Back in Volume 1, I introduced the character of Grissom, a female ex-partner of Roka and Ril. Back in that commentary, I mentioned that she was originally designed as a male character until my wife rightfully pointed out that the cast was almost entirely male and could stand to have more parity. At that point, I reworked Grissom’s design (interestingly, without changing any actual dialogue or personality) and ended up with a character that, despite her short page time, has become a reader favorite.

Azarek is pretty much what Grissom was supposed to look like. When it came time to figuring out his look, I realized Grissom’s old, unused design would fit the character perfectly.

Speaking of which, I’ll touch upon concept design stuff in these commentaries, but the bulk of the actual sketchbook material will be on my Patreon, where backers can get access to much more concept work for characters, costumes, weapons, ships, etc, along with design commentary. If that’s your thing (or if you just want to help support the series), be sure to check out my Patreon!

On the coloring front, I usually do a slight tweak pass on the pages I get back from the colorists. On this page, in addition to those slight tweaks, I also added the pattern to the sheer parts of the female alien’s outfit. The deco was always part of the design from the concept sketch phase, but it wasn’t something I bothered trying to have Cyril do and figured it would just be easier for me to add it later myself.