Remote viewing was last seen in chapter two of Dead City Radio. James is a hell of a lot better at it than Jesse – it’s kind of his thing. As stated previously he can remote view with a high degree of accuracy, though he’s never physically been aboard the Daealus so his perception is a bit distorted. He’s doing a cold read boosted by his synergy with Thad, who’s serving as a sort of “bookmark” for the location. While Jesse’s remote viewing was processed as an unbalanced load of ambient occlusion in an unfamiliar space, the desired visual feel for James’ perception is much more fluid – if this was an OAV or live action thing the look and feel of the effect would be liquid.
Discounting the distortion effect on the previous page this is the first appearance of a Daedalus crew compartment in 3d. Crew accommodation first appeared in 2d in October of 2003 – I suppose it’s fitting that the first compartment shown would be the last to be modeled. The accommodation space was grown from the wardrobe and was built in January and early February of 2015. A few props and large parts of the bulkhead and deck textures date to 2008. This isn’t a one-off – we’ll be seeing more of the accommodation space in a few pages.
As established in 2003 and 2013, Xand’s right arm is detachable. Removing it during sleep may save power, and it certainly makes snuggling a bit less awkward. The remote viewing effect serves to cover up the fact that I had no idea what I was doing when I designed the thing in 2003 – the smearing gives the panels an implied consistency that doesn’t exist in the line art.
Speaking of less awkward… between posting the last page and writing up the commentary for this one I watched Sense8. Any concerns I may have had about conceptual convergence evaporated during the first episode. Nice violence, solid cast, well shot, obviously a Netflix series, and any opinions I may have about narrative content or pacing are skewed by my taste in music and by having watched Mr. Robot beforehand.
In local news, I snuck around a plurality of neuroses last week and finally have books on store shelves. Phantom of the Attic (Oakland) has a few copies of the no-longer-available-online DCR #1A on consignment. If you’re reading this in September of 2015 and happen to be within driving distance of Pittsburgh go buy one! And buy other stuff while you’re there!
