Web Comic Realizations...

Hey everyone,

I just wanted to keep you posted on the web comic situation. While my original goal was to have the comic done early in the week (today or tomorrow), I know now that goal was unrealistic. I'm going to tell you why, and ask you not to judge me harshly because I'm already feeling a little down on myself anyway. (I always judge myself more harshly than others do...that's just the way I am.)

1. The first comic is about the lightning strike. To emphasize the amount of destruction, I decided to make it a nine panel comic showing the various things that were broken. (It'll make the punch line much funnier, believe me.) Still, for just starting a comic, nine panels is very long and difficult undertaking.

2. I haven't done graphic design work in years. I thought it would be very easy to remember those skills. However, I was wrong. Since I haven't even picked up the program in so long, it turned out to be very difficult. The first few days were a disaster. I couldn't even remember how to make the boxes line up with one another and felt like I was losing my mind, and my skills. I'm doing much better now, but it's going to take me a little while to remember everything, meaning the comic will take longer to produce.

3. The comic is in color. This means something I could've simply sketched out will take twice as long to finish. I figured if I was going to do this, I might as well do it right. I think the finished product will look much better in color and will set a standard for my work. I just should've taken that into account when I thought about how long the comic was going to take me.

4. Writing a web comic is a very different experience than designing a sign. When you design a sign you mostly want it to be eye catching, simple yet bright and interesting enough to catch someone's eye. With a web comic, you're actually telling a narrative. You already have an audience who likes to read web comics, so you want to make it more stylized and while eye catching, more of something that is fun and amusing to follow. While I've always loved drawing, I've never drawn out a comic before, so this is a new experience for me.

5. I'm a perfectionist. Even though I really want to finish this by the deadline I set for myself, I want it to look good. Already I'm dissatisfied with the way my characters look, mostly because I should have more confident strokes on the characters, but I'm willing to let that slide. Still, there's a lot of work that needs to be done before I'll deem it "acceptable."

And there you have it. I'm setting a new generous deadline by allowing myself to be finished by the end of next week. Still, I think if I work extra hard on it, I could have it done, or close to being done, by the end of this week or early next week. I'll keep you posted. Sorry for the delay, but I think it'll be worth it. After this initial comic, I think most of my comics will be around three panels, and I'm going to try to produce one every two weeks. Wish me luck, and sorry that I accidentally lied to you. It seems I also lied to myself as well. Ain't that a B.

aMUSEment

Hello everybody,

Just thought I would let you know I'm in a great mood this week due to the fact that I've purchased Muse tickets for when they tour in North Carolina during October. I'm totally psyched up about it. Muse is the group I listen to the most. I find them very inspirational for my writing and I've wanted to see them in concert since I started listening to them. It's very rare that I find a group where I like just about every song they sing and that is talented enough that their music doesn't sound the same every single album. I'm glad to say that with Muse I've found both.

Also, for some reason, this week has been very good for me. The weekend that led up to this week went swimmingly. The Grimm game went very well and the game later that night went well also. I've been very productive and yet I've balanced a lot of fun in with it, and Joel and I are getting along very well. I'm also almost done with all of the chores for the week already. I just hope things start going a little better for some of my other friends. It seems this week has been bad for a lot of people so far. I'll have to wait and see and do my best to cheer them up.

Also, I'm finally completely finished with the World of Warcraft story. I had to rework the ending a little bit because I realized it was way too abrupt. That's the only problem with working with word limits. If you get carried away with the story, something has to give, and usually that's the ending. I spent a few hours today trimming away extraneous sentences and working with the ending and I believe it made everything much smoother. Hopefully whoever is judging the contest will think so as well, but I'm not getting my hopes up too high.

Today, as soon as I finish this blog, I'm planning to get started on the web comic. I'm hoping to at least get the first doodles of our characters finished. That way, I can start the comic tomorrow afternoon and be finished by the end of this week or the beginning of the next. Now, that being said, barring an emergency or massive computer failure, I'm going to be held accountable. I know better than to promise something on the internet and then go back on that promise, except in the case of New Years resolutions (everyone goes back on those). So, I'm going to work on the web comic and post it on the blog as soon as I'm done. I hope you like it, but I'd better go ahead and go so I can keep my promise to you. Take care.

New Goal: Web Comics

Just a brief update. Sorry I haven't been on very often, but I've been very busy. I just got back from the beach on Sunday. It was a very fun trip, but I was very tired. I think in a way I'm still recovering from it. It was one of those trips that was lots of fun, but not very restful. I was planning to do a lot of work while I was there, but for once all I felt like doing was resting. Still, I'm glad to say that I finished the WoW story on Monday, so I should be able to turn it in any day now. (The sooner the better.)

Other than that, my project for this week is mostly to plan for running my Grimm game on Sunday. (It's a table top role-playing game about children trapped in fairy tale lands, only the fairy tales are twisted into fractured fairy tales that have a horror slant.) I have lots of places to map out, so please wish me luck on finishing in time. Also, while I was at the beach, I came up with a new goal that hopefully will help make a web presence for me.

I'm going to start drawing a web comic very soon. It'll mostly be about video games, but it'll also be about movies, life, etc., anything that I find humorous. I've started character sketches and the first comic is going to be about the lightning strike that took out most of our electronics. I've already got it story boarded out. (Joel actually mostly did that for me, but we came up with the idea together.) It should be pretty fun to do and hopefully pretty funny.

Since Joel bought me a tablet, it should be a lot easier and more fun to draw on the computer. I can finally work with my left hand. I got used to using a right handed mouse when I was a graphic designer, but my left hand is the one that I usually draw with. Anyway, I like my tablet, and this is how I'm going to utilize it. This will not only hopefully get me at least a small internet following, but I can use this to sharpen my Graphic Design skills and more samples of work in case I want to break back into the industry. It would be nice to make a little money with some freelance work. We'll see.

Anyway, wish me luck on the web comic. I probably won't get to work on it much this week, but hopefully next week I'll have plenty of time. When I finish it, I'll be sure to post it on the blog. Until then, take care and keep reading!