wise_mommy

AMPLE Chapter 2 | Writing and roughing part 1

Published: January 20th 2024, 12:26:26 am

Hello! I've roughed out a good chunk of pages for AMPLE's second chapter this week. This isn't all of them, but I'm not sure if I like the flow of Plenty's conversation with Modest in the pages that come after the ones I've shared. 

Like most of this comic (and literally all of the above pages), Plenty and Modest's scene is improvised. That being said, I've known for a while what goals it needs to accomplish. The biggest of those goals is establishing for the reader why Modest lives at the abbey. Hardly any of the girls are there because they want to be. But it's difficult to toe the line of establishing something for the reader that both characters already know. As is, the conversation is fairly unclear. I like that! But it's also very easy to misinterpret. Because of the subject matter involved, that leaves me a little conflicted. So, for now, I've decided not to include those pages.

(I actually alluded to this subject in January 2023's Carnation comic, which gives some insight into how Modest feels about herself. At least in relation to Sister Innocent, who at this point we also know very little about...)

Normally I would share pages I might end up changing, everything is subject to change at the rough stage, but this time I don't want to accidentally end up giving you more information than I end up intending to reveal. 

This whole chapter feels a lot looser than the first. I originally intended to just keep going with the scene chapter 1 ended on. Writing in chapters was not planned for either -- I just needed a good stopping point to print a book for a local event. But I like this new structure. It gives bones to a story that's otherwise pretty fleshy and nebulous. It also, ironically, gave me some flexibility to do something different with chapter 2. 

All I knew going in was what happened between Plenty and Humble Harvest. And that at some point Plenty and Modest would have a conversation. I didn't even know if I wanted to write Gentle into the story in a major way, but then I had some ideas for her, and decided to see where they go. She gets her second appearance in the rough pages above, if you can pick her out.....lol

I'm enjoying picking away at these characters, and really getting to know them. That's not something I get to do very often with my shorter comics. All I know about Charlotte and Elaine from "When Death Comes" is enough to create an interesting story. There's only one named character in "Verona" -- the one the reader gets to know the least about. 

Of course, I'll still withhold a lot from you about the characters in AMPLE. I love having OCs, but if they're going to be a part of a story, I think it's best if you know them through the story alone.