cryptic preview

This is the first page of a story called Uncertainty which I 'm illustrating for Alexander Danner. The notebooks will be text panels eventually, and there's still some other stuff to add so this doesn't make a whole lot of sense just yet. I'm still playing with the design...

I'm usually pretty cagey about posting a work in progress like this but I hardly drew anything this week, and looking at this page with hardly any text except for the last panel struck me as kind of funny. Like a punchline without a set up. Maybe it's just me.

So, anyway...

Sommersault

This is a sketch for one in a series of sort of paintings I'm thinking about which may or may not have to do with a larger kind of project which might be a kind of story-thing maybe. (How's that for specificity?)

The series is a look at simple comics forms and phenomena, particularly examining the viewer's relationship to the action (or otherwise) depicted. This one focuses on a simply indicated motion expressed from several vantage points. Objective here refers to the pictoral object, subjective meaning the viewer, so on and so forth... I'm not sold on the terminology yet but, what the hey - it's a first draft.

Art Trade

Some time ago my friend Jeff and I worked out an art trade, piece for piece.
He being a painter of considerable skill offered up this, which I proudly display in my home right now:




I - part-time cartoon hack that I am - took a little longer to fulfill my end of the bargain. But my feeble effort is now finished, and I will share it with you as follows:




It was actually my second submission for trade as he respectfully rejected the first for being too creepy. I was trying out some text rendering techniques here (i.e. practicing hand lettering). Note the near lack of punctuation and attempt to more fully integrate the text with the illustration. If I were a smarter cartoonist I probably wouldn't have tried to cram so much into a 5" x 14" space. Oh well, live and learn...

All in all' I'm pretty happy with it. Seems a good way to kick off the ol' shift in blogging here.


---edit:---
I think Blogger is out to get me. It wouldn't let me preview this post before publishing. Assuming everything was hunky dory, I went with it - posting one of my older comics instead of Jeff's painting. All fixed now.

forces are converging against this blog

I never took my computer to the shop last week. I've had it all this time and just took the week off of posting.
I can't really say I missed it.

My frustration towards Mostly Banal comics has been increasing for months now, and the arrival of several more interesting (to me) opportunities has split my focus and decreased my interest in keeping up with a regularly scheduled blog/comic. I still think the underlying concept I had is sound, but right now I lack the focus to sufficiently implement my ideas. I'm scaling back the "journal comic" aspect of this blog again - in favor of a looser "sketch blog" - until I can work out whether I can realize my original concept in a more satisfying way (or whether it's even worth trying).

That being said, I am not leaving this blog to seed. I will continue to post artwork, cartoons and various little formal experiments (you know, like a sketchblog) as I focus on more finished comics work.

I don't expect vigorous posting (as if I have ever been accused of that) but I hope that those of you who have found something of interest here will stick around. As I said, I have several projects in the works that I am very excited about.

I may return to the original Mostly Banal concept, but not until I feel that I can do it right.

I appreciate everyone who has followed this blog through it's ups and downs and I do hope you'll hang on for what comes next.

out of order

My computer is going into the shop on Monday, so this seems a good time for Mostly Banal to take a break. I'll be back in a week or so.

How often do you see that?

Why I Like The Black Keys

Obligatory Linkage: The Black Keys (.com version)

yeah, so?

Not that it's keeping me up nights...

Your Guide to Finer Living: How to Be A Webcartoonist

I posted something here every day this week.

I need to get a life.

five more minutes...

Wednesday Sketchdump!

I haven't done a lot of sketch dumps here, but since I'm ahead of schedule on the comics this week, I thought I'd let you take a peek in my little mini-sketchbook where I've been playing around with the ballpoint pens.



Here's the family. Sophie running around with no pants on next to an awfully poor sketch of my wife...



Sophie doesn't yet notice when I'm drawing her. Rachelle is a little harder to pin down unawares...



Here's the only member of the family who sat still long enough for a proper life drawing session:



That's Tico




A nonsense comic. Nothing to do with anything. That's my mom and dad up in the front seats. You can see the crayon where My daughter Sophie improved these drawings somewhat. Nothing like a splash of color to brighten a sketch.

And for those of who who have ever wondered as to my process for these blog strips (yes, there is some process) here's the page in my little sketchbook where I worked out the layout and dialogue for yesterday's strip:

Sometimes I Have a Lousy Sense of Humor...

I went back and forth as to whether to post this strip.

My reaction to the events at Virginia Tech here touches on a bit of insensitivity that I'm not entirely comfortable with revealing. Obviously I can't even begin to imagine the heartbreak that family and friends of the victims are feeling right now. I feel a great sympathy to these survivors of what can only be called a completely senseless massacre. I have no wish to insult their pain with anything that could be construed as any type levity regarding their loss. My reaction is that of a selfish nature; thinking first of my family, and a sense of the helplessness toward protecting my own children that an event such as this can evoke. Perhaps the whole thing reveals the same selfish nature that compels me to pen an autobiographical strip in the first place.

If I erred in posting this strip, I did so in the sake of honesty.

Weak-end

You'll have to bear with me on this ballpoint pen thing...

Last one for these. I promise.

Before I scribbled all over this one, I scanned in just the panels and dialogue. I was a little surprised at how well it worked like that (at least to me)



(sorry about that stray hair there)

And now, real quick - just for fun.
(Everybody's read Matt Madden's 99 Ways to Tell A Story, right?)





_________
An aside: as I was readying this post for publishing Sophie got onto the book shelf and picked out a Love And Rockets collection to read. All by herself. She's engrossed...

Not even two years old yet and reading Jaime Hernandez...

...and it's suddenly Thursday

...and it's suddenly Wednesday

I've been playing around with doing these strips in ballpoint pen.

The science of Mostly Banal

bad week for comics

I tried to save it, but I'm calling today's comic another dead buffalo. Man, am I having a bad run lately...

Jeremy, contemplative

I wasn't happy with the way that todays comic was turning out so to calm my nerves I drew up a sketch of Jon Morris' Jeremy (youngest son of Frankenstein)
Jon has that great bold line that the kiddies love so much. I'm not so bold with my brush but I'm getting more comfortable...



Comic tomorrow?
we'll see...