cage -2-

posted 2008.12.17 at 12:36

Animal -2- in the first edition and hammering -1- in whatever you want to call the edition before that. First edition draft, maybe? Oh, what a long, tortured history this page has. So long. So tortured. Tweaked again - this time making the hands in the border a little more obvious, and adding in some super-hair a la control -6-. Also, shirt decal swap.

First Edition Metadata

OPD : 2005.04.20 @ 20:56

20070731 : Belated ding removal. Ding version here.

Two years later, my diet has been effectively adjusted and the "voices in my head" that conjured up the introductory scene (brought on by a sugar overdose in the form of too much Mountain Dew) have silenced. The edited recomposition of what was hammering on the gates of nothing reflects this and other changes, without (hopefully) changing the style of the narrative.

I'm aiming to do the next few pages in a slighlty simpler / sloppier / "faster" style as a means of "fading into" Chapter Zero. Assuming I can bear doing so, anyway- if not, it's going to be a bit of a jolt.

The biggest change here is the composition, obviously - which fits with the "tarot" element and is also a vastly stronger image. Also, slightly Burtonesque.

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Originally hammering -1-, Done 27 May 2003, back-published 2003-05-23 14:58:04. A rework of an even earlier draft image. Here are the original "draft" (done at Zythos, a bar on the South Side of Pittsburgh that has since been bought out and replaced by the "Z-Bar", a hipster fuckhead aggregator) and the original "final" image (1200x1600, done at the ATC Batcave):

 

Original post text :

Hammering on the Gates of Nothing, 1.

Scrapped the original rant. This was a super rough ink drawing. It's been replaced with something that's better in many ways, though it still falls down in a few. I'm still deciding on the style I'll be using for The Dualist, and it stands to reason that a little practice with fullbore production work is in order.

This piece is not without its flaws. I need to hit the art store up for supplies as soon as possible- everyone I know seems to be using brush tipped microns, and it makes waaaaaay too much sense not to try them on the rest of the reconstruction.

Swapped original sketch page done in a bar for a redraw and photoshopped page done in elsewhere. Time consuming- my first attempt at cel shading. I can only get faster. And better- yes, it's hella glitchy (backside of the right arm, for example), but I'm trying to work with what amounts to a whole new coloring style and improve my inks at the same time. I need to work on my patience. :P