Long time no see!

Wow, the dust is kind of gathering in the corners here, isn't it?

The explanation isn't "I've stopped drawing" - it's "I've gotten a job, and also a Tumblr".

Been incredibly busy lately, with all sorts of things - among other things, an actual paying job, as mentioned above. This means I haven't really had time to think about updating here. But I thought I'd get my act together and post, because, well - why not?

Let's start things off with Fathoms of the Sky! I've finished lettering issue 3, and I've done the front cover and the title-page - I need to do the back-cover and a short text before I can assemble the PDF and send it off to the printers. I'm so excited it's almost silly - this really is going to be the best issue yet!


The cover of issue 3 - with Khazri taking pride of place!

You can read the first five pages either on Tumblr or on my DeviantArt-account (where you'll find the previews for the previous two issues as well).

I've also started storyboarding/writing the fourth issue, so that once things calm down a bit (say, in November), I'll get cracking on drawing that - I'm hoping to have it finished by April 2013, in time for Stockholm's International Comics Festival. 

But of course, I've also been drawing other stuff.

Like grumpy little girls with claws:


... and comics about grumpy samurais and not-so-grumpy little girls:



From now on, I'll probably be updating my Tumblr far more frequently than this place - though I'm not abandoning this blog. I like to use this place for when I feel like rambling on in text, as well as images.

Fathoms III - previews!

Yes! I have done it - I've finished inking Fathoms III, and am basking in the glorious, glorious light at the end of the tunnel!

All I've got left on this chapter now is to clean up some inking-mistakes, letter all the dialogue and do the cover/title page! 

I have to say, in my own humble creator opinion, this chapter is going to be a lot better than issues 1 and 2. Not only is it going to look better - I've levelled up in crosshatching, making me like a Level 4 Inking Mage at this point - but it's also going to be better because stuff is happening in it, unlike in issue 2, in which absolutely nothing happened except for a flashback.

It's going to introduce some new characters!

Like Khazri. Who can high-five you, flip you the bird and steal your wallet - and still have one hand left over to scratch his nose.

Also, Gilavar - Transportation, Beast of Burden and Totally Awesome Flying Whale Pal.


... There's an awful lot of whales in this chapter. And clouds.

And of course, a repeat performance by the leading man with the fantastic nose, Gale:


Talassa returns as well, sometimes looking like she has for the past two issues:

... that is; worried, scared and not entirely sure she trusts these weirdoes and their flying acquatic mammals..


... and sometimes looking like she might actually be having a good time.

Also whales. Did I mention whales? Because whoo, boy, did I ever crosshatch a lot of whales in this chapter. They might be outnumbered in appearance by the clouds, but if so it's by a very slim margin. Still kind of proud of myself that I stuck with it and didn't just throw up my hands somewhere mid-chapter and go "AAAAGH! Whatever - this comic is going to be about talking heads in a white room with no windows!". I mean, I even drew a cityscape on one of the later pages.

The final plan is, right now, to release parts III and IV as separate issues, and then take a bit of a break and trying to finish the whole thing - which will then be collected in one complete volume, with extras and bonus art and all sorts of good stuff.  I haven't got any ETA date on the complete volume, but I'm hoping to have part IV finished for Stockholm's International Comics Festival in April 2013.

If you want to get in on this whole "fanzine"-thing, you can check out the previews of the previous two issues here (along with all sorts of concept art). They're both available for sale for the cheap, cheap price of 35 SEK/4.76 USD (with reservations for changes in currency-value) each, plus shipping to wherever you are in the world. If you want one, or possibly two, just contact me with your address and name, and I'll get back to you with my paypal info and total price.

Sketchdump XVII

Collection of warmups and sketches and stuff. Let's start things off with a healthy dose of Shirtless Russian Mobster:



This is what Ygritte from A Song of Ice and Fire looks like in my head - all messy, wild red hair and the kind of determination you can bend horseshoes around.


Zebraspider. Because.

UppCon-sketches:

Sketchdump+stuff

Okay, time for a general update on pretty much everything.


Fathoms of the Sky III, excerpt from page 13.

Fathoms III is progressing quite well - 22/24 pages are pencilled, and I'll start inking it soon. I've also plotted out the big picture-stuff on what happens in the rest of the comic. Some of it is still very rough (like, "Gale mopes. Talassa gets lost."), but I've got the final chapter+epilogue pretty much clear in my head. I've done some calculations, and arrived at the conclusion that it'll be 200 pages or less in total.

I've also started thinking about how I'll publish the thing; right now, it's published in pieces by the chapter, but it's really one of those comics that needs to be read as a whole. So I'm thinking of collecting it in one bigger volume once I've published a few more chapters; that is, I'll publish perhaps up to chapter 4 or 5 separately, and then take a break until I've drawn the whole thing and release it in a collected volume.

Of course, this means that people will have to pay at least in part for what they've already bought (the first couple of chapters, that is), but I'm intending to go back and fix things, so that the first half won't just be a re-release of stuff people have already bought. I know there's a mistake in the inking of Gale's gloves in part one, for example, that'll be corrected for the final version. I'm also intending to have some extra material in the volume - concept sketches from me, fanart from friends of mine if they've got the time, etc., etc.

... I'll also be doing smaller print-runs of the separate chapters from now on; 100 copies of each is a bit too much.

Okay, on to the pictures (which is probably why you're here, after all):



New character for the frowny-samurai-story - his name is Tsuda, I think.


Character design for the lead in a short horror comic I want to draw some day - it's full of spooky Edwardian houses and murderous cats.


Costume re-design for Munya, from Golem-verse. I'll be doing minor re-designs of Orme and Auga too; they're being appropriated by Fathoms-verse, which is kind of good for them, because before, I had the characters and a story-theme, but no world to set it in. Now I've got characters, theme and universe; all I need is a solid plot.


Photo-reffed environment practise; really fast, but it felt good to practise the stuff I know I'm not brilliant at.




Mini-sketches that I will be selling att UppCon 2012 for cheap (like, $1 each-cheap), or handing out free to anyone who buys Fathoms I+II as a package. 

Fathoms+sketchdump

Okay, time for another update!

I've been working on Fathoms III lately, and am making some rather impressive progress (impressive, that is, because I didn't really intend to make so much of it): 12 out of 24 pages are pencilled!

Here's a piece of page two:

I feel as though I'm filling up each panel better in this chapter compared to the previous ones; yes, there are panels where there's just the head/shoulders of a characters and a speech-bubble, but most of them have more stuff going on in the background and a more solid sense of place.

Speaking of character-only panels... Here's one of my favourite panels I've ever drawn of Gale:

It just... seems to capture his whole look somehow.


Here's a few warm-ups from the last few days:

Sketchdump, round Nth

My warm-ups from the last couple of days; some sketchy, some more finished. Some in colour, some not.

First round; some Fathoms-stuff:

Superheroes: Firestarter. I need to practise drawing fire, because this looks like crap. Blackbird in uniform, being ninja.... ... and out of uniform, being her plain clothes-self.

 Samurai: Whoah... Perspective and backgrounds and stuff. Far out. Masahiro being picked on by the mean kids.

 Assorted misc.:
A Nopon merchant from Xenoblade Chronicles - which is a neat game, despite the three million sidequests and silly support-meeting-esque battle dialogue. Vesto, being the badass-space-fleet-lieutenant-turned-exo-biologist-nerd that she is. The 1920ies might, not so secretly, be one of my favourite historical periods - mostly for reasons of awesome fashion and art movements. And tommy-guns. And Prohibitions and gangsters.

Comics, etc.

Flatland is getting on a bit in pages - all the way up to 10 now, so we're almost halfway! - so I thought I'd post the sketch for the latest page:


As I got further and further into drawing Flatland, my sketches started getting rougher and rougher; this is honestly what I inked on top of - no further sketched details added. I think that the simplicity of the backgrounds and the familiarity of the White Walker made it easier.

Otherwise, I need a pretty solid sketch to ink over, especially when I'm inking non-digitally - as I do with my ongoing fanzine-project, Fathoms of the Sky. In digital media, there's than handy "undo"-button, that my brushpens just don't have. :P

And by solid, I mean this is my storyboard for Fathoms III:


Compared to the ready-to-ink Flatland sketch above, the Fathoms-storyboard is at least twice as detailed - but it kind of needs to be, because it handles more visually complex stuff; more detailed backgrounds, characters with more complicated clothing, etc., etc.

I ink Fathoms mainly with a Pilot Pocket Brush Pen (Soft), with Staedtler pigment liners of varying width for panel-borders and tiny details. The first two parts will be available at the Stockholm International Comic Festival 2012, 28-29th of April, at at UppCon 2012.

Sketchdump

New roundup of warm-ups and stuff. Some Fathoms, some mobsters, some superheroes and a bit of frowny samurai.







And an environment study/practise/thing to round it all off:

Sketchdump

Sketch-roundup again:


Munya from Golem-verse in a new outfit; it seems to be migrating into some sort of strange North African/Middle-Eastern steampunk territory. Hmm.


Practising Khazri, who will be turning up in the next chapter of Fathoms



Kuro and Banri, because mobsters.


Kuro and Banri as teenagers, because it's fun to explore what your characters might have been like at different ages.