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So - What i'm Working On Now - part 1
12 years ago
Okay, so previous journal was about my history in animation biz. Now what i'm working on now.
i'm working on some graphic novels and short stories. Before i got into animation biz i wanted to do comics. Lost interest in the superhero stuff when exposed to art-nouveau, book illustration, fine art, but still loved comix form of story telling. Saw that form evolve while stuck in animation biz. And started to form plans to get back into it with original (non-superhero) stories... A sf story or two...Something anthro?...
After moving to Canada about 16 yrs ago a story started to take shape...the early colonial days of the British on the west coast....the native side was largely untold back then...this was their land i had moved to...
At this time i was also “getting into” David Sylvian's music – he became my favourite songwriter, and prolly still is....the sense of poetry, shamanic vision, relationships, honesty...
These two came together with what was happening in my life to form this story of Emma and Ash....
The story was there before their designs or names....The native wolf shaman, far from home and enslaved by a coyote tribe - and colony fox female doctor, outcast in her people....they had a forbidden secret love affair when they met, but it couldn't continue in their world. Emma thought he could pretend to be a stable slave sort of thing, Ash wanted her to flee with him back to the north wolf lands...
It fell apart. Ash left back to coyote tribe, refused to see Emma. Emma kept trying to see him, to no avail.
Ash was suicidal, starving himself – so the coyotes forced him to take care of a baby Lynx girl who they had found alive after searching another coyote's tribe raid. Having to take care of his new daughter Teesha he could no longer think only of his lost love.
Meanwhile Emma was not so fortunate. As the only doctor of the fox colony, yes, she had to take care of others everyday, but at night she was alone. She started to drink....looking at the photos she had made of Ash...of them together....Kept going to coyote village, but he would always be away, would never see her. So she would lose herself at night in strong drink and fading photos, hoping each night might be her last...that the slow poisoning would take hold....no more waking up...
Five years later the story starts...Ash shows up at the colony with Teesha, deathly ill, strapped to his back. The lake at the coyote village has become poisoned and he thinks Emma has something to do with it. He had told her about the underworld, all the workings of death there – she was the only one who knew these secrets – she must be behind this....
He shows up on her doorstep that night as the story starts...It's a sort of agony for them to see each other again....Ash explains that the village has been poisoned from the lake...Emma sobers quickly through drunk haze – doesn't know Ash suspect her – Swears to help – to save Teesha -
But it gets worse – Ash doesn't trust her – And there are things going on about the poisoning of the lake...The colony is being threatened by fox monarchy as foreign wars tax colonies, etc...
That's sort of the background for chapter one of the Emma Ash story. No flashbacks, that back story comes to bear during first two chapters via dialogue...
i avoided starting real work on the pages because the emotional pain between Emma and Ash was so intense...i just wasn't up to dealing with it...
The story was written about 16 or 17 yrs ago. i'm now doing the page thumbnails for pages, some dialouge. The whole thing was written, plotted back then. Sort of an adventure/mystery ride through hell of a failed romance having to deal with a crisis in colony and villages....
Following Emma and Ash is a short graphic story (36 – 60 ish pages) called “To Save The Fish From Drowning” (Nothing to do with the Amy Tang story “Saving Fish From Drowning” - title is coincidence, and the metaphor, if such, totally different). Borderland during a war – two teenage girls are on village guard patrol when they are told that enemy has broken through and is going to blow-up the dam upriver from their village. They have make sure everyone is evacuated...It gets rather dark...i suppose you could say it's an anti-war story...
And then the Willa-Miss Billishire – Lord Tad story. That's supposed to be a comedy – with adventure elements – general idea was “The Importance Of Being Earnest”/”The Princess Bride”/”Black Adder” sort of thingy...but nowhere near as funny....outline for that in next journal...
- l.
i'm working on some graphic novels and short stories. Before i got into animation biz i wanted to do comics. Lost interest in the superhero stuff when exposed to art-nouveau, book illustration, fine art, but still loved comix form of story telling. Saw that form evolve while stuck in animation biz. And started to form plans to get back into it with original (non-superhero) stories... A sf story or two...Something anthro?...
After moving to Canada about 16 yrs ago a story started to take shape...the early colonial days of the British on the west coast....the native side was largely untold back then...this was their land i had moved to...
At this time i was also “getting into” David Sylvian's music – he became my favourite songwriter, and prolly still is....the sense of poetry, shamanic vision, relationships, honesty...
These two came together with what was happening in my life to form this story of Emma and Ash....
The story was there before their designs or names....The native wolf shaman, far from home and enslaved by a coyote tribe - and colony fox female doctor, outcast in her people....they had a forbidden secret love affair when they met, but it couldn't continue in their world. Emma thought he could pretend to be a stable slave sort of thing, Ash wanted her to flee with him back to the north wolf lands...
It fell apart. Ash left back to coyote tribe, refused to see Emma. Emma kept trying to see him, to no avail.
Ash was suicidal, starving himself – so the coyotes forced him to take care of a baby Lynx girl who they had found alive after searching another coyote's tribe raid. Having to take care of his new daughter Teesha he could no longer think only of his lost love.
Meanwhile Emma was not so fortunate. As the only doctor of the fox colony, yes, she had to take care of others everyday, but at night she was alone. She started to drink....looking at the photos she had made of Ash...of them together....Kept going to coyote village, but he would always be away, would never see her. So she would lose herself at night in strong drink and fading photos, hoping each night might be her last...that the slow poisoning would take hold....no more waking up...
Five years later the story starts...Ash shows up at the colony with Teesha, deathly ill, strapped to his back. The lake at the coyote village has become poisoned and he thinks Emma has something to do with it. He had told her about the underworld, all the workings of death there – she was the only one who knew these secrets – she must be behind this....
He shows up on her doorstep that night as the story starts...It's a sort of agony for them to see each other again....Ash explains that the village has been poisoned from the lake...Emma sobers quickly through drunk haze – doesn't know Ash suspect her – Swears to help – to save Teesha -
But it gets worse – Ash doesn't trust her – And there are things going on about the poisoning of the lake...The colony is being threatened by fox monarchy as foreign wars tax colonies, etc...
That's sort of the background for chapter one of the Emma Ash story. No flashbacks, that back story comes to bear during first two chapters via dialogue...
i avoided starting real work on the pages because the emotional pain between Emma and Ash was so intense...i just wasn't up to dealing with it...
The story was written about 16 or 17 yrs ago. i'm now doing the page thumbnails for pages, some dialouge. The whole thing was written, plotted back then. Sort of an adventure/mystery ride through hell of a failed romance having to deal with a crisis in colony and villages....
Following Emma and Ash is a short graphic story (36 – 60 ish pages) called “To Save The Fish From Drowning” (Nothing to do with the Amy Tang story “Saving Fish From Drowning” - title is coincidence, and the metaphor, if such, totally different). Borderland during a war – two teenage girls are on village guard patrol when they are told that enemy has broken through and is going to blow-up the dam upriver from their village. They have make sure everyone is evacuated...It gets rather dark...i suppose you could say it's an anti-war story...
And then the Willa-Miss Billishire – Lord Tad story. That's supposed to be a comedy – with adventure elements – general idea was “The Importance Of Being Earnest”/”The Princess Bride”/”Black Adder” sort of thingy...but nowhere near as funny....outline for that in next journal...
- l.
...heh, drunk Emma...