VEAL Blog

Some test ideas on what a Grey might look like.

So today – I thought I’d start off with the sample image. The subject of the past few days/week has been what a “Grey” might look like.  Yes – we’re aliens’ territory now. The simple fact is – I’ve always been fascinated and terrified of these lil Grey guys since I was a small kid. Nothing to keep me up at nights like some – but still, grey men with big black lidless eyes. Creepy.

So when it came time to start pondering what sort of aliens would populate this story – I immediately knew I would be inserting the Greys and their wacky association with abductions, area 51 and all the mythos I could find. And sure enough – it works thematically. But then came the tricky part. What would they look like that makes them a lil interesting?

One of the big changes I made is to address their gender: they don’t have one. In fact they see gender as a disease. Another change was the way their bodies look. While they might strike us as a humanoid shape – I wanted to give them a fluidity and malleability that will come in later – allowing them to squeeze in tight spots and more or less be a real intrusive headache. So at major joints I worked up some loose flesh and did a quick sketch of how any bone in their skeleton could detach and rearrange itself if needed.

But as for now I’m stuck on the above 4 designs. They are all pretty similar except some torso, head shapes. Take a look and let me know what you think! Most votes will be heavily considered!

So far it seems pretty much like the standard Roswell Grey. But trust me – by the end – you won’t even see them coming…

So I spent some of this afternoon going over what Veal’s body should look like. Build type, scars etc… but he keeps coming out a lil too thin. Waif-like even. When I envision him, he looks thin, but not sickly and when working in a cartoon/comic medium an artist tends to exaggerate in order to sell the concept behind the characters. In this case, Veal starts off very much in his prime but not overly muscled; quite literally a prime piece of Veal meat.

Finding that balance though, between thin and what would appear succulent and something beefy or all even worse, altogether too skinny is proving to be a bit of a challenge.  In some cases, it almost feels like a female body. Which is fine but not quite what I was looking for. I would put up the sketches, but I want to tackle this a bit more before asking for feedback…

But on the other hand, if I don’t – I can’t get any feedback. Begrudgingly…some very 5 minute sketches. And please keep in mind this is just body typing, so while he may be technically naked – he won’t end up that way.

Trying to get a feel for Veal's Proportions. Not feeling it yet.

Hi all and welcome to VealBlog!

Since this is my first post, I thought I’d take some time to explain the purpose of this website and give you a smidge of insight as to what VealBlog actually is. The VealBlog is a way of keeping track of my creation process, from the very beginning all the way through to the release of the first page of my webcomic “Veal”. I figure that it was an excellent way of organizing my thoughts, sharing them with the world and preparing me to keep an online publication of my work. On that note I will should be making posts here 4-5 times a week. It’s also a place where; I hope, to get feedback from various peoples interested in the idea of my webcomic or perhaps want to share in the creative experience.

After all – no one creates in a vacuum, certainly not me. So in order to fully realize this idea, I want to get feedback and test ideas. So who better than the entire world right? As this Blog goes on, I will post tidbits of information about creating various characters, peoples, looks, etc… Basically everything from the ground up. While you won’t know how it exactly fits together till I release the webcomic itself, you’ll have a god idea of what to expect. In theory.

Now as to “Veal” the webcomic; about two years ago, I came up with this weird idea of a talking cow walking around and more less scaring the tar out of folks and giving everyone a good laugh. This was on the heels of me making the decision that my next project I would work on – would be something completely my own.  So while washing dishes – the inkling of this idea came to me. What if Cows could talk? Or specifically one cow – all of a sudden, and just started acting like anyone else. How would we handle that?

It seemed like a strong idea, but I didn’t want to have this anthropomorphized cow running. It just didn’t feel like me. So I started to ponder the various ideas of how I could make the idea more “me”. I like to try and turn things on its ear to see it from a different perspective so I went at making the cow something more relatable for us. And then it hit me. What if humans were the cows? What if people ate us? What if we were killed by the thousands daily? And the idea started to come together. It went from this very lighthearted story to a funny, but darker tale that will (I hope) turn the mirror on ourselves which is what all great fiction tries to do usually.

So yes, Veal is about a young man who is part of a herd of humans who are about to be harvested. Of course though – the twist is when our main character actually escapes and when asked what his name is – he tells them the only thing he has ever been identified by: Veal.

So as you can see – it’s a bit different, but has some very interesting merit. And since this is also the place where I will share some of my very fledgling ideas, let’s start with Veal himself. I have been working on this idea for so long, that it’s come time to start laying out what Veal looks like exactly. I know he will start off Bald (to be explained later) and that he will be fairly attractive for a human. I also know that he will be of an ethnicity that is not strictly white. We see so many heroes today in sci-fi and fiction in general that I figured it’s time to give the Asians, Hispanics, Indian, Native Americans, and Africans a shot at being the awesome guy.

Below are some quick red pencil sketches of Veal in a “Disney” style.  I’m still hashing out the exact style this will be drawn in – but I figured you have to start somewhere and I really enjoyed the design work from Atlantis the Lost Empire. So you may notice a similar motif with the faces. I also did some color tests as well to see what might look best for Veal. Let me know what you think!

A Study of what Veal's features may look like.