Oh, Google, why do you hurt my eyes?

So just now I was google searching "emo guy" to find some reference. I thought "hey, emo kids are usually the general shape and size I'm looking for. There will probably be a few useful pictures."

I did not know the depths to which the internet plummeted. Until now. That search is like the Mariana Trench of google searches. It's like "oh hey fish....hey plankton...hey slightly neon fish...OMFG WHAT IS THAT THING WITH THE TEETH" Only, with a lot more sloppily applied eyeliner. And boys kissing. I didn't know boys kissing was such a big part of the emo culture. Certainly wasn't at either of my high schools, far as I know.

Anyway, back to feeling like a huge creep trying to ignore a bunch of photos of 16 year old dudes smoochin.

More Comic Experimenting

Even more messing around with comic stuff. Found a way less labor intensive method of blocking out the panels and filling in the gutter, didn't have to open Photoshop to do it (which is a good thing for my poor, slow laptop).

Yesterday, my 30-day trial on Painter 12 ran out, and I immediately started to feel the withdrawal effects. I got so frustrated so fast! Painter is the best drawing program I've ever used. It makes Photoshop look horrible. It mkes sense though, since photoshop wasn't really intended for drawing, its for photos. Duh. Anyway, I immediately had to go find a real copy of Painter so I could scratch the itch.

I've basically gotten addicted to drawing every day. It's what got me out of bed at a reasonable hour today, but also what made me stay up til 4:30 last night. "I've got a shiny program to play in. No time for sleeping."

Problem, though, is that I'm having trouble drawing in my sketchbook now that I've been using the tablet so much. It's kinda sucky, but at least I'm getting a little better with the tablet. It makes things a million times easier and cleaner, and cuts out like four steps in my process.

How I Make Comic? Tell me.

Sooo... I'm really starting to think seriously about this comic thing. The above is a reeeaaallly rough test of how I'd end up doing a page. It's based on my minimal knowledge of how a comic is actually made, so it's probably crap, but it's the smartest layering approach I could come up with in the twenty minutes I took to doodle it. It started in photoshop where I used the line tool to make the panels, then I moved it to Painter (go 30 day trials!), filled in the panel layer with the grey gutter color, then just kept adding layers beneath it as I saw fit. A 50% opacity sketch layer, a 100% opacity "linework" layer (in this image, the linework is really just more random, staggering sketches), a color layer under the linework, a shading layer above that, and a word bubble layer above everything.

YAY for EXPERIMENTS!

TWO POSTS in ONE DAY? Holy crap! You're so lucky!

Anyway, would you read a comic that featured characters who looked like this?

They're kinda anime-y. I blame the sudden 5-hour D Gray Man marathons with Amber. Anyway, I've always drawn heads that shape. I'm thinking Steampunk. I like steampunk. Okay, characters, names, genre...whats missing? Oh! Story! Well, that's just a minor detail anyway, lets not get ahead of ourselves.

HEY SORRY INTERNET

Hey, so I'm not dead. I'm just...busy...yes. Anyway, tragedy and strife and malaise and malady and all that. But it's past us now! Onward, to a better tomorrow! You and me, sketchblog. You and me.

I bring you the gift of Art:



My friend asked me to make additions to the tattoo of her favorite member of the band Panic at the Disco...so that she could give it to him at the concert we attended two weeks ago in NYC. Unfortunately, when she got close enough to the stage to offer it, she looked in her bag and it was gone! Alas, Brendon Urie will never know the awesomeness that was Mary Lou's idea for his sweet tat.




The redhead is here because I don't draw enough girls with short or red hair, and I forget how fun it is.

Also! Notice how this last one, the robot, is like a million times nicer than the others? I give credit to Ryan Andrews. He is super-amazing and I just discovered him and I totally"adopted" his method of using textures behind digital art. It makes everything about 500% more awesome.

Anyway, I might get a job doing illustration for some children's books? I need to get a move on getting a real website up.