Space-Gun: The End and A Beginning

Well, if any of you guys kept up with my webcomic Space-Gun, it's an end of era for us. We wrapped on production yesterday: three years, 315 comics with two comics a week with not ONE missed update. We've been late before, by maybe four hours, but there was never a Tuesday or Thursday where there wasn't a comic uploaded. The last three years has been a great collaborative project between a group of friends, we've had our up and down, fun times and frustrating ones as well. But I can look back at those 315 comics and say that I'm proud to be a part of that. Space-Gun has defined my life for the last three years. But it's time for us to move on to things that will define the next part of our lives. Jake and I want to do comics, and Space-Gun was a great place for us to refine our skills in sequential story telling. Doing a full page of sequentials was intimidating when we started, now not so much. We can do our respective tasks as easy as breathing now (Jake: pencils, colors; myself: inks, lettering). I've even developed a sick liking towards lettering; i get a total kick out of it.

With the end of one era is the beginning of another. Space-Gun the webcomic will now become Space-Gun Studios. The studio currently consists of Evan Bryce, Jake Ekiss, Matthew Warlick, and myself. We've recently released one:OFF over at Indy Planet as a group; and we plan on doing much more over the summer. It was a difficult process to get to this core group of creators for the studio, but a good vibe had to be established between us all. Space-Gun Studios is about people with the absolute desire to do comics and creative projects, not only as a studio but as a peer group as well. The studio is just part of my desire to be surrounded by creative and driven people.

Being in a college town environment is a great way to start out as a young twenty-something. You meet creative people with great potential. But as the years toll on, you find that people are not driven to work as hard as they need to make things happen. Or that they want the attention and praise of being a creative person, but are not willing to actually earn it. In world of talented people, pure skill is not the only ingredient to success. I feel that i may not the most talented of peoples, but i'm ready and willing to make up for it with drive. So let's get this done before i burn out.

Design: Sister's Graduation Card

This is a quick graduation card I designed for my middle sister. It took me a while to get down properly because a) I've been juggling a few other things at the same time and b) I've been over thinking the card for weeks. That balance between something that looks cool and something that works for the client is difficult to maintain. Then I realized it was just my little sister and not some corporate client; she could care less if there were multiple layers of messaging involved. It just needed to be cooler than the ones you get from Jostens, simple enough to print at Kinkos by herself, and economic. So I just made sure it reflected her (hence the panda and the green, it pretty much matches her apartment) with a nice clean look. I kept it simple with some tone on tone so the dark text and panda would pop. Plus I'm a fan of things wrapping around edges; I feel it connects panels/sides together to create a better dynamic experience. Anyways, I think she liked it. She mentioned looking for cute envelopes for them, which to her is probably the most important aspect of the invite. Sometimes I just gotta let go of the higher, conceptual designs and just do something fun. Though I think I just caught the Apostrophe Atrophy in "ten'clock". ::sigh:: Eric Ligon would be so disappointed.

Sadly I won't be able to make to my sister's graduation because I'm already signed up to do the CAPE! show here in Dallas. Though she said to make up for it I'm going to have to get Robert Kirkman to sign her hardcover copies of Invincible. Those of you in Austin may know her, she use to work at one of the comic shops around there. Go to her graduation and throw things at her for me =P

Dallas Comic-Con Fallout

Well, I'm finally rested from the con. Sadly i had a major fit of the insomnia Friday night; so I could not get to sleep properly. I ended up being goofy all day Saturday. Though i did learn a valuable lesson: If i actually stay at the table, i actually make money. Who would have thought? I think I made the cost of the table back for once. Good step from being in the red completely.

Overall the con was the usual fare from the Dallas Comic-Con crowd. Chatted with some regular con-goers, talked with some new peoples, caught up with other artists, checked out all the cute girls, and got caught by said cute girls for checking them out. I need to to wear sunglasses. It was a nice little con, not as busy as the others they put on. I didn’t catch a lot of advertising for this show. Matthew mentioned that the only reason he knew of this show was because of me. And though the guest list was pretty split between sci-fi and comics, the attendees where pretty heavily weighed towards sci-fi. It seemed like a lot of people were looking for Star War memorabilia and such. I overheard a few attendees express their surprised with the amount of artists in the artist alley. Which was not laid out in the best manner, especially for the pros. They got stuck in a little cubby, which would be nice way to feature them if it wasn’t for the horrible lighting. One pro joked about falling asleep because it was so dark, but they did seem to make it a worthwhile weekend. I think part of it was that the beautiful, sunny weather; the corridor was well lit (due to the skylights) and that left the cubbies really dark in comparison. Thankfully the next DCC will be held at the Plano Convention center; which is better laid out for that. Sadly the Plano convention center also has a few dark corners. How do i know this? Guess who was stuck in a dark corner facing the fire exit for a whole weeked? :sigh:

All in all, a fairly good con. I was delirious from sleep deprivation on Saturday, got to eat some yummy Freebirds, made some scrillah, and sat within earshot of the lovely Christina Hendricks on Sunday. I got to listen to her very cute and very sweet voice all day; it was very distracting. Not only is she a real sweetheart, she is way, WAY more gorgeous in person. Hawt. Like for serious.

Well, that’s one more show in the can. Last show of the spring will be CAPE! on May 3rd, then it's a nice lengthy summer to prep for all the shows in the fall (DCC, Baltimore, Wizard World Texas). We’ll be working on a few books for the fall season, so be ready.

And i put the pictures from the weekend in a general Dallas Comic-Con set at this link.

The Start

Starting out with a new blog is intimidating. There has been so many in the past that have been forgotten or left unmaintained. But i need to get off my lazy ass and start producing more. I've been updating my DA Journal and my MySpace blog; i think i can import this into there as well. That would be handy; plus then i can import this into my new website as well once it launches. Anyways, this is really a test entry so i can tweak colors and such. Next post shall have actual content. Promise.