Boy arc. It's dismissed by the characters in narration, and the Golden Mage himself isn't even recognized as a sibling by the narrative, no matter how many times John calls him "bro".

Survivor twin grief over dead womb twins especially is a real thing that's often dismissed because in the words of canon Golden Mage himself "I couldn't mourn for those I'd never known". This is not true to the experience of twins. They play with and remember each other from spending 9 months growing in a tight space together. So when one of them doesn't make it out with the other, that survivor feels a grief they can't comprehend. It can manifest in unresolved trauma, commitment issues, and survivor's guilt. All things that feel so relevant to the themes of John Constantine's character. I think that by integrating the real lived experiences of survivor twins, the Golden Boy arc could've been one the most human and personal parts of the original Hellblazer run. It's could've been a story that helped a community of people so rarely validated in their grief feel seen.

[beryllineart]

Battle Against Lancer

... Oh dear... That wasn't supposed to happen...

Deltarune belongs to Toby Fox

Ok, little headcanon here, I think it would be cool if Darkners turned into the object they are in the Light World if they die in the Dark World. Hence, Lancer turning into the Jack of Spades when Susie kills him. She has no idea what just happened, and even though she didn't get any LOVE or anything, she knows that Lancer is definitely dead, and it's her fault. And the player can't do anything to stop it because they can't control or stop Susie.

Anyways, with Ralsei, his robes would cover up the object he really is when he reaches 0 hp, but it wouldn't be damaged like Lancer's card is because it's not a permanent death unless the whole team dies.

But come on, turning into the object could have a whole lore behind it, because the Angel is worshipped by the Light and feared by the Dark, right? So what if it is because light doesn't mean death, but death means light to the Darkners? Like, when a Darkner dies, they are brought to the Light and forced into that form, permanently. It makes sense in my head, ignore my ramblings.

Anyways, I'm not sure how my headcanon would work for Chapter 2 Darkners, but come on, I wasn't going to miss the chance to draw a card sliced to bits with a traumatized Susie looking on. You can tell that I cared about that page because I added a background. Also, I realize that the soul on page 2 comes from Susie when technically it should come from Kris, but I liked the way it looked (and totally didn't notice where it was spawning from when I played the game.)

Comics are hard, but I had so much fun playing around with the panels on the first two pages. My pacing might be a bit off though... Also, it's so so hard to draw the same character over and over in different poses, so sorry if Susie looks a bit different than she should, I did my best. And sorry for the ramble, but that's why I put the keep reading thing up above. If you read through my brain dump, good job! Get yourself a cookie.

[genericpuff]

SO I just got my stay-flats in for mailing prints which means I'm one step closer to getting my online shop open <3

But what I WASN'T expecting to also show up inside the box of mailers was my pre-order copy of Covenant!

Apologies in advance because my photos aren't the greatest, but I wanna share some pics of it because I'm really impressed with how these books look and feel.

For starters, the actual cover designs. The front cover features stunning art and has a nice gloss cover, whereas the backside actually has a softer matte feel with gloss golden text which compliments the overall aesthetic of the book very nicely.

As for inside the book...

I was so relieved to see how well the formatting was done. Those who follow me here know I spend a lot of time bitching about webtoons-related stuff and one of my biggest gripes is how the webtoon format overall is very unfriendly to long-term publishing, as many creators don't anticipate eventually formatting for print (and Webtoons certainly hasn't helped as for years they've perpetuated the notion that print books are "dead", at least until it came to them making money 🍵) It's not an easy task to convert a vertical webtoon into a page format comic, but I'm happy to say that Lysandra's team here knocked it out of the park. The panel and text flow is smooth and easy to follow, they always take full advantage of the page space given to them, and the overall structure of every page feels very well thought out to work for the story it's trying to tell (as this is an action comic with fight scenes which can be tricky enough to pull off in page format, let alone converting from vertical format!) They've also gone out of their way to properly format the episode divides, so episodes (or as they're called in the story's stylization, "books") flow seamlessly with very little breakage, unlike what you would find in some webtoon-to-print books that often find the flow interrupted by episode title breaks every few pages. According to the credits page in the front of the book, we owe a lot of the formatting to layout designer Miranda Mundt and book designer Carey Soucy! Well done!

The print quality of the pages is also superb, printed on high-quality glossy paper which makes for stunning colors that have translated well from web to print. The darks are very dark which is necessary for a comic like Covenant which has a very earthy color palette; but when there ARE color pop moments of pink, red, and blue, they really shine. Of course, there is a downside to this, which is that the glossy paper WILL show your thumbprints in the darker areas (especially if you have particularly oily hands like I do, ech) but hey, it adds character and it's worth seeing the comic's art come to life on the glossy paper.

Sooo yeah! This is a very competent and well-made book from an awesome creator and if I have ANYTHING to snipe about just for the sake of it, it's that it's no wonder Webtoons tried to keep the creator from promoting their book launch, because it frankly outdoes a lot of WT's own publishing efforts LOL Congrats on your book launch Lysandra, I'm looking forward to getting my hands on Volume 2! <3

[ofmdrecaps]

07/27-28/2024 Daily OFMD Recap

TLDR; David Jenkins; Taika Waititi; Galaxy Con Raleigh: Kristian, Con, Vico, and Nathan; Bronson Pinchot; Minnie Driver; Kay Buchanan; Adopt Our Crew: Articles; Voting Reminders; Fan Spotlight; Love Notes; Daily Darby/Today's Taika

== David Jenkins ==

David posed an interesting question to the gallery. (I know many weeks back someone was mentioning a similar thing being related to Non-Binary Folks, not sure if that was Chaos Dad's intent or not, but you can answer on Instagram if you'd like!)

Source: David Jenkins Instagram

Dad also reblogged the absolutely INSANELY talented @blueberreads' fabulous latest pixel video!

Source: David Jenkins Twitter / Blueberreads Tumblr == Taika Waititi ==

More Taika at the Louis Vuittan Pre-Olympics event.

Source: styledumonde Instagram

PS: I didn't wanna post her post here but sending healing thoughts to Rita Ora (Taika's wife), apparently she was hospitalized in the last couple days. Hope you feel better soon Rita! Rest up hon!

== Galaxy Con Raleigh Updates ==

So many pictures came out of GalaxyCon Raleigh! I was only able to get permission from a few folks-- but if you were there and you'd like me to share them on the recap please feel free to reach out! I'd love to!

Poor Kristian was jet lagged pretty bad.

Source: Kristian's IG Stories

So much Nathan!

Source: Nathan Foad's Instagram Stories

= GalaxyCon Raleigh Panel ==

Tell Tale TV was at the panel and will be bringing some more news in the upcoming days!

Source: Tell Tale TV Twitter

The fabulous @/cecillusive on Twitter was kind enough to let me share their transcriptions of the panel! If you have access to twitter, you can see the Full thread here. First up, apparently audio captioning was displaying what was being said backstage!

Source: Cecillusive Twitter

== Bronson Pinchot ==

Bronson is back with more Ned Low showing up in his Serge clips!

== Minnie Driver ==

Fun news! Minnie will be voicing the new Oswalda Cobblebot (The Penguin) in the animated movie: Batman: Caped Crusade, which arrives August 1!

She was also out at San Diego Comic Con this past week promoting it!

Source: Minnie Driver's Instagram

== Kay Buchanen ==

Our extremely talented leatherworker, Kay Buchanan has been posting some stunning work she's been doing-- including what's available for sale! Are you in the market for some satchels, body harnesses, leather armor, or tassel bags? Well she's got you covered! Visit her Instagram for more info!

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A post shared by Kay Buchanan (@kay_buchanan_)

Source: Kay Buchanan's Instagram

== Adopt Our Crew: Articles ==

Adopt our crew spotlighted some quotes from the latest screenrant article that mentioned OFMD and there's some very interesting honk-inducing information in there. Thank you @adoptourcrew for keeping the honk going!

Source: Adopt Our Crew's Twitter

== Voting Reminders ==

Only a couple more days to vote for Rhys and OFMD in the Gold Derby Awards! Reminder, you do need to sign up with an email/account to vote! Vote here! Thank you @adoptourcrew for keeping us reminded!

Source: Adopt Our Crew Twitter

We're a down by part of a % on the Tell Tale TV Poll! It closes at the end of July! If you are up for voting-- you can do so every day! Most Heartbreaking Cancellation of 2024 So Far Poll

== Fan Spotlight ==

= Cast Cards =

More cast cards from the wonderful @melvisik! Ken S. is an action extra in OFMD and Alison Telford is another one of the Casting Directors!

Source: @melvisik's Instagram

= OFMD Colouring Pages =

Our darling @patchworkpiratebear is keeping us fed with more and more ofmd colouring pages! Many of these also have multiple versions now so please check out @patchworkpiratebear's tumblr for more options!

Source: PatchworkPirateBear's Tumblr

== Love Notes ==

Hey lovelies, I'm still on crazy hours for work and will be probably through the end of July. I am always thinking of you though, I hope every one of you is well and having a good or at least not too heavy start to the week <3

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Katie Abey 🌈 (@katieabey)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Katie Abey 🌈 (@katieabey)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Katie Abey 🌈 (@katieabey)

== Daily Darby / Today's Taika ==

Tonight's gifs are courtesy of the lovely, the fantastic, the beautiful, the awesome @ofmd-ann and @starfleetavenger-blog!

[detailtilted]

Comic-Con 2008 - Enhanced Edition of Supernatural Panel

Direct link. Warning: Some of the special content I added has big spoilers for season 4 beyond the original videos.

This video features Jared, Jensen, Eric Kripke, Sera Gamble, and Ben Edlund. If you've already seen the original videos and you're wondering why you'd want to watch this, see the details about the enhancements below. For other enhanced videos, check my YouTube channel or my Tumblr index post.

Video Improvements - Upscaled, fixed bad aspect ratios, improved colors

I received a great deal of help from @sensitivehandsomeactionman on the color correcting. They gave me tips on how to achieve better colors and they even took a screen shot from my video and corrected the colors on it with their own software to provide me with an example of what was possible. Having that example to reference was invaluable for me, because I'm not good with colors.

Without that help, Jared and Jensen would have looked like they were in training to become the world's tallest Oompa Loompas. Any remaining color wonkiness (Wonka-iness?) is due to my own failure to apply what I was taught and my failure to see the colors properly. But look at that difference! I was pretty excited about this.

Combined Videos to Cover Entire Event

As with my other enhanced videos, I combined multiple videos to create as seamless a video of the event as possible, from beginning to end. For my earlier videos, that meant combining maybe 5 videos. For this one, I used a total of 19 videos from 3 different sources. A lot of those were used for the talking head bubbles, explained further below.

None of the videos are my own. My video description on YouTube has links to the original videos I used.

Good, Color-Coded Subtitles

As with my other enhanced videos, I attempted to provide accurate and as-complete-as-possible subtitles. They're color-coded to make it easier to tell who's speaking. This is especially helpful when people are speaking at the same time, or when the speaker is off camera.

Since there were so very many people talking in this video, I doubled up on a couple colors if I thought I could do so without it being too confusing. Here's the complete color key:

Red = Jared Blue = Jensen Brown = Eric Kripke Pink = Sera Gamble Purple = Ben Edlund Green = General audience Yellow = The person asking the questions. In the first half this is the moderator, Alynda Wheat. In the second half, this is the fan at the mic. White = Mostly the publicist (Holly Ollis), but a couple times it's used for people off camera who I believe were Comic-Con staff. Two shades of orange = surprise guests

Additional Clarifying Content

As with my other enhanced videos, I've added some images to help add clarity to the references used by the speakers. I added images of characters and scenes referenced from the show, images to explain various pop culture references, as well as some explanatory text to help add details or clarity when I thought it might be useful.

I mostly kept this extra content to the sides so that, if it doesn't interest you, you can hopefully ignore it and focus on the main part of the video. Unlike my previous videos, sometimes this is on the left side and sometimes it's on the right side. The margins shift depending on where the talking head bubbles are.

Talking Head Bubbles - Jared and Jensen front and center, but other speakers visible too

This "enhancement" isn't anywhere close to perfect, but it sure as heck isn't from a lack of effort. This represented at least half if not two-thirds of the time I spent working on this video.

I always find the Comic-Con videos frustrating to watch. When the camera moves to other people who are talking, I want to see Jared and Jensen instead. I like to see their reactions and sometimes they do funny things that get missed. But when the camera is steadfastly focused on Jared and Jensen, I also get frustrated because I can’t see the people who are talking. Nope, you can’t win with me! I want to see everything.

I attempted to mitigate this frustration by adding talking head bubbles. The main source videos I used were the ones with the most constant and stable focus on Jared and Jensen. However, if one of the other source videos had a decent focus on another guest, I inserted a small window into that other video as seen below. Eric shows up on the left, because that's where he was seated relative to Jared. Sera and Ben show up on the right, because they were on the other side of Jensen.

Like I said, it's not anywhere close to perfect. Trying to make the bubbles look stable was an enormous challenge for me. Behind the scenes the person in the bubble was bobbing and weaving all over the original video frame, so I had to constantly adjust the position of the secondary video to keep the subject centered in the bubble. They also aren't always bubbles. The people taking the videos often had the writers on the edge of the frame because they wanted to capture Jared or Jensen too, so the bubbles start to collapse when they get too close to the edge because there isn't enough video surrounding them to form a circle.

I haven't decided if the end result was worth how much effort I put into these darn "bubbles", so I'd welcome any feedback -- good or bad.