Merry Christmas!

Gawain

 

Cloaked

Dead Leaves

Morgana

Cover design for The Darkest Hour

Once again, a (bad) photo because this is A3(ish). I am surprisingly happy with how this turned out. Does it work for you? 

I tried to paint without thinking too much - if I think too much, the result never looks good O_O. So I used several colours that I have tried to avoid in the past, not least among which are (ivory) black and Payne's Grey. I love Payne's Grey. I also found that my Chrome Green is not the bad buy that I thought it was. When used with lots of water, it makes a lovely, subdued green. I adore it.

A3 concept...

I apologise for the bad photo: the original painting is A3 size and doesn't fit onto my scanner.Hence, you get a photo taken in artificial light around midnight. Sorry. This is one for the copyshop... In reality, the colours are much better, I promise.

This is pretty much what the pages of the comic will look like. Well, this is a splash page, of course, but the line art and colours will be like this. Suggestions? Concerns?

All About Arthur

Have a young Arthur. The gentleman is giving me trouble! I had scripted the passage in which he is introduced, but I hadn't laid it out yet because I felt something wasn't working quite right. At 3.30 this morning I resolved to approach the passage differently and to rewrite it. So that is what I will be doing. 

Have a young Arthur. The gentleman is giving me trouble! I had scripted the passage in which he is introduced, but I hadn't laid it out yet because I felt something wasn't working quite right. At 3.30 this morning I resolved to approach the passage differently and to rewrite it. So that is what I will be doing.

Meanwhile, I'm trying out different types of paper for my definitive art. This is Lana Cold-Pressed. Though this paper has always been a favourite of mine, it seems it cannot take all the rubbing and erasing that went on during the sketch phase, so I guess that rules it out :(.

In case anyone is interested, the process I am using looks like this:

- I sketch my image in watercolour pencil.
- I ink with a Faber-Castell brush pen.
- I take a brush with water to the watercolour pencil lines to disperse them and turn them into a wash.
- I paint the picture.

Loyalty binds me

Richard III, painted for Cecilia :). I think she is the only Italian member of the Richard III Society... Her Ricardian comic, The Boar, is for sale on Lulu, Amazon and probably a few other places.

Poor Richard. His reputation got tarnished forever because Shakespeare's patrons were Tudors. Then again, he is probably my favourite Shakespearean villain!

Peek-a-boo!

Gawain Project: short hiatus

No comic yesterday?

That's because I'm taking a (short) holiday off the comic. I'm busy with work and life at the moment and I feel like I have to churn out new pages inbetween without being able to think them through. So I have decided to take some time off to think about the next few scenes and prepare them at my ease.

I'm not sure how long I'll need - two weeks? three weeks? Not very long, in any case. Trust me, I need to tell this story just as much as I need to breathe, so I'm going to continue telling it. I just need to give it some space because I have temporarily lost my 'oomph'. Just catching my breath here.

Please come back. I promise I'll come back too, with fights, romance, sorceresses and a legendary king :).

Thank you for your patience.

<3

Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 79-81

What went before

Morgana has been hoping that Conchobarre, a former fianna and now a nun in Morgana's convent, would be willing to take charge of Gawain's combat training. But Conchobarre refuses to do anything that might benefit to King Lot. As a young woman, she was pushed aside to make room for her younger brother, and the fact that Lot has removed his eldest child, a daughter, hits close to home. What now?

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Next week: Of sons, cows and Saxons.

Gawain Project: a small break...

Life and work interfered too much this past week. No comic today, I'm afraid... But next week you'll meet someone special :).

For today, have my finalised character design for little Gawain.

Check in next Saturday for the continuation of the story!

Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 76-78

What went before

Lot and Morgana have plans with Gawain, but none of them will bear fruit unless the boy becomes a decent warrior. Because his current training seems to lead nowhere, Morgana brings in an expert: Conchobarre, a former war leader who has taken the veil. But Conchobarre flatly refuses to become Gawain's tutor. Why? Well, this week she reveals her reasons...

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Next week: The fall-out.

Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 73-75

I spent the last few days in Edinburgh. I had a wonderful time - and sunny weather! (Well, apart from the last day, which was very rainy, but I needed that to convince me that I was really in Scotland...). Of course Edinburgh is a little bit magical for me in any case because it is the site of the capital of the Gododdin, and the capital of Lothian - it's Lot Country and Gawain was born there! I rolled my eyes a bit at the shameless commercial exploitation of what is after all Highland dress in the capital of the Lowlands; I was bemused by the existence of vegetarian haggis and Scottish/Mexican fusion cooking yielding quesadillas with haggis; I wandered through the expanse of Holyrood Park pretending not to know that Arthur's Seat doesn't really have anything to do with Arthur; and of course I also drooled over the Celtic exhibits in the National Museum. I also learnt that quite a few members of the Scottish ruling class in the Middle Ages were of Flemish descent, which certainly explains some of the more absurd aspects of life in Scotland ;-).

Naturally I brought back a lot of books, one of which  is a collection of Scottish folk tales. I also (finally) got a copy of the Mabinogion, a small booklet about Pictish fortresses, a history of the Pictish people and a copy of The Last of the Celts, Marcus Tanner's exploration of what is left of the Celtic-speaking world. It makes for gloomy reading. Tanner estimates that one generation from now, all Celtic languages will be extinct. Some of them have been killed off by aggressive government policies (Breton in France, Gaelic in the UK), others are just spoken by people who aren't proud of their language and its heritage (Gaelic in Ireland). All of them have been dealt with in a bad way - measures to preserve the languages have either come too late or have had adverse effects. These things make a Celtophile despair :(.

Well, I'm trying to keep Celtic culture alive in my own modest way (ahem). New pages are below; I hope you enjoy them. Concrit is welcome, as always!

What went before

Lot and Morgana have a problem. They each have their own high hopes for Gawain, but none of their plans are going to come to anything if the boy cannot hold his own in a fight. Gawain is small and not particularly strong. To overcome these weaknesses, he will need the help of an expert - preferably of the female variety. Fortunately, Morgana knows just such a person...

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Next week: Conchobarre gives her reasons. They reveal something about Lot...

Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 70-72

What went before
Lot is concerned about the fact that he cannot draw the sword from the stone. Does it really mean he is unworthy of the High King's throne? But Morgana points out that the sword in the stone has Merlin written all over it, and that as such it is as subjective a means to appoint a king as any other. Meanwhile, it turns out that Gawain's martial skills are rather sub-par and that something should be done about that...

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Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 67-69

What went before

The meeting of the kings has not really been a success. Lot tells Morgana of his worries. There is one in particular...

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Next week: We hear something about tiny heroes.

Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 64-66

Haven't got much to say, apart form the fact that I have just finished another Arthurian novel, Here Lies Arthur by Philip Reeve. It is one of those YA page turners and I finished it in a few hours. I'll try to write an Arthurian Review about it soon.

I hope you enjoy the continuation of the story. As always, concrit is welcome!

What went before

Taliesin has lulled the bellicose kings of Britain to sleep with the magic of his harp music. The meeting has ended and bloodshed has been avoided - but the kings have not made any progress. Queen Morgause despairs, but Taliesin claims that a new High King is approaching...

1-3 - 4-6 - 7-9 - 10-12 - 13-15 - 16-18 - 19-21 - 22-24 - 25-27 - 28-30 - 31-33 - 34-36 - 37-39 - 40-42 - 43-45 - 46-48 - 49-51 - 52-54 - 55-57 - 58-60 - 61-63

Next week: we find out what's up with little Gawain.

Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 61-63

This is what happens if you post in more place than one: sometimes you forget one of them. Eek. Well, the episode is up now. Sorry about the delay!

What went before
It's clobbering time! The kings of Britain roll across the floor of the royal hall of Lothian. Then Taliesin the bard takes his lyre and starts to play...

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Next week: a Lot-and-Morgana moment...

I'm terribly sorry, but there won't be an update of the comic this week.  Papers and theses have taken over my life >_<. I'm also filling in for a colleague who is ill, so I haven't had time to draw anything. *sigh*

Next week should be more comfy.

Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 58-60

Another full Moleskine journal! That makes four of them so far. Mind you, for The Darkest Hour I cheated and added some loose sheets. Had I known that they would be so many loose sheets, I would just have started a new journal. But I kept thinking the story would be done in, oh, two more pages. As it turned out, I needed 25. One of the four full journals also has sixteen pages with non-comic stuff, simply because - well, I guess that when I started writing and drawing this story, I wasn't sure I would get this far. In the meantime, I know I have barely started ;-).

What went before

If you bring the Kings of Britain together for a debate about who is supposed to be the new High King, you can bet that some nasty fighting will ensue. And so it does. Two little boys are watching as their fathers roll across the floor of the great hall...

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Next week: More! ;-)

Gawain Project: Sunrise, Chapter 1: Brothers & Sisters 55-57

What went before
The Kings of Britain are debating uther's succession. Lot and Uriens both lay claim to the throne, as they are both married to one of Uther's adopted daughters. The Irish and the British are not mincing words. This cannot end well!

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