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Where Red Apples Lie - Silent Treatment page 1 of 7

This is another short-story snippet from my rather strange comic project Where Red Apples Lie. Imagine jumping somewhere into the center of a longer story. I will publish one image per week for this snippet.

The "unknown girl" (the one-legged woman) is better introduced in a previous 9-page snippet found on DA, I recommend reading that first. You can find it here.

This current snippet is not a direct continuation of that snippet however.

I see these snippets as experiments with different storytelling-techniques and maintaining consistent artwork. The story is not as simplistic as it may first sound though, so read carefully.
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Griatch

That's a got a good story line to that. Good work

@Lorri
Well, we are just getting started. More parts will come every week in this thread, so judge the story then.
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Griatch

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Page 2/7.

The man talks away. Note the placement of word balloons here, it's very deliberate.
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Griatch

Page 3/7.

What's going on - what's with that look?
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Griatch

I really do not believe she needs nor wants his attention or protection.
Nicely done Griatch.

maybe she thinks he is coming on to her, or she has some secrets he is trying to find out...

Looks like she's about ready to shove that apple into his mouth to keep him from talking.

the characters seem well defined from the three segments posted. really a tribute to your artwork since the female hasn't said a word.

she has a very expressive face, the look she gives when he gushes about the 'rush' & of course, the final panel in part 3 ... great stuff, memorable. looking forward to the rest of the story!

Thanks for the comments!

The black&white&red style remains quite far from my normal style and I find that I get more into it as the pages go by. As it is there are a few anatomical issues on the first page that I need to go back and fix/clarify when time permits.

Whereas the previous snippet from Where Red Apples Lie focused on captions (inner monologue), this focuses on spoken words, which gives quite a different feel I think. Note the placement of the word bubbles, the idea is that they are placed between the two, causing the words themselves to be a barrier between them ... at least that's the idea.
As with the previous snippet, I'm trying out expressions with small means, so it's great if you feel her face gives a feeling of an inner life despite her not saying anything at this point.
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Griatch

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page 4/7

Next page!
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Griatch

Got some interesting feedback on the last page. Will go back and fix some things in it, like the crutches in the last panel ... but will probably wait until the entire sequence is done before getting to it.
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Griatch

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A new page. That guy should really learn to keep his mouth shut, it's not doing him any good.
Anyone starting to sense the twist in the story?
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Griatch

I sense that the guy has a history, not necessarily good. Perhaps he is in cahoots with the 'thugs' as a way to get girls to trust him but it feels like he has nefarious motives.

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Page 6 of 7. He's having a bad day ...

@2-ton:


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Griatch

(Click for DA version)

Well, that's it for this time folks!

This snippet had quite a different pacing and layout than the previous one I did. It's quite a challenge to produce these pages in a timely fashion, and art suffered for it here and there, as people have commented. I will go back and fix a few things here and there, but these pages are practice to a great extent. The art is fun, but it's the storytelling that is the main point here. This story has a bunch of rather subtle hints about the world of Where Red Apples Lie, there are no random words here.

Anyway, comments are critique (on the story, art or whatever) is much appreciated. Feedback is always useful in order to improve, and in comic making I'm very much a newbie.
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Griatch

The more there is of the story, the more curious I am about the girl.

I've not had time to fix any of the pages yet, but it's interesting that with a few exceptions this snippet raised considerably less interest that the previous one I did (nearly zero, really). Was the other one better, this one worse, or are people just uninterested in this kind of b&w short-story? Embarrassed on my behalf for doing badly? I am quite mature enough to hear scathing critique, so lemme hear it, it's the only way to improve!

@2-ton

That's good and partly my goal; she's a rather curious character.
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Griatch

Well... Unlike the previous snippet, this one reached a definite conclusion and doesn't raise any obvious question. (It does raise some intriguing questions, but their answers involve the entire back-story of the character.)

The other passenger summed up this scene very succinctly. Her last comment probably sums up the reaction of most viewers, including myself. We'll just have to wait and see what develops...

@bkh1914

Thanks for the comment! You are probably right that this one is more conclusive than the previous one (although it seems many people I hear don't actually get exactly what happens here).
I'm deliberately vague on the back-story of the unknown girl, but there are really a lot of hints about the world in here, the off-hand comments are all relevant in this sense. I felt the I needed the other passenger to be there though, to put some sort of sense into the story.
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Griatch