Creating a Comic

A new comic book is debuting this summer, and the creators are two freshmen students at CHS. The series is drawn by Camille Curtis and written by myself, Keilan Morrissey. It is titled Abandoned Destinies. This comic has been advertised on social media through an account on Instagram with the handle @destinies_comic. Sneak previews of characters are provided as well as regular updates on the progress of the series. One official poster has been released on the Instagram page as well. A blog with the URL of destiniescomic.wordpress.com is also active. It posts the same images in higher quality and more. Through word of mouth, the Instagram account, and the blog, my co-creator and I hope to spread awareness about the comic book before the debut issue is released on June 2nd.

As seen on the site, this comic book is completely original. We developed the characters and the storyline ourselves. Other stories that we love have influenced our ideas, but this comic is very unique and different from anything else. The series takes place one thousand years from now, beginning in the year 3017. All of humankind is gone from Earth, and monstrous creatures called Embers are the dominant species on the planet. They are colorful and diverse, with many different sizes, appearances, and abilities. Their names share a pattern of three letters followed by a number. For instance, some of the main characters are named ERL7 and FER5. A group of four Embers embark on a quest to discover how their species came into existence and perhaps find out what happened to the human race which preceded them.

As the writer of this series, I wish to provide some insight on the creative process of this project. If you have looked at the blog or the Instagram page, then you have likely seen concept art for the series in different phases. Camille and I developed the ideas for many characters, and then she drew pencil sketches of them until they looked perfect. I colored these concept drawings using Photoshop to give them more of a professional feel, and then released them digitally for viewers to enjoy. Once the appearances of the different characters were nailed down, and we decided what kind of dynamics the main protagonists would have with one another, I wrote the script for the first ten-page issue. The script had detailed descriptions of the drawings required for each panel in the entire issue.

Camille is presently in the process of translating all my writing into artwork. As she creates these drawings, she sends them to me so that I can format them into comic book pages and color everything as well. I spend a lot of time using gradients and shadows to give depth to every scene we create. By June 2nd, all the scenes of the first issue will be complete, and the first ten-page issue will be available free of charge on the website. After that, five-page issues will be released monthly for the price of two dollars.

I want this comic book to teach valuable lessons, wrench the hearts of readers, entertain everyone, and simply be awesome. That is the goal I have for Abandoned Destinies and I encourage CHS students and others to take a look at this project and see if it strikes your interest.