Update notice, February 28th: The next page will be late (not sure when it will be ready), because I’m having trouble with the script, and a lot of stress in my life … ;__;
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Err … Yesterday, as I was reading (the infamous DDR translation of) Cours de Navigation des Glénans, I had a severe “WELL, DUUUUH” moment.
I realised that having the wheel in a sheltered place like this is not good at all! It should actually be in an exposed place on the stern deck. That’s because the helmsman can then easily tell the direction of the wind with his ears. The wind direction is the most important thing ever to keep track of when you sail, and you do this most easily by listening to the sound it makes.
If the wheel is in a sheltered place like this, the wind is diffused by the surrounding structures, so I suppose you’d have to rely on watching the sails, the sea, etc. to tell the wind direction, and that’s obviously nowhere near as good as your ears. This seems so self-evident to me now that I can barely believe I never thought of that before.
I don’t know where I got the idea to put the wheel in this place. I’m pretty sure that no real sailing ships have ever had it like this. Oh well, that’s what happens when you start drawing a comic with a topic you don’t really know anything about at the tender age of 15 … V^(oo)^;V
I suppose it’s something to consider, eventually, for the next part of the story – how much “creative licence” I should allow myself in correcting things like this. (I guess I could also redraw all the scenes with the wheel in this part of the story … V`(oo)´V)
A hah. Hah ha ha. You go for it, Aeron. Lucky man.
I like the last panel there, nice traditional ending shot (though this isn’t the ending, right).
Regarding the wheel’s placement on the ship: Ummm… you have interdimensional portals and ghosts and worlds full of furries. (And some might say, a world where Communism survived is even less likely…). And I’m pretty sure whatever tatters are left of the Fourth Wall are crying in a corner somewhere after the middle chapters. I don’t think anyone notices nautical correctness…
But if it matters, do as you like and continue to dazzzle us with your outstanding knowledge of sailing ships…
-Aidan.
Oh yeah, before you ask, You’re the one who knows I’m a christchurcher, right? Well, me and mine are all still alive after the last quake. Though from what I’ve seen, my city is quite dead – fallen over and sinking into the swamp.
We have no water of course, but now we have electricity and most of the tidying we can do has been done, I can catch up on the webcomics I’ve lost track of with all the hassle of Uni starting. University being, much like the rest of the city, quite dead.
Cheers,
Aidan.
No0o, this is by far not the ending! If it was you wouldn’t be asking. ;o)
Weeell, even with all the interdimensional portals, ghosts, mermaids, magic, etc. the basic rules of physics still apply! (Unless you bend them with magic, I suppose, but they aren’t using magic when they sail.) But yeah, only I would care. ;__;
“Worlds full of furries” … aha ha. To be fair (or a hipster?), like a lot of kids I was drawing “furries” long before “furries” became a Thing. In the earliest drafts of this story, only Willie, Shannon and Eva were human. Samona was some kind of octopus, and Aeron wasn’t in the story yet. Then I abandoned it for a while. At some point I returned to it, and had the revelation to make them all human and add some new characters. But I just couldn’t bring myself to change Seraphine into a human, so he remains a “furry” (or, rather, “bristly”?) …
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Yes, I was a bit worried about you. :3 Good to know that you’re all right!