I’ve begun working on my Slimepunk minicomic this past week, and thought I’d share some process nonsense, largely because it feels like I’m charting new personal territory as I work on it.

I’ve been making attempts every now and again for a few years now to try and draw digitally. My kaiju poster is the only decent thing to come out of those attempts outside of a few October Game pieces from 2012, though. I was convinced that the problem was my cheapo hundred dollar Vistablet, because it’s never your own fault, right? It’s always the tools, not the user, no!

Which is one reason why it took me so long to finally make a convention banner. I was sure that drawing something at the usual size and blowing it up would look awful, I wasn’t sure what resolution I’d have to scan it at, blah blah blah. I knew my safest bet would be to do it digitally, but again, see above. Well, I finally bit the bullet and did the Slimepunk banner I showed off in my last post, entirely digitally, and it doesn’t look half bad, does it?
It turns out the problem was never necessarily the tablet, it was my way of using it. Since I moved, I’ve set up at a different computer desk, one that’s a perfect height for drawing while sitting and with enough space for the keyboard and tablet to sit, unlike my setup for the past few years. It’s like an epiphany or something, realizing that my lines weren’t super shaky and wobbly from the tablet but from how I was holding it while drawing! DUH. Stupid Brett. You’re an idiot.

I mean, my lines are still a little shaky. I think in Manga Studio there’s a way to cut down that jitter, but I only have an earlier version that I‘ve never been able to figure out, so I’m sticking to Photoshop since it’s what I know.
ANYWAYS. Here’s some process stuff! Starting with the cover, here are my digital “pencils,” throwing down lines to get an idea for composition and things. I think I’m starting to like this more than real penciling, it’s quicker, erasing is easier and not so messy, and I’m using the same brush tool as when I do the later inks, so I’m getting a better idea of line thickness from the start.
Then we have the inks, done on a separate Photoshop layer. I’m a little shakier here, especially with the longer lines. Sometimes it’s better to zoom out so the canvas is smaller and just throw a line down, but it’s harder to be precise in my direction like that. It’s a learning process, for sure. I was talking to my friend and comics badass Alejandro Bruzzese as I was working on the banner, and I mentioned the shakiness bugging me. He suggested owning that line, handling it in a way that it becomes part of the work. That sticks with me as I do this, trying to make that work.
And here’s the final cover after, well, all kinds of edits and stuff, though I’m really thinking about changing the logo. Something about it isn’t sitting right with me.

Oh, by the way, I didn’t just open up Photoshop and start drawing. I thumbnailed everything first. Typically, my thumbnails are stupidly tiny, only a couple inches in height, usually layouts for 9 or 10 pages crammed onto one sketchbook page requiring me to squint at little scribbles and try to interpret them. However, last month I ordered a couple of super awesome Field Notes notebooks. One is lined for writing, as you expect from a standard notebook, but the other one is grid paper, specifically for doing science and stuff. I spent a few days staring at it, figuring out what to use it for, when it hit me that it’s perfect for page layouts. And so:
This is so much better, those page layouts are the perfect size. Thanks Field Notes, I’m a fan now.

So yeah, the cover wasn’t too shabby, but I was really terrified over how drawing the comic itself would go. Drawing a comic page is not the same as drawing a single image, and even with the layouts already done I was still uncertain, at least until I started to pencil the first page:
The panels aren’t completely even, I admit. This is because I didn’t know what I was doing and threw down WAY TOO MANY guidelines and made each box individually. Then I realized it would have been so much easier to just do one big box and cut the gutters out, tier by tier. The rest of the book’s panels will be a bit more even, ha.

Aside from that, though, I was kind of flabbergasted with myself. Penciling this page took less than an hour, and with the layout drawn at a decent size for once I was never all that confused. Plus, being able to letter as I go, knowing from the very beginning where dialogue is going to be? So helpful. And, as I realized working on the second page, if I think the pencils themselves look good, I can just copy and paste them into the inks layer in black, no need to redraw. That’s GREAT.
The actual act of inking took longer, of course. Especially panel 4, with those ruins on the right. You can really easily do straight, even lines in Photoshop with no problem, but it wasn’t working with the occasional jitter of the rest of my linework, it looked too fake and mechanical. Alejandro’s words remained in the back of my head, so I took a nearby book to use as a straight edge and drew the lines that way, so the line thickness changes with pen pressure and there‘s the occasional wobble. It’s weird, but it works, I think. Curved lines are still a pain, especially the bisection of Slimepunk’s Spitwad.

The page isn’t finished yet, but I managed to get all the flat colors down last night, changed some of the line art, and fixed the lettering. I’m nearly there:
And…geez, that looks GOOD, doesn’t it? It’s not just me, right? Something about how quickly and effortlessly I can throw down and erase lines with the tablet and zoom in or out kind of…it opens things up for me, I think. I can’t articulate it, but it’s like seeing things from a completely new perspective this way. Penciling on paper never felt this good.

Of course, I’m still doing Cannonball Fist the traditional way, inking digitally just isn‘t the same for me. The horror comic will also be done more traditionally, I think. Maybe if I get a better printer, I could pencil digitally, print that, then ink traditionally? Ooh yeah, that’d be good, I think.

So yeah. This minicomic is a fun exercise. I’m moving fast on it, hoping to have it finished and printed in time for ShikaCon in April. Probably before that. I wish I’d come up with it sooner so that I’d have it done and in print in time for ETSUcon this weekend, but yeah, that’s not going to happen at all. Alas.
Speaking of cons, I made a new sign for doing mutant portraits and sketches! Yes, I’m pushing to do more mutant pet portraits. Yes, I know that’s kind of weird. No, I don’t care at all.

I want to continue posting process stuff. It keeps things moving, I think. Hope you enjoyed reading this!