Shades of Gray

Author notes

4 year anniversary!!!

avsaroke

on Aug. 20, 2010

Oh wow this snuck up on me.
I mean… wow… it's been 4 years to the day that I posted the first page of Shades of Gray on here. Where the hell did all that time go? And how am I not farther along in the story? Hahahaaa…

I want to give some big ol' thanks and hugs and internet cookies to everyone who's supported me in this crazy endeavor. I had no idea that a random alien doodle would turn into something so monstrous or well-recieved! It still gives me warm fuzzies to see new comments and watch the page view bar take off on update days.

So, for everyone who reads, comments, or just stumbles through to see what this is all about, thank you so much. It really makes my day to know that other people are enjoying this as much as I am. Special thank yous to some of my more gung-ho commenters: Kikaru, schubacca, kaleygeminni, and Senex. And extra-extra-special thank yous to TheBlackCat (my guest comic magician) and Desert pirate (my sounding board) who have both been on this ride since the beginning and tolerated my terrible, TERRIBLE first attempts at stories with the kilm. I mean that's true friendship right there. The pre-Shades of Gray stuff is atrocious and they just soldiered their way through it for me. Good, good friends. :)

I wanted to do something special for the 4 year mark, so I ended up doing a "how the art has changed" sort of thing. (Props to Desert pirate for helping me come up with this!) It's weird, but checking on the older pages, I've only been using a tablet for about the past year. Good GOD, I do not miss inking with an actual pen. I mean, just look at that mess up there! Coloring this sucker, I was actually getting mad at the first three panels for being so scratchy and bad looking. Then I'd get to panel four and be like "ahhhh… smooth lines… I love them so…" And then I'd go back to panel one again and get agitated all over again, heheh.

Also, this is a bit of a joke/dig at myself because I can never seem to decide what shape Kiva's head is. It just… morphs out of control… like a freakin' lava lamp. Year two was especially not a good look for her, as Ten not so wisely decided to point out.

But seriously, good stuff is coming up. TheBlackCat's wonderful guest comic is going to be put on hold for a little while because she's crunched for time right now. Which means I'll be starting back up on the one shot pages this Thursday! Huzzah! There's going to be a bit of page order weirdness when the last of the guest comic comes in, but I'll deal with that later… post them as extras and then shuffle the pages around or something.

Sooo…
This Thursday check back in for a new page from me!
By popular demand, it features Jovi.
:D