Ix Glow Facto

So then. Huh.

Someone mentioned to me a few years back it'd be cool to have Ix's dots glow sometime. Damn right, I thought. But there'd have to be a reason; a trigger for them to light up.

So I've been working towards that; towards the situation in which every part of her little body is utterly,
profoundly orgasming in one huge torrent of spine-breaking craziness, towards the moment when her subconscious is entirely opened out and joined to the person she's with. Can't fake that kind of sex, but if you've had it in real life, you'll know what I mean. So to that end I've been slowly moving the plot; isolating Ix from the crew a little since we met her really; there haven't been many intimate sex scenes with just her and the other characters. I've been getting her theoretical subconscious to the point at which the release would be just like real life: epic.

And we're finally there. Difficult to upload pics to this blog without giving away spoilers this late in the comic rendering process, so you can have these lighting tests instead (you know me and lighting tests, it's this fetish I have...). We're at about 120 pages and ready for the dots to start glowing, baby!

Don't check back every five minutes; it'll take at least a fortnight of work to get the comic ready. At least. But we're getting close to that stage :)

Gotta be honest I'm proud of this one, there's more funny bits than normal I think, and ... wait what am I saying there's nonsense in every comic. But this one is more haha than the previous ones. To me, anyway. And it's more ... I dunno, intimate I guess. Just what I was going for, and lovely to have some warmth after the fairly bleak plot environment of comic 18 - Shadows and Dust was really good but necessarily a little dark and cold. This one has just a touch of chiaroscuro, but on the whole it's all about the comfy snuggliness.

And tons and tons of descriptive content so if you're blind and just have someone read it to you it's hot as heck. How accessibility-minded of me! You're welcome.

Publishing note: The blog title Ix Glow Facto was because I was thinking early last year (when I wrote the script for comic 19) that the comic should be called 'Ix Xho Facto', but I thought people probably wouldn't get the 'clever' play on words from the Latin Ipso Facto, nor get the link between the content of the comic and the meaning of the Latin phrase. So I thought bollocks to Latin references, let's have it subtle rather than convoluted. Anyway, there you go. I might have Luce whisper "Ix Xho facto" to Zan instead; I like their conspiratorial stuff, they're a good couple to play with. Just ask Tom. Or Becky. Or ... well, anyone really :D

If you click on the pics below there's higher quality renders. Just sayin :)

Chiaroscuro

The recent Comic 18 was full of Chiaroscuro (high contrast lighting, lots of shadows etc), largely because I wanted to get some of the cool lighting I had lucked on when I did the corridor [anal] scene between Ix and Tom in Breakfast in Tacspace.

When I created that scene in Breakfast in Tacspace, I threw a few spotlights in and it just kinda worked - I remember blogging about it at the time and someone was like "Hey amazing chiaroscuro!" - and I'd never
heard the word so googled it and discovered it was a real thing! Yay!

So wanting some of that harsh/atmospheric lighting back, the title of #18: Shadows and Dust just kinda fitted with what I wanted the comic to be; Luce being a shadowy character who used stealth to get onboard the ship, and because (1) there were lots of shadows generally (corridors, the galley, main ops room all shadows), and (2) the pivotal use of the hyperdrive as a weapon was to shunt rock around the galaxy. ie dust.

Also Gladiator is a great film and having just watched it (and randomly given my PB Google account the name Marcus Aurelius Bellerophon for shits and giggles), having a reference to that film sorta fitted. In an obscure film reference kinda way, even though the universe of Gladiator and that of STFW are literally lightyears apart.

AAAaaaaaaanyway, in the above page from the upcoming comic (don't hold your breath; it'll be about a month yet), Xho is clearly looking for Ix. Just thought I'd blog it up because I liked the lighting; looks super scifi having such strong contrast and reflective surfaces. I quite like the way Tacspace fits nicely with Stonemason's scifi corridor prop - again an amazing scene from that guy, which with a bit of light play can look super atmospheric.

Note the subtle x-wing in the corner of tacspace - that's the only hint we ever see of it in this comic, just chucked it in there for consistency with the previous comics, though I figured Xho's had time to clear all his tools and junk away since his work on the hyperdrive.

Yes I think about this stuff too much. No there isn't really any reason because nobody but me would likely spot those details. Yes plenty of readers would skip all these pages anyway because there's no boobs on them. No I don't care.

I'm just gonna keep doing what I do :)

Hot physics flipchart action

Remember I garbled on about Loop Quantum Gravity a while back? You know, how it explains a big plot twist that's been rumbling on under the radar for a few comics and will be fully untangled in comic 20?

Well this is where we're at: I've done over 110 pages of comic #19 now. That's right, it'll be
another epic. But we're about to meet the most exciting new character yet: THE FLIPCHART

AAARGHH!!!! I know, right? I've just created this sexy three-legged bastard, and damn it's got me all hot under the collar. Winking its inky eyes at us as it squats and presents Xho's meandering sketches on LQG to the world (no I didn't draw those equations I just googled LQG pics, yes I'm lazy). Daaaaamn baby, turn a sheet for me, mmmm, yeahhhhh.

Anyway ... fun thing about this is it's not going to get explored/explained in #19, the flipchart's just going to sit there in the background of one of the sex scenes so that when we (ie the crew) realise the importance of LQG in comic #20, they return to explore the physics that Xho's already been doodling about.

Fun!

COMPETITION RESULT: And the winner is ...

Right, time to announce the winner of that arbitrary 'Oldest fan' competition from a week or so ago...

*Drum roll*

Winnar: Uzkuhi Fongo! Won because of sending the dropbox link for me to download all that stuff I've blogged up this last week. They also win the 'craziest made-up name' competition. So I've designed this poster to go on the wall of one of the
scenes - it'll be near the end of the upcoming comic.

(It's a little brown mushroom cos Uzkuhi himself said it'd be funny, and I put it in German because I think that makes it even more bizarre [truth is I think Uzkuhi is probably from Germany, and it seemed funnier in German, so...])

Archive: Character development with Rebecca Starwalker

1st generation Becky character

Silly idea really; basically make a 3D barbie character and play with her. Get bored, make a 3D Ken doll (Tom) and smoosh them together. Still not quite edgy enough ... hmm I know they can be siblings! Yay wincest! What's not to like?! Great fun. 

These renders were like original character development; I liked the idea of being

a 'real' 3d artist - you know the sort of 3D artist who produces cool looking characters as concept art for films (in Zbrush or whatever) - those amazing artist guys always did renders like this, 360 degree spin-around views of their character.

Mine just had fewer clothes on, is all :)

(as you can tell, I was going for the sweaty / wet look...)

So here she is; first ever character I created in Poser; Rebecca Starwalker - lead character (along with Tom) for mini comic idea 'Space Trek Fleet Wars'. You knew that.

Name: Rebecca Starwalker

Age: 17 to sort of 20 ish
Height: 5'5"
Weight: How dare you! About 8 stone? 9 after a big roast?
Waist: Barely
Bra size: not that she's ever worn one, but 28H - 28J depending on how booby she's feeling
Favourite drink: Red wine
Favourite position: Cowgirl, though also partial to being bent over a desk, bedside etc. Depends who's in charge
Hairstyle: 'Shag' - a la hit TV sitcom Friends character, Rachel
Love interest: Tom. Always Tom. Since she learnt to masturbate. 2nd in line is probably Zan; they've always got on, on account of the easy-going ness, and the ... err appendages.

Then I was like "Hey, we need more outfits; need some sort of soft sports kit that can be unzipped" - so this kit turned up on Zan and Luce in the 3rd comic, but it had been setup on the original character, Bex.

(Notice in this render she has slightly smaller boobs than later on in the comics? Pretty sure I gave her a boost as the comics progressed; liked the idea that the 'coming of age' stuff led to bust development, as you'd find in real life. Yes I probably put too much thought into it. Yes I did the same with Tom and Xho's penises - just in case you'd not been paying attention...)

Actually those shorts are pretty cool, maybe should grab them again sometime, wonder if I still have them for her...

^ Very early character fun thing, this - did it to test out lighting (no suprises there), and though it was never used as a scifi comic scenario with Bex, I later used it for Tom (see Spymaster). He didn't quite look as good as Becky though, and I always wonder if I should have swapped their roles in that comic... ah well, too late :)

2nd generation Becky ...

More detail in the skin, less shininess/wetness so her skin looked drier than 1st generation. Better detail in the eyes, slightly stronger tan so her skin contrasted nicely with Zans. 2nd generation Becky also had slightly larger breasts as I thought she was a year or two older than the coming-of-age 1st generation Becky (above), so I gave her a slightly more womanly jawline and bigger hips too.

YES I KNOW YOU DIDN'T THINK I PUT THIS MUCH THOUGHT INTO THE CHARACTERS OMG I KNOW IT'S A BIT OF A SHOCK ISN'T IT AAARGHHHHHH!!!! Obsession eh? I think about this detail for all the character, btw! Yes I probably need psychological help SHUT UP ABOUT IT IT'S JUST A HOBBY AAARGHHH!!!

A SEXY HOBBY AAARGHHHH!!

Favourite 2nd generation character pose, below. Always loved that cowgirl moment, she just sort of naturally fits it, her contrapposto bodyshape accentuating the shape of her breasts, hips and waist:

Below: first render in 'Tacspace' after I'd plonked the lighting and grey backdrop in there, I put 2nd generation Becky in there and hit render. Yikes, I thought, that works. Time to do a comic.

Got a lot of time for thigh-high socks. These were sock test renders, readying the texture for They Came In Outer Space...

Just ... errr ... no reason.

2nd to 3rd generation test comparisons below - 3rd generation was all about the subsurface scattering on the skin  - these tests look kinda waxy, I toned it down a bit for the 3rd generation proper, and made her skintone a little closer after these tests, which made her look a bit pasty compared to old, tanned Becky.

Skintone was 'deeper' though - she was a bit glossy so looked like wax, but the realism was upping slightly so I was happy :)

Was pretty pleased with this bounce cycle to be honest, despite the skintone not quite being right.

Too tanned ... but nearly there ...

Nightie mode. Sometimes the sexiness comes from the scenario rather than the medical close-ups I guess.... :)

2nd generation - tanned and flat-looking (flat skintone I mean, not flat chested.)
(Obviously.)

3rd generation not quite there; too pale and low contrast and waxy looking, needed a bit more work...

3rd generation Becky...

Just need to sort out that darkness around the mouth...

3rd generation Becky character, reporting for duty. Love the subsurface on this skin, even though the lighting is weird and eerie :)

I'm such a sucker for a walk cycle...

  

Poor girl: tuckered out from all this test rendering and changes of skin, posing, sex etc. Needs a break.

Archive: GIFGASM!!

So it's time to look back at ancient gifs I've created. They're not all here (still plenty of Tink and swimsuit ones out there), but this is a pretty decent haul.

<< One of my faves, right there.

Not sure what it is about this one, guess it just looks fairly natural and the skin tone's very ... I dunno ... strokable o_o

Think that's my 3rd generation Becky, judging by the texture.

EDIT: I've added all the gifs I've ever done in ...

Archive: Wallpaper!!

Few years back I made a bunch of wallpapers after someone requested it - then uploaded to Minus and discovered Minus were rubbish at honouring their upload/hosting thing.

So these are kinda limited edition (if you scrunch up your eyes and don't pay too close attention to the facts)!

For some reason I made them in 1080 resolution; not massively huge for modern screens but

Archive: FAN ART!!!

Yo it's time to catch up with all the super awesome fan art people have produced over the years. Part of this whole "Hey plz send me old stuff from my blog!" effort has dug up the following (props to Uzkuhi for that, they're currently leading the 'oldest fan' competition), so I'm plopping it here because OH MY GOODNESS the quality is so high.

NOTE: If you've sent fanart (or done some recently!) and it's not here - please send it to me!! cornholiobelle@gmail.com - and I'll add it to the load below :)

I mean some of you guys clearly have like 3DS Max and Maya and all that shit because the render standard is epic. I'm sure I could

COMPETITION: The Quest for the Longest-Running Fan

Here's your chance to prove you're the longest-running fan and win an appearance in the comic (by name or by photo - up to you). Just comment below with your earliest memory of finding my stuff! Extra points for uploading earliest development character renders or any gifs you kept! 

[Yes this is a thinly disguised attempt to harvest ancient renders I've long-since deleted, but you really will get into the comic if you win so please play the game! Heck you can even email me at projectbellerophon@gmail.com if you don't want to comment]

So, who thinks they've stuck around the longest then, eh? Who remembers my days as a Turkish butcher or my awkward struggles on a certain island in the frozen north Atlantic? The car discussions, the IRL voting, the bookshop fiasco, the original jump from Blogger to Tumblr? Who was there right at the beginning when I uploaded character development renders for first generation Tom and Becky, or that animated swimwear walk gif?! Gotta be a contender for winning upload if you have those kicking about! Who was there when I uploaded page
by page of the first comic to the poser gallery on Renderosity? Then it got a bit adult and moved to Renderotica and included a bunch of Tink-themed gifs? Hint: you won't find any of the really early stuff on this blog; that'd be too easy!

I have my own ideas of who might be the longest-running fan; guess we'll find out :)


Anyway, the thing is, fans are important to me! I've had some amazing feedback and kind comments over the years, it's just hard to pay back in a way that isn't just MOAR FREE COMICS. Kingdan got his name in Blue Steel after winning a competition - just for fun.

What you probably don't know is that the character of Xho is actually based on a long-running commenter on this blog. This guy never swore in emails or comments, and didn't tend to engage in the more IRL/political discussions - which was interesting. Xho's kinda innocent appearance was easy to create with that guy in mind because that whole "Gosh darn" approach sticks out, you know? Anyway I'm not going to clarify who it is (other than to say Who fanfic is a relevant reference), because I don't want to embarrass the guy, especially as Xho himself is on the brink of totally corrupting into an incestuous relationship, so it's a bit harsh to link that character with a real person!  :)

Anyway, answers below! Go go go!!!

Sexy hands of wonder

Errr, did you say "Ix's top off"?
Totally off?
I'm asking for a friend.

Well, the next comic is coming on and by THUNDER it's fantastic fun, this one. It has taken 55 pages just to get Ix's top off.

FIFTY FIVE! Yes I'm taking my bloody time.

So let's go off on a tangent and talk about hands. I know, it's a normal day at work and then someone comes up to you and creeps over your cute hands and/or hand posture.

Typical. Classic.

If I had a penny for every time ... only most of the time it's me being the hand-based perve. Not that I have a hand fetish you understand (heck if I had one it'd be obvious in the comics; no secrets there), it's just that hands can be so awesome and I'm only really just now consciously thinking about it.

It seems (looking back), I've always paid careful attention to what the hands of the characters in my comics do. This sounds stupid, but without poise the whole reality breaks down. And if the reality breaks down then there's no point trying to make it look sexy because it won't be.

In this image, Tom's hands are
expressing the emotion 'can't be arsed'

I could do some examples, where someone's finger angles look unnatural vs same pic with their hands expressing something, but remember I'm pretty lazy and so I can't be bothered.

Just close your eyes and imagine I've done that, and proved my point. See what I mean? Exactly. Glad we all agree.

Anyway, back to the comic - think we're going to be well over 100 pages again by the time I'm done. And yeah taking 55 pages just to get Ix naked means I'm going slow (I mean, all the others have been naked by page 20 or something, but Ix is the key one here), but the build-up just adds to the believability / sexiness I think. In fact I know; I had to stop at page 58 for the fapping to begin, and that's always a good sign - fapable content. Urgently fapable content, even better :)

Sorry, rude topic.

Means it takes a bit longer to complete the comic, but I'm sure you guys don't mind waiting, huh?

Free comic, can't complain :D

Rendering...

Beep beep. Pretty bored at work today, thought I'd move the comic on a little. Got some headway, played around a bit, made some nice things.

Truth is I love this process. It's such fun moving these CG characters around the 3D space, tweaking their thumbs and eyeballs and every body part, making sure it seems human, getting the riiiiight camera angle.

Maybe it's a control thing. Heck if it is, who cares, control is fun.

Even the pre-render clay subsurface calculation is fun - look at the picture below - the computer has to figure out how light is going to bounce beneath skin, so it renders just the skin and figures that out with the shadows from the clothes first. It's like a weird voyeuristic preview, giving you a vague idea how the scene's going to pan out.

Slightly strange one here in that Xho doesn't have a penis (it's hidden for this shot cos he has shorts on), but trust me, it'll come into play at some point. Oooh yes. Yes indeed.

Hey-ho pip and dandy.

 

This next comic though. It's going to be good. Goooooooood.

Brainwave mode

I've been reading a really interesting book on loop quantum gravity and (whilst extruding my brain into bow-tie shaped vol-au-vents), hit upon an epic plot twist for the comic. Yay physics! Yay geometry and movement vectors integrating with perceived time!

I was also busy working on some good old-fashioned angst between Tom and Becky, when it struck me Tom hasn't been much more than the butt of the joke for about 10 comics. Poor chap. So this epic (and it is a corker) plot twist will bring our dear Tom back into the spotlight, back into the protagonist camp once more. No Ix isn't going to secretly have been a baddie all this time, they're all still good don't worry I'm not that evil.

Not wanting to give too much away, but I chose that pic of Ix holding her tshirt up like that because it (1) rather nicely depicts the infinite spherical loop quantum effects I'll be exploring in comic 20, assuming her cleavage and top are graphs for spacetime and (2) is a nice picture with boobies. 

My two great loves, there; norks and theorems. 

"...and if we take the bottom as dY, the path vectors accelerate towards the event horizon, dZ with respect to the original path described by the boobies. Even on the planck scale, spacetime ..."

Ah, astrophysics lectures would have been SO much more pay-attention-to-able.

Comic agenda

This is a lighting test. It failed.

So like let's talk about the comics, because comics are cool. And let's talk about psychology because that's also cool.

When I started them with comic #1, I was excited about the fact that I could basically put the digital Ken and Barbie dolls together and hit the render button and hey presto! A picture like I could never draw! Awesome!

So putting the comics together in the early days, I literally put no thought into the plot or the attitude of the characters. It was just "What basic premise can I use to get these dolls out of their clothes and basically inserted into each other?". Good place to start.

Looking back at the first few (5?) comics I did, it's actually pretty cringey - not because of the poor rendering nor the stuttering scripts, but the pretty bad way they treat each other! Like in The Spymaster, when Tom gets Zan out of hypersleep and just bends her over and has sex with her?! WTF! The real, real, genuine reason I put that in the comic is because I actually genuinely couldn't be bothered to render the whole thing where he explains everything to her, and it was just quicker to just have them have sex right there. Stupid, craziness. I figured it's nothing like real life, and as far as character consistency was concerned, maybe Zan would forgive Tom because he was cool about protecting her from a rape scenario at the beginning of Comic #3 - remember Tom is offered sex with Zan in return for ship supplies. His honourable reply explains why they get on so well with sex afterwards, and why Zan forgives him later - she knows he's good and his confidence is generally in his ethics.

Anyway, rendering-wise, it was laziness. But who cares, it's a comic, it doesn't matter.

Then I got as far as Breakfast in Tacspace, and I guess I started caring about the characters a bit more - caring what they said and how that affected each other.

Which made me start thinking about what matters to me, what was the big deal about why I wanted to escape into creating a comic in the first place? What was I really trying to tell the story of? The whole reason I put a 'rape' scene in Dive into the Dark, after that, was that I wanted to make a comment about control in sex. Get the ball rolling. Big fucking ball, roll it slow. Take 20 comics to explain it, fine.

And now we get to the point. I've mentioned subservience before on this blog, years ago; it's an interesting topic which gained a few interesting comments at the time. I get that people really get into tying up / control within a relationship, within sex play, that's something I kinda get like I get that it's fun to dress up as doctors and nurses and be naughty. All good fun.

I also understand that some people actually like being treated like shit in their relationship all the time  - though I do find that a bit sad if it's ALL the time, that seems more like serious psyche probs to me. I've had a few friends who've been drawn to abusive partners. I say a few, I had one. And that seemed to be because her parents were abusive and there was a whole trauma / abuse problem there re-occuring throughout her life. Not a happy bunny. Also pretty unusual. Not unusual to be abused, unusual to get a kick out of it.

So here's the point: how come there's so much subservience / control / abuse in porn? The propagation of abuse stuff in particular on porn sites is a bit worrying. Just look at the front page of Xvideos. Guys grabbing girls throats, calling them bitches, treating them like dirt. Like the male porn stars are the ethics police or something?

Is it the growth of the entitlement thing? Do young men really think they either claim (1) what's 'theirs', or (2) they earn it? That those are the only two options? Be a heck of a shame if that was the case, because both are bloody wrong. Is it because there's been so much divorce in America in the 80s/90s, and now we're seeing the cultural repercussions in the form of bad father-to-son modelling of behaviour? Those fatherless guys have grown up and are affecting the porn industry. Oh great. More prejudice against women. Wonderful.

*golf clap*

(Yes I know my thing is incest, and yes that might make me a massive hypocrite, but the difference with my particular bias is it's even-stevens, both parties get into it, and the other thing is there's only like 2% of stuff in porn is incest - it's nowhere near as mainstream as specific abuse of the female. If incest was prevailing so much I'd probably be equally concerned. I mean heck it'd be great if it was everywhere and it was sexy and well acted, but it'd still be a weird trend in terms of cultural psychology, right?)

So comic #19 will open with a discussion between Tom and Becky and I hope it kinda lays the ground for me to make a point in my comics. It's something I've been working towards (along with finding out about Ix's past), a bit of a discussion on misogyny and control.

Long-term readers of my blog will know I've always sorta thought of the different characters in my comics as different fragments of my own psyche. So when Tom's overconfident and full of shit in They Came in Outer Space - Ix lays him out. That's the part of me that wishes I could just end the conversation when a guy is unbelievably cocky. It's also the part of me that says stupid things and wishes I could take them back!

Or in the same comic when he says he doesn't want the alien girls, he just wants Becky - that's the part of me that wakes up and realises I'm in love. When Xho wants to do the right thing but keeps thinking about the wrong thing - that's me, right there. When Zan just wants everyone to get along, when Luce doesn't explain anything but remains a mystery, when Hayley just wants to cram things into her and experiment, when Becky's daydreaming or feeling cross - it's become ways to talk about my own feelings as opposed to just trying to produce a comic. I guess that's my secret. That, and not taking myself too seriously. So the next comic will include angry conversations about misogyny, and more incest than ever before.

 Plus tits.

And dicks.

And bottoms.

Haha, bottoms. Gotta love em.

Test render #2: "Uhh hi guys, I wondered if any of you knew why half my clothes are buried in my skin and I seem to have developed alopecia?"... this is why we do test renders ...

Original script for comic 18

Ix. No reason.

If you haven't noticed yet, my new comic's out. Read that first cos this blog post is a major spoiler otherwise.

Go on, read it - it took 5 months and is huge. Seriously, read it now. We'll all wait.

We're waiting. Srsly, we'll be right here when you come back, go on off you go. Gone? Good.

Back? Welcome! Phewffff, I know right?! And it was free, I'm like a freaking Girl Guide or something. Boy Scout? Who cares, something like that.

So, I thought it might be fun to release the initial version of comic 18 because it's fun to see the changes, especially when the original versions are dire! This is
also one of the first comics where I wrote the entire script out a few times before even beginning the rendering process.

Unusual that, to be that organised, but I think it's the way to go because you get a better feel for the flow of conversation rather than if you just make it up as you go along and try to caption the comic after it's all rendered. If you do that you're screwed because you're at the mercy of describing what you've rendered rather than the other way around, so the conversation always ends up a bit unnatural.

Anyway, if you've read this far you must be a proper fan of mine because this is a really boring topic!

Congratulations! No cash prizes.

Here's the scripts then :)   >>>>>>>

Comic 18: Shadows and dust (original sketchy version)

• Shit kicks off for Tom etc, they try & fire (Zan on joystick, Bex on weps) but ships disappearing, explosions mayhem pew pew, Zan flying blind,
  "Evasive manouvres!"
  "There's nothing to evade; their fleet's still about a thousand clicks off!"
  "Then what the hell are they firing at?"
  "We've been hit we've been hit! Oh sorry no wait that's ketchup on the monitor. Carry on."
  "Hold on, no-one's even firing at us, they're fighting amongst themselves".. leading to one ship left. Ix-Xho running to bridge. Tom says must be Fabuloso, and with that firepower they're in real trouble
• Katana plot, Luce revealed
• Luce/Ix respect, head down to tacspace
• crew tests hyperdrive, tattoo explanation conversation
• Asteroid messages left in home system
• Ix & Zan measuring scene
• Ix & Xho no touchy question time
• Ends with reference to emperor; notice passed in quiet halls

That's it! Very nearly no nudity whatsoever! AAALLLLL PLOT. And yes my notes to myself for the space battle were "Shit kicks off". Thanks. That's great. Great notes, there. I'll get right on that. 

So here's stage 2 -  the full script:


Comic 18: Shadows and dust (first proper draft version)
*wraith enters battle, speech bubble from bountyhunter*
sir! an unmarked craft just buzzed in and dropped six mines on our hull!!
shit it! shields up!
too la*explodes*

ships disappearing, explosions mayhem pew pew, ix flying,
xho: they're miles away, what the hell are they firing at?


*another speech bubble from battle*
commander, our shields have been taken out by railgun kinetics!
what?! from where?
i can't te..

bountyhunter on screen: this is captain aurelius, we demand *static*
becky: we demand what? he hung up!
tom: that's just rude
becky: so rude
xho: err, his ship was destroyed
becky: oh
well, fair enough


ix: i've taken two out, but no-one's firing at us, they're all dealing with some tiny bloody attack ship by the looks of it
i think it's a drone of some sort
whatever it is, it's chowing through them like a bastard

*page or two of sky fighting, zooming, lasers pew pew
becky/zan: twelve left
ix: gotcha! eleven
nine
shit! did you see that?! four!
thr.. two.

*one ship left*
ix: well, guess we get ready for some negotiation
Tom: must be fabu-fucking-loso, and with that firepower we're in real trouble

ix: whoever it is we'll need to have a little chat. i'm going to get a coffee



xho: err yeah coffee sounds good, i'll join you

*walking through corridors with coffee, lots of thought bubbles from both*
"sorry about the cum" ... "i'm sorry i came all over you"
oh god there's no good way to say that
"how do you feel about all that sperm then?"

look at him, stressing about something
fuck
he's so gorgeous
am i visibly salivating?

*5 mins later, with coffees*

i've got to say something
she's so ...
i just want to touch her
say something

xho: you were ... you're amazing. pretty, i mean
pretty amazing?
i mean you look good except i'm so rubbish with words!
thanks. you too. look good, are good, all sorts of good
i'm sorry about my ... sorry about all the ...
(smiling) all the what?
um nothing
*ix pinches xho's bum as they enter room
*ix and xho pad in with a coffee*
*tom and zan sitting at stadium seating, becky playing tomb raider*
we about to die then or what?

it's still just hanging out there; seems deserted or something weird

can't be deserted


(full page)
becky: sorry, what even is it? I don't understand how it took out all those ships

xho: it's a wraith; they're like drones in that they can manouvre at insanely high gee, but they do have a human crew; the pilot goes into a chemical trance and operates the ship from a slowtime couch, meaning they can process instructions almost as fast as a drone ship's ai mind

ix: so they have all the manouvrability and lightning-fast movements of a combat drone as well as the creative unpredictable attacks of a human crew
they're unmatched and almost invincible as fighter ships, but because of the exotic materials they're made from and the risky affects of slowtime on the pilots, there's only a few wraiths in existence
hardcore

(next page)
look, the crew must be either repairing or planning something - comms still closed?
yeah, totally dark

ok, they've had enough time for negotiations; i'll head to the armoury and suit up; tom, with me, zan and bex get ... zan what?

i don't know, it feels ... weird in here

come on, we need to ... oh

*silent look*

get her ix!

i don't think ix will be moving

yes ma'am

tell them

guys, stay still. this blade is a monofilament hydroforming saw
it could cut through diamond like it's walking through a fart
if i'm right, it's fitted guided by a semi-sentient ai

she's called glaive* *glaive is a Krull reference! We all knew that though, right? Right! High fives all round

the ai can move about using magnetic vortices and change direction pulling five hundred gee. possibly the rarest, most illegal weapon in the civilised galaxy and we don't want to fuck with it

oh shit

yes. shit.
one word from me, and you'll become diced ham in two tenths of a second. so let's talk

how did you even get in here?

you  don't seem too hot on keeping the shields up, i just strolled into an airlock.

becky: sorry, that was my bad; i mean, the bountyhunters were gone and i wanted to play tomb raider so ...

ix: zan - smack becky's bottom please.
zan: yes ma'am!
*zan continues to smack becky's bum throughout comic*

ix: you're from the wraith, right?

i'm the pilot

then I guess we should say 'thank you'

that's a good start
there's a big price on ix and xho here; you - fatty - how exactly do you know these two little dudes?


err .. we employed ix at a space station as our pilot about a year ago. then we, well, ix, rescued xho from a hostile planet a few months back

and?

and nothing; that's it

i can remove them both from here without any problem and leave you three to your own business, would you like that? i'll even split the bounty with you

no deal. we're crew

interesting. do you agree, zan?

*zan continues to smack becky's bum throughout comic*
how do you know my naOH MY GOD!

hahahaha!!!! oh my god!!!! no way!!

zan, what?

huh? oh, nothing, nothing. um, no mysterious 'wraith pilot', i would not like you to remove ix and xho - they really are crew. and we love them
*zan continues to smack becky's bum* 

cool. gotcha. glaive; return

becky (to zan): could you stop smacking my bum now?
oh! sorry, got carried away


SSSCCHHIIIIINNGGGGGGG

becky: so you're?!
tom: LUCY!
*zan hugs lucy*
hi, dickhead.

sorry for testing you, i wanted to know your intentions
i know these three, but it's an honour to meet you and your twin, captain ix

the honour is all mine, wraith pilot lucy (bows)

a captain with humility
now here is someone i can serve under (also bows)


ix: right you lot, it's a good bet fabuloso knows exactly where we are now, the clock's ticking and we need to test that hyperdrive; xho?

yeah we can jump anytime.

what? i thought you still needed to ... then why didn't we just jump away from that bloody great battle?

i ... didn't think we really needed to. i mean, nobody asked?

ix: xho ...

sorry, you're right i should've mentioned it. hey, we can even bring the wraith if it's close enough to the ship

distance?

within two hundred metres of the hull would do it

let's test it then.


ok *presses a single button*
*they're all facing away from the windows, stars zoom briefly*

done?

*looking at screen intently*

err ... yep!
yes!

ready to test?

it's ... we've already tested it

what?

we're now five hundred lightyears from where we were

since when?

uhh since i pressed that button

holyyyyy ... shiiiiiiittttt!!!!

yep!

*hugs all round*

luce: great job.
hey, where did you get this tattoo?

i crewed a wraith as the cover story for the last job i did; our government used it as an excuse to penetrate a smuggler colony and get me some kudos on the way in

it represents?

well i got a reputation for getting results; for using tools to destroy the invincible. the tattoo is an icon for bellerophon - he was a

i know who he was

is yours?

pegasus

...

tom; pegasus?

...

*eye contact between luce and xho*

xho: because sometimes you need a magical flying horse

luce: pegasus and bellerophon made the ultimate team

tom: cool.

becky: no way, so you both have tattoos of the same horse and rider? what?

ix: that's a hell of a coincidence

zan: or a hell of a destiny


luce: this new hyperdrive is ready to rock then, what's your problem with this admiral?

ix: well he's ...

zan: hang on. hold on. i've just had an idea. xho, can you transport other bulky objects next to the ship, like a few hundred tons of rock, and make multiple jumps within a few seconds?

yeah but it could take hours to run the computations
be quicker to move the hyperdrive to the wraith - less mass to figure out

ok, and could we also run the maths first? like i mean do all the calculations before the wraith even heads off?

yeah, sure

ix: what are you thinking, zan?

well, this might be a bit out there, but it will mix things up for fabuloso...

*a few days later*

massive rock flies through system at six hundred thousand kmh, fabuloso's fleet tracks it - can't understand how it appeared at the edge of the system without them knowing about it

rock with lasered cock on it  turns up at zero relative speed next to a ship - the delivery wraith hops away.

similar rock placed in orbit with message to the government

*speech bubble from a fleet ship*
"Commander, here is a close-up of the asteroid"
"Damn, they've totally circumnavigated all our defences to get these asteroids in here. We must be dealing with a ruthless cartel of top-end professionals"
*cut to lots of renders of everyone; tom & hayley in bunk, luce & xho in shower, becky riding victor in wraith

ix and zan scene
*in manhattan apartment -style cabin*
*zan looks at insertion depth*
knew it.
wha .. what's that line?

i measured xho's schlong against it so i could test a theory

what?

i think you could take the whole of xho.

what? but i can barely get tom inside me, and xho's ...

xho is a little bigger and a little harder, yes, but it's a species thing.

but ... but YOU can't even get all of xho inside, and you're twice the bloody size of me!

listen sugartits, i'm the only one who can feel inside you and becky like i do, and you're different on the inside. you're tight but you go deeper - you just have to bend at the right angle
and i'm the only one who's had both cocks in me, and they're different, they move slightly differently, at different points...

what .. what are you saying?
*zan rolls to one side*
i'm saying, young lady, that there's a very real possibility that despite appearances, your cute little pussy is the only one onboard that can take every millimetre of xho.

no!

zan: yes.

no!

i'm telling ya. the tentacle never lies.
*whole page*
i reckon it'd fit like a glove too  *ix eyes wide, zan talking in her ear*
fill you right up
i'll leave you to think about that little scenario

*exits, 20 mins later is seen whispering in xho's ear in a corridor*
xho: no!

i'm telling ya

why .. why are you telling me this?

just thought it was interesting, that's all. veeeery interesting.

i ... i ...

*zan walks off*


*xho walks into galley, ix sitting on surface with coffee*

hi there

ix: oh err hi!

hey
you been busy?

errr ... well ... ****Ix pictures her with zan in bed, a render or two in thought clouds****
kinda busy, yeah. you?

err, same *Xho pictures him with luce in shower*

i err ..  wanted to ask about the message we lasered into those asteroids
i mean
i wanted to talk to you

sure, anything

that tacspace thing. look, i'm sorry i've been so uptight
that time we were trapped together was ...
was actually ...

[SPOILERS REMOVED: THIS SECTION'S NOW AT THE BEGINNING OF COMIC 19]

oh! i meant to ask - about those asteroid messages we left
what do you think will happen next?

well hopefully it'll mix things up politically back home, get some of fabuloso's superiors involved then anything could happen; the whole fleet could come after us, or fabuloso could simply be removed from power and we'll be free. guess we'll find out
we're in a much better position than we were though, thanks to your work on the hyperdrive

oh it's nothing. great fun

*ix blows a kiss*

hah! i ... see you soon

*ix side smile*
*xho exits, door closes*
*ix gasps, holds head, lies back "wow"*


****comic ends with quiet hall - messenger brings emperor a message****

your imperial majesty, a substantial threat to the home system ..

hmm?

a message has been cut into an asteroid and placed in orbit, circumnavigating all our defensive systems ... including the fleet itself

...hmm

the ... the message requests that we remove admiral fabuloso from command *holds pad out*

emperor turns, eyebrow up

THE END. Now rewrite this five times & make 30% less dreary GOGOGO

Comic 18: Shadows and Dust

Friday! Comic 18 day! Woop woop wooooopppp!!!!
This is a good one. Oh yes indeed. Oh myyyyy.

120 pages: you'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll wet yourself. There's plot, but it's not slow. There's love, but it's not cloying. There's boobies and willies and bums and all sorts of nice moist things that go squelch.

Enjoy! Let me know what you think!

DOWNLOAD FOR FREE >>>
(or from g.e-hentai here)

Lovely to have this out by lunchtime, eh? You're welcome; a little gift to the world from sunny England! Cor blimey mate!

Just rendering the cover...

So after much deliberation (ie. none, it just seemed right about 6 months ago or whenever it was I was pondering the plot), the next comic will be called ... Shadows and Dust.

< This is part of the raw image for the cover, rendering out. I tend to put slightly more effort (& raytrace bounces, all that tech crap) into the cover for obvious reasons. Can't be doing with depth of field for most of the comics pages; places to go, people to see. But for the relevant pages and the cover, depth of field adds some lovely ... well ... depth.

Looks from the progress of the render above like I'll need to sort out the tomato-coloured light on her face, but that's no biggie.

Anyway, back to the comic title: it'll be clear from the plot why it's 'shadows and dust', and I've done the usual thing of obsessing over lighting to really get into the chiaroscuro mindset - kinda difficult because you're always tempted to add more lights and reveal more of the object you're rendering, but I guess that's sort of the trick; knowing when to stop.

Not that I know, but it does make lighting this stuff an interesting challenge in discipline.

Not that I have any of that.

So, update-wise, I still need to photoshop the little errors and improve the contrast on all 120 pages, so seriously don't hold your breath, but given a few days peace and quiet from the tumultuous craze of my life we could be seeing the final comic online by ... well ... Friday/Saturday maybe? Be nice to get it up in time for the weekend, eh?

Definitely by next weekend, anyway.