invent whatever tune you like to go with those lyrics. As for me, i came up with a melody and now i cannot get it out of my head, and it’s stuck there forever. For ever ever? (for EVER EVER?!?)

i’m not a morning person. chances are, you’re not either, and neither is Gogo, by crikey no. Actually, she might be. I dunno. For the purposes of this strip, she is NOT. *emphasized with hammer-blows* I’m cheerful in the morning once, twice, maybe three times in a given year, and perhaps once every decade do i get up and sing.

Implied here is that Didi blows out of bed often, and with mighty song and tweety accompaniment. I have no doubt that she is on key and quite melodious, but i imagine quite shrill…one of those people who becomes higher-pitched as their enthusiasm builds. *shudder*

uh yeah, so there. i been working on this tiny bits at a time for a couple months, actually, and just finished it since i included it in the recent poll, so Pablo’s a little off his current design, but anyway…please enjoy and may you somehow be infected with a musical interpretation of your own making.

my fave animaniacs character from back in the day. My sis mentioned her earlier today and i felt compelled to do a quick fanart of her.

Slappy’s pretty endearing in a way that most bitter old ladies usually aren’t…if you’re unfamiliar with the character, here’s a classic taste

Apparently bombs and anvils aren’t as funny nowadays. Damned kids, don’t know what you’re missing.

you asked for it.

Technically, you did, cuz the poll with the thing and the…yeah…

If you don’t remember (but actually care), this story arc featured a sexually frustrated little…whatever Pablo is…and his owners’ (Gogo and Didi) inability to cope with his habits. So they neutered him, and he promptly took up biting as a new compulsion. Implied here is that he’s been at this for quite a while, and even Gogo has a threshold when it comes to nippy, bitey pets.

I hadn’t posted or really drawn much that I was happy with for a long while, so this comic sort of functions as a massive restart of my brain. And this story arc was already pretty juvenile, so I threw in some slightly gratuitous shots for good measure.

Also, I’ve been up all night doing this while battling insomnia, so if absolutely none of this comic makes any sense, that’s my excuse.

Trivia: “Fridley’s of Winnepaneka” is a made-up store that apparently sells invincible bath/chew toys. It seemed like an appropriately midwestern type name for a shopping center.

Gogo’s shirt is my best attempt at “daikaiju”, which i believe means roughly “giant monster”, which for me somehow makes sense to have plastered on Gogo.

Pablo’s design continues to evolve too. For those who ask what he is, i prefer to think that he’s some sacred celestial being who, under different circumstances, would be revered like unto a god, but instead is the pet of a terrible girl-creature who couldn’t be trusted to care for a can of beans. Or just a unique lemur-like pet (and I’m aware he looks an awful lot like Stitch…i’m trying to move away from that )

well, enjoy! and thanks to all for the big response to the poll!…i kinda want to do all those ideas now, hehe

Illustrating a children’s book isn’t exactly a new idea, but it’s a new demographic for me. I think it’ll be a challenge, simply because when I remember storybooks I read as a little kid, the story itself takes a back seat to the images, which stick with you much longer. As a kid, pictures are the words, whereas artwork maybe carries less importance when you get older. How many books or films are poorly displayed visually but memorable because of story? Working for children’s eyes, I think the formula is reversed. You could tell a ridiculous or horrible story, but good or memorable illustration can make it appealing. (Not saying this story is necessarily horrible or ridiculous, heh)

On the flip side, making an educational or helpful graphic novel for parents of teens is another challenge altogether. With The Adventures of Johnny Bunko, there was a wider potential for readership based on the premise of the book, which was a career guide, and the lessons were rather broad. This new work focuses on parents who are experiencing teenage rebellion for the first time, or for the first time in a dynamic way that demonstrates lack of control and a rift of understanding between parents and children–definitely a largely untapped market as far as graphic novels go. I wonder if such an age group is receptive to this sort of work. The thirtysomethings and fortysomethings of today might go for it; I’m just shy of 30 myself and still love picturebooks.

I guess these would be considered “old” by now, since I did these at the beginning of summer, but these are some character design concepts for “Warcraft: Legends Vol. 5″ from the story “Nightmares”, which was pretty cool to work on. It was also the first time I’d ever worked with previously established characters. Blizzard had to sign off their approval on each design and a certain amount of reworking was in order. This wasn’t as big an issue as it could have been, and the process was pretty painless.
I don’t actually recall a lot of the actual working process, but trying to recollect the actual gruntwork is a lot like trying to remember what it was like filling out your taxes. I did the thumbnails in a small sketchbook via pencil, but 90% of the work was done entirely digitally with a Wacom Intuos3 tablet and Photoshop CS3. I really like the digital method because it feels so much more malleable. Edits and tweaks or whole revisions are much easier, I think, but the tradeoff is that it can take a hell of a lot longer to get things done. When working in Photoshop, I tend to work at a highly magnified level, and the broad strokes and comprehension of the full page that you get with working on actual paper is lost because I’m eyeball-deep in pixels blown up to 300%.
I also realized that I’m really, really weak with backgrounds. I feel much more at ease with characters than I do environments, and even though I felt I improved with the Warcraft comic, it wasn’t saying a lot that I was actually addressing backgrounds with a vague level of sincerity. Between that and trying to force myself into creating more dynamic panels and camera angles than I usually do, I think the comic was a step in the right direction, but a lot more needs to be done for this sort of thing to really pop.

Some stuff I wish I still worked on, or wish had gone through, or whatever. Not everything works out or is sustainable. I need to remember these things, what went wrong, or what I could have done to make them better, so I don’t make the same mistakes. Still, sometimes things just don’t go anywhere.

Sometimes it’s just me being a perfectionist and not being able to uncork speed and creativity, other times I just can’t figure out what to draw or how to draw it. Conceptualizing is, I think, the hardest part of anything I’ve done. Execution can be time-consuming, but settling on what in particular to execute can just grind me to a halt.

Most of what I’ve shared on deviantART is more or less complete in nature, at least from a per-upload perspective. I’ve preferred to submit only what I consider to be a fairly completed piece (with the exceptions of a few scrapbook materials, most of which are horrifically dated) But in doing so, particularly with Bomango, story and characters only come out in bursts, and a cohesive comic narrative has not been forthcoming.

My goal here at this blog is to offer more insight as to what I’m working on with a more bare-bones approach to sharing my work, rather than inconsistent and maybe overwrought submissions at dA. Which means I’m going to probably post crap I’ll be itching to take down almost immediately, but we’ll see how this goes.

Anyhow, I’ll offer a few creative smatterings or smatterings of creativity as I go along and warm up to the idea of true blogging. I might also try to share current work from clients as well, at least as far as NDA taboos allow.

this is really a throwaway comic, but in the spirit of my favorite sporting season of all, i colored it and now you’re looking at it.

While i’m sure Gogo appreciates smashmouth plays and brutal hits, i’m also sure the primitive lizard-brain that occupies most of her skull is drawn to the endless parade of slo-mo shots of rippling muscles and tight pants. The fact that the gentlemen in question are also hitting each other violently is the icing on the cake.

Just the same, though, if you’re a football fan (American football, to be clear) as I am…my God, games can really have an unbearable amount of downtime.

the tragic saga continues. Even the savage removal of Pablo’s manhood yields no relief. Is it the neurotic tendencies of an understimulated creature, or bitter vengeance?

Rather than monkey around with Illustrator, I wrote the big poofy words myself. And yes, they look kind of crappy

there’s something incredibly dirty at the heart of that little blue thing. He may have been fixed, but he sure still has one heck of a pair on him.