Real Life Blues

Good afternoon ladies and gents!

So, another week has vanished and as I rightly predicted last week, I don’t have a huge amount for show and tell this week. The sad reality of finishing university means that the last of my carefully saved student finance has been depleted and I’ve stepped back into the world of work – this time with some temporary work to bridge a gap and give me money to, y’know.. Eat. Keep the roof over my head. Exciting things like that.

Last week I was well underway finishing the roughs up for my submission to kuš! comics, in the form of a 16-page story themed around ‘BFFs’. Low and behold, after an intense all-dayer on Thursday I managed to finish up the last of the roughs even after some last minute story adjustments – what a relief!

I’m not going to tell you all what the story is about because I like to think of myself as super mysterious and interesting, but there are some previews of some more of the roughs I was working on after last week’s blog and also the final array of 16 pages with finished pencils. Huzzah! As much as it pains me to say this, I’m only two pages into inking given that I’ve been in training for a new job -sob-, so the inking and painting is going to take me far longer than it usually does (I could usually crack out 4-6 pages of inks a day if I did nothing else, and around 2-4 pages painted). Real adult life, eh? How FUN. Anyway, here are some of the inks from the first two pages to give you a bit more of a teaser..

Having been so spoilt with time to make comics in previous months/years, this may well feel like it’s taking years to complete.. But do not fear! If I have to resort back to my previous levels of caffeine from the Hoax: Psychosis Blues days to get this done then I most certainly will, ready for the kuš! deadline of 19th September. Even if I go loopy in the process.

In other news, it’s now less than five weeks to go until the deadline of Sneaky Business! I’ve been hearing from more people who are creating stuff and I can promise that it’s going to be a good ‘un.. Next on my list is writing a new short comic for SB myself, so if I can juggle all this and still design and edit an anthology then you can most certainly fit a little 1-2  page comic in.. Right? Don’t forget that all the details are over here – and if you have any questions just get in touch!

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Finally, table applications opened up for Leamington Spa Comic Con on Sunday evening and yours truly has applied for a Small Press Table! Leamington Comic Con isn’t for a while yet (Saturday 25th March 2017 to be precise), but if you’re interested in checking it out you can find all the details over at the Facebook event page. Seeming as I was born in Leamington Spa and I originally hail from Warwickshire, spending many a weekend in Leamington in my youth – yes, I can just about remember that far back – I’m really hoping that I’m accepted! So keep your fingers and toes crossed for me, because that would just be plain awesome.

Anyway, that’s about it for this week’s short and sweet update! Hopefully I have a bit more to show you next week, though you’ll all have to bear with me whilst I adjust to having far less time to work on things; for example, if I cut my blogs shorter for a while, it gives me more time to do the good stuff i.e. make comics and draw nice looking stuff. Until next time, over and out.

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