The Weekend Challenge 1:3 days/30 pages

Chapter 1: COMPLETELY DONE
Chapter 2 Inks: DONE

Okay so late new year's resolution--update this blog at least once a week. Because now I am cruisin!!

So a couple nights ago I finished all the chapter 2 pencils. Whilst basking in my glory, I began to wonder: "What if I had all of chapter 2 completely finished by Monday? Wouldn't be surprised?!" And then, I decided that was indeed, what I would do.

3 days

30 pages

Lots of Red bull. (Which I'm finding leaves you feeling quite out of sorts if you drink 2 in one night...)

I've already finished all the inks--I can't believe I inked 20 pages in one day! And I didn't even skip class! I went and did everything I needed to do! The first 10 I need to get done were inked previously, so I had a little boost, but now...ugh, I have to paint everything. I'm glad I'm suddenly able to get all this done really quickly. See, I need to get this done in the next 6 weeks...AHHH! That seems terrifying to think of! But I already have a whopping 67 PAGES complete. And by complete, I mean everything that needs to be done by hand is done. I'm not even thinking of putting in the text and final editing. That's all computer stuff. Besides, to get to the fancy dinner at the end of term for early thesis finishers, I just need to have a "Substantial draft", and I figure since you can physically read the story off the raw pages, then that is a substantial draft. And I think I can do it.

If I can finish chapter 2 in just two weeks, and chapter 3 is barely 20 pages....I am on my way. Luckily, chapter 1 was the only monster. 50 some pages! I can hardly believe it.

It's come to the point where I don't even really care about my other classes. I've been blowing off all my reading just to work on my graphic novel. And it a way, that's great, because it means I really love what I'm doing and am working intensely on it. But on the other hand, it's bad cause I'm not doing my homework, which is mostly reading for English classes, and as all good English majors know, you can make most shit up and it will serve your purposes quite nicely.

Also, I'm thinking I need a new DeviantArt ID...another project for another day.

Thought I'd Finally post Some pages...

Hey all! These are some preview pages I put on my deviantart I thought I might share with you all on here.
First off, we have the chapter 1 cover


Then, the first two prologue pages:




Sorry about the watermarks, but I'm really anal about people stealing these. (Though, honestly, who would want to?) But I swear that these are my works taken from my deviantart. They have my name on them! SEE?!
Hope you all enjoy! I'm steadily finishing more pages, and I have up through Ch1 ScIII done! YAY! Better some progress than no progress, even if the progress is slow...
~6H

HOLY CRAP! Some of the First Final Pages!!!

Currently Working on: Chapter 1 Sc3 Inks, Ch. 1 Sc IV/Ch. 2 Sc II pencils
Artist's Status: Empowered

You can go to my deviantart (located here:) to see a preview of some of the final pages and what it will look like when done! There are three story pages up so far and the cover of Chapter 1. It's very excited! I even used REAL comic font for once, so I'm feeling really cool.

I have a nice stack of finished pages, but I'm still in Chapter 1. And there really isn't enough time to work on it this wekk because of two huge papers I have due...hmmm...

Hopefully, when things begin to settle, I'll be able to do more at one time. I'm almost done with this term! And then it's off to Rome for a nice two week study abroad trip, and then home, where I plan to do nothing but pencil and ink like mad. Hopefully....HOPEFULLY this will come true.

Until then, enjoy the preview!
~6H

Rolling Along! But I Forgot to Update the Blog...

Currently: Penciling Chapter 1 Sc IV, CH. 2 Sc II
Inking:Ch 1 Sc 3
Painting: Ch1 Sc I and II
Artist's Status: Embaressed

Embaressed cause I haven't update this in FOREVER! So here's an update, all you people who don't even read my blog!!! HERE IT IS!!!!!

We're starting to pump out the final pages. Everything else is done. Except for the thumbnails for chapter II Sc III, a scene I, not lying, bullshitted on the spot. I am sooooo not a professional....Whoops.
~6H

It's been awhile! But the Project continues full speed Ahead!

THUMBNAILS:Done
SCRIPT: DONE
FINAL PAGES STARTED!
Currently drawing: Chapter 1 Sc II

HUZZAH!
That how I feel when I think that I have the whole story of "Akari" done in some form, that I know every that's going to happen. However, at the same time I'm quite far behind, so I'm worried. I was able to pencil 15 pages in about 4 days, which wasn't too bad considering that the paper came in late. (Even though they made me pay 15 dollars for shipping! FIFTEEN!!!)
Then my advsior wanted a typed up copy of the script. That took from monday till today with much non stop typing, except that Tuesday night I got sick so yesterday I couldn't work on it very much. I was able to finish typing it this morning, at least, but no pages have been worked on this week and I jsut don't feel with it enough. Also, the inking takes FOREVER, and I'm being totally anal about everything. But oh well.

Back to taking cold meds! AWAY!
~6H

A New Direction

"Akari Saito and Sana Arai...two women may be linked by fate..."

This is the new theme of Akari. I'm going to bring Sana in and make her more prominant, whilst cutting out some things like the smugglers in Chapter 1, and some other things that actually happened OFF screen! I have a new strategy for doing this now. I'm going to take scenes from the script that I absolutely think are important and thumbnail them out with stick figures and scribbles, to get an idea of how long each one is. Then I will arrange them in a way that makes the most sense. At the end, we'll see if I need to do storyboards at all or if I can jump straight to final pages.

The new theme doesn't really change the overall theme of the story, but I hope it will make it much more cohesive. It's still about the 5th Division of the Inaka police trying to hunt down the serial killer Ghost. What's changing are the roles of Akari and Sana.

Sana Arai, who is murdered in the beginning, is Takaharu's old girlfriend. At first, Junko tries to keep her death a secret from him, but he finds out anyway. Akari is his partner, and his new assignment, as he is supposed to watch over her as well. However, his failures in the past still haunt him...

Please look forward to how Sana and Akari will be connected in the story!

DISASTER! DISASTER!!!

Currently Storyboarding:Chapter 1, Scene VI
Artist's Status: PANIC

Okay, so it's been awhile. A long while. I apoligize....but now there is a disaster and the whole futre of this project has been thrown into Jeopardy once more. ANDNOBEFOREYOUASKIDIDNOTFINISHTHESCRIPT!!!!

I'm storyboarding chapter one and everything is going great till I do a page count...I'm currently on page 70. 70...in Chapter one...granted, the first 8 pages are prolouge, so chapter one is really only sixty some pages at the moment. But still, this is about twice the length that I had origianlly thought. Chapter one is not the longest part of the script either. So what I had originally thought to be a 150-200 page graphic novel is now completly out of control. The thing is, that it doesn't FEEL long when reading it. One of my friends said that the pacing was fast enough to not make it feel long. This is terrible...

Looks like I gotta totally scrap chapter one and figure out something else...I got an idea, which invovles getting rid of the smugglers in chapter one and merging in parts of chapter two...but it's very complicated...ack.