largento

Check it out in this thread.

Very impressive! This is going to be something special! Have you experimented with the Technocrane model any?

Thanks, Ken. I play around as I go. I think the lighting is probably very similar to the first panel of the last story. I set up the lights and then switch it to IBL and use the Photoshop image I created of the wall at some percentage (like 40% or 30%). I use a lot of warm colors, even though I kind of think of the Storyteller as a bit of a mysterious character. Essentially he's like the Cryptkeeper or the Witch in the old horror comics. :-)

Thanks, Tony! Much appreciated!

Thanks, Rodney! I'm cranking away on strips trying to get ahead of the game for once. As worn out as I was by the end of the last story, I'm really having fun being back into it again.

Thanks, Robert! Rodney, there'll still be a window to get coloring books for a little while. There's a pirate festival here in October that I'm hoping to get them into and I'm expecting to sell out of them there.

Just making a note that the new story will be starting on Monday! Sword of the Rightwise King has been pushed back until the next story, although this new one will set up elements for it. The new story's called: "The Wannabe Pirates and the Amulet of the Apes."

Robert, here's the graphic ...and thanks for the link!

I don't, Robert, but I will very shortly. :-)

Thanks, guys! I had fun doing them. I've never done anything that went for multiple issues like this, so it was cool to get to play with changing the colors of the logo and picking out elements from each section rather than doing just one general, all-encompassing image. Here's a random thing I found interesting. For these apps, I have to create application icons for the various devices. It's wild, but the icons for the iPhone 4 are bigger than the ones for the iPad. It's because the iPhone 4 has a much higher resolution display.

Working on covers for the iPhone/iPad app version of The Wannabe Pirates and the Curse of Greyhawk Island

Not in any way I'm aware of. When A:M renders an image, it renders a raster image. I would suspect that even if there was such a way, you would end up with a tangle of paths that you would never be able to make use of. In Illustrator, you can create graphic brushes which could have the look of chalk. Most likely there is already one in the graphic brush libraries.

Nice job, Jake!

Thanks, Rodney! Instructions are now up on the website if you want to order the Coloring Book!

I did come across a website that was set up to do that. At least that was my impression (I didn't stick around long.) A thought I had was to take a couple of pages, put copyright notices on them and submit them to some of these places that offer free coloring book pages to download. A kind of advertisement for free. What I found was mostly a wild west of copyright infringement. Obviously, that's not a huge concern in that I'm giving it away, but it seems like those are the kind of sites that could be packed with malware and that kind of stuff and I'd hate to have somebody email me that they got a virus because they downloaded my coloring book page.

Thanks, Paul, David! I used a local printer. I was checking around and a friend of mine knew of a printer that could give me a reasonable price on a short press run. The big printer I used to work at wouldn't even consider doing the job.

Ha! That's great, Paul! Love the face.

Thanks, Homes! I'm working on the pricing now, Myron. I've got to figure out how much they'll cost to mail and balance everything with how much PayPal takes out. They cost more than expected to print. Best guess right now would be $5 including shipping. A bit steep for a coloring book, but they are a very limited edition. :-)

And here they are! I'm very happy with how they came out. Can't wait to see little kids coloring them!

Truer words were never spoken, Myron! I just got back from picking up the coloring books! They look great and a few friends chipped in to increase the order to by 50 books! Bless them, since that lowers my per book cost! I'll post a picture soon. They came out great!

Thanks, Gene! I'm not ready to make a formal announcement yet, but I'll informally say that I just signed a deal to have the "Greyhawk and the Starbucklers of the Caribbean" and "The Wannabe Pirates and the Curse of Greyhawk Island" built as iPhone/iPod apps! I am really excited about the prospect and hope it will be a way for a bunch of kids to discover The Wannabe Pirates! If only I was gainfully employed, I could buy a new iPhone & an iPad and right it off on my taxes. :-)

Thanks, guys! Yeah, it's been too long to remember, but I must've thought they looked right at the time. :-) They should definitely be the other way. I used the same reflection style on all of the spaceship sets, so I would be looking at an impossible amount of re-rendering to change it. I've actually got a deadline now, as I've promised to have all of the pages completed by tomorrow. It's going to be wild having the whole thing finished. A 206 page graphic novel ain't nothin' to sneeze at. :-)

Superhuman just about covers it. :-)

I think I've made mention here that I've been turning "The Wannabe Pirates and the Curse of Greyhawk Island" into a graphic novel, reformatting the pages to comic book proportions. It's been a fun challenge and I must say I prefer the way it looks as a graphic novel to the uniform panels of the comic strip. Today I ran into challenge: Part 158 of the story was this 1-panel gag: To get it to work on the comic page, I had to split it into two panels like this: The only problem is that although you can see they are running in opposite directions, it's not clear that they are about to intersect. So, this time out I was forced to create a new page. It was fun, though and it helped me bridge a problem with the next strip which introduced these big robot suits as a throwaway gag in the last panel. It was very satisfying to be able to show the collision I had always assumed happened. :-)

Thanks, Gerry!