Comic strips before Comic books

Happy Pride Month and Happy Caribbean-American Heritage Month!

Rethinking my early influences as I create this webcomic: 

Peanuts

Beetle Bailey

Blondie 

Bringing Up Father

Hagar the Horrible

Andy Capp

Family Circus

Little Orphan Annie

Curtis

Calvin and Hobbes

Jumpstart

Boondocks 

Brenda Starr

Rex Morgan, MD

Pogo

Doonesbury

Where I'm Coming From

This list will continue...

Let's Hope for Better And More In 2024

Sorry I have been MIA... A lot going on but I still want to keep this blog going.

First, still dealing with house issues: insects, cracks, and my mother had to terminate at least two contracts, one dealing with clearing out the vents. 

Had to give up my web host as their costs became even more expensive. 

Next, still trying to working from home as my health has gotten even more unpredictable. 

Because of my 2022 medical emergency, I had to put off things to set up for my freelancing. 

That meant putting off watching virtual and online classes to teach myself new art software and illustrator applications - I couldn't sit up for long periods and I stopped sleeping in my bedroom.

After all this, I needed to change my health insurance.

I also couldn't set up a new website. Plus, I was still debating which hosting companies to use.

I also ended up getting stiffed by a webhost company that did not even have the common decency to have their call times and days on their website, the host never even answered my question about logging in.

I went off on them in an email and they had the nerve to send me the WHOIS registry rules (which I already know as my previous website was 15 years online!) and nothing else! 

I will be dissing them online. 

Now here are some good news: SUMMER TO WINTER the webcomic is now official on my old Tumblr account! I created a secondary blog to host the webcomic. Soon, when I have my website, I might migrate it.

Summer to Winter is also on ComicFury, a longstanding webcomic hosting cooperative I learned about on YouTube

It is also on GlobalComix, a comic platform that showcases independent comics, small publisher, large publisher, and self-published comics! They also have a YouTube channel and offer workshops as well as podcasts and articles about their company and the comic industry. 

So, my webcomic is in good hands!

I will be uploading an episode per month. Sorry, this is my speed for now. Who knows how much faster or slower I will be in the future?

Summer to Winter already has five episodes up and an upcoming special for the March month!

See you in the next post, Dear Readers!

So Much Is Happening...

Looks like my furry K-pop art will be merging with my Pride Month art. Too much has happened this month and I couldn't keep up my own prompts. This is why I also stopped doing official art prompts.

You know, it's okay...

These past few months have been stressful with a lot to do. Which is why I haven't uploaded my website's new live version. I also need to update my DeviantArt as well. But I'm also working on pet projects I had put aside for years only to realize how far behind I am in my personal creative life. So, I'm going to post some verses below for anyone who's either feeling stuck, overwhelmed, or lost in their own Artist Life:

You know, it's okay to quit.

(That project that's not going anywhere? Yes, that.)

You know it's okay to start over.

(With your career, with old ideas, with new ideas, with a different pathway. It's okay.)

You know. It's okay to rest. 

(To take those naps. To detach for a bit. No one owes all your time. No one owes you all the time. Only you owe you.)

You know it's okay. 

(To recharge oneself. To 'flip the script'. To reinvent how you want to be.)

You Do know it's all okay, right?

(To change. To remain the same in some things. To be stable. To be kinetic. All of it is okay.)

Now to continue my work. Thank you for today, Dear Readers.

From the Twitterverse... Have some techniques to catch up on

So glad I went back to markers. I loved especially drawing with highlighters when I was a kid! 

But then middle school art class introduced me to color pencils and I stuck with those for many years because I assumed color pencils were more sophisticated.

Right now, dual-tip markers are my favorites again and I did return to watercolors. So I'm a mixed media artist again. 

And once I get most of my rearranging done, I can take some of my old color pencil set from one room back to my bedroom. I'm not over color pencils, it's just a good idea for me to get back into an old medium that brought me so much joy as child.

Here's a list of what art mediums I've worked in:

Regular pencils, crayons, pens, markers, charcoal, pastels, color pencils, calligraphy nibs, ink nibs, watercolors, MS Paint,  QuarkXpress, MS Publisher, Adobe software suit but mostly PhotoShop, some Illustrator, and PowerPoint. 

I need to get back into some of digital art software but I keep getting distracted by doing things manually and only using the artist softwares to edit or touch up my stuff. 

My writer group mentioned maps in one's world and I think I'm going to practice the software I currently have on my laptop to practice making maps from my stories!

 #Artist #ArtistLife

A Message to My Dear Readers

I feel like this blog is getting academic but I'm a different person than I was several years ago when I finally hammered down this blog. 

In the yesteryears, I kept trying my hand at different blogging platforms and kept losing each one. I also didn't have a clear message for why I would maintain a blog. 

Now I'm posting old notes and other information I've gleaned from journals over time but I feel it's important. As I grow as a creative, so much that creativity be expressed and when I change and evolve, that will reflect in my creations. 

So again, my dear readers, thank you for staying with me all this time and I hope you will continue to do so. Also, to take something from the Hunger Games films but with a little twist and in the spirit of this blog: May the opportunities be ever in your favor.😃🙋🏿‍♀️

My mini-review for Honey & Clover TV series

Just finished bingeing the Honey & Clover anime series. Back in the early 2000s, I read the manga while it was serialized in the number of manga/anime-related periodicals the U.S. once had, and I must say that if you were any sort of Art Major/Minor, this is HANDS DOWN the most complete and perfect TV series (beats any live-action or other animations with this subject/topic) to show EXACTLY what it means to be a college/university art student in one's head, heart, and how much baggage creative people carry while we tackle real-world life issues... *chef's kiss* 

Honey and Clover on Wiki

The Art of Plugging Away 2.0 ('20)!

I'm working on a number of projects as I always do. But one is a graphic novel that's had many starts and stops. About near the end of 2018 is when I finally figured out how I should make this story 'look'...  

Now, I've gathered all the drafts and am wondering about how to bring them to final: do I manually light-box trace to better paper or scan/upload and fix on illustrator software? 

We shall see.😬

McCall's and Simplicity memories

My mom has sewn for many years, making shirts for my dad, dresses for me and my sister, work suits, vests, qipao/cheomsang, and slacks for me.

When I was a kid and she was in the middle of sewing, I remember the sleeve packets that held the tissue-thin tan colored pattern sheaves of papers, McCall's and Simplicity were the brands I remembered. I used to teach myself anatomy by studying the fashion art on these packets. Elongated and elegant women, lean muscular men with boyish hair, children in all sorts of outfits. I learned some of the differences between women and men, boys and girls, and especially skin tones and shades. And while some were more expressive and detailed than others, I really taught myself on how clothing fell on a body, how it framed. I learned hairstyles and gestures. By the time I was doing art classes in elementary, I had a pretty good handle on anatomy compared to my classmates. These pattern sleeve packets even had an added bonus: showing how much styles, trends, and fashion changed within a decade. 

Enjoy the following images: [Credits from Pinterest (Germany), Amazon.com, ArtFire.com, Allthepreciousthings (Australia),  Bonanza.com, MomsPatterns.com]