As you may have guessed, this week's Capital of Helsinki centers on the subject of crime noir. I already do a noir comic called "A Very Long Death", but I decided that I wanted to have some fun with the classic stuff too. Mickey Spillane, Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Donald E. Westlake, and the like. I also tossed in a bit of comic book artist Frank Miller, who slavishly models his work after all the writers mentioned above.
The detective in the comic is one of my generic figures. I threw him in a trench coat and a fedora since that's the cliche uniform for a guy in a story like this. I also tried to draw his nose as a bit disjointed, as if it had been broken and then healed irregularly. I thought this might give him a bit of that pug-ugly look attributed to Mike Hammer.
The woman was initially modeled on Lana Turner. (With her appearance in 1946's "The Postman Always Rings Twice" as a focal point, obviously) She deviated from Ms. Turner quite a bit though. I also factored in the look of 1940's pin-up girls, with the paintings of Gil Elvgren a particular influence.
This strip took a long time for me to do. I tore up a lot of earlier drafts and then restarted from scratch, which is something I almost never do. It just took a while for this to get where I wanted it to go visually. Ultimately, however, I think this one turned out really well. It may sound immodest, but I think this is one of the best-drawn Capital of Helsinki strips I've done.
Also of note is that I made the panels a lot bigger than I usually do. This allowed me to fit in more expression and detail. I also drew panel two without any borders, which I don't think I've done on the web before.
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