Page Commentary No. 235

Gunwild: Being able to lift a soda machine, then putting it in front of the door your enemies would have tried to get through... that's a very important tactic we learned from the game Deus Ex: Human Revoluton, I think? Not that the developers ever intended it.

Psu:  Did we all use that technique at the elevator stage? I thought I was really creative but it seems like everyone tried it.

Gunwild: Actually you and I are the only ones who I know did it for sure. But it's also just nice to maintain that page-to-page continuity of "There was a soda delivery because yes, this place has soda!"

Brellom: I never played that video game, so I guess you've given me the solution to the level!

Psu: Well... before this becomes a big conversation on the video game. Maybe it's time to pat ourselves on the back for being pretty clever. Cassiopeia is talking about not thinking that far ahead, and yet here she is on the page setting up the holo emitter distractions! And I think I need to point out more examples of thinking ahead. A lot of this chapter was written around jumping from scene to scene, often within the same page. So one way I could make sure the panels move you from place to place, was to give every scene a different color scheme.

Gunwild: That's smart, I wouldn'a thought of that.

Psu: Though the color schemes had to co-exist with one another in different panels, each panel needed to tell you that you were somewhere else and sometimes with very little detail available.

Brellom: I really liked the colours in this chapter in particular, especially near the end. I forgot just how involved I was with this chapter.

Psu: You definitely helped define the character's features with more sharp planes in the shading. I don't know if people really notice but you can usually tell a page that Brellom worked in just by how sharp the light fall off is on a character's face.

Brell: Wow, I was just about to say that same thing! Except you said it way quicker.

Psu: Panel three in particular has a very sharp fall off across Cassiopeia's cheek.

Brellom: Psu & I have very different ways of shading. Although I did try to adapt my style to better fit Psu's, since I think there was A LOT of back & forth collaboration during this chapter in particular. Psu's style of shading tends to feel very soft & natural, whereas mine is more design-based. The strongest example of this is on Zeke at the bottom of the page, notice how he's shaded with strong shapes & edges? It almost looks as if the form was chiseled, and this becomes more apparent in later pages, even when the edges are still soft, like in panel 2. And it uses a lot of rim lighting... some of the pages in this chapter are still some of my favorite artworks ever produced...

Gunwild: Take that, Italian renaissance!

Psu: You helped a lot. This page was another tough one in a long line of tough pages. I like to think that we got across that this base has a very different look than you might normally imagine an evil villain lair to look. Designing this spot in particular, I was reminded of my college dorm's common rooms. Not saying that the bad guys were all chummy but it implied that this place might be a little different than your average evil lair.

Brellom: Colleges are kinda like villainous lairs in their own way...

Psu: Did we have anything else to add, like uh... how we build dramatics tensions?

Gunwild: Well, this is already going on and on, but yeah, I think this is around when I was first reading the book Make Comics Like the Pros by Fred Van Lente and Greg Pak. There's this bit in there about applying at least a vague act structure to every comic or story arc or even just every page. It makes each unit of the comic a more solid reading experience on its own, which is important for webcomics. So if you notice the comic having more page-ending surprises or teases from this point on, that's probably a result of me absorbing that philosophy.

Psu: Oh yeah, I think overall we started really embracing the idea that... every page needed to deliver on its idea. We need to think about reintroducing the events on the page to the reader cause it could be days or even weeks since they've been with us. You did a great job here, making very natural segues between hugely big ideas. Like we got to learn about Kitty just before we threaten to have the mission with all our favorite characters involved go horribly wrong!

Gunwild: I drink so many soft drinks I should probably see what the lowest cost to have a machine installed is. Having my home directly restocked by a distributor might be the cheapest option.

Psu: Was... was that a segue?

Gunwild: No I just like cola. Brellom!

Brellom: I create content that some people can find objectionable, like cute girls with big butts, so anyone who investigates me further does so at their own peril. I understand that people who like cute girls with butts is not necessarily the target audience of Cassiopeia Quinn, so my content may rub some people the wrong way.