LookingLand

i haven't posted a picture of my desk in forever. mostly because i haven't been working at my desk and there's been nothing to see. even in this picture, you can see how sort of scattershot it is. i don't even remember why i have all the glue out (maybe i ought to put it away, you think?)


this weekend i managed to get a bunch of stuff done in spite of frittering my time on watching movies (among them: Crossing Over, which I recommend!), spinning about the usual quandaries, eating popcorn, and spending much of saturday running around at booksales and Cinco de Mayo festivities. a good time was had by all and very little damage was done to the pocketbook.

i also want to say that after 20 freakin' years my character's been lugging around a Navy Colt, i officially switched it to a Colt Dragoon this weekend. i had always wanted a heavier, more ridiculous firearm with a larger caliber (.44 instead of .36) ~ the dragoon is perfect. thanks, jamie, it's entirely your fault.


image for an up-coming scene
it's a good thing the dragoon shares a lot of similarities with the navy variety. it made drawing this one much easier than i suspected!

: D

I was really hoping to bring in the new year with a clean workspace, but I think the picture below tells it all. On the bright side, I'm busy and enjoying the busy-ness! I'm working on a ton of projects simultaneously and don't know how long I will be able to keep juggling them, but for the time being I'm going to ride this enthusiam train to the end of the line. Today I am cleaning off my actual drawing table (which has been buried under a map of Washington D.C. for the last six months at least) to see if I can't move some my work over into the other room and alleviate a little bit of the clutter.


Yesterday I worked on Reconstruction a good deal and am excited to announce that I think I can probably start posting three times a week very soon! I've finally distilled the process into something I can knock out very quickly. The art only suffers mildly for it and I have so much more fun moving through scenes quickly. I've finished drawing the "For Katie" scene that I have been working on and I like the way it wraps up. I'm glad I started with this sort of non-sequitor as a lead-in. It really gave me a chance to experiment with the tools I'd allotted myself and to get the story rolling. If you have been occasionally checking in at WebComics Nation for the updates, you'll notice that it's not very well organized over there, but I'm hoping to work on the "official" website this month and get that up and running at the start of February. Then maybe it will be easier to follow along.

It's a new year, but I'm slow to change my habits. As usual, I'm struggling with the usual pile of nagging doubts about what I am doing with my life and talents (I suspect many of my creative friends and readers go through the annual self-assessment thing around this time of year), but I'm going to just work through it (and I hope all of you do too!). Even if there are projects on my desk that I'm not entirely in love with at the moment, I will probably love them again next week.

I've been so busy that I haven't been posting much, which is a good thing, I guess ~ but I have so many cool books and things I want to share. I hope this week I can start to catch up!


Lastly, I need to post this picture as annual proof that yes, I do have the cutest dog that ever lived. This was taken at my sister's house on Christmas, which is why he's wearing the silly ribbon with the poinsettia on it.

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We got a dusting of snow ~ not quite enough for full coverage, but it's nicely chilly and mostly white outside. I hear it will be a mild winter, which is a huge disappointment. I am hoping the predictions are wrong (isn't the weather always contrary to what's predicted? Please?).

I have returned from the long holiday weekend and jumped right back into work, which is good. Didn't get much done yesterday having driven in from Wisconsin in the morning and putting in a half day at work, but I inked a few panels and that's better than nothing.

I've noticed that the art for Reconstruction doesn't look very sharp on PCs with low resolution. The art is optimized for Mac at 1680 x 1050. This is a technological failing on my part, and something I will have to work on as I go. Meanwhile, my apologies to all the non-Mac users out there who are seeing Reconstruction as pale and fuzzy.

We are almost ready to launch The Orchard, which is also exciting. Okay, it's running a lot late, but I guess we've all been pretty busy this autumn with other stuff.

I have also managed to clean off my computer desk and it looks pretty great (see below). My work desk is still a disaster, though. I'm not even going to bother trying to tackle it. Clearly I work better buried under a pile of paper and tools.


Unfortunately, this picture is too wide an angle to see some of the details of the very cool doo-dads I have on this desk: like the little light-up fire station (which is a recent acquisition), and some of my favorite little old books. But at least you can see that the desk is clean!

Lots of plans in the works. Just wanted to check in since I've been out of town a while. More to come soon!

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it's been a long while since i updated the condition of my desk. probably because there's not much to show and tell. the same projects have been sitting, sort of flitting, around the desktop for the last month with scarcely a breeze to disturb them. it's gotten to the point where, unsure of exactly what's on the desk in its piles, i'd just as soon not disturb it (i may not like what i find).


for example, this sketch below of Reverdy Johnson explaining the lazy way to make panels for comics. on a scale of 1-10 of weirdness, i'm pretty sure this rates a 10 (at least!). put in context of the overall conspiracy pile on the desk, however, it brings it down to about a 6. still, sometimes i find things among my own dreck that amuse me and this definitely ranks.


the panel next to it is Colonel Bolton and General Hartranft from a series of sketches i made testing out a pen. there's a note on the page that says something about Bolton having a nightmare about looking for his teeth (which he lost when he was shot in the face in battle). it sounds like a great idea that i had, but sadly can't remember the exact context. i am hoping that somewhere in my pile is some note that explains what i was getting at.

even though these sketches are just toss-off jibberish, i actually like them. i certainly have a lot more confidence in the pen strokes when i'm not the least bit serious about what i am drawing.

: o p

happy sunday, all!

p.s. i finally made a "desk" tag. that only took me forever.

it's finally happened. i have completely lost control of my desk. last night i sat down to work on Reconstruction and couldn't comfortably angle the clipboard in a way that made painting easy. of course, instead of clearing the desk, i just forced myself to make do. because God forbid i disturb the tower of i don't know what. and that's the worst part of it. i'm not even entirely sure what's in those piles at this point. a lot of photocopies, i think, and notes, and scanned microfilm. last night i was trying to baste together reconstructed pages of the Evening Star from 1865. and of course i did the scans wrong, so i am missing two lines in the middle of the pages (argh!). fortunately i still have the microfilm reel, so i can write in the missing lines tonight or tomorrow (but i am such an idiot).

i'm glad i went to the trouble of ordering this newspaper for a couple of reasons: it's the local paper for crying outloud! what was i thinking for blowing it off originally? and also, it's given me a few interesting new tidbits to work with (one description of sam arnold's father crying in the courtroom was rather heartbreaking).

i was really tempted to include a bunch of random local news things in my outline, but restrained myself (fascinating as they were), given that the monstrousness of this project is already too much for even me to handle at this point.


the good news is that this desk will be completely wiped clean this weekend. i've got the summer projects moving in (for the Here there Be Monsters press) and so everything is getting put on hold until late July. well, by "everything", i really mean In Pursuance of Said Conspiracy, which means i can get most of this stuff off my desk until then. this is not the way i wanted to do it, but life has a way of dictating the priorities. i have to write Issue No. 5 of Eleison in the coming week (yikes). thankfully i have a story in mind. just have to commit it to paper now.

in painting: Reconstruction shouldn't suffer for the schedule change (i hope). i'm a little bit behind, but the style change is gradually making it easier. i also have something more like a draft to work from (instead of winging it like i was doing for several pages there ~ shouldn't have done that, but oh well, it's all a learning process).

new projects: ooo exciting ~ my brother and i are going to launch a webcomic of some sort in late June/July hopefully. i want to title it The Orchard, but that sounds so prosaic given the subject matter. this will be an online exclusive about Death, War, and Bacon (for those of you who aren't familiar with my obsession with war and breakfast, please see Grantcakes). it will star Death, a soldier, and a pig (right?), and will likely be a meditation on themes familiar in my work for those who know it (fidelity, honor, and estrangement chief among them). stay tuned for more details!

in reading: book updates later. this post is already long and jumbled!

well, it's a mess now. i've been home from work feeding a cold with popcorn and green tea (because that's healthy, right?). and between trying to get my little dog to eat something and blowing my sore and drippy nose, i have been attempting to get some creative work done. the good news is, i am making some progress. the bad news is, my desk is messier than ever (and completely non-conducive to actually working).


i tend to work best while standing, so it's fine if i throw stuff all over the chair, but the fact that i barely have any space to actually work in is making me feel buggy. i need a rolling trolley thingie to put my books in so that they will be right on hand, but not consuming the lion's share of my work area. then i could just pull 'em up when i need 'em and shove them off when i don't.


and all of this just to say: really, i am working. inking the Morse house on grace street may kill me, but i'm going to finish it (and a number of other goals) this weekend.

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