I tried to get a bit heavier on the linework again for the dark panels, but I’ve realized that it’s completely unnecessary for color work.  Yeah, I know, I should have known that, but now I can clearly see why.  Also,  I forgot the lobster again.  Crackers.

Originally I wanted to do a story line where the power went out, and I had started to flesh out the idea when I found out my grandmother was in the hospital.  For new readers, my grandmother passed away while we were in the area visiting her.  As far as those things go, it went as well as possible, but it was still tough.  When I came back, I was ready to tackle the story and to use the power outage as an analogue for loss in the main character.  The fact that it was a loss so transient softened the blow and, I think, made it funny in a ridiculous way.

Unfortunately, not all loss is temporary.  I wanted to do one more strip, where they celebrate the return of electricity and then the main character does something inane, to show he has already forgotten his lessons.  I spent days trying to do it justice without success.  In the end, I decided to leave it here.  The light being on is comforting to the main character, because it shows that power is restored, and he can sleep happily.  In my story, the analogy clearly breaks here; It is the lamp itself which is important to me.  In this way, I think I’ve been able to weave a part of myself into this story but still maintain an upbeat comic atmosphere.  I hope it was entertaining and satisfying.

I’m still not satisfied with this one, but I’m so far behind on all my projects right now that I’m settling for rushed work.  I was hoping I’d be in the middle of an art restructuring, that I’d be moving forward, but lately I feel like I’m standing still.  Hopefully I’ll bust through this wall soon.

I am not unhappy with the shading, at least.  I feel the writing is really bad, though, and I’ll explain that when I wrap up the story.  I had a story planned ahead, then changed it to fit a new theme, then totally forgot the changes I made and winged it on a strip by strip basis.  Bad move.  I need to go back to my collection of sticky notes, arranged and rearranged as needed.

It took me a long time to be satisfied with the pacing in this one, and satisfied may be too strong a word.  Let’s pretend I went with “accept” instead of “satisfied with”.  I do like how the middle and especially last panels came out, most particularly the linework on the house.  I’ve started adding some flourishes when using the brush, and I’m finally getting a sense of how to properly adjust the ink in the reservoir.  There’s still a lot to learn there, but it’s helping make the linework better reflect what I’m trying to convey.

However, I did intend to throw the lobster in at the foot of the bed, and just forgot.  Repeatedly.  I’ll see if I can’t sneak him in soon.

I apologize for the title…I couldn’t help myself.

I really had fun with the highlights in this one.  To effect the darkness, I use a blanket layer of 25% opacity black across all color areas.  Yesterday, I used shading like I normally do; A layer of 15% opacity and a black brush applied as necessary.  Today, I used shading and I also used the eraser tool to remove areas of the 25% opacity blanket black to show highlights and indicate where the candle light falls.  The combination of highlights and shading is rudimentary (this is pretty much my first rodeo, here) but I find it satisfactory.

And again, I’m really sorry that I couldn’t help myself…But the title just screamed at me like a heartless banshee which found me at her star-crossed lover’s tomb at midnight on the anniversary of their poison pact.  Perhaps that’s a bit extreme, but I had to get the idea out somehow.

It’s nice to have all my art supplies back.  I never realized how heavily I relied on my brush until I had to use technical pens and Pitt brushes.  The horror!  Peace, my friends.  Let there be no more weeping and gnashing of teeth; Let there be no more beating of breasts.

I balanced the dark and the light here for visual appeal.  I tried leaving the third panel lit, thinking it would really draw attention to the last panel, but it was too unbalanced.

Originally, the last panel was intended to have the Main Character yelling, panicking.  I had designed the letters to be large and italic, with a starburst word balloon.  The more I thought about it, I really wanted to drive home the sense of loss.  This offsets the second panel, where he says he would have been ready for the power outage and makes it a point that he realizes he’s not ready.  When he was panicking, it seemed more like a knee-jerk reaction, not really a loss.  I made the letters a bit smaller, gave them a generous word balloon and drew some “rainy” balloon accents to reinforce the mood.  I also mirrored the second panel in writing, with minimal words in the last panel and three full sentences in the second.  Both ended in the word, “ready”.

Most of my important drawing implements (for example, my Pentel brush and my Wacom tablet) are inaccessible at the moment, so I had to do everything with improvised tools.  That’s why there’s no shading today.  I also changed up some little things, such as which “I”s get serifs and leader placement.  I felt it was important to keep the leaders out of the characters’ faces.

I’ve wanted to do this story line for nearly a month now, but it wasn’t until yesterday that I finally put all the pieces together.  I hope you enjoy!