Tag Archives: Skook WIP

Skook WiP #58

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Good morning! I hope you’re doing well. It’s Friday and this is the newsletter.

These Days

Today is the first day of one of my vacations. I have a lot of complaints about working for the Post Office but the job has its advantages. We get paid days off, both sick days and vacation days. I didn’t use a lot of the vacation days during my first few years at the job so I’ve got a good stash of them. All unused sick days roll over from one year to the next. Vacation days roll over as well but only up to a point. Eventually you start to lose the days you don’t use. This year I’ve scheduled three weeks – this one that starts today, another one in the summer and a third in the fall. I’ll primarily use the time to do art and visit with friends. Given that there’s still a frikkin’ pandemic going on I’ll be doing more art than hanging out.

The longer I work for the PO the more vacation days become available and the more I will take. This is one of the benefits of having a union job. Yay unions!

Mugshots

This week’s process gif is of a couple of happy dragons. These critters are modeled on the Eastern version of a dragon. I like dragons in general but I have an extra fondness for the Chinese version. They’re more likely to share a cup of tea with you than set you aflame.

Dragons come in a variety of colors so I did a second version in red and green.

These designs are available on mugs in my Zazzle shop and lots of other schtuff in my Redbubble store.

Coming Attractions

I do most of my preliminary sketches on 8 1/2 by 11 cardstock. I scan them into my computer and covert the art to a blueline drawing, blow it up and then print it out on 11×17 bristol board for inking. Last week I ran out of bristol board and the local art supply shop didn’t have any available in my preferred size. I’ve got a new supply headed my way by slow FedEx but until it arrives I’ve been getting new designs sketched up on the cardstock. Here is a sample of them.

I hope your week goes well. Take care of yourself and those whose company you enjoy. Thank you for reading!

Skook WiP #57

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Happy Friday!

You’re reading the latest issue of the Skook Works-in-Progress Newsletter in which I ramble about … stuff … and show off some recent art.

These Days …

This week has been relatively uneventful.

I’ve been working half days at USPS to give my knee time to recover. It’s better than it was back in December but it’s still telling me that something is wrong. I’ll be seeing my orthopedist this morning to get a check up and have paperwork updated. Workman’s comp did not approve an MRI so I don’t expect that he will be able to tell me much new. Hopefully the updated paperwork will push Workman’s Comp into approving the procedure.

I have been without a regular vehicle for about two and a half months now. Every morning I come to work and check to see which routes are being broken up for delivery by the overtime folks. Then I check to see how many of those routes have vehicles available. The truck assigned to my route broke down at the end of October. It sat in the station’s parking lot for a month before Vehicle Maintenance finally took it away. It hasn’t been brought back yet. I heard that the engine needed to be replaced. Last week our new station manager asked where my vehicle was. When I told her she said she would call Maintenance and find out what was happening with it. I’ve had a couple of supervisors say they’d check too. My truck remains MIA.

Driving other routes’ trucks has provided me with lessons in hygene and organization. One look at my studio space will tell you that I am comfortable with a certain level of chaos. But that’s home. It’s my studio. No one uses it when I’m not there. I’m a lot tidier at the post office. I keep the shelves of my case clean, put my rubber bands away after I’ve organized the day’s deliveries, put the trays under the shelves and give all the missorts and undeliverable mail to clerks at the end of my shift. The only thing I would leave in my truck are few forms for vacant addresses and certified mail pick ups. I would always take my personal belongings home. I don’t want the next person who has to use my station or drive my truck to have to deal with mess.

Many of my fellow carriers seem to be comfortable sharing their messes with the other potential users of their truck. They leave food. They leave trash. They leave jackets and hats and satchels. They leave stacks of rubber bands. One guy has a selection of small tools stuck to his dashboard with magnets. I’m tempted to take photos.

Mugshots

Below is this week’s process gif. I am … hmmm … I was going to say, “Not a fan of clowns” but that’s not accurate. I like the idea of clowns. I like the idea of silly beings dedicated to making regular folks laugh. I feel bad that clowns are considered scary and creepy by so many people. I like the idea of putting on wild make up and ridiculus clother and going bonkers.

I just can’t remember ever laughing at (or with) a clown. A lot of clown humor is slapstick and slapstick doesn’t do much for me. I sympathize too much with the person getting the pie in their face or falling down the stairs to laugh at (or with) them.

Regardless, I don’t find clowns scary or creepy. Clowns just want to have fun. The world needs more fun. And lots of people deserve pies – in their faces.

This image is available on a mug in my Zazzle store and a variety of schtuff in my Redbubble store.

Full House

I did the design above last year for a client. He generously told me that I could use it for my own projects if I wanted. This week I spent some time coloring and expanding it so it would fit better on t-shirt and other schtuff. Yes, Halloween is always on my mind.

And that’s it for this week. I hope your days are pleasant and your nights are relaxing.

See you in February!

Skook WiP #54

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Hello and welcome to the first issue of the Skook Works-in-Progress newsletter for this year!

This is the seventh day of 2022.  I didn’t make any New Year’s resolutions. I haven’t done that in years. If I’m going to take on new habits I prefer to just take them on rather than wait for a specific date. I do plan projects based on dates and time frames. This newsletter, for instance, should run weekly throughout this year. I’ve found that having to post on a weekly basis inspires me to have something to post about – specifically to have some new illustrations or images to show off.

I’ve been running a couple of online stores since the end of 2020. I spent 2021 adding designs to both stores.Many of the designs were reworks of illustrations from my portfolio. Many more were original illustrations done specifically for the stores. As I added designs I started designing specifically for the products that were available. A design tends to work best if it is created with a specific product in mind. What works on a t-shirt may fit poorly on a phone case.

Mugshots

My favorite object to design for is a coffee mug. My big project this year is to create 52 new mug designs. And, because I think it’s fun to make and share process gifs (and because this is the Skook Works in Progress newsletter) I’ll be posting a process gif of new design in each issue here.

This week’s design is an abstract. Because … what the hell.

It’s available on mugs in my Zazzle Store. My chosen version is below. If that particular mug isn’t to your liking you have the option to move the design to other mugs or objects. If you have difficulty doing that just email me and I’ll be happy to help out.

This design is also available on a variety of schtuff in my Redbubble store.

These Days ..

I’m working at the post office again after a month off due to injury. I’m currently scheduled to work half days – that is four hour shifts. Before the injury I was working ten to twelve to thirteen hour days.

I had to look up the history of my knee problem in order to justify my downtime to workman’s comp and I was reminded that I first injured this leg back in June of last year. It’s gotten better and then worse again.

When I sit it feels fine. When I stand and walk it complains. The longer I stand and walk the more it complains. The x-rays have been inconclusive as to a cause. My orthopedist has requested an MRI. That will need to be approved by the insurance company. Hopefully they will decide they don’t need quite as much profit this quarter and they will give the okay.

Ten-Four Good Buddies

That’s it for this week. I’ll be working on other art and illustrations in additon to the mug designs. The mugs will be my regular feature. Other work, designed for other products and purposes, will get sprinkled in as I have time.

Take care of yourself. Be kind when you can. Punch a Nazi if you have the chance.

See you next week!

 

 

Skook WIP #17

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Open on: the Skookworks studio. The Cartoonist sits in front of his computer. He is typing. A black cat is slumped on his lap. It’s impossible to tell the time of day. The room has no windows. Two of the walls have built-in floor to ceiling bookshelves. The desk on which the computer sits is cluttered with scraps of paper and pens. The drawing table next to the computer is similarly cluttered but with a different variety of pens and pencils and the papers have more art on them.

The Salesman wanders in.

Salesman: “Hey.”

The Cartoonist doesn’t look up. Cartoonist: “Uhm?”

Salesman: “Did you listen to the Planet Money podcast about buying a superhero?”

The Cartoonist stops typing. He looks at the Salesman. Cartoonist: “Of course I did. We’re the same person. If you’ve done something, so have I.”

The Salesman rolls his eyes. Salesman: “For a guy with a lot of imagination you’ve got a narrow focus. Just pretend we’re two people so I have something to write about in this week’s newsletter.”

The Cartoonist rolls his eyes in exactly the same way the Salesman had done. Cartoonist: “I’m writing the newsletter while we’re talking. So keep talking.”

The Salesman frowns. Salesman: “Why isn’t the Writer writing the newsletter?”

Cartoonist: “We can only be so many people before I get confused. Let’s stick to the point. Or find one. What about the Planet Money thing did you want to talk about?”

Salesman: “What do you think?”

Cartoonist: “I think the Archie comics guy was right, Micro-Face is a terrible name.”

Salesman: “Not that. What do you think about us digging up our own public domain superhero?”

Cartoonist: “Another one? We’ve already got five. What do we need another for?”

Salesman: “All of our guys have been used by other people. Why not grab a more unknown character and use that?”

The Cartoonist stares at the Salesman. The cat yawns and adjusts its position slightly.

Cartoonist: “Having some recognition helps us doesn’t it? These characters all have some reputation outside my drawings. A more unknown character might as well be a completely new character.”

Salesman: “Have you at least looked at the Public Domain Superheroes catalog?”

Cartoonist: “I’ve looked there and at this list. It’s easy to get overwhelmed. There are thousands of characters listed. Lots of gods and goddesses from old myths. Lots of daring aviators. Lots of folks who wear masks to fight crime. Lots of Flash Gordon wannabes.It’s fun to look but it’s hard to get more than a glimpse at any one character.
And I think the public domain status of some of the characters is questionable. The lists were put together by fans not copyright lawyers. I’d rather not get inspired by some character, do up a bunch of designs and then get sued. That’s not fun.”

Salesman: “I’m just trying to figure out an angle to take to promote our work. It’s … weird.”

Cartoonist: “Isn’t that an angle. ‘Weird stuff’?”

Salesman: “There’s a lot of weird stuff online. I’m trying to figure out a more focused branding to use.”

The Cartoonist makes a crumpled up paper sort of expression. Cartoonist: “Do you have to use the term ‘branding’? Isn’t that outdated by now?”

Salesman: “I googled it before you typed my dialogue. It’s still in major use.”

Cartoonist: “I hate marketing catchwords.”

Salesman: “Deal with it. You’ve got to play the game to get rich.”

Cartoonist: “A. If we’re trying to get rich we’re going about it wrong. B. We’ve got a day job to pay the bills so we’re doing this for the fun of it.”

Salesman: “You’re doing this for the fun of it. I want us to be rich.”

Cartoonist: “You’re only a tiny part of our personality. The rest of us doesn’t care about being wealthy. Some parts of us are morally opposed to great wealth.”

Salesman: “The Mail Carrier wouldn’t mind retiring. Soon.”

Cartoonist: “He does have an exhausting job. And I would enjoy spending more time drawing.”

Salesman: “Right! So I’m trying to figure out a more focused branding for our merchandise. The stuff in our stores is all over the place. Cute cartoon animal greeting cards. The Mighty Nizz. Cthulhu stuff. One-off scifi and monster illustrations. I’m thinking we’d better off having a half a dozen more directed stores instead of a couple general ones.”

Cartoonist: “Have you wandered off the point? I thought we were talking about our superheroes.”

Salesman: ” …. Right. So we’re not going to revive some obscure public domain character?”

Cartoonist: “Not today. Our stores are a jumble because we just jumped in and started putting them together with what we had on hand. We’re past that stage now. I’m designing images for the available merchandise. I’m having fun. I’ve got plans for Stardust, Octobriana, the Heap, Fantomah and the Face.”

Salesman: “Are you doing new comics?”

The Cartoonist makes that crumpled paper sort of expression again. The cat hops off his lap and wanders out of the studio. Cartoonist: “Ask me that when the Mail Carrier has a long vacation. Comics take time and concentration and those are rare commodities in this studio. Meanwhile, I’m working on some fun designs.”

Salesman: “Fun designs that I’ll be able to sell?”

Cartoonist: “They’ll be designs I’d want to wear myself.”

The Salesman sighs. Salesman: “More weird and obscure things? You hate me, don’t you?”

These Days …

Happy Friday! Thank you for dropping by.

This issue is a shorter one, a bit of breather between finishing the greeting card conversions and starting discussing the next phases for the online shops.

It’s been a weird couple of weeks. If you read my last newsletter you know that we (me, my wife and our housemate) have been quarantined because our new housemate is recovering from covid. The responsible thing to do after exposure is to stay away from other people for 14 days. So no work outside the house. No delivering mail.

Last week I was in a bad mood. I like my routines. This wasn’t in my plans. It wasn’t a vacation. I may have complaints about the number of hours I work at USPS but working there gets me the paycheck to fund the rest of our life. Not going to work makes me nervous. Not going to work because there’s a potentially deadly disease in my living space adds to that discomfort.

This week I was in a lighter mood. Our housemate has been getting better. Neither Sarah nor I have had any symptoms of covid.

I’ve been able to use the home time to get a lot of designs completed for my shops. Chemo, the black cat, has been acting as my executive assistant. He was waking me up at 3 am before quarantine and he has continued to do so now. Most of the new work is available now in my Redbubble store. I’m really happy with how the new stuff has been turning out. I’m enjoying the challenge of creating images that both suggest stories and look good on t-shirts (and mugs and blankets and shower curtains and phone cases and ..). I will be showing the process steps for each design in upcoming newsletters.

We’ve been rearranging the space a bit so our new housemate has room for her own stuff and has a place to work on her paintings. We’ve been giving away furniture. Chemo and the new grey cat, Flax, have been getting along.

We plan to all get tested for covid tomorrow or Sunday. Assuming we’re clear I’ll be back delivering mail next week. I’ll be getting my second Pfizer vaccine the week after that.

Yay.

I hope that things in your world are looking bright. If you need to wear shades, put them on. Everyone looks cooler in shades.

See you next week!

Skook WIP #16

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Another town, another train.
Nothing lost and nothing gained.

No. Wait. Those are lyrics from an ABBA song.

Another Friday, another newsletter
Nothing to read is ever better. 

There’s a good way to get started.

Welcome to the sixteenth issue of the Skook Works in Progress newsletter. It’s been a more eventful week than I would have preferred. I would prefer to just stay home and draw and occasionally hang out with friends. This week … I had to stay home and draw and avoid people for the good of humanity.

But we’ll get to that after the pictures.

Greeting Card Conversions

The following are the last examples of my before (scans of hand drawn and colored art) and after (digitally edited and updated) greeting card designs. I did the first versions of most of these back in 2013. I did more than fifty of them and these are the final designs that needed updating. The current versions are all available for purchase in my Zazzle shop.

Everyone Needs a Hobby

There are so many uses for a chainsaw other than carving up random tourists for the family sausage business. Carving sculptures is one creative one. I hear you can use them to cut down trees as well.

Chainsaw sculptures can be used to decorate the grounds of your family sausage business and attract more tourists! Marketing is everything!

Working for Bones

What’s in your lunch box?

Or is it a lunchbox? Is a really a suitcase filled with extra socks? A carrying case for an unusual musical instrument? A kit bag for a cat assassin? Is he a good boy or a bad boy?

Any Other Friday

If Friday the 13th is your day for chopping up horny teenagers, what do you do with the other 51.2 Fridays that don’t fall on the 13th day of the month? And what do you do on the other six days of the week?

You could garden. You’ve got more tools at your disposal than just a machete. Gardens are good places to dispose of bodies and said bodies can enrich the soil.

Cognitive Dissonance

Most people seem to hate clowns. Most people seem to like cats. What happens when you combine the two?

You get the apocalypse of course. Or maybe you just get a sardine custard pie in the face.

Yumm.

Shall We Dance?

Of course we shall. Any other answer is the wrong one.

Dance at dawn. Dance in the afternoon. Dance on into the night.

HOOOOOOO?

Last week I said I’d be designing a calendar featuring the Mighty Nizz for 2022. Zazzle has a template that looks like it will work for the project. There will be twelve full page illustrations. Maybe thirteen if I use a different image on the cover. It is, of course, a work in progress.

The above image is my process gif for the first illustration I completed for the project. The calendar will probably only be available through Zazzle. If you’d like to have Nizz staring at you before then, she and her feathery friends are available now on a variety of merch in my Redbubble store.

These Days …

Bleah.

We have a new housemate. She’s here a little earlier than we planned. Officially she wasn’t going to move in until May. She stayed here for a week last month to be sure that her cat and our cats could get along. The visit was success. Flax and Chemo and Sabe reached cat detente and even worked their way up to some moments of playful interaction.

We thought the new housemate would be able to move in during April, being here completely by May 1st. She had some medical problems that she couldn’t put off that made moving her stuff and cleaning the apartment too much to manage so things got delayed for a month. She was getting those problems handled when she started to get sick in unplanned ways. The kind of sick where one loses ones sense of smell and taste. Where one coughs a lot.

She got tested and came up negative for covid.

She got sicker and was having a hard time taking care of herself and her cat. So we offered to have her stay here until she felt better. No biggie. It wasn’t as if she had the plague.

Except she was having constant coughing fits. So we took her to the emergency room. Where they diagnosed her as having covid.

That happened Saturday night. We’d been wearing masks to avoid catching her cold or flu so we had some protection. On Sunday Sarah and I went to an urgent care to see if we could get tested for covid. Sarah got her second dose of vaccine Thursday morning last week. I got my first on that afternoon. The urgent care folks said we would need to wait five days to get tested and that our vaccines wouldn’t be fully effective until two months after the second dose. Probably. New virus. New treatment. Not enough history to be certain of anything really.

Our housemate has her own bedroom and bathroom. Quarantining her is relatively easy. We’ve got masks and gloves. I called in covid to USPS. I have plenty of sick days and no one wants a possible plague carrier in the station so there was no argument.

I’ve spent a good part of the rest of this week in bad mood. I have a better understanding of why some people are lousy at plague safety. I feel fine. I don’t think I’m sick. I didn’t do anything to try to get the plague. I’m just helping a friend. Shouldn’t I get to just keep on with life as normal? Shouldn’t I be able to go to work and hang out with the rest of the world? Why should I be inconvenienced when I’m healthy?

In general I place being responsible to and for others over following my whims. I also know that shit happens even when you’re being careful. So I may be grumpy but I’m grumpy about the situation. I’m grumpy about the culture and the systems that have allowed (even encouraged) the current mess.

I’ve also been getting a lot of artwork done. It’s the sort of art that takes advantage of being cranky. Bonus!

Our housemate’s health has been improving. When she was at the emergency room she got a dose of the drug cocktail that the 45th President had received. It seems to have helped, as have the various meds and vitamins she’s been taking since. Her cat and our cat are getting along. Sarah has been very patient with both our housemate’s needs and my attitude.

We’ll be in the weeds for a bit yet but we’re forging ahead.

Thank you for dropping by. I hope you are doing well. I hope you are healthy. I hope you are in a good mood. If not, I hope you’re able to use your mood for something that will give you satisfaction down the line. See you next Friday!

Skook WIP #14

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It’s Friday. You’re where you are. I’m where I am. This newsletter connects us for a moment. Thank you for stopping by!

Greeting Card Conversions

As usual, we start with before and after versions of some greeting card designs. The after versions will be available in my Zazzle shop. Normally they are already uploaded by the time I send out this newsletter but … squirrel!

Speaking of Squirrels

Joy + Noise = Music.

Truth.

A little extra color just makes it shine.

Hip to be Square

Good god, I’m dating myself by quoting that song.

It wasn’t true then. It’s not true now. It’s hip to be hip. Being square puts you in a corner.

Dress for success. Dress for excess. Dress to impress. But, please, dress!

And the Award for Best Best Goes to …

Sometimes you just need a prize, an award, an acknowledgement that you did it, you made it, you’re still here. And if you’re fine today, then someone else can use it. Share the love and the kudos and the huzzahs and the cake!

Especially share the cake!

A Relaxing Cup of Tea

I like the idea of sitting down and drinking a nice warm cup of tea. Of just letting the world take a pause.

I really should try it sometime.

Joyful Noise

This is the first design created specifically for my online shops. Because I have this newsletter I thought to scan each step in the process.

Most of my design start with a sketch. I use a non-photo blue pencil to do the rough sketching.

Once I’ve figured out the basic design I use an HB lead pencil to finish the sketch. I scan it into Photoshop and use a filter to remove the blue lines.

I then convert the pencil drawing into a blueline drawing and print it out at a larger size. The original was done on 8.5×11 cardstock. The second version is on 11×17 bristol board.

I ink over the blueline and then add shading. Sometimes I shade with greytone markers. Sometimes, as in this case, I just use an HB pencil. I scan this version into Photoshop, remove the blueline and start coloring.

Voila!

Here’s a process gif. It’s not real without a process gif.


This design is available on a beer stein in my zazzle store and on many, many other things in my redbubble store.

These Days …

Each week is a juggling act of attention and action. The day job and the Sarah get my attention first. Then it’s chores and art and writing and marketing and goofing off. This week I was having so much fun working on art projects that writing and marketing got mostly ignored. As did some chores.

I will show off the art in weeks to come. The chores you can imagine for yourself. I will have more to say next week.

Thank you for visiting. Stay well. Get your shots. Pet a cat. Give a compliment. Look out for each other.

See you next week!

Skook WIP #13

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Thirteen weeks into 2021. Sixth day of the week. Pictures to look at! Words to read! Yay!

Greeting Card Conversions

In which I present a scan of an original hand drawn, hand colored image and then the digitally cleaned up and edited version of the image that is available as a print on demand greeting card in my Zazzle shop.

Better Than Impossible

“When pigs fly” is an expression to indicate an event that will never occur. Silly cynical people. We live in the future now. Flying pigs and talking cats and vacations on Venus are right around the corner!


Once pigs get off the ground, other gravity challenged species will demand equal time. All sorts of critters will fill the skies. Birds will complain. Strict demarcations will be made in our airspaces to prevent collisions. This is not an anarchist future. It’s a future with rules!

Or maybe it’s just a fun greeting card design.

The Fast and the Really Slow

Sloths spend so much time hanging upside down that their fur grows in downward pattern from their bellies. They spend so much time being still that there are species of algae that have evolved to grow in their fur. Sloths are not speedy creatures. Not in modern times.

In the past there were giant sloths that lumbered on the ground and tore up termite mounds without seeking permission from the builders. There were sloths that lived in the ocean. Sloths can adapt. Sloths can dream of speed.

“When sloths caballerial” may describe an impossible event today but tomorrow? The possible lives in tomorrow.

Spring is Sprung

The seasons have changed. There’s less cold. More sun. More color. More bunnies. All you have to do is look.

You will need to be very patient if you want to see them in their spring fashions. They don’t get dressed up for just anyone.

Squeezebox in the Night

What is that music? It’s 2 am. I want to sleep not dance. I don’t need infectious rhythms pulling me to feet inspiring me to boogie. Go to bed you annoying noturnal critter!

In the future the raccoons will wander through our ruins and give thanks to the ancients who left them such fascinating trash. Then they will dance and sing and give thanks for their clever thumbs that have allowed them to rule the world.


Designing Fantomah

I thought that coming up with “my” version of Fantomah would be easy. She’s a blue nature goddess with a skull face. It’s pretty simple design. I’ve drawn her a few time before and had fun. I assumed the main challenge would be adapting Fletcher Hanks’ original design into a version that was comfortable for me to draw on a regular basis.


Her skull face is fun to draw. As with all his characters Hanks gave her a limited set of expressions. I like sketching a range of emotions. Her hair in the original comics is long with a series of tight curls. She does have awesome magic powers so maybe she uses them to style her hair. I tried doing curls the first times I drew her. This time I tried drawing her hair as if it were always floating, constantly twisting and turning.


I ran into problems when I started thinking about her dress. She’s wears a black cocktail dress. Why does she wear a black cocktail dress? Why does she, a jungle goddess, wear a black cocktail dress in the frickin’ jungle?

I know, I know, a blonde, caucasian jungle goddess is already a problematic figure, why do I care about her outfit? I’ll get back to that blonde, caucasian part in a minute.

I like the main design in the above sketch but it’s a very different look for Fantomah. It’s more goth superhero. I think that if I’m going to take an existing character I should at least start with a version that’s close to the original. It also looks … warm. Aren’t jungles hot?

The two smaller sketches are inspired by ancient Egyptian fashion. I wasn’t satisfied with them either. Egypt is located in Africa but it’s more desert than jungle and I don’t know enough about ancient Egyptian culture to appropriate it for an imaginary vengence goddess.


I settled on a black dress with simple straps. Is it still a cocktail dress?  Probably. It somehow seems different to me than the original version but I can’t tell you why.

The unskulled faces are possible versions of Fantomah’s human alter ego. I working from the idea that the version in the original comics is a sop to its white American readership, that Fantomah is herself African. As yet I don’t have an origin story for her. It will come. My brain seems to think up ideas without me having to work at it much. They aren’t always good ideas of course. And ideas by themselves are just seeds. There are great stories and fun characters who were born from bad ideas.


These Days …


I did not wake up at 1:30 am this morning with a cat pawing at my face to tell me that it was time to feed him.

There is currently no cat at my feet staring up at me in order to get me to check that the food dish has fresh food in it.

For the last seven years we’ve shared our apartment with two cats, Chemo and Sabe. Sarah picked them up at an animal shelter in 2014. Chemo was a kitten. Sabe was a full grown cat that, supposedly, had lived with an elderly woman who had passed away. Supposedly he was not a friendly cat. Sarah put the kitten in the same room with him. He didn’t exactly play with the kitten but he wasn’t upset either. Sarah thought he just seemed tired and needed a home.

Chemo and Sabe got along fine.

Chemo grew into a big cat, bigger than Sabe, but Sabe was always his boss.

We shared our place with a housemate and her cat, Toulouse, for a few years. The cats all got along. As you can see.

Sabe died on Wednesday. We’d taken him to the emergency vet on Tuesday night. He’d had a massive seizure. They had kept him overnight in hopes that they could get help him. I called in the morning to check on him and they reported that he was doing well, considering. I went to work. We’ve been short carriers a lot recently and I didn’t want to stick anyone with carrying my route if I didn’t need to. I’m an optimist. I thought Sabe would hang on and I’d be able to bring him home in the evening.

No.

He had a heart attack about mid day.

We knew his time was short. He had kidney problems. We’d treated him with subcutaneous fluids for a few months but he got tired of the process and refused to participate. He got thinner. He seemed to have a harder time getting comfortable.

He was a good cat. He spent a lot of time in the window watching the world. I was the one he expected to fill the food dish. Sarah was the provider of laps for his naps. We had to be careful not to leave the front door open because he’d try to get out. When he did he never went far. He just seemed like he wanted to feel the world that he saw from the window.

There’s a ravine behind our house. It’s full of all sorts of wild things. I tucked his body in a sheltered spot a short distance down the incline. Nature will claim it.

His spirit goes where it wishes now. We miss him. I’m glad for the time we had.

Skook WIP #11

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Today is March the 12th, 2021. Friday the 12th. One day away from being a Friday the 13th. Supposedly the 13th is a day for bad luck. I’ve only experienced one bad luck Friday the Thirteenth. That was back when I was 16 on a bicycle tour of Europe. I got lost. I got into an accident that required replacing my back wheel. I was grumpy and frustrated. I was also in Europe with friends so, in retrospect, it wasn’t that bad a day. Perspective is everything.

Today is also the fifth day of my Long Week. Because of rotating days off mail carriers have a six day work week once every five weeks. That week is bookended by a three day weekend at the beginning of the week and a two day weekend at the end. After seven years at USPS I’ve gotten used to it. Of course I complain about it. I am human. Humans complain. It’s in the handbook.

Tomorrow is Saturday the 13th. Since it’s the last day of my Long Week it seems like a lucky day to me.

Shall we get started?

Greeting Card Conversions

Once again – before (scans of the original hand drawn and colored illustrations) and after (digitally cleaned up, edited and ready to print) versions of greeting card designs. The after versions are available in my Zazzle shop.

Let it Snow!

I love the idea of snow. Here in Seattle it only takes a little snow to shut the city down. But I still have to go work. So I don’t love the reality of snow.

That’s okay. This mouse isn’t me. He’s enjoying himself!

Forget the cold. Forget the wet. Enjoy the miracle of fluffy frozen water drifting down from the sky!

A Master of the Feather Duster

Armed with a feather duster, Jeeves attacked the disorder and entropy of the house. Armed with dry wit and keen observation Jeeves deflated the egos of his “masters”.

Jeeves is unflappable. Mess not with the Jeeves.

A Room with a View

Available soon: one room, great views, very cozy, perfect for writer or monk or other single hermit. Current occupant is a working mother who is looking forward to stretching her wings and getting away from it all.

The mother will be taking her children with her. Some redecorating may be necessary.

Eight Arms to Hug You 

Love is whatever you make with whoever will make it with you. Love can happen at the beach or the bottom of the sea. Love is a word. A gesture. A look. Love is vast and may have suckers.

Love is where you look for it. Love is where it looks back. Love is love is love.

Bigfoot Boogie

Sasquatch are generally solitary creatures. Mostly quiet. Mostly keeping to themselves. Once in a while they feel a need to be social and loud. You won’t hear them. They know how to be loud a long way from human ears.

Most human ears anyway. They consider the Mighty Nizz to be, if not exactly a Sasquatch, different from those critters that only see a forest for the number of trees they can slaughter.

The above is a process gif of one my Mighty Nizz illustrations. The final illustration is available on all kinds of stuff in my Redbubble store. Plug. Plug.

Defining Octobriana 

Octobriana is 50 years old this year. I first met her as supporting character in The Adventures of Luther Arkwright back in the early Nineties. Her first published appearance was in 1971 in Octobriana and the Russian Underground. Her original adventures can be read here. Supposedly she was the creation of a group of Soviet artists and writers in the 1960s. She wasn’t. That’s a hoax. But it’s a story that gives the character an attractive background and it inspired quite a few comic book artists to use her in new stories in the following decades.

I’ve drawn her in my sketchbooks a few times over the years. I included a couple of illustrations of her in my 2019 daily drawing project. One of those is now gracing a coffee mug in my Zazzle store. She seems like she’d be fun to use for other merchandise so I set about doing development sketches.


My version of Octobriana is more conservatively dressed than most other depictions. I’m a fan of dressing comfortably. That boob bandana she is usually shown wearing just doesn’t seem practical, especially in a fight. Octobriana has magic powers and deadly combat skills. Maybe she also has superior sartorial sorcery?

That’s a question I didn’t try to address in these sketches.


Part of the fun of drawing Octobriana is that she’s angry almost all the time. Well, maybe not angry, maybe passionate is a better term. She’s a revolutionary. Revolutionaries have got to have strong emotions to keep going. Octobriana stares into the abyss and laughs.


What will I be doing with Octobriana?

Eh. I don’t know. Part of my creative process is to (re)invent a character first and then find a place for them. In the process of trying to write this part of the newsletter I came up with a new backstory for Octobriana that ties into a few of my other imaginary mythologies. Once she was Nurri Kala, child of the caverns, daughter of Surrilana, Blessed of the Blue Flame, priest of Shub Niggurath, citizen of Carcosa, Devil Woman of the Endless Revolution. All that is a bit too complicated to fit on a coffee mug.

These Days …

The house is quiet. It’s been quiet for a week. Thing One and Thing Two have moved on to better places.

No, they aren’t dead! They’ve literally moved somewhere else.

Names have been changed to protect the innocent and to laugh at search engines. The Thing One and Thing Two designations come from Dr. Suess’s The Cat in the Hat. I’m sure you know the story.

Thing One came to us a year and a half ago. “Came to us” sounds effortless. It wasn’t. Thing One is one of Sarah’s young cousins – 22 at the time of acquistion. Sarah had been in contact with some of her cousins in Texas. A group of them was homeless and she had been trying to help them out, not an easy thing to do given the distance and our minimal resources. He and Sarah had struck up a friendship via text and messenger. He was living in and around Spring, Texas. He was friendly and had spent some time caring for elderly relatives when he was younger. Sarah has medical issues that have made her eligible for in home caregiving. The agencies in charge of supporting caregivers advocate making family members caregivers whenever possible. Sarah had had one caregiver that she’d really liked and a number that hadn’t been good fits. Her favorite caregiver was needing to return to her home country for a while so Sarah got approval and offered the job to Thing One.

That was the easy part. One had lost his ID. He had no bank account. He had a cellphone for communication and not much else. You can’t get on a plane without an ID. You can’t get an ID without a mailing address. It took months of wrangling to get him an ID and onto a plane. It was his first plane ride. He’d never been out of Texas before. He arrived in Seattle in September, 2019.

He spent the first year sleeping on a couch in our library/studio. He got certified as a caregiver in Washington and got a regular salary. He cleaned and cooked and helped Sarah with physical therapy.

In August, 2020 our housemate moved out and we rearranged things so One got his own room. Less than a month later we acquired Thing Two.

Thing Two came to us from Spokane in Eastern Washington. She was 20 years old and she says she’d never been out of Spokane. She was part of group of friends that Thing One had bonded with online. One of her parents had just been arrested for assaulting her and Thing One thought she needed rescue. He convinced a neighbor friend to give him a ride to Spokane and bring her back. Yeah, we agreed to it. We believe in helping people when we can. She and Thing One shared his room.

There was drama. Drama with exes. Drama within their online groups. We didn’t see most of it. It happened online and over the phone with people in other states. They mostly kept to their room. Eventually things got heated enough that the Things needed to go. Thing Two went to Pennsylvania to live with friends on February 25th. Thing One went to live with loved ones in Texas on March 5th.

I had hoped that, in living with us, they would have the chances to build up their resources (mental and economic) so that when they moved on they would be better off than when they arrived. And they were better off. They went to places that are a better fit for them. We’re told to live by the Golden Rule: “Do to others what you would have them do to you”. That’s a good start, but one that doesn’t take the other into account. A more compassionate rule is: “Do to others how they would want done to them”. That one is harder because it requires communication and observation. It requires that I am able have honest, revealing conversations with the other person and that I am able to observe their actions and way of being in the world enough to be able antipicate their needs and wants. It requires time and patience. It requires communication skills that I’m still trying to develop.

The world that existed for me in my twenties doesn’t exist for the Things. Their home lives were very different  from mine. They have a neurodivergencies that I hadn’t really heard of at their age. It’s common to complain that “kids these days” spend too much time on their phones but cell phones didn’t exist when I was their age. Neither did the internet. I’d keep thinking about what I would be doing at their age in their situation and I’d have to keep reminding myself that my experiences couldn’t be used to fit their situation. Economics were different. I didn’t live through a pandemic.

So we gave them a place to stay and regroup. We made sure they got fed. We tried to pass on the knowledge and wisdom that we thought would help. The Things are intelligent. They are generally kind and honest. Thing One is creating a family with people his own age. Thing Two is living with people who were expecting her. I’ve lived long enough to guess the problems that they will face. I wanted them to be better prepared for the world before they left. But they are not me and they have their own experiences and mistakes to learn from. I wish them well.

I wish y’all well as well. I hope that your loved ones treat you as you wish to be treated and you can talk about it when they don’t. I hope you are able to do the reverse with them. See you next week!

Skook WIP #10

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Well hello! It’s a delight to see you again! The constant insanity of the modern civilization doesn’t seem to be infecting you at all!

Me? I’m okay. There are been some bumps in the road but whether those bumps are problems or high points is something I’m still figuring out. I’ll talk about those next week when they are more sorted out. This week, let’s just talk about some art. We’ll start, as usual, with some greeting card conversions, before (scans of ink, colored pencil and marker drawings) and after (digitally cleaned up and edited) versions. (The final designs are available in my Zazzle shop.)

Carving Your Face

In America, Halloween is the season for giving faces to oversized, hollowed out squashes. This is, apparently, an evolution of an old European traditon of carving faces into hollowed out turnips. A long series of films to the contrary, it is not a season for killing teenagers. Killing teenagers is frowned upon by all right thinking people. If you’ve been thinking about killing teenagers, please consider carving pumpkins instead.

Admittedly, killing teenagers will give you more cardiovascular exercise. However, most teenagers are actually more entertaining when they are alive than otherwise. Pumpkins are much more entertaining as objects to carve than teenagers. Plus, you can roast the seeds for a tasty snack!

There are No Weak Kittens

One day Sarah, my fabulous wife, described herself as feeling “weak as a kitten”. That comment inspired this card design. She has the original.

That original was done on a sheet of 8.5×11 folded in thirds. For the version that’s in my shop I had a lot of fun moving and reorienting the elements to fit a standard 5×7 greeting card design. Climb those curtains baby!

A Bit of a Breeze

There you are, walking with your umbrella, staring at your feet, thinking out what you’re going to have for lunch, trying to keep dry and suddenly …

The wind gives you a new perspective!

The world is suddenly a much bigger place. So many colors! So many birds! So much moss on people’s roofs!

Love Is …

Time is short. Spend as much of it on the things that bring you joy in the company of those you love.

A little peace and some cuddling makes the chaos of the rest of the day so much more bearable.

Hail to the King!

Photoshop is a massive program and my knowledge of it is actually pretty minimal. I know how to do a few things fairly well but the program can do so much more than I use it for. Lately I’ve been practicing making gifs of my illustration processes. I save my work in layers so making gifs is fairly easy. This process gif is of one of my King in Yellow portraits.

Influences – Chuck Jones

Chuck Jones is the one of the first film directors I remember identifying. I didn’t really know what he did, I just knew I liked his cartoons more than most of the other cartoons I saw on television. The short cartoons were funny. The smart characters outwitted the buffoons. The drawings were attractive.
As an adult I can identify why I liked Jones’ work more than other cartoon short directors. His character designs are a mix of angles and long curves. His heroes were the smart guys. They succeeded by being more clever than their adversaries. When the clever ones crashed it was usually from failing to think out the ramifications of their latest plan. (Hello Wile E. Coyote!)

I saw most of his work on television. There was the regular Bugs Bunny show on Saturday morning and during the week there were blocks of cartoons that played on a local station in the afternoons. There was The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Horton Hears a Who. Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. He drew a comic strip that ran in our local paper for awhile. I loved the art but it didn’t really stand out from the other strips. Jones was a master at motion and timing in film. His strip looked good but didn’t have the space to play to his strengths.


My Moe and Detritus/Misspent Youths comics owe a lot to Jones. The heroes (mostly) succeeded by being smarter than the bad guys, by being (mostly) calm in the face of chaos. Hell, I owe a lot of my personality to Jones. I got bullied and picked on as a kid. He gave me examples of characters who faced bullies and survived (and thrived) by being more rational and much weirder than their foes.

Model Sheeting the Super-Wizard

Last week I posted concept sketches and a model sheet process gif of the Heap. This week I’m posting concept sketches and a process gif of Stardust the Super-Wizard. (Superwizard? Super Wizard?)

The first thing I realized as I started sketching Stardust is that, in the original comics, his expressions were pretty much the same from panel to panel. They ran the gamut from stern to slightly more stern. I spent all of two seconds considering making my version of Stardust just as stoic and blank faced as the original before deciding, “Nah. That’s no fun!”


The original Stardust seems to be a giant – taller than regular humans. I made him about ten feet tall, lanky and stretched out. He’s a space wizard. Maybe he grew up in zero gravity. Maybe he grew up on a planet with lighter gravity than Earth. Maybe his practice of superscience has transformed his body. I’ll figure it out later.

Expressions!

I updated Stardust’s outfit slightly, more for the fun of it than because there was anything wrong with the original. I don’t question the fashion choices of technosorcerors.

That guy in brown standing behind Stardust? His name is Bill. He’ll be in most of the model sheets for size comparison. He claims he’s 5’10” but, you know guys, he may be exaggerating somewhat. He is on the taller side of average. The average height for men in the USA is 5’9″. Since I’m an American that’s the height I’m conditioned to think of when I have to think “taller than” or “shorter than” average when designing characters.

What do I plan to do with Stardust? When I know I’ll tell you!

These Days …

“Bad art is forever.”

I have a friend who likes to quote that when talking about why he noodles on all his projects and has abandoned many altogether. I get that. I want to be proud of the work I produce. I want it to be the best it can be. I’m also plagued with more ideas and images and thoughts than I will ever get down on paper. I plan the work. I do the work. I fix glaring mistakes. I resist noodling. I put it out in the world and leave it to the world to judge whether it is good or bad.

I will always see the faults in my work. Most creative folks can tell you everything that sucks about their work before they can point out what’s good. But art, good and bad, exists in interaction between the work and the audience. Once I put art into the world it’s no longer completely mine. I retain the copyright and the trademark but the interpretation? The judgment of goodness, badness, coolness, greatness? That belongs to the audience. And that’s great! Not because the creator is a bad judge of their own work (although they often are, both rightly and wrongly) but because humans are social animals and art is part of the conversation we have with each other.

I got an email recently about Misspent Youths, a comic book series I created back in 1991.

Hi, there! I just wanted to let you know that I’ve been a fan of Misspent Youths for a while now–since they came out, actually, when I was a disgruntled and disaffected teenager working in a comic shop. The shop I worked at brought them in and I snatched them off the shelf eagerly whenever they arrived, but for whatever reason (it might have involved the store eventually going under; it’s kind of hard to remember) I never got to read Issue #5. Flash forward three decades and my original copies have long since vanished into the aether and I’m in lockdown halfway across the continent from my hometown. Regardless, I got a hankering to read Misspent Youths again and found a set on eBay for a reasonable amount, so I ponied up my money and waited. Well, they arrived today and I couldn’t be more pleased. I’ve read the first issue again so far and it’s just as great as I’d remembered it (and captured much of the flavour from my hometown’s punk scene in the ’90s (minus the Pile and the cop homicide (though we sometimes wished it were otherwise)). Interesting characters, fun dialogue, compelling story–just great  all around. In any case, I just wanted to shoot you a quick line to let you know that those comics you put out all that time ago imprinted on and have stuck with someone since they came out, and I’m thrilled to finally be able to read the entire series through for the first time. Thank you very much for the quality read.

I thanked the author, Chris Eng, for writing, saying –

Your email made my day. I’m delighted that, thirty years later, someone would track down issues of Misspent Youths. I hope issue five was a good read!

He replied:
Issue five was, weirdly, really touching. I mean, it did bring back the shitty kitchen job I had in my teens (where I put up with the first of many exploitative managers but thankfully not a hostage situation), but the issue in general was a nice coda on the (too) brief tales of Detritus and Moe (and all of the other assorted and endearing members of the cast of characters). The series in general summed up my time in my hometown’s punk scene: all of us living as best as we could and looking out for each other while scraping bottom. Good times all round. (Also, can I just say that I would have loved to have seen Detritus and Moe in Bugtown? That would have been a hell of a story. I’m imagining the bizarre and intense meeting between Detritus and Hiroshima. Or the Pile jamming with the Bulldaggers.)

His letter did more than make my day, it made my week. I loved doing Misspent Youths. I loved the characters. Doing that book was fun and exhausting and satisfying and … unprofitable. The publisher didn’t make any money. I certainly didn’t make any money. I did draw 160 pages of comics in about a year while working a part-time job. Brave New Words (the publishing company – they also put out the first four issues of Oz Squad) put out more issues of Misspent Youths than any other series they printed. Cancelling the series was a mutual decision – the guy behind Brave New Words was reassessing his business plan and I wanted a break to improve my art skills. I’d planned to pick the series up again, to publish it myself.

Other things happened instead. My drawing skills did improve. I drew the Misspent Youths characters in some calendars that got printed at Kinkos and sold to friends. I got married. I moved from Santa Rosa, California to Seattle, Washington. My wife and I tried running a publishing company and put out few anthology magazines. I worked in a couple bookstores and as an office manager and now as mail carrier. In the thirty years since Misspent Youths I’ve illustrated/collaborated on a lot of projects (comics, RPGs, novels) that haven’t gotten finished. I’ve enjoyed that work. I got paid for most of it. I’ve improved my skills in the process. But I’ll never get any fan letters complimenting or complaining to me about that work. It sits, unfinished, in my files.

Bad art in the world is more fun than great art in a drawer. I’m not saying that Misspent Youths was bad. Not at all. I put my heart and soul into it. It was the best work I could do at the time. And it’s out in the world. Copies can be found on ebay and on comics specialty sites. If the internet crashed all the art on my websites would be unavailable but someone could still read an issue of Misspent Youths.

I’m a different person than I was when I did that book. The characters still keep me company but they’re older and wiser and (mostly) more settled. They wave to me from the back of my imagination. I love the idea of drawing comics but, so far, working as a mail carrier doesn’t leave me the time and mental energy necessary to do an ongoing series. Drawing is relatively easy. Writing takes more concentration than it used to.

So what’s my point?

Number One –
A big thank you to Chris Eng for writing! Chris has finished some projects of his own. He has a couple of novels available through Amazon: Molotov Hearts and ZeroWave. He didn’t ask me to include those links.

Number Two –
That project you’re working on? Finish it. Put it out into the world. Art is ephemeral. Do the best you can and let it go. What was brilliant once is often considered terrible by a new audience. What was obscure and forgotten originally can find new fans. But it needs to be available.

Yes, I’m talking to myself as much as to y’all.

Back to work. See you next week!

Skook WIP #9

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Welcome to the ninth issue of the Skook Works in Progress newsletter. You are a fabulous person and very good looking. Give yourself a gold star!

Greeting Card Conversions

In which I present a sampling of before (scans of the original ink and colored pencil/art marker drawings) and after (adjusted in Photoshop) greeting card designs. The final designs are available at my Zazzle store.

Probably Not Bob

In the January 15th issue of this newsletter I posted a card design featuring a beer drinking, cigarette smoking reptile. One of my reader’s asked if it was a portrait of Bob the Lizard. My response was, “Who?” The reader sent me an image of Bob saying that he was a character in the Grimjack comics published in the Eighties and Nineties. I read a good chunk of those Grimjack comics but I don’t remember much about them.

My beer drinking, cigarette smoking lizard is Aunt Hortense. She made her first appearance in The Highly Unlikely Adventures of Moe and Detritus minicomic, issue 5. She’s the parental figure of a bunch of dimension hopping lizards. I published that minicomic in 1989. I don’t know when Bob the Lizard started showing up in Grimjack comics but the first issue of that series was pubished in 1983. Did Bob influence my creation of Aunt Hortense?

I don’t remember. What I do remember is that, sometime in the mid-Eighties, a good friend of mine got tattoos of some drawings I had done. One of those drawings was the silohuette of a lizard. I remember thinking, “I should draw more lizards!” From that seed came Aunt Hortense, Seth, Zerro, Lamallia, Missi and Willy. I first drew them as basically identical but, over the years, they evolved distinct appearances. Aunt Hortense got craggy and squarish. In the Nineties I featured the lizards in a series of xeroxed calendars and some issues of GLYPH magazine.

In recent years I’ve only drawn Hortense a few times. Once was the previous greeting card design. More recently was this portrait done for my tattoo sporting friend for her birthday.   

I didn’t do much to update the image for a greeting card. Hortense is not someone you mess with.

Good Buddies

This image is blatantly inspired by the Chuck Jones directed cartoon Feed the Kitty. I saw it as a kid on one of those afternoon cartoon shows and it stuck with me.

We all need friends and having friends who are very different from us is good for our character.

A Smile and a Dance

I have no idea what’s going on in this illustration. He’s happy so I’m happy when I look at him. That’s good enough for me.

Let the joy shine!

A Little Monster

Inside every big monster is a little monster that just wants a hug. And a cookie.

Giving this critter a cookie and a hug will not only bring you joy, it will keep you from feeling those claws and teeth. It is a monster after all.

Spreading the Heap Around

I did this drawing of the Heap as one of my daily sketches back in 2019. It’s one of my favorite pieces from that project so it seemed like it would look good on a mug.

To better fit a mug I extended the image, colored the figures and redid the background. Here’s a process gif showing the main stages.

I usually imagine there’s story behind my illustrations. The Heap and this girl are grooving at a night club. Why?

I don’t know. I often always know the story. I have to think about it.

The Heap as a DJ? As an MC? Maybe this image is part of an album cover?

Okay then.

And if it works as an album cover, why not on a t-shirt?

Okay then.


Influences – J.C. Leyendecker

It’s hard to discuss J.C. Leyendecker separate from Norman Rockwell. Rockwell is now the more famous of the two illustrators but Leyendecker came first. Rockwell idolized Leyendecker and his early style is strongly modeled on Leyendecker’s. I was glad to read that the two artists did become friends.

I love Leyendecker’s art for its precision. It’s deceptively simple. It’s all sharp angles and clean lines, geometry and design. All his characters, even the (rare) down and outers, have a sparkle to them. No grime.

Oddly, it was easier to find good images of Leyendecker’s work online than Rockwell’s. The link in my first paragraph will take you to a ten part blog series that features a wealth of his paintings. I only grabbed a few for flavor. The man did thousands of paintings – magazine and book covers and clothing advertisements.


It occurs to me that Leyendecker’s idealized men and women could have been models for the original comic book superheroes. The artists of early comics would have known his work. Today, he is a nostalgic footnote. In the late thirties and early forties, he was famous. It would have been hard not to think about Leyendecker’s work when you wanted to depict a heroic figure.

Character Concept Sketches and Model Sheets – The Heap

The Heap. The Face. Octobriana. Fantomah. Stardust. You’ll find depictions of all these characters in my shops. They are all comic characters who have escaped into the public domain. They are actually just a few of the comic characters who (mostly) debuted in the early days of the American comic book industry who are now available for anyone to use. So why am I  interested in this bunch?

Honestly, it feels like they found me. I didn’t go looking for public domain comic book characters to illustrate. I’ve participated in online remake/remodel challenges using other public domain characters and none of them stuck in my imagination.
Each character has a different appeal.

Stardust is a space wizard. His sorcery is of the “Technology so advanced as to seem like magic” variety.

Fantomah is a jungle vengence goddess.

The Face is … so basic he’s fun. He’s a guy who puts on a scary mask to fight crime. No superpowers. No tragic backstory.

Octobriana is a kick ass revolutionary.

The Heap is the original comic book swamp monster.

Until now, all my illustrations of these characters have been one-off images. I hadn’t considered drawing any of these folks on a reoccurring basis. Because of that they often look significantly different from version to version. I’m now past the “just get started” phase of creating merchandise in my shops and I’m moving on to the “create a consistent brand” stage.

That has meant doing what would have been preliminary sketches. These are to try out different versions of a character to see what looks good. I figured I’d start with the Heap. I’ve drawn him quite a few times over the years and his design is pretty simple. He’s basically a humanoid haystack with a sort of a carrot nose. In most of my illustrations I’ve given him some sort of eye. The Heap was drawn by a number of different artists during his original comic book run but most of them just gave him shadows where his eyes might have been. Having eyes means there’s more of a chance of having expressions so I decided to keep them. Most of my earlier versions have had some sort of roots and fungus on them. That gives a little variety to his design.

The Heap is a compost pile that’s come to life. It grew up around the body of a WW! pilot who had crashed his plane in a Polish swamp. It shambles about the world fighting monsters and human evil doers. 
Once I’d gotten a feel for the details of the character I set about creating a model sheet. I plan to do this with all the characters I will be using. Model sheets are usually created when a character is going to drawn by different artists in a variety of media (animation, comics, toys, breakfast cereal, whatever). It gives the creative team a base to work from. I’ve done model sheets for myself when I’ve been designing characters for comics and graphic novels. Most model sheets feature a character in a series of standing positions – front view, side view, back view. Most of my model sheets will have character in motion. It’s more fun to draw.

I basically stuck to my Big Swamp Boogie version of the Heap. I liked it when I drew it in 2019 so why not?

I’m mostly going to be showing my process work as gifs. I like watching an image as it evolves but, if you’d rather (or would rather also) see the different stages as separate images, just let me know.

These Days …

I like deadlines. But only deadlines that I’ve either given myself or negotiated with a client. I like them because they help me to structure how to manage a project. If something is due in two weeks I know I should be finishing at least 1/14th of it every day. I therefore know the minimum of work I need to complete. I also know that life happens and I may not be able to do 1/14th of the project every day so I aim to get 1/7 of the work done each day. That does not mean I push myself to do twice as much work as possible every day. I hate rush jobs. It means I’ve planned (or agreed to) a schedule that allows me to do good work at a comfortable pace in the time I have available outside of my USPS job and my responsibilities at home.

Last year’s newsletter was an exercise in getting myself to write on a regular basis. The art I posted was primarily from past projects. I published an issue a week. That was my goal and I met it. Yay me! My one frustration was that I wanted folks to subscribe and only a couple of people did so. Apparently the set up of my website made the subscription link difficult to find. I subscribe to a couple dozen newsletters. I don’t read every issue but having them show up in my inbox reminds me that they exist. So for 2021 I decided to use an email newsletter service to see if that would make it easier for readers to sign up. A number of the newsletters I read are hosted by tinyletter.com. Most of the rest are hosted by substack.com. Substack allows writers to charge for subscriptions. Tinyletter does not. I don’t plan to charge for subscriptions so I chose tinyletter.

Because I like being ahead of a deadline I started setting up emails. At the moment I’ve got images prepped (and some writing about those images) for newsletters into April. The first seven newsletters went out with no problem. You folks subscribed. Thank you!

Last week I hit a snag. I pressed send on issue 8, went to have a cup of coffee and came back to this message –

“Your account has been flagged by our abuse prevention system. Our team reviews all accounts for Compliance with our Terms of Use. If your letter has not been sent after 12 hours, please reach out to our Support team with the username for your account.”

Issue 8 was stuck in limbo and, most annoyingly, I didn’t know why. Was it the Rockwell images? Was it the joke about the red canid with the trumpet? Did I have too many links? I read the Terms of Use. I checked FAQs. I missed my Friday posting deadline. Phooey. After 13 hours the newsletter hadn’t sent so I sent tinyletter an email asking for help. Friday became Saturday became Sunday. I

The really embarassing thing is that, having concentrated on putting together this newsletter for the last few weeks, I’d kind of forgotten that I still had a website. Having remembered I recreated the issue as a blogpost and sent out links via tinyletter as a test to see if it was just my 8th issue that was blocked or my whole account. Those links went.

On Monday morning I got a response from Stanley at tinyletter –

“Hi there,

Thank you for reaching out about your TinyLetter account. We’ll be glad to help offer some clarification here. 

Taking look at the account, it appears that our automated prevention system, Omnivore, detected content, keywords, or activity that can indicate the possibility of harmful information being sent through our service.

Upon review, however, we can see that the letter is fine and has been moved back to drafts where it can be resent. 

We appreciate your patience during our human review. As the specific keywords and content that Omnivore detects are constantly changing, we’re unable to provide a full list of all potential triggers, however if you run into any issues in the future, please reach out and we’ll be happy to assist. 

You can read more about our detection practices here:
http://mailchimp.com/omnivore/

Please let us know if you have any questions. We’re here to help. “

I responded, jokingly asking if it was my joke about the horny fox. Stanley then answered with –

“Hi David,

Thanks for the reply. For proprietary reasons I wouldn’t be able to divulge exactly what set off our system, but rest assured we’ve made adjustments to prevent it from stopping letters in the future 🙂

Let us know if you have any questions. Take care :)”

I sent out issue #8 on Monday afternoon. If you haven’t read it yet it’s available in both the tinyletter archives and my website. Hopefully you’re reading this issue on Friday morning in your email as planned. If not, check my website on Saturday. I’ll be reposting it there.

Hopefully you are also doing well and only a little stir crazy. I get outside as part of my job and I’m stir crazy. Hopefully you’re managing better than I.am. See you next week!

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