There’s been a lot of work on Cosmic Dash that I’ve not really made known, and I feel a bit bad for keeping you guys out of the loop.

So, here is a part of a larger drawing I am doing for the comic, a kind of splash page of sorts. The final image is more of a metaphor than anything that actually happens during the first book.

Oh, did I say first book? More on that later. Anyway, enjoy the image and start wondering what it means.

I have a cold right now, but that hasn’t stopped me from starting to draw the new comics! I’m going to take it easy on them though, no sense getting worked up and stressed out over this sort of thing.

However, I’ll gladly show you a little of what I’ve done so far. Click here to see a couple drawings from the page of the Lucky Strike. Remember the redesign that popped up in my artdump? That’s the end result you see there.

I’ve noticed that the ships tend to be very messy and complicated when I sketch them out on the template, so what I’ve done is I’ve drawn the ships on a separate piece of paper and will composite those drawings onto the rest of the page before I start inking. I don’t know what other elements will get that kind of treatment, but I think due to how complex those ships can get, it’s a smart move on my part.

Anyway, just another example of the process. I am hoping to at least have one page to post by the end of the week, we’ll see how that goes.

Part of the fun in drawing these new comics is having the ability to go back and tweak things from their original designs. In my previous post, I discussed the fact the the Lucky Strike received an overhaul, that of course meant the internal aspects had to fit this new shell as well.

This panel shows a couple of aspects about the new helm of the ship. In prior designs, the helm was a room tucked onto the port-side of the ship, separate from the bridge. While this was pretty cool and gave the ship a feel that was similar to The Millennium Falcon, it wasn’t feasible with the new design, so I had to make a compromise.

Now, the helm is still in it’s own kind of "room" however it is a room built into the bridge itself. The  hastily drawn image below should illustrate what I mean:

The helm has seats for two vital crew-members. The pilot (Senn "Kracker" Toucair), and the Captain (Mara Senten). Kracker’s seat is built for comfort and accessibility when it comes to using the flight-wheel. Flight-wheels are really only required for landing and when maneuvering needs to be handled with finesse. See the large panel against the wall? That’s a large-screen-interface (touch screen) that allows the captain to program the computer to take routes and perform automated flight. Aside from showing the route, it displays a lot of information on other aspects of the ship. There are several monitors located in the helm as well including two highly-mobile and adjustable monitors that are geared specifically for the pilot to have the ability to view the surrounding area from any part of the ship he wishes. The ship will also display urgent alerts on these. Perhaps the most important screen for the pilot is "windshield" itself, which is coated with a layer of electrons to form a window-wide monitor, this is also capable of displaying anything Kracker wants. Generally, he likes a small portion devoted to viewing the underside of the ship since pirates tend to sneak up on ships from underneath (three-dimensional space, after all).

Mara’s seat however is more like a standard office-rolling-chair. She is never in one space too long. She also performs duties such as being a navigator and communications officer. Her section has several monitors displaying various information which are in turn all touch-based. Her touch-board is similar to a keyboard, only the keys are able to be grouped as the user sees fit, and is a more specialized and pressure-sensitive screen. However, any instances where she is sitting down are rare, as she’s obligated to move around the ship constantly to where she’s needed, and often NOT needed, a hands on personality being a trait of many great captains.

Anyway, hopefully you guys found this interesting!

Unfortunately, some misfortunes or sorts have occurred in my household, things which I won’t mention, but enough that I’m very, very exhausted from dealing with it. Despite this, I at least have the pencils to the next page completed. I have decided one update a week is perfectly reasonable for myself, and I am going to stick to it for you guys.

This should be a fun upcoming page. I’ve really played with camera angles and such lately, so the composition will certainly be more dynamic than most of my prior comics.

I think not forcing myself to work quickly and just doing one comic a week, each week is actually rather therapeutic. I am certainly less likely to crank out a bunch of quick, sloppy pages. Grow dissatisfied with how they look and re-draw them all over again. Yes. I have done that on several occasions. Not exactly because I drew them sloppily, but if I have a number of comics done, and my hyper-critical nature gets the better of me, I start to get real antsy.

How are you guys enjoying these updates about the comic? Are they pretty entertaining? Do they make you interested in what is going to happen next? How do you like today’s sketches? Am I asking too many questions?

Anyway, enough of that. One more sketch before I depart and work on a guest comic for a fellow Scienteer.