Dameon Strykes Issue #1, Page 17

For the full comic, visit ironfistregime.com

I create 4 layers for every page. The first layer is the image itself. The second layer is my copyright. The third layer is labeled as whomever is speaking, so this page would be listed as "Hones." The fourth layer is labeled as "Skull." In nearly every page, I have hidden a skull into the image. The skull has generally had its opacity greatly decreased, but its been in every image. As an example, in this page, its hidden in the carpet in the lower right hand side.

Dameon Strykes Issue #1, Page 16

This was directly behind a building I used to live in. I thought it was a great shot. Again, I’m not going to show you the gruesome, I’m going to let your mind go there. Only one of my shots has ever showed actual death:

That’s actual roadkill. I was hunting for roadkill for months. I was not going to kill something with my car to get this shot, so I had to hunt. I spent weekends driving through country roads. On my way to a wedding, I came across a dead raccoon. I decided that was not the time to take a picture of it, because it was in the middle of the day and the lighting was just all wrong. After the wedding, I went to the same location and apparently people cleaned up the kill.

I was getting so desperate that I actually asked friends that if they found roadkill in my area to let me know so I could get a picture of it.  I love my friends, because more than one responded. One even sent me a picture of their find, and I was about to use that photo.

Week that the cover is supposed to be released, I’m driving home from a camping trip. It’s dark, like using my brights dark, and I notice this dead deer.  This is a long highway with no nearby exits or turn-arounds. I need this shot though, so I take a U-turn in the middle of the highway, drive beyond the deer, and take another. I park behind it. My cameras battery is flashing low. I quickly get out of my car, and take as many pictures as I can, with my headlights, with my brights, without, with my brake lights every way I can until my camera is dead. I don’t review the photos or anything, and my camera dies. I just cross my fingers and hope that it works.

Two shots turned out, and so we get the double cover.

Dameon Strykes Issue #1, Page 15

For the full comic, go to Iron Fist Regime.

Some of my photos make me feel like I’m doing something illegal. Strangely, it is not the photographs where I’m actually doing something illegal, but a photo like this. I simply walked into an area that had a jewelry shop that was locked up, and took photographs of the jewelry from behind the bars.  There was nothing illegal about my actions, but at the same time I was worried someone would think I was staking out the place and call the cops on me.
Doesn’t help that I walked in and out of the stores three times that night with my camera just waiting for them to lock up. Yeah, not suspicious at all.

Dameon Strykes Issue #1, Page 14

The full comic can be viewed at: www.IronFistRegime.com

I have an aversion to using real people's faces. One of the big reasons is if I do it once, it might be more and more expected. Then I need "actors," and actors are people who are not nor on my time schedule. It is frequently difficult for me  to find the right shot I want, but then to have people rush out to be in the photo would make this project impossible to do.

Sometimes a face is needed though. Luckily, Sheppard Douglas' artwork for the drawn comic book gets to be resurrected at those times. So now we get to meet Agent Constance Wu.

Dameon Strykes Issue #1, Page #13

The full comic can be viewed at: Ironfistregime.com

My longer term readers might remember this page from the drawn comic:'

While I may not being using any of the originally drawn pages, I am still following that story line. So, for this staged photograph, I pulled up the old and tried to replicate it. It took me a few pages to get the writing to look proper. When my artist drew this, the page looked like it had been folded up and placed neatly in the back of the Night Rider's throat, like you'd expect Buffalo Bill to do with a moth. Soulscourger is not that concerned with protecting either letter nor his victim, and would've shoved it down his victim's throat. So... I ate the page. Omnomnom. I really should have added the ketchup before I tried to eat it, would've made it taste better.

Photo Issue #1, Page 12

Unlike the prior page where I had difficulty finding the subject, images of small animals are easy to obtain. The problem was sorting through them and choosing what image I wanted.

At one time, I was considering making something like a fake arm that would also have food on it so it would attract animals. I’ll be honest, it would make the picture significantly more gruesome; but, more than a few of my readers have commented that they really enjoyed the simplicity of my pictures. That I take a simple thing, such as a picture of an empty culvert, and the language I use  leaves the violence up to the reader’s imagination. 

With the concept of simplicity in mind, I went through all my pictures again.  I decided that this image was the least complex, and allowed for the most mind wandering.

Dameon Strykes Issue #1 Page 11

New page has been added ( www.ironfistregime.com ), and we’re finally going to meet Detective Thomas Hones.

It was suggested to me I start a blog about the pages. I don’t intend on adding anymore to the story in this blog as I feel it would distract from the actual pages themselves. I want them to tell the story; if I wanted this to be entirely written word I would have tried writing a novelization of Dameon Strykes.  No, the intent of these blogs is to talk about how the page was made.  Where I took the photographs, changes I made, and what not. Very few of the pages are staged, and some of them having interesting stories behind them. Hopefully this area further enlightens as well as entertains any of my readers.

Often times I find myself looking for things that one would think it would be easy to find; until you hunt for it. Police vehicles might always be lurking around that corner you’re speeding around, but finding one parked (and not currently conducting business) is a bit more difficult. Add in the number of times I found one without my camera, ran home, only to return to the vehicle gone and this one took quite some time. While I could use my phone, I find myself having to do a lot more post-work to get a lesser quality image. There’s also a lot of things I do while taking the picture that my Canon Rebel can do that my phone simply cannot. I found this vehicle just waiting for me while  I was hunting down next week’s page.  I took my time getting this from various angles without appearing too suspect. Sometimes I go weeks without finding an adequate picture, but this day I shot two of them. The other will be next week’s page.