This was one of the original final concepts for tBtM's second cover. As you can see by the date, I started on the hard prints and cover pages a bit late in the game for this manga.. (tBtM started as an online manga only in 2001 for those who dun know me or my previous account here.)

To think it's really been over three years since I had actually started producing that manga. I may well end up posting them in whole again.. but, ah we'll see. As scanned, it needs a lot of cleaning.. I'm still figuring out this scanner.. it's very different from my last, and this was the first attempt.

I scanned this one first for two reasons:
1. It was readily available (not in storage)
and
2. It's one of the more detailed covers, giving me a good idea what the scanner my dad just picked up for me is capable of and how to work the controls etc without screwing over the lines

" Who the heck are those guys? "
On the left we have the one JJ refers to constantly and affectionately as 'the dead guy' (lol it's true lol) Hitoshi Isamu. He's a son of one of the shrine gaurdians. He's been described by my few remaining readers as " tenaciously stubborn but not stupidly loyal. " Though a spirit in the modern era, he's been finding that has it's perks.

On the right is Tsukiko Umeko. A shrine maiden alive during the feudal eras of Japan, she she's more than she seems.

In the middle is Jen "Butterfly" Yoshiko. American born to the modern age.

A very tiny bit of the story:
Jen stumbles onto a forgotten and deapitated shrine in her new neighborhood after moving to Japan to live with her grandmother. Fixing it up becomes her pet project and something of a retreat as she finds she doesn't quite fit in. A few hundred years prior.. Isamu dies in defense of the remote shrine: his body left to rot in the tree overlooking the reflection pool..

Other Notes: For some reason I always liked drawing the stupid butterflies and moths for the covers and panel art more than I did many of the characters lofl! I always enjoyed drawing Isamu and Umeko though.. they were always a lot of fun! Especially Umeko's hair.. I dunno why.. maybe the detail in her braids lol! Come to think on it.. >.> I think I might have partially fashioned them after one of my fave animes at the time.. Vampire Princess Miyu..