Hamilton and Helena

Vegetables, yuck! Gimme 'em donuts!

Where exactly is Kamiko going?

Hamilton's the pig. The woman's name is Helena and we'll get to meet more of them next time...

...when I can finish that next comic for the current chapter. I'm running behind, or am I? I took up doing the webcomic again on the basis that it should be fun and not that I should be constantly stressed about what to post week after week. It's been a bit of a juggling act to figure that out.

I pretty much did this to myself by going all in. I told myself I wanted to post at least once a week -- no matter what. As I worked I began to ink and digitally color artwork, make more 3D backdrops, create longer comics, and so now I'm at the end of my buffer... again. I started to draw Magical Girl Kamiko as an escape. At first it was quick drawings done on an iPad. No need for quality. Sketch something out. Put it together and push it out there.

The tune has changed somewhat. The art is more... refined. There's an upcoming chapter I've been working on that'll be in full color (mostly), and it makes me wonder, will that be how things continue afterwards? It's literally a small step above what I do now to flat and shade the characters. Doing more intricate backdrops... in color... well... that will be a challenge, but I guess you don't grow as an artist if you don't challenge yourself.

I have some other ideas for how to proceed going forward such as doing more of a mixed bag approach to the artwork. Some color, some black and white, some as 4komas (i.e. four panel comics). I've even thought of doing some as illustrations with text -- sort of like a light novel.

Magical Girl Kamiko itself has no set format other than it won't be a traditional graphic novel format like The Rabbit and the Moon. I kinda like the freeflowing long form "webtoons" style approach. It means less puzzling around with trying to fit panels together since I can keep growing the comic vertically. And, you might guess, if the comic gets too long, I chop it into pieces and spread out the release of it over a few weeks -- that's the general ad hoc approach I've used to build my comic buffer.

Well, regardless, it's all varying degree of drawing versus writing and trying to strike that balance between them.

One thing I don't want to give up at a minimum is a post a week -- I need to anchor the work in some consistency.

Anyhow, I'll be working on something for next week. It'll be a surprise for me and you as to what that is.

Until then, have a great weekend!