NEW BLOG ON TUMBLR

Hey, Friends! In an effort to drag my feet into the 21st century, I've migrated this blog's posts over to a new Tumblr blog that matches my new website. This blog will remain indefinitely, but I won't be updating it.

Check out the new website at www.csmcdermott.com
and the blog at www.cshanemcdermott.tumblr.com.

I hope to see you there. Later!

A long time ago at a bout far, far away...

One-sixteenth.

I'm one-sixteenth of the way finished with the thumbnails for my Seahorse comic. That's half of the first 28-page #0 issue. Which is one of eight 28-page issues. That's a total of 224 pages.

It took me the entire fall semester to write the script for issues 1-7 as well as creating all of the character sketches. I've spent this semester writing, re-writing, re-re-writing, and finishing the script for issue 0. I have just begun the thumbnails.

Here's a peak at my process. I've compiled all the tiny thumbnail doodles I do on my printed script. I then do really REALLY detailed thumbnails on templates I made. Don't ask me to do the math and tell you what percentage of an actual page it is. I have no idea. I'm also posting some prep sketch pages to show how many different ways I frame and block my shots before making my final decision. I don't always pick the shots I like best. Sometimes you have to pick what works best with the rest of the page. Sometimes.

I'm not sure why they're so gray. I do, however, know why the first page looks all wrinkled. It's because I had to glue shitty preliminary scans of pages 2 - 4 to a new sheet of paper along with the originals for pages 1 and 5. BECAUSE my jerk cat Heinrich jumped onto my desk AS SOON AS I FINISHED THEM and fucking wretched all over them. It was nasty. This is the same cat who waited until I was asleep and vomited all over my night guard case because I stopped him from vomiting on the rug earlier in the evening.

sigh.

Anyway...STUFF!

If you like pina coloadas...

...and roller derby and THOR and LOKI and mash-ups and gender swapping and comic books and maybe not pina coladas because I don't know if they sell those at bouts, but you still like all those other things...AND run-on sentences, then this is the blog post for you. I'm so excited about this one I'm peeing my pants (as we speak) with anticipation.

I also never posted the final "disco" double header poster from last June so I'm posting it here...along with the one from July because I heart it. Seriously. Hearts like shoot out of my eyes for it. Pew Pew! (that was hearts)

Seriously, why can't I have a job JUST DOING THIS?

Page 10...sort of.

This semester Jessica Abel is leading our mentored studio at CCA and our first assignment is to take one of our thesis pages and rework it with a different layout and shots. I'm finishing up the script so I haven't even started thumbnailing pages, but I picked one of my favorites to dive into and then rework. This is the first time Sam encounters the Wicked Witch of the Old West. I haven't inked anything with my brush in a few months so I was a little rusty. I also feel my love affair with the brush is waning. There are SOOO many pages to do that I think I'm going to switch to nibs for more speed. I'll ink my covers with a brush, and some aspects on the interiors, but I'm looking forward to a change of pace.

Sam from the Fahr-Fahrawei Galaxy and Manfred, the robotic, high school mascot turned dream world warrior.

Sam is a robot girl that was once human. I'm not going to go into any more detail here about her origin, but I can say she looks out for Jack when he first returns to the dream world. She's handy in a fight as well. I played around with several different hip designs for Sam, but have settled on the larger ball and socket design. For now. This is what her robot body looks like, but she wears clothes for most of the comic because it makes her feel a little more human.

I almost called this "The Long Arm of the Law" because her extended arm is a little too long in the original sketch sans Photoshop correction, but I decided to just make a joke about it here instead.

I guess you could call her THE LONG ARM OF THE LAW.

Anyway...

I will tell you a little bit about Manfred, however. During the homecoming hall decorating contest at Jack's high school, he and his best friends created a robotic tiger mascot out of cardboard. Naturally, Jack did a lot of daydreaming about Manfred and his imaginary origin is that they actually built him out of an old F-150 and brought him to life Frankenstein-style with a bolt of lightning. Ultimately, Manfred has to battle a robotic mascot from a rival school and all kinds of giant robot/high school antics ensue. This daydreaming about Manfred created a very real Manfred in the dream world.

In Jack's long absence from the dream world there was an epic battle in which Manfred was destroyed. Now that Jack has returned to the dream world he rebuilds Manfred with the help of Sam's intergalactic technology. The sketches reveal the original, boxier Manfred, and the revised sketch shows the new and improved Manfred. There are still visible pieces of the Ford F-150.

Bold explorers from the Planet Xarglefax and The Wicked Witch of the Old West

So here's some more stuff. The Xarglefaxian space craft transforms into a giant robot, and is piloted by three bumbling Xarglefaxian space explorers. One wears a red uniform, one wears gold, and the other blue. Wait, what? Also, their ship almost crashes when it enters the atmosphere and they have to save themselves by deploying a giant parachute. The pattern on the parachute is the pattern from the Atari Space Invaders video game from the 80's. It also kinda looks like the pattern on Clint Eastwood's poncho in A Fistful of Dollars. The robot becomes entangled in the parachute and ends up poking a hole in it, and severing the cords to free itself. The result is a poncho with fringe. Neat, eh? You don't have to answer that. I already know it's boss.

And below that you'll see the Wicked Witch of the Old West. I don't want to say too much about her because I want her to remain mysterious, but I will say BULLETS THAT TURN PEOPLE INTO FROGS!

Oh yeah...these guys are bad guys.