GOOD FRIDAY
Happy Good Friday.
“… I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.”
Genesis 3:15
SKETCHBOOK #18: I filled another Sketchbook. Here are some of the highlights. I am thinking of doing some videos where I go through my old sketchbooks, is that something yall would be interested in?
ONU ART: I am the official artist for the Orsak Narrative Universe. The ONU is a collection of role-playing games that range from single-player text-based games to group live sessions with a professional Dungeon Masters. Here are some of the characters I have painted for the universe this month.
JUNK RABBIT #3 COVER: Skottie Young’s Variant cover for Junk Rabbit was revealed. I did the colors over his inks. I am looking forward to adding this to my library of published work. Order Code: APR230251
JOB: I am doing the final touches on this book. I only have a few pages to ink and then there are some random edits and color corrections.
BBMH: This stands for Boys Becoming Men in a Hurry. I am busy coloring the amazing inks of Keith Browning. Script and letters by William Outlaw. Here is page 5.
LIVESTREAM: Monday! April 17th, 8 pm on Instagram I will be doing a live stream with my wife where I will be drawing, showing art, and taking your questions. I’ll see you there!
CONS: I am a guest at the following shows this summer! I will be selling books, prints, original art, and drawing commissions. I have a special free gift for any email subscribers that swing by my booth. Just say “hi” and tell me that you are subscribed and I’ll give you your swag.
SC Comic Con - April 15-16 Greenville, SC - Table 426
MomoCon - May 25-28 Atlanta, GA - Table TBA
HeroesCon - June 16-18 Charlotte, NC - Table TBA
DragonCon - September 1-4 Atlanta, GA - Table TBA
My commission lists for all of these shows are now open, I have a limited number of slots and I want to give you my subscribers a headstart before I open it on Social media. My rates will be higher at the show so you should definitely jump on these discounted rates.
SFX BOOK: I am working on a new experimental book. The book will be ~100 pages of random sound effects. I am considering starting a special paid section of my substack that gets access to this comic. More next month.
GOATMAN: I am trying to stay sharp on my sequential storytelling. Recently I have been too busy with coloring and freelance work to make any comics. But I have this short 12-page story about a Goatman cryptid. I want to have it inked before HeroesCon as my newest Mini-Comic
WATCH: Nope
Jordan Peele’s newest movie is a fantastic sci-fi thriller. It is hard to talk about the movie without spoiling some of the bigger reveals. One thing I wanted to talk about is the beautiful way he trusts his audience. There is a storyline in the movie that feels very disconnected from the main plot. But as the main story unfolds the connection becomes quite clear and serves as a punctuation to the main plot. Even though it is not explicitly stated, the theme of the movie comes through loud and clear by the end. Great shot composition, spooky scares, and eerie visuals.
READ: Hauntology
The study of ghosts and hauntings, this anthology title is also a pun on the creator’s name Jeremy Haun. I backed this Kickstarter last year and I am finally reading through the book. It is a collection of short comic stories ranging from spooky poems to vignettes of eldritch deities entering our realm.
LISTEN: The Princess Bride
I have been doing some more writing and I need some non-lyrical music to vibe to and The Princess Bride soundtrack by Mark Knopfler (I have no idea how to pronounce that last name...) hits the spot. It is relaxing and inspiring all at once.
PLAY: Colt Express
A new addition to the bookshelf: Games! My wife and I host a game night every week and I wanted to share some of our favorite board games. Colt Express is a game we got right before the pandemic and it served us well. It is a strategy and memory game where you are bandits robbing a train in the wild west. What makes this game unique is that all the players stack their action cards first and then once all actions are played the play deck is flipped and the actions happen in real-time. Meaning you might have planned to be next to someone to punch them, but now they moved to another cart. So you have to remember who played what and where they might end up. There are tons of variations and extra abilities you can play with, also it comes with a model train.
Play
I recently had the opportunity to playtest a new board game being developed. It is basically Space Catan. The game is still broken in a few places but on the whole, it was loads of fun to play.
Play is super important for social and emotional development. You learn how to interact with others, deal with disappointment, and celebrate success. My wife and I have learned that there are a few games that we just cannot play together because it is too stressful. But we are generally down for anything.
I (in my quest to put all things in a grid) have found that most games sit on a grid ranging from Luck to Skill, and Simple to Complex.
In chess, though there may be complex strategies, the basic gameplay is very simple and understandable by young children. But all the responsibility of winning rests on the player, you can’t hope for a stroke of luck. Even if your opponent makes a mistake, that isn’t luck in the same sense as a dice roll. Yahtzee, or the cheap knockoff that we have, Yacth, is almost wholly decided by random 1:6 chances on each die. There is some strategy, but you are mostly at the whims of lady luck. Catan does have a few elements of luck, but mostly it comes down to a complex system of skillful choices and moves to claim victory. I have never actually played Ludo, the bottom right of the grid, but upon some research, I saw multiple gamers name it as the most complex luck game they had ever played. I looked up the rules and I can confirm, it’s pretty complex. It appears to run on luck with the dice deciding most of a player’s moves.
So, not really a rant, but more just a little treatise on Games, so there you go.
I am in the final playtesting stages of my own card game, Spoiled Fruit. I am hoping to print it later this year, but we will see.
Stay creative, and have fun out there.
Cheers,
&