dupe

familial stranger, page 21

Added 2018-07-24 05:41:02 +0000 UTC

the shading in this page was much less frustrating.
the limited palette makes sugar's design elements like her eye markings obscuring her eyebags much more extreme... you can't even see any tired lines under her eyes, yet i still draw them in every sketch... just in case. here is a snip of what she looks like without the coloring:

it's been interesting to write sugar post drop-out, tangentially. i'm going to try to save it for the thoughts post i make at the end of these side comics, but i did mention something on my twitter some-odd weeks ago about how sugar's lesson was that sometimes life just isn't very happy, but that doesn't make it not worth living.
i did figure out a way to possibly incorporate some development about sugar's gender into the ending of this as a thematic lead-out, but we'll see. i'm going to be reminding myself not to force it.

this page i also tried thumbnailing before sketching. i'm ambivalent about the experience. a lot of the fun for me comes out of being able to get new ideas (this is where most of the extra touches and pacing panels come from) and tweak details as i'm working on any given scene, but i intentionally restrict myself with thumbnails to make sure i'm not wasting time on unusable art.
it definitely made it easier for difficult days to already have the shots drawn out, but it was less enjoyable overall. i'll keep trying with the pre-planning of soft-pedaled.

besides that... the dialogue on this page was fun to write. lots of small tweaks. i'm trying to bring sugar back around to a strange mix of formal (nerd) and casual in her speech mannerisms, like i wrote her at the beginning of drop-out. meanwhile, i'm trying to make lola more actively self-aware.