About Set Apart

Synopsis

What happens when you throw a faithful Christian vixen into your average dorm room with a worldly individual? Interesting things will happen. The influence seems mutual, but those in the criminal world are looking to shake things up in a way they never expected! Nevertheless, the Christian will do her best to let her light shine (Matthew 5:13-16), even literally. The purpose of this comic is to entertain while showing respect and reverence for Biblical authority. If you’re not a Christian, understand that this is not specifically a Christian comic, but rather a comic that has Christian characters since the subject matter will certainly not always be about the Bible or the church. Read strips in context before judging and remember that context is always being developed.

Starting Motivation

After seeing so many online webcomic strips I had always thought that something of this nature was so unattainable as an artist as particular as I am. It is a fun way to communicate. For the three general purposes of making something of this nature, to inform, to entertain, and to persuade, I have chosen among my favorite to entertain. Although more particularly, I like humor, I like to laugh, but cry only on occasion, he he. However, many such forms of entertainment have been plagued with commending vulgar and crude elements. Simply put, the main purpose of Set Apart is to entertain while showing reverence to God and the Bible. I also want to provoke everyone to read the Bible and to encourage Christian living for those already a member of the Lord’s church hoping they also get a laugh out of it. But may it be known, this is a fictional comic that is designed to entertain and not to be taken as a representation of anything literal, although real life experience may be included.

Elements Used

I use anthropomorphic or anthro characters because they are simply more visually interesting, like cartoons. (See my own about page for more details.)

This comic will contain somewhat deep emotional expressions, feelings, and some scenes of violence. As a general rule, I probably won’t have anything more intense than what you can read in the Bible, but if you haven’t read the Bible, you don’t know how intense it can get. I suppose if I were to give it a rating, it would be, for the most part, MPAA’s PG-13, ESRB’s T, and Censorship Pandas between Pai Gon (Web PG) and Fa Teen (Web 14).

Profanity will be represented as “[profanity]” since I do not wish to actually use it but rather rebuke it, thus it is represented this way. Scripture references will be represented as “[Book c:v-v],” unless I forget to make it blue. Various notes may also appear between brackets. Fantasy elements will also be employed. Certain characters will have special abilities and reality will be bent to an extent. After all, what’s the point of making a comic that only emulates real life when I could just live?

Using the Bible

Understand that this comic is not intended to be a Bible study aid, in any sense. Some scriptural references are included to help with situations dealing with Biblical topics, but only use the Bible as your ultimate source of authority. Some references only point to a few verses, so be sure to read the versus with their context to understand how they’re being used. Know that you can probably find more references from the Bible on the same subject. Don’t rely on this comic for you’re Bible knowledge, read and re-read the Bible yourself! The comic’s main function is to entertain, but perhaps in some cases, knowing the Bible will help you understand a joke.

Flaws

Since I am merely human, there will be flaws of all kinds. If a Scripture has been misused or taken out of original context, by all means, show me through the Bible so I can correct it! If I merely misspell a word, it would please me know, but don’t feel obligated. If there are artistic issues, please show me a redline or something of how I can improve.
Things that have been fixed:

• Proportional issues exist with upper arms until comic #11.
• Merdrako now has a wedding ring in comic #16 and the cast page.

Postponement

Written on Sept. 14, 2009, Published on Sept. 26,2009

Well, it’s been a great 2 years since I’ve started my comic and I’ve learned quite a bit from it. I’ve gained a lot of experience, including a better understanding about how one should go about rigging a character for animation among other things. It’s been a good run, I’ve never missed an update, yet, to my great regret, I have decided to postpone and currently cease the continuance of my comic Set Apart for a time. Now I will give an answer as to why I’ve come to this decision, not that it is required of me, but I wish not to leave anyone with ill will or feelings of severe disappointment, nor loss of hope in my future efforts.

To start, I’m someone who, in the realm of creativity, can’t seem to stay put doing the same thing over and over for very long. I like to experiment with different things and have felt constrained during this project. Although the comic process included many different stages and did undergo experimentation, their repetition through the course of two years left more experimentation to be desired. It started out as project that I thought would be something I could enjoy doing every week. It’s not exactly that I didn’t enjoy it, but as a result of the medium I used, (3D), I was very restricted and grew discontent with using my outdated models. It’s also hard to do initial development while everything else is still under development, as the nature of most comics.

Here is an example of my recent efforts:


Second, I believe I’ve taken a backwards approach in setting up my comic, thus failing it from the start without hope. Yet I can hear some asking, “What do you mean by that?” I’ve not been socially engaged in terms of people knowing what I’m doing, receiving input, and responding. I know people, but I don’t communicate enough. I don’t communicate enough because I spend so much time straining over what and how to write something that is easy to understand and isn’t obtrusive. I spend so much time thinking about what to write to reduce the chances of someone calling “foul!” because they fail to understand what I mean or are oblivious to the context. However, I realize that someone, somewhere, will always criticize out of malice, but I believe that most do not criticize for this reason. This is not to say I have been negatively criticized by anyone as far as I know concerning my comic, nor have I received much positive criticism or encouragement for the reasons I’ve just set forth–lack of sociability. It’s not that I’m completely nonsocial, but I wait for a request and rarely speak unless spoken to directly. I must start reaching out and stop expecting people to come in.

Thirdly, since I’m now attending the University of Texas at Dallas, I will be taking more intensive upper level courses and wish to direct most of my attention toward school, especially since it now costs a pretty penny compared to Collin County Community College.

To wrap up, this is not to say the the comic will die completely, but the likeliness of that happening exists. I wish to continue the comic, but at the present time, I cannot. It is still possible that I may continue it in the future, but in a different manner. I could possibly perform updates at odd and undefined intervals as some others do while updating my models, which would take time. Or I could change my style to something more simplistic.

If you would like to discuss, question, or otherwise reprove my decision, please confer without fear, as I am listening and am willing to respond. If you have any questions, concerns, thoughts, or suggestions, make them know to me at adam_l_humphreys(at)hotmail.com and don’t be disappointed if I don’t reply within the same or following day.

And for those few who may have had thoughts of “I knew it!,” I ask, did you really?