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page 51 – 54

This was another expositiony scene. I have been trying to stay away from these more and more as I write these days. The shopping is mostly to give them something to do while talking. The outfits offered to Suzanne, I told Shazzbaa to do something that would be easily adjusted for different sized Nistans but was also elaborate and more feminine than what Suzanne is used to.

page 55 – 56

These silent pages I wanted to drive home that Lope is home and part of a community here. It’s something Suzanne hasn’t had for a long long time.

page 57 – 61

Suzanne’s mad at everything, even the ground. I wanted to have her take out her frustration at what she is lacking communty wise on something else. I love the face Shazzbaa drew on Suzanne when Lope goes back to is use talk about helping people in need. It’s extra annoying to her now because Lope has a family and community but is choosing to give it up to help people. She had always assumed he didn’t have any connections like this because he was traveling with her. I told Shazzbaa that in those last two panels I wanted a tree or crack in the glass street between Lope and Suzanne as a visually cue of the barrier between them.

page 62 – 70

I love of Shazzbaa draws magic goings on.

The scene that Lope and Suzanne see is for the second half of Love is a Losing Game. I sent Shazzbaa the script of what would be happening in that scene and told her what Danny was wearing since they weren’t drawn at the time. The scene with the fugitive shows him talking to one of the clut members. It wanted it to be picked up on if someone reread As We Were or if they had read Sorcery 101 before this.

The motorcycle vs piece of shit joke is dumb but it still makes me laugh.

page 71 – 75

The random helpful person is a think Lope is super used to. So he completely doesn’t suspect to get grabbed like that after.

While I’m in between big projects I wanted to do an exercise to get better at designing covers. So I’m making title cards for Buffy episodes. I did roughs for every episode of season 1 and $5 patreon backers got to vote on which ones I finished up.

This is for episode 7 Angel. I wanted to keep Angel in shadow so that the title card didn’t give too much away, even though cultural osmiss means everyone already knows he’s a vampire. Since Angel focused episodes are usually more romance focused, I looked up pallettes from the Sailor Moon anime so things would be moody but not too dark.

The Better to Find You With page 7 is up.

Kel has a Patreon! If you’d like to read the comic pages early click here! It also will also get you free sketches, earlier writer notes, and a behind the scenes look of the business side of my comics.

Page 26 – 37

So the bulk of this chapter is for showing off where Lope lives. So I tried to put in a bunch of small moments that would help with explain some things about the location and Lope. I also wanted it to not be too clunky and be an info dump. Also, I wanted to show Suzanne’s continued focus on Seth. So as Lope gives her some basics of his home she repeatedly brings up locator spell and Seth.

If I thought the glass street through better I would have realized that it is super impractical and SUPER doesn’t work. Haven’t recently had to walk on an inch of ice covering the sidewalk, it’s a bad idea. Looks cool though.

Them getting food is to also give contrast or a clue to how Suzanne and Lope usually get by. It also lets you know how much easier Lope’s life would be if he stayed home. Shazzbaa likes medium shots a lot. I never told her to redraw stuff, but I did end up sending her a general note of please pull out more often. I like backgrounds. Shazzbaa did a fantastic job with Lope’s expression when he awkwardly changes the topic away from Seth.

page 38 – 41

This argument is basically the main conflict of the whole book. I probably could have made that clearer if I wrote this book now. And I should have gotten to it sooner. Lope’s whole reason for staying with Suzanne is that he is trying to gentle nudge her away from revenge. He means well but it is pretty shitty to not tell Suzanne how long it’s gonna take. I told Shazzbaa to stay on the side of Suzanne that has a scar when she is being demanding toward staying on mission. Ya know, cause of metaphors and symbolism and all that.

Also, that letter if from Danny and Brad. It’s what they sent to Lope right after Jeff got bit. I imagine Danny and Brad trying and failing to remember how to write Lope’s name in his own language, then giving up.

page 42 – 50

Lope’s knowledge about how humans work is partly from watching humans from public spaces and from what Danny or Suzanne told him.

Suzanne calls Danny “The spy” because she is better about connecting the dots on implications of blood bonds and vampires than Danny is. Danny is obviously a big ass area of disagreement between Lope and Suzanne. I also wanted this whole scene where Lope tries to talk Suzanne out of hunting Seth to be sad. Also, he never tells Suzanne to forgive Seth. It’s just about her.

Flashback time. Again red is Seth’s flashback color. I also wanted to show that Suzanne’s hatred of Seth is more than just I hate you cause you killed my father. I maybe should have put more flashbacks like this in there or made it clear in this one. Seth seduce Suzanne first. Her expression when thinking about if she should let Seth behind the counter could be read as discomfort. It’s more do I want to do this thing that will get me in trouble? This is more of Seth manipulating teenagers. I did make sure to put in the “Do you WANT me back here?” line. So she trusted Seth before he went and murdered her family. I feel like that original consent is important, because it makes his betrayal sharper, especially when Seth and Suzanne have their final show down in Sorcery 101.

While I’m in between big projects I wanted to do an exercise to get better at designing covers. So I’m making title cards for Buffy episodes. I did roughs for every episode of season 1 and $5 patreon backers got to vote on which ones I finished up.

This is for episode 3, Witch. I tried to stick to greens and yellows for an eerie scene. I included the cheerleading trophy from the episode. Then I put tried to show a few of the curses cast on the different cheerleaders. The girl who catches on fire and Cordelia losing her vision were the easiest to convey.