Karmic Debt Comics

Once there lived a village of creatures along the bottom of a great
crystal river. Each creature in its own manner clung tightly to the twigs
and rocks of the river bottom, for clinging was their way of life, and
resisting the current what each had learned from birth. But one creature
said at last, “I trust that the current knows where it is going. I shall
let go, and let it take me where it will. Clinging, I shall die of boredom.”
The other creatures laughed and said, “Fool! Let go, and that current
you worship will throw you tumbled and smashed across the rocks, and you will
die quicker than boredom!”
But the one heeded them not, and taking a breath did let go, and at
once was tumbled and smashed by the current across the rocks. Yet, in time,
as the creature refused to cling again, the current lifted him free from the
bottom, and he was bruised and hurt no more.
And the creatures downstream, to whom he was a stranger, cried, “See
a miracle! A creature like ourselves, yet he flies! See the Messiah, come
to save us all!” And the one carried in the current said, “I am no more
Messiah than you. The river delight to lift us free, if only we dare let go.
Our true work is this voyage, this adventure.
But they cried the more, “Saviour!” all the while clinging to the
rocks, making legends of a Saviour.
-- Richard Bach

Well, as we can see this battle is not exactly working out in Keith’s favor…

But fear not! I am sure our hero has a plan!

In terms of the art, this was quite a lot of fun to draw. Action panels are sooooo much fun to draw. If I could draw a comic with just endless fight scenes I would so do that (Scott McCloud already did it with DESTROY!) but the world is silly and apparently doesn’t want that sort of thing. Which makes me sad….

Anyway… back to the art. I had the most fun drawing panel 3, to the extent that I actually drew that first (after doing rough pencils that is) I’m pretty pleased with how the main character came out, but the backgrounds… well. I know I need to work on my backgrounds… a lot. The preceding panels, while not as much fun still were pretty interesting to draw, sometimes its difficult to have to characters of such a vastly different scale interacting in a single panel. Overall I am pretty happy with the outcome.

Oh, and in case you were wondering about that quote up top, well, that is a Quote from Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah by Richard Bach. This particular quote has always been one of my favorite, because in case you missed it, I love me some parables….