Todd

Introducing… THE NORMLINGS!

Introducing, THE NORMLINGSAnd it has begun… production has officially started on my newest comic, THE NORMLINGS. I have no idea when it will go live on my website, so join my NEWSLETTER and find out first!

I wanted to challenge myself with THE NORMLINGS by structuring it differently than my past work. With my past comics I would sketch out every episode, scan them into my computer, and then do all the finish work digitally. This comic will be completely hand made minus the speech bubbles and text, because I would like you to actually be able to read it.

Another thing that will be different is that it’s an experiment in story telling. Sure, there’s an ongoing narrative, but in every possible sense I am starting this comic from the ground up. This means the comic starts in a white void. The only thing around is a couple of characters and nothingness and over time the story will reveal new things as the characters try to live in this environment.

Lastly, this comic will probably be one of the most mainstream things I’ve made. It will still have that offbeat sense of humor about it, but I feel it will appeal to a larger demographic of readers who like this type of comic.

Thanks for reading!
Todd

The struggles with character development

Character Development - WinstonI have a new comic that I’ve been developing for the past couple months and although I have six months of scripts written and ready to go, there’s been one roadblock that has prevented me from putting a single pencil to panel, and that is Winston. Meet Winston everyone, or the several variations of him that I’ve drawn.

Why is he a roadblock? Well, he’s the main character, and in my head I have a particular look for him. That look is not translating once pencil hits paper. *bangs head against table* This character has a “voice of reason” type personality and is the sanity amongst the insane characters that will be around him. He is my grounding point in my comic, and therefore, it’s pretty important that I get the look right. He’s also the very first character you see in the comic, and for some reason I’m not nailing his look, and it’s irritating.
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Update on new comic

New Comic Scripts 40epFor my new comic I’ve decided to take a little different approach compared to my previous work. I guess I’m deconstructing things a bit because when I first dove into comics with FRIK, each episode was 10-12 panels. Then I made HOLES IN IT, which was 6 panels. Now for the new comic it will be 3 panels.

This currently untitled comic will be more akin to a “joke a day” comic, and because it’s 3 panels, that means writing scripts for it is incredibly fast. As I’m still in the process of sketching out character design, I decided to start writing the scripts to see where it takes me.

I plan for this new comic to be released twice a week, which means I need a much bigger buffer of finished comics in case something happens and I can’t work on it for a bit. As of last night I’ve written the 40th episode, and as you can see from the photo, that’s 5 months worth of comics right there.

Heck, I haven’t even figured out what the character names are minus one, so I’m using temp names just to keep things organized. I was originally going to call this LOWEST COMMON DENOMINATOR, but then I realized rather quickly that there’s already another comic by the same name. Back to the drawing board on that.

As far as how I will create it, I’m leaning towards it being traditionally made by hand 100%. With my first two comics I would draw it out, then scan it, then finish everything digitally. With this one I’m thinking of keeping it all hand made, but I’ll know more when I get into it. I love working digital, so it will be hard to get back into the groove of a fully hand made comic.

Thanks for reading!

Ten Year Retrospective: “Hands Of Decision”

It’s hard to believe that my first “official” digital mixed media abstract artwork was released almost ten years ago. I had dabbled in it before that point, but it was really more of a curiosity than anything. Why I chose that moment is because of two things.

My son was born two months prior, and we were still in the “every 3 hour” feeding phase. I spent many late nights creating digital artwork in lieu of sleep. I had massive sleep deprivation and that probably fueled the abstract nature of the art because I was on auto pilot for most of it and not thinking about what I was doing.
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