Pirates of the Coal Sack #13

Sep 30, 2021

Phoenix vs. Spiteful! Lots of explosions! This is the big finish! Well, until we pick up the pieces next issue.

Did I mention lots of explosions? There are three different techniques used for explosions this issue. I’m more or less happy with all of them, but I’m curious if you can spot them.

This time around I made some notes on things I wanted to mention as I went, so page by page:

p00: Our cover girl is Captain Claudia, played by the same actress as the Rose from Alexander II.

p06: I really love engineering, but I don’t get to set too many scenes there. And I don’t think we’ve seen the inside of the boat bay for some time.

pp10-15: For me, this was the climax of the “A Pirate’s Life for Me.” It’s a rare case where I wrote the script before doing layouts or renders, which let me do a better job, I think, on the expressions and body language. There’s more subtext in general this issue than I have previously attempted. I hope it comes through.

p18: In “Balance of Terror”, Enterprise tracks the Romulan Bird of Prey using “motion sensors.” This was my attempt to make sense of that bit of Treknobabble and avoid introducing new babble. It also takes a step toward something I want for the cloaking device in this setting–it comes with drawbacks, gaps, and tradeoffs. The balance between cloak and sensors isn’t just one of technology, but also how you use it.

p26: As a general rule, I don’t like showing two ships underway in the same shot. This isn’t Star Wars; these ships are hundreds of thousands to millions kilometers apart and maneuvering over periods of minutes, not seconds. Two ships were never together in original Star Trek for production reasons, but it helped contribute to the capital ship feeling. This time, I just couldn’t manage to get the spatial arrangement clear without showing both ships, and given the circumstances of this battle, if it’s ever appropriate, this will be it.