coldironbadge.com

Cold Iron Badge: Book 1

Stephen — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 13:42:55 +0000

Fresh from its debut at Word on the Street, Toronto’s annual outdoor literary fair, Cold Iron Badge: Book 1 will be available for order online via this site very soon!

Bunny

patrick — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 03:48:59 +0000

So here is Bunny 2.0. She was another character that I found hard to draw. My biggest mistake was making her head a ball. I like the look of her round face. It makes her look young, which she is. But circles are actually really hard to draw. So the first change I made was to put a few angles into her face. That makes her easier to draw but it also aged her. So to balance that out, I kept her wrists and ankles thick, to give a feeling of baby fat. By the start of book two, she is more experienced and mature. To reflect that, I gave her a hair cut.

Incidentally, Bunny was the last of the core cast to be designed. And the hardest. I went through many, many versions before I found the mix of sass and innocence I wanted. As young and inexperienced as she is in book one, she isn’t naive or stupid and I hope that book two will give an opportunity to show her more spirited side.

Concept3

patrick — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 04:00:00 +0000

Christine

patrick — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 04:01:07 +0000

My main concern with the new Christine design was to show her physique without adding a lot of details that will slow down drawing her. I also found towards the end of book one that I was developing a really lazy hand. I was using more short angular strokes and it was a lot of work to soften up the lines. So I went with it and made Christine’s face a lot more angular. It still has that same proportions and general shape, just a bit sharper.

The challenge with Christine’s body, is to show how muscular she is but still keep her feminine. The mix of angular corners and soft lines here seems to do the trick, using the silhouettes to convey a feeling of muscularity without making her too manly.

I especially like the drawing in the bottom right corner. It catches an aspect of Christine that the story hasn’t shown so far.

Concept2

patrick — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 04:00:00 +0000

New book, new look

patrick — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 04:00:49 +0000

For the majority of book one, I didn’t have as much time as I had hoped for to actually work in the comic. So to help manage my time when I start on book two, I am am changing the look of things a little. Mostly, I am simplifying things, which was happening slowly over time anyway. I thought I would put some of the process up here periodically.

A good place to start would be Christine, since she is the main character. She was also the one I found hardest to keep on model, and will be the one most changed for book two.

Concept1

patrick — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 04:00:00 +0000

And the credits roll!

Stephen — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 13:40:21 +0000

Well, not really. They’re there, in the bottom right corner — see? — but they aren’t exactly rolling, I guess.

This is the last installment of Book One of Cold Iron Badge! Patrick and I want to thank you for joining us on Christine’s — and our — journey. We’ve enjoyed bringing you installments of our story every week, and we look forward to continuing to do so in Cold Iron Badge: Book 2…

But not just yet.

We’re going to take the opportunity provided by the break between chapters for a hiatus. We need to take a little time to recharge our batteries before we return with the further adventures of Christine, her new partner and the rest of their team.

We don’t have an ETA yet for the launch of Book 2, but we’ll be posting it here as soon as there’s news. And in the interim, I’ll be doing some blogging here, so just add us to your RSS feed to make sure you get updated.

Once again, thanks to you, our readers — we love our story and our characters and it means a lot to us that you care about them too!

Our thanks also to our illustrious editor at Modern Tales, Shaenon Garrity, whose Skin Horse you should all be reading.

To our supportive friends and colleagues like Greg Beettam and Tara Tallan (whose comics you should also all be reading!)

And to the generous sponsors whose support help us keep the pixels running.

We appreciate you all so very much, and we look forward to seeing you again soon.

Stephen

P177

patrick — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 04:00:00 +0000

P176

patrick — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 04:00:00 +0000