A Simple Escort Mission - Thumbnails and Goals
- GenreChowderStudios
- Aug 7, 2017
- 3 min read
Every pose must silhouette well. Every action must be clearly readable. Every figure must be interesting at all times.
Whether or not I actually achieve any of the three aims listed above, these were the goals I set out to fulfill for "A Simple Escort Mission." For a few years, I've wanted to hone my cartooning ability, specifically those regarding appeal mixed with an ease of production. I've played with various styles here and there, but nothing was working. "But what if I simplify everything down to their basics, down to very simple shapes, completely remove dialogue, and focus on the fundamentals I want to improve without the extra stuff getting in the way?" As the kids today say, challenge accepted.
Really not sure why the thumbnail layout went the way it did. I think I was trying to match the aspect ratio of the first few panels, so I drew them closer together. Then that cycle just snaked around here and there and everywhere. Until the last page, anyway. If I'm not mistaken, the aspect ratio will remain the same for all the panels. It'll end up looking something like an animatic, now that I think about it.
I'm going to go into the plot of the strip, so if you don't want to know, here's your first and only warning:
THAR BE SPOILERS BELOW!
Okay? Okay.
Seeing as the world Jay and co. are from is based on video-related things, I wanted to base it on a common gripe: the escort mission. More specifically, the the all-too common escort mission with a stupid escort. The gist of the strip is as follows:
Jay has an escort mission. During a battle, Jay tells the escort to stand in one place at a safe distance, but the escort keeps moving, eventually getting herself hurt. When Jay gets back to the guild HQ to see if she can claim the reward, we see that the escort must arrive with health greater than or equal to half. Because of the damage the escort sustained, Jay fails. However, it turns out that the escort had a mission for arriving with less than half health. (I'm really getting sick of calling the other character "the escort," so I'm just gonna call her Bindhi. First name that popped into my head. Dunno why, let's roll.)
Now, the easy thing to do would be to have Jay go berserk and beat up Bindhi or just leave the strip with her tied to that tree. For all I know, that might actually be funnier to a lot of people, including much better writers/comedians, including me on some days. But... I don't know. There's something mean-spirited about that. Aside from the fact that Jay herself is not a mean-spirited person, I don't want to communicate that kind of unpleasantness in my work. The incorporation of video game tropes is meant to be from a place of love, a la the loving send-up, not a hate parody. Leaving Bindhi without any motive or goal or anything just kind of makes her a tool from me to throw my stones at.
Plus, to me, at least, just leaving it with Jay beating Bindhi up or tying her to that tree seems, like I mentioned at the top, easy. Too easy. The twist makes Jay's failure seem more complete, somehow. And honestly, I could be making a huge comedic mistake here or heck, somewhere else that I'm not even thinking about. But there you go. I hope to post more about the creation of this comic strip.
Stay tuned.
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