did this last night. wish i had more stuff. I’m going to do a Roland S Howard drawing tonight.

this aint rock and roll this is...genocide!

For the [past month I have been sick. I cam down with Lofgrens Syndrome, a mild form of sarcoidosis, I have been out of work and laid up. As a result I have been reading lots of comics. Probably the amount of comics i would read if i wasnt interrupted by pesky disturbances like well work. It beats being on the internets all day, which leaves me feeling drained and useless, or watching tv, which does as well. I’ve read a bunch of old favorites, like the sand man and some new wonderfull books like Brandon Grahams King City and James Stokoes Orc Stain. I have been trying to veiw these books with a more critical eye, trying to glean what I can from their construction and hopefully start to convey that in the stuff I am doing.

One thing I have been trying to channel is some of the emotional turmoil being sick has caused me. I am unaccustomed to being unable to move myself of feeling trapped in my body. I am also extremely dissatisfied with what i am doing right now and the thought that returning to health means returning to that stuck me is some pretty dark places. I did manage to focus that dark place into an actual start to a story I had been trying to put down on paper for years. Whether or not it is going to just die there remains to be seen but it is a start. I have a bout 6-7 pages drawn and inked, they are for three different stories and they still need to be laid out and lettered. I have a good number thumb-nailed and it feels like i am actually starting to gain some momentum. Focusing is really hard for me and I’m pretty sure comics will never pay my rent but maybe someday they might pay my grocery bill which is very high as anyone who has ever seen me or my girlfriend eat will attest. I think the trick is finding something that will take care of the rest and not cause me to feel like ever moment is wasted.

Looking at my poor journal here I have determined that I need to put more art up here and get more people to look at it and tear it apart. I am lazy and for an art blog there sure are a lot of words. I may need to lay down the law for myself and make it so I post what I did every friday night and make a rule that i get no beer or booze until I put whatever i’ve done in the week up,regardless of quality.

Time is so slippery. Each second that passes represents a a smaller and smaller fraction of your life. Rapidly accelerating to a blur. It becomes hard to find room for everything. I wise teenager once said on his day off “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”

No drawings at the moment but I upgraded the software which is pretty cool. to me anyway. there is a “post” button for me right on the site . I added a favicon, which makes me happy. It’s a little skull wearing a crown. I also poked around the codec and found a share this thingy. which means I can share posts to facebook fairly easy. not that it was hard before, its just more convenient now, and as an american I demand that all things are easy.

I had a good idea for a comic that I started a number of years ago about the tiny evil monkies that live in my head. I think its gonna be about my add and my journey back to medication. I think that could encapsulate all of the monkey related hijinks and how I have come to terms with it. I have a couple of pages already drawn up and then stopped as it wasnt going anywhere at all. keep an eye out.

Taking classes at RISD currently and it’s going fairly well. Finished an anatomy class that really helped my figure drawing, just started a design class and I think I may be doing well.

Hmm. Been Busy. Yesterday was the last day of my anatomy class at risd. The class met six times, it was pretty short, but the teacher was wonderful and there was a lot of information that was immediately usable. I also met a few people and got the info on some figure drawing sessions around town.

I am registered for spring as well. I originally wanted to take a design class and a comics class but it turns out they’re on the same night at the same time. I had some worries about whether or not that would effect my financial aid award but it turns out not to be the case.

I did the ou line of a tattoo on a  friend. I do not have a picture and that might be for the best. I have discovered there is a lot more about tattooing that I am unaware that i am unaware of.  I would need to figure out a lot of the things that I don’t know, before I could even start to figure out how to do them, much less do them well and there is more to learn than I can from just doing.

Simply put: I need a teacher.

Here is an old drawing I redrew today. I was going to color it in photoshop but I forgot the specific steps.

crap forgot his tonsure

ugh. I don’t have photoshop on the laptop. I haven’t gotten the hang of gimp. My mac is to slow to do ANYTHING. I’ve been stupid busy with school and snow and the beginning of the semester at work. I have lots of drawings to put up, lots of things to write about and link to and shit, but i have no time. I am going to redesign the site with prtty pictures and such and ways to hire  me and rates and the like. so tired.

ok this is pissing me off some thing fierce. stupid fucking wordpress wont let me paste text. what the fuchsia? dumb crap. I would really like to make a long involved post about anatomy class and put drawings. I suppose its time to delve into the WordPress codex.

Here is something I was playing with when I initially wanted to make my own website. It mirrors a business card I made. My intention was to have the site and my collateral have this style identity. Everything was going to be oldtimey and appear to be letter pressed, possibly even letter-pressing some of the physical collateral (business card, envelope, letterhead). As it became more apparent that this was above my capabilities at the time I decided to  start with something modular and more manageable.

Given that I have a new computer that can actually handle my attempts at illustration and design, maybe I’ll give it another shot.

Busy at work and lazy at home. they switched my pills up and I get a headache at 1 pm everyday guaranteed. I need to make my upstairs work space more habitable and work there. I will make an inspiration post this weekend, and then hopefully one involving character design for one of my comics. Need to develop more of a schedule regarding these things, write on Tuesday, draw on Wednesday, scan and color on Thursday, that sort of thing. Well develop it and then actually follow it.

My step mom makes jam and I offered to do some design/illustration work for her. Now her jams are actually something special and she likes to mix up her fruits combos, so they’re pretty flamboyant. I did a cartoon version of her for the logo (which I will add later) and a couple of flamboyant fruits to complement her flamboyant jams. Technically they’re jams not jellies but her name is Michelle, and Shelly’s Jellys sounds so much better that Michelle’s Jams.

I have a new laptop that is seriously faster than my desktop. It’s not exactly new, it’s my bosses old dell and the video card went on it. Replacement cards generally go for a bout 350 so he opted for an entirely new computer instead and I got the laptop with the busted vid card. I found one eventually for about 200 bucks and replaced it myself, which required taking the whole damn thing apart, on thanksgiving morning ! I have a bunch of things to post and can effectively color them now. new stuff coming soon.