About this Episode:
As I was shooting this scene I realized how important it is to not mess with a set too much once you commit to its design. Any changes you make you have to go through all your previous shoots and make sure the change doesn’t affect any visuals in the other shots. Otherwise, you have to redo everything.
See the last panel on the bottom right? That door overhang kind of blocks the zombies banging on the door which I don’t like. However, I liked the way it looks in the other photos so its a bit of give and take.
This scene also illustrates how an author and a reader view something a little differently. In the book its more of a straight line in the alley with the door being on the right that they enter. In my mind I read it is a L shaped alley like you see here. Snell and I started drawing sets on paper emailing them back and forth between each other to get the point across. So as you can see we ended up using how I envisioned it simply because it looked better for the comic, not because my idea was better.
Discussion Question: This one comes from Bo.
A person needs about a gallon a day. It weighs about seven pounds a gallon. The average person probably couldn’t carry more than about twenty pounds of gear, including his boots; so, how’s the zombie apocalypse survivor going to get his water? He could probably drink out of a gutter; but if he gets a bad case of the doubled-over runs he won’t be running very quickly. Children and the elderly are particularly susceptible to diarrhea.
Well the bigger the guy the more gear he can carry. Me, I would travel by car and take water with me, and a purification straw from www.cheaperthandirt.com
I have experience carrying about 40 pounds on my back for long durations of time, and also, most rivers and streams in my area are mostly clean.
Condoms, and a shit ton of iodine purification tablets until you can at least set up a base.. Or better yet.. Get a pan or more preferably, a pot.. And purify your water on the spot.. All you need to do is get it up to boiling point and not even for that long.
As for condoms? Great way for quick transportation of a limited water source, and they’re light!
Carrying water on your being at all times will be more cumbersome than is reasonable, and always keep a back up canteen or two just in case you need to drink on the go or can’t find water. Never refer to your canteen other than that.
Wait.. Was I suppose to answer that one?
Calicade – so sweet and youthful. I think that one went over your head.
Better make sure those rubbers are not lubricated. >.<
But those aren’t made for her pleasure.
Get the flavored rubbers instead and make your own Kool-Aid. 😉
Kool-aid condom water? Post-Apocalypse Patent that!
Ugh. :p
LOL.
I’m appalled at you guys, there are kids around here! Dave turns his back for one minute and this is what happens… 😉
Teh Innerwebz: SERIOUS business!
Evan, where did you come up with the idea of the zombie in the Hazmat suit? 😀 That must have been the unluckiest Hazmat employee ever! 😉
I wish I could take credit. But the moment the hazmat guys came out a few people did it. I personally say it first from an artist called PowerPig.
“Condoms, and a shit ton of iodine purification tablets until you can at least set up a base”
I have not read the blog portion of this episode yet but this comment makes want to not read it and just let me imagination wander. lol
Ok so I read the question and I totally agree with Calicade on the water thing. You can buy a bottle of 50 tablets for less than $10 so that is a great idea.
Too bad about the condoms though. *snicker*
Mutts – My jaw fell open when I saw this comic. Well done! I love the “Moannnnnnnnnn” in the middle. Way creative dude.
Thanks! 🙂
I really like the way it turned out, too, very much like a comic book, especially the overhead shot. I think that’s a style lost on many web comics.
I cannot tell you how much I appreciate the feedback I have been getting.
I like that it’s more like a comic book. That’s an angle you might want to explore further.
We will be doing this again at some point and I’ll keep that in mind.
I guess I’ll just die of thirst. Lol
Yeah, except when it makes you so crazy you’re drinking out of the toilet…
Don’t know drinking from the toilet! The tank on the back of a toilet holds a few gallons of drinkable water! Granted, some older ones may have issues with lead, but a little poisoning is not too bad, when confronted with dying of thirst or braving zombies!
When the chips are down, raid the toilet tank and the hot water heater. Still, that won’t last long, a day or two tops. After that, standing water is going to get stagnant in a hurry.
A low tech solution is to make a sand filter, maybe coffee filters, then boil the hell out of it (remembering that you need to boil it longer at higher altitudes to account for lower boiling temperatures).
None of that considers chemical or radioactive contamination, of course; and in a total societal breakdown, there will be nuclear and chemical contamination.
I keep a half gallon of water in two Nalgene bottles in my Go-Bag, with a stainless steel cup that fits on the bottom of one of them, plus an empty bladder in my bag, and another empty bladder in my LBE (that’s “Load Bearing Equipment”, Dave). I also keep a Miox purifier in my bag, and a Katadyn Pocket and coffee filters (to prolong the Katadyn’s useful life by keeping the bigger crud out of it) in my base camp gear. My goal this calendar year is to add a Big Berke to the home gear. I also keep about fifty gallons of steam-distilled water at home, in addition to several cases of water in half liter bottles. In an emergency my plan is to fill the bladders, drink as much as I can before I leave or get to work, and do the same for the wife and kids. Eventually they’ll all have their own bladders and bottles.
Water is important. It’s the one piece of survival kit you can’t fake or do without. Even in our modern world, diarrhea causes 4% of total deaths over 2.2 million deaths per year) and 5% of health loss to disability (http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/diseases/diarrhoea/en/).
I wrote that I have both a Miox and Katadyn. The Miox is only a purifier. It kills germs and cysts, but does not remove chemicals or improve the taste of the water. It is, however very compact, about the size of a fat magic marker. It uses electricity from batteries to ionize a small amount of salt. When one adds the ionized salt to the drinking water, it kills the germs and cysts.
The Katadyn Pocket is still the gold standard of handheld filters. I grew up in the 80’s, under the shadow of nuclear Armageddon, reading American Survivalist and Soldier of Fortune magazine. My dad was a Carter-era survivalist. Reading through the articles and ads in those magazines, the one thing I always wanted was a Katadyn Pocket. I grew up not only reading those magazines, at the height of the Cold War, but also in Arizona’s Sonoran Desert. Every year some tourista would wander off into the desert sightseeing and wind up dead. I learned quick that water is life.
Water hygiene is vital to survival. You have to have a gallon of clean water every day just sitting around. Start exerting yourself in the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse (running, fighting, salvaging/scrounging, gardening), and a clean source of water will be near the top of the list of requirements. If you’re on the go (like the zombie preppers plan) requires constant hydration. A bladder is best for that, in my experience. One can take sips of water as needed, without stopping to take a drink. Additionally, with the Katadyn, one can attach its output to the drinking tube and fill it backwards.
wow good post, Bo!
There is so much to know about water; and so many ways to make it potable. There’s iodine and boiling, bleach and distillation. There was a free book in pdf on the web years ago about purifying water, written by some Greens. The last time I went looking for it I could not find it. I have a printed off copy in my preparedness files somewhere. When I find it I will check for a URL and post it, if it directs to something other than a 404 message.
Folks that live where there is a lot of water (like our BotD protagonists) are fortunate. There are plenty of people in LA and Las Vegas that would be most screwed should the electricity go down for a week or more. Where I life there is plenty of water; but I do not trust it. I’d likely filter it twice, then boil it to be sure.
Oh there are those Brita-type filters, too. I don’t think they get everything; but using one first could save wear and tear on the final filtration. I just remembered, I also have all of the material in storage to make a simple sand filter, like the ones aquariums use, but made from two five gallon buckets. My plan in the short term is to use the sand filter before the Katadyn or Berke.
I always get a chuckle that zombie movies seldom deal with the necessities of survival, other than the zombies hankering to eat their brains. What do the survivors do for water, food, shelter, medicine, etc?
I’m working on a hand powered pump for the well we already use for our water. I’ve definitely taken some notes on everyone else’s plans, though.
Evan, I like your style. Keep it coming!
Thank you sir! 6 more!
Great 2nd episode, I await more.
Thanks. It’s nice to see them displayed on the site. Its like I am seeing it for the first time myself.
didnt this episode happen on a glitch 3 weeks ago?
It appeared for a few hours last week it seems. Chaos erupted as I was trying to schedule the comic. Scheduling the comic part of the site requires complete admin access to the site which we didn’t realize until my stubbornness damn near collapsed the site as I tried every work around I could dream up. Hah
Wasn’t that bad. Just a file in the wrong spot. Ain’t no thang.
its gotta take some real talent to make a tragic story in 8 strips
Well, we did our best to give 1 chapter a beginning and end but I’m not sure “tragic ending” is the right phrase. 🙂
It’s the culling part of the zeepoc, how much tragic can it get!?
True True
the first 8 strips were all it took to get me hooked on BotD. There’s a lot you can do with 8 strips!
“Curses! I keep tripping over those giant hockey puck discs on the floor!”
Why I like this:
1. Straight to non-stop action: Fight, Flight, Freeze, Faint. Once the zeepoc is in full swing, for a season, THIS is what itz all about.
2. Onomatopoeia Gone Wild!
3. Overhead Shots. I’m a sucker for any scene from above; I just think they are hella cool.
4. Love the comic book fonts. Been reading, um, Sequential Art, for decades and it never gets old. 🙂
Thank you, Luis! I like that shot as well. I’m going to work in more next time I do one. And I’m sure Dave will as well.
Feedback changes and motivates ideas.
About the water: ALL unopened water sources will be suspect and will need to be purified; especially once the madness is in full swing. Between cadavers, zombies landing (and dying) in water sources, collapsed infrastructure, massive pollutants released, it would be best to consider all water sources as poisoned and contaminated.
As Bo and others share, decontamination procedures and purification is a must. One question, who in the group gets to volunteer to test the “purified” water?
Two quick points:
1. Avoid the diuretics! No matter how much one “needs” caffeine, energy drinks, alcohol, etc., the peeing drinks are not “better than nothing.” They will just exacerbate dehydration.
2. There’s water and there’s water. Consider many of the can products, as well available fruits ‘n veggies, which all contain some water. No, not ideal, but every drop counts; even if it it’s from a can of peaches.
IF you follow the purification procedures correctly then you won’t have to have a
“Who’s going to make sure?” person.
Only after you gain some confidence in your ability to treat your own water. As for me, I only trust water that I purified/filtered/treated. I sure as hell and not taking anyone else’s word for it.
Cholera, anyone?
I love Cholera! Just spew it out and blind the zombies!
There was a doc on NPR this week talking about hydration. He said that a little caffeine wasn’t bad, as long as you’re drinking adequately, something about water overcoming the amount lost to diuretic effect. It was a really cool show. I’ll have to see if I can find it online.
http://m.npr.org/news/Health/156731306
^ NPR app. Has archive of everything. Best app for the iPhone IMO.
Funny, there’s no text for me, just a menu bar on the left side of the screen. I’ll try a different browser.
Thanks for the link. If this is the same story I think it is, it’s going in my prep notebook.
I’m really stoked to see this adaptation of the opening chapter at BRICKS, and I hope you guys enjoy it as much as D.L. Snell and I did!
Thanks for the fantastic work, Evan!
Thanks, Thom!
hey evan, could you put me in one of your awesome pics?
Sorry, AC. Comic is already shot. Besides I don’t see an avatar.
and was that stonewall back there?
Stay tuned
Looking pretty good, Evan! To be brutally honest, I can still see from this episode that you’re a beginner – I can’t put my finger on it, but it may be something about the pacing, or the layout, or something.
Regardless, the photography is pretty good, and I like the overhead shot. It’s a great shot you see used in a lot of high-budget action and zombie movies. It also makes the characters look small and powerless, and illustrates nicely that there’s only a thin wall between them and death.
And I’m still liking that post-apoc set you’ve built, nicely done.
Finite episodes to tell a short story. You have to condense 🙂