XTIN: The Dragon's Dreamworld (comic)

[Jack the R]

This is possibly the hardest page to write of the bunch, thus the late posting. I sat down to work on it early enough, but it took hours and hours to figure out Taonui.

If you'd like to see a swift and expensive karmic return on stupidity, check this out (scroll down for the vid) -

http://aol.it/tTxyWi

Mozchops - Thanks!

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

Hey, this guy's in the wrong movie -



I'm excited about Prometheus but this guy has me worried! He'd better have the other half of his head!

On IMDB they're saying this is a new alien species, and they don't like seeing such a human looking species in the Alien universe. I agree. Please Ridley, don't let this be what a living Space Jockey looks like when he's not grown onto his chair!

On another topic, I found this to be noteworthy -

"Transgender Soccer Player Leads American Samoa Team To First-Ever Win"

http://bit.ly/vCU3bH

This is the first time I've seen a biological male, with no intention of transitioning to female that I'm aware of, referred to as "transgender."

I can understand the logic of expanding the definition of "female" to include people with biologically female brains, born in male bodies. I've seen it mentioned that this is a medically recognized condition. I'd classify myself as very ignorant on the subject, but it seems possible.

I'm not sure expanding the definition of transgender to include Fa'afafine, on the other hand, makes sense. What is female about Fa'afafine? According to Wikipedia, they are biological males who are perceived to be "effiminate" as children, and so are raised to perform traditional, conservative female roles.

Wait a minute - wouldn't accepting Fa'afafine as a legitimate idea, mean accepting the idea of "proper" social roles for women and men? If the woman can be in the office and the man can be in the kitchen, how can there be Fa'afafine?

Another thing to consider- wouldn't expanding transgender to include Fa'afafine, alter the definition of female so that it becomes a state of mind? And if so, doesn't that put us back to associating sex with specific mental or emotional traits? I was born as a male, in body and mind, but if I should feel dainty and delicate, would I be a woman? Because women are supposed to be dainty and delicate?

It will be curious to see if how much traction the idea of Fa'afafine gains. There is a movement to get away from the idea of two sexes, and redefine sex as a specturm with absolute male and absolute female on each end, so perhaps Fa' afafine could be adopted.

[Jack the R]

A little late but this one needed more time to cook. And it still needs more time, some of the writing feels clunky. I may make a few changes in the future, since this is one of the more critical pages.

Anyway, I hope you found my explanation for the naguil to be more cool than midichlorians. How can you not love powers based on space dragon sex?

There is more to it, Rau isn't using radio in the Yuga period, but this is essentially how the body naguil works.

[thedestroyer]

Your artwork is just cool. Reminds me of Frank Miller, but kind of creepier in a positive way. You'll go your way.

Cheers

[Jack the R]

thedestroyer - I've never been a big fan of Frank Miller's art. It's not bad, I'm just not into the style. I see what he did though - simplifying the art so he could tell more story. Obviously it worked out well for him.

[Jack the R]

The art load was light, but writing Professor Rau is challenging.

According to Wikipedia, the question of how life began is still up in the air. Rau doesn't exactly know either, he's just making his best guess.

I've been giving more thought to where to go with this, once TDDW is done. I reread the comic again last night (it takes a long time now!), and the beginning feels amateurish compared to chapters 3 and 4. Having so little dialogue hurts it. I feel like the next book will be much better. It won't be as horrific, it'll have people who are much more normal. But, years ago I saw Warren Ellis commenting on Red, and he said something to the effect that there was no reason to do comics without going to film. I've got a better idea how little print comics make now, and I have to agree with Mr. Ellis. TDDW was designed for easy low budget film making. The next one probably won't be. I think I want to take a break between comics and try to get at least the first page of TDDW made, and see what kind of response it generates. Instead of updating again this week, I'm going to finish the graphics on Concept and Film. Then I'll mix updating this site with updating C&F. Rau's dragon form could stand to be improved, for starters.

Any thoughts?

[Velocity Kendall]

great back story; i love a lovecraftian universe-spanning secret history me.
about raus best guesses, assuming he couldnt just wind the clock back and inject himself fully formed into the baby universe and expand with it, he could probably game the volcanic pools where we (he) thinks our dna replicators evolved in the simulation spaces of his mind, over and over and see what happened.. along with every possible death of everyone whoever lived, or whatever.. hes the penultimate, hes got a lot of computing resources and energy on hand to run his dreamworlds.. sparing a few exabytes probably wouldnt take more effort than blinking does us... if things happen in broadly the same way a few trill;ion times he can call it a certainty..
i will say though dragons dreamworld as a name carries so much make harry potter new age baggage it turned me off for a while til i read it. people youre pitching it too might not have time to read it all and the initial impression might be a large part of their decision to work with you or not. just my 2c. cant wait for more.

[Jack the R]

Huh, I wouldn't have thought the name would be a problem.

Does anyone else dislike the name?

You might really dislike the next one. It does have a New Age vibe.

Towards the end of chapter 4 I'll cover a couple of the problems Rau's been having. He's somewhat crippled and has done well for his condition.

[Velocity Kendall]

"Huh, I wouldn't have thought the name would be a problem. "

Maybe im on my own on this one then, but Dragons Dreamworld sounds like a cheesy website selling magical crystals to me. i dont think it does the fantastic artwork and story justice.

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

125 pages!

I planned to update Concept & Film today, but I've messed up the new hard drive and/or Linux install. I set up an overnight Terragen 2 render and habitually turned off my UPS's, leaving the laptop on battery power. I don't understand why running the battery down turned out to be such a big deal, but now the new Linux install is too slow to do anything with. At least the battery charged back up. For a while it didn't look like it was going to. I'll probably be able to figure out what's wrong the new Linux install, but at the moment I've got no idea. I got tired of messing with it this morning, put the old hard drive back in and drew this page. Sometimes you need an easy win.

Jake Estrada wrote a positive review of XTIN @ ComicBookClash -

http://bit.ly/ypsygT

It's weird seeing XTIN on the same page as the X-Men and Batwoman (if you go to the front page of the blog and catch it before it scrolls off). There are a few corrections that need to be made (like my name) but I'm very pleased to get such a great review. I figured XTIN was more likely to end up on the bad webcomics wiki.

A few pages back I wrote that a possible explanation for transgenderism is that the brain was formed with a different sexual orientation than the body. While apparently that is the position/opinion of some transgendered people, there are others who object to it -

http://bit.ly/xtba3R

I'm not out to offend or be hurtful to anyone who isn't causing me a problem. I think this question of identity is really interesting. If Stephen Beatty doesn't believe there's a biological reason why he is male, why is he male? Where does it come from?

Eventually technology will make it possible for us all to be immortal shapeshifters - but will we be allowed to be immortal shapeshifters? What degree of body modification will society allow? How much of your self-perceived identity can you compel others to accept, and act around? I see this as a question the trans community is on the bleeding edge of.

[Izi]

No I don't have a problem with the name, I actually found it attractive. I mean, if people are picking up the title with an X in it, expecting puff the magic dragon, I think the cover will scare them off, and it will definitely attract the right crowd. black pyramids with space dragons tend to do that. Then again, bah, look at my avatar and last name - I may be biased.

The last few pages are amazing! The writing of the creation of universe is awesome! :>

Congratulations on the review! But Tao Nui is a female is she not? The writer referred to the character as a he...Tao Nui rocks in either case, even if she is a self-centered daddy's girl.

[Jack the R]

"Taonui" is one word. FWIW Taonui and Sina are obscure Polynesian goddesses.

Jake Estrada got a few details wrong, the most important being my name (Ray not Jay). I pointed it out a few days ago. He knows but it looks like he's not going to change it? At least the review is positive and it's another link sending people my way. Overall, can't complain. Anyone who sticks with XTIN will figure it out.

[Jack the R]

I regret not being able to put cave men in, but the Makah working their boat make the point better. They have specialization- one works the rudder, six or more paddle, another throws the harpoon. They're cells performing a function so the boat organism can live.
They're crammed into a shape that is not unlike the whale's body. As part of the body they can live, but if they become separated from it they might drown.

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

For the next few weeks I'm going to be working on covers. I need to run a Kickstarter project and attempt to raise the funds for a new computer. A couple days ago my "no disk error" problem came back with a vengeance. I eventually got it working again, but I don't consider it reliable anymore. I cracked the case open, and it doesn't look like I can easily replace the socket the hard drive plugs in to.

This is probably going to be a cover for issue 3, and a Kickstarter reward. It's a real physical drawing, done while attempting to install Linux on the new hard drive (tried two more distros, both had bugs. One couldn't install the boot loader, the other didn't have working bluetooth).

Almost forgot to mention - Taonui's face paint is a little different in
this drawing. The original was too much like Keira Knightley's face
paint in King Arthur. The stripe curving around the cheek bone was too
similiar. When I originally designed Taonui's face paint, I checked
Keira's and they looked different enough, but I came across another
view of Keira's face paint recently, and in that view they looked too
much alike.

This may be the new look, but I'm hoping to come up with one I like even better.

[Jack the R]

Cover for issue 1.

[Jack the R]

[Collin Smiley]

Awesome art!

[Jack the R]

First page drawn on the new computer. It's taken a long time to get Kubuntu 11.10 configured, and there are still a few bugs I need to work out, but overall this is a much better set up to work with. The newer version of GIMP I'm using doesn't have the panning bug that was randomly shooting me down to the bottom right of the image, and I really appreciate that.

---------------

Memetics - http://bit.ly/b1d4G

VS

Cultural Appropriation - http://bit.ly/17bjzL

One of these ideas is right, and the other is a bad meme.

No matter how much some people may want to live in the past, it is the nature of memes to replicate. They aren't ownable. Not any more than a contagious disease is ownable. How much sense would it make to say "Hey man, that's my flu, give it back!" The flu moves from person to person, and so do ideas. They come to you, they stay with you for a while- maybe they mix with enough other ideas to create a new meme- then they move on and do it all over again in the next host. If you get infected with a strong meme, you're going to pass it on. You're a social animal. It can't be helped. That's just how it works.

Probably every group would like "their" memes to stay with them forever, but would this be a good thing? The rap meme migrated from West Africa, to the Bronx, to the west coast and south (of the U.S.A.), around the world, mutated into the nerdcore strain (and others). Some people would have kept it in the Bronx, or kept it black only, but if it had been contained billions of people would have been poorer for it.

That's wrong.

Should early west coast rappers have had to go to the Bronx and beg permission to rap from Bronx rappers? Should nerdcore rappers be begging permission from black rappers?

Hip Hop has given us a useful meme with high value in this situation - whack. As in, "this shit is whack."

"Cultural Appropriation" is whack.

Most of my favorite things are mash-ups of various cultural elements, but then, every meme started out as an intermingling of other memes. They all come from elsewhere, and they can't be owned by anybody or any culture. Some people and groups are going to have to wake up and accept nature for what it is.

Collin Smiley - Thanks mate.

[Jack the R]

[Jack the R]

That one took a long time . . .

I've changed the previous page and replaced Khafre's sphinx with a statue of Nea-Isis, also known as Cleopatra Philopator. I was hesitant to use Cleopatra, since she has such a goofy place in pop culture, but the similiarity between her and Sina is compelling. Cleopatra Philopator was the seventh Cleopatra in a massively inbred line, she had two of her siblings executed, seducing Julius Caesar led to the death of a third, she considered herself the reincarnated goddess Isis, etc etc. After reading her Wikipedia article, I wonder if she wasn't the main reason Rome became an Empire and eventually collapsed, bringing on the Dark Ages. Did Cleopatra set the human race back 700 years? I'm no historian, I'm just googling around, but - without Cleopatra, there would have been no Caesarion (her son with Julius Caesar), and Octavion would have been the uncontested ruler of Rome. Mark Antony would have likely remained married to Octavion's sister Octavia Minor and not become an enemy. There may not have been the civil war that allowed Octavion to seize total power and become the first Emperor of Rome. Rome may have stayed a Republic, with a distributed power structure and more competent leadership than the Empire possessed. Maybe it would have had an industrial revolution in the 13th or 14th century and become what England or the U.S. became, several hundred years earlier.

The theme of going back in time and assassinating Hitler has had a fair bit of play in scifi, but assassinating Cleopatra might be more interesting. In Star Trek terms, if we had our 700 years back, Captain Picard would be 400 years in the past. We'd be sending time travellers back to study him.

I love the symbology in the second-to-last panel of this page - it's accidental, but it couldn't have worked out better. It looks like the ship is a big monster about to bite down on the little pyramid and wreck Cleopatra's world. What a nice tie-in to Sina and Rau.

--------------

After page 16 there may be a short break while I finish putting together the first volume for the printer. Due to the unevenness of issue/chapter sizes, and the amount of work it takes to make covers, I'm back to the volume plan. I'm going to throw in a bunch of concept art and such, try to get all that stuff together, and differentiate the individual volumes from the final graphic novel. At least that's the plan ATM. The volumes will have the story at an older and less polished state (what it is now), but they'll have concept art and other illustrations that the GN won't have. When I get through the end of TDDW, I may rewrite/illustrate portions of it, run a Kickstarter to have it colored and re-lettered, and get it as professional as possible, with the idea that the GN will be a significantly different product than the volumes.

It's looking like the volumes will be 130 pages each, and the GN will be 180-200 pages.

[Velocity Kendall]

fascinating idea, very Kim Stanley Robinson.
there are hints that an industrial revolution couldve happened a LOT earlier given half a chance, for example the Antikythera Device, a compact mechanical computer from 100BC, or the Baghdad battery.
however, didnt the advances achieved by the roman empire more than make up for its fall into the dark ages? i guess we'll never know.

[Jack the R]

Velocity Kendall - "however, didnt the advances achieved by the roman empire more than make up for its fall into the dark ages? "

But what if they'd been able to keep going for another 700 years? They would have had a moon base when Columbus was discovering the Americas.