THE TRIP page 5

I'm blazing to catch up! A back to back post. Now that I've got time to work on these, I'm having a ball writing them up.

A huge challenge was swapping between Hiro-vision and real life. I wanted to make sure that people could understand what was going on. Wherever possible I tried to mirror panel layouts, so things just became a "spot the difference". With Hiro in the same position in each panel, it just becomes a means by which you see how elements change. A good example of this is panels 2 and 3 on this page. But I really set the standard back on page 3. Every panel is a mirror of another one on that page.


You can see on my line art (the black and white version) that I separate all my backgrounds onto separate layers. I find it allows either Annette or myself (whoever is coloring it) to pick which elements you want to bring forward and which elements you want to push back. For example, Annette decided to make the background 100% black in the last, but faded it back in panels 2 and 3. In panel one she decided to pull some elements (the log) forward, and let others like the forest fade into the background. I find this technique takes a little longer to do at the drawing stage, but allows great flexibility at the coloring stage.

POP CULTURE REFERENCES:

Panel 2: That's some sort of Yoda-like creature. Again, a generic princess.

Panel 5: A huge Flame giant cos I wanted to draw a huge giant. I think he helps add scale to the proceedings. That's Bilbo throwing the One Ring into the lava too.

Note: I am particularly happy with Hiro's likeness on panel 4. I think it's very... "him".