Prestidigitation

The Northwind creator was kind enough to give me a place on the comic’s “About” page. This is the self-portrait I made for it.

For Drake! It’s Rowan, Alysandir and The Angels re-imagined with a darker Victorian twist, a la League of Extraordinary Gentlemen:

(Larger version here.)

From the left, we have: Max, the mad scientist; Ria, the heiress who funds the team’s exploits; Beth, turned into a vampire but still the group’s protector; Rowan, the enchantress; and Alysandir, the hard-core monster hunter currently under Rowan’s thrall.

One of the coolest concepts (and possibly the most detailed portrait) that I’ve gotten to work on so far. ♥

(AKA “How to Cheat at Webcomics”)

Just for fun, here are some progress shots from the last panel of Page 150, along with a few tips for being lazier more efficient about drawing:

(Larger version here.)

Step 1: Google SketchUp! Very fun to play around in. Best thing ever when you don’t want to figure out environment perspective and proportions from scratch in every panel.

Step 2: MyPaint! Free and open source. Inking is so much faster and easier here than in Photoshop, it isn’t even funny. Try the Ico_Precise_Pen_02 brush (in the Ink set) with a boosted radius. You can even zoom way out to ink a long line, and when you zoom back in, the line will be perfectly smooth. ♥ So good.

Step 3: Photoshop Actions = Win. Flat fills take about one minute per panel once you have a good select->expand->fill Action set up (assuming you’ve closed most of your lines).

Step 4: I haven’t figured out how to cheat at this part yet. Any suggestions?