Issue 30

What I can say about issue 30?  It's probably the shortest issue that I did.  When I did this issue the laptop that I had been using stopped working and I had just gotten a new one and finally went out and bought a drawing tablet, which I'm still struggling with!  The end result was an issue with less than 30 panels - if you can call it an issue just to wrap up the Time-Hopping storyline and introduce a character called The All, who will play a role later on in the series.

Here's the original character sketch for The All:

Issue 30 - Here's a link to the issue if you want to read it - trust me, it won't take long!

Issue # 29

Issue 29 brings an end to the Earth-Hopping adventures of Titan and Phantom.  In this issue they get to Alternate Earth 14, a world where the Roman Empire (in the classical sense) never fell and where organized religion was outlawed.

This led to the creation of the Godboy, a sum of all religious energy and dogma for the religions that never formed on that Earth.  The island of the Godboy has an emotional effect on the heroes and they decide to return to their own Earth where Phantom discovers something about himself that he decides to keep secret - but for how long?  You can read it here if you'd like: Issue 29

When I was creating the draft for the Earth-Hopping storyline I had several ideas that I wanted to touch on, and originally the Roman Empire and Godboy elements were going to be on two separate Earths, but I decided to combine them partially to save space and also because I thought I worked well together.  

My original intent was for these stories to be back up stories in the regular issues, but then I realized that it would be going on too long for Titan and Phantom to be away from the team; while they were only gone a week it would have taken about ten months of real time to cover that!  Which is why I decided to move it a long a bit. 

The other part that the story has touched on is Phantom being bisexual and how that plays a role in his life.  When I originally created the character, that was not an element that I had built in, but when I was getting ready to launch the comic almost 30 issues ago, I wanted to make sure that my universe was diverse in several aspects and decided right before issue 1 came out to make him bi, and this is something that comes to light during this storyline and will play a role in the future. 

It also deals with Titan being straight and for the first time he hints that he has feelings for Crossbow in a subtle way, which will also be explored in the future. 

On a creative note, this issue marked a turning point for me.  Originally this was supposed to be the back up story in issue # 28 (which was running long), but I started to run out of time and to have computer problems (as mentioned in a previous blog) so I decided to make this a stand alone issue.  This is also the last issue that I created on my old computer and the last that was penciled and inked on paper before my old computer stopped functioning.  

Enjoy the issue, and perhaps one of the most bizarre final panels in comic book history!

Issue 28

While Titan and Phantom have been traveling around the alternate Earths, we look in on the rest of the team...

The team faces a new threat in Monstersaurus, a dinosaur-like creature that the Preventors unleash - as well as a new member of their team, Ox.

Along the way Crossbow meets and fights a clone of hers called Dark Bow.

The mysterious Rainbow Lad flies out of nowhere to help them, although his ability to fire rainbows doesn't really seem to help them much!

To end the battle, the team is assisted by more mysterious First T group, claiming to be from another alternate Earth, but when they return to their base we learn that things might not be what they seem as Power Boi knows who the First T really is as he's part of the Ninth T.

Oh, an unknown creature hovers in the air in front of them before walking off...what could that be?

Issue 26

The Fall of the UltraLine Team!

Back in issue # 7 I introduced that fact that my universe had alternate Earths, certainly not a new notion in comics by any means.  In that issue I had a team of villains that had taken over Earth 3, totally forgetting about DC's Crime Syndicate being on their Earth 3.  Not wanting to think there was an influence, I actually changed the villains to being on Earth 2.  

In this story we learn about the team before the 'day of darkness', a happier time on that Earth where Titan was given his powers by an elder, one-armed god named Diodarius.  One day, Titan snapped and he killed the G'Ion of his world and absorbed his powers. He then killed the Diodarius of that world and absorbed his powers.  

This led to a fracture within the team - some sided with Titan, others realized that he turned evil and wanted to stop him.  This leads to a major battle and several members are killed and two, Mindbender and GeoMancer escape.  

Having called themselves the UltraLine time, as they drew the line against evil, those loyal to Tian changed the name of their team to the Terminators of Evil.   Here is the cover to the issue:

This cover was done using a special effect photo editing ap.  

The nature of this issue is very dark, not like the rest of the issues I've written - there is no humor, there is no happiness to this issue.    There is a reason why the people of this world call it the "day of darkness".

Here is the original artwork for the cover, before the special effect was added:

Here is an alternate I considered, but didn't use for the cover:

In the back up story, Titan and Phantom find themselves on Alternate Earth 6 where the Ultra-Elite Team operates out of Australia.  Here's who makes up that team:

Issue 25

 This issue was focused on Pussywyck, the Elder, and his formation of the Pinnacle Forest.

We also saw the development of a new villain called Raw.

Plus we saw Titan and Phantom's visit to Alternate Earth 5 where they met the African Freedom Union.

Issue 24

Issue 24 had a few things going on, for starters we see Titan and Phantom get to the first of the alternate Earths, # 4, a world full of megafauna where humans never evolved.

We then see date night with Magno and Master Mind before witnessing a battle between Serpent and Mythos against some villains in Mexico who attack near the temple where Serpent was almost killed centuries ago before she was rescued by Magno.

We see Vapor and Electrode arrive in the Pinnacle forest and a young man walking down a street in Florida where he is attacked by dark forces.  Oh, let's also not forget one of the would-be muggers of Crossbow being approached in Jail by Major Hole. 

Also, if you blinked you might have missed it - but there is a bird in China waking up from a nap in one panel, and you just know that is going to play a role. 

There were a couple of deleted images.  The first one is a close up of Phantom's face, I just didn't like how the image came out, so I scraped it.

Lastly, there was another two panels that I did the breakdown of, it was during the fight with Serpent and foes in Mexico, which I also didn't like.

Production, Computer Issues and Fixes

What a journey it has been so far in getting the comic out each month.  When I started the comic, I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do in terms of producing the comic.  The writing wasn't a concern, but how I was going to draw it was a bit of a problem.  

At the time I launched the comic in April of 2018, I had a Dell Inspiron Computer from 2008 running Windows Vista and just a mouse (no stylus), but I figured that was what I had to work with, so I better make it work; and I did...for the most part.

Through out my comic, issues 1 to 29, they were always a mix of digital and hand drawn.  For the first few issues I did a pencil on paper breakdown and inked and colored it using the ArcSoft PhotoStudio program and lettered it with that program as well.

But I soon learned that I had a hard time getting things the way I wanted them inking digitally, so starting with issue # 5, I did something different.  I just used a black ink ball point Bic pen and drew the issue directly on paper and then fixed and edited it digitally.  However, there were a few problems with that, sometimes the ink wasn't spread evenly and that was very prone to smudges or spots on the paper and I was spending too much time correcting those errors.  I only did this for numbers 5 and 6.

Starting with issue 7 through 29, I penciled them on paper and then inked them on paper was well, using Sharpie Ultra Fine point markers, sometimes in later issues I would use Razor Point markers from Pilot, these were my markers of choice for inking when I used to do posters for my brother years ago.

Starting with issue # 8, through now I started doing the lettering using the PhotoScape program.  

Things went along quite nicely for several years, but then we got to early May of 2021 and the monitor on my old laptop stopped working.  Luckily for me it has a port where I could hook up another monitor and I was able to keep working, but I knew my time with that laptop would be ending soon.

In early June 2021 my laptop/monitor set up didn't want to work.  I came home on a Friday night ready to finish my work on issue # 29, but I couldn't do anything.  After about 45 minutes of messing with it, I was able to get it working, but knew that was it.  I ordered new Dell Inspiron computer and then spent the weekend setting it up. (I did end up finishing # 29 on the old laptop)

I had to make quite a few adjustments to be able to do what I wanted, but knew also that I needed to evolve with my comic and decided to go completely digital.  I ordered an M708 Graphics Tablet from Ugee and I downloaded the Kitra art program and started to learn that.  Here's the first thing I created on there:

Trust me, I got better after this one!  

Starting with issue # 30, every issue going forward will be completely digital.  

The pro's to me: no more spending time penciling, inking or scanning in the book - I should be able to increase my production and get more material out there.

The con to me: digital drawing just feels weird and I'm not comfortable with it yet.