ESP - Pre-Production No. 1

You could say that this is an exploration of the look I'm aiming for in my comics project "Empire State Patrol"; you could say that it's a demonstration of the many character, scene and prop assets I'm building for the project; you could say all sorts of things, in fact. But what this is, really, is a sign that I've been going bug-eyed from working on a whole bunch of parts with which to make the scenes and shots I need for the project - without finishing a single picture.

I was posting some WIP shots through the summer of the city of Nova York as I slogged my way through it; that, the characters, and some assorted rockets and props were the main things I worked on for most of last year. It's all work that needs to be done, but the fact that I wasn't churning out any finished work based on those parts goes against my immediate-gratification mindset, I guess.

So as I ramp up for the new year I really need to see that the project is getting someplace, which is why I've done this picture now. It's given me a chance to take some of those bits and pieces I've been working on and make something with them. So while it probably is something like a proof-of-concept piece, it's mainly me blowing off steam.

This isn't really a scene from the story itself - I had the idea for a scene like this, set someplace in the New England of the retro future, and because that's where it was I wanted to do some of those particular trees that Maxfield Parrish always placed in his landscapes from that region.

As always, it's a 3DS Max / Photoshop piece. The picture is composited together from I-don't-remember-how-many separate renderings and finished in Photoshop. The two characters we see here are Clay Hooper and Swede Peterson, who like the other Patrolmen were among the construction workers who built the Empire State building in 1930-1931; though of course at the moment they find themselves someplace else.