Slow Business

A Little Applied Design and Color Theory

I’m finding the need to solve problems created by the limited color palette. I try to assign a unique subset of the color palette to each character. But with new character designs and only twelve base colors, this has gotten increasingly problematic. For example, here’s those three down-and-out Belarusians flatted in the strict 12-color palette:

054 palette strictFrom there, I had to consider the cohesion of their design on two levels: as individual characters and as a group. The staging was so complex that twelve colors weren’t enough. To keep individual characters cohesive, I adjusted the value and chroma, but not the hue, of certain areas:

054 paletteThen to keep them cohesive as a group, I ran the whole layer through a “tone curve” adjustment, unifying their palette in contrast to Malutki’s and the background:

054 tone curve

Kickstarter – Final Week

I’m elated at the response to the Kickstarter campaign to print the first 50 comics in a book. We’ve surpassed not only our funding goal, but the first two stretch goals. This means I can afford to print the book in a beautiful clothbound edition.

As of this posting, there are five days left in the campaign.

 

There’s still time to pledge! After the campaign is over, the books and some of the incentives will be available for sale on the website. But if you pledge at the $20 level, you will actually be getting a copy of the book at below the future website price.

Click here!
Click here!

 

 

 

 

4 throughts on "Slow Business"

  1. It would /really/ help if you inserted translations of the non-English words/phrases. Since I don’t read Polish or Belorussian or whatever it is, and there’s usually no context to interpret it by, I think I must be missing out on a lot.

    1. Hey, thanks for the feedback. I try to make it something you could guess from context, so I appreciate you letting me know that it’s confusing. “Прывітанне” is just a “hello.” You probably aren’t missing too much :) When it is something important, I put footnotes (like in “Passive Aggression“).

  2. Don’t most Eastern Europeans, unlike the British, traditionally drink tea with lemon rather than tea with cream?

    1. Hmm… good point. Maybe the owl is so desperate to correct the otter’s insult that she forgot they don’t take cream in Belarus. ;)

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