| :: When is the comic updated? |
| Unless I slack on Sunday afternoons, European time. |
| :: What were your inspirations? |
| There must be hundreds of inspirations I'm not aware of but only one I fully realize. It is this game. It is completely different from my comic in its mood, story and characters [well, perhaps except for one or two things], still it's the only inspiration I wanted to mention here. It was my first interactive fiction ever and if all were like this I would probably get addicted to them because this game is just so good. I finished playing it, went for a walk and the first scene of the comic just came to me. |
| :: What is this title? |
|
The original title of the comic was different and it was "Another Romance." What I meant was romance as defined by Umberto Eco, a story using historical motifs only as decorations, which, I guess, holds true about most fantasy stories. And "another" because there already are just so many. However, everybody asked me: "So, when will you be writing this love story?" and I decided that the title was misleading. Besides, I didn't want to put off all men just by the title. So I changed it to "Drown the Maidens." The title has its literal meaning which refers to a nice little custom of Wisteria's fatherland. Maybe I will describe it one day but for now it seems a bit out of the story. It also has metaphorical references to the story but don't worry if you don't see them. It doesn't really matter. Everything has to have a title and believe me, if it depended on me, there would be no such obligation! Some people come up with great titles but I'm just not one of them. |
| :: What is your technique? Materials? Creative process? And such? |
| Too time-consuming, that's what it really is. But if you are interested in how I create the comic, here's how. So first, I don't start any work before I have a script for the whole episode. It's very roughly divided into pages and then I work on one page at a time. I first draw tiny weeny sketches where even I can hardly see anything but they are the basis for the panels' layout. Then I divide the page into panels and copy the sketches. This first sketch is so rough I only hope nobody will see it. I'm not one of those people who can put their sketches in a gallery. Then I refine the sketch, still in pencil, and boy, it takes a lot of erasing. Finally, when this stage is over, it comes to inking. My technique is based on applying India ink with both pens and brushes, similarly to a water color and with plenty of water, too. This stage takes a lot of paper towels and frustration but when it's finished there's little left to do. I mean, I'd love to be doing the page in color and at first I even meant to but then I would probably update one page a month. So then I scan the page and add lettering with a free font I downloaded from 1001 Free Fonts. And then I post it. So that's it. No magic:] |
Your question's not here? E-mail me at once. I always answer. I mean, almost always but always if your mail is reasonable. [Remember to remove the capitalized part of the address, please.] |