flower language comic wip

Hi again! Thanks for being here, as always. 

The CQ retrospective series is over, as you know, and I haven't really settled on anything to replace it...! But at least until I do, I'd like to post monthly updates on whatever project I'm working on, with insights about my process and approach here and there. This post will be the first of those!

If you've been following my sketchbook posts, you're probably familiar with the fantasy project I've been chipping away at for the past year or so. Honestly, "chipping away at" is pretty generous--it's very, very early in development, but it is living in my brain full-time, so I'd like to share as much as I can get away with at this stage.

About a year ago, I wrote a short comic about two of the main characters, Loic and Ysme, discussing one of the magic systems of the setting. It was meant to be kind of a proof of concept, but I've since decided I don't want this project to be a comic (lmao), so it fell to the wayside. Recently, I came back to it because I liked the script. I'm classifying this as a "WIP" because it's still rough, and I think I'd like to polish it further, but the point of this post is offering a look into my process, so...

First, here's the comic as it is:

This is the first comic I've drawn in a while, now that I'm thinking about it! Here's what's on my mind right now:

1) I chose to draw this script because I think it's a solid introduction to these two characters that stands on its own. I could give you the rundown on who they are or why they're traveling together, but I hope the most important information about their personalities comes through from the dialogue. That's what matters!

This dialogue went through a few iterations before landing where it is now, mostly because the relationship between these characters has really evolved in the past year. (This is from the very first version.)

2) I tried not to fuss too much over details for this progress post, but even when it's "finished," I'd like the backgrounds to remain minimal. Everything about the setting is still pretty nebulous; as long as it has the atmosphere of an ancient ruin, I'm cool with it.

I went through a few ideas for the big statue of the god of language in the background:

And here's the one I ended up using.

3) I wanted Loic and Ysme's speech balloons to be color-coded to make it easier to tell who's talking when, but this presents some different problems. On page 2, "So the story goes." draws the eye first because it's the point of higher contrast, especially when you read by scrolling vertically. But it's meant to be the second panel!

(In the original sketch for this page, the first line was going to be in the top left. I think I might go back to that.)

I could abandon the color-coding, but... This is personal preference, and I know it's sometimes unavoidable, but I kind of hate it when word balloons have these long, winding tails that stretch across an entire panel just to show you who's talking, you know? I was even reluctant to add the trail between panels 2 and 3 here.

 3) Lastly, here are the thumbnails for these pages:

I struggled a bit with the first page, which was originally going to open with a huge establishing shot--but, like I said earlier, the setting isn't that important! So I tried a full-page close-up panel on the characters, but that didn't allow much room for dialogue... I think the panel layout now is pretty comfortable.

That's all I've got for now. I hope it was at least a little entertaining! Thank you for reading, and see you next time.