Happy pre-Halloween everyone! Thanks for coming in on a Saturday! If you don’t recognize Selkie’s outfit, she is the title character from a great game called Ico. Check it out if you like minimalist atmospheric puzzle adventures! I thought Halloween[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Today's edition of the Secret Commentary is empty, because Dave failed to come up with something for it.
I haven’t done a Sketch Day Saturday in awhile, but since it’s Halloween weekend, this is a good time I think. Come back on Saturday to see a sketch of Selkie dressed up as a video game character! Which one?[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I remember liking gym class when I was Selkie’s age. At that age it was just fun unstructured stuff like freeze tag and duck duck goose, or whatever you call the big rainbow parachute. I didn’t start hating gym class[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Due to poor time management, I couldn't do shadowing on this one. Sorry. -EDIT- And one whole update day later, I've gone and retroactively shaded the comic. Also added some classroom details to panel 3 that I forgot earlier. Yay retcon!
If I (mentally) scribbled my timeline notes right, Andi started calling a little less than a week before the adoption day, and this meeting was put off until they had a chance to talk without child’s ears around, so it’s[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I mentioned in Andi's cast page entry that she has an in-progress back tattoo themed around the Epic of Gilgamesh. I wanted to get at least one shot of it worked in. I think it will probably become a continuity nightmare. XD
For those that may be interested, I uploaded a couple of my better student art projects to my Deviant Art account. http://eclipsing-saturn.deviantart.com/gallery/ Some of the items in that gallery are oooooollllld, so don’t judge me too harshly. XD
I was going to have Todd offer Andi a beer, but then I remembered it's still late morning at this point in the narrative. This almost led me to include a line about how Todd decided to stop keeping beer in the apartment because of post-adoption inspections, but it was too wordy to squeeze in.
Aaaand scene change. 😀 Probably silly to post this a second time, but based on reader feedback I made a few more changes to the seating chart. I replaced the X placeholder name for the orphans that were surrendered as[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I didn't mention it last time due to forgetfulness, but I am playing with no panel borders, based on some critical feedback from one of my professors during a student work critique.
Amanda’s displeasure face makes me laugh. I also have an addition to the Ancillary Art page. A seating chart for Selkie’s class I made for reference: The three “devil orphan” kids are in this class, coincidentally (ha ha). The girl[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I don't yet know much about Chanelle, but apparently she loves math!
And now we introduce Mrs. Mina Afkhami’s student assistant: Ms. Jessie Flower.
Jessie's re-emergence requires a little bit of a retcon to her backstory; Wool Mart shoe clerk is now her job she works during summers and between classes while working towards her elementary education degree. When I created her way back when, I turned out to like her as a character more than I thought I would, and many readers grew attached to her very quickly. So I decided on "student teacher" as a means of giving her a more stable supporting cast position.
In lieu of Director Commentary, I thought I’d share the pencil sketch version of the final panel of today’s strip. I wanted a bigger shot of the classroom kids, but cramming so many kids in the panel made the desks[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Today's edition of the Secret Commentary is empty, because Dave failed to come up with something for it.
I may have to make a seating chart to keep track of all these background characters. O_o
The previous comic's reader comments brought up a lot of questions about what sort of teaching techniques Selkie's school uses that I must admit, I did not think about. :x After doing some reading, I decided that the classroom uses a whiteboard instead of a chalkboard (easier on potential asthma issues) and uses light colors on the walls and floors to encourage a "bright" atmosphere (the background shadows are also a little paler than the "outdoors" scenes because of this. I left the character's shadows regular so they stand out more), and has some potted plants at the front (not visible in this strip) for color and a sense of life. I read a few articles about computers and even iPads in modern classrooms, but decided that equipment that runs $300-$500 per unit would not be a good investment for excitable and inattentive elementary students, so the kids will use books and paperback journals. The desks have cubbyholes instead of flip tops to reduce accidental finger-slams. GAWD that is a lot of commentary. XD
