Comments For ARW Page 457

Join the celebration. ARW had been online for three years today. Starting into the forth year, we can look ahead to Page 500 which is only 43 pages away. After that ARW will come to a final conclusion and I'll start concentrating on my new web comic, which will be starting in another month (June 6th to be exact - the same day Dungeons and Dragons 4th ED comes out, which is what the new comic will be based on).

For now lets enjoy the celebration, although I don't think Slara is too happy with the situation. It looks like the Rhino King wishes to take her as his wife and queen. She might be honored if she wasn't in a hurry to save her friends.

What will happen to Balap? Hopefully as her friend, he might be allowed some freedom. We'll just have to wait and see.

Sorry the backgrounds are a little plain. I spent a long time just drawing all the people into each scene. Crowd scenes always take a lot of work. If I had unlimited time I might have put in more people and had decorations on the walls. As it is, it took 10 hours just to draw everything I did draw.

My foot is starting to heal. It's still painful to walk very far on it but I can get around the house well enough. The swelling has gone down. I just have to wait for the new layer of skin to be thick enough to protect my nerve endings. I'm sure it will be tender for a few more days at least.

Peace, love and happiness to you all.

Comments For ARW Page 456

Who is the Volcano Queen? What difficulty have our heroes gotten themselves into now? The cliche answer is that they (or at least Slara - assuming she's a virgin) will be thrown into the volcano. I wouldn't use that old troupe now, would I.

I would have had this page up last night but several things conspired against me. Not the least of which is that my computer decided to slow down considerably and then stop all together. Fortunately I was able to save, being alert to trouble, but I still lost precious time restarting my computer and Photoshop.

On top of that, I had a second degree burn on my right foot where I had dropped a hot cup of tea. I should have been watching what I was doing and blame myself for the whole accident. I was not the one to boil the tea or to set it on an unsteady surface, but I should have been aware of the danger and been more cautious.

There is a large blister on top of my foot which doesn't hurt or cause me pain. It does prevent me from wearing shoes which makes it hard to go anywhere. It's better that I stay home and rest anyway.

Comments For ARW Page 455

whoops, looks like the natives are unset that Slara has removed her disguise. Maybe Chahex should have maintained it a bit longer.

Now that Slara has her snout back, I'll have to reacquaint myself with how to draw it. Her ears are different in her normal form as well. The head shape is the same for both so the transition from one to the other is mild. Which look do you like better? They are both similar, but I find the human head easier to draw.

I've reused the cage once again. I hope no one minds, since it is a lot of work to redraw it. I flipped it this time so it doesn't look the same.


I also reused the skulls on sticks. I was worried that the rows of identical skulls would look weird, but the symmetry works. It would look worse if they were all slightly different. I'd either have to completely redraw them of leave them the same, and I did the lather since it was less work. It takes me too long to do a page as it is, so the simple solution is the best solution.

Nothing to report on other fronts. It's been quiet . . . too quiet.

Comment For ARW Page 454

Looks like Chahex won't be much help until they can wake him up. Does Slara really want to remove her disguise anyway? Of the three, she is the only one still disguised. We'll have to see what happens when Chahex wakes up.

Instead of redrawing the cage, I duplicated it and used it in panel 1 and panel 5. However, it took considerable work - almost as much as if I had redrawn it - to close the cage door. I also put a bottom on the cage since it's clear that Balap and Slara would just fall out otherwise. Kang is too small for the cage and was allowed to go. Presumably he is following the procession.

I tried to get a head start on this page as I had done with the previous one. Unfortunately, it was not to be and I was delayed more then I would have liked. I should be able to get Wednesday's comic up earlier but we'll see. The group should reach the native village by then and who knows how hard that will be to draw.

Not much to report. I continue to try to make connections but It's hard to talk to people. All I can do is keep trying. I'll see you Wednesday.

Comments For ARW Page 453

There's only one cage, so it looks like Balap and Slara are going to be in a tight space for a while. Not a very private place either.

I got the page done tonight but it's late so I'll wait until tomorrow to blog. For now just enjoy the comic.

Edit: Sorry for the delay. I forgot I hadn't finished this yet.

I started this page earlier then normal and was able to get it finished before I went to bed. Because of this I spend more time on the drawings, especially the cage in the last panel. If you've see my last attempts at drawing cages, you know how much of an improvement this is. (although some of my drawing of the steel cage in Slara's house were okay).

I can't guarantee that I'll keep drawing the cage like this, but I'll try to keep the art consistent.

If your not reading Dandy and Company then you're missing out on some great comic stories. The art style looks like a kids comic but the action and adventure is something anyone can enjoy. The story can get serious in places but usually it's a laugh a day riot.

The reason I bring Dandy&Co. to your attention now is that the creator, Derrick Fish, is planning to animate the characters and needs your help. Check out the note below the current comic for more information. Because I'm a trained animator, I offered to help with the animation. It would be good to work on a small independent project like this. I hope everyone loves the idea as much as I do.

Comments For ARW Page 452

Looks like our friends have been captured by some African bushmen or whatever the equivalent is on this planet. They are very effective hunters, whoever they are.

I started working on this page earlier then I normally do since it has been taking me longer then normal to do the pages with the busy backgrounds. I also knew I wanted to do the large panel at the top. I'm glad that I was able to get the page done in time.

It actually wasn't as hard as I though it would be. It's nice to be able to capture the vision in your head and translate it to the page. The background is simple but effective. I believe I got the perspective right as well. Perhaps it's a little off, but it's not noticeable unless you really look for it, which most comic readers don't do.

Speaking of perspective. How do you like the little visual trick in the second panel? Since Balap is shorter then Slara, I turned the camera on an angle so that they would be at the same height. I think it works. Do you?

Between working on my webcomic and working on a logo for a client, I really haven't had much time lately to work on anything else. Since I have tomorrow free, I will spend most of the day working on my new web comic. I really must force myself to put more effort into my comics if I want to be a success. June 6 is only a little over a month away and I want to release my new comic at the same time Dungeons and Dragons Forth Edition is released. With any luck I'll be able to get my comic into Dragon Magazine. I know it's only a slim chance, but I can dream can't I?

Comments For ARW Page 451

What could they be looking at? You'll likely be as surprised by the answer as they are. No, Kang hasn't invited the creature to tea. I said it was surprising not bazaar.

Once again I'm late getting this up. Besides all the extra work that's been going into the comic lately, I've been having a lot of computer problems that are getting annoying. I think it stems from the fact that my hard drive is getting full. I'm going to have to clear out some old files so that I can free up some space. Hopefully that will fix the glitches I've been having lately.

I've found a collection of Sherlock Holmes stories on audio tape that I've been listening to as I've worked on this page. I've listened to three stories so far and they closely follow the old Sherlock Holmes mysteries TV show. Or I should say the TV show must have followed the books very closely. Interestingly each story is about 44 minutes long, the same length as a hour long TV show (not including commercials). I should try to follow one of the stories in the printed version to see how closely the tapes follow the original words. Perhaps I'm actually listening to an audio version of the TV show.

EDIT: I've listened to another recording and can now verily that the audio recordings don't follow the short stories at all. Much of the dialogue is the same but some additions are added and text has been rearranged. A set up scene was added to the beginning of all the stories in order to make them seem more dramatic. I don't have any of the TV shows to verify if the recordings are the same as what was on TV, but the fact the the stories seem very familiar to me and that the recordings are all about 44 minutes in length seems to suggest that is the case. At the very least, the audio recordings have more in common with the TV show then with the original text.

Comments For ARW Page 450

Well, that didn't work. Now Balap and Slara are trapped. What are they going to do now?

Once again the complex artwork has made this update late. I'm sure no one minds since this is all a free service anyway. There are likely many who only visit once a week or month anyway.

I like the scales on the lizard's nose in the last panel. I'll have to use this technique in the future.

I'm currently working on a Logo for a caregiver association. It's not much money, but it's local so maybe it will lead to more work in the area.

I'm still struggling to manage my time better. I'll post more when I've got something to report.

Comments For ARW Page 449

What does Slara have in mind? Seems kind of dangerous to stand so close to a cliff. She's going to have to time this pretty carefully.

I hope my fan(s) enjoy this page as I spend a good 10 hours putting it together. This is only the second page that's taken me all day to create. As the backgrounds get more details, the length of time grows longer. However, there is a certain sense of accomplishment to doing some nice backgrounds.

Sorry there are no scales on the reptile this time. That would have taken way too much time. It would look better with scales, especially the forth panel, but I'm really too busy right now to even consider fixing it. If people ask me to, I'll put them in but I don't think too many people will care at this point.

As I said before, not many people seem to read my comic. I don't know if it's because it's a long form comic and people want to read it when it's done or if it's just because the story sucks and no one wants to read it at all. It can't be the art since its as good as most comics out there and better then a lot of more popular comics. I know there isn't a strong story line and little reason to care for the characters and I think that's what's putting people off. Since I'm not getting any feedback I can only guess at what the problem is.

I'm going to fix all the story issues in my next webcomic. Then I'll know for sure whether the problem is the story or the format. Maybe I'll need to advertise more. I'll wait until I have the first story arc done before I'll go that route.

Comments For ARW Page 448

Slara looks a little shocked at seeing a giant lizard standing behind her. I'm sure anyone would wet themselves if they were in the same situation. Good thing She's a trained warrior. She might actually have a chance to survive this encounter.

A lot of work when into the page, as you can see, so I hope you can excuse it's lateness. It took a while to put the scales on the lizard in the last panel. Originally, I had planed to just leave the skin flat, but I felt it would look better with scales. I'm glad I added them as it really brings the creature to life.

Originally, I hadn't drawn backgrounds for Slara in the two left-most panels. As you can see there is no black outline around the colors. It looked weird to see just a single color behind her (even though I've done this many times before) and so I colored in more detail to make the scene look better.

I've done some more work on Dungeon Warden and Dragon Lady (working title). There is now a nice inked picture of the characters on the Word Press blog and I've written the first 5 pages of the comic. I'll try to get some more pages written today. I'm hoping to get the comic up and viewable Sometime in May or Early June. I may be getting a new website for the comic which is exciting. I'll let you know when I have the details.

Comments For ARW Page 447

Slara seems to have bad luck whenever she tries to land on her feet. Remember back on page 336 when she had a perfect 3 point landing and then slipped on a rock. This is much worse.

As you can see this page has more detail then I usually draw, so the page is late because of it. Thursday's are pretty busy for me anyway, so I didn't have the time to devote to this page was I would have liked.

There was a major error on the last page (page 446) that no one seems to have noticed. I hadn't colored Balap's hair in any of the panels he appears in. It was only after I nearly made that mistake again on this page, that I realized I hadn't colored his hair on the last page either.

I'll fix the error in a minute, but my question is this, "Is anyone reading my comic?" Most webcomic artists have readers who take great delight in pointing out any minor errors in a webcomic, but no one points out even major errors on my site. I realize I have a small reader ship, but I have to wonder if I have any real readers at all. Maybe I'm just getting a steady stream of people who are finding my comic while surfing the net and none of them come back again.

Well, I'm hoping that will all change when I release my new webcomic. I'm trying to do the next one right. I'm developing the characters so that they all have interesting personalities that will clash with and support each other. I'm also writing the story ahead of time so that I know what's happening on each page long before I actually draw it. The first story arch will be a 32 page comic book style that will introduce the characters. Once the arch is finished, I'll make it available to purchase online (probably through Ka-Blam). We'll see how it goes after that.

I'm getting excited to start my new comic. The characters are much more interesting this time and the interaction will hopefully make them more appealing to the readers. My current comic is kind of blah, and I really don't know how to fix it. It's better just to end it and start something new.

Comments For ARW Page 446

Slara seems to be in quite a hurry. Now, why would that be? Was there something Horese said that would indicate that she didn't have much time? Is she trying to gain extra time in order to trap or outwit Horese? Could she maybe have something else in mind? We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

The first panel took a long time to draw, not just because there are four people in it, but because there is one person I rarely draw and two people I've never drawn before. I do seem to be getting better at drawing random people.

Other then a extra bit of work, there wasn't too much to this page. I think it gets the point across.

I put some of my freelance work in my Deviant Art gallery. I've been getting a few good projects lately, but nothing that pays very well. I anyone has any commission work I could do let me know. My rates are pretty cheap.

Comments For ARW Page 445

Balap and Kang are at least safe, but how long can that last if they must go to Monkey Island? By the way, this is a completely different Monkey Island. Nope, no relation to that game at all.

The colors are really vibrant because it's full daylight now. The candle burned out long ago.

I've used the motion blur before, but I really should use these special filters more often. I wanted to blur Kang so that you couldn't tell who was attacking Slara, but it's still pretty clear. Oh well, you learn the truth in the next panel anyway.

I like how Slara looks in the last panel. That serious face has a lot more character then the other versions. I'll have to see if I can do that again.

I finally finished the freelance project I was working on. I'll put the drawings on Deviant Art sometime later. I've done quite a few drawing I haven't put up. I'm going to have to start scanning some stuff in for you to see. Maybe I spend some time tomorrow doing that. That's assuming nothing else comes up first.

Comments For ARW Page 444

Things just keep getting worse. What has happened to Balap? Looks like Slara's journey is off to a bad start.

Lots of backgrounds on this page. Nothing too complex but it always takes more time to do backgrounds.

I put Slara in a few odd positions this time, so it took a few redraws to get it right. I'm not entirely happy with the way she looks here, but I did the best I could.

This page is up latter then normal, but it isn't entirely my fault this time. I mean the page did take extra time because of the extra detail, but the main reason the page was late was that my wireless Wi-Fi connection disappeared. I don't mean I lost the connection, I mean it was completely gone as if it had never existed.

After restarting my computer five times, I was able to get the connection back. But the next time I went into hibernation it disappeared again. I did a web search and found out that this is a common problem with HP laptops and the Broadcom Wi-Fi card. I spend several hours looking for a fix that didn't involve sending the computer in for repairs (many posters said they had a nightmare trying to get HP to fix the problem, including sending the computer in four times to fix it and losing access to the computer for four months in the process). I did find a solution that involved making the WLAN drive files read only so they can't be over written (which seems to be part of the problem). This solution seems to help. I can still lose the connection but it's not as hard to bring it back.

This problem has make me late getting my other work done as well, so I haven't gotten much done with my new webcomic project. I did sketch out the characters, so I'll put that picture up on the wordpress blog later today. I'll see you Monday.

Comments For ARW Page 443

Slara's gone from the frying pan and into the fire. It's a long way down. I wonder how she's going to survive?

I've been drawing a lot of people lately and I think it shows in my drawing of Slara. It was almost too easy to pose her for this page. I'm amazed at how good I'm getting at this.

I'm most surprised at the last panel. I just pulled that perspective completely out of my head. Then I added the waves and some highlights and the whole image just pops from the page. If there is one problem with it, it's that Slara looks like she's way out over the water instead of falling out of the window. Maybe the cliff face slants under the castle - yeah, that's it.

I've been working on a new freelance project that requires me to draw several young woman, which is kind of nice. I feel that I need to put more effort into the project then I do in my webcomic because I'm doing it for someone else. Because of this, the project is taking a lot of time. This means I can't do any work on my new webcomic, which I'm disappointed about. I have been thinking about it during my breaks, but it's not developing very quickly. I should be done by this weekend, so I'll try to get something done then.

Comments For ARW Page 442

Hey, Slara you might want to look behind you. This scene may not actually happen but it's fun to think about.

I think this is the most work I've put into a cover. That's not to say it's the most work I've put into a drawing. I have done a few pictures that have taken a few days to complete while this page only took 6 hours to make.

It's has a nice cartoon look to it, so I kind of like it. The idea was to copy a cover from an old children's comic book. The title comes from an old movie title, which I'm sure most people recognize. This is a hint about what the next chapter will be about.

I'm still working on my new comic but things are going slower then I had hoped. Other things keep interfering with my time and I really need to focus on what's really important. I hope to be able to put something on the wordpress blog tomorrow. I have a few things to do but I should be able to do something. Go over to dungeonwarden.wordpress.com and see what's going on.

Comments For ARW Page 441

Slara is all alone. What is she going to do? Get out of there as fast as she can, that's what she's going to do.

Thus ends another chapter of ARW. The next chapter will be the first one that Racheal is not the central character. The story will follow Slara as she tries to decide what to do next. Monday's page will be a nice cover image that will hint at what is going to happen. I'll leave that for you to imagine for yourself.

For my next web comic, I'm still debating if I should go completely for the laughs, completely serious, or somewhere in between. I want to do the comic in a different style with well constructed characters, but I also would like a simple style that will allow me to make more updates. I want to go completely black and white so I can use a looser style, but I also what the pages to look nice. I'm really going to have to play around with this for a while until I get the perfect mix of quality art but nothing too stressful to draw.

This will be a very character driven story as well, so I need to write the characters in a realistic way and have lots of interaction between them. They are very different people but their goals are very similar, so that they will work together but will step on each others toes as well. I want to do this right so it will be a while before the first page ever goes online. When it does, I hope to release a full 30 page comic book to introduce the characters.

Comments For ARW Page 440

Oops, looks like Racheal's down. The girls actually lost the battle. Looks like this is the end ... or not.

This cold/flu thing is still hanging on but I'm recovering my strength. This will be the last page without any background detail for a while, so it's good that I have my strength back.

My next chapter will have lots of different backgrounds so I can practice them. The characters will be moving outside again, so expect more details.

I'm also working on a new comic and I put a short description of the main characters on a wordpress blog. This isn't a finalized list but I think it's a good mix. I'll draw up some character designs and some story details as I continue the blog. This blog is mainly for ARW, so I felt a development blog dedicated to the new comic would be a good idea.

I'll see you all on Friday (sooner if you go to the other blog).

Comments For ARW Page 439

Looks like Racheal pulled a fast one on Horese. Can she keep it up or will Horese slam her. Return Wednesday and find out.


Nothing special about the art. I'm finally over my cold (or flu or whatever it was) but I'm still a little drained. Hopefully a good nights sleep will cure that.

I should have some new information about my next webcomic tomorrow. I've been thinking about the characters and I'll write them up soon.

I want to help others get better with their art, but I need to get better myself. Does anyone what me to teach them at my current skill level? I doubt it. I'm going to put a lot more effort into my next web comic and hopefully learn the skills I need to be completive. I've gotten so much better, but I still have a long way to go.

Does anyone know if there is an online artists support group? Maybe I should start one.

Comments For ARW Page 438

Racheal has cat-like reflexes. Odd how that works. Strange how Horese keeps calling her Katt. Long time readers should know why, but that brings up a whole other series of questions.

This page took a long time to draw, especially the first panel. That one panel took as long to draw as the whole last page did. The rest of the page took that much time again.

I'm thinking of ending ARW after the next two chapters and finishing up the story. The comic has been running about three years now and hasn't been having a lot of success. Lots of people have been reading the archives, but I don't get many people returning on a regular basis.

I tried to do a strip comic (split shift) but we all know what a mess that was.

I'm going to write up a story and develop characters for a new webcomic based on the new Dungeon and Dragons forth Edition RPG. I've been reading about the rules changes and new character classes and races, and there are some interesting developments in the game that would be fun to draw. I especially like the new battle tactics rules. I can see being able to do battle scenes that would make great drawings because of all the interesting things you can do each round. I'm going to take my time and do this right.

It will still be a few months before the new rule books are released, so I'll spend that time developing the characters and story. In the meantime I'll keep working on ARW and finish up the story. I hope people will support me during this time of change.

I'll see you all on Monday.