Had a lot to do today and NONE of it was shopping. Or working. Go, me. I did have the podcast to do; another episode in the can awaiting editing. Then I had to go see "Wicked" in the theater for the next episode, which won't be for two weeks. Had laundry to do but managed tow work on a sketch of roughly what I had in mind. The above mix is NOT how it's going to look, it's just the idea of it. I need to make the graffiti Silas a bit more extreme, especially in the hands and feet, I think, movements more exaggerated as well. I think I found my style. He will mimic the foreground Silas and he will be able to speak, through graffiti where the 'real' Silas can't. So, another step.

 Forgot this, too. I did start the next page and THIS is where I stalled. Still like the colors and aesthetics so far. It's the graffiti part that always trips me up.

 This is actually from a couple days ago, but I forgot to post it here. A beginning. Then I stalled on the style of the images he was going to be dancing in front of. But I think I got a better idea of what to do so the time might have been well spent. We'll see.

Finally got back on this. While it was a quick and easy start, it is a start and that matters. I like a little 'animation' here and there and I also like playing with the idea of Silas kind of jumping in front of himself as it if was some kind of performance, which it is. This whole comic is meant to have hints of 'stage play' in it. It is an opera, after all. So while this isn't much, it's at least me getting back onto the horse.
 

 Couple of things. Did some work on this today. I'm sitting on it for at least another day to see how I feel. Overall, I think it's decent, not my best, not my worst. Not sure of the colors at all. I did zoom in a bit as I felt there was a lot of wasted blank area. I think I got likeness, just...well, he IS a clown. That's problematic in a way. We'll see how I feel tomorrow.

Worked a little on another test for the next track of City Silent. I want a much more painterly approach to the characters but, after doing this, decided I wanted a contrast with the background. I will likely have Silas dancing against huge representations of his new work. Unless you click on it, you can't see the detail on the image above. But that's ok, because I did a quick and dirty piece of graffiti and then plunked this in front of it:

I want to soften the edges of this, make it look more painted, likely put it into perspective with just a hint of the wall texture behind it, but this is kind of what I had in mind. It's all inspired by the "Gotta Dance" sequence of "Singin' in the Rain." I think more of a silhouette will actually work well, and it will allow me to get some more wild colors back into the comic.

 Distracted! Big surprise. Really, though, work has been sucking any creative spark out of me. While I WANT to make art, I just don't have the energy and there's so much else to do. Because of that, I let myself draw whatever I want when I actually can be bothered. Puddles Pity Party is a YouTube 'star,' though I don't know how popular he actually is. A very tall man with an amazing voice, he tends to do covers and does them quite well. He just chooses to do them in a clown suit. It might be a gimmick, especially as he's mute unless singing but hey, whatever it takes these days, right? I took some screen shots of one of his recent videos, looking for poses that were the most Puddles. This is one of them. I got decently far tonight though am at that point where I want to stop to get some perspective. The issue is that I'm worried my portraits style is getting stale. Dunno. Might continue with this, might start over. Haven't decided.