Bitácora, July 17, 2021

by Juan on July 17, 2021 at 9:01 pm

Work notes: On thursday I posted the new comic, called ‘It’s Not’. I’d say it’s a nonsensical escalation from being disturbed by the loud vibration in TV fiction phones, or at least that’s just what happened when I first scribbled the idea for this one. I had some doubts about making the ending more explicit, and avoiding the notion that the Mom character had gone inside the TV somehow, so I made some small changes to the first version posted on Patreon to that effect. In the end, I listened to Discord members who said it wasn’t necessary, so I pedaled back some changes. In any case, I hope it’s an intriguing little tale, a bit more cartoonish than most of my comics.

I’ve been getting used to a new drawing setup, working for the first time on a pen display tablet. (A Huion Kamvas 13, sort of an alternative to a Wacom One). Up to this point, I had worked on a Wacom Intuos, or with real pens and paper. It’s been a long process of finding the right drawing position and using more plugs and cables now, a general downside of pen display tablets, that need power-up connection, besides the use of HDMI. Another downside for a new user coming from non display tablets is that you cover parts of the drawing with your hands at times, which is a non-issue when you draw looking up front into a different screen. Of course, the process in order to feel comfortable with a non-display tablet in the first place was probably harder in its day. Another novelty is the need for a more complex physical setup: I had to buy stands to lift the notebook, and incline the drawing tablet. Still, drawing directly on the screen feels nice, even with the cursor lag. I had to switch off the size-display cursors in Clip Studio to avoid getting distracted by the circle that takes some time to catch up with your pen when you move your hand quickly, like a sentient shadow that’s bad at imitating the movements of the person. For what I’ve seen in drawing videos, artists get used to the lag, apparently. Maybe I will too.

There wasn’t a Patreon post this week.

From the Secret Knots Discord

Trailer from a 1961 Czech version of Baron Munchhausen by Karel Zeman (that I haven’t seen yet). It looks beautiful, a mixture of live action, animation and illustration.

HazySkies recommend this Queen-inspired rock opera version of the Final Fantasy VI Opera sequence.