December 2023 Challenge: Sir Francis McNutter's fateful expedition

[ChickPea]

MISSING EXPLORER LATEST!
READ ALL ABOUT IT!


This is a *very* early WIP without a map in sight, but I just wanted to get a thread started. My entry will tell the cautionary tale of Sir Francis McNutter, an intrepid explorer who vanished during the winter solstice.

As will be obvious, I'm creating a newspaper front page to tell the story. I've included an intro paragraph here, and the big white space to the right of the text will contain a mock-up of a couple of pages from a journal, with some text on the left and a map sketch on the right (as if drawn by dear old Sir Francis). At the bottom will be another map showing the larger area and the route of the expedition, and maybe some more text (I have written too much text...!)

This is just a first draft as I'm still playing about with layout so I may change things around, but the basic idea is outlined above. Later on, I'll 'age' everything to make it look a bit nicer, but I need to get my layout organised first.

About the good Sir Francis.... he's an upper class buffoon whose ancestors have been marrying their cousins for a thousand years. He wears tweed, smokes a pipe, and speaks too loudly especially to foreign people. He's very brave... probably because he's too dumb to understand risk. But has he met a sticky end...?

More soon.

### Latest WIP ###

wip1.png

[Kisachik the Wanderer]

He isn't missing, he is performing acts of buffoonery on location. I have heard it from the man who is the brother of the guy who works for the third cousin of a guy who owns a local pub, and this very reliable source tells that sir Francis married a donkey on a dare, but cannot yet get divorced, as there is a substantial dowry coming from the donkey's side, as he was led to believe by some local swine herd masquerading as the town's wise woman. Sir Francis has also taken upon himself the task of saving the village from its baffling village idiot deficit, as the village only had two real idiots living in it in the span of last 50 years. Nobody knows for sure where the idiots of old have wandered off, but the village mayor's wife's mother's aunt says most if not all had moved to the city to dabble in politics and run banks.

[ChickPea]

You've been reading my notes!!!

[Straf]

Oh I'm so looking forward to seeing how this develops. Will there be space on the page for an advert for some dubious health tonic, preferably one containing heroin, cocaine and mercury? I think it was around the 1840s when the first regulations appeared regarding not using actual poisons to colour candy marketed to children. You know things like lead (red and yellow) and chromium (green). If you survived past your sixth birthday you were practically an adult and could have a full time job hewing coal out of the mines.

Anyway I digress. I'm anticipating another ChickPea Inkscape masterclass

[ChickPea]

Thanks, Straf!

I wanted to include a couple of ads and that's what the little boxes on either side of the title were for. I wanted them to be.... quirky, but I hadn't quite decided what to do yet. You've given me a great idea and now I need to research the most horrific medical treatments I can find. I love the idea of a cocaine or opium laced tonic, and I'm also thinking leeches. What kind of a medical treatment is it if there isn't a leech or two in there?!

I'm still putting things together and will hopefully have something to post in the next few days. I'm experimenting with caterpillar mountains...

[Redrobes]

I recall radium was the cure all of yesteryear... oh and electric shocks.

[Straf]

Corsets as well. Got to have that hourglass look.

[ChickPea]

Hehe, some great ideas here! Thank you.

[Diamond]

I recall radium was the cure all of yesteryear... oh and electric shocks.

Are they not any longer?

[ChickPea]

I've been crazy busy and haven't had as much time as I would have liked to spend on my map. But, here's an update on what I have so far. I've had to scale back my ideas a little so that I can (hopefully) get it finished in time.

### Latest WIP ###

wip2.jpg

On the blank notepad pages, I'm thinking I'll put some text on one page and a sketch of the village/surrounding area on the other. Then at the bottom right it'll either be more text or maybe an image of a standing stone circle if i can pull if off. Not quite sure yet.

Haven't had time to think about my crazy adverts either, but that is of course my top priority!!