Work notes: Patreon portraits, and little else this week in art related tasks. Halloween will find me with part of this reward completed, but not all of them -as I first intended. But delays have had a lot to do with finding new tricks and learning a bit more of the tools, so in the end I think it’s ok.
Treats of the season: a full YouTube version of the 1967 soviet film The Viy, or “Spirit of Evil”, adapted from a story by Nicolai Gogol, a fun and visually charming movie with witches and great practical effects and sets.
Work notes: I’m currently illustrating Patreon portraits, and this also means a brief blog this time. The drawing above is the background for the mansion ghosts portrait, the direct reference for it was the Crimson Peak manor.
Work notes: TSK activities during this week consisted on promotion and setting the Patreon portraits treat.
I was talking recently to students in the class I give, mostly young authors and editors on indie publishing projects, and I was a bit surprised to hear their reactions to the possibilities of Patreon or crowdfunding logistics. In a few words, they thought that these solutions were not for them, that they were out of their reach. All the crowdfunded or patron-supported projects they could think of, at the time of the discussion, were made by semi celebrities, really popular streamers, influencers. We discussed, later, tactics to reach or create audiences, but I was left thinking about how they envisioned these systems in 2021, the huge gap that young people perceive today between a base level of media usage, and the unreachable level of almost divine scale where social media climbers, those blessed and exponentially boosted by the algorithms of the day, set example. And, honestly, these are the people that get chosen as templates in the very patronage websites that use some variation of “creation first” as advertisement mantra. I realized, first, that no one is buying that discourse among those who are considering to start with their comic or project today. But at the same time, it’s frustrating to see how the huge popularity of the few has the effect of undermining the motivation to do new things in today’s landscape. The future web in which all tools and all kinds of audiences are finally out there, supposedly within grasp, has proven to be a dense, rigid network, solidified around fewer nodes, less chaotic and decidedly unfriendlier than it was only a few years ago.
In my case, I guess it’s really fortunate to have been able to start in a different context and keep going through the creation or preservation of the niches where I can share my stories and interests with others. The Discord server is great, the audience in my Patreon is really supportive, and whenever I’m allowed to pierce the net of some of the more exposed outlets or social media systems, the response is good. But promotion, as I mentioned in the beginning of the post, takes considerable time now, and that’s just one of the characteristics of the work now. This is something to explore further in future posts.
If you’d like to join my Patreon and get your portrait as ghosts, the timing is perfect.
From the Secret Knots Discord.
Recommendations of aesthetically interesting, comic-inspired games: Koldun mentions Sable (though it seems it may have performance issues), LTK shares Zineth
professionalbanjoist recommends the webcomic Barbarous
What Else is There
From the National Library of Sweden Flickr: “Celestographs or coelestographs are photographs of the sky taken without camera or lens.” Beautiful, and also, If you make digitally layered art, these make for some really cool textures.
Into The Odd remastered, a tabletop rpg on Kickstarter. Possibly TSK-ish as we say on the Discord server, I really like the way it looks.
More in the spirit of the season: Tales of Mystery & Horror by Edgar Allan Poe, read by Christopher Lee. A bit over 2 hours, YouTube link.
Work notes: promo comic about ghosts finished, for now I shared it on Instagram and Reddit, and I’ll see where else can it fit. I’ll add it to the Patreon post with the portraits call as well.
I’m not sure if it works that well as a joke or parody, but I had fun working with the YouTuber expressions, and trying different things with the ghosts and their backgrounds was also satisfying. In the last months, I’ve grown more comfortable with paint tools in Clip Studio, specially oils and watercolors. Even the basic, preset tools are intuitive and respond well to the drawing tablet. I’m using a Huion Kanvas 13 and overall I think it was a good choice for my first pen display tablet.
One of the ghosts I drew in Clipstudio, without the text and additions of the comic
On Patreon
The rules and character classes for the traditional October portrait game will be sent out in a Patreon post this week. The sketches for this post are part of it.
From the Secret Knots Discord
professionalbanjoist shares the twitter link for this 24 hour comic called The Night Mother, by Melanie Gill Man
Work notes: promo comic about ghosts almost done, with a small preview in the ghostly little lady caught in the camera, up here.
I’m resuming posting on Reddit after a long time. I had to adapt a comic in terms of format, and test a different font. This led to some interesting discussion and tests on the Discord server. In the end, I see the problems with the fonts I’ve been using for Secret Knots comics, specially with readability in the wide range of screens, devices, and the inevitable resizing to comply with social media limitations, and at the same time, I’m not too fond of the standard fonts for comics, even though they tend to a stronger body and higher clarity. So it’s research in progress.
On Patreon
No post this last week, but the traditional October portrait game this way comes.
From the Secret Knots Discord
The life and death of Otzi the Iceman, as told by analysis of his 5200 years mummy. Link shared by Gyrgir.
The short-lived Giger Bar that became a yakuza haunt. (Twitter link). More at the Giger official website.
Work notes: I had a busy work week, so I’m behind in the comic progress. I’m working on a story loosely based on some elements from the Portrait of Dorian Gray, trying something slightly different with the visual storytelling. But right now I’ll take a brief detour to finish a piece I intend to use as promo for my October Patreon portraits, a silly short comic about ghosts. I’ll keep you updated about all of these.
On Patreon
Posted a collection of the “partial stories” so far. I’ll skip making a new one this week and instead will use another exercise to go along with the blog.
What Else is There
I read the Mörk Borg rpg guide this week. I love how it integrates the fantasy world (which is metal-inspired apocalyptic bleak fun) in every little aspect like equipment lists, treasure findings, and basically every random table generator it features. It’s a game that wins you because of how it looks, though, and I get the feeling that its graphic design approach has already permeated other works and media.
Flickr user Ivan Chekhov collects “dust jacket cover art starting from the 1920s” and there are tens of thousands of them. I landed in this particular page featuring many beautiful Deco inspired covers, a great source for typographic work.
A blog with analysis of the work of Javier Pulido in the comic Ninjak, a rich use of the medium.
Work notes: Progress on the new comic, which I’m drawing in final form, frame by frame, based on a storyboard drawn loosely with pencil in my sketchbook. It’s not my usual way of working, but the script for this story is more defined than, for example, the latest comic about the surrealists. A tighter story allows me to experiment with the method, and so far I find it very satisfying. This story includes some typographic play, so research includes finding the right fonts for it.
From the Secret Knots Discord
Gyrgir shares the link to David Lynch: No, I won’t explain – supercut
