Roller derby stuff keeps popping up in my sketchbook. I’m not coordinated enough to ever do it myself, but I like the idea of it- a bunch of tough chicks on roller skates racing and getting physical seems to be tickling my imagination. Plus, looking at derby pictures gives me a huge variety of bodies to draw, with interesting outfits and cool props. Expect more of these.

Tags: art, doodles, drawing, girl, pinup, roller derby, sketches

I actually did this about a week ago, and haven’t gotten around to coloring it until today. I’ve been practicing!

I’ve also been doing a lot of doodling, but I’m not inclined to post that. People have been asking me why I stopped posting though, so maybe I should!

Tags: comic, guitar, journal comic, practice

Now that I’ve had the guitar a couple of days, I’m starting to see how this fits into the larger picture of changing my life and my art. I played the violin when I was a kid, and sucked badly at it, partially because I didn’t like the whole  neighborhood being able to hear me when I practiced. So I didn’t practice. When I was 14 or so, I was given an acousitc guitar by a friend, and went to guitar club after school for a few weeks, but quickly got frustrated for sucking again.

I still suck, badly. But it’s only been two days, and I’m determined not to let my self-consciousness  stop me from trying. Plus, the kit I bought came with headphones that plug into the amp, so I can practice without anybody hearing me if I want

Tags: comic, electric guitar, guitar, ibanez, journal comic, two street music

Tags: art, cute t shirts, illustration, robot, t shirts, vector, zazzle

I haven’t forgotten about SnoogleZoo, I just needed to take a break. I don’t think doing a serial webcomic is for me- it’s not exactly the time commitment, like I thought it was, because doing all this constraint-free drawing is taking up the same kind of time that working on SnoogleZoo was. I think it’s more like feeling trapped within a certain framework. It felt like homework and I think it was stifiling the art. Not to mention all my other art that I wasn’t doing.

I’ve been kicking around a couple of ideas of what to do- I miss the characters more than I thought I would, so I’d rather not abandon them to the realm of silent, one-off illustrations. But I don’t want to get trapped slogging through an un-interesting story arc just to meet a deadline. I’m thinking I should just do stories on a whenever-I-feel-like-it basis, which I think will serve my desire to do something of quality, and also prevent me from growing a readership of any respectable size.

But you know what? I don’t really care about that right now. I really need to be making art before I can concern myself with things like making art on a schedule.

So don’t worry, Pan. We’ll be back soon enough, and you can pick on Efram and get extra whipped cream from the Kitties’ cafe and have all kinds of fun and silly adventures with the rest of the gang real soon. But sometimes I will have to give my attention to killer robots and pin-up girls, too. It’s better for everyone this way

Tags: being blocked, comic, drawing, snooglezoo, work, works in progress

I am going to regret that bowl of ice cream in the morning.

Tags: artists block, comic, emotional eating, ice cream, journal comic, productivity

Drew this comic way too small, and that is partly why the drawings suck. Also because I’m out of practice and lazy. Will work on that in the future, but hooray! A journal comic!

Tags: comics, doodles, drawing, journal comic, owl, wasting art supplies

I’m doing a little series of portraits of the women of Oz, starting with Ozma. It’s an exercise to give me something to draw, and to practice some new materials. I like the way she came out, but I had a funny little mishap:

So I’m working on my inks and things are going well. The paper’s not great for the croquil pen I’m using- it tends to bleed a little and the nib scratches it up, but I’m proud of the control I seem to have. I’m starting to get distracted by the idea that I could sell the series on Etsy, when suddenly, BLUT! My hand skips and I drop a huge perfectly round circle of ink right on the edge of Ozma’s eye!

You know that sound you make when you burn your hand on the stove? That kind of inwardly-drawn scream? That’s the sound I made.

You can actually still see the blob in this picture- I covered it up with gouache, but it’s still somewhat transparent. I meant to take a picture of the damage because I was immediately aware of the lesson the universe just dropped on me, but I decided to refocus and just finish inking instead, which was the original purpose of the whole thing. So I did. And I’m still happy with it.

I set out to do this set as practice. Not to sell it, not to make Deathless Art, but to work on a particular skill set. So I worked on it, in spite of the mishaps. I feel good about that. I won’t be painting this one in real media- I’ll do it on the computer because the gouache will interfere with the watercolor I had originally planned to use.

Tags: croquil, dip pens, drawing, ink, oz, ozma, practice, works in progress

I’m noticing a pattern:

• I get an idea to try some new artistic project or endeavor (pattern design, comics, whatever)
• I start researching my new interest by looking around the web at what other people are doing.
• I start worrying about the quality of my work out-the-gate not living up the the work I see online, and get discouraged before I even get started

I started reading American Elf last night (I’ve read it before, but not since James Kochalka opened up the archive). As I got deeper into the archive I started feeling my enthusiasm for doing my own journal comic starting to wane, which is exactly the opposite of what I meant to accomplish. Thinking about it a bit, I realized that happens a lot when I’m in “research mode,” looking at the work of people who are doing whatever I might be interested in.

I have to just start, rather than trying to figure out exactly how to start. Even if my comic consists of two characters scribbled in a lined notebook, that’s better than no comic at all. At least I’m doing something, right?

Tags: american elf, comic, discouraged, james kochalka, journal, writing

This past weekend Brad and I moved my drawing table out of the dark corner of the bedroom and into the frontroom, in front of a nice big window, in the hopes that it’ll make it more pleasant to sit and work at. So far, it’s working.

I’ve been doing a lot of journaling/listmaking about what I can do to be a more productive artist. I doodled a lot, and kept coming up with little owls with speech bubbles, making suggestions about what I should do. I found it a really amusing way to process my thoughts. Anyway, I decided through these little guys that what I should do is get out some of my nicest paper and plan on wrecking it. “Waste Paper!” the owls kept coming back to this basic principle of moving the pen for the sake of moving the pen, giving yourself permission to make a mess of whatever materials you want to play with at the time. Sounds like something I read recently
…imagine that!

So in answer to my own question: yes I am wasting paper! (I also made a shrinky dink of one of these advice-giving owls) And I’m having a great time. And, oh wait! I have something to post about! I think the owls are on to something…

Tags: art, drawing, fun, lynda barry, moving the pen, owls, shrinky dinks