I tried to psychoanalyze the Prince of Carnavals long after the comic was made, but there were some questions I still had towards his motivation and behavior. I knew he was a solid character, but there was some things that just didn't make sense. Why did he take Davis? Was it to get to Georgia or just to mess with him? Why would he host the Haunted Carnaval? What master plan did he have with the souls? Then it hit me.
These were the actions of a winner.
The Prince of Carnaval's one wish as a human was to live forever and party. He made a deal with the devil and ESCAPED! He had completely and utterly won, and the only thing left to do now was to enjoy all the fruits of his labor. He was a man who no longer needed to work, sleep, or even meet basic needs for survival. Being dead allowed him time to completely devote to his own personal entertainment. If he saw an opportunity, he could take it or just let it go, with literally all the time in the world and limitless possibilities the Prince of Carnaval doesn't need a reason to do something and can act on whims. He chose to torment Davis and Georgia purely because the opportunity presented itself and he had nothing to fear from taking it.
The abducting and dropping off of people also may have been a staple of the Haunted Carnaval and would be something that the Prince would do. Having someone defy the Carnaval to take him back like Davis did was something and the Prince felt it deserved a personal audience. He even wore his curled shoulder pads to greet him.
The design of Prince of Carnaval was the one I worked the hardest on, since he wasn't a human character. I knew I wanted an understated uniform for him, something like a ring leader but not quite. I decided that drum major would be more appropriate. His triangle brim hat and mask were going on regardless. I wanted no one to see his real true face. The King of Carnaval (an elected position) is someone who is selected to lead the parade and is dressed in overly fancy crown and cape. The Prince of Carnaval likes to pretend he's subservient so he can do his wicked deeds without being suspected. Thus the step down the hierarchy.
The very first sketch I drew of the Prince looked odd. He had the hat, mask and drum major outfit, but the brim was set too low and his head was too realistic and small. The second sketch was more like the current Prince with his long chin and twirled goatee. The mask and costume had a few too many details to them and looked weird when drawn smaller. Interestingly enough, the long blades for hands were included in each sketch. One student commented that they looked like knifes which I thought was a good way to describe them.
This is how a blog ends not abruptly.
22.4.12
Capstone process blog #6 Character Design "Love Interested"
Georgia's planning was less involved than Davis' or the Princes' designs. I had a clear idea of what Davis' design should entail (puffy hair and oval eyes) and the Prince actually had some failed sketches. Georgia's design was made up on the fly. Sort of.
Georgia's appearance is an inside joke that only me and my sister would get. For a world history class my younger sister had to make a story or comic using ancient gods or heroes in a modern setting. She wanted to do a high school drama with greek gods and she wanted me to draw it. She had a story about Aphrodite, a fashionable pretty girl, trying to earn the affections of her crush. I drew the story with chibi anime style characters, short bodies and big heads. The crush was a scene kid named Adonis, and Aphrodite's nerdy friend was Athena.
Anyway, Georgia was an exact foil of Aphrodite. She had the same hair and expressions, but was drawn as an adult figure rather than the cute small version. She had a small costume change towards the end (she was in a dancer costume in ghost form) but the aspect that changed the most often was her expression. I'm not sure if it was because of her past as a chibi character but she had the most interesting changes with her eyes and hands. The one part of the comic that made everyone who read it snicker was after Georgia had finished telling the Carnaval's story and waved her hands in front of Davis' face to add dramatic effect.
Georgia is a funny and energetic counterpart to Davis' plain and dry protagonist. They complement each other well, and it's not hard to see Davis being dragged along with Georgia's ideas. There is an unspoken application of the "opposites attract" fable that makes their relationship believable. Both of their names are uncommon as well so that the Prince of Carnaval's power over names can take a hold of them.
Another fun Georgia fact is when I was drawing the last page I forgot to draw Georgia before Davis, so in their big embrace Georgia overlaps Davis. I would've had to erase the lines on the computer, but instead I had an idea to give Georgia a ghost tail instead of legs, showing she was still in transition and making my mistake look more natural. Also the ghost tail and bubbles covered up some dead space pretty well.
Capstone Process blog #5 Character Design "Davis does Dallas"
I love character design. It's probably the most fun an artist can have. I can't tell you how many DeviantArt accounts I've seen that are just original character sketches. Detailed characters are my favorite to draw. Though I had to keep in mind that I would be drawing the characters over and over again so a simple design would be preferred.
Davis was always going to be a "regular guy", so a plain outfit would best suit him. I'm used to drawing robots and fantasy characters, so Davis was actually a nice break. That doesn't mean I didn't think when I was drawing him. Davis by far had the most costume changes out of all the characters, going from a casual look to a "battle-damaged" look and finally ending with a jester costume. His slick-backed pompadour hair was the only aspect I knew I wanted before drawing him. Solid black hair is easy to draw because it covers up old lines and doesn't need volume. Davis, being a simple guy, merely gels back the front. After being abducted and dropped off by the Haunted Carnaval the hair loses its shape and droops far in front of Davis' face. He also loses his jacket, which was a nice touch I came up with on the fly. The tear in his V-neck collar was fun to draw as well and gave his outfit a neat customization.
Davis' Jester costume was based on an old Portugal clown costume. Portugal was not a random location, rather it is host to one of the world's biggest carnaval celebrations and the likely origins of the Prince of Carnaval. Also, being close to Spain, the language may seem familiar but be different enough that even if Davis knew a little bit of Spanish he might get lost in different dialects. The native people talk in squiggles to show how little Davis understands what is being said around him. There was actually a font I found that turned words into squiggles, but it looked so much like what I had already drawn that I decided to leave the speech bubbles as is.
17.4.12
Capstone 461 process blog #4 Technique "All the Print that's fit to News."
I had the idea, now I just needed the supplies. In Edinboro there were a lot of independent art stores near by and the school shop was set up with the fine arts department in mind. So when we were doing the newsprint project it wasn't so much an issue of finding newsprint as much as it was picking the right shade. There was 80% dark and 20% light, 60/40, 30/70, on and on. So I had planned on buying several different versions of newsprint.
The big stores however sell their paper by texture, with only a basic unscaled newsprint. I was afraid that the newsprint might not be dark enough to show the white marks and looked into other colored paper, but it would've been too difficult to draw on. Construction paper is too pulpy and could fray, while the glossy colored paper was usually just that, regular paper with color on top of it. If the colored paper tears (and it does easily) then you end up with a nasty white mark that would be hard to fix.
While I was there I also looked for tools to make the white ghost marks. I already had colored pencils, but I wanted a few different options to try. I found some white ink markers but couldn't find any of the white charcoal pencils I used before (Edinboro must have special ordered a lot of stuff just for bizarre assignments). The paint markers were on sale and also came in multiple points of thickness, which was a rare treat considering I was testing the new medium.
When I tried the white paint markers on the newsprint they made cleaner marks than the colored pencils and kept their opacity, which was more than enough for me to make the choice.
The big stores however sell their paper by texture, with only a basic unscaled newsprint. I was afraid that the newsprint might not be dark enough to show the white marks and looked into other colored paper, but it would've been too difficult to draw on. Construction paper is too pulpy and could fray, while the glossy colored paper was usually just that, regular paper with color on top of it. If the colored paper tears (and it does easily) then you end up with a nasty white mark that would be hard to fix.
While I was there I also looked for tools to make the white ghost marks. I already had colored pencils, but I wanted a few different options to try. I found some white ink markers but couldn't find any of the white charcoal pencils I used before (Edinboro must have special ordered a lot of stuff just for bizarre assignments). The paint markers were on sale and also came in multiple points of thickness, which was a rare treat considering I was testing the new medium.
When I tried the white paint markers on the newsprint they made cleaner marks than the colored pencils and kept their opacity, which was more than enough for me to make the choice.
15.4.12
Capstone Process blog #3 Edinboro project
When I was going to Edinboro University back in 2004 I was pursuing a major in Animation. The problem was that they took a physical definition of animation where it was more about drawing than anything else. They we teaching us to animate bouncing balls rather than making stories. And the majority of the program was based in fine arts.
The professors were very intense, expecting you to meet expectations without telling you what the expectations are. It was a crapshoot every time you turned in a project so the one time I actually got praise on a project I remembered it. The projects that I did the best on were studies of light and dark charcoal.
On newsprint.
Using white and black charcoal pencils the class was supposed to sketch the model in lights and darks on top of the gray newspaper pad. I was able to turn off presumptions of how I should draw the model and actually draw them based on how the model appeared. The model was wearing steel frame glasses that reflected the light. I was the only one who drew her glasses with white highlights and dark lines where the shadows fell, the rest of the students said "Glasses are drawn like this" and gave her big thick Buddy Holly glasses rather than look for the shadow.
Anyway, when I was trying to figure out how I wanted to draw the ghosts with the people, I remembered back to Edinboro project and the charcoal pencils on newsprint.
The professors were very intense, expecting you to meet expectations without telling you what the expectations are. It was a crapshoot every time you turned in a project so the one time I actually got praise on a project I remembered it. The projects that I did the best on were studies of light and dark charcoal.
On newsprint.
Using white and black charcoal pencils the class was supposed to sketch the model in lights and darks on top of the gray newspaper pad. I was able to turn off presumptions of how I should draw the model and actually draw them based on how the model appeared. The model was wearing steel frame glasses that reflected the light. I was the only one who drew her glasses with white highlights and dark lines where the shadows fell, the rest of the students said "Glasses are drawn like this" and gave her big thick Buddy Holly glasses rather than look for the shadow.
Anyway, when I was trying to figure out how I wanted to draw the ghosts with the people, I remembered back to Edinboro project and the charcoal pencils on newsprint.
Capstone Process Blog #2 Anya's Ghost "With the Most"
While I was taking Graphic Novel I had found a short but cool comic in the Four Seasons book store in Shepherdstown. The comic was called Anya's Ghost by Vera Brosgol. I hadn't started on the final project yet, but it was already October so the spooky nature of the comic and Halloween was coming up got me thinking of making a ghost story.
Without exposing too much of the comic Anya's Ghost was about a young russian girl struggling with bad self image and being the daughter of an immigrant mother. Anya deals with her problems by acting out and avoidance but her attitude changes when she falls down a old well in the forest. She becomes friends with the ghost of a young girl (Emily) who fell in the well centuries ago. They become fast friends as the ghost helps Anya with her problems, but Emily has a dark secret.
I loved the way they handled the ghost in the story. Emily would stretch and twist her body to fit her needs. Sometimes she would have a whole body, while other times she would have a ghost tail or stretchy arms. I decided that the ghosts in the Haunted Carnaval should also have flexible designs. The Prince of Carnaval experienced a transformation around this time as well, going from having a realistic head to having a very elongated pointed chin and thin stick-like arms that widened at the cuff.
Anya's ghost was a great inspirational piece and really helped fill in the blanks during the planning of my Ghost Story.
Without exposing too much of the comic Anya's Ghost was about a young russian girl struggling with bad self image and being the daughter of an immigrant mother. Anya deals with her problems by acting out and avoidance but her attitude changes when she falls down a old well in the forest. She becomes friends with the ghost of a young girl (Emily) who fell in the well centuries ago. They become fast friends as the ghost helps Anya with her problems, but Emily has a dark secret.
I loved the way they handled the ghost in the story. Emily would stretch and twist her body to fit her needs. Sometimes she would have a whole body, while other times she would have a ghost tail or stretchy arms. I decided that the ghosts in the Haunted Carnaval should also have flexible designs. The Prince of Carnaval experienced a transformation around this time as well, going from having a realistic head to having a very elongated pointed chin and thin stick-like arms that widened at the cuff.
Anya's ghost was a great inspirational piece and really helped fill in the blanks during the planning of my Ghost Story.
Capstone Cultural Event 2 Cashore Marionettes "The World on a String"
The main difference between puppets and marionettes is how they are controlled. Puppets are usually controlled from below with opening for the hand, marionettes are controlled from above with strings attached to the limbs. Cashore Marionettes (named after the puppeteer and his wife) used marionette puppets in a way that I have never seen before. He could make the puppets move in small subtle ways that brought the marionettes to life.
The first thing you'll notice with Cashore marionettes is that he doesn't mess around. The marionettes were made by himself but more importantly so were the supports. Above every marionette was a large metal horror of thin steel beams and fishing wire. The wire was too numerous to count and allowed miraculous use of the marionettes.
The two hour show comprised about a dozen skits, each with their own set of marionettes. There was no dialogue except for the occasional exclamation and the gibberish of a monk in one sketch. The movement of the marionettes was incredible and Cashore was able to move them in ways that seemed impossible. One of the more impressive early skits was of a mother and her baby. The mother walked onto stage cradling and rocking the baby. When she lifts the baby up, the baby's feet kick. The mother then brought the baby close to her face and nuzzled it's belly. When she held it out again the baby started kicking its feet, waving its arms, and shaking its head. I never even expected the baby to move, let alone do 3 different things at once! The audience was stunned as well as they were laughing.
Cashore Marionettes was a rare treat, not only did he revive a really old art form, but he did so in a way that was truly unique to his show. He threw away the convention of hiding the puppeteer, staying in plain sight with his black outfit and even broke the fourth wall on occasion (for his last performance he had a puppet climb onto his shoulder).
The skits touched on just about every emotion as well. There was a hilarious rookie trapeze artist with his shaking limbs, a monk finding short-term joy in a ballon, a galloping horse being harassed by a dragonfly, and a heartbreaking scene of a homeless old man. He could shift the mode almost effortlessly and that in itself is another impressive talent.
Cashore Marionettes is a resurrection in the ancient art of marionettes. It's not even enough to really call them marionettes. He created something unique and magical that needs to be seen by everyone.
The first thing you'll notice with Cashore marionettes is that he doesn't mess around. The marionettes were made by himself but more importantly so were the supports. Above every marionette was a large metal horror of thin steel beams and fishing wire. The wire was too numerous to count and allowed miraculous use of the marionettes.
The two hour show comprised about a dozen skits, each with their own set of marionettes. There was no dialogue except for the occasional exclamation and the gibberish of a monk in one sketch. The movement of the marionettes was incredible and Cashore was able to move them in ways that seemed impossible. One of the more impressive early skits was of a mother and her baby. The mother walked onto stage cradling and rocking the baby. When she lifts the baby up, the baby's feet kick. The mother then brought the baby close to her face and nuzzled it's belly. When she held it out again the baby started kicking its feet, waving its arms, and shaking its head. I never even expected the baby to move, let alone do 3 different things at once! The audience was stunned as well as they were laughing.
Cultural Significance:
Cashore Marionettes was a rare treat, not only did he revive a really old art form, but he did so in a way that was truly unique to his show. He threw away the convention of hiding the puppeteer, staying in plain sight with his black outfit and even broke the fourth wall on occasion (for his last performance he had a puppet climb onto his shoulder).
The skits touched on just about every emotion as well. There was a hilarious rookie trapeze artist with his shaking limbs, a monk finding short-term joy in a ballon, a galloping horse being harassed by a dragonfly, and a heartbreaking scene of a homeless old man. He could shift the mode almost effortlessly and that in itself is another impressive talent.
Cashore Marionettes is a resurrection in the ancient art of marionettes. It's not even enough to really call them marionettes. He created something unique and magical that needs to be seen by everyone.
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