Current Process

I have a fear of routine. There's something numbing about it. Walking the same way to work every day, you stop noticing anything about the walk. It disappears, in a day or two you won't even remember it. You'll only know it happened because it's what you always do. If you walk down a different side of the street, you suddenly notice new things. The walk becomes memorable.

And maybe because of this fear of routine, I've never found a method of comics that I stick with. Some people have a locked-down process, but mine has remained loose. In fact, it constantly changes. I don't work the way I did last year, and the way I worked last year was different from the way I worked the year before.

My current project, a space-fantasy called Hedra, is heavily focused on the design of the page. The goal is for an interesting page that forces the eye to go in different directions than it normally would. Each page is something of a puzzle. The plot is very simple, which allows the telling to be complex. My hope is that the book will be something of a riddle, perhaps confusing, but enjoyably so.

There is no written script, just a loose plot in my head. My documentable process begins with layouts on 3x5 notecards, which are small enough to let me keep the whole of the page in my head. A page will often go through a number of iterations.

After I've found a design for the page I like,  I work on 11x17 bristol.

For the straight lines I use Microns or Faber Castell PITT artist pens. For characters I'll use a Pentel brush pen. This page is heavy on the geometric, so there was almost no need for the brush pen.

I color the page in Photoshop. My intention is to self-publish this book with Risograph, so I've been working on trying to create a full color feeling with only two colors. I'm not sure why, but pink and blue have just felt right to me.