Democracy vs Monarchy
I was looking at the art style recently and noticing how it has evolved over time. You can see it in today’s strip. When we first started, characters did not have ears. Now all newly created art comes with ears that require shadowing when we color. There’s still the odd, older style character that will show up with no ears, but… I’m kind of cool with that.
Over time I have come to sympathize with George Lucas’ constant revisionism of his films, because so often our strips are rushed and don’t turn out the way we might have liked, ideally. I’ve even gone back and made changes now and then to the odd strip, from a new background in a scene, to a tweaked pose, and sometimes–though more rarely– a revised punchline. However, looking at the evolution of ears in the BMS art style is kind of neat, and I don’t feel any real urge to start an ear revision frenzy. I think overall, the quality of the art has improved, and if we start tweaking ears, then what about the line work too? Where do we stop? Early BMS has a charm of its own, just like the Original Trilogy with its Muppets and Teen Wolf rejects. It’s part of experience, in a good way. Hopefully that applies on some level to BMS as well.
I recently updated the About page as I felt the larger BMS team had gone without a nod for a long time now. These are the people that have helped make BMS something bigger than Leanne and myself could have done on our own.
G. Padilla – 3D Star Wars vehicle poses
T. Gatto – Paper milk carton designs, supplier of some strip backgrounds
J. Porter – 501st Blackhole Stormtrooper cosplayer, BMS promotion and forum moderator
P. Dejawavu – Rebel Legion Jawa cosplayer, BMS promotion
Gennady – Russian translator
M. Stipp – German translator
V. Torres – Spanish translator
Carlos – French translator
Thanks so much guys!
Leanne and I have been publishing Blue Milk Special since the start of 2009 and are now approaching four years. Sometimes that feels like a long time, other times it seems to have sped by. We’ve come to know a lot of fellow fans in that time and many of you have helped spread the word about this webcomic. As we look to complete our parody of The Empire Strikes Back in December we hope to have you along for the rest of the journey. And we welcome all the support and help we can get, whatever your idea or help might be. In fact, I’m really interested to hear any suggestions.
It takes on average about 5 hours per strip. That’s a long time for a hobby. We are in two minds over selling anything BMS related except for original sketch commission work. However, don’t rush out asking us for sketches as we are desperately short on time and most of what we do have goes into producing the strips themselves. Since we don’t want to infringe on LucasFilm by trying to make any kind of livelihood out of BMS we wonder whether donations are even a good idea to help us. What would you guys say to a “Best of Leanne Hannah Art Book” for $12 including shipping?
The idea behind this is that we can’t currently offer our original project as its not ready. The Best of Leanne Hannah Art Book would feature her best full color pinups from across a range of pop culture icons, along with some sketches and perhaps one or two BMS pieces included. And it would be personally signed, of course, with one of the free BMS promo cards thrown in. It would be a way to financially support us without infringing with a specific Star Wars product, but you would still get something in your hands in return for your BMS support.
Fire away with your ideas!
P.S. It has been pointed out that I forgot to add Leia’s Splinter of the Mind’s Eye costumes to the current poll. Sorry! I really like those outfits too! I just totally forgot when I was busy putting the poll together. 🙁
Well, while you are adding the Splinter of the Mind’s eye costumes, you could add whenever Leia is slapping the snot out of someone too. 😀
I don’t think you forgot to add Splinter Leia to the poll; it’s not a film costume, and if you start going into the comics then you’ll have to add quite a few costumes. 😉
Personally I don’t see anything wrong in donations, but if you’d rather sell a sketchbook then do so. 🙂 It’s a great thing to offer.
Btw. I really wish I could vote for more than one of Leia’s costumes; I have at least three I would like to give my vote. 😉
Lora, if you have a smartphone, or another computer, you can register additional votes. I guarantee some of the voters are multi-voting, as certainly happened with our best sci-fi poll where Firefly beat Star Trek. So, if that’s what others are doing, I say join ’em.
Ha! That would require that I was arsed to turn on the old com on. 😉 It’s very slow… and then I would have to give it internet. Wonder how that would go.
It would probably be easier to loan the library’s computers.
Thanks for the billing! I think I’ll update my professional resume, to see if I get a response the next time I apply for a job, or promotion. 😉
“Lets see you have 16 years of experience, a Masters degree, considerable continuing education, oh and you make cartoon milk cartons. Just what we needed on our team Welcome Aboard!” 😉
Can’t wait for the opportunity to buy a sketchbook! 🙂
Yes, escaping from a maximum security prison cell is usually pretty easy in these things. Kudos to Threepio for voting for the Leia striptease!
Sign me up for a book please!
I thought strippers charged extra for slaps? 😛
I’ve never read a webcomic that didn’t improve art-wise during the run. Go look at early Penny Arcade or Questionable Content if you want to see really dramatic changes! It’s part of the charm of them and I enjoy watching creators push themselves to do better and better.
Also, I would definitely buy the art book, especially if it has the Order of the Phoenix picture. 🙂
Its been a joy to watch you guys evolve.
Now bring on the book, I’ve got some spare moolah in the PayPal account.
Have you searched for ‘star wars comic’ on Google? Check it out!
Revisionism. I know how you feel. I’ve come so far with the new ‘ALIEN age 11’ pages that the stuff from a few months ago now looks really poor in comparison. But I’m determined to resist retrospectively tweaking it. I’m pleased to be able to see the huge progression in quality and want to keep moving forward.
John
You’re taking a scalpel and making slight fixes.
Lucas is not even taking an axe to it, he’s using a club, hoping to beat it into submission.
I thought strippers loaded increased designed for slaps
I don’t understand what you just said.
Hey First time Poster here.
Must say I can’t even remember most of those outfits. Clearly the slave Leia going to be a big one (see it all the time at cons). But I go for the Cloud city dress more.
As for tweaking what been done before. Exxos right your making minor fixes. Lucas went and mass changes, some even changed the story setup (HAN SHOT FIRST!). You also have a very small budget, short amount of time, handful of people. The Team that produced the original trilogy all gave insight and ideas on the Star Wars films. To be kin to Lucas you have to first argue against changing things (as he did arguing against colorizing movies, Change whole strips with out talking to your team. Then Saying that the Originals weren’t right and no one should see them again.
Oddly if he just changed things and still let the Original versions be produced to DVD and Blueray it be more accepted. They would also get more money from it!
Great points from both of you. I guess what I’m saying is that I’m able to understand Lucas’ sensitivity about his work through having had to rush certain strips at times. The result hasn’t always been what I had wanted, and sometimes it looks poorly thought through, because it sort of is.
Although it has been super rare, at times I have even gone back and made dialogue tweaks, long after that strip debuted. There’s at least one strip I think was too gross and silly and I have often contemplated removing it, though I have not done so… yet. I guess the reason I haven’t given in to my doubts and removed it, is that I hope that the many strips I am proud of, stand up and represent BMS in a good light and balance out some of our less classy moments. Generally, I’m trying to simply learn from the past and move forward. In George Lucas’ case, his films were massive hits, seen by millions of people and became a pop culture phenomenon. Probably a lot easier for a guy like him to want to respond to critics and his own pet peeves about his work by going back and “fixing” things. So, BMS has made me understand what he might have gone through with Star Wars a little better. I still think he should have left it alone, but it can’t be easy seeing it aging as the decades roll by.
I’m fortunate I have access to the originals. I use them for my reference and background modifications in photoshop. So Cloud City is not quite as extravagant as it was in the Special Editions. But I like the charm it had in the original and I still think it’s a wondrous and convincing world.
Very cool about the artwork progression!
It’s always fun to go back and see how things have changed 🙂