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Sunday, December 30, 2012
Bonusbot
When I was probably inappropriately young to have seen them, I watched a lot of stuff with creepy biomechanical stuff in it. Alien, Bubblegum Crisis, Akira... As a result, I'm a pretty longstanding fan of techno-organic meldings like this.
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Sunday, December 23, 2012
Clank clank.
Some new bonus bots. I've been experimenting with coloring and drawing techniques with these. First one is all digital, second is a scanned sketch digitally colored.
Friday, December 21, 2012
Thursday, December 20, 2012
Bonus drawings
I've been finding recently that after I've finished a dailybot, my tablet pen stays itchy. Sometimes I'll sketch something randomly or solicit ideas from the Desert Bus chat. Here's some samples.
I will be making an official post about it soon, but I will be offering art commissions! If you want something goofy drawn for a forum avatar, desktop or just general interest I'll be around.
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
READ THIS IMMEDIATELY
I have some very strong recommendations for reading material. First off is Prophet, the beginning of a sci-fi epic with a richness I haven't seen in a very long time. Ironically enough, based on a character created many moons ago by the infamous Rob Liefeld. Seriously though, it's some hot shit.
Second is something I'm enjoying so much I'm recommending it before I'm even done reading it. Its like Geof Darrow and Sergio Aragones had a baby and it did a totally sweet comic about spies, cute girls and cats.
Get ye to a comic shop!
Saturday, October 20, 2012
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
Thursday, October 11, 2012
IRL Fetchquest
As we approach Halloween, one of my favourite times of the year (Christmas is casual tier), I find myself getting ready for an unusual occasion. Myself and a few of my friends will be participating in this year's GISHWHES, also known as The Greatest International Scavenger Hunt the World Has Ever Seen!
Sadakochan's deviantart page with more photos!
Put on by Misha Collins of Supernatural fame, this event gathers international teams with the goal of locating a diverse list of bizarre items. It should be fun and nutty and a unique challenge that I'm quite looking forward to!
Some of the items scored last year
Oh, one more thing. This Maeve cosplay is REALLY COOL.
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Derp Show Episode 17 - Robots
This week we beep boop the does not compute!
Dailybot post 2
Hooray for not being totally full of shit! But seriously now, if I had a dime for every project I started that suffered from followthrough problems, I would be able to afford a therapist to talk to about it.
Anyway, so begins what I want to keep as a steady trickle of robots, and with it an incentive to revisit here and listen to my inane ramblings. I have a lot of ideas and a lot of thoughts about a great many things, but without practice they won't ever come out as anything but meaningless spew. Even this post is pretty poor, so I'll cut my losses and call it a day.
Maybe I'll harass Kroze about doing a Derp Show...
Monday, October 8, 2012
Announcing DAILYBOT!
So a while back I drew a very sleepy little robot titled rather obviously "sleepy bot". After captioning it with the implication that he had to recharge, the idea began to grow into several, then many more different robots, each with a silly remark attached. After creating 64 of them, I split them into two posters formerly offered at Loading Ready Run as a limited run. This past weekend, I premiered a very small coffee table book that collected all 64 robots into one volume, with the addition of even more caption material.
This is an idea I quite enjoyed, and I feel the format has nearly limitless potential. With that in mind, I present to you DAILYBOT! This will be a continuation of the 64 robots series, with no destination number yet determined. Perhaps I'll keep going to 128? 256? 512? In any event, it will be an interesting experiment in illustration and writing that I want to keep up with and give everyone something to check in on day after day.
I hope you enjoy, and I will keep everyone posted on the availability of the new books!
PS: If you have a bot idea that you'd like to see, email me about it, and you'll be credited if it appears!
Friday, October 5, 2012
No cause for alarm
Some visible changes to the blog, but nothing to get concerned about. Tidying up, fixing links and making room for... Something. It might be related to premiering a new coffee-table book at Vancouver Mega Comic-Con.
SHARDS: Tales from the Ruin Nation has been filed on the sidebar, where you can grab your own low res PDF for no money at all, or throw a few bucks our way and get it in shiny no-artifacts high res for just ten bucks!
So stay tuned, we will be working hard to bring your more DERP SHOW and maybe something new and more frequent.
*cough*morerobots*cough*
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Monday, September 24, 2012
The Derp Show Episode 16 - Gaming
We've been away for a while! Turns out, it was because we were playing video games.
The Derp Show Episode 16 - Gaming .MP4 [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 16 - Gaming .MP3 [FREE]
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Tuesday, August 21, 2012
The Derp Show Episode 15 - Fire
Get your matches and fuel up that zippo, because we're gonna burn somethin!
The Derp Show Episode 15 - Fire .MP4 [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 15 - Fire .MP3 [FREE]
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Wednesday, August 15, 2012
DERP SHOW EPISODE 14 - SURVIVAL
Its a harsh world out there, but maybe this podcast will help you get through it, or at least make the wait for rescue more pleasant!
The Derp Show Episode 14 - Survival .MP4 [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 14 - Survival .MP3 [FREE]
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Tuesday, August 7, 2012
DERP SHOW EPISODE 13 - MEMORY
To commemorate our lapse on Monday, today's Derp Show is about MEMORY!
The Derp Show Episode 13 - Memory .MOV [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 13 - Memory .MP3 [FREE]
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Tuesday, July 31, 2012
X Gon give it to you
We're trying out a new content delivery platform that will ideally let us serve up a greater backlog of derp show episodes. Here are the links below!
The Derp Show Episode 03 - Design .MOV [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 04 - Changes .MOV [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 05 - Toys .MOV [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 06 - Mysteries .MOV [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 07 - Food .MOV [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 08 - Travel .MOV [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 09 - Time .MOV [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 10 - Conventions .MP4 [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 11 - Science .MP4 [$3.00]
The Derp Show Episode 12 - Technology .MP4 [$3.00]
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Monday, July 30, 2012
This week on THE DERP SHOW we discuss technology and its use in making everything more confusing! Also a cat insists on being the star.
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Monday, July 23, 2012
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
After a long absence, we've resumed posting of The Derp Show! We will also be trying some experiments with other services to hopefully supply people with access to the archive of videos, so stay tuned for that!
Download Derp Show Episode 10: Conventions MP4 [$3]
Download Derp Show Episode 10: Conventions MP3 [free]
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Thursday, July 5, 2012
Shards: Tales from the Ruin Nation FREE TO VIEW
Sales of my book and pdfs have been very sluggish recently, so in an effort to stimulate interest I decided to do something other webcomic artists I love and respect have also done. The former backlog of sketches and concept art above has been replaced with the entirety of my book "Shards: Tales from the Ruin Nation", a sci-fi graphic novel written by and in part drawn by myself, along with a motley crew of talented young students. If you like the strip, please consider buying the PDF or ordering a paperback hardcopy from us, or show your support by purchasing the luxurious (and inexpensive) wallpaper for a mere $3.
1024x768 1152x864 1280x1024 1600x1200
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Today is another exciting story workshop day for The Tower. This new tri-weekly schedule has moved work on my pet project from fussing around the job site counting sundries to the long grind of actual progress, like a giant story-driven tunnel boring machine.
What I'm working on right now is the actual chore of locking down each and every story choice and event in sequence, hence the feeling of grinding ahead through a solid obstacle. Maybe it isnt the same for everything, but I find that this process is the hardest part. Spitballing about world concepts and character ideas is a piece of cake, but constructing a sound story? Difficult. And always hanging over me are the horrifying concerns I have: "Is this contrived?" "Does this work?" "Is it interesting?" "is it too complex?"
Choices to be made, foundations to be laid.
But its getting done!
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Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Haven't made a blog post in a long time, so I'm trying to fix that. Thing is, if you're as anxiety-ridden as I am, its often a challenge just to convince yourself that anything you say is interesting or relevant.
Anyway! Some updates about whats going on.
I've been having regular meetings with a certain top secret muse recently for the purpose of doing all the actual hard work of making concrete story decisions based on the reams of vague concept work I've amassed over the last few years. Slowly but surely we are actually locking down the story thread one scene at a time, and it turns out that doing that is FUCKING HARD. But it is getting done, which is pretty crucial when you consider that its probably what has been stalling the book(s) this long. Its a trap many creative people fall into, and it usually goes something like this.> Be a creative person
> Have a great idea for a story
> Come up with lots of sweet ideas
> Never choose specifics because you're terrified of making a sub-optimal choice and having the whole thing turn into unbearable dogshit because of it
> Continue manufacturing unused concepts, hoping for some nonexistent "right ones"
> Create nothing at all rather than risk making something mediocre
> BAD END
Working on The Tower has been an incredibly long process, and the longer I work on it the more scared I become of it not living up to my own hype. Or worse still, of it simply being average. But what's the point in just staying in this stagnating little cul-de-sac of preproduction and concepting? I've always tried to be inspired by Aaron Alexovich's timeless quote:
*Special note for artists: Getting things done is the most important thing. Even more important than making things good. Nobody cares about all the fantastic ideas that live only in your brain or scattered all over your floor in various unfinished lumps. We ALL have fantastic ideas that live only in our brains or scattered all over our floors in various unfinished lumps. If every one of your ideas exists solely in your head or scattered all over your floor in various unfinished lumps, then guess what: Rob Liefeld is a better artist than you are. Yeah, that's right. This guy. Better than you. Just finish the stupid thing, already.
But as anyone who has followed my career knows, The Tower has been fraught with empty promises and false starts. And from my perspective, the reason has always been the same - "Its just not good enough yet."But I could literally keep making that excuse until the day I die and then have nothing to show for it. So my mission now must be to let go and make it happen, because even though it will likely be rough or awkward in places, it will be very sincere.
Im lucky enough to HAVE this secret muse, because pairing with someone helps in the discussion and decision process. I have my ideas challenged and must defend them or conclude that they need to be cut or modified. Furthermore, as Shards: Tales from the Ruin Nation demonstrated, I seem more able to generate something tangible when i'm part of a team.
So here's
- The story will span approximately five manga-style volumes.
- We have approximately four scenes "in the can" from book one, and a few more with strong plans
- All of the lead and major supporting characters have been exhaustively worked on in terms of personality and motivation.
- Story work meetings are happening every other day for a minimum of one hour, though usually longer.
Just thought you might want to know.
PS: Today's top pic, #100 is from one of the early scenes in The Tower.
-A
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Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Make good art.
I probably have to read Sandman now. Neil Gaiman is a very inspiring guy. Neil Gaiman Graduation speech
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Thursday, May 17, 2012
I command you to rise from your grave
So my computer is up and running again, minus most of its information. Due to this unfortunate state of affairs, it will probably be a few days or a week or two before I'm fully functional... However, with hardware restored we can restart work on The Derp show and others, so stay tuned!
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Friday, May 4, 2012
We are experiencing technical difficulties...
So, for reasons I will go into after the raw embarassment subsides, my computer is broken. It may take a little while to fix, so until then I will attempt to Wednesday, April 25, 2012
We're back! And appropriately doing an episode of the Derp Show on time!
Download Episode 9 MOV [$3.00]
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Monday, April 23, 2012
In three days' time, we will mark the 26th anniversary of a unique event in history. In the early hours of the morning on April 26 of 1986, reactor number four of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the Ukraine exploded. It was the beginning of the worst nuclear disaster in history, and from its wreckage came uncountable stories of horror, bravery and sacrifice. This thursday, we will be live streaming three documentaries about the disaster to inform, educate and remember this indelible mark on human history. Please join us and ensure that the importance of this event is never forgotten.
Link TBA
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Friday, March 30, 2012
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Draw!!!
So on a random whim, I decided to broadcast some coloring I was going to ustream. Afterwards, I took some requests from the chat which yielded some pretty funny images.
This is probably going to have to become a weekly thing.
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Monday, March 26, 2012
The Derp Show Ep.8 - Travel
So now that Kroze is back, we shoveled some coal into the derp engine, stoked it up and crashed that fucko straight into a wall. Please enjoy the latest derp show!
Download Episode 8 MP3 [FREE]
Download Episode 8 MOV [$3.00]
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Saturday, March 17, 2012
Anyone seen Kroze?
So I've been trying to do a podcast, but my cohost has proved elusive this week. I'm sure he's off watching ponies somewhere. Until then, enjoy some artwork of mine.
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Thursday, March 8, 2012
YOU FAILED
So, no word of a lie, we TRIED to do an episode of The Derp Show today, but apparently midnight is sleeptime for our neighbors, a concept which they communicated to us by means of percussive fist on wall. We will make a second attempt during daylight hours tomorrow!
Pic unrelated.
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