Photo Issue #2, Page 12

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Whenever I go on trips, I always make sure I have my camera with me. I never know what kind of interesting things I’ll run into. I have a whole folder of “potential photos” The folder grew so much that I made sub-folders like “Buildings,” “Vehicles,” “Nature,” “WTF?” and the like. Then some of those folders needed to grow further and now I have sub-sub-folders like “Livable Buildings,” “Demolished Buildings,” “Creepy Nature” and so on so forth. I have each file named, and I have an idea of where they are. Whenever I need a specific type of building, I peruse the folders.

I’ve had many for a long time that I don’t know where they were taken. I can make some guesses what city this is from, but nothing exact. I also made sure to remove any identifying marks, such as address #s or things like that. I’d hate for someone to get harassed because of my art. I do love these buildings though. So much character.

This picture is not of an asylum or a psychiatric ward or anything like that. I’m pretty sure it’s just someone house.

Photo Issue #2, Page 11

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Writing these pages is a pain in my wrist. It requires a lot of focus, and a lot of pressure. I like how they turn out through.

I also took a picture of the pages with the similar letters circled. Unfortunately, it made both letters hard to read, and just looked cluttered. So I used the clean pages instead. Soon though, the pages will transform into something else, and I look forward to that.

In the original drawn comic book, this and the next few pages were not included. It jumped from Hones being told about the other killer, to him just talking about some similarities. I actually had an entirely separate comic written of him exploring what happens here. While I've yet to return to that full comic, this and the next couple of pages explore this previous killer.

Updating the pages

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After preparing Issue #3 and #4 for release, I realized a problem. Between when I initially released #3 and #4 and now, I made some pretty significant changes to how I was doing the photo issues. With those changes, it made reading between #1 and #2 a bit difficult. Specifically, Detective Thomas Hones' font and background changed between the two sets. I like the current font I'm using, but was displeased with the size of the white backgrounds. I've gone through every single page with Detective Hones' speech, and made adjustments. On some pages, the change is just a few pixels, and others free up a lot of space.

While this change was made to make the transition between Issue #3 and #4 easier, I hope it also helps the pages. It makes Hones' lines feel more succinct, and should allow the page to be more visible.

An example of the differences. 
Original: 

New:

Photo Issue #2, Page 10

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My problem with using actors and taking pictures of someones face is that once I have established that "This is Agent Wu's face," I have to use that same actor every time. What happens when I need a page, but the actor isn't available? Maybe they are out of town for the week, month, year? Maybe they died? O maybe they're just dead to me because we had a falling out? Do I now awkwardly tip-toe around not taking this one specific character's face? Or do I try to establish a new face of the same character? Whatever happens, once I have a picture of someones face, they are now that character, and changing it won't be easy and it's risky. I don't want to use actors for that reason.

But shadow play on the wall? Not only will it go well with what happens in the future of this comic, it looks interesting, it can convey emotion, and I don't have to worry about re-using a face. I'm really happy with this page, and I hope my readers are, too.

But story line wise... in my drawn comic of this, what just occurred took a couple more pages, and was pretty damn clear. I understand what's going, so do my test readers... but I know what was supposed to happen, and my test readers know the story as well. How about you, internet readers, did you follow what happened over the last couple of pages with Detective White?

Photo Issue #2, Page 9

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Sometimes my pages are not photos, but stolen from the internet and edited. For this page, I simply googled "White Female News Anchor." I was overjoyed when I found an individual whose name was easily converted into Lisa Flowers. The only letter that the original photo did not give me was the letter "u" for my fake conservative news station, which I just stole from the w in news. Perfect? No, but I'm pleased with it. This is also the easiest page to find the skull in. Maybe...too easy. Hrm, I'll have to consider that.

I do not use Photoshop, but a similar program named GIMP. If you are an artist who cannot afford a full version of Photoshop, GIMP is an amazing substitute. I haven't used a full version of Photoshop in years, but when I converted over to GIMP it had many similar features and a very similar feel. It is free software made by free developers, so it won't have all the flashy support that Photoshop or other professional photo-editing software does... but you can still make beautiful work with it. I highly recommend it to anyone and everyone.

Photo Issue #2, Page 8

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News vans, just like cop cars, is always a thing I find when I can't take a picture. Maybe I don't have my camera on me, maybe I'm rushing to work, but I could never get the picture I wanted. I wanted a news van parked on the side of a street. I went down to a local rally that I knew the local news stations would be covering, but every van I could find was surrounded by people. This photo is supposed to feel like there was no-one around, and so as opposed to a picture of a news surrounded with people I went to wheres news vans are always parked: news stations.

At this time I'd like to apologize for my absence in pages.  I am currently suffering from a knee injury. At the time of this writing, I'm attempting to go on short term disability and potentially get surgery. Putting any weight on my leg causes me an extreme amount of pain. Seeing as my photographs involve a lot of footwork, its been harder to continue my comic book.  I do love doing this though, and I really hope I can continue.

Photo Issue #2, Page 7

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I'll be honest, I feel this is one of poorest efforts of a page.  I wanted to buy a police badge for Detective White. I couldn't find good ones from the fun and cheap local all year round Halloween store, and purchasing good replicas on line was more than I could afford (both the Cover photo and page 6 were relatively cheap investments which I might use in my daily life... a fake police badge is not). So I decided to just go with the hand cuffs... which broke while I was using them. On top of that, as mentioned in the Page 6 blog, I was a little disheartened how the two pictures were coming out, and I was running into a deadline.

Lesson is, sometimes art doesn't turn out how you want it to, and you gotta use what you got. In this case, I feel like the less interesting page lets the reader focus more on the story. What happens, story wise, in this page is pretty heartbreaking. By now it should be obvious that this issue, if not this entire collection, asks the question of "What is justice?" I think this page lets that idea start really sinking in.

Photo Issue #2, Page 6

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When originally written, this page and the following were supposed to be very similar. I bought the crowbar and staged it in the way you'll see in page 7.  When it came to take this picture and the following page, I was displeased with the similarity between them.  While pacing, trying to think of what to do with either of the pages, I passed the glove on the ground behind my residence and noticed the thumb was bent over, like holding something.  If I was using actors, I would have had an actor with a black glove holding the crowbar while wearing a black hooding. I'm not using actors though. Creepy dirty gloves that already look like they want to hold a crowbar on the other hand? Definitely.

Photo Issue #2, Page 5

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This was my parents old backyard, before they moved, and one of the first picture's for this issue I took. I knew I would be needing something like this, and took a huge series of similar photos. Some with shadows, some with shadows against the fence, some from around different corners, others darker and others lighter. If I  have the chance, I want to play with my camera and my photos. Having options is important.

Photo Issue #2, Page 4

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I love walking. Just grabbing my camera and going. I find a great deal of good pictures that way. The one bad thing about doing a story line comic book is that I am hunting pictures instead of finding them. This picture is a found one. The original page was to be binoculars, then I found a van just parked right by my place and decided that looked a lot better.

I'd love to find a way to do just single pages occasionally.  Right now though, I'm to focused on finishing the issues I do have!

Photo Issue #2, Page 3

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The original idea of Dameon Strykes came to me when I lived in Boston. I was a poor college student (as opposed to a now poor man with a degree), and I slept on the floor of a crummy apartment complex. The walls of my apartment were red and it overlooked an alley. I slept on an air mattress on the floor, and near where I laid my head was a hand print in the red paint. While it was most likely just a kids print that was trying to "help" their parent as they painted the room, I took a picture of it. I wrote the story of Jared Blaine, a man who saw a horrible crime in the alley his apartment faced, did nothing so the criminals got away, and then was tortured by someone that knew he let them get away.


This led to me taking a series of pictures like this about some kind of Lovecraftian beast, which over time evolved into Dameon Strykes and the Soulscourger. While I lost the original photo, along with a lot of the other things I did back then, this image always stuck in my head, and Jared Blaine has stayed as a Dameon Strykes story,

Photo Issue #2, Page 2

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When I originally went looking for locked doors, I wanted a door with the chain. I didn't think my camera could pick up that the door was locked Unfortunately I couldn't find any with the chain lock, so I decided to just hope that my readers would get that it was locked. This is a picture of my own front door, which has a slightly larger than normal gap between the door and the frame, and when I went to take the picture I noticed with the flash on, the locking mechanism could actually be seen! I rejoiced.