A DISTANT SOIL: The Ascendant Chapter 2 Page 1

Page 1 of A Distant Soil #15. No, we did not skip issue 14. Issue 14 was a fill-in full of development art and pin-ups.

This issue is the first issue published by Image Comics. I let issue 14 serve as a break for me to prepare for my move to Image in 1996. And I’ve been there ever since!

I’m embarrassed to admit I had forgotten the “skipped” issue, and tore up the office looking for the missing art and files.

I need to get more sleep or something.

13 Comments

  • JKCarrier

    I was always intrigued by Beys…perhaps because she’s one of the few Ovanon ladies with short hair! 😉 Like so many of the characters in ADS, she seems to have her own agenda, over and above “the rebellion”.

  • Carla Speed McNeil

    Hadn’t noticed this before, I’m sorry to say, but there’s a clever little device in the top panel: the same figure used two times in two different parts of one conversation.

    Here’s what I mean: It’s normal, when you have two characters talking, to have more than one balloon per character. Statement-response-response. Character A says something, Character B responds to A’s statement, A responds to B’s response. More than that often doesn’t fit, or starts to get awkward, though it can be made to work.

    In a group, where you’ve got everybody trying to get their two cents in you have to go around the room, each person talking in turn (unless you WANT unruly gabble). Each character gets one spot to say something, or two somethings close together. Possibly three, but then he or she’s getting gabby, and probably needs his own panel.

    Here, Colleen’s gotten very clever with the doctor. He’s on the far right. Every character in the background gets his say, one at a time, along the top. Doc makes his remark. THEN every character in the foreground gets HIS say, one at a time, along the bottom, and the doctor gets to react to what’s been said SINCE he opened his mouth. Colleen has reused one drawing in a very natural, conversational way, but one which is unusual for talking crowd scenes. Ordinarily that retort from the doc would have had its own panel, but it isn’t needed– in fact, giving it its own panel would flow less well, since what he’s saying is not a Da-NAAAH moment.

    Ding! /scottmccloudmode

  • Colleen

    I restrict captions almost entirely to voiceover narration and setting establishment. That is, when a character is speaking and their words carry over into a panel in which they do not appear. I don’t use an omniscient narrator.

    And there are almost no thought balloons in this book.

  • scribblerworks

    I have gotten so that I don’t like though balloons, with the puffy edges. Stylistically, I prefer to use caption narration boxes. But if I do use them, I try not to have any omniscient narration to confuse the issue.

    I’ve gotten so when I encounter MULTIPLE narration captions — color coded with character logos stuck on them … why not just have the characters in the panel talking to each other? It starts to lose its effectiveness, when the boxes just become dialogue in a different form.

    But puffy thought balloons…. they just seem visually dorky in current art styles.

  • Colleen

    I made a decision not to use them in ADS to contrast the humans and aliens: aliens are telepaths, humans are not. By allowing us to see into the thoughts of the characters, that makes telepaths of the readers. It is important that the internal motivations of characters remain opaque, because the readers are not mind readers, and the mind readers in the story expend a lot of effort keeping secrets.

    I had a former small press editor who would impose these incredibly overwritten captions that would almost fill entire panels. Images were almost completely obscured. It drove me nuts.

    They were redundant – describing action the reader could see clearly – and not at all in the voice of the story.

    There were these long digressions that had absolutely nothing to do with the story. I recall one went on and on about rain inside very large buildings at NASA. This description was during a scene on an alien world. It made no sense at all. It would be like having narration in Wizard of Oz about Frank Lloyd Wright’s architecture, comparing it to that of the Emerald City. It wasn’t about the story, it was about the editor trying to show off knowledge and impose himself on the project.

    I was so relieved to be able to redo the writing later and remove that intrusive nonsense.

  • Arlnee

    I remember that scene! There was a lot of “wait… what?” in the dialog in those days. Good thing the art was pretty 🙂

  • scribblerworks

    Good lord! I had no idea, Colleen. I’ve only seen the story in the bound volumes. I’m fascinated (and appalled) that you had to put up with that sort of crap.

    But repeating in captions what is in the art? Yuck. That’s one of Chuck Dixon’s No-noes about comic book writing: if the character is riding a motorcycle through city streets, you do not need a caption saying the character is riding a motorcycle through city streets. Duh.

    But seriously… was there no way for you to protest the editorial intrusions that had nothing to do with making the story clearer? Or did he actually claim that it DID make things clearer?

  • Colleen

    Frustrated creators with no talent do not have the faculties to know whether or not their work is any good. The editor had a tin ear, and was TeH CRAZY beyond description. A publisher in the basement type thing, with all that implies.

    I protested vehemently and quit after a few issues, but the editor begged me to stay. The editor cut back on the heavy hack work, but contract violations and lack of payment became intolerable. I lasted a few more issues, then folded up shop and got a lawyer.

    Then I went to the SECOND worst publisher I ever worked for, which was Starblaze.

    It all seems like comedy now.

  • Colleen

    Oh, wait, to this day, I cannot even begin to figure out a bit of dialogue the editor crammed in there for Brent.

    As an expression of surprise, Brent says, “Cried the Dutchess!”

    I have no fucking idea what the hell that means, and I created the character. So, I’ve get an editor putting words into my character’s mouths, and I have no idea WHAT the hell the dialogue means.

    I asked the editor what it was supposed to be, and he said he was thinking of Alice in Wonderland.

    And I don’t recall “Cried the Dutchess!” as a key term in Alice in Wonderland, but more importantly, I cannot fathom why BRENT of all people would be QUOTING Alice in Wonderland. Seriously, that makes no sense at all.

    Every time I would have a character swear and say “fuck” or “shit” or something, both TeH Crazy and the Donning editors would freak. One editor at Teh Crazy Publishing Co. actually demanded I remove Jason’s exposed nipple in one scene, and were extremely concerned about D’mer and Rieken and their cuddling.

    And for those who know what Teh Crazy I am talking about, the irony in the expression of Teh Crazy’s tender sensibilities in these matters is obvious.

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