The fifth and last stage (so far) of The Purist 2, in which I try to combine the results of stages 2 and 3: As I said in the write-up for Stage 2, I weren’t at all happy with the results when I finished it. Even so, after some more successful experiments in stages 3 and 4, I needed more material to work with to contort and stimulate what I already had.

Once again, like in Stage 4, I wound up taking two different stabs at the task. The first part simply takes the hexagons from Stage 2 and subdivides them using fragments of shapes from Stage 3; the other half integrates the two stages’ end results better, and feels more like a true combination.

Download the PDF here: PURIST-2_5-Combine, and if you haven’t already, go read stages 1, 2, 3, and 4

A note of clarification: I’m not just naming this experiment The Purist 2 to be mysterious—there is a Purist 1, it just hasn’t finished gestating in my mind. It is even more basic than this piece, perhaps even to the point of being insulting to the reader.

I do not know if it makes sense, if the concepts are even original, or if anybody would gain anything from reading it… If there turns out to be sufficient interest in The Purist 2, I will go on to make the prequel

This is the fourth part of The Purist 2, in which I intervene the process with 1½ attempts at the subdivided grids from stage 3—as you’ll see, this falls in two parts of  ”intervention”, as I got a bit over-enthusiastic with the first one, that became almost architectural.

The second attempt is more workable in a comic layout context, but may not be as interesting in terms of experimentation. I can only hope the whole sits somewhere in between. The systematical approach to the progressive stages of developing and exploring this self-imposed grid worked better and better for me, however.

Downloadable PDF: PURIST-2_4-Intervene

The previous three stages have been published as individual PDFs here, here, and here.

This is stage 2 of my process comic The Purist 2. You can read more about stage 1 here. Basically, it’s a line-by-line documentation of me developing a grid to use for laying out a new comic I’m working on. Initially though, I tried to clear my mind of any purpose and just see what would come up.

With this stage I decided (a bit prematurely) to force a shape dogma on the grid. For various reasons I thought it would be a great idea to work hexagons into it, for effect or for concept/story purposes, so for a couple of hours I laboured on finding and isolating honeycombs in the mesh of lines that came of stage 1.

Eventually, I manipulated the shapes out of the raw material but not to a result that I cared for at all. Too much of the spontaneity was lost, and I found that I had tried to intellectualise the thing way too much, at least at this early stage. Nevertheless, or for that very reason, this second stage is included in the Purist 2 series, as a slap on my wrist to not let my cleverness run off with me

So, for your downloading pleasure: PURIST-2_2-Mutate (PDF) — part two in a series of five, next one up tomorrow!