continued

and this is the character design layout for the solo. I like most of them, but the dad still needs work

Timeline, sketches, and projections for Solo Comic

THE TIMELINE AND BENCHMARK LAYOUT

Week 1-Week2: Research and Development Stage

                Concept sketches, research different styles of comics, figure out a story

Week 3: Goal- Have story written, begin storyboards

                Benchmark- Have story written

                Study- Look at multiple styles of comic artists and see what they did to make the characters look the way they do; line work, shading, backgrounds, color

Week 4: Goal- Have storyboard finished, characters created, start to build panels

                Benchmark- Have Characters finished, storyboard 50% complete

                Study- Learn how to make panels, scene setup, panel placement, etc.

Week 5: Goal- Panels laid out, begin penciling

                Benchmark- Storyboard complete, Panels built

                Study- Penciling and inking techniques, color and cell shading

Week 6: Goal- Penciling complete, begin color

                Benchmark- Penciling complete

                Study- color, ink, and cell shading, bubble placement, onomatopoeia

Week 7: Goal- Inking and color 50% finished

                Benchmark- Inking and bubble placement complete, begin color

                Study- cell shading, marketing, and post-production

Week 8: Goal- Color finished, begin cell shading

                Benchmark- Color finished

                Study- post-production, printing, etc.

Week 9: Goal: Shading finished, begin lettering

                Benchmark: Shading finished

                Study- lettering and typography, post-pro

Week 10: Goal- Ready to Print

                Benchmark- Ready to Print

                Study- Marketing and self-expression

Week 11: Finals. 

STORYLINE AND PAGE SETUP

PAGE 1

Opening- est. view of a high school

                View of a school hallway, students walking, lockers, talking

                Braceface at her locker- small panel to the side

                Gay kid- shuts locker- small panel

                Word panel- “Hey Queer!”

                Close up of gay kids face- eyes wide

PAGE 2

                Half page panel- Bully shoving kids, others looking away

                Triple Panel:

Grabs gay kid- in face “homophobic comment”

                                Gets in braceface’s face (gay kid to the side, looking hurt) “Misogynistic comment”

                                Walks down hall- knocks fat nerd’s books out of his hands

PAGE 3

                Nerd picks up his books, kneeling, looks after bully, scowls

                Braceface stands next to gay kid, comforting him

                Bully high-fives jock boy

                Nerd walks to gay kid and braceface, the three of them glare at bully

                Third page panel: gay kid yells “HEY! TRAILER TRASH!”

PAGE 4

                Bully turns around, mad

                Three kids stand united- braceface: “We’ve had enough of this!”

                Middle-Third panel: gay kid punches bully in face

                Triple panel:

                                Braceface kicks to chest

                                Gay kid uppercuts jaw

                                Nerd pins bully against locker “How do you like it?!”

PAGE 5

                Full page- Bully lies in middle of deserted hallway- defeated in a heap

PAGE 6

                Walks home alone, head hung in shame

                Small inlet panel- shabby apartment walkup

                Bully walks indoors

                OTS bully- drunk father sitting on couch mindlessly watching tv

PAGE 7

                Triple panel

                                Bully stands next to father. Father: “the hell do you want?”

                                Close up bully: “I kind of had a bad day, dad..”

                                Close up dad: “Yeah? Well I’ve had a bad life.”

                Double panel

                                Walks down hallway to bedroom

                                Low POV next to backpack- bully walks to bed

                Triple Panel

                                Front shot bully sitting on bed

                                Reaches for picture on nightstand

                                Close up picture of smiling woman with a kid (bully)

PAGE 8

                Full page panel

                                Aerial view, bully sits on bed, holds photo, shoulders slumped

                                Small inlet- face, single tear “I miss you, mom”

 

Rough design sketches for characters in Project 31

I really like the way Rebecca and William turned out.. the other ones need some revision

Here I am again!

Yeah, I'm back.. I took some time off for multiple reasons... but who am I kidding, it's not like anyone reads this thing anyway.

Anywho...

Exciting news on the comic front- I am working on a solo comic, nothing special- just an 8-page morality tale. But the cool part is it's all mine, so yay :)
Also, I won an award at an art contest last weekend, so yay again- really awesome experience, I'd never done anything like that before- once I figure out how to upload a pic from my phone onto the blog, I'll upload the photo
And last but not least, local author Zack Daggy and I are collaborating on a new project that I am SUPER excited about- can't say anything yet, but I'll post progress.

So yeah, that's the update, I've got progress pictures to come, so stay tuned!

Losing steam...

I'm truly ashamed of myself.

I have spent so much money on a "college education" and for what? It's all a joke. It's not like a degree from my school means anything.. but the worst part is that I just really don't care. I'm like the dumbass burnout in the school sitting at the back of the class, talking to no one, sleeping through most of the class, and paying some nerdy sophomore to do my project for me so I can skate by with a D. I never used to be this way. What happened?

Did I make a horrible mistake?
It's embarrassing.

I need motivation, or inspiration, or something... I have just lost so much of myself over the past couple of years and I don't know why. I did what I was supposed to do.. I graduated High School, I went to college, I got married... what do I have to look forward to? Five screaming kids, a crappy job, and eventual death.

But why can't I have something I am proud of in the process?
I don't want to just go through the motions of life without actually living it.

I need a challenge or something. But then again, everything I say I'm gonna do, everything I start, I give up on it. I was going to do a 30-day: 30-drawing challenge. I gave up after less than a week. The whole comic idea I was supposed to do with my friend Stephen... I have no idea where that ended up.

I am truly ashamed of myself.

A great loss.

As some of you know, if you are my friend on Facebook, yesterday I lost a great man and a great influence in my life. My mom's older brother, my favorite uncle Kim, lost his battle with Multiple Myloma. A cancer that affected his bone marrow and blood. It attacks the centers in the bone marrow that produce the white blood cells that make antibodies. Much like AIDS, it is treatable, but not curable, and the disease itself isn't what actually kills you. It's the illnesses and infections that your body can't fight off because of its lack of antibodies. People die from the common cold. He had had this cancer for 3 years, and fought it enough that he was pretty much back to his normal, fun-loving, happy-go-lucky self. But when it came back the second time, it came back with a much greater force. He was very sick and his body was essentially attacking itself. He was always in pain, bruises here, swelling there, and the quality of life was very low for him. The doctors decided to put him on dialysis to try to clean out his bad blood because his kidneys and his liver were shutting down. The chemotherapy only did so much. Finally he went in for a dialysis appointment where his blood pressure plummeted. He was delusional and couldn't breathe. He was able to call my mother to be with him and within the day, he had fallen into such a deep sleep, he was essentially comatose. The next day, his lungs failed. His heart was still beating, but he could not breathe on his own. They attached him to a life support respirator to help him breathe until he was able to do so. Yesterday morning at about 5:00 a.m. the doctors called my mother to let her know that they had found massive bleeding in his brain and it was very doubtful he would make it through the day. I got the call at about 6 a.m. to inform me of the situation. At 10:30, my mom called me again to tell me that I needed to come to the hospital and that all of the family was coming. Something inside us all told us it was time. We were all gathered in his room in the ICU. My mom, my Aunt Suanne, her husband, my dad, my grandma, my sister, my cousin, Pete, and finally my cousin Emalie (Kim's daughter) and her boyfriend showed up. We sat in the room together for several hours, hugging, crying, holding, and comforting each other. At around 3:30 we decided it was time for him to go home. We weren't doing him any good keeping him here when his father, family, and Heavenly Father were all waiting for him on the other side of the veil. We pulled out his respirator and let him go peacefully.
At 4:09 p.m. in the Howard Community Hospital, Intensive Care Unit, in Kokomo, Indiana, Kim August Schmidt, the man I admired and looked up to, the man that kept a weak family held together strong, the man that was the cause of so much laughter and happiness, passed to his family and friends in the Kingdom of Heaven. He will be very much missed, but far from forgotten. He will always be there with a can of Mountain Dew and a smile at every moment we think of him. He will always be in our hearts, our minds, and our memory, and I can't wait to see what he's done when I go home as well.

Yay smart phones!

I can now blog while on my phone. Hooray. So now there's no stopping the thoughts that pour out of my mind even though they have a ruthless tirade on facebook and twitter... yay networking