The Sequential Salon

How to Choose Color Palettes

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 01 Jul 2014 14:52:00 +0000

A cute and simple tutorial by Melanie Gillman.

Cintiq Companion review

noreply@blogger.com (Carlos) — Wed, 19 Mar 2014 15:22:00 +0000

Last year Wacom teased that they would release a mobile art tablet, and by the summer they announced the Cintiq Companion line. Consisting of a pair of 13.3" standalone tablets in multiple configurations, one running Windows 8, the other running Android. This was very exciting news to anyone whose ever used or owned a Cintiq or any other Wacom product. After seeing a few options in the marketplace lately such as the Surface Pro and Lenovo Helix, we were seeing Wacom's answer to mobile productivity.

I was fortunate enough to have a review unit sent to me from Wacom to test out and I happily put it through its paces. I was sent their higher end Windows model which had an impressive list of specs for sure, but the real question was, “how does it perform?” As with my Lenovo Helix review, I used my Surface Pro and Wacom Cintiq w12x as my reference point for some items.

Display Size 13.3 inch
Full HD 1920 X 1080 Resolution
Advanced control 2048 levels pen pressure, natural feel and multi-touch
ExpressKeys™, Rocker Ring, Home Button, on-screen controls
Ergonomics Adjustable stand
Windows 8 or Windows 8 Pro
Intel® Core™ i-7 7-3517U processor, 1.9 GHz
256 or 512 GB solid state drive (SSD)
Intel® HD Graphics 4000
Micro SD slot

8 GB DDR3 RAM
Multi-touch display
Pressure Levels 2048, both pen tip and eraser
Extra Nibs 9 standard
Pen carrying case
Resolution 5080 lpi
Video out mini DisplayPort
2 SuperSpeed USB 3.0 ports
Headphone jack
Bluetooth® 4.0
Wireless 802.11 b/g/n
Cameras: Front-2MP HD; Back-8MP HD

The first thing I noticed upon looking through the contents of the package was the attention to detail Wacom put into it. They included a zippered carrying pouch for the Cintiq which is really nice. It has pouches to store the pen case, and a space for a keyboard. The inside is a nice soft material which helps clean and protect the screen a bit as you slide the device in and out. It also has a couple of elastic straps on the corners of the interior to keep it in place. The pen case they provide is also very nice, with a magnetic clasp to keep it shut; it neatly houses your pen, nibs and nib puller. Everything fits snug and nothing rattles around. The pen itself has a nice weight to it and feels very pleasant in the hand; even better than my current Cintiq's pen.

Wacom also provided me with their Bluetooth keyboard that they sell separately. The keyboard was nice and thin and the keys had a nice feel to them, though I have to admit I didn't use it much.

The unit has two USB 3.0 ports and a Micro SD slot, even though the hard drive size options are decent, it's nice to expansion options and speedy ones at that. On the same side as these ports is a Displayport out and the power switch. I had a little issue with the power switch since sometimes I noticed that the Cintiq's power was on when I took it out of the bag. What I plan to do if I get one would be to make a little cover using some Sugru, but its something to be aware of. The kickstand came as a separate piece and seemed flimsy at first. It has three rubberized slats that pop out to give you different heights. I was worried that the device would collapse when applying too much pressure, but it proved to be the opposite. It was quite sturdy and allowed for six different positions if you turn it around the other way.

As soon as I first turned it on I could already see that it was a speedy device. Boot times were quick and launching apps like Photoshop opened speedily. The pen touch was very responsive with little to no lag. Pressure sensitivity preformed admirably in the suite of software I tried. I loved the fact that they used a matte screen instead of a glossy one. Its nice to have some texture as you're drawing rather than just gliding around a glossy screen. I tested it out using Photoshop CC, Manga Studio 5, and Sketchbook Pro and it preformed well in each test. Next I tested the expresskeys that are placed on the left side of the device. Anyone whose used a Cintiq or Intuos tablet is familiar with these programmable shortcut keys located right where you need them, next to your work. After using them its hard to go back to using only keyboard shortcuts. These keys functioned well and my only complaints were that there were only a set on the left side, as I'm used to having them on both giving me more shortcut options. However given that this would have increased the overall size of the device, I understand why this decision was made. My other gripe is that the key in the middle of the ring is a Windows key and did not seem reprogrammable. I would have liked to change this to my own short cut, even if it only functioned as such in my art applications, it just seems like a wasted button. Though I wished that there were more buttons, the fact that screen is also a multi-touch display helped to make up for it. I was able to use multi-touch gestures for zooming in and out which worked pretty nicely, though I was unable to use rotation in anything but Sketchbook Pro so Adobe need to work on that. I did encounter one issue with the multi-touch that became a bit annoying. Depending on how I moved my hand, the canvas would sometimes jump off screen. I believe this had to do with the way I rested my hand on the screen When I began to remove the pen from the screen it started to detect my palm and caused the canvas to jump. This could be remedied by turning multi-touch off, or leaving it on and using a cutoff artist glove.

The colors on the Cintiq are relatively good. While not quite as accurate as the Surface Pro, it does an acceptable job, far better then my Cintiq 12WX. Colors were not as vibrant or sharp, but keeping in mind that the Surface Pro has a glossy screen and higher brightness setting, it isn't too surprising. Colors were cast a little more to the orange side, but should probably calibrate well. It didn't bother me much however and it is definitely usable out of the box.

Battery life on the Companion was just adequate, partly due to the Ivy Bridge chip they used instead of the current generation Haswell. It would have yielded much better battery life as well as a minor uptick in performance. I would like to see Wacom release some sort of thin battery pack for those times you're away from a plug for longer periods such as long airplane trips. Since the charger jack is proprietary you cant use the various chargers already on the market. This would have to be my biggest gripe with the overall build, considering the price you're paying, you would expect to have the latest components included. Another issue I had was a strange glitch that would sometimes occur. If the device was in sleep mode for a period of time, the multi-touch would not register, but the pen would. Using the pen for a few strokes would eventually turn multi-touch back on, but its a strange glitch worth noting. Hopefully this can be fixed with an update.

The weight of the unit itself, while hefty, was not bad. Some friends have noted it was a bit too heavy for them, but I found it acceptable given the screen size and everything you get. It's a good tradeoff in terms of size and weight.

In Conclusion, despite the fact that the Wacom Cintiq Companion is an expensive purchase, with all that is featured, I feel it is a premium device that definitely makes you feel that it was money well spent. Even with the few issues I had, for the artist on the go, I would definitely recommend this product.

Final Score: A-

Burrell Gill Jr's Myfutprint Interview

noreply@blogger.com (Bowie) — Mon, 04 Nov 2013 14:44:00 +0000

It's ben a while since I've posted anything on this site. Demon Hunter Kain is going strong and I'm here to report that I did and interview at Myfutprint.com Check it out!

Figure and Gesture Drawing Tool

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Tue, 06 Aug 2013 16:18:00 +0000

Want to practice your figure drawing without having to trudge to a studio session or pay for a class?
At this site you can find a handy tool where they will cycle images in intervals of your choosing.

They also have animal drawing tool too!

Check it out.

Levono Thinpad Helix Review: An Artist's perspective

noreply@blogger.com (Carlos) — Mon, 29 Jul 2013 01:27:00 +0000

One of the great things about being an artist is that you can draw anywhere. From doodling on a napkin to carrying around a sketchbook, its always been easy to be creative on the go. In today's digital era we artists have taken to importing our work onto the PC with programs like Photoshop, Manga Studio and Painter to name a few. This coupled with a drawing tablet allows us to do more with less space and materials.

Tablet PC's have been around for a while but have been expensive, large, heavy and didn't quite always work to our expectations. Tablet devices like the iPad and Android tablet showed some promise, but with no pressure sensitive stylus it just amounted to digital finger painting. However with the latest Windows hybrid tablets we have the potential to achieve the best of both worlds. The release of the Microsoft Surface Pro drew the attention of many artists, including myself. Introducing a decently spec'ed PC with Wacom digitizer presented us the possibility of finally having that digital art experience in something the relative size of a sketchbook.

As with any new product it didn't take long for other manufacturers to follow suit. Companies like Samsung, Asus, and Lenovo joined in releasing their own hybrids with a different spin. One of these devices that also caught the attention of many digital artists is Lenovo's ThinkPad Helix. I was fortunate enough to have the nice people at Lenovo send me a review unit to put it through its paces and give a digital artist's impression.

The Helix takes the hybrid concept in an interestingly different direction. At first glance it looks like a typical laptop until you push the switch on the lower left corner and the screen comes off revealing it's tablet mode. The interesting thing you can do after this is what Lenovo calls "Rip N Flip". Turn the tablet around and re-dock it the other way to have it in "Stand mode"; good for presentations and watching videos. Push the lid down with the tablet docked this way and you have "Tablet+ mode" which gives you a thicker, heavier tablet that nearly doubles your battery and increases performance a bit due to the extra battery and fans located within the keyboard portion.

It also comes with a Wacom digitizer that slides into the tablet for storage. It's rated for 1024 levels of pressure sensitivity . As far as specs go, the review unit I received came with an Intel Core i5-3337U, 4 GB of RAM, 11.6" 1080P resolution IPS touch screen, 128 GB SSD drive, Windows 8 64 bit, 5MP rear camera, 2MP front camera, 1 USB 2.0 port on the tablet/ 2 USB 3.0 when tablet is docked, 802.11N, mini Displayport out, and of course an audio jack.
I will be comparing the Helix with the Surface Pro as this is what I use for my work on the go. The first item I set about testing was Photoshop. It opened very quickly, slightly quicker than my Surface Pro. After trying a few brush strokes, I noticed that there was no pressure sensitivity. This did not alarm me as I had the same issue with my Surface Pro. After installing the tablet PC drivers from Wacom's support page I was ready to go. Once I installed my favorite brushes I tried a couple of quick sketches to get a general feel for things. One thing I should note, unless you have tiny hands, I found the included stylus almost useless for drawing comfortably. It is only about 4.5" long and slightly less than .25" thick.

I used my Wacom "Bamboo feel" that I bought for my Surface Pro which I highly recommend. This lead me to discover two problems though. If you leave the included pen in the slot, it disables pen input all together. I had to keep it out if I wanted to use my Bamboo feel. The other problem I noticed was if I booted the machine with the pen in the slot, the pen cursor would be stuck in the upper left corner. The only thing that would fix it was a reboot (making sure the pen was out of the slot). Upon first use I quickly realized that it's very sensitive, a bit too much. I had to go into the driver settings and ratchet up the firmness to its max setting before I felt comfortable with it. The other problem I encountered was that its pen calibration was inconsistent. I re-calibrated it several times but could never get it quite right. It would be fine to the left and middle of the page but would shift off slightly as I worked towards the right side of the canvas. If I changed the angle of the pen it would improve a little but became awkward to use. Other than that, it was as responsive as my Surface Pro. Though, like my Surface Pro, I needed to change the drawing rendering mode to "Basic" in performance preferences to remove the bit of lag I was getting. I also tried out Manga Studio 5 which performed just as well.

I also decided to "benchmark" the next most important items to a digital artists' art tool: screen performance and color accuracy. As mentioned earlier, the Helix has a 1080P IPS screen. This provides a nice high resolution, and an IPS display typically allows for better viewing angles and more accurate color representation. My first test was to compare it using an image I worked on so I would be familiar with how it's supposed to look. My Surface Pro's color was very good out of the box; it matched my work IPS monitor pretty well so I never felt the need to calibrate it. Looking at the image on all three screens revealed that while the image looked fine on the monitor and Surface Pro, the colors on the Helix were off a bit and a little too saturated. I then ran some tests using www.lagom.nl, which has a nice variety of screen tests including Contrast, Clock and Phase, Sharpness, Gamma calibration, Black Level, White Saturation, Gradient (Banding), Inversion, Response Time, Viewing Angle, Contrast Ration, and Subpixel Layout. Both did well in all tests but the Helix again showed that its colors were not where they should be. It did have a little better response time than the Surface Pro. I also noticed an oddity where the site reported the resolution on the Helix at 1534 x 856 instead of 1920 x 1200; I'm not sure of the cause of this.

Next I ran the Passmark MonitorTest 3.1 to further test the screen's accuracy. This showed how the Helix's colors were not quite right. I had to run the test a couple of times because the scaling settings on the Surface Pro gave me inconsistent results. After changing that it fixed any issues I was having. Passmark also includes some single touch and multi-touch tests as well. The Helix performed a little better with capacitive touch.

The rest of my testing involved using the Helix as my daily portable machine for a couple of weeks. Here are my findings: The larger 11.6" display on the Helix vs. the 10.6" on the Surface was definitely nice and the keyboard on the dock is great. However, carrying around the tablet and the keyboard was a lot heavier and not something I would always want to cart around. You could carry just the tablet alone but you lose the extra battery life, USB 3.0 ports, and of course the keyboard which I didn't want to do, granted the tablet alone did give me better battery life than my Surface. I got over 5 hours on the tablet alone, versus the 3-4 hours on the Surface. I also liked the physical home button. I had to get used to not accidentally tapping the capacitive home button on the Surface by accident; on the Helix this was not a problem. It was nice to have the laptop form factor when I didn't have a flat surface handy to do some writing, though I'm on the fence as to whether the extra weight is worth it. It worked well for drawing except when the inconsistent calibration interfered with my workflow. It was frustrating when I needed precision in those areas. Another thing I noticed during this time is that switching from pen input to finger input acted strange at times. While palm rejection worked wonderfully, it would lag if you were using the pen and then wanted to use your finger for something. Nothing would happen, then 2-4 seconds later you would see what you attempted to try happen. It didn't interrupt my drawing much but it did become annoying depending on what I was trying to do.

As I mentioned, flipping the tablet around and closing it gives you the "Tablet + mode". This is nice because of the extra battery life you gain and the minor performance boost. The performance boost wasn't too noticeable but things did feel a tiny bit zippier to me. The problem with this is the fans. They are always on and they make a high-pitch whining sound, which while not too noticeable with some background noise, can be annoying if you're trying to work in silence. The fans stay on even if you're idle and the machine is cool. I also encountered the fan issue while docked normally in laptop mode. Another gripe I had is with the ports; if docked you have two USB 3.0 ports at your disposal, but I don't know why they chose to have only USB 2.0 on the tablet itself. Since there is no memory card slot like the Surface has it limits your storage options.

In conclusion, The Lenovo ThinkPad Helix is a very nice device, but not without its obstacles. The pen calibration is a problem; if I can't get accurate pen tracking it's a deal breaker. The colors are not bad but not where I would want them to be, though that could probably be calibrated to acceptable standards. The weight is another problem as I would prefer to travel a little bit lighter. I don't mind some heft, but it's a bit too much for me with everything I tote around. The pen is too small but that is easily remedied using an aftermarket pen. This brings me to my main issue; the device is expensive. At $1,679 for the Core i5 model and $2,129 for the Core i7, it is a bit too costly especially given that it's running a last generation processor. Now that devices with the latest Haswell processors are being released, and this is stuck on Ivy Bridge, makes it a harder sell. The Core i7 comes with 8 GB of RAM as well. I wish they would have allowed for a Core i5 with that much RAM as a configuration option. Pricewise it would have made more sense to sacrifice the processor speed for Photoshop work and to have the extra RAM. Granted most of these issues can be fixed with a few software patches but until that happens and it gets a significant price drop I have a hard time recommending it for artists.

Pros:
•11.6" screen size
•Physical home button
•Great battery life
•Terrific keyboard
•Laptop form factor
•Flip screen for viewing mode
•Tablet alone is lightweight
•Good response rate

Cons:
•Heavy with keyboard
•Screen color not as accurate out of the box
•Pen too small
•Pen calibration uneven
•Fan noise when docked
•Processor already outdated
•Expensive
•USB 2.0 on tablet portion
•No memory expansion
•Odd resolution reported •Lag and glitches switching from pen to touch
•Pen does not work if included pen is in slot
•Pen needs to stay out of slot when booting up otherwise pen cursor will be stuck in the corner

Final Score:
B- if software issues are patched
B if price is also dropped
C+ if not

Psychology of the Artist: How to get more creative

noreply@blogger.com (Carlos) — Wed, 24 Jul 2013 15:14:00 +0000

I'd like to start a general series of post over time about something that we tend to avoid addressing as artists, writers, and anyone doing any type of creative work, and that is the our general state of mind and approach to things. Its easy to psyche ourselves out and put ourselves in a place were we don't do any creative work, or if we do our work suffers do to our mental state. I like some of the points brought up in this video, something I've heard from several artist and its a good thing to remember: Don't obsess over what others are doing! "Don't be competitive, be creative" – Wallace Wattles

More on the Monomyth

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 21 Jul 2013 18:51:00 +0000

This is in response to the bit Lynn posted a month ago, with the puppets discussing Joseph Campbell.

If you want to write these days, especially genre fiction, then you've definitely heard of Campbell and the monomyth. I first heard of him freshman year in high school, when my English teacher had us analyze Star Wars. (I really liked that English teacher.) Even then, though, part of me rebelled against the idea of Campbell's monomyth as a formula for writing. Here's some thoughts on why.

First, let's go back to the video. It's a pretty good summation of some of Campbell's character archetypes. But there is, of course, more to the monomyth than that. The archetypes are really a sideshow compared to Campbell's plot formulation. Wiki has a good distillation of it here, so I won't go into specifics. And anyway, the video isn't really about Campbell's monomyth. It's about Hollywood's application of it.

So let's talk about Hollywood a bit. They've been applying Campbell to storytelling since George Lucas became richer than God. I have my doubts, though, about Lucas's claims to have consciously applied Campbell during the making of Star Wars. This has more to do with my concept of Lucas than my concept of the monomyth, though, so we'll move on from that. The story goes that the monomyth really got started in Hollywood when a producer condensed it into a memo and passed it around the studio as a guideline for writing. There are a lot of things about that sentence I find troubling from a creative perspective. Mainly "producer" and "memo". But mostly I'm concerned with the front-end aspect of the approach.

Hollywood has a tendency to think on very simplistic, very linear terms. I suppose it's an advantage when you're working in a multi-billion dollar industry, where each picture has thousands of people working on it and very fixed budget and time constraints. But it's also led to a conception of the monomyth as a recipe. Add one cup farmboy hero, mix with one cup villain and one tablespoon girl-as-reward, spice with wacky sidekick, and bake. Like the three-act structure, uncreative minds have made the monomyth less of an analytical framework and more of an orthodoxy, a cage where stories go to die. (TVTropes often makes the same mistake, taking a Mad Libs/Tangrams approach to storytelling that assumes that if you've got your tropes assembled in the right order, then you're all done except for the bit with all the words.)

"One-size-fits-all" doesn't really work when it comes to art. Hell, it didn't really work that way for Campbell; a full study of his conception of the monomyth allows for a large variation in how the elements are arranged, or if they're even there at all. And many great stories simply don't fit. After all, Campbell was writing specifically about the heroic legends of antiquity, and some stories don't follow that at all. Jane Austen is a nice go-to, since the monomyth is by its nature male-centric, and falls apart when you try to apply it to many stories that have been written by and/or about women. And then there's the modernists; the framework doesn't show up much in Faulker, Fitzgerald, or Steinbeck, and when it does, it's often torn to shreds. Ditto Hemingway, now that I think about it. Umberto Eco does something similar in The Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum, although those books are really about their own things, and Eco demolishing the monomyth is kind of collateral damage. And then there's works that have more of an ensemble cast; can't have a Hero's Journey without a Hero, after all.

None of which is to say the monomyth is useless, just that it's not a "how-to" guide. Campbell was writing from an analytical perspective, exploring what myth and legend say about society and the human psyche. (So was Jung, whose work often gets mishmashed with Campbell's into sort of a megamonomyth. Which sounds like something the Power Rangers should be fighting.) So the monomyth is best used as an analytical tool, not to create characters or settings or plots, but to examine them as you do the writing. Maybe you're blocked on the next plot development, and picking one of the steps of the Journey will get things moving again. Or maybe a character is showing some characteristics of the Trickster archetype (which is a hell of a lot more than just a wacky sidekick, dammit); what does that suggest about his place in the narrative, and how can you play that up on the second draft? Thinking about your story is always a good thing, and the monomyth is as good a springboard for thought as anything else.

None of this, of course, goes into what really gives a story its flavor, and separates the great and beloved stories from the hackjobs and the flops. Stuff like theme and style are where you make your story your own. Because, after all, you're not telling the Hero's Journey, you're telling your hero's journey.

As a postscript: The reason Adam Sandler's movies don't do as well anymore isn't because he abandoned the monomyth. It's because his man-child schtick gets less and less endearing the older he gets. A man in his twenties acting like the standard Adam Sandler character is cute. A man in his forties acting like that is depressing. Once Sandler gets to his sixties, we might just have to kill him.

Why Are Things Creepy?

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Fri, 19 Jul 2013 23:33:00 +0000

Why do some things scare us when there is no actual element of danger?
This video by Vsauce tries to explain why we find certain things creepy. A helpful video if you're considering writing a scary ghost story someday.

WARNING: Some of the imagery shown are disturbing.

Yoshikazu Hamada Comic Digital Drawing Videos

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Mon, 08 Jul 2013 14:22:00 +0000

A video of a 2 comic pages drawn digitally by manga artist Yoshikazu Hamada.
I'm not sure which program he using for these pages, quite possibly Manga Studio. By my estimation it took him about 15-16 hours to finish these two pages. The pages are from his series つぐもも "Tsugumomo" published in the comic magazine Comic High!

In this other video he shows how he digitally draws an entire room, quite impressive. It was meant to be used for his comic series but was rejected by the editor.

Apparently he does not use any assistants and does all the backgrounds himself.

He has a whole bunch of other videos with both digital and traditional illustrations which I recommend you check out. If there is anything you want translated. Let me know.

Gesture Drawing

noreply@blogger.com (Carlos) — Sun, 30 Jun 2013 21:22:00 +0000

Doing some drawing this weekend. While doing some warmup i felt like i needed a refresher on some gesture drawing (not to mention doing it more often. Found these videos that did just that. A nice refresher from art school (explained a little better i might add)

The Hero's Journey as Explained by Puppets

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Sat, 29 Jun 2013 06:03:00 +0000

Need a refresher on the Joseph's Campbell's Monomyth formula?
Puppets, Mario and Fafa the groundhog from Glove and Boots, are here to educate.

You can find out more of Joseph Campbell's theory from his book, A Hero of a Thousand Faces.

Interview at Flickering Myth

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 21:07:00 +0000

I was recently interviewed by FlickeringMyth.com.
Check out the interview. Woo!

Zygote Body

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 15:53:00 +0000

Some of you know I'm currently studying écorché, the study of human anatomy without skin. While searching for some reference I came across this interesting site, Zygotebody.

It has a nifty tool where by using sliders you can adjust the transparency of various parts of the body. For example if you want to see the circulatory system and the bone structure just slide the away the skin, muscles etc to reveal the structure underneath.

For studying anatomy, it's great. You can see the the various underlying layers of muscle using the slider. There's both male and female figures too. The only downside is that while it's possible to see the figure 360 degrees, you have move your cursor way off the screen just to be able to see certain angles of the body, and this chops the image off in awkward places. Also you can't really adjust the figure's pose either. It's not great for pose reference but it's a handy tool for learning anatomy and it's just fun to play around with too.

The Science of Productivity

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 17:14:00 +0000

I don't know about the rest of you but winter time is usually a big productivity slump for me. Here's an interesting video about the science of productivity. I'm gonna try applying some of it's tips, here's hoping it works. Here's more detailed article about productivity from Sparring Mind.

What's On My Writer's Reference Shelf

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 18 Dec 2012 02:24:00 +0000

Hi, there. I don't think we've been introduced. I'm Michael, Sequential Salon's resident writer-with-no-artistic-talent-whatsoever.

Anyway, Lynne asked at the last meeting for more posting, so I thought I would help out by sharing some about the books on my writer's reference shelf. I have two reference shelves, really; one is general reference for stuff I might want to put into stories someday, and the other is books on writing. Of course, there's no substitute for actually writing, but this stuff is helpful nonetheless. Some of it's comics-specific, some of it isn't, but it's all about story, so that's all right.

Under the cut, because goodness there's a lot of this stuff.

The New Merriam-Webster Dictionary, 1989 Edition: Every writer should have a good dictionary. I should probably have a more recent one, but this one has some sentimental value; my mom got it for me as a study aid for the regional spelling bee after I won the county one. It turns out that going through the dictionary page-by-page every night is a really good way to get a kid to hate spelling bees. But I kept it, and it's still useful. And really, I know how to spell newer words like "cromulent" and "website" anyway.

Webster's New World Thesaurus: "Revised and updated for the 1990s!" Yeah, I don't buy new reference books very often. This one's probably even more useful than the dictionary. A lot of people think synonyms are indistinguishable, but denotation and connotation make each one unique, and as Twain said, we should use the right word, not its third cousin. It's not often that I need to use a word like "mendicant", but when I do, I can look here under "bum" and find it.

The Little Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar: This one's a bit more esoteric, but sometimes you find yourself forgetting what exactly the vocative case is. Or is that just me? The anatomy of language gets pretty short shrift in English education these days (harrumph harrumph), but I think it's important to know how all the pieces fit together, or at least to have an idea. This is more of a prose thing, though.

The Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White: The writer's little bible. There's a school of thinkers that pooh-poohs this book, probably because they were taught it badly by a fascist twit of an English teacher, but they're all rather silly. Gene Roddenberry may have redeemed the split infinitive, but clumsy, ignorant writing still looks like crap on a stick, and this book takes that writing and flushes it. You have to know how to walk before you can run, and this book is the best guide a toddler-writer could ask for, as well as the most helpful reference for a veteran to turn to when he's not quite sure about a sentence or phrase. Buy the latest edition right now and keep it in a place of honor. Best section? All of it, but "Elementary Principles of Composition" is probably the one I find most useful.

The Associated Press Stylebook and Briefing on Media Law: Okay, yeah, this is just for nonfiction writing. But I'm a completist, dammit.

How To Write Science Fiction and Fantasy by Orson Scott Card: Ooh, controversial! Or maybe not. Regardless of how you feel about his politics, Card knows a lot about writing, and specifically about writing in genre. This is one of the first "how-to" books I bought, and it was pretty instrumental in getting me to think about stories as stories. Some of the specifics he gets into are damn weird (seriously, you have to read his bit on developing a concrete system of magic, but not after dinner), but the theory is sound.

On Writing by Stephen King: Not so much a "how-to" book as one author's guided tour of his journey as a writer and how he developed his own process. The memoir parts are interesting, as you see how King got to where he is (and, of course, compare it to your own writer's journey), but there's some good meat in the back half as well, especially a section where he walks the reader through his revision process, complete with the marked-up first draft page. King's been writing professionally for damn near fifty years, and non-professionally for a lot longer than that, and no would-be writer should pass up this chance to learn at the feet of a master.

Various Issues of Danny Fingeroth's Write Now!: Yes, Virginia, I do have comics-related stuff. This was a magazine briefly published by Twomorrows Publishing where Fingeroth, a comics veteran, interviewed comics writers on their process. I learned a lot about how to write a comics script from this series. A great bonus is that Fingeroth also published script examples alongside the finished pages. Seeing how artists interpreted the scripts (not always for the better) is a real eye-opener. Also, you can see Fingeroth try to get Bendis to admit his dialogue is repetitive!

Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative and Comics and Sequential Art by Will Eisner: Remember what I said about learning at the feet of a master? In these books, Eisner breaks down the elements of a comic book story into their simplest forms. They're books of theory, but written in a simple style that focuses on utility. Eisner also includes some sample stories, pointing readers at certain techniques and leaving them to absorb the wisdom from how well the story works. Panels, pages, figures, and even lettering are all here, all explained. The writer-artist will get the most use out of these books, but even schmucks like me can learn to write visually from a careful study of Eisner's technique.

Panel One and Panel Two, edited by Nat Gertler: Two excellent books of comics scripts by writers old and new. Pretty much every kind of comics scriptwriting is represented here, from "Marvel-style" plots to the kind of dense scripts that make Neil Gaiman's assigned artists cry. There's even a set of thumbnails from Jeff Smith from his prestige format Bone prequel, Rose. Every writer finds his or her own style, but these scripts are great for picking and choosing. Panel Two also features commentary from the artists on the stories, for more insight into how the script translates to the printed page. If there's been a Panel Three or Panel Four, get those, too, and then link me to their pages on Amazon.

The Writer's Guide to the Business of Comics by Lurene Hanes: Yeah, there's other stuff you have to know first. Whether you want to be a freelancer on your favorite company-owned superhero book or self-publish a series that will break the medium wide open, you have to know how to manage your career. I wouldn't call any of it fun, but there's stuff you need to know about self-marketing, self-employment, getting paid, and keeping the IRS off your back. Hanes outlines everything very well, and gets plenty of commentary from actual working writers and writer-artists in comics. The business world is a dense jungle, and this book is the machete you need to hack your way through it.

Writing For Comics with Peter David: David is one of my favorite writers, and a comics veteran who doesn't need me to talk up his credentials. Here, he walks the reader step-by-step through the basics of storytelling, punctuating each lesson with examples from his own work and giving suggested exercises. All of it is explained simply, but not shallowly. There's even a bit at the back with advice for breaking in and setting yourself apart from the pack. I actually have the first edition; I understand the second (called Writing for Comics and Graphic Novels with Peter David) has even more stuff. Excellent for beginners, especially those who want to do serial genre stories (and that's probably most of you).

Understanding Comics and Making Comics by Scott McCloud: One of them is the book that made me look at comics as a medium and a career. The other is the book that made me realize how much further I still had to go. Understanding Comics breaks the medium down to its elements and defines them; Making Comics takes those lessons and applies them to the practice of building a comic from the ground up. Like the Eisner books, these will be most useful to writer-artists, but again, writers-only will still find plenty to learn. McCloud has another book, Reinventing Comics, but it hasn't aged quite as well; time has proven most of his predictions about comics in the digital age to be pie-in-the-sky fantasy. Still, it's kinda fun to flip through from time to time to pick out everything he got wrong.

The DC Comics Guide to Writing Comics by Denny O'Neill: Back when he was a group editor at DC, O'Neill would put new writers and editors through a little story boot camp to get them up to speed with how he did things. Eventually, he took his notes from that boot camp and turned them into this book. I don't know how much use it would be for writing at DC these days (there's no section on having the hero's girlfriend raped or basing a book around a team of blood-vomiting violent maniacs), but it's definitely useful for learning how to write a comic story. The examples are, of course, skewed towards superhero comics, but the theory extends to pretty much any type of story you might want to tell. This is part of a series DC did on pretty much every aspect of creating comics, so if you're looking for a how-to for penciling, inking, coloring, lettering, or digitally drawing comics, you could do worse than to check out the respective volumes.

Alan Moore's Writing For Comics: A curiosity, and maybe a bit hard to find, but worth searching out. Like King's book, it's less of a "how to" and more of a "how I"; unlike King's, it eschews memoir entirely, and is much shorter. Much of its 48 pages is taken up with what I call Moore's practical philosophy of writing comics, covering general thoughts about the medium itself, as well as specifics of story structure, theme, plot, and world-building. Then he takes us through his process of writing the classic Superman story, "For The Man Who Has Everything." (Turns out it's about more than just Superman dreaming about a Krypton that never exploded and then beating the crap out of Mongul.) Moore reveals quite a lot of the tricks of the trade here, and I urge readers to steal them liberally. (I certainly do.) In showing us how he thinks about a comic story as he's writing it, Moore touches on an aspect of process that's often left unspoken in books on writing. This may be the most valuable book in my collection, now that I think of it.

Writing Fantasy & Science Fiction and getting published by Brian Stableford: I'll be honest, it was those last three words that made me pick this one up. Not that the front end of the book is worthless; on the contrary, it's filled with tips, information, and musings on the genre from a forty-year veteran. But boy, did I love and do I love the section on submitting and selling your manuscript once it's finished. No one had ever said the words "slush pile" to me before, and while they still sting every time I think them, better I learned them here than on the streets. It's a pre-Internet-ruling-everything book, so some of the information on market research is less than helpful, but extrapolating from it and running a Google search can be very profitable. (The mention of the Science Fiction Writers of America led me to seek out the guild's website, which today is a treasure trove of resources.) And, as with every book on this list, the Further Reading/Bibliography section is a great starting point to expand your knowledge of the field in which you want to work. Because you do want to work, don't you?

That's what's on my shelf. There are no doubt many glaring omissions, but I've found it works pretty well for me. Use this as a guide to build your own shelf. But while you're doing that, don't forget to write.

I'm in Mary Sue!

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 01:56:00 +0000

My art was featured in one of my favorite geek sites The Mary Sue.
Woo I say woo! *dances the cabbage patch*

Link to article

What It Feels Like To Be A Freelancer

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Sun, 05 Aug 2012 13:19:00 +0000

BWAHAHAHAHA! It's so funny because it's true. Ok, now I'm sad.

A video created by dontgetscrewedover.com. They have a video introducing Docracy.com, where they provide free, open-source legal documents. It's not just limited to artists.

The Science of Insight Creation

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 20:21:00 +0000

Jonah Lehrer - Contributing Editor of Wired has a new book out titled, Imagine: How Creativity Works. I was intrigued so I decided to do a quick google search and found this video.

He shares scientific research on how the brain comes to those 'A, ha!' moments, why brainstorming doesn't work, how criticism is essential for creativity, and other tidbits on how creativity works. Planning to check out the book eventually.

Interviewed on Promateurs

noreply@blogger.com (Bowie) — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 23:50:00 +0000

Hey everyone! I recently had the opportunity to be interviewed by David Yoon, author of Spoon, and Contreras, author of Blade of the Freak, for their podcast show: Promateurs. Give it a listen when you get a chance.

Character Design and Sihouettes

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 16:03:00 +0000

A cool article using silhouettes to create strong character designs. The rest of the blog is pretty interesting too and worth taking a look.

Thanks to Alex for the heads up.

Figure Drawing with Light Sabers!

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 00:09:00 +0000

For three nights at the Art Students League of New York will have figure drawing sessions with the New York Jedi: Light Saber Enthusiasts Collective.

They are trained martial arts performers who will pose with their custom light sabers and bust a few moves.
Finally figure drawing sessions for the geeky comic artist! Any body interested?

Phyllis Harriman Mason Gallery
January 26, February 23 and March 8
7–10 pm
$5 to sketch
$10 to be a saberist-in-training

More information here.

Women of Wonder Day October 30th 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 16:15:00 +0000

It's Women of Wonder Day tomorrow!
Formerly known as Wonder Woman Day, (I guess they changed it to make it inclusive for all super heroines) this charity event raises money for Domestic Violence programs. A very worthy cause.

Many artists (like Alex Ross and Adam Hughes) and celebrities donate pieces for the charity auction. I've been wanting to donate a piece for a while and finally gotten around doing it this year.

The reason why I didn't do it previously is because they don't accept all digital works, and frankly I didn't think my traditional skills were up to par (can't ctrl-z markers and ink).

This year though, I've practiced, and donated a marker illustration piece. I also did a digital color print piece (so it's a two-fer). More bang for the buck, right?

New York Comic Con 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 15:58:00 +0000

Y'all excited?

I am! I'll be at booth B6 sharing a table with Tim Smith III. I'm not on the listing, so if need be look up Tim's name to find me on the map.

My first big convention, oh boy, oh boy.

Do You have Color Vision Deficiency?

noreply@blogger.com (Lynne) — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 13:15:00 +0000

According to this site, 1 out of 255 women and 1 out of 12 men have some form of color vision deficiency. Based on the Farnsworth Munsell Hue test, it's not quite the same as a color blindness test. It tests your acuity to detect subtle hue changes. I scored a perfect. Woo!

Hue Test.

Get Schooled

noreply@blogger.com (Carlos) — Tue, 07 Jun 2011 13:33:00 +0000

Came across this website recently called Schoolism. It allows you to take a streaming video art course in which the person teaching will also give assignments. You email the assignments to the instructor, adn the they email you back critiques. It's a very interesting concept, and they have some good artists up there teaching. They also have a "self-taught" option for less money which forgoes the ability to get critiques form the instructor and just gives you access to the videos. Though it is quite expensive, it seems like a great resource if your willing to spend the time and money.