AudioShocker

Previously in 2069: FuturePete decided to take matters into his own hands... which means he went and got his arm ripped off by FutureNixon, and then got himself captured by the FutureNazis.

Previously in 2010: FutureShawn finished her campfire story and then hurried back to 2069, leaving Pete, Nick, and Shawn befuddled as to what they should do next.

Some of you may have seen my editor credit on Time Log and wondered, "Why does Time Log need an editor?" I figure now's as good a time as any to explain what I do!

We've split the creative responsibilities into five steps: writing, penciling, inking, coloring, and lettering. To get metaphorical on yo' asses, I'm like the comma between each of those steps.

Pete and I plot the story together (often verbally, to our own detriment), and then Pete scripts it. My metaphorical comma activity comes in when I proofread the scripts, make sure continuity is in tact, and email them to Shawn.

Shawn and I meet up at a coffee shop in Pittsburgh nearly every weekend, and every other weekend he pencils Time Log (he pencils it two at a time on a single piece of bristol board). I scan his pencils, handle any clean up, convert them to pure cyan, and email them to Paige.

Paige prints out the blue line pencils and inks them. Then she drops them off at my apartment, where I scan them, clean them up, make them fit into our border-less panel system, and prepare the coloring files for Justique.

Justique typically colors the comic strip on the Wednesday night before it gets posted. I'm happy to say we're moving her deadline to Tuesday. :)

Then I letter. I do my best to stick to everything Pete's put in his scripts, but sometimes circumstances leave me with little choice but to make some changes. If we're still working with the comma metaphor, then this is where the "and" comes in.

Take today's #27, for example. Here's what it looked like when Justique finished:

Great, right? But when I compared the art to the script, it left me with a few issues. First off, the final panel needed a background. Easy. And in the third panel, there's an issue with the FutureNazi's arms. After testing a few options, I decided to fill both of the sleeves in black. Still pretty easy.

But fixing the issue between panels one and two was more difficult. See, the FutureNazis show up without smoke to indicate their arrival. I found that the best solution was to condense the art and add a vertical BEEZOOOP in the middle. I'm not convinced it looks better than the original, but I do feel it was necessary.

Then I paste the lettered version into our title/credits template, come up with a goofy line for the upper right corner, and post it here on the blog. And that's pretty much what I do as an editor.

Anyway, don't forget about last week's caption contest!!! I'll give you one more week to enter, and we'll announce the winner next Thursday. See you then!

FutureNixon ripped off FuturePete's metal arm (which contains a packed-with-time-traveling-power unicorn horn) and BEE-ZOOOP'd into the past to do whatever evil stuff a cybernetically-enhanced Richard Nixon likes to do.

But wait... how did Nixon even know about the unicorn horn in first place??? He got secret inside intel from FutureSlavePaige a.k.a. the time traitor!!! And now, with FutureShawn and FuturePete in shock, the FutureNazis are ready to set their devious plan in motion...

It's finally here!!! The contest you've all been waiting for!

As we mentioned last week* this contest is gonna send you straight to your think tank to come up with clever and witty entries as you fight for the top spot!

The rules are easy:

1. Read Time Log #26

2. When you get to the last panel, come up with some snappy dialogue for the metal legs FutureNazi and FuturePete.

3. Submit said snappy dialogue in the comments section of this blog post.

4. Rinse and repeat.

The winner of the Caption Contest will receive a FREE copy of The New Time Log (1 of 3) mailed directly to your door! It's a deluxe collection of strips #0-17 in lavish color and printed on silky, deluxxxe quality paper!!! Also, I'll toss a special surprise into the winner's envelope.

* WHAT? You don't remember the contest announcement? Well, that's your fault, not ours. Whatever the deal is, we DID NOT just come up with this contest on the fly because we can't figure out what we want the characters to say in the last panel. And we didn't just invent the contest this morning while staring blankly at the near-finished comic. If you don't remember the contest announcement from last week, that's all on you, man. ALL ON YOU.