Scribbledeegok

This week's big task has been penciling. For most comickers, Penciling is the most integral part of the entire comic making process. The Penciler gets second billing on the credits (after the writer), and Pencilers are sorta the celebrities of the comic book industry. The Pencilers pencils give shape and form to the work, and although Inkers are not tracers (Kevin Smith is a great director and writer, but damn I wish he hadn't wrote that bit in "Chasing Amy"), most Inkers leave little of their own style behind, which means that most of the work that the reader looks at is the work of the Penciler. Because the Penciler needs to leave as much detail as possible on the page for the Inker to work off of, Penciling can be a long and lengthy process. I read in one article that Jim Lee takes about One Day to Pencil One Page (now, whether one day meant 8, 12, 14, or 24 hours is unknown to me, but still, whoo, that's a long time).

Penciling works differently here in TORC Land. I don't write a script, so in many ways the Penciling process and the Writing process are indistinguishable. In addition, I'm my own Inker, so I don't need to draw in every single last detail during the Penciling. Hell, my pencils are so rough it's sometimes borderlines on ridiculous. But again, because I know every single thing that's supposed to go onto the page ahead of time, I can flesh out my loose pencils in the inking process. (Quick examples of things I never pencil: Cracks in cement, grass, bark on trees, shadows (unless their positioning is integral) As a result, I can Pencil with an incredible amount of speed. Last night I penciled something like 5 pages or so. Take that, Jim Lee.