- Keenan Fonger
Blast Off
Three, two, one... here are are.
I'm not entirely sure what this blog will turn into. It may just be my ramblings. It may be more. Mostly, I will be talking about my projects and making comics and other things I do. Somewhere to think aloud.
So, excuse me while I ramble on. I have exciting news today. I've released the first volume of my originally created graphic novel In Flux : Sung Away Souls (which is free! and readable from this very website! Wow!).
Its full title is In Flux: Sung Away Souls, which is Volume 1 of The Aurora 195 Mystery arc. It's about a group of weirdos who get up to weird things in a weird world. It's fun, it's adventurous, it's full of wonder, and I'm really happy with it.
If you want more details and to see what it's like, here's a super fancy button to click on that'll take you right to it.
This is just the first volume, but it was a big project.
The whole idea for the story came to me quite spontaneously. It was three--or four--years ago at university. An image popped into my head. A dark space, a flash of bluish electric light that illuminated a big, crazy, smiling face with giant goggles and crazy hair. That was it. That crazy-faced, goggly-eyed idea would eventually turn into Manic, the catalyst for all that is In Flux.
Normally, if I want to create a story, I have to shape and carve every part of it. Like I'm building a house from scratch. This was the exception. It appeared as if discovered. Why that was, I don't know.
At that point of inception, I had zero interest in comics. But the idea rolled over me like a fever. Over the next two years, I expanded on the idea. Slowly, things started to fall into place. Manic, Piper, Howard, Ella, and Cleo... The Cricket... Carrot... Moths... I used my university classes as an excuse to develop it. In a script-writing class, I wrote a story about Manic and Piper finding lions that eat metal. In another class, I designed each of the Moths. For my grad project, I refined the designs further. It was at this point, I realized comics were the best way to approach this idea.
So I taught myself how to make comics. Maybe I'll make another post about that another time. It was fun, if not full of trial and error. Like everything, there's so much you can only learn through experience. I made A LOT of mistakes, but after each mistake, I got better and better, until I actually knew what I was doing.
Eventually, I wrote a script for a story. Then I rewrote it. Then I rewrote it again. I put the script to page, and drew it for roughly a year. I formatted it, polished it like a stone, and added some extra bits.
And after all that time, here it is!
As I wrap up a project that has been in ideation for nearly three years, and production for one year, I am enormously excited. Because I'm going to make more. I have so many ideas for the Moths and the ridiculous stuff they get up to...
This was a good ramble. I have a lot more to say. But I have to go.
For now, check it out, it's pretty cool.
Keenan