SCAB-Redux
Editing my early sequentials
After a busy Kickstarter campaign for SCAB, it's finally time to get back to the basics of making comics. When discussing the SCAB book, I was often asked, "Is it new art? Is it the original art?” The answer is yes to both.
When SCAB was originally published in 1993, I was starting in comics. Years later, upon revisiting the book, I quickly realized that there were panels, sequences, and lettering (which I hand-lettered) that didn't work for my more experienced eye. There were also many things I couldn't do then that today's workflow allows me to make up for. It's not every day I get to return and give a body of my work a second chance. I want to retain my original art style to keep the feel of the original series while making the story flow more consistently.
Let’s dive in and look at the changes.
In this original sequence of panels, a young SCAB reflects on his first encounter with the undead, hiding in a closet, cornered.
The original sequence
Here are my problems with the sequence
Panel 1 contains tangents that create parallel lines in the art, which can distract from the characters. Panel 2 doesn't effectively convey the appearance of a zombie that has been dead for years. Panel 3 should reflect SCAB's fear, which it does, but the change in style may remind the reader that they are reading a comic and disrupt their suspension of disbelief.
Here are my fixes
Panel 1 now has white space added between the tangent lines. I also included more detail to better reflect SCAB's situation. Panel 2 has more detail added and thicker lines to enhance the appearance of the zombie. For Panel 3, I redrew it to convey SCAB's fear and how he has been cornered. Also, I roughened up the panel borders to indicate that this is a memory, not a part of the current storyline, which has straight border panels.
Keep creating.
