Sunday 27 December 2009

The Darkest Hour 104-108

This week we have a pretty wordy update. This episode was not easy to script. I guess the tricky part was to condense everything and still keep it comprehensible and credible. If it doesn't work, please let me know :). I spent more time on some of the art than is reasonable for a storyboard, but, you know, I do want to have something worth looking at - that is more enjoyable for you and me both. Some of the faces came out so well that I'd gladly use them to accompany a cast description :-). I may just do that.

At the comics festival in Turnhout at the beginning of this month I was told that my storyboard is much too elaborate art-wise. That is true. But if I had drawn it with stick figures, I couldn't very well have posted my progress. The storyboard has been my main occupation, art-wise, since April of this year. Take out its pages from this blog, and there will be rather little left. I guess I could have progressed faster if I'd spent less time on the art, I suppose - but I don't think I would have been able to assess how well (or not) certain set-ups would work if the pictures had been strictly basic. That, and it's always a good thing if I enjoy myself while working on something, especially on a project this big.

Famous last words?

Maybe.

In any case, we are in the meantime getting very close to the story's end indeed :).






4 comments:

Anonymous said...

nice pen, mademoiselle

ampersand said...

Thank you, Anonymous :-)!

Cecilia said...

cross-cutting! I love cross-cutting :)
So Morgause takes the young Lot and Morgana the old Uriens? I wonder if that will mean bad luck or, in fact, a good thing.

Everything is clear, I believe. The only thing I can notice is the extreme likeness of the two sisters - I couldn't really tell Morgana from Morgause. Is that intended? Or it's just me, that I don't catch the differences in their traits?

Btw: on January 9th Italian tv is going to start broadcasting the second season of Merlin! Yeeh!

ampersand said...

Ooh! Our local television (commercial channel) is only just broadcasting the first season... Lancelot appeared this weekend :). Fandom on LJ was rather negative about Season 2 - I'm curious to find out whether or not I agree. I only saw two episodes on BBC, and one I thought was pretty good, the other not so much. So: curious.

Morgana and Morgause - well, it's not easy keeping a balance between the fact that they resemble each other and must yet be distinguishable. I like to think that I give them different traits (Morgause's jaw is a little more square, Morgana's face more oval in shape; Morgana has a small pouty mouth and Morgause has distinctive eyebrows) BUT I'm the first to admit that these traits don't always come out clearly :/. Normally I give them different hairstyles too, but last week I didn't...

Clearly this is something I need to work on. Strange though it may sound, I really have trouble inventing/drawing different faces. I don't think I'm as bad as some popular mangaka, but I know it can be a bit of a problem :(.