“Striking Sparks” — Page Twenty-Eight
Ironically, this will likely result in a major boost to Breechlode’s album sales.
More below!
Bobservations
Falling From The Sky
Yes! I get to start stuffing effects into the artwork again!
This particular set of effects were created by hanging a miniature black-smoke-and-fire burst charge from an overhead cable and using the clear blue sky as a natural bluescreen.
Which was all fine except for the squirrel.
Before anyone gets upset, the squirrel was nowhere near the effect when it went off. But it did run afoul of my overhead cable.
Now, this overhead setup I had created by running one end of a hundred-foot length of parachute cord through an eyebolt atop my chimney, and using the handheld compressed air cannon (seen in a previous post about cleaning drains) to fire the other end into a treetop, attached to a weighted tennis ball.
It is worth mentioning that I was doubtful whether using the air cannon as a line launcher would work. But I coiled the thick black paracord on the ground, stuffed the tennis-ball end down the muzzle, aimed at the top of the tree, and fired. And God DAMN if the thing didn’t go sailing up past the top of the tree, reach the end of the cord length, jerk back on itself, and go whip-whip-whip around the topmost tree branch, just like in the movies. Totally awesome. I felt like Batman.
Anyway, I could raise and lower the line by feeding the excess through the eyebolt at the other end, pulling it taut or letting it have slack from the ground. But the paracord was pretty thick, and would show up in the shot. So I lowered the center down to where I could reach it, cut it, attached heavy stainless clips to either end, and replaced the center with fifteen feet of almost-invisible fishing monofilament.
Each time an effect would fire the fishing line would burn through, of course, but the clips were heavy enough to drop the line-ends down to where I could reach them and replace the monofilament.
So I got some shots, and then replaced the monofilament one more time and pulled the line back up into the sky again, to keep it out of the way.
But that night, I heard a wild animal screech, followed by a loud SPLASH, then more splashing and screaming. Ran outside to find:
That a squirrel had discovered the paracord in the tree and (the cable being thick enough for a squirrel to run on easily) had been bounding along it to reach the house — until it had unexpectedly found itself on fifteen feet of fishing monofilament instead. Struggled for grip, lost it, and fell thirty feet straight down into my swimming pool. As I came upon the scene, the squirrel was clambering out of the pool. Completely unhurt, of course; but soaking wet, absolutely furious, and swearing a blue streak in Skwirl.
It should be noted that Skwirl appears to be an excellent language for swearing in.
— Bob out
Artists Notes: Tossed the idea around a bit with Dad about the no sound effects thing… wasn’t just laziness on my part (although that’s a pretty good excuse in my book). It’s typical to throw on a big “BOOM” graphic text to accompany artwork like that depicted on this page, but I felt it made it too comic-booky and less “real,” which is silly, since it IS a comic but I think you know what I mean. Sometimes it’s called for and sometimes it isn’t.
PS: Fans of the Call of Duty video game franchise should mosy on over to my storyboarding website DigitalStoryboards.com and check out my latest blog post- about my cinematic cutscene storyboard for the recent “Call of Duty: Extinction” game. -Max
Bob, that is an awesome story about stringing up the line, and also about the squirrel. As I picture you using an air cannon to launch the line across your yard and secure it between the chimney and a tree, I again realize that I have really made the wrong choices in my own life.
Although the experience with the squirrel must have been worth its weight in gold (don’t think that through too much), you should probably take it as a fortuitous warning and only leave the cord connected and strung up while in use.
What does your wife think about this sort of craziness going on. From all you’ve told us, she’s probably used to it.
She is not used to it. She has assured me that she never will be used to it. She just puts up with it. Barely. 🙂
Looks like we’ll be introduced to another spirit, soon
Hmmm . . . while Paul took that as a warning to not leave it strung up overnight, I had a different reaction. If the pool was drained, and the setup repeated every night, how many squirrels could eventually be collected in the bottom of the pool? And what nefarious purposes could such a captive army of angry squirrels be put to?
TWO PROBLEMS WITH YOUR THOUGHT.
1> squirrels are notorious for getting where you don’t want them (like into your bird feeder) or NOT staying where you do (like in an empty swimming pool).
2> how would you control even one squirrel… much less an army of them?
heh, army of squirrels…I am now thinking of David Crowder’s music vid for Foreverandever Etc 😀
Oh yeah man squirrels are some of the most foul-mouthed creatures on the planet. Just as Foamy the Squirrel.
Oh yeah man squirrels are some of the most foul-mouthed creatures on the planet. Just ask Foamy the Squirrel.
Holy crap! Are they okay?
…
Also, what’s Breechlode?
Breechlode is the band name, IIRC.
I kid you not, under “Primary Weapon” on the right is an advertisement for squirrel repellant. I hope you’re proud of yourself, Bob XD
Love it!
Great comic. That pilot was two days away from retirement, wasn’t he?
Thanks! And that would be the tradition, yes.
haha thanks!
Well, who didn’t see that coming? Still the ‘splodey bits are Great!
Regarding the comment about the album sales… The Labels actually like to strong-arm stations into advertising albums (especially “complete” and “best of”) as soon after an artist’s death as they possibly can. Industry experience taught me that.