Creating a comic seems easy. Writing it is a labor of love indulged by a dream-like trance.

Editing it.... not so much. Thank Cthulhu (Ïa! Ïa Dagon! Ïa Cthulhu!!) that this team is very open and talented. Ladies and gentlemen, the hard-working artists behind Deutschmaschine:

I stated before that the first version of Gabriele by Santiago scared mea bit. And he put that fear to rest swiftly. His pages are structurally sound, very solid and clean work. I don't really know what Santiago's forté is, but for clean, dynamic action shots he sure knows his stuff. Talent definitely deserving of wider recognition.

The first inked pages Devon produced scared me, too. As an inker myself I saw some of Devon's details as... outlandish. Off-putting. Unfamiliar. And maybe a bit "easy", to put it diplomatically. However, the two main components I needed of those inks were always there, that is, solid blacks, and fine, strong line work. Really, that was all I needed to focus on.

There's Luis who scares me now. His coloring is, well, it's downright out of this world. I wanted textures; well, he adds textures like it's the last day of summer. The marble colums in that suite are magnificent. The sand in Zahra's private garden is stunning. What scares me is, well, this caliber of quality needs time. And when it comes to color, I can appreciate it, but as a colorblind artist myself, understanding HOW to create those shades is as alien to me as mining for fuschia emeralds in the dead of night on Neptune.

And then we have Ed, who scares me with something else entirely. He makes me realize with no uncertainty that, like my blogging, my chatting and my socializing, I talk too damn much. I've had to edit Deutschmaschine's script three times already. I suspect I *might* have to do it a fourth time before we're done. I guess that's an able combination of my reading too much Bryan Talbot and seeking to infuse this first issue with too much background information, plotting, and hidden references. I'm sure Ed hates me. I'm also sure his font is too big, but then again when you want to cram in a huge amount of info, everything's too big, so that's on my head, too.

And finally, there's Julian. Julian, who jokingly yet somehow-truthfully tells me that I should not go into graphic novels afte rthis, but into novels, period, because my script leaves no place for the graphics. The guy is just a joy to work with. Another wonderful experience working with an editor. I initially suspected he got assigned to me because he speaks French and I'm the only French-speaking CCN winner of the bunch. Little did the Z2H tyrants know that we never discussed business in French, ever.
Oh Julian, what would Z2H do without you? No seriously, what WOULD they do behind your back? Hmmm...

That being said, I have no idea what our deadline is at the time. I would imagine sometime in July, like everyone else... at least I hope so. 

Last, but not least... you know how hard it is to crack open the top of the neck of a non-twistable bottle of beer?
Well it ain't the same with a squirrel.

Typing away furiously,

 - Christian