I just posted a new adaptation of a short story, this time, Bradbury's The Lake. I hadn't done any sequential art for a while and it was good practice. At the time, I was looking at some Eisner and really wanted to focus on flowing panels and using pictures and text in a complimentary way.
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It has been a LOOOONNNNGGG time since I posted anything here. And sadly, I basically haven't drawn since.
I listened to the Crime and Punishment audiobook while I was working recently. At first I was just curious as to why I liked the book in high school and figured it would just be a brief respite from my normal rotation of sermons and NBA podcasts. But soon I was wrapped up in the story and two weeks later I finished, a pool of emotions and old memories bubbling to the surface. It was time to make some drawings. The scene I wanted to do right away was Sonya reading the story of Lazarus being raised to Raskolnikov. I made this doodle at work and I knew the time was right to pull out the drawing equipment. As I complete drawings, I'm slowly uploading them in the Crime and Punishment Illustration tab. Synopsis: A couple has a child, but complications arise and a blue pyramid is born instead of a human child. The couple grapples and struggles, especially the wife, as they wait for the doctors to determine how to bring the baby into the human world. The situation continues to worsen, but the doctors find a solution: they cannot bring the baby boy into the human world, but they CAN recreate the conditions to bring the parents into the baby's world of abstract shapes. They will see each other as human, but to the rest of the world, they will appear as alien beings who cannot be understood. Because of their love for the child, the parents join their son. And this is the FINAL illustration. Why did it take so long you might ask? I have no idea really; this was actually done a long time ago, but I didn't post it. I have a bad habit of not completing my projects, but this one is done (though a cover image would be nice) This image shows the end of the story: the parents joining their son in his dimension as shapes while the doctor and his assistant leave the room. It's a beautiful moment, but visually, it was challenging to show. I really wanted to depict them as humans somehow. I decided to show their reflections as humans but also their cast shadows as the shapes. All of their possessions: purse, hat, scarf, and everything else lie scattered on the floor. Yes, there is no way that mirror could fit in that purse, but I don't think anyone will notice. Here's the thumbnail that I did: And here's the final image: When I think about projects now, I like to not just explore new styles and media, but also to express something thematically that I've been considering or meditating on at that time. For me, this story demonstrates that real love comes with great costs. The parents will be seen as mutations and misfits cut off from everything they used to know, but for the sake of their child, their sacrifice is redeemed. The idea of parents crossing into another dimension to empathize and join their child very much mirrors what Jesus did when He came to Earth to save us. But besides the Christian undertones, I also have a sister who is adopting children currently. When I see the love of new parents for their children, even those who are not born to them or like them in any way, I think of this story. I may post again about this story, see if I've got any other cool sketches, but I hope you enjoyed the journey.
Synopsis: A couple has a child, but complications arise and a blue pyramid is born instead of a human child. The couple grapples and struggles, especially the wife, as they wait for the doctors to determine how to bring the baby into the human world. The situation continues to worsen, but the doctors find a solution: they cannot bring the baby boy into the human world, but they CAN recreate the conditions to bring the parents into the baby's world of abstract shapes. They will see each other as human, but to the rest of the world, they will appear as alien beings who cannot be understood. Because of their love for the child, the parents join their son. Here is the fifth illustration showing Peter's decision at hand: wait for the doctors to come up with a solution to bring their baby to them, which could take years, or join their baby in his world. Could I portray the thought and inner conflict that was in this scene? It starts with the thumbnail: Now I know that that doesn't really look like anything, but even in this 1" square thumbnail, I can tell that the composition will work. There are clear foreground and background, the main character is framed nicely, and the character posing already effectively separates Polly into her own space from the doctor and her husband, physically as well as psychologically.
I've drawn enough now where good draftsmanship is still something I strive for, but even more important is to tell the story. I've been studying a lot of Tom Lovell illustration lately and I noticed how he will use character eyes to direct focus. By directing where characters are looking, like Dr. Wolcott and Peter Horn in this case, this scene becomes all about Polly. I could have tightened up some of the elements here, but I really enjoyed the energy and looseness of this one. One more drawing to go! Synopsis: A couple has a child, but complications arise and a blue pyramid is born instead of a human child. The couple grapples and struggles, especially the wife, as they wait for the doctors to determine how to bring the baby into the human world. The situation continues to worsen, but the doctors find a solution: they cannot bring the baby boy into the human world, but they CAN recreate the conditions to bring the parents into the baby's world of abstract shapes. They will see each other as human, but to the rest of the world, they will appear as alien beings who cannot be understood. Because of their love for the child, the parents join their son. So here's illustration number 4 of 6. This was the illustration that I did last and took the longest time. This is a pivotal image, but it seemed very challenging; a single still drawing had to show that Polly is drunk, she is humiliating herself, and that Peter has witnessed it. Before I started the final drawing at all, I had to understand how to draw a drunk person. I looked up some reference, freeze framed some videos and made some sketches. There is the easy clue of putting a bottle in a hand, but you can make it easier to see; stains on clothes, unkempt hair and clothes. I even added a mismatched button. But for posing, I learned that the key is a lack of balance: I couldn't just draw the pose straight up and down. Also, drunk people can not walk in straight lines (I know this from Randy Marsh from South Park, not from personal experience.) When I gave my first pass at the final drawing, I scanned the below. Sometimes I don't see compositional problems until I see the drawing in the computer. When I saw this image, I realized that the silhouettes were just not reading. I needed space. What to do? It seemed like manipulating it all in photoshop would be too difficult, I can't really mimic my drawing with any Photoshop brushes. So the next best thing: Pulled out a scissors. Oof. So I cut up the image into pieces and taped them on a clean piece of paper. I think it was worth it.
Synopsis: A couple has a child, but complications arise and a blue pyramid is born instead of a human child. The couple grapples and struggles, especially the wife, as they wait for the doctors to determine how to bring the baby into the human world. The situation continues to worsen, but the doctors find a solution: they cannot bring the baby boy into the human world, but they CAN recreate the conditions to bring the parents into the baby's world of abstract shapes. They will see each other as human, but to the rest of the world, they will appear as alien beings who cannot be understood. Because of their love for the child, the parents join their son.
Here is illustration number 3. I'm quite proud of this drawing and I really think that the perspective is something that I could not have pulled off before. This is probably the closest I came to doing what I wanted with this project with regards to the variety and rhythm of the contour drawing. I actually took reference photos of myself for Polly because it was a very tricky pose. Maybe the subject of a future process blog? Even though a drawing like this takes a lot of time, it's so vital (and very difficult) to push the drawing to tell the story. As an illustrator, you are the director and the actor of the scene. All of the decisions are yours to make. As I drew this, I found it easy to sympathize with Polly. It was painful to be at this point of the story where Polly was being so self-destructive. I've had times (not now) where I was deeply unhappy with myself and my life and also made self-destructive decisions and habits. It is the rare times like this, where drawing becomes more than just a fun pastime and can become a deeply personal journey. Synopsis: A couple has a child, but complications arise and a blue pyramid is born instead of a human child. The couple grapples and struggles, especially the wife, as they wait for the doctors to determine how to bring the baby into the human world. The situation continues to worsen, but the doctors find a solution: they cannot bring the baby boy into the human world, but they CAN recreate the conditions to bring the parents into the baby's world of abstract shapes. They will see each other as human, but to the rest of the world, they will appear as alien beings who cannot be understood. Because of their love for the child, the parents join their son. Here is the second illustration. After being warned about the child, the Horns finally meet him. I may return to this one later as I'm not sure I like the posing on this one.
Over the next few days, I will post a series of drawings based on Ray Bradbury's story, Tomorrow's Child. Hopefully the images tell the story, but I'll give a short recap here. I've planned out six drawings so far. The goal of this project was to get back to simple pencil drawing, and focus on line weight and perspective in composition.
The images will tell the story, but I think it might be helpful to describe the story shortly: A couple has a child, but complications arise and a blue pyramid is born instead of a human child. The couple grapples and struggles, especially the wife, as they wait for the doctors to determine how to bring the baby into the human world. The situation continues to worsen, but the doctors find a solution: they cannot bring the baby boy into the human world, but they CAN recreate the conditions to bring the parents into the baby's world of abstract shapes. They will see each other as human, but to the rest of the world, they will appear as alien beings who cannot be understood. Because of their love for the child, the parents join their son. Here is the first illustration, showing the couple's excitement about the baby. If you hadn't been here in a while, you'll notice that I posted She-Captain, all 13 pages. This was done early last year, but I had neglected posting it.
I think the idea behind it and the script are both pretty good. After a few projects under my belt, I realize that my comedy really isn't my strong suit; I'm much more drawn to dramatic stories. However, besides my natural weakness for comedy, I've also noticed that my storytelling is a little off in some places. Some pages are good, but some are pretty terrible. I also think a good colorist could really improve on it since my own coloring really doesn't help. Nevertheless, another finished project. I'm not going back and revising it, even though I already see some quick improvement could be done through some panels redrawing and quick color changes. It was the best I could do at the time. One of the things I enjoy about blog posts, which I don't write nearly enough of, is the opportunity to write about process and not necessarily final product. Below is a discarded page, a prior version of page 10 of the book. I needed this page to say more than just what the word balloons offered. I wanted it to feel like a life remembered; a blur of big moments and little moments that had somehow stuck with you for some reason. For Hollis, I imagined some of these moments (none of this is really in the story): the time his dad took him to a ball game, or leaving home for the first time. There was the time he got terminated from the Rocket Company and there was that time when he didn't talk to the girl he may have liked when he had the chance. I liked the idea a lot, but I realized that it just wasn't as effective as it could be. Basically I was packing too many disconnected images that were all detracting from each other. And even worse, by the time the pages were all pencilled, I realized that this just didn't flow. The panels in the bottom right got lost and there wasn't a visual force toward the bottom right corner of the page which is where the panels were going. The page had to go. Here it is. So I came up with this new page 10. With the large black shapes in the lower left, I took out the busy-ness of that part of the page and now the eye can flow from the middle down toward the right. These are things that sequential artists have to learn, and even if throwing away a page isn't optimal, the story is always the most important thing. I found this line much earlier in the text about "life being so short, over before you took a breath," and I knew I'd have to put it somewhere. thought it'd be great to illustrate that more lyrically with the smoke in this page.
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Brandt WongThis blog shows the progress and describes my thoughts on my most recent project(s). Archives
September 2019
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