Manipulated by the Manipulator

Back to the drawing board so to speak. I hate it sometimes when the voices start talking all at once. Then it becomes organized chaos in my head. Mixed in with the kiddies asking for something and the dark portals opening and closing it becomes a regular get together in my head. The problem with this is...I'm not invited. I just have to sit back and wait until the meeting is done and then I'm put to work. So now they have all calmed down, I'm back to work.
They started last week when illustration Friday popped out with song. The first thing I saw was this twisted image of a character who's body was in itself an instrument. I started the print you see above and it didn't go the way I was planning. Not say that the image is gone; it still bedecians a word of life inside the portals of the dark. Now this week we're on tea and I thought of another great idea to use this image for, and I'm working on it. But for right now an update of what is in progress.

As you can see this is the first layout on the left still in the sketch book. On the drawing board you can see the transfer sheet ready for final layout.

This is the portion that takes the longest in the beginning. Once the final design is done, I use tracing paper and go over it. Each line in detail. Then it is flipped on the back and retraced over ever line in reverse. This sorta makes carbon paper with the mess. I use a 4H pencil so there minimum amount dust. Then it is flipped again and placed on to the final the print (or the paper I will use) which in this case is Water Color paper to give the shades a since of dept.

And then on to the inking which will be the first portion of the layout as far as color. I always do the inking first so I know just where I want the lights and darks to go. This goes with water color, prisma color, or ebony. So it's looking good right now and I guess I'll just have to wait and see where this is going. On a normal run, I could give a good guess, but this one is talking in tongues, so the translation is lost at times.
I'll keep you up to speed as the Manipulator comes to life.