We are back with a new project!

The Alice Demon's Gate project crashed back in 2018. Now, we are making a fresh start, with a smaller team, just Petra Brewitz and I, and a shorter story.

Back in 2015, when we were working on the A Rift in Time photo comic, which we managed to finish and publish, we discussed making a series of four connected stories. Alice Demon's Gate and The Return of Maple White are both part of that story suite.

The reason why we have started working on The Return of Maple White, rather than continuing with Alice, is that Maple's story is much shorter, and easier to tell.

If all goes well with The Return of Maple White, we just might decide to tackle Alice: Demon's Gate again.

Alice is back!

Alice and Agnarr face off against a giant spider. This is a standalone picture, Arachnophobia II, not part of the storyline in Alice: Demon's Gate.

The Alice team is back at work after a summer hiatus. We had a planning meeting today, and work will proceed, with focus on finishing the first draft of the manuscript.

Haldor Half-Ear

Haldor Half-Ear is played by Jesper Andersson.

Haldor Half-Ear is one of the main characters in Alice: Demon's Gate.

You may wonder why there are Deep Ones and a T-Rex in the picture. It's not a spoiler. We just decided to have some fun with the picture.

Battles, bloopers & some changes

We are slowly, very slowly, moving forwards. The picture above is a small part of a larger battlefield picture.

Our main problem is the same as most projects like this has, a lack of funding. It does not stop us, but it does slow us down.

Bloopers, on the other hand, aren't a problem. When they happen, we have a laugh, fix the problem, and move on.

A funny blooper can actually provide extra energy.

We are doing a couple of visual changes. For example, the adventure was originally set during winter. We are changing that for two reasons:

• Winter campaigns were very unusual 1,000 years ago. The logistics were simply to difficult to handle.
• We may shoot some backgrounds on location, and it is getting warmer. The snow is gone. We can add snow to scenes, but it is time consuming, and the results vary. It is better for us the less work we need to do. Better for you too, if you are interested in reading Alice: Demon's Gate.

We are also changing Alice's sword, Illi, a bit. The inscriptions on the sword used to be in relief, but that makes the sword difficult to clean, so we have changed the inscriptions to be in a metal of a slightly different color instead. Makes a lot more sense.

That is it for now. Back to work!

Blood and Gore - in 3D

Blood and Gore-day!

I've been busy working on blood and battle wounds. The results look pretty good, I think...in a horrifyingly painful way.

When I do stuff like this, I work while wincing.

I was pretty happy when I saw the test render though.

I've done blood and gore before. Notably in our previous graphic novel, where we had one pretty horrific scene. (If you have read A Rift in Time, you know exactly what I mean. If not, I'll spare you the details.)

Previously, I've only done it in 2D. This is the first time I am doing 3D blood and wounds.

Doing things for the first time is part of the reason we are doing this. We want to push ourselves in new directions.

Style Experiments: Laborec vs. Soldier with Spear

Lennart Guldbrandsson as Laborec

We are trying out some new tools to create the graphical style we want. The picture above was created using Daz Studio, AutoPainter, and Affinity Photo.

We are also optimizing the workflow a bit. Rendering this image was about 8 times faster than before. This is really important when making a graphic novel.

One problem with 3D is that it is difficult to make faces that look right. They tend to have stiff expressions, and be a little bit off. So, we are using live actors for face shots.

Laborec is played by the author Lennart Guldbrandsson.

For comparison, check out below what the picture looks like if we use 3D only.

Laborec, 3D only version

As you can see, there is a lot of difference. The version with Lennart Guldbrandsson wins hands down.

Blooper of the day!

We were trying to record brief presentations of the Alice: Demon's Gate team members. This was my fifth try.

First Alice Demon's Gate VLog: Making backgrounds for outdoor picture panels

We are testing an easy and fast way of chronicling what we are doing, and giving everyone who is interested a peek into daily work on the project: VLogs.

Instead of setting up a studio and creating high quality, carefully edited video, we do this the quick and dirty way: Shoot on a smartphone, iPad, or whatever is handy, edit minimally, or not at all, and upload.

We do it quick and dirty because we want to spend as much time as possible on moving the project forwards.

Why do it at all? Partly because we want to let you see the creative process, the good, the bad, and the weird. Partly because we want to chronicle what we are doing for ourselves. We want to maintain records that we ourselves can learn from. Partly, because...well, we´ll keep that a secret for now.

Alice: Desert Dragon

Alice and Ragnarr fights a Desert Dragon. Actors: Petra Brewitz and Peter Markusson. Photo & Edit: Henrik Mårtensson

Alice: Desert Dragon is a picture from a recent test shoot. We are trying characters out, work on their back stories, and test image editing software and techniques.

An image like this looks quite different from the original.

The Secret Alice: Demon's Gate Group on Facebook is now public and open for new members

Yep, we opened the secret group! You didn't know about it because it was...secret.

We started the group early on to document what we were doing in the project. Our intent was to open the group so everyone that is interested could join the conversation once we were under way.

Now the time has come, so the group is open.

Join the conversation! We'd love to hear from you.

Alice: Demon's Gate - Test rendering enemy soldiers.

We are back to working on Alice: Demon's Gate!

While we haven't blogged for awhile, things have been happening behind the scenes. We now have partial financing, we have spent quite a bit of time practicing with Daz 3D, and we have worked on the manuscript.

It is now pretty clear that while the Alice project is ambitious, we can do it, if we use a mix of 3D graphics and photography to tell the story.

The picture above is from an initial test of a soldier we will use in a scene. It is not a main character, so we are deliberately spending a little less effort on him than we otherwise would.

Now, that we know he works, the next step is creating more of him. Many, many more...

The background scene is a photo from Borgholm Castle, on Öland. It is one of the locations we have scouted. Will we use it in the adventure, or not? Well, that we won't tell you just yet.

Virtual Location Scouting with Bryce

Our very first experiment with Bryce, a 3D landscape generator.

One of the good things about having constraints, limited budget, limited time to work on the project, limited number of people, no SFX department, and oh, yeah, we are making a comic even though no one on the team can draw worth a damn, is that it forces you to be creative.

Many of the problems we are facing this time around, we solved when we made A Rift in Time. For example, we figured out how to create the comic book look we want by using digital postprocessing. We know how to speed up the digital compositing process, so we can have more effect shots than would otherwise be possible. We know how to structure a story and shoot so we can be flexible in terms of time, and how many people we need.

The Alice: Demon's Gate project ups the ante. We want cool locations, horrific monsters, 10th century clothes and equipment...

Sounds expensive, right? Not necessarily. We are looking into using 3D software to create environments, creatures, and even equipment and clothes.

For outdoor environments, we are considering using Bryce, a fractal landscape generator.

Bryce is easy to use, as 3D software goes, and as landscape generators go, very flexible.

For example, we can easily create a forrest, and because Bryce is a 3D program, we can change the camera point of view however we want. This is way faster and cheaper than going to locations, shooting, and perhaps having to reshoot.

There is more to write, but I think I'd better get back to the project.

More news soon.

Alice: Characters and background story is taking shape

Alice will be played by Petra Brewitz

Right now, we are working on characters and background story. We are also working on the overall look and feel.

If you know your Lovecraft, you know what the sign on the sword is. :-)

Alice - Reflections of Evil

Petra Brewitz as Alice. From a recent test shoot.

We have now begun story development.

Alice - First Shot

This is the first test shot of Alice, the Viking warrior that is the main protagonist of Alice: Demon's Gate.

Alice is played by Petra Brewitz. 

Peter Markusson, who is also a team member, supplied viking warrior gear for the test shoot.

Cthulhu Version 3

Monster building is an iterative process. Each iteration gets you closer to your goal.

Can you spot the differences between this version of Cthulhu, and the one posted yesterday?

Here is version 1 again:

Cthulhu Came Calling...

Nope, Cthulhu won't join the cast of Alice: Demon's gate, but he made a great test subject for some of the textures we are going to use.

Petra Brewitz and I were out shooting textures last week, and this is our first test picture.

Project Funding: Kickstarter

Actors from the production company Kompani Bastard, shot at Liseberg in Gothenburg. For illustration purposes only. Not associated with A Rift in time or Alice. Photo: Henrik Mårtensson.

We are looking into funding the Alice: Demon's Gate project using Kickstarter, and other crowd funding sites. Here are some interesting links:

• Kickstarter Channel on Youtube
• Self-Publishing a Photography Book using Kickstarter
• The Things I Wish I Knew Before Launching My First Kickstarter Campaign

More links will be added to this post when we find useful information.

Location Scouting: Gothenburg

Peter Markusson has done location scouting in the Gothenburg area for Alice: Demon's Gate, and other projects.

All location photos by Peter Markusson.

Vattugatan Water Reservoir

Sisjön, near Aminogatan and Argongatan

 Godhemsgatan

 Sankt Eriksgatan

 Tyska Kyrkan

 Wernerska Villan, Storgatan

Not scouted yet:

• Bohus Fästning
• Ragnhildsholmen

Alice: Halloween Scream!

The pumpkin was shot at the Borgholm Castle while doing location scouting for Alice: Demon's Gate.