Archive for ‘My Other Websites’
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Hey folks…
As you can see from my left sidebar, I just made some updates to it. I added a new “Appearances” section listing my very first two comic book convention appearances EVER!!! I’d like to give a great big thanks to Fleen for giving me a very brief mention on their blog today. Thank you very much Fleen! Every little bit helps when you’re out there trying to make a name for yourself.
And I’ve already been listed as an “official” artist on the Heroes Con India artist list. I’m near the bottom a few links under DIGITAL WEBBING, so that’s exciting as well.
I’ve already purchased my banner stand for my new adventures in Comic Book Convention vendorship so I’m really excited about that. I should get the banner and the stand in about a week – plenty of enough time for Heroes!
Stay tuned for more!
-Chris
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…is hard to find!
As a cartoonist, it’s funny how you can sometimes be so caught up in the drawing or writing of a strip that you end up failing to see an obvious flaw. It’s not until you have had a chance to put the strip away and walk away from it for a bit that you are then able to see a very obvious flaw. While you’re working on the strip, the decisions you make seem to be extremely obvious and logical but after that time away from the strip, you can look at it with fresh eyes and say “what was I thinking???”.
What am I talking about? I’m talking about the first panel. It has suddenly occurred to me that the word balloons could flow a little bit better. As it stands right now, the “I simply must know” dialog seems to be oddly placed or, depending on how you read the strip, seems equally out of place.
I should have had some of the dialog from the woman on the right be in the same area of the table – that way you get a much better flow of left-to-right dialog flow but I didn’t want to cover up too much of the table so I opted, instead, to put all the dialog above rich lady number two.
Ah well… the things you miss at 1:30 in the morning…
:-/
-Chris
I used to have a ‘78 Chevet. Although it was a terrible clunker, I had a long of great adventures in that car – including the right of passage for most teenage boys (I’ll let you decide what that is but Meatloaf’s “Paradise by the dashboard lights” could have been the theme of that vehicle).
But I never painted it like the Mach 5.
However, my dad and brother DID paint his VW bug as a replica of Herbie.
God, I hope “Speed Racer” is a lot better on the big screen then it looks on TV or on my computer monitors…
-Chris
This is an example of why the ‘Net is so great. It affords you the opportunity to create friendships with people you otherwise may never have met. And chances are, Lee Cherolis and I – unless we accidentally bumped into each other at a comic convention – probably would never know each other. But thanks to the web, we do!
As you all know from my post on Monday, I put my cherished cat, Seagrams, to rest that morning. I didn’t go into work that day and I felt very little desire to draw or do anything remotely creative. But yesterday, as I finished checking my business e-mail at work, I take a look at my Google e-mail and was very pleasantly surprised by an e-mail from Lee with an attachment. So, I open the attachment and I find his wonderful strip of Roy, Joey and Marc that’s posted above. Needless to say, it was something that really hit the spot and put a smile on my face. I absolutely love the way Lee drew Joey. I might even have to “steal” a few little things in the way he drew her. Hope you don’t mind, Lee! 
And as for Lee himself, he’s a wonderful digital artist that does an equally wonderful, illustrative web comic called Better You Than Me. Please click on the link and check out his work. He is a member of the Indy Web Comics Group as well as a fellow member of C4. C4 is a collection of web comic creators that have decided to band together to help each other promote our web comic endeavors. Lee and I (along with a few other C4 creators) will be at the Baltimore Comic Con in September.
You’ll soon see me post more information about C4 and out Talkshoe Podcast once my new site re-design goes live (which will be very, very soon). In the mean time, please enjoy Lee’s interpretation of my three main characters as much as I do.
Thanks Lee!
-Chris
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Okay folks, well here it is. The dialog needed to be adjusted a little bit seeing as this strip will be running the day after the Ironman premiere. Again, sorry for the fact this isn’t a Friday strip but you got a color illustration of Bowser today. You can’t really beat that, now can you?
Also, it looks like we’ll be able to go see Ironman on Sunday. And when I say “we”, I’m talking about me, my wife and my daughter as she has become a big-time comic book junkie in her own right.
-Chris
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[Update: It's late afternoon and I still haven't had a chance to work on the strip that was supposed to be online today so it looks like there WILL be a special Saturday Capes 'N' Babes strip after all!]
Boy, Murphy was right. Whenever you NEED something to work, THAT’S when something will crash!
So last night, I’m working on today’s Capes strip and my little 100GB iomega external Hard Drive suddenly disappears from my laptop’s desktop.
A couple of hours later, it’s still gone. Can’t access. Can’t try to do a backup of it. Can’t do anything really. Fortunately though, my iMac at my office recognizes the iomega drive but warns that I need to do an immediate backup so I’m in the process of doing that now.
This isn’t ideal but in the mean time, enjoy the Sha-na-na cartoon for today. The good news is, this might mean the very first Capes SATURDAY cartoon! As soon as I have everything up and running, the new strip will be posted.
The management apologizes for any inconvenience this may have caused.
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Ever since I was introduced to Avengers #135, Taskmaster has always been my favorite comic book character even though he’s a super-villain. And over the years, I have drawn, drawn and re-drawn him over and over again. I even submitted a rendition of him in a Wizard cover contest. You can’t find a single sketchbook of mine that doesn’t have at least ONE attempt at drawing him. I’ve even gone the lengths of re-designing his shield and what I envision his “logo” to look like.
And yet, the VERY BEST version of Taskmaster I have ever drawn is right there in the second panel. A friggin’ cartoon!
I wonder if someone’s telling me something?
Currently listening to “Mainstreet” by Bob Seger…
-Chris
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Just having a little fun with the fact that Roy ISÂ a furry looking dude who’s always trying to get laid so of course, he’s probably run into this situation once or a dozen times – hence the reserved reaction on his part. By this time, he’s used to being called a “furry”…
On an un-related note, I just finished watching Hitman this week. Took my most of the movie to realize that Agent 47 was Timothy Olyphant from Live Free and Die Hard. I had recognized his smirk all through the movie but his shaved head really threw me. Took me a while before I did. Don’t hate when that happens?
Anyway, hope you enjoy today’s strip!
-Chris
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Man, how do the web cartoonists out there that do full-color strips DO it???
Okay, I know how they color their strips. I actually used to color the Sunday Syndicated strips for a local newspaper when I was a graphic production grunt so I have the skills to color. What I’m talking about is SPEED! How do cartoonists like Paul Southworth do it so fast? Today’s strip practically killed me.
I started the coloring process at 5:00pm or so. That went until 7:30 when I left work to go get a buzz cut and some dinner for me and the wife. Got home around 9:00pm, ate and was at the laptop between 9:45 – 10:00pm or so. I finished coloring at 1:15am, put the strip into Illustrator for words and balloons and just now uploaded the strip almost exactly at 2:00am.
That’s why Capes isn’t a full time, full color strip!
Hope you all enjoy the final payoff of the Little League arch. It was fun (even this one).
Currently listening to “Edge of a Broken Heart” by Vixen…
-Chris
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I’ve recently been listening to old Web Comic Weekly podcasts and on a couple of them, there was discussion about what an artist should or shouldn’t write about on their blog. For the most part, I agree with what Dave, Brad Kris and Scott have said… that no one really wants to spend extra time reading about the misery, pain or suffering that a particular artist is going through as we all have problems in our daily lives and the last thing we want to do is read about someone else’s problems.
But one of the things that intrigues me about blogs – particularly artist blogs – is that fact artist blogs offer a glimpse into the mind of that particular artist… you can get a feel for what they are thinking or how they were going about creating a certain strip or page. Granted, it’s a fine line between introspective thought and just flat out complaining.
Still though, I remember picking up Matt Wagner’s original Mage and being fascinated by the very personal messages he would write on the inside covers of each issue. It actually got to the point of where I was actually looking forward to reading the thoughts he included on those inside covers and I was actually a bit sad that he didn’t include them in his follow-up years later. Those passages on the inside of the original Mage issues were heartfelt and complimentary to people who helped Mage be what it was. And Matt used that space to also explain what Mage meant to him, why Kevin Matchstick was growing bald, why he was afraid of heights and things like that.
Yes, I agree with Dave Kellett that a blog needs to be entertaining but that doesn;t mean it can’t be informative as well. For me, Matt’s messages in Mage WERE informative and fascinating and I looked forward to reading them every other month. To me, IÂ think that’s a prime example of what an artist’s blog should really be.
-Chris
