step-by-step screen capture

I’ve always been intrigued by cultural social etiquette. What society demands in one arena, another culture may denounce in the same setting. It often makes both people uncomfortable as they struggle to keep up appearances. It also leaves the door open for the unscrupulous (or salacious) to take the advantage.

It’s funny sometimes to see what panels seem more polarizing in this (mostly) light-hearted adventure of mine. This week, I received my FIRST donation! Yahoo! Thank you very much. I am unsure wherether the Automaton panel instigated the spontanious show of support, but I appreciate it.

This week also marked my first (hate?) mail. Supposedly, I demean woman in my depictions of subjugated and objectified roles; like wind-up dolls, or miniaturized in the palm of male hands.

I replied that I also have men hanging from cages around women’s necks, and a female (furry) leader who is definitely not a toy in her agressive stance against foreign invaders. I also pointed out that wind-up girls are not my invention, and that they almost constitute a subgenre within the Steampunk community.

Somebody once said that polarizing issues make good reading, and that mediocrity grows in the grey shadows of the mundane. While I certainly do not wish to offend, it is my intent to explore using AG as an innocent “everyman” who tries to make sense of the strangeness of circumstance that surrounds him. I reserved the right to place him in almost any compromising position to make a point, get a laugh or sow a satirical smile.

Whew! glad I got that off my chest.

All of that being said, here are a few housekeeping items:

I fixed the site. Almost. The functionality is back. The look and feel is repaired, and reading and writing is working again. I am working on a few “behind the scenes” issues but the solution was easier to implement than I first supposed.

As an extra bonus: Here is a step-by step screen-shot of how my sketch progresses into a finished piece.

Thanks for reading!

Click for larger image

No, this is not a regular post. This is more of a sketchbook wandering. I found some scrap online that had an interesting look, and I wanted to turn her into a vamp kind of image. I really didn’t have a story in mind. I wanted to play. So I played and lost interest someplace in he middle. It’s not like vampires don’t interest me, but I am more of a dog person. I like werewolves. Anyway, after some frustrating wrestling with hand geometries and heart placement and some anatomy issues, I decided it wasn’t fun anymore. So it died on the vine. I post if for your enjoyment and as yet another mark proving that sometimes it just doesn’t come together.

Click for a larger view.

It makes sense to blog about the process, at least a little. I am not entirely sure I have a process. Is whim a process? My brain suddenly comes up with an idea. In order to make sense of it my brain often ties other ideas to it. Before you know it I have a concept with legs. From there I put together thumbnail sketchs, because, not all concepts with legs actually work on paper. Some concepts that I find laugh-out-loud funny are dead as bricks when they hit the reality of visual space. Some concepts I find incredibly deep often come off as stupid.

Be that as it may, I like to share my doodles, and when it comes down to it, posting more content can’t be a bad thing. And for those of you who are interested, you can see how a story goes from brain burp to cerebral yowl.

Click for a larger view.

My wife has a love hate relationship with this webcomic. She loves that I have something that I enjoy doing. She hates that is is a time sink of non-billable hours. Beyond that, She does not always embrace the obscure darkness that sometimes emerges with my digital wanderings. I do not censor myself. OK, that is not entirely true, I do censor somethings. But if it feels true, for whatever reason, I am less apt to yank it, just becasue it isn’t pretty.

After the great fairy butter debate. She requested a drawing that would not send my 6 year old to therapy. No half-dressed woman with an affinity for dirt and worms. No headless bipeds served for dinner.

“How about a mermaid?” I asked.

She looked at me with that “how are you going to pull that off?” stare.

So I started writing and searching for scrap. (reference material.) I had something down in words that I liked, but it started to get dark again. So I worked up a quick sketch.

What I have here is a box of problems. The look on the mermaid’s face is more akin to “yummy, appetizers!” than adoration. The man looks clueless. I found some good scrap on diving suits, but mermaids was a bit more difficult without scabbing somebody’s else’s work. I had some great underwater shots from a woman’s hair advert, that looked promising, but her body was going to cause me problems. How do you draw buoyant breasts? With as many comic books that I have read, you would think this would not be a problem. But I could tell it would be. Do I search the internet for buoyant breasts? I think not.

Also, as a PG strip, what would I cover said breasts with? Shells? I don’t think so. I was thinking of a combination of seaweed and barnacles. Which led me down a darker road again. Sort of a Davey Jones locker from Pirates of the Caribbean look. Again this was not going to a good place. Then there were issues with the tail, and mermaid anatomy, and the water that surrounds them and I said ENOUGH!

I ditched the sketch, and moved on to another idea. I just thought I would share that little adventure with you all. Not everything works. I could FORCE it to work, but that hardly seems fun.