The Harbinger’s Path | Chapter 2, page 2, panel crop
I think I’ll make this post for any page previews I don’t end up making a separate post for – starting with this preview crop from chapter 2, page 3. Will add to this post as needed!
The Harbinger’s Path | Chapter 2, page 3, panel crop
The Harbinger’s Path | Chapter 2, page 2, panel crop
This page went through a number of changes and deliberations while I worked on it, and I wanted to share some of the process and thoughts that went into it.
First, some process steps below! The first 2 are fairly early on in the process, though further along than the “layout” step (which are barely above stick figures). This page’s ideation started with heavy silhouetting. When I initially drafted the layout for this page, Malyck was the only panel on it for a while. I went between leaving the rest of the page with negative space – either empty or filled with black – or with an establishing shot or something involving Trahearne to fill the space.
Ch2, page 2 | Early draft
Ch2, page 2 | Starting to refine the draft
My aim was that this part of the page should convey some time has passed since the final scene in Chapter 1.
I wasn’t decided initially, and left the rest of the page blank and went on to do the rest of Chapter 2’s layouts. When I came back to this page later on, the idea to show Trahearne most appealed to me. It would work both to reorient ourselves with where our main character is now, as well as also serve as a bit of an establishing shot. My hope is this would also convey how the previous page is a memory – though whether by Trahearne, Malyck, or someone else, is left to interpretation.
My other dilemma with this page involved Trahearne himself. It was important to me to convey his sense of desperation, but also his strength and resolve. The clawing vines are a visual representation of his capture, but I didn’t want to only represent his imprisonment – I want to represent his strength of will. The main question became, should I represent this visually, or through internal thoughts?
Ch2, page 2 | Test colors (didn’t like this initial test)
Ch2, page 2 | Color scheme chosen – the cooler tones were a better fit.
To thought balloon or not to thought balloon
This is an interesting question. My understanding is, displaying internal thoughts for characters is a bit more archaic (at least in western comics). It was very commonplace in the old Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Marvel comics (which of the few I’ve read, I quite adore). I personally really loved the style of those old comics – including the thought balloons. I don’t know if that’s a controversial or unpopular opinion or not, among comic fans today (I am woefully out of the loop). My understanding is this has fallen out of favor with modern comics (at least, again, with more western ones). The preference being to represent character thoughts externally, through visuals, instead of through thought balloons.
I admire this aspiration. There is incredible merit to it. My favorite webcomic, Unsounded by Ashley Cope (which has, incidentally, just launched the pre-campaign on Kickstarter for the Iron Circus Comics publication of volumes 1 & 2 – which you should very definitely consider checking out & giving the campaign a follow!), adheres to this methodology. I believe I read it in an interview Ashley gave many years ago (or it might have also been a reply to someone on Tumblr), where she explained more about her reasoning behind this. I’m going to paraphrase (forgive me), but the general sentiment I took away from it is that, if you forgo thought balloons, it very often results in much more visually interesting, impactful pages.
For me, the easiest example to show are pages 16 and 17 from Unsounded’s first chapter. It makes more sense in-context if you read from the beginning of the chapter (which I highly recommend!), but even so, these pages are excellent examples about visually representing the internal turmoil within a character’s thoughts and mind, without any use of thought balloons. I love these pages because of how well the concept is executed here. From what I recall (and again, forgive me if I’m misremembering), Ashley is such a strong proponent of this, that I think she has mentioned before that she doesn’t use thought balloons anywhere in Unsounded – which currently sits at over 2,000+ pages in length! A mightily impressive feat, if you ask me.
Ch2, page 2 | Final version of the page
Now, all that said and all my praise for this methodology – why did I decide to use thought balloons, in the end? I also used them in The Harbinger’s Path’s first chapter, also for Trahearne. I’m sorry to say I don’t have a deep reasoning for my decision other than – despite both my awareness and admiration (and enjoyment!) for eschewing thought balloons – it’s a personal preference that I also highly enjoy them. If I had to guess, I think it may be because I grew up reading comics that used them a lot. I read mostly Japanese manga, which makes liberal use of thought balloons (at least, in the ones I read). I enjoy how it can make the character feel closer to the reader, or more intimate. It is true it’s an “easier” technique – it is far more ambitious to represent a character’s thoughts visually, and it is something I would like to attempt in the future. However, I do also think it is a more advanced way of making comics.
So! With my comic project being a “pilot” project of sorts for helping me learn how to make comics in general – combined with how I personally love the intimacy thought balloons can add – I decided to make use of them in The Harbinger’s Path. Maybe this will change in future pages, but for now, I think this was the right choice for me, and for the pages so far.
This was the first page I finished for chapter 2. I finished it a while ago, and have been working on finalizing the rest of chapter 2’s pages since. Because of this (as I should have foresaw) – when I saw the page yesterday, I saw several things I wanted to adjust.
The main things I wanted to change were the colors, values, and contrast – because when I was previewing the page with the final page from chapter 1 yesterday, I thought the color schemes clashed. I suspect the original version might be more pleasant “illustratively,” but I’m fairly certain the revised version flows better visually when these pages are read sequentially.
I’ll post both versions below to compare:
Chapter 2, page 1: Current version.
Chapter 2, page 1: Original version.
If the images look similar, try clicking one and flipping between them a few times – this should make the differences more apparent.
As with the first chapter, I’ll also note down the updates here at the tail end of this post – primarily for myself, as it’s helpful for me to see the sorts of updates I need to plan for when handling the logistics of this type of project. It’s also kind of fun to keep a record to look back on down the line. As well, with how fast-paced (and outlandish) things are nowadays, time has a way of slipping by so quickly. If I don’t note down what I did at the time, the memories of what I was even doing at the time are so easy to pass by, or even forgotten. Pages like this post and the physical notebook are ways to help slow me down, and keep track of how much or how little I’ve been able to do – because when I don’t, it often feels like I’m doing very little,. Or that the amount I’m doing is moving along at this glacial pace. Which is still arguable, but at least when I keep track of it, it helps remind me of the small victories. Like posting this page today. :D
Further Thoughts
Adding a few more thoughts I wanted to note down here later in the day – I think I need to preview how pages look on the website earlier than when I’m ready to post them. Even though I can browse through the pages in my files, flipping through them on the website feels different.
Maybe it will only be for this chapter page – because I hadn’t yet tried paging through Chapter 1’s final page and then to Chapter 2’s first page. In retrospect, this was silly not to do. It made me immediately see a number of things I wasn’t satisfied with in the original version, and know what to change to add cohesion.
As well, I’m doing this with page 2 for Ch2 now – and it helps a lot seeing how it reads when flipping from page 1 to page 2. Maybe this is one downside to working on the pages as spreads – it doesn’t give me that “webcomic” page-by-page experience. Which is important to me that it flows properly, since it’s the primary way (I hope) the comic will be viewed.
Comic & Site Updates Log (Ch2)
June 23, 2025
Chapter 2, page 1 posted.
Slight UI adjustments:
Added a “Latest Updates” anchor link to the page index.
Added additional navigation to chapter 2’s pages.
Reduced the footer font size for all comic pages to be less obtrusive on mobile.
June 25, 2025
Chapter 2, page 2 posted.
June 30, 2025
Chapter 2, page 3 posted.
Adjusted the updates portion of the Harbinger index page layout to improve readability.
Headers are now aligned to the left, instead of centered.
Added “Latest Update” and “Previous Updates” sections.
Moved the “page updates posted on…” section to below the most recent update, instead of at the bottom of the page. This is for improved visibility on mobile. I might move it back down during shorter updates – it was mainly looking a bit messy and confusing having it all the way at the bottom, above the art gallery.
Add-on Updates: June 30, 2025
Slightly updated the art for page 3 (small touch-ups).
Page index UI update:
The “page updates posted on…” section now only shows on mobile! This was my preference as the desktop version has the links on the sidebar – which disappears on mobile, along with those links. Really glad this cleans up the desktop layout, while keeping the functionality on mobile. :) Hopefully I will not forget the links are there on mobile, since I still mainly use the site on desktop (phones are not ergonomic! I don’t understand how people can use them for so long comfortably).
July 7, 2025
Slight updates to the Harbinger index page layout to improve readability.
July 9, 2025
Slight updates to page 6’s art – touched up Malyck’s arm pose to be more correct.
“Varré” from Elden Ring | Current work-in-progress
I realized while typing the title for this post that it’s been exactly a month since I posted with the first time I drew Varré, haha.
I did the sketch for this last week while working on the comic pages, and I’d like to finish it sometime after the second chapter is a little more finalized.
“Varré” from Elden Ring | Initial sketch
The initial sketch from last week. The colors you see in this post were added quickly this morning, as a little break from the current comic for today.
The drawing at a slightly earlier stage from the top of this post, as I figured out which color scheme I wanted to use.
This is an earlier work-in-progress i think is less interesting. But I happened to save it, so here it is!
Initial thumbnail sketches.
I forgot I also saved the thumbnail sketches in the file – starts from left-to-right. The left idea was the initial idea, which is different from how the drawing ended up going. The middle thumbnail is trying out a variation of the first, as the first thumbnail wasn’t matching the idea I was imagining. (I might try that one again another time, as it’s a more difficult idea for me because it has more foreshortening).
The third thumbnail is the second one duplicated and then worked on further – lately, I’ve noticed I tend to concept my initial ideas this way. With a very messy thumbnail/sketch/silhouette, then duplicating it and dragging it to another part of the canvas. I might repeat this process a few times until I decide whether I like the idea or not. Then I’ll take the most recent version, hide the rest, and resize the “concept sketch” larger, and work on it that way.
It feels convoluted to me, but something about those extra steps seems to help me a lot with concepting.
“The Harbinger’s Path” | Trahaerne panel preview (in-progress / artwork not final)
Wanted to do an update post! Chapter 2 for The Harbinger’s Path is about 85% complete now. I finished the first “refinement” pass for all the pages last Thursday, and began doing the “final refinement” pass for the first half of the chapter (if you’re confused about what I’m talking about here, I go into my rough process in this post).
While working on them last night, I realized that because the files themselves are spreads – with 2 pages per file – I thought I had done half as much progress of the “final pass” as I’ve made so far. I realized I had double the amount of progress as what it had been feeling like for the past few days. I feel very silly, but this means I am confident I can begin posting new pages for chapter 2 next Monday, June 23rd!
“The Harbinger’s Path” | Malyck & Trahearne panel preview (in-progress / artwork not final)
I’m going back and forth as to whether adding Malyck’s luminescence here adds or not – for the scene itself, I think it could work either way in terms of what it says about the character.
“The Harbinger’s Path” | Malyck & Trahearne panel preview (in-progress / artwork not final)
About 80% refined.
“The Harbinger’s Path” | Malyck & Trahearne panel preview (in-progress / artwork not final) | Black-and-white version
This a small panel in the comic itself, but one of my personal favorites. I really like the contrast it has in black and white (though it will be in color in the comic itself). I feel like it’s working better in the black-and-white version – still working out how to convey a similar feeling when color is added.
