This was originally going to be a full page, but I think it works better as a three panel strip.  Also I had less to draw!

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Phosphorescent mushrooms are an important part of every fantasy setting–almost as much as cool floating rock islands (soon to come hopefully).  I’ve got the next few comics generally laid out in my brain, and I think we’re going in a good direction.

I think the colors turned out pretty good this time, and the shading tends to hold things down, but I am a bit sad it isn’t as bright and exciting as some of the outdoorsy stuff.  I’ve been learning a lot working on this old thing, and trying to apply said knowledge to some pretty sweet side project comics.  I’ll keep you guys posted as those projects progress.

And so Bo and Jasper go forth in to the sweet cavernous tree, in which there will very likely be many Deku tree references.

I’ve been looking at Adventure Time a lot for inspiration as to how they draw their backgrounds, and it’s certainly been helping.  After drawing trees for weeks now, I think I’m getting the hang of it.  I really like how they turned out on this page.  I’m trying a little bit of a different shading, and I really had a blast with it.  What do you guys think?

First off, be sure to Like the Dungeon Crawlers Facebook page.  I keep forgetting to mention it on here, but it’s been up for a little while here and I am trying to post bonus wallpaper versions and behind the scenes images, so it’s a good place to check out.  It’ll also be one of the first places you’ll be notified when there is a new comic.

I have a bit of a confession: I’ve never beaten a Final Fantasy game.  At first I didn’t even like them.  I remember watching a friend play on the NES and thinking it was boring.  Why was he just clicking on text to fight and walking around a lot?  It wasn’t until Final Fantasy 7 that I really got in to it, but even then I never got around to beating it.  I think the series as of late has gotten a bit… off the rails.  Definitely something very different than what it once was I suppose, but there are plenty of people who love it, so who am I to get in the way of their fun.

Pretty simple page this time, definitely by choice after the last three pages, and it’s got humor!  Hooray for humor.

Artwise, I was inspired by the Adventure Time backgrounds as I have been in the past, and can you really blame me?  I’m really happy with how mine turned out, though I spent way too much time on them.  Drawing with a tablet really can slow me down compared to drawing pencil and paper, but thems the breaks I s’pose.

 

EDIT:

I really like how the background inks turned out when they’re just plain black, and can’t decide if I like them more colored or this way, so I thought I’d share:

The big boss is finally revealed!  This comic was a doozy (seems like I say that a lot).  Huge learning curve with this one.  I started using Google Sketchup to do layouts on my other comic project, and thought it’d be good practice to test it out on Dungeon Crawlers–hence all the fancy angles!  Usually I’ll try and recycle backgrounds to save me time, but I only recycled two panels over the course of nineteen this time.  And man did that tack on the time.  I drew on my day off from 9:00 AM to midnight, only stopping for lunch and dinner, and I still didn’t finish.

For those of you curious about my process, here are some of the layouts I did with Adobe Illustrator and Google Sketchup:

 

 

And below is the second page before all the shading and textures got added:

 

 

A quick single panel this week, still building up to them meeting the boss.  I almost forgot, for those who don’t play D&D, that is a beholder in the role of the boss’s secretary.  And it is a woman, even though technically beholder’s are gender neutral, but this is my comic so blah.  Beholder’s were one of the enemies in the first edition of Dungeons and Dragons and have stood the test of time for the most part.  I think this image here is the original beholder drawing, and coincidentally my favorite.

For those who were interested, I’m also putting up a gigantic version of the image for desktop size  sans word bubbles (1920 by 1200), so click it to big it:

A simple comic for today, setting up for a soon to come adventure.

Oh and let it be known that I redrew Bo biting his lip about fourteen different times, and I’m still not 100% satisfied.  And before you have a hissy fit about him not having teeth, I’ve already drawn them in this comic here.  That’s right, they’re canon.

Oh and uh… here’s a gif I made when I was bored (done in Flash):

I like how the bottom panel turned out with the massive amount of brickwork done, in a very chaotic and frantic sort of layout instead of the usual order (like the top few panels).  I think I’ll try doing more stuff like this.  Yup.  That’s about it.

I’ve always been a fan of the gross-up close-up trope, and have done it with this comic before, but never this large.  Also need to mention that I was having some killer writer’s block, and the wifey helped me crack this nut.