I figured there needed to be a quiet page in here somewhere, something where it's clear that Malaya is contemplating the situation fully. Unfortunately for everyone involved, she does eventually react to things. Part of the reason I think she has always worked so hard to keep the werewolf thing at bay is that underneath her relatively cool exterior, she's definitely got a temper. (Which is obvious ever since she was little, as per chapter 2 when she attempts to like, maul her brother. Whatever, he's fine.) THIS PAGE TOOK FOREVER. I've been plugging away at the pages for this week at a very responsible pace, yet this one fuuuucked me over multiple times. First, I decided to get fancy with that top panel. I'm very proud of the low angle, depth of field thing, don't get me wrong. But that meant that everyone has to be a liiiitle bit in perspective, and also be rooted to an actual place on the floor. So in my layers somewhere is a sketch that actually includes the floor, legs of the table, etc. so that I could tell where everyone's feet were supposed to go. Elias looks very tall, but in reality, he's standing a little bit closer to the "camera" than everyone else, so he's not technically a giant. (Plus, he's feeling pretty bad about things right now, and hey! he's very isolated to the side of the frame! That worked out well.) Then, trying to get Mal to look appropriately firey in that bottom panel was super hard. I have a hard time pushing poses to be more energetic. I know very exaggerated, cartoony (Cal-Arts-y) poses have been "in" for awhile, and I just can't do that. I've tried. I think I managed to fuck up my whole drawing style post college trying to do that. I've finally gotten back to my happy place, so I'm not going to worry about pushing things as far as I used to. As long as it's a solid, dynamic pose that feels grounded in space, that's all that matters. Also, Marin continues to feel bad. Just file all that away and I'll address her issues about being torn between pack and doing what she believes is right when I get there. (Shopping montage.) There's a lot of windows on this page? I meant to give the big window some damn curtains, but I forgot, and by this point I'd have to go back and add curtains to like, most of this chapter. Not worth it. Her family lives in the woods for a reason. ? Symbolism. ? Anyway, one of the weirdest parts about doing a webcomic is that you..."level up" so to speak at a breakneck speed. Like, where I am now is nowhere close to where I was when I started drawing this comic, and I was pretty happy with how I could draw when I started. The downside of that is, every couple of months I hit this wall. I can see what I want something to look like, but my skill hasn't quiiiiite caught up with me yet. So I'm happy-ish with every page, but I want everything to be a little bit better. This is apparently a normal thing that most artists go through, which is great, but in the meantime, every page takes me twice as long because I can't stop fucking fixing stupid little shit! So instead of just accepting a panel as is, I go back the next day and start moving eyes and faces around, or tweaking things in the background, or adjusting the hell out of the colors...it never ends. The result is that after a few weeks, I get like, a month where I'm happy with everything I draw! And then this process starts all over. Boo hiss! I have shit to do! I can't be moving eyeballs around like I've got all the time in the world! Okay, I'm way behind on tomorrow's page >_>. Off to work on that now.