Test strip

Here’s the strip.

I would never consider this good enough. I wouldn’t include it in my portfolio. I was practicing inking with the dip pen.

My thoughts…decent joke and bad drawing.

What I’m looking to improve is the composition, the character design, and the ink lines. Also, Knox’s response should be “I heard that.” But I didn’t feel like fixing it because this is a test strip. The students don’t look like modern teenagers and they don’t feel natural enough. Knox’s head is too small. The chair should be black. The ink lines are inconsistent and messy. The ink is so fast and wet, I feel like I can’t control it. But I’ll keep trying. The interesting thing about the dip pen is how quick the inking went. I didn’t spend nearly as much time actually inking.

In the meantime, I’ll continue to use the technical pens just so I can get stuff done.

I do like the white space between Knox and the students. I’m debating on the need for a background.

doodles

Warming up is important to drawing. It works out cobwebs and gets your brain and hand loose and working together.

Mine are almost always random people. I should probably work on my standard characters as a my warmup so that drawing them becomes even more reflexive and intuitive.

Oh well…here’s a new guy. He kinda looks like a muppet. And I’m noticing I draw a lot of angry men. Hmmm.

Also, I’m working on drawing people in more natural settings and poses.

Healthy again

I finally defeated the scourge that is asthmatic bronchitis. I’m back in the groove and working again.

For some reason, I still think I have to create all of my strips using techniques from 1936. So I’m dipping my nibs in shiny black india ink. Using nibs is an interesting experience.

For years, I’ve been using technical pens, Pigma Microns to be exact. They give my more control and are a safer way to ink strips. However, to get line variety and different line weights, I have to add more strokes to make lines go from thick to thin. This is a natural characteristic of nib pens and brushes. So I worked more to get the same result as the pen I feared.

But nib pens are more dangerous because they are harder to control. The harder you press, the thicker the line. I felt the pen was in more control. It and I had to come to some agreement on what the pen line would look like.

Delays Delays

Fighting horrible cold. Nothing is amusing. My suffering eclipses all other tragedies. The world weeps for me and my stuffy nose and hacking cough.

I’m already regretting the first strip and considering changes. His look is too blase and bored. He needs a more emotional expression. I will probably go back and change that for before I send in a packet to the syndicates.

Developments

Ever since I came up with the character of Mr. Knox, I’ve struggled with what he would teach. I’m an English teacher by training and a computer teacher by chance. But none of those struck me as particularly unique or interesting.

The English teacher has been done by Funky Winkerbean. I now HATE that histrionic heap of weepy melodrama, forced conflict and truncated plot development. I remember when Tom Batiuk wrote jokes.

The computer teacher seemed like an opportunity to talk about nerd-ness and geek-dom, two things about which I know much. But it didn’t feel right. If Knox loved what he taught, he wouldn’t be so bitter.

I even toyed around with the idea of it being a mystery…never really saying what he taught.  That was my plan for quite a while.  It would be a good gimmick and fun to watch people argue over it.

Then I realized how hard it would be to write around that, and I don’t want to work that hard. Heck, I want to be a cartoonist. I obviously don’t really want to work hard at all.

Well, I just realized what Knox should teach.

I was sitting in my office watching a soft, constant March snow cover the quiet roofs and gray tree branches with a perfect white. Having the day off from school, I was excited about spending all morning and afternoon working on the strip. So I sit down at the computer, hot coffee at my fingertips, and looked for background music online.

However, my first stop is my local newspaper’s website. Then I hit some of my political blogs. I double check and the primary campaigns. And I end up at NPR, streaming news to listen to. And like so often, this moment of habit and natural inclination reveals to me what Knox will teach–civics. A freshmen civics class, no less.

I love politics and current events. I also hate how students don’t. And this was the perfect situation. Knox loves his subject, but is frustrated by how little his students know or care, and this is where much of his bitterness and frustration comes from. His passion is wasted on apathetic youth. This is a common yet timely theme.

This will allow me to write about political themes/ideas and current events. And if you really think about it, everything is a current event. This should provide plenty of material.

evolution

Here is the very first iteration of Mr. Knox:

And here is the very next drawing. It was even on the same page of my sketch book:

As you can see, he took shape really quickly. What I liked most was simplicity of the head and the flexibility of the mouth and eyes. He tends to be either stone faced or completely beligerent.

I spent some time at the pool this summer and spent time experimenting, which gave me this:

 

This version gave me an idea for Knox’s character–during the summer his personality completely switches to a slacker, Jimmy Buffett-lovin’ parrot head kinda guy. I don’t know if that will happen. But it interesting to me that just experimenting with drawing the character will reveal opportunities to the development of the character.

But, this drawing was the first version that I thought nailed it.

 

I also started on title design. In the back is a drawing of a recurring bartender character. Since Knox is essentially a working class guy who teaches, I want to show him in the local watering hole after work, just like other people do. And the bartender, who has no name yet, will have some interesting quirk or gimmick. I don’t intend on using him a lot; however, I remember how Berkeley Breathed didn’t think Opus would last long either.

Here it is…the first official Hard Knox strip.

And the world said, “meh.”

Oh, yeah…

I just wrote the first strip for HK. It also hit me tonight the legal stuff that needs to be addressed. Copyrighting.

Google search “copyright” here I comes!

Always thinking

It’s 1:30 in the am. My redbull and vodka is almost gone. The Stephan Pastis interview on the cable tv news show got me to thinking.

He sent 30 strips of 4…count ’em 4…strip concepts. I’ve got one.

While I’m writing Hard Knox ideas, I’m gonna start thinking of other strip concepts.

Another idea I’ve had bouncing around my head is a current events type of commentary strip that isn’t character based. That will be number two.

Regardless, Hard Knox is still my focus.

Diversions

The goal of this blog is to track and record the evolution of a creative endeavor. In my case, it’s a comic strip called Hard Knox.  Which brings me to this…my conflicting responsibilities.

I’m trying to work everyday on the strip. I want to do something…anything…everyday. And the blog is a public way of making myself do it. It’s a new responsibility.

But…I have a little daughter to take and get her haircut right now.  So no time for the strip. I have friends inviting me to dinner tonight. No time for the strip. There are chores around the house to do. No time for the strip.

I’m writing this now instead of strip ideas.

Apparently, one of the first things I have to do is to decide what is most important and sacrifice something for the strip. Because everything feels like it’s trying to divert me away from working on the strip. All of these forces are pulling me away. I feel guilty and neglectful to all parties in this conflict.

Hey, maybe I can turn that into a strip…