Drew a couple of monkeys today. Monkeys are cool. I might do more of this one as that tail is just too fun to draw. Does he have a purpose? Nope. Just more distraction. Carry on...

Here's the finished Crawford and Cromwell story. The anthology I was making it for was sadly canceled. I had a LOT of fun making this and think it has some of my best work in it over all. Made a lot of characters for it, tried to keep things very lively and full of as much action as I could. There are little hidden bits just for me as I like, including a cameo by characters from Tamino and Fite. I even managed to get some females in there, something I'm still not good at drawing. While I'm sorry this didn't see print, I have no regrets as making it was a really good exercise and learning experience. Short work shouldn't be overlooked, at least by me. It allows me to do things and experiment without having to go out of control.

Just a quick pencil sketch done while waiting for dinner last night. Wanted to do something much less slick and smooth than the rabbits.

And Armand completes the set.

Inevitable that I'd redo this redo. Well, now it's out of the way and can go along with the others. Eventually I'll have to do the actual comic. Yah. Should look into that...

And so yes, I felt the need to do Benny in this style. Well, the idea of Delve Deep was to be a more commercial project so why not try the characters all out in this more commercial style. So there.

Had a long day and not much time left when I got home, so I threw together one more of these. It's a far more commercial style than I was working in. No real comment other than I think it looks slick. I will say that drawing anything again feels good so it was worth it just for that.

A couple of quickies from tonight as I was feeling like I hadn't done enough today. A much more commercial try at the rabbits. Just some throw aways but something to get out of my system as well. Just to see what this would look like, that kind of thing.

I haven't drawn much lately, and that bugs me, partially because, during this time, it didn't really bug me. Been putting a lot of work into getting Tamino ready for the iTunes book store. Having gone through it again and again, I think it's probably the most autobiographical thing I've done, and that includes comparing it to the Bio comic. I don't mean that it's factually -me- but that the feel, the thought process of characters and just the overall -ness of it is about as me as I think I can express in my art. I also don't think that this would ever be apparent to anyone but me. Anyway, all I have left to do with it is to purchase its ISBN and submit it to iTunes. Then there will be links and ads and stuff in hopes people might buy it and read it. Til then, there's this.

Man, not a lot of posts this month. I have been working on the Tamino book for FINAL publication through the iBooks store, so there's that. Still, I want to keep the blog going, even though it's only got one reader. :"D This is just a quick something I sketched the other day using Illustrator and the Yiynova. There is something cool about making simple shapes and not editing them all that much. Should do more of this kind of thing. So here, have a skater mouse.

Did some more work on this; added the title, lightened the lines on the earlier figures to help suggest the passage of time, added shadows to the latest to help underline his position in time, edited the trees (sometimes nature's wrong). This is better. Now for page 2 because I do these things in such a bad order.

Comp for the first page of the new comic. Title and word balloons are missing thus far. Might not 'write' this until it's further along.

Some work in progress images of stuff for the next short story I'm working on. My pencils are fairly tight but I like to think of inking as a sort of final edit. Inks shouldn't be exactly the same as the pencils, some problems should be left to be solved in inks or it's just repetition and thus, boring. One of my recurring problems is that I cannot place figures on the page which results in things like the last sketch having feet that are cut off. Oh, well. Can and will be fixed. AS much as I've loved my brush, the crowquill is just SO wonderful. I'll probably still use the brush but this style is in my head right now.

EDIT: Here's the inked version of the last sketch, now with feet.

A few things; first are two sheets of sketches, just me making variations on a fox character. The inked version is just me, the pencil is me looking through my Nickelodeon book and using their styles to play with. I think it's good to try and get out of my own head, to see how there might be other ways to approach a problem or a character. I'm always hoping to push myself into something better.

The last one is the update from the previous entry. I changed the species, made him a fox and colored it. That one's just a warmup.

Afternoon warmup sketch. I think I have another short comic story in mind, this time not for anyone or anything in particular. So I'm doing mood pieces on pub tran as that's where it will take place. More detail means more time but that's ok as I don't have an editor in this case.

Self portrait with me as a fox sitting on the bus. I grew up with pub tran and I miss it. Ink and Illustrator.

Added the second character from the show. Actually watched an episode so I have a better idea who they are. I have to say, my interpretation is, shall we say, wide. But so what? The person I did them for seems to like them, so that's fine.

Quick warmups today as I didn't have anything set I needed to draw. The ferret is meant to be a friend of Digby's, the jay is a character from a show called, "The Regular Show." I don't know anything about the show but someone sort of asked me what my version of the character would be so I did this. Ink, Illustrator.

Finished beaver. ArtRage has a lot of potential and for my money, is a lot easier and more fun to paint with than PS. That being said, there's probably a lot it can't do. Don't know if that's going to matter to me. ArtRage seems to work more like I do with 'real' media. So yah. Here's a beaver.

That last page of Biography went over fairly well, which makes me feel good. I think the third in the series is the strongest of the four personally but I'll take what I can get. Since I was playing with ArtRage, I decided I should play around a bit more with it. I haven't used it that much in the past partially, I think because it really needs a Cintiq type tablet to be used properly (though I think tons of people don't have one and use it just fine). So I grabbed a random character from the files and just started painting away, the goal being to make it a lot more 3D than my usual work. This is only a WIP shot, but I think I'm getting the hang of it. This is a dirt cheap program (I think there's still a free, less featured version) but it's grown and gives what I think are pretty nice results. It has the most 'real media' feeling of any program I've yet used. This image is being made with mostly just the paint and palette knife tools. I'll likely finish it tomorrow.

Last one in this series. This time I used ArtRage, a program I've barely used before but which seems to be made to be used with the Yiynova. This is far more like actual painting than does PS. I thought about painting the background as well, and I was even erasing the lines that showed through but I like the suggestion of impermanence so I left them. After all, I am supposed to be going off to watch cartoons. The lie here is that I was already watching them in the background. Ah, well. The point of this series was to experiment with different media to make what is essentially the same image. The background doesn't change (much). So I learned something. And I do like the sense of motion between the four pages. Much better than the original idea of this being four panels.

Finished version of the drawing from last night. Sometimes I know exactly how I want to finish a piece and even what needs to be done to get it that way. This is usually dangerous if I can't finish it before bed as it means that I'll be thinking through those steps when I should be falling asleep. Last night was, thankfully not such a night. After some brief thought, off I went. Who wants to dream in PS layers and settings anyway? There will be one more in this series, though I'm not sure how I'll finish it yet. It's actually been rather fun using this series as a means of experimentation. Only the second one didn't use the Yiynova, too. This is a good thing.

Came home from work and drew this up for tomorrow's biography. Thought I'd post the plain drawing before I did the painting that will go with it and without the continued background. Crowquill and ink.

Same setup, different approach. I took some photos and was originally meaning to do this as a four panel page but yesterday's took too long to do. So now it's a short series. Biography's been on the back burner as I do other things. Until I can get my tax return and buy ISBNs, Tamino will wait just a little longer. Otherwise, I don't have pressing matters. So, this.

Not having a bad day, I just feel the need to try and create something every day. I can't tell if it's because I love to draw or I just need to prove to myself every day that I can draw, that I've learned something that I've made some kind of progress. One of the first things I do in the morning, after slathering peanut butter on bread and grabbing my diet Pepsi (yah, I know) is to sit down and see what art is being underlined on the web. This gets me going. It's rare that I don't see something that makes me want to draw. And so I do. I think some of it comes out overly maudlin, such as today's but I don't think that's a reason not to make it. Biography is meant to just reflect what's in my head for that particular day. Apparently, this was in there. Now it's out. I can move on to something else.

Took a little break from nearly everything and played with this today. I was painting it in PS and I might go back to it but something just made me reach for my old standby, AI. So here it is. A youth about to break his neck. Well, that's what some of them do, isn't it? Originally drew this upside down, but it looked too much like the last version of Smatt I posted. So I flipped it (which is a good way to make sure that the drawing's ok) and added the skatepark.

Another take with PS. I was looking through a book I have on Kunisada this morning and decided to give this style a try. Took one of his prints, changed the gesture from one of a samurai with raised sword and changed it to the fox stretching. Couldn't use the watercolor brushes, so used a nice, flat oil color one. Found a decent paper texture online which helps a lot. Could have done this in Illustrator I suppose, but it still would have had to come together in PS. And since I own the program, I might as well learn how to use it. Ink, PS.