Clearly this beginning is going to need a little explanation in a short intro... like, for one thing, the author sometimes speaks of himself in the third person, and calls himself The Skipper at times.
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Here I'm explaining the process from deciding on the text, to layout, to first draft, to final (??) artwork. Or rather, lack of buttermilk. Draft of two pages in Holding's book which has expanded to nearly four.
I've been looking forward to drafting this bit where Holding goes on at some length about the need for people to make the effort to get on with each other, rather than rise to unintended provocation or get upset about silly behaviours. He writes this just after the part in his book where he finds the Bantam bicycles being ridden by two of the party really aren't up to the job, and are slowing everyone down terribly. That's why his arms are pointing like that on the left-hand page -- which will be on the right-hand side in the book, rather than these two being facing pages like they appear.  In Holding's book, there's a fair bit more but this seemed plenty to get the point across. One more paragraph I sort of wanted to include but haven't, follows below. Should I?
"May I presume to say that I have had twenty years cruising in the company of many and widely varying men, and each, of course, with his varying mood. This has given every condition possible for criticism and even differences, not to say, sometimes, offence." Since I'd decided to take up the challenge of #inktober again this year (that is, an ink drawing every single day of October), I thought I might as well use it for what I most needed: getting better at drawing people, and getting used to drawing these bikes from 1897 and, in the final frame, having a go at character development for the four guys in the story.
 This is my entire graphic novel, Two Shillings per Day, all 138 pages of it in rough draft form. Very very rough. Post-it notes in a binder, some not even with pictures, still moveable around if it's too text-heavy in places (very likely) or I just want to change the layout of a page or two (I hope not TOO much of this).
I photographed the whole thing because I had a lot of trips away in May and wanted to take the work in progress with me, even camping where I was playing music at a festival, and the thought of losing it..... well, doesn't even bear thinking about. I doubt if I would have the heart to start over again...but I would have to, eventually.... This made it risk-free and I got some good hours on trains to work on it. Weirdly, seeing it all laid out like this makes it somehow seem more possible! I even had to count the pages to see if they were really all there. It's a lot, especially as I've never made anything this large before, but I actually think it's going to be doable. Watch this space.
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READ THIS FIRST!I'm making a true-story graphic novel... Archives
June 2021
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