Monday, June 22, 2009

The Army Satchel Kind of Kills the Effect.

Today's Strip

At first I played with a punchline regarding O'Henry's Gift of the Magi but decided against it.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

I thought You Burned that Thing.

Today's Strip

You Were Wearing A Wig

Today's Strip

The last time Paul and Nancy talked she was dressed like this. I think we can forgive Paul for missing the new hairstyle.

Monday, June 15, 2009

Well I'm Off To Maine

Well my three hour countdown to finish packing and getting everything ready before I head to Seatac. I'm off to Maine to spend some quality time with the folks and recharge the old batteries. I always come back thinner and feeling a whole lot smarter after a week of dinner conversation with a PHD and smaller servings.
I'm looking forward to several projects I have planned, mostly painting forests and coastlines as well as see how far I can get in rewriting an idea for a space opera i've had kicking around.
The only downside of course is the actual getting there part. The flight is a redeye starting at ten. Which means around four hours of sleep tonight PLUS jet-lag. On top of that I'm not the biggest fan of flying.
It's not a phobia, mind you, it's more a case of letting the imagination get the best of you. Thanks to a very bad made for tv movie in the eighties I was paranoid about hijacking LONG before 9/11. And I can think of more ridiculous scenarios a lot faster than my rational side can shoot them down. I think it's the giving somebody control of my life for an extended period of time. I have perfect faith in the pilot's ability and I know a crash is statistically as likely as a bus about two miles away from me careening out of control and keep careening in such a way that it eventually careens its way to me walking on a sidewalk. But in that extremely hypothetical situation I'm able to leap into a bush to get out of it's way.
Silly, I know, but there you are pre flight jitter. A fear of being out of your element for a week and thinking of all the things that can go wrong no matter how ridiculous.
Anyway I should be fine and even enjoy the trip, and I'll try to post some pictures. Otherwise see you all in July.

Water Color of Discovery Park


I decided to throw in some of my occasional watercolors into mix. Watercolor, at the moment, is my primary non-virtual medium. I like it first because it is extremely portable and second because since it is such an forgiving medium where mistakes are VERY hard to correct, being good at it is something you can take smug satisfaction in.
For some reason though no matter how good my pieces are, and trust me I have some of them in my portfolio, I have a difficult time considering them anything more then sketches. Most of the reason behind this is a lot of them are... a good chunk of them are concept art for assorted story ideas and the rest of them are these...
In my frequent out door walks i like to bring my watercolor kit with me. Doing these pictures are good because the force me to hyperfocus on various objects and thus take in all of the details, as well as being a "running weights" kind of practice. Every now and then this produces something really good. However most of the time, like in this painting of the bluff in Discovery park, they can be charitably considered abstracts.

Here's the real thing for comparison (though I had a clearer day and Rainier was not hidden by the haze.)

Whatever You're Thinking Keep It To Yourself

Today's Strip

Friday, June 12, 2009

Friday Museum Sketches


Okay back from a too long hiatus sketches from the Seattle Art Museum, or in this case the Asian Art Museum up in Volunteer Park. Today's sketch is from their permanent collection of Indian sculpture. One thing I really like about this exhibit is that they've opened up a little bistro there so along with the overpriced sandwiches you have a table and chair to draw at. Because of this I've come out of this room with much better drawings than the usual affair where you have to work standing up with your sketchbook balanced as well as you can manage as you draw...

Anyway, today's sketch is from a stone relief of Siva and Parvati, from Khajvraho done in sandstone in the 11th century. You can see the original here.

Mister You Better Be Worth It.

Today's Strip

Nancy and Michelle first inflicted that dress on Kate here. Other than this rather forced nod to continuity I really have no excuse for Kate to act out of character and participate in this bit of cheap fanservice.

Tuesday, June 9, 2009

Why do You Care?

Today's Strip

Sometimes it's good to see Kate isn't the only one who stresses out over these things.

Monday, June 8, 2009

That Depends on Your Debriefing

Today's Strip

Kate's talking about this moment just after meeting Stefan at Dunsany's.

Friday, June 5, 2009

I do not need a Slurpee!

Today's Strip

It looks like Gage can be taught. The Last time Fedya used this one on him was here.

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

I'm All About Sacrifice.

Today's Strip

I can't help noticing, in strips like these, Is how the limitations of strip time and strip continuity come back to bite you. Since a strip only allows you what is on average five minutes of time a day, time does weird things and there's only so much you can do about it. As far as the strip is concerned the last time Paul and Nancy spoke was Halloween 2008, the last time they went out together was a year before that watching the final game of the World Series. Heck one year I was almost relieved that I wouldn't be able to do a Valentine's Day story line because as far as continuity was concerned it would mean that Valentine's day had happened twice in one month. As time goes by you learn to imply that time is passing and that there are things going on off camera, but the problem still comes up as a stumbling block more times then I'd like.

Monday, June 1, 2009

Look Mommy! A Bear

Today's Strip

Just realized I hadn't done anything with Mitzi For a while.

The funny thing with this strip is nearly the moment I put it in the can I happened to see the headline about Urban Phantom. Which made a liar out of the mom.