King Sheep Productions

There are a couple of points to get to today in my rambling and megalomaniacal external monologue. Number one is the comics. It’s my nature to feel I owe my readership an explanation whenever I have to shelve the comic that I was promoting for so long. My illustration gig has extended itself to another 20 pictures which will keep me pretty well under ground until mid July. I’ll try to update as often as possible, but things’ll be pretty irregular until then.

Topic two explains the title of this post: I am still engaged in a Kung-fu-esque stand-off with my new tablet. It has the skills I require to achieve my goals, but refuses to dispense them at my request. “Once you can snatch the pixels from my surface,” it offers, “then you will be ready to leave.” Through my trials and online tutorials, I have so far produced this work in progress:

It’s simple, but then again I have only just begun my journey to enlightenment. And thanks to the advent of blogging and mainstream egocentrism, I can detail this tumultuous process step-by-step for all the person who wants to read it.

Groove ahn.

Edit: The comic is finally up, and what a ride it was. You’ll notice there are no backgrounds, but maybe I’ll put those in at a later date. Still fiddling with how much I can abuse the abilities of the Wacom and still complete the strip in a timely manner. We’ll see what we end up with.

Later,
Nate

I was unable to get the comic up last night or this morning due to bill-paying illustration work, so here’s a little something to tide you over until my lunch break. This is my work space at my job, specially labeled for your elucidation. Hope you get at least one laugh from it.

Click for larger view.

Groove on.

This morning’s comic is brought to you by the the letters W and Y. The W is for Wacom because this latest strip was inked and colored thereupon. Is “thereupon” a word? With a Wacom, I can make it one. Such is its power. The Y is for “y did it tak u so long?” in the parlance of our time. The answer to that is: because using a Wacom ain’t like dusting crops, boy.

Lazy artists, like me, who don’t want to teach their drawing hand and arm to use their full range of motion often cheat by turning the sketchbook or other drawing surface until the line they wish to make is aligned with the easiest motion for their arm to make. While I call it “cheating,” it’s so widely used that it isn’t really regarded as such. However, when one is learning to use a tablet, this practice begins to harm rather than help.

Drawing a downward line (especially one skewing to the right) is like performing tantric yoga. Muscles scream and begin to spasm as my body contorts into previously unknown positions. It’s good times, but they’ll get better. They will, or they will be replaced.

In other news, I can’t do a Google search for something as simple as “peanut casings” without coming across 9 blogs about how great The Name of the Wind is. The book is doing well indeed.

Check ya later.