Jun26

Photoshopping

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Photoshopping

I downloaded a free trial of Photoshop so I could work on my final comics project at home. As easily distracted as I am, of course, I ended up spending a lot of time playing around.

I’ve been working on a piece in my sketchbook that I might use as a cover page for something or other (the text will go into the long rectangular box). The other day, I started to add color with pencils and markers, layering them to get colors that please me. The drawing is 9 x 12, with great swaths of white space that I was not looking forward to filling in. (My markers, though not xylene based, have a somewhat noxious odor. I can only work with them for so long.) I decided I would fill in the rest of the color using Photoshop.

The drawing as it appears in my sketchbook

The drawing with color added in Photoshop

..and with different colors

As I was working, it hit me that I could create my own color palette using markers and pencils, scan that in, and have it on hand to dip into using Photoshop’s ink dropper tool. It seemed like a good way to use “my” colors digitally.

Marker palette

Pencil palette

Alas, my scanner didn’t capture the colors as they look in real life (and they’re off even more than when I scanned in the drawings shown above — I’m thinking it might be the difference in paper?). Still, it was fun to click on a color and use it to fill in shapes:

Line art drawing

Line art drawing

With color from my palette

I’m also a fan of Photoshop’s filters, even though that probably breaks some kind of graphic design/art code (“thou shalt not overfilter”).

With mosaic Photoshop filter

And another

My Photoshop trial runs out soon, but for now I’ll keep on playing! This chicken says I must:

Jun15

Olympia Comics Fest

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Olympia Comics Fest

I tabled at my first comics festival a couple of weekends ago — the Olympia Comics Fest. “Tabling” simply means selling your wares at a table, while also hanging out with other creators. Eight of us from the IPRC program and two other Portland artists sat together.

At my table, there were four of us, and as people walked by they tended to pick up everyone’s work but mine. I crabbed about this to a fellow student who replied, “You’re the one who chose to do abstracts” — the intimation being, I guess, that had I created a more narrative comic, more people might have leafed through it and maybe even bought it. Indeed, my lament made the same assumption — that somehow the style of my work is what failed to attract people.

Later, though, when I looked at the event photos, I realized I had not done a good job marketing my work. To the right of me, Moises had his comic with a bright red cover. To the left of me, Sam had two or three color-covered comics, plus a number of color prints. In the middle were my black-and-white covered zine and some color stickers. Because we were so squished at our table, I spent most of the day set back, where I couldn’t interact with potential customers. I think these two facts had more to do with how many people picked up my comic than the fact that I work in abstract form. This is instructive. To better show off my wares, it would behoove me to have more space, to interact more with customers, and to create a more inviting display.

Our table: Fiona's work to the far left; Moises's "Mindwich"; my work; some of Sam's to the right.

Another view of our table.

Another, more important, thought has lingered with his comment, though: The notion of choice. I didn’t choose to make an abstract comic. Not really. It chose me.

Some might scoff, but the comic I created is the comic I felt called to create. Sure, my stuff is not like everyone else’s. It doesn’t tell a story in words, although I do believe it tells a story in images. It might not be everyone’s cup of tea, just as some comics do not interest me. But while making this comic, there were times when I felt obsessed, times I felt like I’d never stop drawing in this particular way. Talk about flow…whole hours passed as I drew and drew and drew.

No matter how the work is received, I’ll never believe I made the wrong decision in pursuing this project, namely because I followed my heart. To have done otherwise would have been the real failure.

Here are some pages from the comic in question. You can also see more on the Art page of my website. (Addendum: I should explain, for those who don’t know, that my final project involves my drawing 100+ individual abstract comics cards — 2.5″ x 3″ — and then arranging them into pages. I also plan to print out a card deck with instructions on how others can use the cards to make their own comics. Each “panel” in the pages below is actually its own card.)

Page 2 of my abstract comic, "Once Long Ago..."

Page 3 of my abstract comic, "Once Long Ago..."

Page 10 of my abstract comic, "Once Long Ago..."

 

Mar9

Catching up

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Catching up

One of my friends keeps asking me to update this page, so I figured today’s as good a day as any. I stopped blogging in the middle of last semester, when things started to get tough. In hindsight, perhaps that was the time to have kept writing, working out all the angst as I went along.

Quick stage setting: Soon after I moved to Portland, someone from last year’s certificate program told me about the “weird old guy in his 40s” from their class who made comics no one understood. From about the midpoint of last semester on, I’ve felt like this year’s weird old guy. Which sucked for a while, but two friends have convinced me it’s something I should embrace. (!)

During the first half of the first semester, our instructor Nicole truly made me feel as if I could accomplish anything and everything I ever set out to do. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt that good about my writing or like I have a voice worth hearing. No one person should have power to make me feel I do or don’t have a voice. But a good teacher, I believe, is someone who instills confidence in her students and who makes them want to take chances. Nicole did that for me. Even when I submitted work that was only so-so or that showed visible signs of struggle, she spurred me on and encouraged me.

The first comic I ever created and submitted to workshop was received well. The second comic, the one about love, confused people a bit. The script for this three-pager received an okay response, and though we didn’t officially critique the comic itself, comments were mostly positive.

At the midpoint of the semester, we switched instructors. The first assignment Jesse gave us was a photo comic, and I had a really great time creating it. I loved the concept and the execution and spent five days laughing about the story while I worked on putting it together. Alas, when I showed it to Dan he didn’t get it at all. That night, prior to workshop, I asked Jesse whether he ever created comics he thought were hysterical that people didn’t get, and he said all the time.

I titled this comic “Say what?” but later I wished I’d called it “That art of deflection,” because to me that’s what it’s about:

When I presented the photo comic to class, it was greeted with mostly silence. Pretty much to a person, the other creators’ comics were funny, so prior to my dud the room was filled with laughter. Jesse read mine and said, “I hate these kinds of conversations. They make me want to live alone!”

His comment called to mind two things—a short story I wrote that I think is really funny and that Dan finds utterly depressing; and a career counselor who once told me I’d likely not become a famous writer because I was too much of a niche taste.

That night, a visiting cartoonist read us a series of elephant jokes, then Jesse assigned one to each of us and asked us to make a comic out of it. All of the jokes were from a book I had as a kid, so I incorporated my assigned joke into this autobio comic:

I had a difficult time with the following week’s assignment to create a “How To” comic using no words. My lack of drawing skills hit me hard as I struggled to create a comic instructing readers how to write a story. It took a long time to draw, and I was never happy with it. In addition, I tried out new tools to ink the comic, and the results basically sucked. We were working on page layout, as well, and as I inked the page I realized two panels, one above the other, read as too similar, so I cut them out with an X-acto knife and rearranged them using tape. Alas, when I did that, I inadvertently flipped one of the panels upside-down and didn’t notice until I’d already made 12 copies for class. Suffice to say, even with my explanation of what happened, the comic was difficult to understand.

Here it is in all its badness. (The middle panel is supposed to be our protagonist washing dishes at a sink, but it doesn’t quite read that way!)

In the process, I did create this wonderful little guy, though, who I like very much:

By the time we got around to working on our final projects, I was feeling pretty insecure. What did I want to do? What was I actually capable of producing?

For the thumbnail stage, I created a pantoum comic…a series of images repeated using a specific pattern, based on a poetry form called a pantoum. This piece actually generated a lot of discussion as the class attempted to suss out a narrative from the wordless piece. It was fascinating and fun to listen to the group create a story about a dog, its master, etc. etc.

Later on, I colored it with pencils:

My initial thought for the final project was to create a series of one-page pantoums, but in the end I decided to move forward with a different plan: to write a new poem then illustrate it. I actually loved most of the process. I love writing poems, even if they suck, and wrote in my head every morning as I walked around Sellwood. I loved working the language. I loved, too, abstracting the images, even as I struggled to do so. But when the time came to present my work for critique, I was petrified.

Lucky for me, only half of my classmates were there that night. I almost held back my work-in-progress, but I decided to go ahead and present. People didn’t seem to get or enjoy the piece. I don’t think they liked the poem. Jesse wasn’t keen on the pages with only abstract images. To his credit, he did try really hard to get people talking. Still, It was a tense and unpleasant experience.

When I got home that night, I felt pretty lousy. But a couple of days later, as I kvetched to myself and my pal, Claire, and fretted about what to do for my final project, I came up with the idea to combine imagery from the poem’s four pages into a one-page abstract painting/comic sans poem. I traced some boxes, added imagery, did a bit of an ink wash and sponge painted the background. I fell in love with the resulting piece, which I turned in as part of my final project.

During the five-week semester break, I filled up a brand new sketchbook, which was extremely satisfying!

Here’s Dan, then 10-second Dan:

Here’s a little coloring:

This semester, our two instructors—Lisa Mangum and Dunja Jancovic—are really into abstract comics, which has spurred me on. We’ve completed a bunch of exercises (which I’ll share next time), and my current focus is on completely non-narrative comics. I’m enjoying the work and am producing a lot. I suspect it’s still not my classmates’ thing, and an overall sense of community is still missing for me here in Portland. But Lisa and Dunja insist that if I keep following my path and stay true to my vision, I will find an audience and my tribe of fellow creatives.

I do miss my artist and writer friends in various spots around the world and wish I could bring them all here for a week’s retreat and play. In the meantime, I will keep on keeping on.

We’re midway through the term and switching to a new instructor, John Isaacson. We’ll focus on narrative structure, plot, character, and more. To begin, we’ll adapt a story or poem into comics form, which I’m really looking forward to! I’ll continue my abstract work, too, since that will make up the bulk of my final project (which will likely be a 12-page comic, although I’m considering other forms as well…more on that another day!).

Nov8

Workshopping love

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Workshopping love

Comics are brand new for me, so up until a few weeks ago, I’d never experienced a comics workshop. I have, however, lived through many, many writing workshops, and I can’t say they thrill me. A few have been helpful; some have been deadly, filled with mean-spirited meanies; most have been meh.

When you’re sitting in a circle with ten or twelve writers who speak in turn about the story at hand, a few things can happen: 1. Repetition. Sometimes this can’t be helped because there’s only so much to say about a particular story, yet everyone wants to have their say. Even if their say was someone else’s say ten minutes ago. 2. Tangents. These are creative writers, remember? Staying on task isn’t necessarily a major skillset. 3. Smartypants comments. Often, though not always, someone in the room needs to prove how clever they are by referring to obscure literary theories or devices, or going off on a very dry intellectual tangent. 4. Anger or hurt feelings—often on the part of the writer whose work is being critiqued. (Full disclosure: I’ve been told at times I come off as a nonstop talking smartypants, but lately I’ve been trying really hard to contain that part of me!)

I was thrilled to learn Nicole (and presumably Jesse—we’ll see!) uses the basic tenets of The Amherst Method, a kinder, gentler workshop form. That is, we share positive feedback first; any “criticism” is presented in as positive a way as possible. (There’s more to it than that, of course. You should read about it!)

Still, I figured the issues listed above with fiction workshops might apply here. Repetition, for sure. (Our class has 11 students.) Tangents, probably. Maybe some hurt feelings or a smartypants. Who knew?

Our first-ever workshopping session took place in Week Three, so most of us had only known each other for a short time. Nicole introduced the Amherst Method and the process called “going into the box,” which essentially means the author/artist can preamble a bit about the work (not much), then must remain quiet and “invisible” as the others critique the work. At the end, the author/artist comes “out of the box” and can comment or ask questions.

Each person received a copy of the comic to be critiqued and had a few minutes to review it. One thing should have been obvious but only hit me during that first workshop…comics are easy to read and assimilate. If you handed out even a 400-word short-short, people would want time to read and reread, make notes, linger over phrasing. But you can read a one- or two-page comic in a few minutes. Plus, it’s much easier to refer back to as people make comments. (That’s not to say you wouldn’t notice more if given more time, of course.)

I can’t recall who went first that night, but I do remember this: Immediately and spontaneously, we simply began a conversation.

One person spoke up. Others jumped in with their comments, seconded what someone else said, asked for clarification from a speaker—pretty much without being prompted by Nicole. No one tried to outdo another speaker; no one scoffed at what anyone said. I’m not sure if Nicole had meant for us to go around the table and each take turns commenting (I think she did), but we kind of just took off and she didn’t seem to mind. We talked over each other a bit, as happens in groups, but always the floor was ceded and everyone got their say. Nicole guided, when necessary, but mainly it felt like she was a fellow participant. Meanwhile, each author/artist remained happily “in the box,” with no hint of throat clearing or foot stomping or anxiety.

That way of conversing and interacting has continued through three critique sessions, and each time I’m a little bit amazed yet also giddy. I don’t know if everyone else in the room understands how rare this is, and I hate to even speak it out loud for fear of jinxing it. But for whatever reason, this group of people in this time and place makes for a pretty kickass workshop. And that makes me very happy indeed.

———————————-

Ah! But this post’s title does double duty, because our second workshop assignment was a relationship comic. Our story could focus on a specific incident or be generally about love. I went for the latter, and made it kind of a gag comic. (Funny to me, at least!) I also did two different layouts. Personally I like the second, more jumbly one better, even though it’s a bit harder to read.

The initial character (yes that’s a jumbled-up woman) was inspired by the Picasso dogs exercise from Drawing Lab by Carla Sonheim. I was way too pleased with myself when it hit me to use a photo of George Clooney as my indicator of hunkiness. I giggled all week.

[ADDENDUM 11/11/11: I should note for the record that I actually created the jumbly layout first -- not sure why I posted its photo second? But then I was reading about layout, gutters, and margins in Drawing Words & Writing Pictures and figured I should attempt a more "proper" page layout.]

 

Oct23

Thank you, Cameron Crowe

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Thank you, Cameron Crowe

This has really nothing to do with comics, but a couple of times each year this quote from Lloyd Dobler — John Cusack’s character in “Say Anything” — pops into my head. (Well, parts of it do, then I look it up on my computer, read the whole thing, and chuckle.)

“I don’t want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don’t want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don’t want to do that.” — Lloyd Dobler

Oct20

Making faces

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Making faces

One of our in-class assignments last week was to draw a simple face in profile, then alter the eyebrows to change the face’s expression. (The exercise comes from Ivan Brunetti’s book, Cartooning: Philosophy and Practice.) Here are some from my sketchbook:


This exercise called to mind one from Carla Sonheim’s online class, The Art of Silliness. She had us make faces a couple of times  — first, using food then using office supplies and whatever else we had lying around. I spent hours making faces and taking photos of them, and then started seeing faces everywhere. (I won’t post the hundreds of photos I took!)

 

Pistachio shells, cough drop, coffee beans

A fresh-from-the-oven pumpkin pie with coffee bean eyes

 

Office supply faces With cameos by rocks and seashells

 

Dog cookies, wine cork, rocks, seaglass, pieces of old car stereo, office supplies, clementine, barrettes, clothes pin

Gears, microchips, pieces of old car stereo, a top, barrettes, shells, seaglass, office supplies, bracelet, bottle caps, Post-Its

Seaglass, shell, and rock faces

 

Pizza and salad

Lunch

 

And, just ’cause, here are some random pix of my doggies:

Gizmo!

Mini the Moo on Sauvie Island

 

Oct16

More SPARK

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More SPARK

I just got photos from the Get Sparked! opening reception at Del Ray Artisans in Alexandria. I’m super excited by the show — it looks fantastic! Check it out.

My co-curator, Amanda Wright, did an excellent job hanging the show. She also made some art in response to my writing. Here’s my written piece:

Every Angel
By Amy Souza

Every angel is terrible. They like to remind us who we are, who we’ve been, show us who we might become if we could muster the energy to try again. For this we hate them, because part of our nature is not wanting to know the truth even as we seek it.

Define them as you will: heavenly creatures, ghouls from the depths, figments of an imagination poisoned by church-fed guilt. Angels exist, and they’re out to get you.

Don’t believe me? What about that time walking toward the park, when you stepped right over the legs of a greasy man slumped along a painted wall? The kind of man you normally don’t notice, but the deep blue façade made you look. You thought, he’s drowning and he doesn’t even know how to swim. Remember the tiny pricks that crept up the nape of your neck as you kept walking? How your breath quickened and suddenly you felt transported to the room where, ten years earlier, you’d looked your withered father in the eye and said, No I did not come home to help you? You flinched at the sound of that girl’s voice, spiteful and small. Tried to erase the image as you jaywalked across the avenue. You wondered why the scene came to you, blamed randomly firing neurons, as if science could deliver all mystery to its rightful place.

Yes, I’m saying that man was one. What he looked like is incidental. You maintained stride, pushed away the unknowns, but he’ll return. They are quick to disguise, angels, which makes sense. They couldn’t do their work otherwise.

And here’s Amanda’s response, on her blog.

 

 

 

Oct12

My first real comic and a new studio space

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My first real comic and a new studio space

Be warned: This is a long post. I’ve been sick for over a week, not feeling up to typing. But there’s so much I want to share with the five of you reading this. !!

Last week our homework assignment was to create a one-page diary comic — basically, taking events from a day in our real lives and turning them into a story. Heck, I do that all the time in my mind! My tagline could be “imposing narrative structure wherever she goes.”

Although I’ve completed in-class comics assignments and some exercises from Drawing Words & Writing Pictures, I consider this my first real comic. It’s the first story of my own creation, and the first time I sat down with my sketchbook and jotted down a story in image and word form at the same time. Normally, I jot down ideas for a story then try to figure out how to illustrate it. For this one, the process was simultaneous, and it felt really really good. (Interestingly, I was reading a book today aimed at kids – So You Wanna Be A Comic Book Artist — that states people write scripts for comics before actually thumbnailing. I’m thinking that’s a generalization — like, some people do that, some people don’t. Some people thumbnail while also writing scripts. Some people…well, you get my drift.)

The process of small revisions as I moved from concept to rough draft to first draft went smoothly — not much hesitation as I solved little problems, changed phrasing, altered which text went where, cut and pasted panels in a John McPhee-esque way to try out different structures. It’s probably not how you’re supposed to make a comic (all that cutting and glue-sticking), but it worked for me! Storytelling and all it entails, like organizing, pacing, sweating over word choice, deciding what to put in/what to leave out — all of that is transferable to this new medium. I knew that in theory; I’m getting it now for real.

Again, there are things I would change in a final draft, but this was a super satisfying process — fun and energizing, which is what creative projects should be, right?? — and I’m actually really proud of the results, despite the rudimentary drawing. Prepare for more photos than you ever wanted to see.

 

Initial story idea in my sketchbook--morning after tossing and turning

Panels on marker paper (using ShinHan Touch Twin markers and a Micron pen)

Cutting up panels and rearranging

More cutting and arranging

And more...

And more. (I decided I liked the vertical layout much better.)

Might it work with a funky colored background? (Decision: No.)

I tried to cram it all onto one page until Nicole's voice popped into my head: "Don't cram!"

Final (first) draft, page 1

Final (first) draft, page 2

 

In my library travels, I discovered a book called Abstract Comics. Despite the fact that not one woman’s work is included (grr), it’s an interesting book. Unlike abstract painting, a comic should tell some sort of story, right? Sequential art + abstractness = ??? I’m not sure yet, but I decided to try my hand at abstracting the diary comic. The story without words is already kind of abstract-y and gets across the tossing and turning (although I do think the text intensifies the angst and adds some humor). Would the comic work if I made the “character” even less recognizable as a human shape? Here are my attempts–all very similar except #5. (My faves are #3 and #6.)

Abstraction #1

Abstraction #2

Abstraction #3

Abstraction #4

Abstraction #5

Abstraction #6

 

Oh, and despite the huge pangs of guilt I feel at spending more money, I moved into a studio space last week. It seduced me with its high ceilings and big windows:

So great to have a dedicated place for painting!

 

Now if I could just feel less sick…

 

ADDENDUM: I’m really proud to say I furnished that studio for 67 bucks. Thank you, Craigslist, Freecycle, Ikea, and Salvation Army!

Oct5

Getting SPARKed

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Getting SPARKed

Lots of SPARK-related stuff going on right now.

At Del Ray Artisans, Get Sparked! Art inspired by writing opens this coming Friday. I just got my postcard in the mail, featuring one of my paintings. My co-curator, Amanda, did the graphic design and is handling all of the onsite curation, including hanging the show. I can’t wait to see photos!

SPARK 13 also just ended this past Friday and the work is starting to go up now. The round should have taken place during the time we were driving across country, but since I didn’t think I could handle administration from the road I postponed it till September. Of course, that meant the first day coincided with my first night of Comics class. Oops. I didn’t do as much publicity as I normally do, so we had a small crowd — 22. (Usually we have 50 – 95.)

A bunch of people signed up to respond to Charisse Cecil’s work. Charisse was a longtime SPARK participant and a really great person. She died suddenly a few months ago,and frankly I still can’t believe it. I’m happy that her voice lives on through this project. Her work is also featured in the Del Ray show.

For this round, I traded work with my friend and colleague, Bobbie Troy. Here’s Bobbie’s response to my artwork. I don’t know if I’m thrilled with my own response to Bobbie’s poem, “Emptiness,” but part of SPARK is creating something with limited time so that’s what I did. Did I resolve the skirt? Not sure. I’m still on the fence and might end up replacing the digitally manipulated image with the full-color image.

My friend, the artist Sukia, also responded to one of my poems during this round. I was honored that she wanted to use my writing as her inspiration, and I love the resulting work! Take a look.

And for anyone reading this who doesn’t know….SPARK is open to everyone, and it’s free to participate. The next round will take place in November so let me know if you’re interested!

 

Oct3

10-second cat

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10-second cat

This week in comics class, Nicole had us do two exercises. First, everyone wrote a generic, broad title at the top of a letter-sized piece of paper. Then she shuffled them around so we each got another person’s paper and had to draw a comic based on whatever title we received.

I got Fiona’s title, “Hell Yeah, Doggies!” and drew a weird dog (which resembled a wolf/coyote/Greta hybrid) standing on two legs, with its other two paws in the air, making a “signs of the horn” gesture. (I’ll see if I can get a photocopy of it to post later.)

My title was “Dogs’ Day Out,” and Moises made a pretty awesome cautionary tale about a dog going out on its own. (A tree fell on it.)

Then we did a spontaneous drawing exercise in which we had three minutes to draw a car; then one-and-a-half minutes; then 30 seconds; then 10 seconds. We repeated the exercise with a cat. I can’t draw cars to save my life, but my kitties are at least recognizable as feline-like creatures. To my surprise, the best cat of the bunch? The 10-second one, in my opinion. It’s really just a hint of a cat, and I like that.

Here they are, in order:

Three-minute cat

One-and-a-half-minute cat

30-second cat

10-second cat

In other news….as of today, we’ve lived in Portland for one month. The move was difficult–3,200 miles is a long way–and my life since I got accepted to the program in June has been pretty much all about packing, culling, selling, storing, giving away, saying goodbye, driving, unpacking, buying, setting up, and settling in. But you know what? It was totally worth it.