Category Archives: Uncategorized

A Bold Triangle Mandala

Leave a reply
This mandala would probably appeal to hippie Jews. Also, hippie Rastafarians. Although in my experience that phrase is basically redundant.

This mandala would probably appeal to hippie Jews. Also, hippie Rastafarians. Although in my experience that phrase is basically redundant.

All weekend I kept telling myself, “I’m going to get 1 or 2 comics finished this weekend so that I’m not driving myself crazy trying to beat midnight deadlines after crazy days all week.” Friday night we actually got in early–10:30, which is an early Friday for us–and then spent 3 hours playing Words with Friends. OK, there’s still Saturday. No, Saturday we were frantically cleaning the house in expectation of some guests, and once they arrived we went out with them, and didn’t get back until 10:30 again, at which point I had other work to catch up on for the next 3 hours. But there was still Sunday: we only had brunch plans and then had the rest of the day free. Except I had to bring soup to a sick friend, and there were a lot of things to talk about with a lot of people, and now it’s after midnight, I’m still updating a mandala post, and so far I’ve got 3/4 of a script for tomorrow and nothing else.

Monday Mandala was a good idea, but it’s removed some of the urgency of Sunday nights.

I should have an article on Panels entitled, “3 Webcomics for People Who Find Kinky Sex Hilarious.” Will update later with link.

Dragon Comics 102

Leave a reply
In reality, no force in Equestria could have compelled Spike to return those birthday presents.

In reality, no force in Equestria could have compelled Spike to return those birthday presents.

This sequence amused me to no end. I’m hoping for another 3-strip inspiration over the weekend, but if it doesn’t come I might take some days off from blogging next week to get caught up on some writing projects, specifically a couple longform book reviews for the Best Children’s Books website and a couple of comic book articles for Panels. Plus, I’d like to start another big project I’ve been wanting to do for a couple years. I’ve set a deadline for myself on this one, so there’s a good chance that it will actually come together. Especially now that I’m learning Photoshop, ideas that seemed really complicated to execute feel much more manageable. Everything erases in Photoshop, and when you put things in the wrong place, you can just pick them up and move them. I wouldn’t even have to sketch out a separate rough draft.

Damselfly Mandala

Leave a reply
You might think these were dragonflies, but you'd be anatomically incorrect.

You might think these were dragonflies, but you’d be anatomically incorrect.

Dragonflies have dissimilar front and back wings, and keep their eyes close together. Damselflies have wings of the same size and keep the eyes on opposite sides of their head. Those are lily pads, though, with rippled water forming the outside edge of the mandala. It’s a cool shape, too. I’d like to do something that maintains the angles and proportions of this form as it expands, with the points and curves alternating and expanding.

Today was rather unproductive for me in general. After biking 3 miles to try West African food (goat soup and fufu cooked by a dude from Benin) for lunch, I took a salsa dance class and then ate chicken and waffles with The Man the Misseses Cat. Now it is very late and this blog still hasn’t been updated and nothing related to visual art will be accomplished today.

I wasn’t a complete waste of brain, at least. In between lunch and the salsa class I spent a lot of time working on my 4th essay for Panel.net, so I did write for a couple hours, but not with the focus that used to consume my writing. Still, I’m pretty excited about this one. My 3rd piece, “I’m Gay, Who’s My Dad?” came out today but did’t seem to get as much traction as the previous 2 pieces. I thought it was a pretty catchy title, but nothing. No comments, no likes, no tweets. But this next one should get a little more attention, I think. Anyway, it doesn’t matter, because I write for myself, of course. The only person who needs to approve of or get excited about my work is me.

But, you know, I do have meaningful things to say, to anyone who wants to listen.

Dragon Comics 76

Leave a reply
It's like deciding to ignore your lungs's need for oxygen.

It’s like deciding to ignore your lungs’s need for oxygen.

You know how you sometimes have these eye-opening dreams where everything seems infused with wonder and meaning and there’s some kind of message or idea you want to carry back to the real world but once you wake up and try to explain it to other people, even if you can actually remember the dream in its entirety, you still can’t communicate the deep and sublime feelings that it instilled in you as you slept? It’s like that.

My 2 guest essays ran on Panel.net in the last couple days: the first one is about world-building and the graphic novel Aya, and the second is about reading comic books to a blind person. It seems like people liked them and I will be writing more in the future. Pretty excited about that. I’ve also been trying to keep my book review blog updated. I probably only read about 2 adult books a month, but sometimes I read 10 or 20 kids’ books.

This week I have a bulletin board to create, too. Everything depends on whether I have to serve jury duty, though. Ug. I really believe in democracy and the right to a trial by jury, I just don’t like being personally put out to ensure that it happens. I hate the courthouse and I hate being awakened too early and I hate being bossed around and I hate being forced to sit in merciless plastic chairs in huge rooms packed full of strangers. Jurors should be allowed to serve online. I would be much less uncomfortable if I could watch a trial on my laptop in bed.

Dragon Comics 70

1 Reply
Opportunity, perception, whatever: opening doors...

Opportunity, perception, whatever: opening doors…

What a week. Too many plans, too much going on, not enough sleep. It makes me cranky. At least my splintered hands are 90% healed.

Today’s comic, as opposed to Monday’s and Wednesday’s, came off in record time, just over an hour for the entire thing, including the text. The only parts I had to think about were the hand on the door, and how dragon looks turning into the light. Used the model for that one! Speaking of which, I have a commission for a little clay model that must be completed soon. But first I have to write these essays about graphic novels for this other project. And then I’m making curtains for Mrs. and Mrs. Cat.

Plus this week I booked my first paying photo gig. People have been approaching me about photography work all year, for trade or for volunteer stuff, and especially since I started shooting DSL, but nothing ever came together before. This one looks definite. We’ll shoot half out in the desert and the other half in this stunning house belonging to a friend who lives in the suburbs.

Dragon Comics 67

Leave a reply
I thought you said don't go into the light.

I thought you said don’t go into the light.

And the light comes spilling in.

Feels a little like I’ve been stumbling around in the darkness myself. This comic is visually fairly simple, especially since I’ve been paying so much attention to light lately, but it took forever to draw, mostly because I haven’t been feeling all that spectacularly lately.

However, Dragon and the Blue Morpho Butterfly called Hope are rapidly approaching some sort of revelatory room, one that appears brilliantly illuminated.

Maybe tomorrow will be a brighter day.

Dragon Comics 48

3 Replies
Having trouble seeing clearly? Wondering if you need a new perspective on life? Try hanging upside down by the ankles to see things in a different way!

Having trouble seeing clearly? Wondering if you need a new perspective on life? Try hanging upside down by the ankles to see things in a different way!

Those who know me know I love being upside down. Before hurting my wrist, I spent a lot of time in handstand. Now I have a rather lovely inversion table that some strange person put by the dumpster at my friend’s condo, which said friend then retrieved and gave to me, because upside down! It decompresses your spine and fills your brain with blood. I find it very relaxing, although, apparently, many people find it terrifying.

I’ve joked about the Andy Kaufman test before; I always think my ideas are funny, and have no idea if other people will find them so. This comic cracks me up, but definitely ranks high on my list of ideas that I suspect will not amuse others to the same degree. See, Dragon thinks the pie in the face gag is hilarious, so hilarious that Dragon will willingly take a pie in the face. But Dragon doesn’t get a pie in the face. Instead, Dragon gets a small rainbow flag distraction while a robot arm ambushes Dragon’s ankle and hoists it into the sky. Meanwhile, the fox is still primarily concerned with the absence of pie.

OK, explaining it doesn’t help.

Either it’s funny, or it isn’t.

Kitties!

1 Reply
If your cat requires entertainment and Animal Planet does not capture its attention, you can always get a fish.

If your cat requires entertainment and Animal Planet does not capture its attention, you can always get a fish. This is a watercolor I did in my late 20s. I’d like to offer this design on a T-shirt.

I’m in mourning for my cat right now. Algernon was geriatric at 17, and he suffered from a rare slow-moving cancer called multiple myeloma, and, at the end he was deaf, and blind, and incontinent, but he was the best cat, absolutely full of devoted love. In fact, he was my husband’s cat, and had been since he was young. My husband had Algernon before he met his first wife, but once we moved in together, the cat decided to love me best. He would purr so loudly you could hear him from twenty feet away whenever I walked into the room. He used to sleep next to my head (he had his own pillow) and purr into my ear when I had a headache, and he would head butt me repeatedly if he didn’t get enough pets. He was also prone to tender love bites.

Fast cat

Fast cat

I can’t find the sketch I want to include here, of my friend’s imperious cat, Suna. I know it’s around somewhere, because it’s one of the nicest cat sketches I’ve ever done. Possibly, I gave the picture to my friend. Instead, here is a super-fast drawing I did on the Wacom tablet in a minute or two. I was trying to look at the proportions of a child’s body, and the cat was a convenient way in.

Another fast cat

Another fast cat

Cats make terrible subjects. While they may lie, unmoving, for hours a day, the second you try to sketch one, it will move. You have about fifteen seconds to limn a cat before it changes poses.

I miss him a lot. You were a good cat, Algernon.

I miss him a lot. You were a good cat, Algernon.

 

 

The Trickster’s Hat Part 5

Leave a reply

If you plan to apprentice yourself to Nick Bantock, you’ll need a lot of art supplies. I had most of them already, although I had to go out and purchase different types of paper at various points in the process, along with matte medium. There were a couple exercises that instructed readers to go to thrift stores and buy, essentially, junk, and something in me bristled at this. I was in the process of getting rid of junk and didn’t want to accumulate more.

You're simply much more likely to find unicorns and fairies than dragons and monsters on the knickknack shelf at Goodwill.

You’re simply much more likely to find unicorns and fairies than dragons and monsters on the knickknack shelf at Goodwill.

Still, I had intended to do every exercise, so I relented, and I’m pleased and amused with this one. Exercise 10 asked readers to find a cheap item that represented themselves (Bantock’s was a taxidermied skunk that had sat so long in a window it was bleached white) and mount it in a box with other items that seemed to go along. My diorama is conveniently situation within a cigar box, which I acquired, along with all the trimmings, at Goodwill.

box of me 2

For the purposes of this exercise, I am a pewter unicorn, sitting upon a mirror, surrounded by colored glass, mounted inside a wooden cigar box, with a playful tile roof. The unicorn is chill and so am I.