Another of the farewell pictures as Dylan Dolphin leaves the story

Two-page spread, Mexican circus tents in the background

Today I drew this rough sketch showing Dylan Dolphin leaving the story. The background took the most time. I’ve redrawn those tents half a dozen times. To make sure the tents didn’t distract the reader, I de-saturated the background colors, removed the black line work, and gave everything a dose of Gaussian blur.

Since this is a two-page spread, I’ll have to deal with Betty’s arm passing through the spine page margins. That will create a 3/8in gap in her arm as it goes from the right page to the left.

Getting back to the business at hand

Now that my part-time job is in the can, I’m working on waking up the right side of my brain. Doing technical work 24-7 suppresses my creative impulse. Today it felt good to wake up from four months of slumber caused by writing technical documents under the pressure of meeting impossible deadlines. That kind of stress is not relieved by anything but sleep, and even then it frequently filters into my dreams.

In this picture — one of the final pages that wrap up the plot — Jimmy and Betty are best friends saying farewell, not knowing if they’ll ever see each other again.

The Agony of Buying a 40-year old Camera on Ebay

So many choices, so many ways to be disappointed, so many risks.

I couldn’t focus on anything but cameras today. Cameras and film scanners. Then I started lurking around Ebay. I’m a camera addict, and Ebay is my dealer.

Despite my trepidation about buying a used camera on Ebay, I’ve bought three working cameras in the last 7 years — a big Polaroid camera for which film is no longer made, a Nikon F3, and an 80-year old Rolleiflex, which works like a charm. Now I want a little Rollei 35 to carry with me while I’m out and about. I have other cameras, but they’re alarmingly huge and conspicuous and I want to be discrete as a mouse, just going here and there without being given away by a foot-long lens sticking out from my jacket.

Chore Day One

Same chores: vacuuming and laundry.

I had a brainstorm while talking with my partner. I was talking about my chaotic time in college and she suggested a graphic novel about student life at a big college in the 60’s. It was mind-blowing as we emerged from the repressive Eisenhower 50’s to the student rebellion in the 60’s. I was not part of that rebellion, mired as I was in inner conflicts. As a student, who showed great promise — according to my SAT scores — I was a magnificent underachiever who spent an entire year floating paper airplanes out of the window of my 7th floor dorm window.

I figure my tale would require four volumes: freshman year, sophomore year, etc. It would be a huge undertaking on the order of a masterpiece such as Kent State: Four Dead in Ohio, by Derf Backderf. FYI, that’s an affiliate link. Derf has been doing comics for 40 years. It would take me 40 years to learn the skills to describe my four chaotic years at the Great Big University.

Alas! So many books to write, so little time.

I'm now free to be a starving artist

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Today I wrapped up my part-time tech job. Now I’m going back to being a full-time children’s book author…for the next three months, at which time I’ll become gainfully employed again…unless the world come to an end.

The picture above shows my concept drawings of the villains of book 4. They’re heartless robots. The world is full of them.

Those darned circus tents

One more attempt at circus tents. It won’t be the last. I want to create a majestic landscape, with towering tents and roller coaster rides, with a magnificent mountain range in the background. I do know that Acapulco is surrounded by jungle, but this is my Acapulco.

The big news is that I sold another book today. That makes 5 books this year. My career seems to be on an upward path.

Circus tents, one more time

I drew these tents with the bezier tool. I wanted to make the stripes smoother and they are smoother. Despite that, I like yesterday’s hand-drawn tents more. I was in a hurry as I was copying and pasting and didn’t notice until too late that one of the tents is floating in the air. Perspective, please, Mr. Artist!

Drawing a Circus Tent, second attempt

I used a reference to draw this picture of a fabulous Mexican circus. Clip Studio Paint EX helped me draw the yellow and red bands quickly with the Lasso Fill tool.

The more I use Clip Studio Paint, the more I appreciate the tools designed for drawing comics. Even after drawing three books with CSP, I’m aware of only 10% of CSP’s features. I enjoy fiddling with other painting programs, but when I have a deadline, I reach for CSP.

Sunday, May 22, 2022 -- Second chore day in a row, and the return of my first love

Today was a cooking day. From 9:30 to 4 pm I was baking vegan loaves and cornmeal encrusted tempeh buffalo wings. Oh, I almost forgot the gallon of tomato sauce I cooked.

On another front, I feel my old first love beckoning me again…film photography. I was totally into film photography from 1967 to 2001. I was a camera addict with my share of Nikons, Leicas, Hassleblads, Pentaxes, and a shit ton of no-name cameras I found in pawn shops. I had my own darkroom, enlarger, the finest lenses, and 100-foot rolls of 35mm black and white film. My true loves were Kodak Tri-X film and D-76 developer.

Then, I went insane and stupid and sold all of my gear. Why was I so dumb? Simple. I was going to go digital! From that day in 2003, when I bought a shitty digital camera and tried to make it work, my interest in photography eroded year by year until all I had to take pictures was my telephone.

But now, the sleeping giant has awakened. My partner has been talking madly, passionately about film photography, and I feel excited about shooting someblack and white film. Tri-X, of course.

I’m not sure how deeply I’ll dive in. I still have picture books to illustrate and stories to tell. Will their attraction be enough to keep me faithful, or will my first love consume me…again?

May 21, 2022 -- Chore Day and Mexican Circus Tents

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Today’s chores were pretty much the same as last week’s: laundry, vacuuming the house, and gardening. Normal stuff. After taking Nacho for his afternoon walk, I had time to open Clip Studio Paint and start painting a background image showing the kids arriving in Acapulco. In the background are circus tents. I used my imagination to paint the initial sketch, then I thought: “These are boring tents. They look like an eight-year old drew them.” That’s when I realized it was time to look a some references.

As you can see in the tiny reference picture, Mexican circus tents are really eye catching.