What’s Next?

in which our hero shares

Dear Readers,

So, what’s next? After finishing fulfillment of the Kickstarter for The Blood of Seven Queens #6, I find myself at a bit of an impasse. On the one hand, I would like to get started on #7 straight away. On the other hand, I know that I have World Anvil’s Worldbuilding Summer Campcoming up in July, and do I really want to start working on #7 for a month only to stop on July 1 and lose whatever momentum I’ve got going?

The answer is no. The answer is I’m going to take a pause on generating pages for the comic for two months. The hope is that I’ll refuel myself with worldbuilding fun and by messing around with new artistic tools and techniques.

To pacify that part of myself that wants to be making at least some kind of forward progress on #7, my plan is to focus my efforts on building out the two cities that will be home to more of the comic’s action over the next several years than anywhere else.

I’ve already made some cool progress on a map for the city of Saltgate, where the bulk of issue #7 will take place—and I’ve figured out a technique for turning that hand-drawn 2D map into the base of a 3D landscape I can use to build out the city in the comic. If all goes well with that, I’ll start in on the other city that I need to flesh out: the Emerald City.

Folks who’ve been around a while know that depicting the Emerald City as I envision it has been a struggle since issue #0 of the series. If this technique I’m using for Saltgate works, I think I may have finally found a way to make everything easier for landscape establishing shots going forward.

So, that’s all for now. I hope to get back to weekly updates by moving my writing day to Fridays (a day I work from home, which gives me hours back in my day that I normally lose to commuting). Fingers crossed!

Yours,
Chris