Ugh. The trees. In my initial concepts, I had planned to do much more alien-looking trees and thought it would be cool to have clump-circles where a single big “spine” tree would grow in the center, surrounded by a ring of smaller trees that grow lateral, flying buttress-like branches to support the main tree, which would need support to carry its snow load. As it turned out, I decided that rings of trees would get really thick in the art and it would be hard to space multiple rings out enough to clearly show the characters in the scenes. So I opted for singular trees instead.
To make them a little more alien, I went with the twisty trunks, with the idea that a couple trees would grow together and intertwine for support (again, I was thinking about the snowload the trees would have to carry on this planet). Ultimately, I’m not crazy about the tree designs as I think they could have been more visually interesting, even if they had just been a bit thicker or more twisty and intertwined, but there you go.
This page marks the start of the nighttime sequence, and I obviously made heavy use of blue overlay tints to enhance the mood and setting. I think it came out well, and I also found it helpful to slightly erase (or mask) the overlay in certain areas to lighten the blue and let the underlying colors show through. I did this to accent specific elements that I wanted readers’ eyes to be drawn to, with the technique being a bit more apparent in the following pages.
Hey don’t let that bother you far too much.
The trees may be quite earthlike, but the quality of the electric fence blocking off the yaks were designed as to be futuristic enough to tell us that this isn’t quite 21st century Earth as we know it. Plus it’s nice having a juxtaposition of 3 aliens in middle of an earthlike forest too.
Yeah, I thought the electric fence was kinda cool. I imagine they telescope a bit, so they can be collapsed for traveling and then extended to full size when being set up. And it makes sense that as traveling rustlers, you’d carry something compact and light that could easily be deployed and spaced out with some degree of flexibility to create a simple fenced-in area wherever you set up camp.
I thought the electric fence was cool too! So is the “campfire”. Looks like its hooked up to that generator thing in front of the Roaming Armadillo RV.
though I am presented with a quandry.. does that fence go all the way around the camp? or is it just there to put a fence between our heroes and their goal?
I think it’s there to keep the cattle from roaming off, not as any sort of defensive measure.
Yep, the fence is there to keep the herd in one place. I figured they’d find the most enclosed area (boxed in by trees and rock outcroppings) and then use the laser fence posts to close up any gaps. It’s not much of a deterrent to people since the posts can be deactivated pretty easily by anyone with an IQ higher than that of a yak. So maybe Cember might have some problems. Ha ha. Just kidding, Cember! You’re a smart guy. Don’t kill me.
Personally, I like the Dr. Seuss trees you wound up with. : D