I thought it could be fun to tell you a bit about the edits and many small and bigger changes I made during the creation of page nr. 9, so here it goes.
First off all I fiddled with the faces of the girls a couple of times or needed to fix the arm here and that hand there so they would match up nicely proportion wise. Cornelia's
face on the top right was actually fine the way I drew it at first but compared to the face she had in the previous page and at the bottom of the page this just didn't work. So I changed the jaw
line a wee bit and her mouth, made her hair less poofy and voila! Also I didn't want her to look so disgusted.
Will was really tricky in the bottom panel! I tried two different expressions, and edited her hair possibly 5 times! And I had thought she'd be the easiest of them all because it
was just her face and arms! To be honest I'm not super happy with the final version I went with now but it's the best I could get out of my hand.
The first panel of the comic is a funny story. As you can see in the rough sketch I had originally planned to show Hay Lin in class by the window day dreaming or attentively
taking notes. I can't even say what gave me the idea but suddenly I thought it could be more interesting to show a different class. Like... chemistry! Oh! How about an experiment! And how about-
and then the ball was already half way down hill and before I knew it I had come up with that failed experiment which is funny since Tara is usually an ace in science classes.
Weird fact: It was trickier drawing the lab coat on Hay Lin with her straight stance than for Taranee who is moving so much with folds and everything. Hay Lin's coat still looks a bit awkward to
my eyes...
Another little fun fact is about Ms. Knickerbocker. She's usually not someone to move her hands around so much. Always strict and correct in everything she does. But I also think
that she's very passionate about her job at school and after summer I just figured she'd be SO happy to finally being back at Sheffield, where she truly belongs, that she'd be babbling on about
all sorts of things. Nothing of what she's saying was planned when I started working on the page. It wasn't until I finished the line art of her that I had the idea of that speech.
Now to the cookie affair: The cookies in general were planned from the start. They had their own little panel on the bottom left, like they do now, and Taranee was eating one. That much was clear. Chocolate chip cookies were too tough to draw. I felt it would be bothersome with those crumbly shapes and those random blots of chocolate so I went with these square ones that I used to eat back in the day. Funny thing with those though: When I drew the cookie in Taranee's hand and started colouring, it took me a few seconds to decide which type of square of the cookie she'd start with: "Would she go for chocolate first? She'd probably like vanilla the most but then maybe she'd eat off chocolate first so she'd have the good stuff after?" And then I started wondering if she was holding the cookie like in the small panel on the left, which square would be the one she ate off of in the big panel where her hand had a different angle. I actually imitated the motion myself a couple of times.
Finally, the page was done but there was an empty spot staring at you right in the middle of the sofa... I had already given the page to my beta readers because I was tired and just wanted to be
done with it when my boyfriend suggested to put the plate of cookies there. "Ugh... but that would mean more effort. I'd have to draw the WHOLE plate! And tons of tiny cookies with differently
coloured squares. Why did I pick those again? I don't wanna... but it would look better... okay I'll do a rough sketch and if it doesn't look good I can still submit the page the way it is."
Needless to say: It did look better with the plate. The page submit was delayed a day (it was evening when I started the sketch of that cookie plate) but I think it was worth it.
Maze wasn't supposed to appear in this page, but only be mentioned. I had planned to show the OTHER new student in there but somehow... Maze wrestled himself into the frame! I
couldn't help it! I swear!
Okay that's about it! Some random facts about my thoughts and the edits I went through while creating this page! Now imma go back to work. Page 10 won't draw itself!
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