Ian and Noah as a couple explore their own internal conflicts that had gone either unnoticed or avoidable until they met one another. Noah comes from a deeply religious family, and Ian's been openly gay his whole life. Noah doesn't notice Ian's sexuality until they've already developed a friendship. Naturally, this throws Noah into a conflict between his upbringing and what he has in front of him.
For Ian, his openness doesn't change that he's insecure about his sexuality, not having fully accepted himself. He allowed himself to befriend Noah expecting it to blow up in his face. But then it doesn't.
It's not a Christian vs Queer conflict at all, but something I think is more realistic and relatable. They like each other a lot. They just have their own demons to battle so they can enjoy the relationship they both value greatly.
The comic will include sex scenes because it's really important to their experience, discovering and becoming comfortable with sexuality. It's not focused on it, though. That said, I'm tailoring the work so that the explicit portions of the sex scenes are on their own pages and can be skipped for readers who want to have an NC-17 experience rather than X. Everyone's happy!
This is the result of over a week of grinding out a method of drawing anthro heads that gives me a range of expressions, adjustable proportions, and unique characteristics. I've finally landed on something I think not only works, but works well. Most importantly, I'm able to rapidly repeat this. This portrait took about 15 minutes. I could easily take this to a clean drawing and paint it to completion. I may end up doing that eventually for the comic's cover art!
I'm very excited about this milestone. I feel like I can charge ahead with a ton of work. Most of my major work has been on hold while I hard-focus on this, and now that it's complete, I'm filled with all kinds of inspiration to go use it.
