#24HCD first post

24Hour Comic day is a challenge to create a 24 page comic from scratch in 24 hours. I've tried before and failed, because I drastically underestimated the effort involved. I've spent a year getting to grips with digital tools working on www.wychwolf.com and have settled on a workflow which suits me, though I still struggle to break out of the basic side view shot of characters from the knees up. What have  found is that adding more constraints in terms of time and theme actually help me work, so to extend the constraints even further I have also added the idea that I will tell a comic story using a format akin to a child's  A to Z book. One of the first illustration jobs I had years ago was doing just this, (apple on a bed by Collins educational ) and I really enjoyed the invention around the simple script.

See the dog faced boy...

I had a meeting over coffee last week in the cafe under Methodist Central Hall, I was early and was delighted to see an art exhibition on display.
Whilst I wasn't really attracted to any of the works, which were all done in coloured pencils (this being an exhibition arranged by the UK coloured pencil society) I was intrigued by the sideshow put on by the sponsors: Faber Castell.
There were a couple of sculptures made out of pencils, including a ridiculously uncomfortable chair...

... more amusingly there was a display which held "the worlds smallest pencil".. which wasn't really very small at all.

"The smallest pencil in the world is 17.5mm short and about 3mm thin, made of North American spruce with a genuine graphite lead (0.5 mm diameter). Count Von Faber-Castell had this tiny object specially made to be able to givean appropriate present when the world's largest pencil was unveiled at the Faber-Castell plant in Malaysia."

I don't know what delights me more, the idea that this , the worlds smallest pencil could be trumped by another which was sharpened, precipitating a "worlds smallest pencil" record breaking sharpening match...
OR that there is a Count Von Faber Castell, presumably with a cape, and monocle.

That's Numberwang

I have been dallying with the idea of creating an entertaining but obtuse iOS game, which would have plenty of monsters, and bold graphics, possibly inscrutable japanese text, and lots of shouting.... and then I found "monsters ate my condo" by adultswim.
It is madder than a bag of frogs, crammed with incomprehensible graphics, and possibly the best thing I've seen.
I think I may well follow their lead, and build some kind of godzilla game... with giant squid and killer robots obviously...

24HCD

Next weekend is 24 hr Comic day.
This year I will succeed.
I have set aside time to do the comic, and even booked the Monday off, so I can work through the night over the weekend and not be a sore headed bear.
The hardest part is trying NOT to prepare too much.. the idea of 24HCD is to create a story from start to finish in 24 Hours, and that's a tremendous challenge. It's very easy to start thinking of stories, characters and plot beforehand.
What I do know is I'm going to work in pencil onto DELETER Manga paper, and ink stuff with a mix of pigment fibre tip markers, rotring isograph pens and DELETER No4 ink using a flat brush.
... better check I have enough paper stock in.

#Monsters12

#Monsters, a photo by killercarrot on Flickr.

We bought a peg bag from Wonky Giraffe on the Etsy store.
It is one of my favourite things ever.
etsy

Sketchbook Pro for a proper computer

Tired of finger painting on the iPad, but very impressed by Sketchbook Pro I splashed out £39.99 on a copy for the mac. I bought it through the app store, so if/when i get another laptop I can port it direct. I  think sketchbook pro typifies the new design ethos that is creeping into mac apps.. I looked for my traditional keyboard shortcuts, to find there dont appear to be any, luckily I have a trackpad, and the zoom works on that. Its fast enough, but a bit laggy at high zoom, and suffers from the reverse axis controls that make sense direct on the ipad screen, but not so much on the trackpad.
I was pleased the speed and accuracy of what it rendered, but a little frustrated with the lack of a crop tool, and still miss my dodge and burn. Below is a quick sketch dashed out in about 6 minutes, and my very first attempt at using the app.
I remember the first time I tried to use Photoshop I came away with nothing... I remember dropping £200 for Adobe illustrator, and never coming away with anything.
Happy with my purchase.

Monsters#11

Monsters#11, a photo by killercarrot on Flickr.

Brain in a jar. Now I have the hang of sketchbook pro, I feel more confident to dash off looser sketches. I'm putting off doing more complex stuff as I have a wychwolf strip to get done which is going tomtakeupma fair bit of time.. I need to close the current story in the next month.