Dear reader,
The basic premise of Kara the Aquatic (the next arc in Kara the Brave) is this:
It’s underwater.
That’s literally it so far. XD
I’m trying to avoid another quest object based storyline, but I keep coming up with those, so I haven’t gotten much farther in that area. So far, I have a mental image of an underwater temple covered in strange and beautiful writing that Kara will explore somehow. The creatures involved will be this seal thing, highly expressive things I call squishies, and possibly a ghost-type thing.
The snake thing above might be part of the temple adornments.
From left to right: the stages of squishy movement. Think jellyfish, but cute and without tentacles. Then the seal thing with three pairs of flippers because why not. Followed by experimenting with various squishy expressions.
The idea for the squishies is that they don’t talk. They just emote. Thus the need for a wide variety of emotingness.
Feel free the use the awkward squishy for things, so long as you attribute me. Because it’s hilarious and totally worth sharing. The ghoulish thing to its right is the ghost thing that might appear in the comic. Not sure yet, but I’m warming up to the idea.
Yes, I want squishies to purr. Or vibrate in happiness, which is practically the same thing. It may or may not make it into the comic, but it’s hilarious enough that I’m strongly considering keeping it.
Some mouth-only expressions I’m playing around with and how they relate to each other. Squishies just have eyes, so this won’t be for them, but I’ve considered using this for another creature in this arc, or just as a reference for this and later arcs.
The challenges I’ll be facing in creating Kara the Aquatic are as follows:
- learning how to draw such that there’s a 3D feel to the space and movement (because underwater)
- figuring out underwater physics (especially with Kara’s cape)
- how will Kara breathe?
- learning how to plan a comic ahead of time
Kara the Brave was SO MUCH fun. I started it without knowing how it would end, and did a lot of planning on the fly. Which worked really well for that but, this time around, I want to be a little more methodical about this and use a development process similar to what professional graphic novel creators do. Like being purposeful about setting, character design, and storyline.
Above all, though, it’s got to be fun.
See you in the new year with more about Kara the Aquatic as it develops!
Sincerely,
Thea