Oooh, a Blade Runner 2049 mini-prequel, from the Cowboy Bebop director Shinichiro Watanabe. In plot terms, the 15 minute Blade Runner: Black Out 2022 sit between the original and the new Blade Runner. As do the follow-on shorts 2036: Nexus Dawn and 2048: Nowhere to Run. All are now on YouTube for free, courtesy of Warner Bros.
Below is my itemisation of the “Marvel Method” of making a comic-book, as best as I can make it out from reading various interviews from Stan Lee / Jack Kirby glory days.
The method began at Atlas and would later change and morph at Marvel in the 1970s, but here’s what it was meant to be originally in the early days of Marvel…
1) Stan Lee wrote (or told face-to-face, sometimes with physical play-acting) a quick loose plot treatment for the comic’s next issue, ranging in length from a simple paragraph to a page or two. Just a plot with beginning – middle – end, and some general indications of where each scene might be set and what the character motivations/reactions might be at specific points. There were almost no detailed descriptions for the artist to follow, unless Lee wanted something very specific or innovative in a particular scene. The ending might also be made quite specific, in terms of exactly how things should end up in the final scenes.
2) The artist would break this story down into pages of framed art, pace the story across the number of pages available (sans splash page). The character designs and relationships/motivations had of course already been set up by previous issues of the title, so the artist could work pretty much ‘on automatic’ in that respect. Then he laid out the story across each page, with rough pencils. He might have to micro-plot specific scenes that the wider plot seemed to require, and/or bring a secondary character into the scene if that was needed. He added visual emphases and visual “cliffhanger” moments.
Obviously here the “Marvel Method” assumed a top-flight action artist like Kirby etc, as the method is not going to work with talent that has lesser visualisation and pacing skills. Or with comics that talk-talk-talk rather than show. Or with comics that need elaborate multi-issue pre-plotting and fiddly sub-plots.
3) The artist of course knows to leave space on the penciled pages for caption boxes or dialogue balloons, but doesn’t indicate exactly where they would be. He likely adds margin notes on the top of the page, to: i) explain the action to the writer, if the pencils are very rough or he’s invented a filler scene; or ii) repeat the section of the writer’s plot he’s covering, to jog the writer’s memory and/or for future reference later down the production line. That would be especially important if the plot had been delivered verbally.
4) The artist then added the splash (opening) full-page to summarise the story, meaning the story as they had imagined it on the page.
5) Stan Lee then came back into the process. He approved the penciled art pages for conforming to his basic plot, picked up errors and misinterpretations (most likely via notes to the inker, such as “the people in this cafe need to be more seedy-looking, please”).
7) Stan Lee penciled in the placing and size of the caption boxes, and suitably sized balloons, so as to meld these well with the artwork. Lee also said in one interview that he invented and penciled in all the sound-effect words (THHWONK! etc) at that point. This means the writer must also have an excellent sense of graphic design and spacing in page layout.
8) Once that was done he had a good idea of how wordy each page could be. He then wrote the copy for the caption boxes and dialogue/thought balloons, so as to fit with what was in the panels — the facial expressions, the details shown in the settings, any new elements the artist added etc. His captions would also help fill in plot aspects that were not being conveyed by the visuals.
Stan Lee: “And I found, as I was doing it, it made it much more enjoyable. Because I wasn’t looking at blank paper in a typewriter, but I was writing copy [dialogue, captions] for people, for drawings that I was looking at, with expressions and actions. I felt carried away.” [He would also ‘act out loud’ his ideas for lines, trying out how they sounded, in the same way that Robert E. Howard had done in the 1930s].
9) Small gaps left over in the layout might be filled with occasional footnotes to the reader, which referred them back to events in previous issues or in other titles. This helped to cross-sell titles to readers, and also helped the creatives keep track of continuity.
10) Did Lee also pencil in the lettering of his copy-writing? I guess it would have saved him typing time, and it seems he did — as in one interview he admitted: “I write the captions and dialogue [aka ‘the copy’], usually right on the original artwork”. This would also have helped with exactly fitting the copy to the space available on the page, making the finished page look even more elegantly arranged. Which means the writer also has to have lettering and copy-fitting skills, albeit not in ink.
The penciled and laid-out and written pages were presumably then photographed as a backup, and then went off to the inker of the artwork. Then to a letterer and colourist, under the supervision of an editor.
That, as best I can re-construct it, is how it was done.
Graphic Medicine : the interaction of comics & healthcare. A very vigorous and dedicated website complete with: an occasional podcast; a blog; a long-running “This Week in Graphic Medicine” news/link digest; reviews of strips and graphic novels; and even a long-running annual conference (2018: Vermont, east coast of the USA / 2019: Brighton UK).
The new relatively-affordable 10-inch tablets with 1920px screens are going to provide an excellent platform for such comics. Add to that Poser’s speedy comic-book rendering abilities and vast royalty-free content library, and there seems to be a huge open opportunity here for talent to get into creating healthcare comics, and then to teach others to make them. That would have to be about teaching people to make them in a non-naff way, a way which meets the high 2D standards which both kids and regular adult comics-readers now expect. Ugly grainy 3D textures with a few toon lines over the top, and “wanna-be-3D-really” shadows, are not going to be acceptable in a therapeutic context.
Now that the new Blade Runner movie has so expertly turned the corner of the year 2017, it seems timely for me to do a new survey of the forthcoming 2018 science-fiction and fantasy films.
There are of course still a few more films to come in 2017. Before Christmas we get Marvel’s Thor: Ragnarok; DC’s Justice League; Guillermo del Toro’s acclaimed ‘beauty and the beast’ movie The Shape of Water; and of course the big-big release which is Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
But below I focus is on what’s coming in 2018. I should note that I’m not someone who watches trailers, due to the generally spoiler-ific nature of trailers. So these comments are not informed by any trailers there might be out there.
* Extinction: Extinction leads a whole pack of gloomy movies, with its January 2018 release. It sounds like Close Encounters of the Third Kind (the grim family-breakdown bits) meets any number of imminent-apocalypse movies. I’m not expecting much from this one.
* The God Particle: The heavily delayed space-station horror movie God Particle is now set for release in early February 2018. Despite the intellectual-sounding title it appears to be just a basic ‘dangerous aliens on a space station’ story. It’s also apparently now part of the Cloverfield franchise. Perhaps that’s how the makers rescued what was, by all accounts, a turkey.
* Annihilation: A Natalie Portman vehicle due at the end of February 2018. It features a small-team scientific expedition to an “environmental disaster zone”. Could be just another “monsters and guns on the jungle” action-eer with a veneers of sci-fi. But the fact that the makers had hoped to get Tilda Swinton suggests it may have a little more intellectual substance to it. One suspects that piranha-like flesh eating nano-swarms may be involved, rather than a giant crocodile. However, with that sort of thing I’m always haunted by the huge pile of pretentious nano-crud that was Johnny Depp’s awful Transcendence (2014).
* A Wrinkle in Time: Once we get past the dead zone of the January/February releases, things become a little more upbeat with a Disney movie. This is an adaptation of a children’s Christian science-fiction novel that was well-known in the 1960s and 70s, but which somewhat faded from public awareness in the 1980s and 90s. It’s a big Disney live-action movie, so should be fairly enjoyable. Though it may work best for those aged 11-14. It’s due in early March 2018, and will possibly be the most cheerful fantasy of what appears to be a very gloomy year of movies.
* Black Panther: Yet more jungle adventure — is the Dominican Republic offering vast subsidies to movie-makers, to film in its lush jungles? I must stay I enjoyed the Black Panther’s first brief appearance on the big screen in Captain America: Civil War. But it sounds to me like this may be a re-hash of Avatar, with military outsiders invading the hidden jungle trying to steal the Panther’s vibranium metal. Yawn. Still, it’s from Marvel, so it should have some extra sci-fi zip to it, if the makers faithfully visualise Jack Kirby’s ground-breaking take on Afrofuturism. Presumably it also somewhat sets the scene for the big Avengers: Infinity War blockbuster later in the year.
* Tomb Raider: A big Warner Bros. release in mid March 2018. Judging by the grim movie poster it’s not going to be bouncy and camp Raiders of the Lost Ark-style fun, and will instead go for a gritty “I’m a survivor, taste my bloody ice-pick!” angle.
* Pacific Rim: Uprising: A sequel to the big brash but forgettable Pacific Rim. This time there’s no Guillermo del Toro in sight. Sounds like a big dumb sequel, full of monsters vs. giant machines, but hey… that can be enjoyable too.
* Rampage. Yet another ‘bio-engineered monsters in the jungle’ movie, this time based on an old 1980s videogame. And of course the monsters escape and go on the rampage. Sounds like an over-the-top formula popcorn movie, basically Jurassic Park crossed with Godzilla. Expect laughs, if not outright parody.
* Ready Player One. Steven Spielberg as director of a post-apocalyptic / cyberpunk movie, set in a future where most people prefer to ‘live’ in the virtual reality world of the OASIS. Sounds like Blade Runner meets Tron. Hopefully it will have an interesting Snow Crash-like edge in terms of the visuals, although it’s apparently based on a dire young adults novel that was anything but the great Snow Crash.
* The New Mutants. At first glance I thought this was proper X-Men movie, but from the description it seems to be a grim psychological teens-in-a-maze horror videogame dressed up in X-Men clothing. Nope, that just sounds awful to me — even when I learn that the great Maisie Williams is starring.
* Avengers: Infinity War: Which releases in early May and opens the summer season. One of the year’s big “must see” movies, of course.
* “Untitled Han Solo film”, in May 2018. A Lucasfilm space-western telling the backstory of Han Solo, and directed by Ron Howard. Yup, I’ll definitely see that.
* The Incredibles 2: Pixar’s big summer movie from… the great Brad Bird. Interesting. Yup, that sounds like another must-see movie.
* Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom: Yet more jungles and escaped monsters, and yet more forgettable popcorn and people-munching action.
* Ant-Man and the Wasp: Presumably this will be Marvel’s lighter offshoot movie, serving as a palette-cleanser after the heavier Avengers: Infinity War. The first Ant Man movie was enjoyable, and presumably this will be more of the same.
* Hotel Transylvania 3: Hotel Transylvania 2 was a thoroughly enjoyable entertainment, even with its (thankfully quite short) musical interludes. So I have hopes for more fun from this.
* Alita: Battle Angel: Hollywood takes another crack at doing Japanese manga/anime as a big summer blockbuster movie. Maybe this time it’ll finally work, with James Cameron at the helm. In the far future a girl cyborg is rescued from a scrapheap. It should be Valerian-style treat visually, if nothing else.
* Hellboy: Apparently Hellboy reboots into an R-rated Deadpool style, but… he travels to an ancient England, must defeat Merlin the wizard etc. Hmmm… Well, I guess an early medieval fantasy setting would allow for lots of gratuitous violence and gore. I’ve only ever seen the Hellboy movies, and I disliked the Deadpool movie, so while the setting excites me the style may not.
* Bumblebee: Apparently a Transformers spin-off movie telling the 1980s backstory of Bumblebee. I suspect a viewer will have to be younger than 11 to enjoy this one.
* The Man Who Killed Don Quixote: Terry Gilliam’s new project, in which a time-travelling ad-man meets the famous tragic hero Don Quixote. Any whacky and surreal Gilliam movie is always welcome.
* Mission: Impossible 6: Always a treat, with cool future-gadgets and snappy patter.
* First Man: a bio-pic on the life and work of the Apollo astronaut Neil Armstrong. Hopefully a respectful one.
* The Predator: apparently an attempt to revive the Predator brand, as a sequel to the 1987 movie. Judging by the timing of the release it’ll just be a big dumb summer action movie.
* The Titan: Seems to be a low-budget action/horror movie in which an Air Force pilot is genetically re-engineered to survive on Saturn’s moon Titan. Might be interesting, though it seems he just turns into the usual movie-monster.
* Venom: In early October we get the big screen version of Marvel’s Venom character, introduced in the late 1980s as a new arch-enemy of Spider-Man. He’s from a time when I had stopped reading Marvel comics, so there’s no “oh wow, Venom!” reaction from me. But he sounds like an interesting character. I’m hoping this won’t be skewed into Deadpool territory, but I guess it will be.
* X-Men: Dark Phoenix: the big and long-awaited X-Men movie lands in early November. It is, of course, the movie version of the famous Dark Phoenix story. Just as long as they do it right…
* Batman: Gotham by Gaslight: an animated Batman feature, in which the Batman inhabits an alternate-world steampunk Victorian Gotham, is on the trail of Jack the Ripper. Based on the graphic novel, though that’s not always a recommendation. For instance, I was disappointed by the recent feature-animation of Justice League: The New Frontier, which was risibly simplistic compared to the graphic novel.
* Fantastic Beasts and Where Not to Find Them: A Fantastic Beasts sequel. The first one was entertaining, in a Doctor Who-ish sort of way, and looked great. Yes, more of the same would be welcome.
* Mortal Engines. An adaptation of the novel set in a steampunk-ish version of London, on an alternate-history desolated earth. Set for a 14th December release, so it must be really good if it’s going to do well in the Christmas slot.
That’s it. It’s interesting to see how steampunk comes through strongly at the end of the year, albeit with a gloomy edge to it. Can 2019 be a bit more cheerful and optimistic please, Hollywood?
I picked up Rift Guardian for Poser, in a recent DAZ sale, and I’m pleased to say it toons up beautifully in Poser 11’s Comic Book mode, without even having to change any textures.
Left figure: my custom ‘2000AD’ Poser sketch preset, run on the Comic Book mode b&w lines only. (12 seconds render). Right figures: Straightforward Comic Book mode (flat lighting, one extra light for brightness), default 3D textures. (5 second renders at 6000 pixels).
I discovered that Darkseal’s standalone characters take Nursoda character poses, though of course not all suit Rift Guardian.
I’ve added a second freebie to my Stuff for free page, here on this blog. It’s a cute retro three-wheeler car, an .OBJ conversion of a public domain CC0 Blender model. The original was nice, but had no material zones. I’ve added these, and now you can easily drag-and-drop new materials. Commercial use of your renders is fine by me.
Posted in Companion software, Freebies, Spotted in the News, The Animation Industry
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A new free ‘open source’ software, Storyboarder. Lets you sketch storyboards, with lots of helper widgets and do-dahs. Nice clean user-interface, too.
Sadly it also has one of those “give us your email and we’ll send you a download link” things. Meh. So I haven’t downloaded, installed and tested. But it looks good, and you can’t argue with free.
According to a third-party blurb it apparently…
“allows the user to type a description in the sidebar and instantly get properly positioned 3D models, over which details can be added.”
Interesting, but there’s no info about things like 3D model import on the website? I couldn’t find anything there about 3D, importing .OBJs or their being some sort of 3D posing dolls inside the software. You can however change cameras to different shot types, and doing so forces your scene into a sort-of tilt to match the camera shot. Perhaps that was what was misunderstood to be “3D”?
For those less inclined to sketch by hand just to get rough storyboards, also look at DesignDoll 4.0, which definitely does work with 3D. Imagine a streamlined ‘Poser for comics artists’, dedicated to making the rough pencils for each frame.
So far as I recall Manga Studio also handles 3D well.
Of course there’s also Poser and DAZ Studio, and their real-time OpenGL previews, and Poser 11’s real-time Comic Book mode.
3D World magazine is increasingly skippable, due to its high-end industry/student focus. But this month at least there’s a good review of iClone 7. Though it has a misleading bit which says that “iClone 7 has a very short learning curve”. That seems erm, well… let’s just say it seems over-eager to hype the software. To be charitable to the reviewer, that line occurs over in the sidebar and perhaps was added later by the sub-editor.
There appears to be a new sale bit at Cornucopia, the Vue store. Log in and click the ‘Personal Offer’ sidebar link. It looks like it’s a small selection, akin to the DAZ’s “Fast Grab” page…
It clicked with two items in my Wish List. Slightly badly timed, though, as I all-but cleared my PayPal balance on the recent DAZ and Renderosity sales.
Posted in Companion software, Real-time animation, Special Offers and Discounts, Spotted in the News, The Animation Industry
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The Reallusion blog has all the details on their just-released $1000 Faceware Realtime system, for accurate real-time markerless facial animation in iClone…
The new Cinema 4D is out, Cinema 4D 19.
* A new viewport with… “Results so close to final render” that they can (apparently) be show to clients.
* 360° Virtual Reality output.
* “New Polygon Reduction” functionality, while preserving details.
* BodyPaint 3D. “Now uses an OpenGL painting engine, giving R19 artists a real-time display of reflections, alpha, bump or normal, and even displacement”.
* LOD. “Level of Detail (LOD) Object – Define and manage settings to maximize viewport and render speed, or prepare optimized assets for game workflows. Exports FBX for use in popular game engines.”
I wonder how automated that last one is? Auto LOD loading for distant objects? To speed up render time?
There’s also support for AMD’s various innovative new graphics power-ups, recently introduced.
Poser Pro 11 users should be able to send their Poser scenes to Cinema 4D, via the plugins that ship with Poser Pro. Though I’m guessing there will be the usual short hiatus before Poser supports the latest Cinema 4D 19. Although Vue is probably your better option there, unless perhaps Cinema 4D’s new “Results so close to final render” viewport is real-time.
Posted in Companion software, Freebies, Real-time animation, Spotted in the News
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The Muvizu website is back again, the Glasgow company having been acquired by Hong Kong’s Meshmellow. Sales also appear to be back, with the £25 Muvizu:Play+ and various add-on packs, though the site appears to be little sluggish from the UK (presumably it’s now hosted in the Far East?). Muvizu is a real-time toon animation animation software based on the Unreal videogame engine, and pitched at a market segment that needs things to be easy-to-use.
Here’s my pick of September’s new content, released for DAZ Studio and Poser.
Sci-fi:
Prototype-X: Synthetic Limbs for G8F. An unusual cy-body makover for G8F.
Morphing Regenerator for G3F and G8F. Could probably also be re-worked as a cyber-vehicle, by adding a hover-ski beneath it.
A chunkier charger is Charger, an unusual power charging-station for your Genesis-based robots.
Spider Bot Mech from The AntFarm. Genesis 3 poses for pilots, and for the mech. An excellent superhero enemy/vehicle, I should think. Also look at Going Viral for Genesis 3 Male, in that respect.
Ultimate Shower, a sort of future-shower place.
The shower and loungers probably a base area for a team of Dolphin Island-style High Tech Scuba Diver for Genesis 8 Female scientists.
Totte’s Flyfishing set for DAZ Studio. Might be adapted to become part of a steampunk scene where an inventor of tiny mechanical bots is readying a fiendish micro-army.
Historical:
An authentic recreation of the Herculaneum Theater at Vesuvius, for Poser. Complete with interior spaces as they were when the volcano erupted.
Medieval Dinner Hall in the Beowulf mead-hall style.
Centurion and Aquilifer for Genesis 3 Male…
World War II U.S. Uniform HD for Genesis 8 Male, Uniform HD Textures and Stonemason’s Battleground.
A freebie canoe, Kanu. For Poser and M4. Commercial use.
Landscapes:
Biomes01: Forest to Desert for Vue. Three different landscape zones which shade into each other, and with the sort of enormous scale which Vue does so well.
Dryland Expanse for Poser, another photoreal set from ShaaraMuse3D, this time with 8192px textures! Plus Dryland Oasis. Lots of uses, from lizards and dinosaurs to desert warfare and Biblical scenes. Also likely to interest Vue users.
If you need something that’s similar, but looks more like The Hulk just visited, there’s also the new Demolished Aftermath for Poser.
Storybook:
Need an old storyteller or wise man? Old Chap for Genesis 3 and 8 Male and Expression Smoother for Genesis 8 Female and Male (sliders to either smooth or exaggerate the Genesis 8 facial wrinkles).
Flying Carpet by Cybertenko. Your classic racing rug from the Arabian Nights.
The Legend for Genesis 3 and 8 Female from Aeon Soul. Reminds me a bit of the bonemold armour in the videogame Morrowind.
Celestal HelmetHair for Poser, a helmet-as-hair that looks suitable for dragon-riders and snake-surfers.
Cave & cobwebs from 1971s. With a slightly stylised feel that should suit many semi-toon characters such as those of Nursoda.
1971s also has a new Swamp tree, which could form a centre-peice of the cave…
Also, the new Teen Josie 8 for Genesis 8 Female, suitable for storybook pictures and tales.
Toon:
Star Witchery, a new clothing set for the original Star! character.
Precious Deer for DAZ Studio, plus (or course) a lot of add-ons and morphs to make dragons and suchlike.
AnnA HD for Genesis 8 Female, gives G8F a Pinocchio-ish semi-toon face.
Animals:
Tyrannosaurus Rex 2, now with feathers, age morphs, more details, and a Gore Pack.
Fishes of the Ocean for Poser and DAZ Studio. With morphs, schools presets, and several species and sizes. Lightweight, so you can have large schools of them.
Free Round Glasses for Millennium Cat.
That’s it. More picks next month.
Posted in DAZ Studio, Poser, Special Offers and Discounts, Spotted in the News, Vue
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The newly revamped Content Paradise store now has a “Sale” page linked, from the top of the front page. 40 pages of sale items, headed by a Poser 11 sale. Upgrade from Poser 6 or above, to Poser 11 Standard, for just $60…
There’s not a lot to get excited about on the sale items, as the reductions are quite modest. But right at the end of the pages there’s a Vue freebie, a cat-lady trailer ‘Granny’s Trailer – Mobile Park’, and it also has a furnished interior. It’s from Meshbox, but a glance inside the .zip shows it has multiple textures rather than a single texture map. Which means you can easily re-texture it…
I also spotted a good amount of NearMe discounted outfits and morphs and even a pose pack, which will interest those using NearMe + Poser to make comics…
The DAZ Store also has a big sale on now, mostly 40% discounts and a few 66%. Most of my Wishlist is discounted, though lacking the 70% discounts that would be really tempting.
As well as looking at your Wishlist, also sort-the-store by price, and then skip to about page 5 in. From there onward in you’ll find pages and pages of older RuntimeDNA items for $3 to $4 each, and lots of toons suitable for use with Poser’s Comic Book mode…
