What I Read When I Was Supposed to be Drawing

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I mentioned that when I was at Staple! I was honored to be part of the Women in Webcomics panel with MariNaomi and Liz Prince. Ironically, we didn't talk about much about webcomics at all, but we did get swap a few tales of our experiences being comickers AND female at the same time (or as Mike Dawson/Alex Robinson put it - Ladytoonists!). I might write more about that topic later.

Most importantly, though, I also got to swipe a few of their comics.

First, I checked out Liz Prince's adorable Will You Still Love Me If I Wet The Bed. It reminded me a little of similar relationship/comic strip style comics, but with one important distinction: it was positive. Not just positive, but unabashedly sweet and cute and reminded you of what it's like to be smitten in a totally weirdo way with someone.

After that smooshiness, I turned to Liz's Alone Forever, which I have to admit liking an eensy bit more. This one was fun, witty, sad, mean, and awesome, and a lot more relatable. You get the perfect sense of what it's like to bop around in Liz's world for a while, and her search for love is as familiar as it is fun. Again, a "relationship" type comic that's full of snark and fun, not depresso-ness. Yay!

Next up, I turned to MariNaomi's mondo memoir Kiss & Tell .

I wasn't exactly sure what to expect from diving into someone's massive, personal, detailed relationship history in comic form. The book details all of Mari's private, fleeting, detailed, and thorough relationships with lovers, friends, and more over the years. I loved how surprisingly honest it was, but also how matter of fact. Even though she relates very private specifics, she does so in such a way that makes the reader feel comfortable relating to it without feeling creepy for spying. My favorite part was how she shared her experiences. This isn't an aggressive recounting, or one tinged with regret. It's a fun, voyeuristic ride that's peppered with deeper messages that catch you buy surprise. Lovely depth, I'll call it.

Awesome stuff. Guess I'll slink back to work now ...

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Gods & Undergrads Update #4 - the last one for Chapter 6!

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Aaaaaaand scene. That's it for this chapter, everyone! I wanted to leave it on a quasi-cliffhanger, or as my boyfriend would call it, an "Oh shit, it's Mystique" moment. Which is a reference to the first time I saw X-Men in the theater. When Mystique first appears on screen, revealing herself as Senator Kelly's aid in the helicopter, this dude in the back of the theater was TOTALLY SHOCKED and said out loud, "Oh SHIT, it's Mystique!" Priceless.

For this chapter, I wanted to deal almost entirely with Anthony's descent into the Underworld. At first I thought about making it just about he and Hermes' journey together, but then I decided to split it up into sections - each one dealing with one of the stages of grief. As Anthony eventually accepts his death, his wounds return, and it finally becomes real what happened to him. And even though the build-up is kind of scary and sad, the reality is - kind of no big deal. Hades was the general underworld of the population - it's where everyone went, good or bad, which I always loved about Greek Mythology. Rather than going down to hell or up to heaven, you got ferried to one place, and sorted out later. I know I barely touch on Hades and Persephone in this chapter, but I'm saving them for later. I didn't want them to steal focus from the guy we've journeyed with this whole time - not yet anyway.

Oh - and they're big on purpose. ;)

Thanks everyone for reading, and please feel free to share your thoughts on this page, or any part of this chapter!

***UPDATE: Gods & Undergrads returns on Dec. 12, 2012!! EEEEEEE!***

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Countdown

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Oh, how I wish the title was "final countdown" and I could see Gob's magic intro. [vimeo http://vimeo.com/1418162]

But by countdown, I mean the countdown to the end of Chapter 6 of Gods & Undergrads! Woooo! Gasp! There are only 4 pages left, my friends, so starting next Tuesday, January 17th I'll post a page a day. It's not terribly dramatic, since really there's only a few pages left, BUT STILL. I like to pretend this sort of thing is a big deal.

In case you need a recap of what's happened thus far, you can check out:

Then come back next week for the startling conclusion! (okay ... still, not startling, but EXCITING!)

Bored Comic Ladies

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After drawing this print of Poison Ivy a couple months back ...

I decided it might be fun to draw popular lady comic characters who looked equally as bored. Like - ho hum, I'm gorgeous and quite powerful and have stuff to do, but I'm waiting for the dryer to stop running before I can leave the house ... you know, so my house doesn't catch on fire and I lose all my awesome possessions.

So here's my next one - Harley Quinn! She's BEYOND bored ...

'Sup December ... You Still Here?

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It's that awkward time of the year when I want to be on winter break and drawing nonstop, reading Calvin & Hobbes, and playing Donkey Kong on the N64. Alas, for me - it's back to work this week. But does that mean I have to stop eating cookies and listening to holiday music and generally pretending I'm still on some kind of vacation? I sure hope not. Well, since as I briefly mentioned last week, my computer ka-putzed, things have been a little hectic trying to get a new machine up and running that will allow me to limp along until I can buy a new one. Luckily my dad is the Frankenstein of computer hardware, so he and my boyfriend rigged up a nice little zombie to get me by.

Just a couple questions I had for YOU all in the meantime, though ...

As you know, I have two webcomics going - Gods & Undergrads and Bonnie N. Collide.  As things stand now, Bonnie is usually once-a-week updated and G&U maaaaybe once every two weeks. Now, I know that sporadic updating is the WORST trait a webcomic could possibly have. Alas, with the day job sometimes I find it a little tricky being consistent. So, my question to you guys out there is ... would you rather things update once on a semi-weekly schedule like they do now, orrrr update maybe twice a month with more than one strip/page at a time? I know everyone has a different opinion when it comes to their comics, but I wanted to give you guys a chance to chime in.

... Now I'm going to run off and pretend it's snowing outside or something. December!

'Sup December ... You Still Here?

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It's that awkward time of the year when I want to be on winter break and drawing nonstop, reading Calvin & Hobbes, and playing Donkey Kong on the N64. Alas, for me - it's back to work this week. But does that mean I have to stop eating cookies and listening to holiday music and generally pretending I'm still on some kind of vacation? I sure hope not. Well, since as I briefly mentioned last week, my computer ka-putzed, things have been a little hectic trying to get a new machine up and running that will allow me to limp along until I can buy a new one. Luckily my dad is the Frankenstein of computer hardware, so he and my boyfriend rigged up a nice little zombie to get me by.

Just a couple questions I had for YOU all in the meantime, though ...

As you know, I have two webcomics going - Gods & Undergrads and Bonnie N. Collide.  As things stand now, Bonnie is usually once-a-week updated and G&U maaaaybe once every two weeks. Now, I know that sporadic updating is the WORST trait a webcomic could possibly have. Alas, with the day job sometimes I find it a little tricky being consistent. So, my question to you guys out there is ... would you rather things update once on a semi-weekly schedule like they do now, orrrr update maybe twice a month with more than one strip/page at a time? I know everyone has a different opinion when it comes to their comics, but I wanted to give you guys a chance to chime in.

... Now I'm going to run off and pretend it's snowing outside or something. December!

Webcomic Week Day 5: The Weak Spots

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Okay, here we go. Let's do this. Let's talk about the areas that I really hate drawing, therefore suck the most when I draw them - aka my weak spots.

As you can tell from this picture, my weak spots are most definitely backgrounds. A lot of artists have areas they particularly dread drawing. Some are hand-phobes, other face-phobes, I am a background-phobe. Filling backgrounds with people and objects and *shudder* perspective never ceases to paralyze me. As you can tell from these next few shots, the beginning of Gods & Undergrads was chock full of poorly planned, horribly executed backgrounds that I really gave a crap about and boy does the sloppiness show ...

Everything I drew seemed like it's own little lesson in What Not To Do as an artist. If there was a comic equivalent of Stacey & Clinton, they would haul me off to New York and give me an illustration renovation STAT. Actually . . . who would the comic makeover king and queen of the comics world be? I already have a list going of the hottest comickers. But the ones with the ability to makeover others? Hmm. I smell an industry need, waiting to be filled ...

Anyway. So why am I showing you multiple examples of horrible drawing in my own book? Because when you create any comic, or webcomic, or story, or art, or what have you, it's important to face your fears. Sure, I did a lot of terrible backgrounds (and still do sometimes), but like with the writing, I kept doing them until they gradually got better. Look, at the end of the first book the backgrounds had already improved:

And by the second book? LIGHTYEARS better.

I'm not saying I don't still have loads of work ahead of me in the Backgrounds Arena. But once I realized that backgrounds were just as much an important part of the story as the facial expressions, the color, the dialogue, the outfits, etc. the comic started to evolve just from being an amateur mish-mash into an actual evolving style. One I didn't plan on, but one that was slowly becoming more cohesive.

Last year, when I started illustrating my first graphic novel for a publisher, my editor gave me some notes on how all of my panel compositions were starting to look the same - headshots, waist up shots, ALL people, all the time. My old nemesis was creeping up on me and not only making me steer clear from drawing backgrounds, but skewing the page layouts of the book too. So was I going to take that shit from backgrounds? Oh hell no. Sure, perspective still boggles my mind and dressing a scene can cause me to break out into cold sweats, but with a little patience, a lot of stress coffee drinking, and this book:

it's gotten MUCH better.

Webcomic Week Day 4: Planning vs. Evolution

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Yep, it's not really Day 4, since Webcomic Week started last week ... oh well, continuity blows! ... Aaaand also happens to be the topic of this post. I've been writing terrible stories since I was little. Luckily I didn't let that deter me. I had a screenwriting teacher in college who told us flat out:

Everything you write will be shit.

And she was spot on. But luckily she added:

If you keep writing, it will become less shitty.

That's the motto I've clung to over my years of writing several short comic stories and one looooooong comic story. If I keep writing, in theory the writing gets better. Or, rather, it gets less shitty. I used to think when you wrote out a story, you had to plan everything in advance before you started drawing. This thought managed to paralyze me and prevent me from ever writing fully fleshed out stories. When I started Gods & Undergrads, my detailed plot points looked like this:

  • There is a girl.
  • She is the off-spring of some gods and stuff.
  • She's going to be at college doing college-y things.
  • Now and again a god will come in and mess everything up.
  • The end.

The inbetweens I wasn't able to quite figure out until I started writing the story. Occasionally I'd randomly decide upon bigger events I wanted to happen (she breaks her arm, Furies are called, etc.) and then would be able to steer the story in those specific directions. Sometimes I worried that all I was doing was spinning my wheels and putting in filler between big, random events. I kept thinking my job as a writer was to keep the reader occupied and unassuming until BAM! The next plot point came around.

Unfortunately, this resulted in a lot of my earlier (okay, truthfully, and current) work occasionally slogging through some slow parts. In these slogs, nothing much happens plot-wise, but at least the characters do take the opportunity to become more developed and separate their personalities from one another. Intially created out of laziness, over time I realized this truly was a storytelling preference of mine. I gravitate towards stories with a sloooowwww burn, all build up and pretense and atmosphere. And most of the time I don't even care if there's a BAM ending (or hell, even an ending at all), I just like to sit and immerse myself in that world for a little while. To me, it adds to the experience of getting into a story. Mm, maybe half that and half laziness.

Over the years my haphazard storytelling method has had to evolve, and I've developed a system I'm pretty comfortable with.

  1. The story idea arrives (usually in the car, or during a meeting, or some other time when I'm generally supposed to be otherwise engaged)
  2. I jot down notes, sketches, snippets of dialogue - whatever keeps me thinking of the idea
  3. I start to storyboard (I go into this process in further detail here), and depending on whether or not I have a deadline, I'll do this right away or take my time
  4. I back WAY the hell off
  5. I return to storyboarding
  6. Repeat steps four and five

Step 4 is what saves me from getting stuck in a story rut or getting bored or throwing shit in the story just to fill it out. I find that if I just physically leave my work, my mind kicks into gear and comes up with way better stuff than if I'd still been sitting there, staring at the paper. The same theory works for me when I draw my pages - if I'm getting bogged down, feeling uninspired, have no clue how to draw this next thing - LEAVE THE DESK. I go get some coffee or candy or let my cat attack me. As the Ghost Hunters say (that's right, I referenced them): When in doubt, get the hell out.

So whether your method is of the JK Rowling variety (I can't even fathom the amount of detail she has in her notebooks) or if you're like me and have trouble staring at Big Scary Story's Monster Face all at once, there is a method for you. I find the best way to keep yourself motivated is to lean toward your strengths. Do whatever you need to to keep yourself going and being excited about the idea. If you're no longer excited, switch gears and try something else. Or go let a cat attack you.

Webcomic Week Day 3

Webcomic Week Day 2

Webcomic Week Day 1

Webcomic Week Day 1: My Obsession With the Subject Matter

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I already mentioned in this post how I've been obsessed with Greek Mythology for a while now. I believe it started with this book:

And then it grew into an uncontrollable gorging every time I went to a thrift shop with a book section:

And peaked when I tagged along with my college's Ancient Studies Club to go to a trip to Greece in 2000.

Why was I so obsessed? Here's the thing. I was raised Catholic. Holy communion, weekly Mass, confirmation, awkward Sunday School taught by my father - the whole bit. And I knew I wanted to believe in some aspect of religion and myth and legend - just not all of it. Some parts were fun and story-tastic and awesome. Others, not so much. What I was really lacking in my religion was variety. All I saw were contradictions  - think this way but act another, strive for this even though you'll never ever get there, hate yourself, love everyone in theory but also judge them, etc. etc.

Then middle school and sixth grade English and Greek Mythology entered my life. Two elements getting it on, twelve titans, twelve Olympians, nine muses, three fates, three graces, three furies ... and a plethora of combinations and gods for every possible thing you were into. The more books and epic poems I read, the more I established my own opinion on what each of the gods were like. I kept trying to rationalize their behavior and give them personalities beyond what I'd read, so they'd fit into what I wanted them to be. It wasn't very difficult, which proves why they've stuck around in modern culture for so long.

  • Zeus - the lecherous dad. All-powerful, but also full of heart. Has a lot of trouble saying no - to women, children, and humans. The stepfather you'd like to have.
  • Hera - the politician's wife. Established and wise on her own, but continually forced to react to her husband's distracting and obvious affairs.
  • Poseidon - the brother who disowns his family. The stories say Zeus split up the world and gave Poseidon the seas and Hades the Underworld - I say he chose so he could cultivate his own world. He basically packed up and moved to the opposite coast from the rest of his family, so he could use that as an excuse for never visiting.
  • Hades - the younger brother who wants to do something "different" with his life. Hades is often painted as evil, bitter, and jealous of Zeus and Poseidon. In my mind, he made it seem like he got the short end of the stick when all he really wanted was to explore his dark side and be feared.
  • Athena - the daughter Zeus is so glad he had. Burdened with being the responsible one all the time, never allowed to cut loose and randomly murder a bunch of people like her siblings.
  • Ares - the son who's belligerent and starved for attention. He makes sure everything he does is loud and noticeable.
  • Hestia - the quiet homebody. She tends the fire, she respects home life. Therefore, no one wants to talk to her.
  • Demeter - the hippie mom. So distraught by what happens to her daughter Persephone that she's forced to become the overprotective mom she always had in her.
  • Apollo - the golden child. Zeus is eternally proud of him and he manages to rock the poet/artist that every woman (and man) lusts after. Chill, bright, his life is golden.
  • Artemis - Apollo's realistic twin, she sees shit how it really is, and knew long ago to pull the cord and go live in the forest with a bunch of ladies. Lesbian to the core.
  • Hermes - the fun-loving gossip. Got to deliver everyone's news and was clever enough to pull practical jokes on the other gods and not get murdered for it.
  • Aphrodite - everyone's favorite. Cynical, business-minded, but also kind of a sap.

So what do you do with all this lovely subject matter, which has already been tackled to death in every possible form wayyyy before you were born? You find some way to express your love and interest in it, using the tools at your disposal.

Tomorrow! Turning ideas and wishful thinking and a love of comics into story.

Scenes from my Favorite Books - Virgin Suicides

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Remember back a couple months ago when I said I was going to start drawing scenes from some of my favorite books in comic book form? And remember I only did a few pages from The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides, to start?

Guess what, I've finally inked them! Progress!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tried and Truly Obsessed

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I've mentioned I'm obsessed with Greek Mythology, right? Well, to celebrate the return of my much neglected webcomic, Gods & Undergrads, on Tuesday, September 27th, I'm posting some pictures of what I recently re-discovered on my last trip home. At one point, I was so nerdy that I drew each of the Greek Gods, taped them to my wall (complete with name tags and icons of their attributes), and organized them into a family tree.

(no, this isn't the last time I would do such a thing - certain college photo projects involving real people as Greek Gods would come later - but I DIGRESS ...)

Tried and Truly Obsessed

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I've mentioned I'm obsessed with Greek Mythology, right? Well, to celebrate the return of my much neglected webcomic, Gods & Undergrads, on Tuesday, September 27th, I'm posting some pictures of what I recently re-discovered on my last trip home. At one point, I was so nerdy that I drew each of the Greek Gods, taped them to my wall (complete with name tags and icons of their attributes), and organized them into a family tree.

(no, this isn't the last time I would do such a thing - certain college photo projects involving real people as Greek Gods would come later - but I DIGRESS ...)

Tried and Truly Obsessed

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I've mentioned I'm obsessed with Greek Mythology, right? Well, to celebrate the return of my much neglected webcomic, Gods & Undergrads, on Tuesday, September 27th, I'm posting some pictures of what I recently re-discovered on my last trip home. At one point, I was so nerdy that I drew each of the Greek Gods, taped them to my wall (complete with name tags and icons of their attributes), and organized them into a family tree.

(no, this isn't the last time I would do such a thing - certain college photo projects involving real people as Greek Gods would come later - but I DIGRESS ...)