Annotations

Okay, lots of stuff to talk about today! But, what do you expect with 16 panels!? It took a long time to do this episode. So long, in fact, that the sun went down before I could get all the photos taken, which delayed work until the morning of the 2nd! And, yes, I'm still a bit of a slave to the sun. I haven't gotten any natural lightbulbs yet, and the sets just look sooo much better in natural sunlight as opposed to my overheads. I really need to get some natural lights so I can take the photos at any time of day.

And, more lighting issues with the bricks. I had to take numerous reshoots to try and get similar colors in each shot for the bricks. I got kind of close. Apparently, the macro setting and the normal setting on my camera result in different shades of lighting. Or maybe there were clouds acros the sun when I took the different shots. Whatever the case, lighting is now officially my number one problem.

I wasn't sure 4 rows of panels would work, but even with the reduced size of the photos, you can still see what's going on. I'll be doing more of these in the future, now that I know they work.

Panel #1 - Maldonado starts his acrobatic career! And, yes, he is actually hanging in the air there, no photo manipulation to get him in. I used some .004/C transparent nylon thread (available at any fabric store), but didn't tie it on to Maldonado. Instead, I squished it into some Handi-Tac and stuck that to Maldonado's hip. I then suspended him and took many photos as he spun around. The thread slowly cuts through the Handi-Tac from the weight, but it lasts long enough for me to get several photos. When I found one I liked, I used Photoshop to manip out the yellow Handi-Tac. The thread is so fine that it's invisible in the photos.

Panel #2 - First time I took this photo it was without Vayla in the shot. I got it cropped and composited into Visio and was working on the next panel when I realized it looked pretty darn empty. So, I went back and reshot the panel with Vayla in it. Looks much better!

Maldonado's dagger is also hanging from transparent nylon thread.

Panel #5 - The fiend's stretching tentacle is made from a bunch of arm and leg pieces from two Xevoz Grim Skull action figures. I don't have enough arm and leg pieces, or wall pieces, to stretch all the way across the page. Those are two reasons that I broke up panels #1-#4 and #5-#8 like they are. I think it works better than if they were combined. Once again, a practical limitation forces something that I think works better.

Panel #9 - I'm not totally happy with how the Fling! Snatch! Grab! Pluck! and Pince! text came out, nor how it was placed. But, it works well enough, and I was getting too fatigued with this episode by this point to do any more experimenting. Next time. ;)

Panel #13 - While shooting this episode, there was a set mishap. The second level wall section collapsed on top of the actors! Unfortunately, Dundorious was temporarily beheaded. He's okay now.