Deltrada Garrison draws closer! So close that our trio is now within earshot of the wall guards.

Anyway, this page gives me an opportunity to post about the page creation process a bit, since an opportunity arose early in the tie-down process that had us ruminating between two competing layouts for the final panel.

109_roughA

The rough above is the one we ended up going with — it features the high angle, the two Canid soldiers looking out over the wall top, weapons clearly visible. The idea was to make the main trio look small and insignificant compared to the might of the Canid. However, to achieve this goal, Rachel had also proposed another take on it:

109_roughB

In this layout, the camera is on a flat plane, the main trio walking in from the right. To the left, Deltrada Garrison cuts off the natural world, guarded by the two Canid soldiers we saw in the previous page. The visual metaphor here is less about the Canid being shown as a dominant force, and leans more on the notion that our trio is about to be swallowed up by the garrison (and whatever strife that may bring). To us, both takes were compelling and visually intriguing.

At the end of the day, however, we ended up going with the high-angle perspective. Suggesting that our heroes are small and insignificant in the world of the Canid felt more appropriate here, and the flat-angle shot felt perhaps just a bit too ominous, menacing, and confrontational. Sometimes something as simple as the camera angle can change the entire tone of your scene!