Bit of a lag on this one – renders on the 30th and 31st, a good long think about how to handle panels three and five (and pages 10 and 11), background rendering tests for panel five on the second, production on the third, line art yesterday and shading this afternoon and early evening. Very much as time and motivation permitted – the fact that I had a few puzzles to figure out along the way certainly played a part, as did external concerns. The aforementioned funk hasn’t helped, though it has been somewhat more manageable this past week.

Given my uncertainties with how pages 10 and 11 may work out, I compromised a bit on what I’d been thinking for panel three and worked to make the mirror of panel five as replaceable as possible – if the background painting winds up not working for the next couple of pages it’ll be trivial to replace. While I’d prefer not to go back on a page, it wouldn’t be the first time – I’m heading into relatively unknown territory here and if I wind up changing direction I’d prefer to keep things consistent.

The decision to go with “painted” backgrounds instead of 3d-assisted environments for the next couple of pages was not taken lightly. The rest of the chapter is going to be one hell of a time sink, and the next few pages promise to be the most intense of the entire comic if I go the 3d route. If I go the digital painting (with mild 3d assist) route, the work will be more manageable, and the look should be appropriately stylized.

More on that when the next page hits. Given my workload and the page requirements, I’m guessing that’ll be anywhere from two to six weeks. The page itself is manageable – it’ll be a few days (read: sessions) of work to get it right. Making that time exist is the challenge – moreso than usual lately. Fortunately the next page is the Goal For The Year – anything after that will be gravy.