The Word Smith continues to be on hiatus. This is due, in part, to some Real Life stuff that happened last month that threw a bunch of stuff out of whack. As such, the continuation of The Word Smith is delayed and, while I'm hoping to get back to it before too long, the Real Life stuff is, for the moment, ongoing and occupies a (not small) chunk of the time I would normally have used for working on the comic. So, expect delays, is what I'm saying.
Until such a time as The Word Smith resumes, I may try posting some other things here. Or I may not. Treat it like Schroedinger's Cat, if you will. Or don't.
Until some time in the future,
Freak Out,
-TFitC
Friday, July 10, 2015
Sunday, June 7, 2015
Hanging From Cliffs
And the final page of episode 8 of The Word Smith has appeared on-line. Yes, this is ending the episode on a cliff hanger, so, dun, dun, dun!
There'll be an intentional hiatus for maybe about a month or so as I finalize script details for episode 9 and (hopefully) get a bit of a head start on drawing the actual pages.
Please look forward to it!
Freak Out,
-TFitC
There'll be an intentional hiatus for maybe about a month or so as I finalize script details for episode 9 and (hopefully) get a bit of a head start on drawing the actual pages.
Please look forward to it!
Freak Out,
-TFitC
Friday, June 5, 2015
Processing Time
The latest page of The Word Smith is not quite done - it's in the process of being coloured (nearly finished!) and should be up sometime this weekend, but in the interim, I thought it might be interesting (for some definition of interesting) to talk a bit about my comic-making process, such as it is.
It all begins with a script, or something like one, anyway. I do, in fact, have the entirety of The Word Smith planned out, in point-form, at least. Before I start actually drawing an episode, I write that episode up in detail, on a panel-by-panel level. Sometime I'm a bit lazy with dialogue and don't finalize it until I need to start actually putting it on the actual comic, which is a bad habit that I need to try to avoid. Anyway, the script stage is all just typing into a word processor so I'm not going to dwell on it.
The first actual drawing that happens is creating thumbnails. My thumbnails are pretty rough and (usually) drawn four pages to a single piece of (scrap) paper, like so:
There are some artists out there who do pretty detailed thumbnails, but I keep 'em simple mainly for two reasons. One, I'm lazy. Two, as this is just a hobby and I try to get things done in a timely manner, I prefer not to spend too much time on something that's just going to get redrawn anyway. Even so, I do view thumbnails as an important planning tool. Sometimes I do change the final layout from the thumbnailed version (as shall be seen), but overall, I don't think I'd want to attempt drawing the actual final page without some sort of plan in place regarding how I'm going to do it.
After thumbnails, I move on to the actual page. I draw pages on pieces of bristol board which measure approximately 28cm x 35.5cm. My current batch of bristol board (which I started using as of page 2 in episode 8) is also made of partly recycled material, for what it's worth. I start by drawing the panel borders, usually measured out using a ruler, though occassionally (as with page 7 below) I just draw them in roughly. I do this if I'm not entirely sure what proportions some of the panels should be or if I'm still a little unsure on some parts of the layout. By just drawing in a rough sense of the panel borders I feel freer to draw outside of them, if need be.
After panel boundaries are in place, I do the rough pencils. In theory, I actually put in any dialogue/text first so that I know that the text will all fit and I don't waste time drawing stuff that's just going to get covered up by word balloons; however, this doesn't always happen, especially if I haven't gotten around to finalizing the dialogue yet and sometimes it comes back to bite me. Fortunately, I did everything in the correct order for this page.
Once dialogue is in place, I draw everything in pencil. I generally start out fairly rough and then refine it. For instance, I'll often use rough shapes (boxes, mainly) to position and size characters in relation to each other before getting too caught up in the details; some of those guidelines can be seen in the above pencils. I currently use a mechanical pencil for the pencilling stage, mostly because I don't have to worry about sharpening it constantly.
When pencils are done, I ink everything using a set of inking pens (one brush pen and a set of pens of varying widths), erase all the pencils, scan it in and colour everything in Photoshop. Colouring could really be its own post so for now it'll suffice to say that there's several annoying things about it.
Anyway, that's an overview of everything up until the colouring stage, at any rate. Perhaps in some future post I'll go into the details on colouring.
Until next time,
Freak Out,
-TfitC
It all begins with a script, or something like one, anyway. I do, in fact, have the entirety of The Word Smith planned out, in point-form, at least. Before I start actually drawing an episode, I write that episode up in detail, on a panel-by-panel level. Sometime I'm a bit lazy with dialogue and don't finalize it until I need to start actually putting it on the actual comic, which is a bad habit that I need to try to avoid. Anyway, the script stage is all just typing into a word processor so I'm not going to dwell on it.
The first actual drawing that happens is creating thumbnails. My thumbnails are pretty rough and (usually) drawn four pages to a single piece of (scrap) paper, like so:
Pages 5-7 of Episode 8. The last quarter shows a couple of alternate ideas for page 6 - in particular it shows the composition I ended up using for the first panel, which was different from my original idea.
There are some artists out there who do pretty detailed thumbnails, but I keep 'em simple mainly for two reasons. One, I'm lazy. Two, as this is just a hobby and I try to get things done in a timely manner, I prefer not to spend too much time on something that's just going to get redrawn anyway. Even so, I do view thumbnails as an important planning tool. Sometimes I do change the final layout from the thumbnailed version (as shall be seen), but overall, I don't think I'd want to attempt drawing the actual final page without some sort of plan in place regarding how I'm going to do it.
After thumbnails, I move on to the actual page. I draw pages on pieces of bristol board which measure approximately 28cm x 35.5cm. My current batch of bristol board (which I started using as of page 2 in episode 8) is also made of partly recycled material, for what it's worth. I start by drawing the panel borders, usually measured out using a ruler, though occassionally (as with page 7 below) I just draw them in roughly. I do this if I'm not entirely sure what proportions some of the panels should be or if I'm still a little unsure on some parts of the layout. By just drawing in a rough sense of the panel borders I feel freer to draw outside of them, if need be.
Rough pencils of episode 8, page 7. Note the layout of the lower right corner has changed from the thumbnailed version.
After panel boundaries are in place, I do the rough pencils. In theory, I actually put in any dialogue/text first so that I know that the text will all fit and I don't waste time drawing stuff that's just going to get covered up by word balloons; however, this doesn't always happen, especially if I haven't gotten around to finalizing the dialogue yet and sometimes it comes back to bite me. Fortunately, I did everything in the correct order for this page.
Once dialogue is in place, I draw everything in pencil. I generally start out fairly rough and then refine it. For instance, I'll often use rough shapes (boxes, mainly) to position and size characters in relation to each other before getting too caught up in the details; some of those guidelines can be seen in the above pencils. I currently use a mechanical pencil for the pencilling stage, mostly because I don't have to worry about sharpening it constantly.
When pencils are done, I ink everything using a set of inking pens (one brush pen and a set of pens of varying widths), erase all the pencils, scan it in and colour everything in Photoshop. Colouring could really be its own post so for now it'll suffice to say that there's several annoying things about it.
Anyway, that's an overview of everything up until the colouring stage, at any rate. Perhaps in some future post I'll go into the details on colouring.
Until next time,
Freak Out,
-TfitC
Saturday, May 23, 2015
Quick Note
A very quick update to announce that the next page of The Word Smith is in its usual location.
Freak Out,
-TFitC
Freak Out,
-TFitC
Thursday, May 7, 2015
Isn't it Ironic?
After a much longer delay than intended (I have no excuse) the latest episode of The Word Smith makes its internet debut at the usual venue. I hope to get the next page up much quicker than this one, but as this weekend is looking to be somewhat busy it's probably not going to be up next week.
And now a discussion about irony.
One tricky thing about writing a comic about a grammar conscious super hero who fights to protect the English language (or thus he would claim) is that I really ought to at least make the effort to be as correct as possible with my grammar in the comic, and I am not a grammar nut. Granted, there's definitely some leeway with writing dialogue since real people don't always talk perfectly grammatically and they usually manage to understand each other just fine even so. But still, it's the principle of the matter, and, while I think I'm reasonably competent when it comes to writing and stuff (technical term, that, "stuff"), I don't really have any personal pet peeves and I don't really nitpick about the finer points of grammar or things like that. This can make coming up with topics a bit tricky.
Sorry, that was a bit long winded there. Moving onto the actual topic of the moment: irony.
As part of writing this episode of the comic, I did some reading up on definitions of irony to try to make sure I was using the term at least passingly correctly. It seems to me that irony is one of those things which is a bit nebulous: oh, there's definitions and examples and that's all well and good, but it's not something as well defined as, say, 2+2=4, and there seems to be some leeway as to what is or is not considered to be irony.
An example. Some people seem to think that sarcasm is (or can be) a form of verbal irony, but this is by no means universal and not all sarcasm is ironic.
The situation that I have set up in this episode has attempted to employ situational irony -- The Pen has gone to some lengths (to the point of turning off her phone) so that her boss cannot contact her and drag her into some language related escapades but, as today's page shows, language related escapades appear to be happening anyway. Is this ironic? I'm still undecided on the matter, which is why I have the Waitress (real name as yet undetermined) babble a bit about the subject in the final panel.
TLDR version: go look at this other comic which seems to match up with my thoughts on the matter fairly well. Also go read my comic.
Until next time
Freak Out,
-TFitC
And now a discussion about irony.
One tricky thing about writing a comic about a grammar conscious super hero who fights to protect the English language (or thus he would claim) is that I really ought to at least make the effort to be as correct as possible with my grammar in the comic, and I am not a grammar nut. Granted, there's definitely some leeway with writing dialogue since real people don't always talk perfectly grammatically and they usually manage to understand each other just fine even so. But still, it's the principle of the matter, and, while I think I'm reasonably competent when it comes to writing and stuff (technical term, that, "stuff"), I don't really have any personal pet peeves and I don't really nitpick about the finer points of grammar or things like that. This can make coming up with topics a bit tricky.
Sorry, that was a bit long winded there. Moving onto the actual topic of the moment: irony.
As part of writing this episode of the comic, I did some reading up on definitions of irony to try to make sure I was using the term at least passingly correctly. It seems to me that irony is one of those things which is a bit nebulous: oh, there's definitions and examples and that's all well and good, but it's not something as well defined as, say, 2+2=4, and there seems to be some leeway as to what is or is not considered to be irony.
An example. Some people seem to think that sarcasm is (or can be) a form of verbal irony, but this is by no means universal and not all sarcasm is ironic.
The situation that I have set up in this episode has attempted to employ situational irony -- The Pen has gone to some lengths (to the point of turning off her phone) so that her boss cannot contact her and drag her into some language related escapades but, as today's page shows, language related escapades appear to be happening anyway. Is this ironic? I'm still undecided on the matter, which is why I have the Waitress (real name as yet undetermined) babble a bit about the subject in the final panel.
TLDR version: go look at this other comic which seems to match up with my thoughts on the matter fairly well. Also go read my comic.
Until next time
Freak Out,
-TFitC
Tuesday, April 7, 2015
Rough Translation
Splurg!
That means, roughly translated, that the latest page of The Word Smith is up online in the usual locale. But don't just take my word for it, go see for yourself!
That is all, Freak Out,
-TFitC
That means, roughly translated, that the latest page of The Word Smith is up online in the usual locale. But don't just take my word for it, go see for yourself!
That is all, Freak Out,
-TFitC
Saturday, March 28, 2015
Charting a Course
Well! It's a bit later than intended, but the most recent page of The Word Smith is now up on the internets. The delay in getting this page up probably means that there won't be a page next week, unless I'm super fast about things, but don't hold your breath. Seriously. Breathing is important.
I also plan to continue the FFXI Let's Play! I just need a weekend afternoon (or equivalent) where I'm not otherwise distracted...
Anyway, that's all for the present.
Freak Out,
-TFitC
I also plan to continue the FFXI Let's Play! I just need a weekend afternoon (or equivalent) where I'm not otherwise distracted...
Anyway, that's all for the present.
Freak Out,
-TFitC
Tuesday, March 17, 2015
Those Three Cashiers
The latest page of The Word Smith is now online! This one took a little longer than expected to complete owing to some last minute changes to one of the panels. I should probably try to plan things a bit better. Anywho, the rough pencils are already more-or-less finished for the next page so hopefully it should be up more-or-less on schedule (I have a schedule?) next week.
This page also calls back to episode 2, which you should totally go read.
Freak Out,
-TFitC
This page also calls back to episode 2, which you should totally go read.
Freak Out,
-TFitC
Thursday, March 5, 2015
Walk in the Park
It is a joyous day, for the next page of The Word Smith has wandered onto the interwebs. It is full of stuff. And things happen. Read it, or something.
... And that is basically all there is to say about that! Hopefully the next page will be up in about a week.
Freak Out,
-TFitC
... And that is basically all there is to say about that! Hopefully the next page will be up in about a week.
Freak Out,
-TFitC
Sunday, March 1, 2015
Distant Worlds: Let's Play FF XI
Welcome to the first episode of my pseudo let's play of Final Fantasy XI. As to why this is a "pseudo" let's play and a few other details, see my previous post. Today is going to be mostly some background information and setting the stage, so let's get to it.
What is Final Fantasy XI?
As one might surmise from the name, FF XI is the eleventh entry in the long running Final Fantasy series. What might not be obvious from the name alone isthat FF XI was the first online entry in the series, making it fairly different from most of the rest of the series. It was originally released in Japan in 2002 and for PC in North America 2003. This would later be followed by a North American PS2 release, official European releases and an XBox 360 version. One of the unique aspects of FF XI is that all players played on the same pool of servers regardless of platform or region in which they lived.
FF XI was released whilst Everquest was basically the pre-eminent MMO of the day. In its height, FF XI boasted around 500 000 players which made it one of the larger MMOs of its time (see the second chart here). One could make the argument that FF XI was the last (or one of the last) successful pre-Warcraft MMOs. But that's something that is perhaps best left to the historians. For now, let's look at getting started...
In Character
The first thing one does in an MMO (and in many RPGs for that matter) is create a character. But I suspect you already knew that. Character creation in FF XI is, actually, kind of anemic compared even to other things of its time (to my knowledge, anyway.) Whilst I can only speculate as to why, I suggest the two following reasons: FF games, in general, don't place much emphasis on visual customization of characters, so Square-Enic (henceforth SE) was somewhat inexperienced in this matter, and PS2 limitations. Speaking of which, this seems like a good time to comment on one of the larger monkies on FF XI's back.
Humes. These are basically your boring old humans. They're the most balanced, in terms of stats. Nobody invites them to parties because they're boring.
Elvaans. These are, in theory, FF XI's version of elves, if elves were tall, awkward and gangly with long necks. Players sometimes called them "Dhalmel necks" after giraffe-like monsters in-game. Elvaan stats skew them towards melee fighters with high HP and low MP.
Tarutaru. The littlefolk of FF XI. Many of them have names that rhyme or containing repeated syllables, many also have various speech affectations, presumably because someone thought it would be cutaru. Tarutaru are skewed towards mages, particularly the kind that blow things up, having the highest MP but lowest MP. Fun fact: the name Tarutaru apparently comes from the Japanese pronunciation of Tartar sauce.
Galka. These are big, hulking meat bags. Technically, they are genderless though they are typically referred to in-game using male pronouns. Galka supposedly reproduce via some sort of cycle of reincarnation, but how that would actually work is a mystery. At any rate, Galka have the highest HP and lowest MP and are skewed to wards being tanky.
Mithra. These are a race of cat-people and are therefore the best, because cats. Male mithra are rare and thus are kept at home as breeders so only the females go out adventuring. This means only female mithra are actually playable. Mithra are probably the second most balanced after humes, being skewed towards dexterity.
Job Search
After picking a race, one picks a starting job. Being a Final Fantasy game, characters can switch jobs (and unlock new ones) later, but to start, one can pick one of six jobs. These jobs are the six classic FF jobs that first appeared in FFI. I won't go into much detail here, but here is a quick run down:
Warrior - wears heavy armour and can use a wide variety of weapons, but focuses on axes and great axes. At low levels can serve as a tank in a pinch, but is mostly a melee damage dealer.
Monk - wears light armour, uses hand-to-hand weapons and likes to punch things in the face. Or whatever the passes for the monster's face. Monks are pretty uncomplicated.
Thief - uses daggers and stabs things in the back. Also steals things because shinies. A melee class that does spike damage and can help control enmity/hate/agro levels.
White Mage - the classic Final Fantasy healer. They keep everyone alive and ticking. They also cast Holy. Holyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!
Black Mage - they cast the spells that make the people fall down.
Red Mage - supposedly a hybrid melee/mage that can cast white and black magic, but in practice ended up being mostly a support/healer. I could go on at great length about the short comings of red mages as implemented in FF XI, but I'll spare you all the rant (for now.)
Place Mats
The world of FF XI is called Vana'diel and the last thing the player selects when creating a character is one of three starting cities. These are:
The Kingdom of San d'Oria. A castle town at the north end of the Ronfaure forest, the kingdom is primarily inhabited by Elvaans. San d'Orians are a somewhat xenophobic bunch and, oddly enough, have french inspired names and have a religion headed by a strangely pope-like figure. I do not judge, I merely report. San d'Oria is at odds with the reptile-like Orcs.
The Republic of Bastok. Affectionately refered to as "Lastok," the Republic is an industrial mining town in the Gustaberg region which is the least visually of all of the starter regions owing to basically being a blasted wasteland. Bastok is home to predominantly Hume and Galka populations. The local beastmen are the turtle-like Quadav.
The Federation of Windurst. Located at the southern end of othe Sarutabaruta savannahs, Windurst is home to the Tarutaru and Mithra and is, therefor, the best (owing to the Mithra, not the easily puntable, bite-sized Tarutaru.) The Federation has an uneasy peace with the bird-like Yagudo.
Guide Lines
And this brings us almost to the end of our inaugural episode. Before we go, lets meet the tour guides for this Let's Play.
Mirayrl was my main character and will (I expect) serve as the primary guide for the Let's Play, but Beruthiel will likely show up from time to time.
I'm going to try to keep these generally less wordy than this post and hope to push through at a steady rate. Next time, the plan is to cover levels 1-30 of one of the starting nation storyline. If anyone is still reading and has a preference, should I start with Windurst, Bastok or San d'Oria?
Freak Out,
-TFitC
What is Final Fantasy XI?
As one might surmise from the name, FF XI is the eleventh entry in the long running Final Fantasy series. What might not be obvious from the name alone isthat FF XI was the first online entry in the series, making it fairly different from most of the rest of the series. It was originally released in Japan in 2002 and for PC in North America 2003. This would later be followed by a North American PS2 release, official European releases and an XBox 360 version. One of the unique aspects of FF XI is that all players played on the same pool of servers regardless of platform or region in which they lived.
FF XI was released whilst Everquest was basically the pre-eminent MMO of the day. In its height, FF XI boasted around 500 000 players which made it one of the larger MMOs of its time (see the second chart here). One could make the argument that FF XI was the last (or one of the last) successful pre-Warcraft MMOs. But that's something that is perhaps best left to the historians. For now, let's look at getting started...
In Character
The first thing one does in an MMO (and in many RPGs for that matter) is create a character. But I suspect you already knew that. Character creation in FF XI is, actually, kind of anemic compared even to other things of its time (to my knowledge, anyway.) Whilst I can only speculate as to why, I suggest the two following reasons: FF games, in general, don't place much emphasis on visual customization of characters, so Square-Enic (henceforth SE) was somewhat inexperienced in this matter, and PS2 limitations. Speaking of which, this seems like a good time to comment on one of the larger monkies on FF XI's back.
PS2 Limitations. FF XI was (perhaps still is) tethered to the PS2. While it was a decent enough system for it's time, it has a number of limitations compared to more upgradable systems like the PC, most notably (I think) it's limited memory. It became somewhat of a joke among the players that "PS2 Limitations" prevented any number of things from being added to the game. Regardless, things did well enough, technical limitations aside.Anywho... the first part of character creation is picking a race of which FF XI provides five choices:
 |
| FF XI Races from left to righ: Hume, Elvaan, Tarutaru, Galka, Mithra |
 |
| The majestic Elvaan - er, Dhalmel. |
Tarutaru. The littlefolk of FF XI. Many of them have names that rhyme or containing repeated syllables, many also have various speech affectations, presumably because someone thought it would be cutaru. Tarutaru are skewed towards mages, particularly the kind that blow things up, having the highest MP but lowest MP. Fun fact: the name Tarutaru apparently comes from the Japanese pronunciation of Tartar sauce.
Galka. These are big, hulking meat bags. Technically, they are genderless though they are typically referred to in-game using male pronouns. Galka supposedly reproduce via some sort of cycle of reincarnation, but how that would actually work is a mystery. At any rate, Galka have the highest HP and lowest MP and are skewed to wards being tanky.
Mithra. These are a race of cat-people and are therefore the best, because cats. Male mithra are rare and thus are kept at home as breeders so only the females go out adventuring. This means only female mithra are actually playable. Mithra are probably the second most balanced after humes, being skewed towards dexterity.
Job Search
After picking a race, one picks a starting job. Being a Final Fantasy game, characters can switch jobs (and unlock new ones) later, but to start, one can pick one of six jobs. These jobs are the six classic FF jobs that first appeared in FFI. I won't go into much detail here, but here is a quick run down:
Warrior - wears heavy armour and can use a wide variety of weapons, but focuses on axes and great axes. At low levels can serve as a tank in a pinch, but is mostly a melee damage dealer.
Monk - wears light armour, uses hand-to-hand weapons and likes to punch things in the face. Or whatever the passes for the monster's face. Monks are pretty uncomplicated.
Thief - uses daggers and stabs things in the back. Also steals things because shinies. A melee class that does spike damage and can help control enmity/hate/agro levels.
White Mage - the classic Final Fantasy healer. They keep everyone alive and ticking. They also cast Holy. Holyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!
Black Mage - they cast the spells that make the people fall down.
Red Mage - supposedly a hybrid melee/mage that can cast white and black magic, but in practice ended up being mostly a support/healer. I could go on at great length about the short comings of red mages as implemented in FF XI, but I'll spare you all the rant (for now.)
Place Mats
The world of FF XI is called Vana'diel and the last thing the player selects when creating a character is one of three starting cities. These are:
 |
| San d'Oria |
 |
| Fireworks in Bastok |
 |
| Cherry trees in Windurst |
Guide Lines
And this brings us almost to the end of our inaugural episode. Before we go, lets meet the tour guides for this Let's Play.
I'm going to try to keep these generally less wordy than this post and hope to push through at a steady rate. Next time, the plan is to cover levels 1-30 of one of the starting nation storyline. If anyone is still reading and has a preference, should I start with Windurst, Bastok or San d'Oria?
Freak Out,
-TFitC
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