"And so it becomes a pattern of using some CG goodness to make the hand drawn goodness look niftier. Parchment is my most abused textrue. ... I need more textures. >.>

I don't think I've ever had a page with so many actual BACKGROUNDS on it... usually I just throw a color or two around in a manner that looks tolerable, but I'm getting better with backgrounds now and thus don't feel so much like crap doing them. (I'm the guy who will put a palm tree.. "Oh no! Lost in Alaska! Whatever shall we do?!" "I know, let's see which way the moss is facing... on that PALM TREE!" "Oh, good idea!") XD What can I say? They're amusing and don't grow anywhere around here. Here on the North American continent we oo and ah at all the cool animals on Australia. I get this funny feeling they do the same thing when they hear about our deer and moose and squirrel and Russain spies.

Oh, and the fade to no color on that last panel... yes, that means a flash back is coming. GADS!"

And if I'd known what Iw as doing at that point, I'd have, Iunno, used a SATURATION LEVELS GRADIENT instead of trying to do that by hand, thus making it less likely it would have looked that weird. Lessons learned.