Topic: Round 1: GreyGun Battlefield Escape

Well, we're at about the halfway point of Round 1 - with 13 projects judged, 11 on to Round 2...and at least 16 more projects set to come in, if NO ONE else joins (and, we fully expect many more to join...there is ALWAYS a last minute rush!) - and today's offering is the latest in the spotlight. I will be continuing the 1-2 projects a day on the weekdays system we've been using so far, which, has made this Round 1 the highest-viewed round 1 in Idol history. Spreading out the spotlight time is giving each project more eyes and feedback. Go Idol!

So, today, we head into the far reaches of space with...
GreyGun Battlefront Escape
Project of: Javier Lopez - Saul Gaytan

Within the farthest reaches of space resides a planet of unbound mystery, ready to involve itself once again, in the affairs of Mankind.

Enter neophyte Special Agent Alegria Chase of the Bureau of Planetary Expedition; she has been tasked with retrieving the mythical alien relic GreyGun. Driven to complete a mission she's not supposed to be a part of, she becomes an unwilling pawn between military armadas on the brink of intergalactic war. The governments of Earth [Allied Planetary Naval Forces] and the human breakaway colonies, the Cadonis Empire, race against time, each other, and a deceptive slithering fiend to acquire the power of GreyGun. Agent Chase and a squad of ragtag soldiers maneuver their way through a battlefield of betrayal and misdirection while defending themselves against a psychotic Cadonis leader, Commander Cylis of the flagship, Argent.

As she digs deeper within the desolate planet to find the missing research team, Alegria's resolve will be tested along with an unwavering desire to discover the true meaning of GreyGun. The unpredictable course of events will lead her on a collision course toward a power great enough to change the fate of the galaxy in a way she could have never expected.

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And now, our resident aliens...the judges...

I gotcher resident alien right here pal! :)

Premise: hmmm. I can get down with intergalactic intrigue and space quests well enough. The pitch itself reads a little long and drawn out, meaning you could have condensed this quite a bit and still had equal if not greater impact on your reader. You're including things that either don't matter right now, or simply don't speak to the heart of the story. You'll want to refine this down to the core, to the hook, and you'll find it a lot less cumbersome to deal with. Even better, so will your fans. Content wise I don't have any glaring issues with it. I get where you're going, even if you made me wade through a bunch of unneeded material to get there. It's interesting enough for me to want to know more, which is ultimately the point. I do have questions about the name however. It seems cumbersome to read, and consider how much trouble that logo will be to fit in the space allotted.

Cover: This thing has anatomy issues all over the place. The standing chick with the gun has some serious problems with her thighs, and her face bugs me something awful. The eyes are off, and that mouth is almost big enough to eat the poor girl she's about to shoot. Now if eating her enemies is her thing, that's fine, but she doesn't strike me as the type really. No sharp pointy teeth and all, you know? Also, her breasts aren't symmetrical either. FYI there.

The girl on the ground also has problems. We can see her leg on the ground but the claf is off, even with the other chick standing on it. Her fingers are just plain bad. Get some reference, get a model, do what you need to do but those aren't fingers and this isn't the type of style that lets you off light with errors like that. They look like Big Bird fingers rather than those of a human. Her facial expression looks alright, but her face seems a little scrunched up, like you were trying to fit it into too small a space.

I like the ships, but use a compass when you're drawing planets in the background. Planets are round due to physics, not egg shaped.

The tentacled thing is really the strong part of your cover here. It looks really good. It has great depth, it's damn scary, and I'm fully creeped out by it. Well done on that. The gun it's holding is off perspective wise. I know it's a ray gun type thing but it still has to follow perspective rules just like regular guns.

Conclusion: The pitch was decent, the cover needs a lot of work to be ready for prime time. I can forgive quite a bit for it being a rough, and that's the reason you're getting a YES. Don't make me sorry in the next round.

Ok then, another week, another batch of entrants... Welcome to SPI!

The Pitch ~ For some reason as I read through this, I imagined the voiceover guy you hear in so many movie trailers... Don't know why, but it made it very exciting at first until a few hiccups made that voice stutter and fizzle out.... Shoot. Worth a shot!

I'd say that first sentence, our hook isn't horrible, but it doesn't really tell me anything about the plot, what makes it different, etc... We're looking at the story from 50 light years away without long ranged sensors and, as a result, it falls a little flat. I'd recommend, as Cary mentioned, finding the heart of the story and focusing on that. Setting is great, but what's it about?

Boils down to... Special Agent Chase tasked with finding a mythical alien relic... pawn in what could become an intergalactic war... race against time... ragtag soldiers... missing research teams... fate of the galaxy.

Yep, a lot going on there! Take into consideration, when you can, a few goals covered in a mini-series of four issues, even if you're going to go beyond that ~ short term goals, mid ranged goals, and long term goals. The long termed ones are, typically, the bigger picture of the story. "What's my motivation?" Try to focus on that and give us only a hint of what may be touched along the way.

Sounds like an interesting premise, but as my colleague pointed out, too much going on, needs to be boiled down a bit, and punched up.

The Rough Cover ~ Some good, some bad... Two things I really liked were the tentacles and the top right ship. They look great on the page, great details, etc... Things get a little rough from there. The ship on the top left looks like a hardback book on its side and cut in half. I could be wrong, but the angle looks off to me on that one, too... If it's really in space a good distance away from the planet and on a similar course to the alien vessel, it should probably look a little smaller in the front. Not getting the ruler out, though, so I'll leave it at that. The other mechanical issue is the gun at the bottom of the page. Looks like someone would have to stick their arm in there to pull the trigger. Maybe it was an attempt make it seem closer to us than the women, not sure, but it seems a little big and thick. Cary already pointed out the anatomical issues... thick legs on the standing woman that would imply she's a LOT bigger... hands of the woman on the ground a bit off, etc...

I have to say, though, the cover does not make me wince or anything... I can imagine with inks and colors (not too crazy on the colors), this will look fairly nice and, with some minor tweaks, maybe even con ready.

For round 2, I'd focus on cleaning up the details a bit. Give us some technological integration with the characters so we can get some of those nice ship details on them, for example, work on your proportions and, regardless of what Cary tells you, don't make them DDD's on top. He didn't mention it, but I'm sure he noticed!

So, overall... Both pitch and cover can be better... work on them. I'd love to see revisions! Bring it in round 2!

YES

THE ART:

Pro: We really like those ships! We like that they're a bit different from the usual direction sci-fi ships will take. After all, why would a starcruiser have to be aerodynamic? Why would it need wings? It could be a huge box in space and move just as fast as if it were sleek and winged. Great tentacles, too. Could be a monster, could just be sentient vegetation, in any case they have good movement and a feeling of space and depth. Nice job on those.

Con: There's a lot of anatomical problems here. Though we can see what you're trying to do with the main girl's pose, the way you drew it makes her arms look far too short, her legs look stumpy, and her overall physique kind of chunky. Now, we're all in favor of a wide variety of body types for lead heroines, but we aren't convinced that the thickness of her body is intentional and not an accident.

In any case, she looks positively ginormous next to the girl on the ground (who has a host of anatomy issues of her own - chiefly her poorly rendered hands and lower legs). Our first thought on looking at the cover was that this girl is some kind of She-Hulk archetype. Then there's the issue of the facial features being pretty rough - the main girl's eyes are an odd diamond shape and placed improperly on the head, the mouth is clumsy, and the head is overall too small for the body.

You also need to watch your perspectives. The ships seem like they're on different vanishing points, and the sky and ground feel like they're on different horizon lines altogether.

Last Word: Taken all together, it paints a picture of an artist who hasn't studied their art. You need more time to work, study, and train before this will be ready for professional consideration.

THE PITCH:

Pro: Nice setup for a big space opera. You've got the brewing war, the desperate factions, the agent caught in the middle, and the mysterious super-weapon that could end it all for good or for ill. All the pieces you need are there, and arranged fairly well to give us the information we want to know just as we're asking the questions in our head. And it isn't a bad concept. Very anime, but we like anime so that isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Con: As has been said before us, you're giving more information than is needed. Much of the last paragraph is extraneous, while the earlier information could be repackaged in a pitch that is more polished and less cluttered. But you heard that from the others.

GreyGun is a pretty uninspiring word for an ancient artifact of unimaginable power. Writing it as one word makes it feel even less impressive. The clunkiness of the pitch and the silliness of "GreyGun" as a maguffin makes the end result feel less like an anime pitch and more like an 80's toy-line-made-cartoon. It's one thing to have nostalgia for Thundercats and Transformers, but one must remember that they were also poorly written and don't hold up when you aren't 7 years old anymore.

Last Word: Could be interesting, but something about the pitch left us wanting you to try again. Not bad at all, just not quite gripping enough.

FINAL VERDICT: Well, you're already getting through without us. While we have serious reservations about the artwork, we'll give you a Yes with the caveat that you have got to show us a lot more than this in round two to keep our very tentative support.

Don't feel singled out for your artworks roughness, either. We've said yes to proposals that were less technically proficient than this, so we weren't going to cut you on that account. We do have the feeling, however, that there could be a serious culling of the herd in Round 2. Bring better than your best if you want to remain standing.

Yea, the cuts will…get much tougher when the public vote is a factor…the fight to stay above a line - gets intense!

But this one gets a soft 3 Yes for now…so we can take a few to hear the Public word on it, right now!

Hm. I think the cover has a nice stylish feel and a lot of action stuff going on. There are the hand/anatomy and perspective problems, but that seems like something that, now that the judges have pointed out that it could benefit from being fixed, perhaps the artist will take some time to consider re-drawing some of the problem areas.

The pitch I found to be confusing and full of holes (and the already mentioned unnecessary info…). First, in the very first sentence, there is a punctuation mistake. It SHOULD read "…ready to involve itself once again in the affairs of Mankind…", WITHOUT a comma between "again" and "in." Also, the PLANET is involving itself, or the aliens ON the planet? Because the planet is never mentioned again in the pitch. Earth and space colonies are mentioned, though…

Then it says "…she has been tasked with retrieving the mythical alien relic GreyGun. Driven to complete a mission she's not supposed to be a part of…" If she's been given the mission, how is she not supposed to be part of that mission? Doesn't make sense.

Then "As she digs deeper within the desolate planet to find the missing research team…" Wait, what? First she's looking for GreyGun, then leading a ragtag crew of Space Marines in a war against rebel colonies, and then out of the blue there is a missing research team? Where did they come from? I don't get it…

As an abstract concept, searching for a missing super weapon in space amid an interstellar war could be pretty cool, but specifically relating to this project, I think that the lack of clarity in the story is really going to hurt in the coming rounds.

Congrats on making it through!

My biggest complaint is that if GreyGun is an ancient artifact why does it look like a generic humanoid gun? Granted, this is assuming the gun on the cover is said artifact and maybe it isn't, but if it is it definitely doesn't look like an ancient alien design or like it's incredibly powerful. It just looks like a hand gun.

You have a dramatic cover and some of the details in the piece show you know a little somethin' somethin'...I hope you take the judge's feedback and tweak the cover and post the changes, you have a great start here it just needs a little reworking/polishing in a few areas.

I really like where this story COULD be going. I love sci-fi and haven't had the pleasure of reading a good space drama in a while.

I think once the artist fixes the flaws with the artwork and polishes that story a bit it will be really interesting.

Question to the artist…is that gun on the page supposed to be the greygun itself? If so it seems a little plain. The pitch makes it out to be some kind of ultimate weapon (I kept envisioning a pocket death star..).

It's hard for me to look at the big character in the middle of the cover but I'm really kind of drawn into the potential the story seems to promise. Anyone else agree with me?!

Please fix the artwork and congratulations on making it through!

Thanks a bunch to the judges. The critiques were extremely spot on and this contest so far has been a humbling experience. I understand that my art style is super raw and I need to focus and practice 100% if we are to make it past Round 2.

Cary, Adam&Comfort = I'm glad you liked the ships because I honestly wasn't happy about them at all. I agree that in space, ships don't have to conform to anything but physics. It is space after all.  But I'm my own worst critique and I wasn't impressed at all by the cover. The perspective and anatomy issues are more glaring than I though which I'm embarrassed about because I spent a lot of time refining the linework. I will revise the issues and get it re-posted shortly for additional advice. Thanks for being blunt.

Last Bard= Great points on setting goals in relation to what kind of project this is. This is a space opera and those generally aren't low issue runs. So I WILL take your advice and flesh out the bigger picture. The pitch was wordy and will get revisioned also but I had so many plot points that I got carried away.  A little.  Hope you guys like the new pitch.

As for the name, I see how it can be either cumbersome, cheesy, and mouthy..    I thought it was a cool reference to what the humans had codenamed the ancient artifact, since they have no idea who or what created GreyGun. There are multiple conflicts here and I will have my hands full refining them each so it doesnt become a jumbled mess.

Thanks again for your unbiased suggestions and I won't take them lightly.

Cancillion

The technical parts of your cover, guns & ships, they really interest me. I can't wait to see a revised version of this cover!

Welcome aboard!

WELCOME TO THUNDERDOME!!!
I like the ships, and the tentacles look pretty cool. I don't really know what is going on in the story, but I like this kind of genre. (space adventure) So I can't wait to see more. Good Luck.  

Thanks for the replies so far, gentleman.

Frequent = I appreciate your breakdown of my pitch more than you know. Yes, there's a lot going on and when I revise the pitch it will be condensed. I can see how the story arc can seem all over the place which was a goal of mine but certainly not in a confusing babbled mess.  

Robbie= I totally feel you on your comments about the gun on the very front of the cover. But thats all it is, a gun.  it's actually Chase's gun. I knew after I drew that peice it would be confused with the title's name.    GreyGun is a weapon but not in the traditional sense. Stay tuned and you'll see exactly what it's about.   

TrickyFox= Pocket death star?  Nice comparison. Hmm..  

Martin =  Thank you for the comments. I'm working on it as we speak.

Micheal = I accept your challenge!   

Cancillion: Good luck revising your pitch. Just remember that we don't need to know everything.

Here is something I cooked up for you as a sample method of streamlining. I trimmed MUCH of what was in your pitch, trying to only add where the wording need clarifying. Everything new is in parenthesis, but otherwise, all of this new version is from your original pitch (I'd still just re-write it, personally, but as an example, you can see how a trim still gives you the gist while whetting the appetite to know more…):

"Special Agent Alegria Chase of the Bureau of Planetary Expedition has been tasked with retrieving the mythical alien relic (known only as) GreyGun. (As she) and a ragtag squad of soldiers maneuver their way through (an ongoing) intergalactic war, (become targets of the rebelling) Cadonis (space) colonies, and (try to avoid a monstrous alien) fiend (with a mysterious agenda), Alegria's resolve (is pushed to its limits). (And when the research team sent to study the relic goes missing, Alegria rushes) to discover the true meaning of GreyGun, a power great enough to change the fate of the galaxy in a way she could have never expected."

great comments judges and everyone. now about that title. yeah. as i was handing my friend here some tissues due to the name change idea. lol. We  were thinking of the title. "Codename: Greygun". now i was thinking this to make the audience more attracted to what it actually is, and not get it confused with actual guns but waht do you guys think?
yes im happy to see what i thought was wrong with the pic is now confirmed we gots some work to do.

Codename: Greygun might work… For me, it implies a character, not a weapon despite the "gun" in there, but the story itself makes it clear enough and, who knows, when she finds it and wields it, her name might become synonymous with "Greygun" since it's history supersedes here own.

Frequent, your suggested pitch sounds cool and less jumbled. I will take that into account. Giving away less without telling more is the key.

As for the name change, I'm hitting a wall here. Saulski came up with Codename: GreyGun but I don't know if I'm feeling that.  We talked for a longtime  but nothing clicked.  

Anybody have any suggestions?

I came up with:  

Battlefront Escape
The Grey Gun Chronicles
Weapons of Myth
Weapons of the Gods
Galaxy Warfare: Alegria Chase

I like the last one, personally. Adam&Comfort, if I could get your thoughts on this please and I did use a thesaurus to get some ideas. Great advice. Do you think I should eliminate the name GreyGun altogether from the story?

Cancillion

I'm not sure we can know whether "GreyGun" should go until we know what it is or does, which you can't really tell us without giving the game away. As it doesn't seem to be an actual gun, however, I'd say get rid of it. Consider why you're so attached to it, to begin with, and if you can live with changing it. You may like a new name even better. If it's a bomb, call it "the singularity" or "the decimator", or something. If it's a cannon, call it "the worldhammer" or "the god hand"… If it's a virus, call it "Leech" or "the greyness". You know, it really doesn't matter, but "GreyGun" is sort of terrestrial and pedestrian.

For the book title, I feel like "Galaxy Warfare: Alegria Chase" is the WORST option you've got. And "Codename: GreyGun" does indeed sound like a person's name.

What about "Operation: GreyGun" or "Galaxy Chase" (I don't really like that one, but it incorporates her name…) as some other options?

Cancillion said

I drew that peice it would be confused with the title's name.    GreyGun is a weapon but not in the traditional sense. Stay tuned and you'll see exactly what it's about.   

Awesome, can't wait to see the real GreyGun!

Actually, from FC's suggestions for alternate names for the weapon itself, The Worldhammer isn't a terrible title. Or just "Worldhammer." We actually aren't great at coming up with titles - it takes us forever and we usually generate a list that's 99% junk with just one or two usable names.

I know the feeling.    I'll go with my gut instinct and bounce a list of names off of a couple friends and see what sticks.  Thanks for the feedback.