City of Heroes Invasion Issue 2
With issue 2, I started working with new tools to construct and build my images. I had recently learned of a pair of special functions in the game of City of Heroes known as "Demo Record" and "Demo edit". Demo Record allows me to record actions from within the game in a sort of script. Basically, the 'demo record' command generates a list of time coded commands that can then be used to direct the game engine to render. I can then take that script, and edit it to render different object. Swap character locations, have a character perform a specific action, ECT. That's the advantage of using demo editing for this.
The disadvantage, you have to manually accommodate for everything. So it's best to use demo editing to do simple things like having a single character performing a single action. Using a "demo dump" command in the game engine I can then run the demo file and export 9 single frames per second of video. This allows me to pick the exact moment I need for the image.
Once I got a character, I could find the location for the shot and grab a screen cap of that. I could then take both the character image and the background image, drop them both into Photoshop and composite the two together into a single image.
I started looking around online and found various tutorials for Photoshop. Through some experimentation I started to apply those tutorials to the images to create the various power effects and environmental effects. I applied them to creating the various effects that would represent the various powers the characters would be using. A good example of this is on page 17,the image of the Cy-tor Prime being engulfed by flame with a smoking hole in its chest. There is no effect in the game that looks exactly like that. What I did here was to write a demo script file that had the Cy-tor character performing a foot stomp. I then performed a demo dump and grabbed the frame where Cy-tor is at the peak of the stomp and pulled it over to Photoshop
From there I composited the image of the Cy-tor onto the background, and added in the flames both behind and in front of the Cy-tor. I cut a hole out of the chest and added some inner-mechanics and then darkened the hole considerably and drew in the smoke trailing out of the armor. Lastly I applied an orange-red color over lay to color tint the Cy-tor to represent the light being emitted from the flames.
Like all my efforts, this issue also involved a learning curve. More often than not, I would try something you would think would be pretty simple but in reality proved to have more of a challenge to it, usually due to other factors that I hadn't known about. A good example of this is on page 8 of issue 2. In frame 2 Tri-volt is surprised when the massive Cy-tor slams into the ground. In order to convey the sheer size of the Cy-tor I applied a motion blur filter. The result of that simple application was to blur the cy-tor in such a way as to make it appear hazy more than blurred from motion. I figured out a better method to accomplish this trick but I didn't have a chance to implement it in Issue 2.
The fight with the Cy-tor from page 9 through page 17 was a moderate victory for my efforts. On the one hand I figured out a lot of tricks for manipulating the various images to achieve different effects. On the down side the sequence is somewhat dis-jointed and doesn't flow particularly well. I had intended to make the fight a bit more desperate then it reads out in the comic. The Cy-tor is supposed to be as strong as Torroes, and able to take more punishment to boot. Yet with one exception we never see it land a punch. Even in that exception a poor attempt at a blur effect renders the image nearly un-readable instead of the effect I had been hoping for.
The sequence on page 16, where Tri-volt runs, falls back, slides between the Cy-tor's feet and launches a grenade under the armored chest plate turned out well enough though I know better Photo shop tricks now to achieve better images.
Frame 2 of page 19 is a prime example of what I was talking about earlier, having to manually account for everything. I neglected to include the Cy-tor's body in the flames behind Torroes.
Page 20 is an example of trying, and failing, to let the information carry the reader. As it stands now, the page is made of up four separate panels, showing mostly Arachnos solders standing around listening to Torroes' speech. If I were to re-do the issue I would change the images entirely, showing the Rikti abusing some of the Arachnos solders while other worked with the Rikti, and as the pages progresses downward, the images would be of the Rikti and the Arachnos stopping and hearing the speech with Torroes' entire speech being presented down the center of the page in on unbroken passage.
In reflection, issue 2 of City of Heroes Invasion was far more of a success then issue 1. There are many things that I would change if I were to go back and remake it, but in comparison to issue 1 it is a large step forward in my comic based story telling abilities.