Except this time it really is coming. For reals.

I finally just accepted that I wasn’t going to do a whole 3D comic and decided to find an artist to work with.

To that end I searched for quite awhile and found Leonardo Romanelli to do the art chores. I really liked the stark black and white style and the use of the blacks to build the scene. It fit with exactly how I meant to portray these guys.

A while back I had him draw up a two page script I did as a proof of concept, and I thought I’d show this here.

Initially I was going to color this in, but I wasn’t really liking my coloring on it, and hiring the level of colorist I think this project deserves is a bit out of my budget for now.

However, it works out, because again, I actually love the black and white feel of Leonardo’s work. I think it works great here for the style.

I figured if black and white is good enough for The Walking Dead comic, then it’s good enough for The Bill Collectors.

Besides, The Walking Dead is now being re-printed each month in color as The Walking Dead Deluxe, so if it sells and makes a decent return then I can re-invest it in a color version.

Most times, after writing it, I would need a penciller, an inker, then a colorist and a letterer to make up the comic. But as Leonardo does all the inking as part of his style I’m coming out ahead there.

Then the only other thing I do is the lettering, which is easy enough for me as I do graphic design and such for a living. So luckily I’m able to absorb some of the cost of this thing.

Even as I write this, Leonardo has just got started on the 36 page debut one-shot comic of The Bill Collectors. My hope is it can come out this year, but I told him not to rush it, so it could be as late as next year before it hits.

So with all that said, please enjoy the comic below.

It occurs to me that this is a competing secret origin, with the other one being my origin revealed in my 40th birthday comic.

I didn’t consciously do this, but I supposed it’s no accident that both of the origins are modeled after Superman and Batman’s separate origins. Maybe I’ll do a Wonder Woman origin one day…

Anyway, this was a comic featured in my Stupid Clowns ebook. I used it as a promo piece for the book, but for some reason this awesome comic failed to move the needle.

Oh well, it will be lauded for it’s genius after I’m dead and buried, I’m sure.

My blog was starting to go into its final death spiral around the time I did this comic, so even less people than usual saw it. And that’s saying something.

This might be the longest comic I ever did. I simply refused to break it up.

Back when this came out I think I had to upload it separately from WordPress and then link to it, because WordPress wouldn’t allow such a long image.

The interesting thing when I look at this comic is that I love the Superman mythos so much, but I’m consistently disappointed by the products, be they comics, movies or tv shows.

It’s too bad, because there’s such a rich history there.

Anyway, at the end of this, the Stupid Clowns reappear. I was so burned out after all that drawing I had to repeat the same panel 3 times just to get through it. I could not draw two more darn panels.

Story of my life…

Once again, I ended on a (psuedo) cliff-hanger.

And once again it was because I couldn’t figure out how to get views on these things.

It was just too much work for too little gain.

I’ve re-thought a lot of my old work (and old work attitudes) and I am going to approach these from a different perspective in the future.

The texturing on the alien’s face is not good. It’s exactly what I don’t like to see in a 3D comic, so I failed on this one.

I always see a million little things I would do differently when I look at these old comics…

It’s too bad I don’t use Daz for comics anymore because I really nailed what I was looking for.

Well, for the most part. There’s always something I would do different if it came to it.

Still, I’m mostly satisfied with this comic, and that’s a win.

There’s only 2 panels in this comic because that first panel almost killed my computer.

All those buildings in such a wide space was almost more than my Mac could handle.

When you do these wide landscape establishing shots in 3D there are tricks you can employ to “fake it” to make it easier on your computer.

I used none of those tricks. So when I finally wrestled the first image out of the renderer I only had one more panel left in me.

Good times.

The Titans basically had no empathy for non-human sentient life forms.

I felt like I nailed the look I was going for with this one.

The problem with 3D was that it wasn’t always possible for me to maintain the same look and feel depending on the lighting necessary for the scene.

I would later come to grips with that issue, but back then there was always an element of luck involved…