Howdy, folks!
See, I made the last check-in early so I wouldn’t forget at the end of July, but apparently I forgot about August instead. So I’ll make this one now and possibly switch my updates to the beginning of the month so it’s easier to remember. Squirrel Brain got me good!
What am I working on?
The Dawnbreakers’ Saga – I took a few days to outline the whole rest of this story, and it looks like it’s going to be another year before we see the end of this thing. I am, admittedly, getting a little tired of this story, but I’m determined to finish it. The end of August was the story’s three year anniversary, so I did basically a week full of recaps so that people don’t have to go back through three years’ worth of videos to catch up. Since I took kind of a personal hiatus in July and August, I don’t have nearly as much of a buffer as I should, so finishing card art and building that back up again should be my top priority right now. (Note to self.)
Secret Lizard Things – Also known as Beyond Skyrim: Black Marsh. I’m on the 2D art team for this mod project! I was going to post about this in August when the Dev Diary came out but alas – I am squirrel.
Urien: The Dragon of Norwood – WIP title for the project formerly known as The Dragon King’s Council. I’ve learned a lot about comics, time, and scripting in the last month or so, and decided to get a lot more organized and condensed. I actually plotted the darn thing out so I don’t waste time getting lost in the weeds, took out some unnecessary side roads, and then actually sat down and calculated how much time it’ll take, how many pages it’s likely to be. The answer is roughly 600 pages, which is a lot but not as bad as I was expecting for the amount of subplots. The original was probably going to be closer to 5,000 if I kept noodling the way I was. 600, I can deal with. I’m on my second pass of the script and managed to condense everything down such that we’re actually getting places and I’m not even 200 pages in yet. 😀 I’m mostly working on this to give my hands a break between art, though I have made a rough design sheet for the main protagonist. (And several Pinterest boards because I am squirrel.) I’ve still got a lot of work to do; I plan to have design sheets for all of the main characters, some of the supporting cast, and a few locations done before I even think about getting into the main phase of production. I would feel more like I’m procrastinating starting the thing except I’m 90% sure I’ll want reference sheets down the line to keep myself sane and the style consistent. This is, I guess… pre-production? What are industry terms? I don’t know – I’m indie.
Salt(?) – The artist formerly known as Hostage has been with beta readers for a little while now and we’ve gotten some feedback. Mostly it’s stuff on my end, which I did expect. Sukhetai was a difficult character for me to write and it took a while for me to figure him out, so the beginning of the story is a little… meh? I’ve got some rewriting to do on that and then I’ve got to finish up the cover, however working on Urien has taught me a lot about story that I didn’t know I didn’t know (which is, appropriately, a theme in this book) so I’m happy to have a chance to apply that here.
That’s all from me this month! I’ll see ya’ll around – with any luck I’ll post another one of these either at the end of September or the beginning of October. Stay safe out there.