Moving

Hello everyone!

I have actually managed to get some small drawing! Not actual pages, sorry. But I'm thrilled to find myself doodling again. I feel more like myself doing that.

The reason I haven't worked on pages is simple. Has less to do with lack of motivation and more with the fact that I have too much going on.
I'm moving at the end of this month and instead of keeping all my art stuff out in the open I must pack them. So I made the decision to get back to comic making after the move when I can relax again :)

My doodling isn't completely out of the comic sphere. I have actually been drawing more pages to my script for TWOD. As I have mentioned somewhere, the script is old and has over 500 pages!

So, give me a bit of more time and I'm sure I'll be back ;)

Drunk Duck is up!!

Hmm, after a bit of googling I actually found drunkduck comic hosting again (and my comics intact) but behind a completely new link!!

Here's the link:
http://www.theduckwebcomics.com/

I'm gonna fix the links in all my sites etc when I have time.

For those who'll rather read the updates on my comics there, here are the new links:
Taint of Exile: http://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Taint_of_Exile/
Tari Uyest': http://www.theduckwebcomics.com/twod/

The new pages of TWOD will be there in a few minutes.

A real update!

Hi there!

Some sad and otherwise busy times have kept me from serious drawing.
I'm slow in my work now, but I thought that by keeping it slow with out any stress I will not only do better, but also feel better about it.
So, I'm very sorry for the long breaks in updates, but I hope you will enjoy unrushed pages and thus so the wait will be worth it :)

BUT i actually updated TWOD!!!
It's two pages of which the second one will be up tomorrow (it's a timed update).
These are the pages I began working on during the time of mourning after my grandfathers death more than a month ago. I feel relaved to have them done and online. It's like one chapter has now ended and the next is just beginning.

Since DrunkDuck has been down for a very long time the updates can be found only at Smackjeeves now. Please enjoy them!

Sad times...

This is a sad time for me because my grandfather passed away exactly a week ago on Wednesday morning. Me and all my family are somewhat coping with this and will say our final goodbyes on Saturday.

The strange thing is that this sad situtation made me draw. I couldn't bring myself to draw anything that had to do with him, but I actually are working on new pages for TWOD.

So, during autumn you will get some new pages. I try to finish more than one of them before uploading any of them.

TWOD: Part 02 page 06

New page in TWOD!

Progress is so slow for reasons mentioned in my previous entry, but at least I got a page up for one of my comics!!

Taking a while

Sorry, I did not mean to take this long untill my next update.

Somehow when I'm unemployed and have no idea when it ends I get nothing really done. It also shows in my drawing. I draw yes, but it's slow and somehow time just goes by faster than I realize.

On good news, I'm finally satisfied enough with the lineart of the second page of TOE that I can start inking it to get it finished. The page to follow is only lacking color, so when I get the lineart of the next page done I will start working on painting both pages at the same time.

TWOD pages are coming as well. It just took a bit longer than I thought, because after reading my old script I realized I have to make some slight changes in the layout. Planning the new layouts took a bit of time (and is still somewhat unfinished, but that concerns only the latter half of the current chapter).

Well, concidering how long I have already been working on these comic, long breaks do not mean I will stop working on them XD

Finnish archipelago 2012

Two new pages on TWOD

Yes, I have done two new pages for TWOD!
The first of the two will appear tomorrow and the second a week later.

TOE will still be on a break, because I want to feel a bit more confident about drawing again, before attempting to paint the next page.

The pages of TWOD do not need as much work as the pages of TOE so to find my confidence again the first one is an excellent tool!

TWOD: part 02, page 03

TADA!!!

Tomorrow there will appear a new page for TWOD!

Sorry for the slowness and etc. Things are as they are and currently I'm again unemployed ^^'

Let's hope I find work soon enough and the kind of work I enjoy!

Part 02 page 01

The first page of part 2 of TWOD is up for your enjoyment during the Easter (if you celebrate it).

Easter means a long weekend here in Finland due to havin a national holyday on next Friday and following Monday. During that time I won't be able to work on pages, but luckily I have still some that I have not yet uploaded :)

The update on smackjeeves-site will take a while due to having some pwoblems with even getting the site open, but on drunkduck you can find the new page already.

I'll try to get the page up in smackjeeves by tomorrow latest.

An Update Tomorrow!!!

Which means I have a new scanner!! :D

There is an update tomorrow in TWOD. I have more to come, but won't upload them all at ones to buy myself a bit of time to get back into business.

But nevertheless I'm back!

Thank you for your patience guys!

Next update on 28.11.2011!

For those who use some other way of indicating the date, I'm talking about November 28, 2011.

I'm sorry, but I had to do this when I realized that it is completely impossible for me to find time to get any proper updates done on time in a week.

Hopefully I get more than one page up for you on that day ;)
It is possible that there will be an update for TWOD as well, but nothing definite on that side yet.

Part 1 the Call

Do not read this before you have read the first part of the story!

The first part of Tari Uyest' (TWOD from now on) builds the ground to the story. We begin it from our world which is much easier for you to understand. We also get to see glimpses of Amy's life and her personality which may or may not be simple.

She's a quite strong character and not easily scared. If I had been her and had seen my brother walk trough a portal I would simply panic and call 112 (which is the emergency number here) or something else! I would not go and struggle against a freaking magical portal!!

This early in the story and for a while Amy's strenght will seem like she's almost too strong. Later, however, we get to see other sides of her.

From the very beginning I always imagined Amy to be a teenager from the early 90's. That makes her a good 10 years older than myself XD

The fact that the story takes place in the early 90's might not be too apparent in the beginning, but much later in the story when we return to our own world I will make it clearer. I was only a child in the early 90's myself, however, so I don't know what it was to be a teenager at that time. But when we get to the later stages of the story, as I already said, I will make it more apparent (which means it will be some studying for me at that time!).

One thing I will still point out: Amy does not have a cellphone. This also includes that computers are rare and internet is not how you spend your time.

In Part 1 we also got to see other glimpses of her life.

She uses two languages, being fluent with both. She's not exactly a hard working student and just tries to get the courses needed. And she's not happy about the extra course she has. She has a boyfriend who's not overly trusting and believes she's cheating on him. She has a sister who has not yet appeared. She sleeps in the same room with her brother. Etc.

There is also a lot more I hint on about in her life, but for now I won't mention them.

To avoid spoilers I can't really tell much more so instead of talking more about what this first part had in it I will tell you about the changes the story has faces ever since it's creation in 2002 and compare them to this final version.

In the very first version Albert, Amy's brother, had no name and only a short storyteller part. The only thing I knew about him was that he was her older brother. After the first version Albert came to exist as he's today. And from that moment on he was the one to walk through the portal first and Amy's duty was to follow him. It still took untill the fourth version, however, before Albert started to walk in a trance. First he was fully awake, which was strange because who in his right mind would just walk trough a strange portal?!?

So, he became spellpound instead.

In the first version Amy was the only one to travel through the portal. But she wasn't very willing to do it since she actually fell from a bridge (how did I come up with a place like that?!). This also happened during the day not during the night so she wasn't dressed in a night dress. She was actually on her way home from school. During this time, however, Amy had no real personality (-.-).

The only thing I'm sad about in giving up my first plan of how Amy went trough the portal is the fact that it's actually much more intresting than the one I'm using now. However, Amy grew a personality and Albert came to have a big part in the story. This is why I had to give it up in the end. There is also another reason which I'll explain next.

The biggest change between the first version and the following versions was the point of view in the story. The first version was observed from the parallel world. Our own world stayed really as a mystery. I still even today like this old approach better than the one I have now, but the truth is that the current way is easier for a reader to understand.

And this change in point of view was also a reason to why I changed the method of Amy ending up in the other world.

I had to give up some very good material to make the story better as a whole.

Toni also came into the picture after the first try as Amy's boyfriend when Amy's character was forming in my mind. The relationship between them has always been the same - one of not much love. Designwise Tony has stayed pretty much the same. I only simplified him since the first design. I never thought that he would need any changing. His appearence already makes the character he is.

Amy's family and life has been in it's current shape since 2003 when I gave up on the first version. Her parents are divorced and she's living with her brother and mother in Finland which is her mother's birth country. Her father still continues to live in United States where he's from. Amy moved to Finland some years after the divorce. She was born in US and grew up there. She has an older half sister with whom she shares a mother.

The reason why I gave up the first version in the first place was that I wanted to create a story that really worked instead of just drawing something for myself as I originally did. This is why the change was most dramatic between the first and second versions. The following versions have been quite similar to each other with some improvements.

In case you were confused by my talk about versions I would like to clarify it.
The first version of TWOD was created in 2002 just for my own enjoyment as I mention above. After that first version TWOD has had three slightly different versions. The version I'm now working on is the final and fifth version. 

Between the fourth and fifth versions there isn't much difference. The fifth version is more like fixing the fourth version into something a reader could enjoy and understand. Not to mention better art and quality!

That's all I can say for now.

Updates on next week!

Hello and sorry for the long wait.

I have next week free from work so I hope to be able to work on the pages more. The next page of TOE is only missing its last layer of color aka shadows XD The following page is also half way done. Also a character design needed for the page after that is done so I can actually think of sketching it as well.

The first page of TWOD's second part has been ready for a good while, but with the cover art still undone (I have a little trouble getting it the way I want it) you still have to wait for it.

I hope to get some pages done next week, but they won't be brought online right away. So there will be updates now and then during the summer :)
However, all in all I have only two weeks of vacation in the whole summer so I quess for the most part I am tired after work. I have so many new things to learn all the time and it's surprisingly tiring when you feel that you still just don't get it. But it's remarkably relieving when you realize you actually understand something!

Have a happy and warm summer!

TWOD character-pages

As the title says, the new characters pages I have been hiding for ages now are open. Go and check them out!

Geryan

The characters introduced so far are Amy, Geryan and Esstel from the main cast of which the two last ones you will come to know in the second party of the story.

I want to say something shortly about Geryan on the right.
Designwise he hasn't changed at all since the first try of the story. Well, at all is a bit wrong because the hem of his jacket has changed it's shape ones. However there is one thing I never did when I was drawing him. I always knew that he had a big build, but for a reason or another I never made him look big so he ended up being the same size with the other characters. One reason behind this might have been the fact that I did not feel the need to be too accurate (and when I was younger and began on the story all my character builds looked the same).

Now in this character picture you finally get to see him the way I have always imagined him! And I myself ended up liking the picture quite a bit :)

TWOD update in DD

Amy character picture

Finally I was able to upload the pages in drunkduck, so they are up now.

Page 19 of Part 1 will be up in a few days. No promises when page 20 (the last page of part 1) will be up. Hopefully it will be soon anyway.
After page 20 we have a kind of "closing words" for part 1. After that the first part of the story is finished.

Between part 1 and 2 so far hidden pages at the homesite will be published. I'll also proof-read the information and world map pages because I seem to have several stupid mistakes there.

Also after the first part I will give my full attention to TOE for a good while.

TWOD update

Tomorrow morning a new page of TWOD will show up in smackjeeves.

However, in drunkduck I wasn't able to do the uploading so it will be up there later. I will try again on tomorrow or the day after.

This was just a quick note pointing out that updates are in SJ, but not yet in DD :)

Fanart

For your enjoyment while waiting for updates I want to show you two TOE fanarts. (There is one more TOE fanart by Cahir-the-whicher at the gallery.)


Viator by Cahir-the-witcher

 First here is child Viator by Cahir that was according to her inspired by my art shown in this blog.

Viator is being extra cute here! However, you will still need to wait for a while before we'll see bits of his childhood in the comic.

The other fanart is by my sister. When she gets back home during summer we can scan the picture properly. However, the current version has been taken with a digital camera.

Aamu and Saturnin by Lehmu

This fanart shows well the relationship (or lack of it) between these two. Aamu has a huge crush on the high-shaman when he is completely oblivious.

It is Aamu's feelings which we tried to show you with Kaj in the First Aside.

Update on the situation of TWOD.
I have finally started to work on the pages again. I have recovered almost completely since my last blog-update. However, I won't have time to become 100 % well before the pollen and allergies come.

So, soon my allergies will steal most of my energy. We'll see how that affects the comics. I know I'll be slow at work just like always during the pollen season.

I'm happy I don't have hay fever!! I consider myself lucky!

Information-page

I have opened the information page for TWOD. It consists of two pages. One includes information which may change and get longer as the story gets forward. The other is the page for the world map and to get there you have to go trough the information page.

TWOD Information

Now, sorry for my slowness with the page updates. I have had a lot in my ming, but all four last pages of the first chapter are almost sketched. I hope to get as much done as possible this week (including the pages) because next week I will start at my new job and the first few weeks will most likely eat all my time and leaves nothing for the comics.

I'm sorry for having so long breaks between pages again, but I hope you understand the situtation. After all I need a job to be able to keep this going to begind with XD And luckily I got one so quickly and a good one at that. Wish me luck!

The two next pages

As the title hints I have been working on the two next pages of chapter 3 of TOE. I have them almost sketched so very soon I will start to make the finished line art.

I won't be working on new pages of TWOD untill these two are finished. However, after these two pages I think I might work only on TWOD for a while to get the first chapter finished. It's only five more pages.

I'm also thinking of making a seperate piece of art of the people in the meeting in chapter Loyalty. Kind of a portrait of the group. :) Let's hope I find time to work on that.

Now I have to also spend time on looking for a new job. I still have about three weeks left of the current one, but I still have nothing after that which forces me to look for work. Lets hope for the best :)

Part 1 page 16

I decided to put an update on the situtation of TWOD so I could try some more features XD

This is the current situtation of the next page of TWOD. It's pretty much half-way done :)
I hope to get the last five pages of the first part done by the end of this year. That would be a good point to take a short break from the comic. Don't worry, this break is just the kind where I will ready some stuff for the release of part 2.

One of the things I will be doing between chapters is to finish the new character pages which are half-way done, but still hidden from public. The next chapter will introduce two new characters and with Amy included they form the main trio of the story :)
I also hope I will get the smackjeeves and drunkduck sites built more to my liking and change art for banners and such.

This kind of preparations will take place between chapters.
I also truly hope to spend more time on TOE as well!

I don't remember did I ever mention this, but I will mention it now.
I received a fanart for TWOD from Cahir_the_witcher!
Go check it out now!