Brave King of Steam

Subject:	A tendency towards "blogging" as the common folk call it.
Time:	6:53 am.

This week's comic update was simply the Halloween art I presented here a couple of posts back. A while ago I took to posting art rather than comic whenever I spent more time on an art piece than any comic work that week. Illustration pieces generally take me much longer than comic work because the level of detail in thbe colouring, linework, and shading is all mugh higher. As such, when I post illustration art I tend to hope it's not percieved as 'filler' for that week, as it does take me more time and effort. It's not something quickly tossed together and thrown up on the site because of a lack of comic work, as filler material tends to be. However, temporarily foregoing my weekly commitment makes it easier to spend more time and care with an invidiual piece, and have it done more wuickly with fewer interruptions.

Also, it's nice to flex my illustration and Photoshop muscles with a single illustration piece, as with the comic I tend to rush through, aiming to get each page done quickly and with the least amount of effort. That is, afterall, the secret to sticking with such a large project without getting burnt out.

Additionally, this week my news post of the week was longer than most of my previous entries. However, rather than edit the post down to fit the news section, as is my usual way of handling the news posts, I simply removed the book photo and allowed the post to sprawl itself out across the whole of the news section.

However, lately I've been thinking that I would very much like to make my weekly ramblings a larger part of the webcomic. Though lofty a goal it may be, I'd like it if people looked forward to the news post almost as much as the actual comic page, rather than seeing it as something to maybe read just to pass a little more time, or, as I presume is more often the case, to skip my inane ramblings entirely.

Towards that end, I'm planning another redesign of the site layout. I hope to clean up the main comic area of the page, make the news section expandable so that any length of news post will fit, and finally I hope to make the site as a whole more pleasing to look at. In the end, I hope to make it more similar to my art page.

If it's possible to make the page I want with the art I already have on hand, then it should not take too long. However, if I need to make new images to create the site (and by that I mean full illustration and comic pieces, buttons and the like are far easier to produce)it will take much longer. As it is, I'm still barely catching up on the comic, far behind on prospective commissions and portfolio work, and working a full time job and leading a fairly social life on top of it all.

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Subject:	This is the time when we sleep.
Time:	11:07 am.

Seems I'm up late again. It's been an odd weak. Very...spontaneous. Not at all a bad thing. Megan and I woke up early and went to a cornfield maze on Saturday. We got our start time at work pushed back to 10:30pm approved, and then called in because we weren't making it back in time for that, and eventually wandered in at like 1am or later. I forget. Could have been as late as 2 I think.

Then the next morning we stayed up incredibly late, thinking we might hit up Best Buy or CompUSA for a new printer (since printers cost only a few dollars more than the ink I need for my printer). Unfortunately, the stores didn't open until 11, it being Sunday and all. Megan got hotted up and gothed out, trying out her Halloween costume idea. I played lots of Castlevania DS. By time the stores opened, we were too tired to go out, but also incredibly hungry, so we ordered pizza wich took another hour or so to arrive. It was about 1:30pm by the time we finally slept, and had to get up again in time to take a shower before work that night.

I plan to get to sleep much earlier than that today, but it's already late. Luckily tonight is my last day of work for this week.

A week or two ago I started posting voting incentives on my webcomic, and they seem to have worked. My site jumped from around 185 in the Buzzcomics rankings to 95 when I checked this morning. I plan to change the incentive picture anywhere between two to seven times a week. The more votes I get, the more people see my banner, the liklier it is the Spud comic will become somewhat popular.

In my last newspost on the webcomic site, I claimed that the DS Castlevania game has music that rivals Symphony of the Night. That's not entirely true. The audio quality, while far better than the DS speakers or what MP3's I've found would lead one to believe, isn't nearly up to snuff with Symphony's aural excellence. However the compositions themselves are quite excellent, with several songs from the soundtrack easily jumping up to join my favourits from the franchise. 'Pitch Black Intrusion' (the Lost Village music) stands out as my favourite piece from the game, with 'Platinum Moonlight' (the Garden of Madness music) coming in a close second. I'd love to hear orchestra arrangements of these.

Gotta run!

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Subject:	Reactor
Time:	11:06 am.

Seems like Reactor just isn't in the cards this year. I've been looking forward to it since last year, but things just aren't working out. First off, I forgot to sign up for an art table when the artist alley registration opened up August first, then I was out of the State for most of the month. Reactor closed AA registration August 18th. Seems they'd shrunk down space for AA since last year, and those of you who went would recall that last year's Reactor had a tiny artist's alley.

Tani offered Matt and I potential table space if I couldn't get a table of my own, but already most of the people I know are losing interest in hitting Reactor this year. Almost no one in the local group has even brought it up. Megan has been having second thoughts about the con because our money situation is tight. Matt has been having second thoughts about the con as well, it costs him a bus ticket from Pittsburgh to Chicago to make it, and if he won't even be able to sell...

To top it all off Reactor is planning on going "red light" this year, with an entire 21 and up section of the convetion that they even advertise as "clothing optional". Now, I don't know how many of you have seen the movie Eurotrip, but there's a scene in that movie where our heroes find themselves on the most popular nude beach in Europe. When they get there, there's nothing but fat, ugly old tourists who also came in search of nubile young european women (who are explained as having migrated to a lesser known beach during tourist season). That's exactly how I imagine Reactor's proposed 'clothing optional' section will turn out. Of course, those who went to Reactor last year will recall that the vast majority of the congoers seemed to be under 18. This can only spell disaster. You just know some kids are going to make it into the so-called "red light" section and it will all end in the sound of police and ambulance sirens. One of their guests for this proposed 'red light' section is a porn starlet who apparently has nothing at all to do with comics or anime.

I'm not letting this ruin my day though. I've got plans. I had fun at Reactor last year, but it's not the best con I've ever been to. Ohayocon, on the other hand, is one of the best. I always have fun at Ohayo, and more of my friends can usually make it to the con as well. Who knows? I might even use Ohayo as an excuse to head out to Buffalo afterwards and visit family and friends.

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Subject:	War! It's not just for breakfast anymore!
Time:	6:26 pm.
Music:	Advance Wars: Dual Strike.

So, a 30 dollar price drop, the release of Advance Wars: Dual Strike, and an unscheduled stopover in the cornfields of Illinois prompted me to drop down my hard earned monies on a Nintendo DS. If only for Advance Wars, wich far exceeds my expectations so far, I must say I'm pleased with the purchase. Pictochat promises to be a lot of fun at anime conventions, too, and more than ever strengthens my belief that Nintendo, or some third party should develope a web browser, IRC client, and MUCK client for the handheld.

I'm looking forward to Sonic Rush, the new 2D Metroid, the new Zelda, and Katmari Damacy all for the DS.

Now to decide on whether to order pizza, wake Megan up, or wait until she gets up on her own.

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Subject:	Summer Daze
Time:	5:39 am.
Mood:	busy.
Music:	J-Random MP3s.

Well, I haven't updated much here so I'll drop a bunch all at once. First, the art.

I've decided to make a concious effort to be more prolific.Other than my webcomic, I tend to go months without finishing new art. Before I started the webcomic I was not much better, sometimes only finishing a few new pieces over the course of a year. Combined with my aversion to catering to the porn browsing crowd, this leaves me something of an unknown in most internet art communities. To remedy this, I've begun cleaning up and colouring sketches and doodles that I used to just toss in the closet and forget about. Not everything needs to be full character portraits with backgrounds, done with exciting and dynamic angles, right?

My first two works towards that end:

Emba, a Sabrina O'Neil character.

Rodney, one of my own.

In addition, I've been uploading work that I've had finished, but not posted, or pieces that I'd previously started but never got around to finishing. First I uploaded the first two covers from the printed webcomic issues I'd had done. Some other pieces I've uploaded have been:

This piece of Rita, Bairbre, and some Bavarian soldiers that I'd started as a colouring tutorial ages ago. I'd planned to do up an excellent, detailed background for it, but just never managed to put my ideas to paper. Finally I caved in and tossed in a background from the webcomic.

Crosswalk is an end piece I did up for my recent Otazine submission. Unfortunately, they wanted all the comics to begin with their title page on on the same side, so they cut this out of my comic to keep the format. Still, that means I can post it freely.

Cover #3 of my webcomic will be going up on DA soon, though I'm still not completely certain I'll be going with this. I may try throwing together another cover idea or two and see what I like the best. We'll see, I have to have it off to the printers by the end of August.

Next, conventions and other trips. In less than two weeks Megan and I will be heading off to make an appearance at the wedding of one of her relatives. We're looking at a 15 hour car trip there and 15 horus back again, wich I won't pretend to be looking forward to. Still, once we get there it should be fun. I'm hoping a new GBA or DS game catches my eye soon, I'll need all the distractions I can for that car trip. I wonder when Sonic Rush and Gunstar Super Heroes will be out? Unfortunately, Advance Wars DS won't be out until October.

Two weeks after that, we have another 15 hour car ride out to Baltimore, MD for Otakon, the largest anime convention in the country. This will probably be the last Otakon I hit for quite a while, so I intend to have fun. Still, I'll spend most of the weekend in Artist's Alley, showing off my books and hanging out with friends I haven't seen in ages.

Far too much driving for a single month. Still, I think September looks to be mostly free. I look forward to doing as little as possible then. October brings us another convention, The Reactor wich is an anime and american comics convention. By then I should have the third issue of my book printed up and ready to sell. Also, I had an excellent time at Reactor last year, and look forward to it being even better this year.

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Subject:	Buy my book!
Time:	9:50 am.

Updated the comic, and included a link to the site you can order the books from. I pla n to eventually offer a way to buy the books through me, along with other merchandise like magnets and t-shirts and whatnot, but this will do nicely for now.

Also, I'm working on the final two pages of Issue #3. I already know what I want to do with the cover, and my previous experience in putting files together for ComixPress should make it a lot quicker for me to put things together so I should be finished and ready to send the book off to the printers within 2 week's time. That will hopefully be enough time to have them shipped off to me before Reactor. If ComixPress is back up to their originally advertised turn around times, I might even have the books ready for Otakon, but I'm not holding much hope for that.

I'm still very happy with the past few pages I've finished for the webcomic, and look forward to showing them off on the site. I'm also very happy with how the next two pages are turning out, and can promise that the third issue ends on a visual high point for the comic. Here is a small sneak peek at the last page of the comic (wich is also part of what will be the cover).

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Subject:	Elusive Sleep
Time:	10:53 am.
Mood:	tired.

I can't sleep. I don't know why, I'm normally on the verge of passing out by this time. This time being just shy of 11:00 am central time. Third shift, for those of you wondering why I'd even be trying to sleep at this time.

There's no real pressing concerns. I've managed to get further ahead of myself than I'd even originally planned at the outset of my weekend. I work weekends, for those of you wondering, so Tuesday through Thursday is my weekend. The webcomic is once again enjoying a four week buffer. I don't plan to add another page to that buffer this coming week only because of the detail level of the page I've started, and I plan to also finish tweaking my Otazine submission. I'm very happy with the two pages I've completed this week, though. They're both excellent looking. I was dreading this part of the story, since it's the weakest point in the original comic, but I think I've made it interesting enough so that it's on par with the rest of the webcomic, or at the very least a visual high point.

I'm hungry. I shouldn't be but I am. I've been craving very specific things lately. Last night it was Buffalo wings then Tim Horton's, this morning it was chinese food, then subs, and currently pizza. Maybe that's what's keeping me up? I don't know.

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