Hey, Kav. I have been super busy with school and my latest script (#32) and I haven’t had a chance to take any pictures. I believe that you are still busy with other projects so you aren’t specifically waiting on. Right?
I would hope that if you were waiting on me you would have gotten on me about this already.
I really will try to get to those photos tonight or tomorrow.
-Josh

yeah I’m good.  Just put p 13 in dropbox and am finishing pages 14-15
I want to finish rc 4 before i do crimson mask #3-thats the last issue.

-Kav

I like this page a lot. I really like how that shot of the Corner Bar is starting to become familiar. Panel 2, with the dudes getting some drinks is great. I love that this is not some mysterious villain bar, but just a regular place where folks get wing baskets. Nice. One day, you and Tony and I will get some burgers and fries at the real life Corner Bar in Kalamazoo.

I like all of the acting that is going on on here. It doesn’t look static or posed. It looks like people talking.

That is some VERY noir shading across Max’s face. Very nice. He is a very noir kind of guy.

I think that his neck tat should be bigger, though. Like, almost ear to ear. It is ok if it is only really readable when he raises his head and shows it off. Lots of tattoos are like that.

And speaking of which, I have a good friend who has done both comic book art and tattoo art. How would you feel about having him come in over your drawings of Max and fill in some tattoo flair?

Also, watch out that you don’t slip back into those 90 degree panel layouts.  This page looks just fine with them, but be aware.

I know these pages can get a little text heavy, so be sure to do your best to leave room for those word balloons.

-Josh

yes these pages were penciled before i started playing with the camera angles.  Feel free to have your friend up the ante on the tats.  I do like having b-ground people active-another thing i learned from Sean Phillips.  Glad ya like the shading-watch for more.  And us three chillin one day would be epic, dude.  weird if we saw a dude that looked like Max in there though.

-kav

Yesterday, Kav wrote…

At first I wasn’t too keen on drawing ‘the corner’ because it was really hard to find good ref of people sitting in booths and I pretty much made up the interior but now it’s like the Baxter Building or something. That’s where we see max and andy. Maybe have a scene where kinetic and monkey are eating there one day. PS I’m emailing you this funny article I wrote on the physics of super powers. Luckily, none of your characters suffer from those defects.

-kav

I like having familiar settings pop up again and again. You are right about it being like The Baxter Building. It now just seems like a place in Rapid City. Hopefully, more and more of them will develop.
If you are ever looking at a script and see a chance to repeat a setting, let me know. In most cases, I think we should do it!
I liked that article you wrote, but I think you are being too generous with Rapid City’s characters. They have their own science problems.
Kinetic, for example, can simply GENERATE kinetic energy. That defies the laws of science.
Flamethrower also simply creates an unusual amount of energy from nowhere.
-Josh

Yeah I’m definitely gonna have settings crop up more often-I may like have ‘the corner’ down below as Kinetic flies overhead.  You are right about flamethrower and kinetic-although I assumed Kinetic absorbed kinetic energy from things around him and re-directed it-a passing bicycle might go slower as he draws energy say, along with other moving objects around him, cars,bullets..the air around him growing cold as he absorbs molecular kinetic energy….  Flamethrower has problems.  But hourglass, monkey, max and others could conceivably exist within the current laws of physics…much more than could be said about so many standard superheroes.
-Kav

I really like the idea of getting to be familiar with a city as the story goes on. I also like that in your original drawings, Rapid City looked a lot like NYC, but now it has really started to take on its own identity.
As for science problem in Rapid City…
You are right, Kinetic could easily just absorb ambient energy around him. Flamethrower is actually telekinetic, it just LOOKS like flames. So, if you can accept telekinesis as “mental energy” then she is good. Battery draws from a nearly infinite extra dimensional energy source. So he’s good.
Maxwell Murder, Red Lion, Glyph, Wraith, and Switchboard all get their powers from magic, so that’s covered as well.
Sidekick doesn’t really use any energy for his powers.
That said, I generally don’t think it is too good an idea to go around questioning the science behind superheroes. To me, that is almost like watching a play and complaining that it is unrealistic because none of the characters noticed a huge room full of people all sitting and watching them.
-Josh

ha ha good point but-the more realistic the play, the more drawn in becomes the audience and the more they forget it’s just a play.  But you’re right-Zombies are completely impossible and I was still drawn into Marvel Zombies cause of the great writing and art.  I did a calculation and the zombies ate the whole Earth population in 3 days that means each zombie ate 20,000 people per second….not very realistic but still enjoyable.  Especially unrealistic considering zombies dont even digest.  So where exactly are the remains of those millions of people each zombie ate?….

-kav