The Far Reaches Webcomic

Sorry about my disappearance…again. I’ve been so sick and having so many problems that I haven’t been able to do much of anything. I’m still trying to apply for disability and now I have to reapply. And man are my allergies killing me right now. I’m typing to you through a flurry of sneezes. The biggest hold up with TFR right now is I haven’t felt up to outlining out the story arc to the finish. I’m afraid I bit off a bit more than I could chew with my health being the way it is. The story would require at least another hundred pages to complete and that’s if I don’t add any subplots. It’s a lot bigger with more twists and turns than many realize. There are deep things going on. But unfortunately I’m not sure how I can manage it.

And I’ve been working on the outlining of my little game project, which I’m not sure if I want to use RPG Maker XP and make it in the style of a retro console style RPG-adventure or use Adventure Game Studio (google them if you’re interested; they’re pretty cool). I finally finished the basic outline and partly because of my disability which makes it difficult for me to make even simple decisions at times, I can’t even decide on the main characters name, or on a look for the thing. I haven’t been able to get too much done on that either.

I’m so appreciative on those who still check back for updates and I really recommend signing up for the RSS feed so you’ll automatically know when there’s an update. I have toyed with the idea of making 2d “cut-out puppets” in Toon Boom so that it’ll make it easier for me to do the comic and in color. Then I might be able to do it in some limited way. The biggest thing to remember is that before I really start in and update again, assuming my health will allow, I will announce my schedule on the site and on Twitter. And I’ll try to at least post something when I’m feeling up to it.

I figure that in the mean time as I’m trying to write and figure out the story for TFR, it’d be fun to start doing artwork to experiment with different art techniques. Then of course I’d post them here for your perusal. Well, here is the first experiment. As you may or may not remember, I’m totally a sucker for 3d art, and have wanted to do a 3d comic for a long, long time. But one of the challenges of doing a 3d comic is doing the clothing. You’re pretty much limited to clothing you can buy, though there’s not shortage of that. But then you have to custom texture it and such to get it just right. It seemed to me that David Simon of Crimson Dark, who was cool enough to share his techniques on YouTube, had an interesting way of doing the clothing of the characters in 2d and making them look 3d.

This was the first of my experiments, in using a 3d character and then creating 2d clothes. In the end, I decided to ink the clothes over the top in Painter and then use Simon’s technique for painting the lighting on the clothes so it looks semi-3d. But I think one of my big mistakes as you can see in the second pic, it that the line work is so “comicish” and to bold. So it didn’t quite fit with the 3d character. My temporary solution was to apply filters: Paint Daubs and Poster Edges, to make it look more artistic. Together they made the suit and character look more like they belonged together. Not perfect, but kind of interesting. It looks more artistic at any rate. Here’s the original image before the filters.

Again, you can click on the thumbnails to see a bigger image. As with all my stuff it’s a work in progress, and this is my first effort at combining 3d characters with 2d clothing. The benefit of the 2d clothes is that they can be any design and take less initial setup work since I don’t have to model or texture anything. That’s always the trick with these things. By the way, to set your mind at ease this is all experimental for another comic, not TFR. So let me know what you think of the style and where you think it’s good or bad, and I’ll try to keep posting stuff, even if it’s just art or articles about the TFR universe.

I don’t know if any of you are familiar with Wind in the Willows. I was thinking about the old British stop-motion movie and tv show that were so beautifully done and have always been a childhood favorite of mine. We recently listened to the audiobook and it was very good and so nice. But that’s not my point. If you’re familiar with Mr. Toad he was always going from one obsession to the next. First a race car driver, then a photographer, then a flier, then a playwright, etc. Well, that’s like me. I’m always going from one craze to the next which is why it’s so hard for me to settle on something. Thus is why I have yet to get anything further done with TFR. I still have my other comic strip I want to do, and I know that TFR needs some serious writing done for it. I just haven’t felt up to doing the writing. I know the story but I’m just not feeling like writing it. But I will. Just as soon as I get games out of my system.

Edit: To be clear it’s not just playing games it’s this obsession with wanting to make a game. I’ve always had this obsession and it’s hard to get out of my system. But I’m trying.

Hey, everyone. Just wanted to first of all let everyone know that Wowio.com has finally improved now that they’ve landed the support of Top Cow comics, and they’ve changed their agreement. It’s now a more straight forward thing where you can preview the first 15 pages and then buy the full ebook for $3.99. I actually make a bit more money on the Wowio ebooks now that they’ve changed their agreement, so if you’re interested in getting the ebook check out the link on the left that says Wowio.com.

Also, I just wanted to let everyone know that right now the big hold up on any new comic pages is the writing. I’ve been feeling like crud the last few days, and just unable to do much. But I need to do an official outline of the whole story and then each chapter. Then I need to write the full script for chapter 7. I’m going to continue more or less where we left off but there will be some changes and refinements. But the writing comes first and I can’t do anything without writing the next chapter and outlining out the whole story. That’s a lot of work so don’t expect it to happen over night, because I’ve been pretty sick. But that’s basically the big hold up right now. But thanks to everyone who’s been supporting TFR for so long. You’ve been awesome.