The Visual Language brief was transport in monochrome so since I'd been drawing a lot of horses lately in my red and blue sketchbook I thought I'd make use of them.
I started drawing horses more formally, using reference from some horse books I found in the library, but I thought a picture of a horse running would be pretty boring so I got some more books on birds and made it a Pegasus instead.
Since the end of Visual Narratives I've found myself in a bit of a creative rut so I thought the best way to combat that would be to do what I usually enjoy most, which is making distributable comics. So I started planning a short story of a pegasus and a girl majestically flying around, with a view to end it in bloody tragedy.
First I did quick sketches of what each page could depict, trying different angles and images.
I sketched most of these in response to the clips I posted earlier of characters on flying creatures.
After this I made some more structured pencil sketches, finalising composition and imagery.
I started with the cover, trying out images that involved wings, sky or a pegasus. I think the first bottom right one is best because its the most simple whilst still communicating the theme of the story.
Here I planned the layout of the pages and how many images I would need to fill a booklet. I also sketched the girls reaction to her pet's grizzly demise.
Most of the pages I planned were lifted directly from movie scenes I collected of creatures flying (see earlier blog post) Below I used the very beginning of this clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NILdh7hl7ZM
Actually quite a lot of the pages were nicked from this scene.
The first page shows the pegasus running to take off, so I tried a few angles to see which one best communicated speed and blowing wind, which I think was a side-on view, because then I could draw hair and clothes flapping violently in the direction of the wind. It took me a while to figure out how to draw a horse running. I found out both their front and back legs bend inwards like a warped crab monster. Who knew.
After take off I wanted to show them leaving civilisation and flying into the wilderness, so I took influence from the middle of this clip where they fly over the town http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xb-pX7sIjFY
On this page I tried to make a strong line of sight, in the first image by making the character look backwards onto the town as the horse travels in the other direction, and on the second by using a central vanishing point into which the characters are heading. I made the hills meet in the middle to emphasise this but it got a little cluttered and I struggled to figure out what size to make the pegasus so that it didnt look unnatural.
Again this page is taken from the very beginning of the Harry Potter clip. I needed a close up image to counteract all of the distance shots and create a connection between the girl and the pegasus. Also the close up allowed me to show the expression of joy on her face. This will contrast with the only other time her face is shown, which is at the end in total horror.
This is another image inspired by the Harry Potter clip. It took a few tries to get the positioning of the pegasus right so the water below was visible to set up the next page, and to communicate the fast swooping movement. I think the best one is the top right because they are leaving the panel, suggesting movement, but the horse could stand to be a bit bigger and fill more of the frame.
Again this image is taken from the Harry Potter clip, but more recognisably so as several people pointed it out. It was difficult to arrange the limbs in a non-awkward manor, it always looked like there were too many and they all pointed in the wrong direction, but I think I figured it out in the last thumbnail.
This image I stole from this clip of The Never Ending Story http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adBmLtE4wwg where he flies over the mountains. I chose this over-the-shoulder angle so I could show the cliffs up ahead and set up the end page where the cliffs are needed.
This is the page I planned in my head first, but when visualising it I struggled to get the right angle where it was clear what had happened but also the gravity around the horses corpse looked believable. I knew it should be drawn from behind them so the cliff face was most apparent and clearly represented as an non-negotiable obstacle, but I couldnt work out how the body parts should fall, so I experimented with different degrees of limpness and different amounts of blood splatter until I got it right (below)
It took a few tries to find the most horrified expression for the last page but I think I got pretty close. I also considered killing the girl but decided it would be more distressing to show her blood-drenched reaction. Also two corpses would've made the previous image even more cluttered.
Here are some of the original and retouched scans of my line drawings.
I think they definitly needed the grey adding because they look blank and unfinished.
After drawing them all out I scanned each page and coloured it in using one shade of grey because I was drastically running out of time.
The final drawing of the town was inspired by this page from Luke Pearson's Hilda and the Bird Parade
It wasn't till after printing that someone pointed out the pegasus looks like a giant horse walking up the hill, rather than flying over it. Depth issues. Maybe a lower horizon would've solved this.
The page on the right has too heavy a distribution of grey, because in previous images I'd filled the sky and sea in grey, so had to maintain this for continuity. Here another shade of grey would've been useful, had I allowed enough time.
In my haste I made quite a mess of the shading on the wing feathers. Again, here a lighter grey would've been useful.
I still can't decide if the black background on the last page makes it appear disjointed compared to the flow of the others, or maybe this effect works to an advantage to continue the visual abruptness of the pegasus' death.
Following the Visual Language session I printed out around 100 copies of the comic, using the black and white printer, so I could distribute them easily. They seemed to be well received by people who have read them, with reactions ranging from screams and gasps to laughter, which is what I was hoping for.
I'm pretty happy with the result, to say it was the product of about three days work. Its satisfying to know I can make something complete in such a short period of time and makes me want to try doing it more often, perhaps recreationally.
There's a lot of things I'd have improved if I'd allowed more time, like the design of the character who I really just made up on the spot. I think a lot more thought could've gone into that, I just made sure she had long hair that to show it flowing in the wind. Aside from that its mostly technical skill I would've refined because I think the quality of the the drawings suffered because of the time constraints I inadvertently forced upon myself. Also I forgot to put my name on it.
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