The Planning Run
In the half week since settling on the myth, I’ve retold what it is to three different people, each time refining my telling. Due to the various versions and nuances, the exact account I wish to convey needed to be created. At this point I am still unsure about many details, the exact scope and where and what I will leave out, but I have a plan and a general structure to follow.
At this point, I’ve come to forming the project proposal. While the exact details are still kind of sketchy, and I don’t want to commit to something beyond my skills to complete in the next five weeks, I have enough to get the ball rolling.
The first step will require creating the script to work from. The pacing, details, and method of information conveyance will be paramount to creating a story that is compelling, conveys the humor and emotions, and isn’t an overlong drudge. To get completely from beginning to end requires a decent amount of material, with another amount of ancillary material needing to be added to make the reason for the actions make sense. Another issue is where in the story to end the tale. While it will be “inevitable” that Shiva and Parvati will produce a child after they finally get together, the humor of the god’s plight does not end there. However, by that point, the story may already be overlong and beyond the ability to be done inside of the time allotted. I will have to keep options open all the way up to rough boards and layout, and judge accordingly how long is too long.
Of course, being a comic, this will require a great deal of design work creating character models. While I haven’t even begun to research clothing a prop design, the little I have is a good seed to draw from. Much of the accounts of the physical appearance of the various gods are fanciful to impossibility in form, not to mention contradictory in places. While the idea of third eyes or four arms seem doable from a design aspect, four heads with differing faces seems ridiculous. Distilling these ideas down to recognizable but practical will take some time. I will, most likely, sketch out what’s in my mind, and then start looking for various references to refine and reshape things.
As a rough plan of attack, this is about how I see this breaking down:
Week 5: Project proposal, script.
Week 6: Character, setting, prop design, rough board layouts.
Week 7-8: Organization of roughs into pencil layouts.
Week 9-10: Cleanup and finalization of art.
Now, this is just a rough guess. Depending upon length and complexity, much of this work will not reach final ink lines. I’m not even thinking of color at this point, because that would entail a whole slew of extra work. If things are looking up, I may try to incorporate some coloring, but it isn’t likely to make it in time. Eventually, this would best be done in color, but I do not believe I possess the skills needed to do it in time for finals.