*crosses fingers*
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The Week – 20 April 2018

Apr20
by on 20 April 2018 at 4:32 PM

LONG JOHN UPDATE:

Long John pulls the trigger in Chapter 3: “Making Smoke.”

The radio silence over the last month has not been due to laziness, negligence, or ignorance––I’ve been hard at work to get Chapter 3 done. Specifically, I wanted to get it done and printed by this year’s Free Comic Book Day on Saturday, May 5. I’ll be celebrating it this year like I did last year at Sacramento’s own Empire’s Comics Vault; every year their event seems to get better and more refined, becoming more than just a venue for people to line up around the block to get free comic books. I’ll post more about that specific event rather soon (since it is rather soon), but for now I can say that I’ll again be a part of its local talent round up mini-convention. Last year was a blast and this year I wanted to have something to celebrate (though not giving away for free): the premiere of Long John Chapter 3: Making Smoke.

Luckily, the month away from the site was not wasted as I was able to finish, proofread, get outside readers to respond, and send the files off to the printer by my self-imposed due date. I have since received the proof from the printer––Long John’s regular printer, RA Comics––and approved it. So, I should be receiving the books very soon.

I’m incredibly excited about this book, more than I was for Chapter 2. I was going to add “for some reason” to the end of that last sentence, but I very much know the reason. Chapter 2 was definitely a “middle chapter” and, as such––as well as being absolutely exhausted as I ran that book to the finish line––it felt like it was an unfinished narrative. It ended on a cliffhanger and was a very quiet book, one that I know was (and was intended to be) a stark contrast to the bombast of Chapter 1. I knew what was coming, but as a reading experience, I went into its printing fully aware that many readers may find the chapter a much lesser experience than the first book, which seemed to be universally well-received.

With the completion of Chapter 3, I get to close the book, so to speak, on the promise of Chapter 2 and it now feels complete. I’ve said before that Chapters 1 through 3 are kind of a complete package, nearly standalone (while dropping threads for future chapters), but it’s really two pieces: Chapter 1 is its thing and Chapter 2 & 3 are their own thing. In my notes, I even called Chapter 3 “Chapter 2.5.”

So, I’m very excited and proud of what Chapter 3 has turned out to be and I can’t wait to get it to you either as a book or when it updates online.

LISTENING:

I tend to get a bit manic when I’m in full-on work mode, so my usual routines and patterns become super focused and tightly wound. Basically, I search around for what keeps my creative train moving forward and just hit repeat on that moment so I can, with hope, keep that going to the end.

With that in mind, two albums led the charge to get this book done, and they couldn’t have been more different from each other, but I played them so much that they have become a complementary pair in my mind.

Source: Epic Records

  • Firepower by Judas Priest

I really love heavy metal music, but I don’t sop up the genre like a sponge on a spill. Instead, I’m mildly familiar with a lot of things, but only really a fan of a few things. I like singing, I like melody, and I like melodrama. Because of this, I tend toward the subgenre of “power metal” comprised of musicians like Dio, Iron Maiden, Twisted Sister, and Judas Priest.

My wander into the world of Judas Priest started a few years ago. I came across a collection of their deep catalogue along with that of Iron Maiden. I have always equated these two bands and was, as stated before, nominally aware of who they were, their history, and their big songs. Iron Maiden was “The Trooper” band and “The Number of the Beast” and Priest was “Youv’e Got Another Thing Comin'” and “Breakin’ the Law.”

Being a nerd, I did some research into both before cherry picking their respective catalogues. Based on the reading I did, I thought that Iron Maiden would be the band I would prefer. Their music ticks off all the boxes a metal-appreciative English major would love: songs based on classic horror novels? Check. Songs that tell stories as well as being catchy? Check. Songs about historical moments and battles? Check.

But I bounced off of their music pretty fast. I don’t really have an answer as to why, but it just wasn’t connecting with me on any meaningful level. So, I put on a Judas Priest album––Screaming for Vengeance, specifically––and loved every second of it.

The music of Judas Priest is definitely built around a pop mentality: short songs, songs that have universal application, songs acting more as snapshots of emotions and simple ideas rather than complex narratives. They also have a loose mythology woven through their albums (specifically album art), but it’s obviously just silly fun.

Judas Priest released their first album in 1974 and have been pretty consistent with regular releases since then, with a few hiccups and major lineup changes along the way. In 2014, they released their first album in a long time, Redeemer of Souls. I like Priest but wasn’t expecting much. Redeemer, however, felt like a band at the start of its career. It was so vivacious and inspired and vocalist Rob Halford sounded stronger than he had in a decade that it blew my mind, to the point that I swore it should be their final album because there was no way to bring even the same level of enthusiasm from an aging band to another album.

Then, at the beginning of March, they released Firepower. It’s better than Redeemer of Souls.

I’ve never seen a musician really come back as strong or stronger than they had been in their prime. It’s an astounding work of heavy metal and I can’t stop listening to it. The masters of their craft in peak form after almost 45 years in the business.

Priest speaks much more to the music of Twisted Sister––my baseline for all music, in truth, but especially hard rock and heavy metal––but no matter how “commercial” they got, they always did things their way. Their lyrics are often clever and layered and the musicianship is much more emotive than technical, which I really respond to. I have realized that music is very much my vehicle for emotional connection and expression. I care more about how a song makes me feel and what tone the music and lyrics are generating than what they’re saying, usually.

I like songs that are personally applicable, that help codify my thoughts and emotions and moments in my life despite my love for literature and complex technical ability. I like that stuff, too, but it isn’t what I look for in music. When I find that, I appreciate and can parse it, but it’s not what brings me back. I like music that makes me feel like I can accomplish anything or encapsulates perfectly my sadness or whatnot. That’s why I like things like Dio, Twisted Sister, and Judas Priest (and, more recently, High Spirits and Dawnbringer). Their exaggerated musical posturing and indefinite lyrics are wide enough to be rather inclusive and they allow me to sew the lyrics and tone to my narrative rather than asking me to follow theirs.

Source: Polydor

  • Days Are Gone by Haim

Like any self-conscious person, I don’t like to paint myself into a corner with regard to my musical tastes. I like to think I’m open to anything by anybody, but, if we’re all honest with ourselves, by a certain age we tend to paint the lines around our own lane and are more than happy to stick to it.

I found the band of sisters, Haim, completely by accident and in probably the worst possible way. But I’m incredibly glad I did because their debut album, Days Are Gone, quickly entered into a strange satellite-like orbit around my fevered workflow along with Judas Priest’s Firepower despite the fact that they couldn’t be more different from each other.

On Facebook, I came across a hilarious joke photo album that basically says, “Guitar players’ faces make more sense when you replace their guitars with slugs.” Google it; it’s hilarious.

One of the pictures featured a blonde woman who looked like she was actually retching and I had no idea what kind of guitar she was meant to be playing before the slug was superimposed. After running through the comments, I learned it was Este Haim, the bass player for the pop band, Haim. Soon after her name was mentioned, a slew of comments came forward praising her “bass face.” Though I only saw it as a still image, I had to see how her face got that way and what kind of music would cause a person to contort in such an extreme fashion.

How I first learned about Haim.

A few YouTube videos later, I not only saw some impressive bass face (Este is really into playing bass and it’s fantastic to watch and listen to because she’s really good) I came away not only appreciating the musician but quite impressed with their music.

Haim makes really interesting nostalgia-laced pop with experimental elements sewn throughout to prove a very unique listening experience. There’s a lot of ’80s-type pop music in there evoking bands like Bananarama, Prince, and Wilson Phillips, but there’s also raw modernism in there that evokes everything from Beyonce to the weirdest stuff from Gotye. To top it off, they’re all really good musicians, which is more than can be said for many pop artists. Watch any live performance to get a sense of their ability, but listen to their albums if you just want excellently written, played, and sounding pop music.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BUD

photo by Casey Cavner

Lastly, today is the third birthday of my dog, Rusty (formally Russell T Buckets). He’s a good boy.

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The Week – 16 March 2018

Mar16
by on 16 March 2018 at 1:00 AM

READING

Greg Pak’s “How I Write a Comic Book Script”

A sample of a comic book issue outline by Greg Pak. (Source: gregpak.com)

As much as I love the things people make, I’m actually obsessed with how people make things. I have been lucky enough to secure a day job that literally focuses on this idea of process over product. Like many creative people, I scared myself stiff because I knew I wanted to create and could make stuff, but I wasn’t confident as to how to do that. I needed a guide. During those impressionable years, I never found a definitive guide aside from just mimicking the things I loved based on the impression they gave me. It wasn’t until much later that I learned that there is no right way to do things––just do them and figure out the way that works for you. Luckily, with the advent of the internet and with creators being much more open and public about their processes now than ever before, models of production are readily available to the potential creative, though they may be overwhelmed with the variety at their disposal. Now, decades later, I realize what creativity actually is; it’s just doing things in whatever way works for you. If you’re good at it, people will find you. If not, adjust and do the best you can. The right people will find you. But still––deep down––I still love to see people talk about their process. At the very least, I can write it off now (both figuratively and literally) as a professional endeavor.

An idea I have been mulling over for literally years was to start a blog that aggregates posts about how people make their stuff as well as publishing interviews and breakdowns of how people do things. I even attempted a podcast version of it with “Part of the Plan,” (though I realize now that “Process Makes Perfect” is a much better name for it) an interview show idea, but in my pilot I artfully dodged much of the process talk that I was actually craving. Part of the goal would be pedagogical––showing people paralyzed by the thought of trying to make a comic book or write a song or a short story that there is no right way to make things. It’s just about doing it. The other part would be to satisfy that need for which I yenned as a youth to see how the people I respected actually got things done. I read all the interviews I could find; I read how-to books, biographies, watched videos––all which left me feeling lacking as if some deep-cut industry secret were being held back because it still wasn’t easy to make things. But that’s the folly of young, eager creativity––impatience.

I don’t think I’ve ever actually read anything by respected comic book writer, Greg Pak. But when he posted in a series of tweets his process for developing a story and writing a script for comics, I immediately signed up for his newsletter if only because he promised to post a cleaned up and honed version of the tweetstorm. It’s rare you see such a thorough look at someone’s process, especially a writer. What I love about Pak’s breakdown of his process is that he makes it explicit that creativity is not magic. It’s a muscle that needs regular attention and practice, something I fully support and stand by. In the syllabi for my classes, there is a line at the beginning where I say that “writing is a verb, not a profession,” and I fully support that interpretation. Writing is an act that only exists while you’re doing it. To declare yourself a writer is to simply say that you participate in an activity.  My favorite part of Pak’s breakdown, however, is this:

“Acknowledge that whatever you’re writing this very instant isn’t perfect, but you’re gonna revise it and make it better and ‘perfection’ is an illusion anyway.” -Greg Pak

This is another thing I impress upon my students. The people that churn out perfect first drafts are rare. Or they’re liars. Writing is a messy process. Make the lump of clay before you start carving things away; you’ll always end up with a better statue than trying to create the Venus de Milo on the first try.

CHAPTER 3 UPDATE

Ugh. I’m in the slog of coloring Chapter 3 right now. I’m making good progress, but it is a chore. I chose the limited color palette under the auspice that it would make comic creation go faster, but that has definitely not been the case. It has been slow and relatively monochromatic. But I’m pushing forward and the end of the book actually seems very close. I aim to get the files out to the printer by the 14th of April, and I think I’m still on a good track for that.

The main image I used to announce the title for Chapter 3 was a quick color job of one panel from an upcoming page.

Chapter 3 Title Announcement

In the context of the narrative, it kicks off the big action scene in the middle of the book. So, without spoiling anything, here is the final version of this panel in the book proper.

It’s still melodramatic. It’s still iconic. It’s still going to be a little bit before Long John gets posted onto the site.

So, until the next The Week, that was The Week.

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The Week – 09 March 2018

Mar09
by on 9 March 2018 at 5:39 AM

LONG JOHN UPDATE

With Chapter 3 “Making Smoke” all drawn, the last month has been nothing but coloring and lettering the book, which is less frustrating than drawing and more rote busy work. It’s also at this stage where I find I really start doubting my artistic ability. Since much of this part of the process is spent zoomed close on the art, I can see where my technical acumen come up short. It’s when I’m up close where I can see my lack of patience––as well as my laziness––shine through with inking mistakes, anatomy shorthand, and flaws due to exhaustion or boredom (at the time). However, it’s likely mostly a consequence of realizing I’m closer to having a book that I will put out there in stores and on this site that people can actually see and respond to. The inherent self-doubt gets loudest at this point, which is a voice that I always have to deal with, whether here or at my day job, or running errands, or going to a party, or whatever. What helps is the memory of having done good work before and knowing I can do it again. A piece of advice I throw out to my classes now and then is something I honestly live by:

If you do your best, you can’t be accused of doing anything less.

The implied caveat being that you’re doing the best you can do at the time, but it’s still your best which will likely only get better with time. So, when these thoughts surface that try to hold me down, I tell myself that this book is just the next step for the better thing I’ll do next. Through that lens, the artwork suddenly starts to look better and I get excited again to tell this story.

With that in mind, here is the first page of Chapter 3 (any future sneak peeks will be excerpts like before):

DRAWING

Like the rest of the world, Nicole and I saw Black Panther and thoroughly enjoyed it. This last week, I was listening to a conversation about the movie and was inspired to try my hand at drawing in a more traditional superhero style. It’s quick and messy, but it was fun. I have been thinking lately what a “superhero style” drawing of mine would look like if I sat down and actually worked it out with rendering and what not. Since I drew this quickly (I felt guilty because I should have been coloring Long John instead of doing this), it isn’t my full effort, but I was surprised by how this turned out.

Ink drawing of Black Panther

Some light color treatment on the Black Panther drawing.

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