Drawing to a close
As 2007 winds down, I, as I’m sure many of you, have the tendency to look back over the past year and take stock of my life, and make some decisions based on what’s worked and what hasn’t over the preceding twelve months.
One of the things that I’ve recently tried is relaying some of my more memorable life experiences through the medium of the comic strip, which I must say, I do enjoy. If I had to pigeon-hole it on one side or the other, I’d say it works, but it isn’t without its drawbacks.
The comic strip format, on one hand, is an incredibly wide-open playground for the imagination, a literal blank canvas to convey an experience. However, this freedom is counterbalanced by, at least my own, inability to convey the subtleties of a given experience. Nuances and satire are very difficult to convey through four or five black-framed boxes. Of course, this could be just one of many rookie mistakes for people who decide to put together a comic strip.
One thing that I’ve noticed is that it isn’t seemingly as interactive as the written word. I would think that folks would enjoy a comic strip that they “knew” the creator, and would be just as inclined if not more-so to comment or use my experience as a jumping-off point for their own stories. While traffic on the site has increased, the number of comments remains about the same. I know this doesn’t necessarily mean anything, but I would venture a guess that there isn’t anyone who takes the time to get involved with a blog who would say they don’t care about the comments. Maybe that’s just the nature of the brevity of a comic strip - short, punchy, get a chuckle and the reader’s on their way.
Another noobie mistake could be the amount of effort dedicated to each comic. I’ve decided that since we’re not limited to black and white or spot colors as they are in the print world, why not do these things in full color? Well, I think I’ve discovered my own answer for that: time. It takes a considerable amount of time to take an experience, dissect it into three or four bite-size breaks, and then deal with color. Fortunately, if you want to call it that, most of the fodder comes from my own work life in a grey cubicle, surrounded by a hundred other grey cubicles, which does make for a fairly neutral color palette. A black and white line art version would be much faster to produce, but since this is a hobby, should I be concerned with that?
I have been mulling over the idea that once one makes the jump from words to pictures, what are the ramifications? Can said person jump back? Is it possible to have a personal blog that straddles the fence between text and comics? I’ve only done eleven of them so far, but every now and then something will happen and I’ll think “there’s no way I could condense that into one graphic”, but that doesn’t make it any less worthy of retelling. You know that there are some that-could-only-happen-to-me kind of moments that you’ve been missing out on, right? Well, that’s mostly because it takes too long to draw. Pictures may be worth a thousand words, but that’s because it takes about the same amount of time to draw as it does to type a page!
I think that the lesson I’m learning here is one of the things on my list of resolutions for 2008: don’t take things so seriously. I mean really, who stresses about a personal comic strip, drawn for fun, on a personal blog, also written for enjoyment?
Me. That’s who.
Wishing you a safe and happy new year folks,
Joe
December 31st, 2007 at 7:01 am
Just wanted to drop a line and say I really appreciate your talent. I read several blogs but have never commented simply because I guess I didn’t think the comments were for random people. Most comments I read are from people who seem to know the writer. I think really since I live in AZ makes your site more fun to read than others I follow. Thanks my friend.
December 31st, 2007 at 11:45 am
Hey AZ, thanks for taking the time to respond. The funny thing is that of all the blogs I read, I don’t know any of the authors personally. If there wasn’t a picture of them on the site someplace I’d have no idea what they looked like either! And, unless they know something I don’t, I doubt any one I know personally knows about this site. It makes it difficult to vent about life or jobs when the idea that the someone who inspired the rant could wander across it.
December 31st, 2007 at 2:58 pm
You too! Make it the best year so far.
And keep doing comics, whenever you can, in whatever form you can. Hey, we’d even settle for sketches.
Cheers mate!
January 1st, 2008 at 5:35 am
Yes as I have said earlier I’m totallu hooked
Happy New Year from the UK!!!
January 2nd, 2008 at 1:48 am
I dig the comments man. I’ve even sent them to some of my co-workers and they liked them too.
Your stories are funny as hell too though.
I think you should keep doing what you’re doing. Post a comic when you feel you need to, and write it out if you can’t tell it in a few frames.
Keep up the good work man and happy new year.
January 2nd, 2008 at 10:46 am
I enjoy both types of post, written and comic so I’d suggest an easy route would be to do comics where experiences can be easily condensed and where they can’t don’t deny us, just write them up!
An added bonus to this is the nuances we get from the writing which we don’t get from the comics (not a rookie mistake I don’t think). The written stuff tells me a bit about who you are, too where the comics only reflect your sense of humour… um… does that make sense?
Cheers
BC
January 3rd, 2008 at 10:00 am
Joe,
A little late on this, but first, happy new year!
I loved the fact you started the Comics series. Yes, you can’t do some things with Comics as you can with words but if you look at your very first one, no amount of words could have expressed the story better - I think, personally. I laughed out loud when I saw the word ’suicide’ in the red box.
And then, look at this post. You couldn’t have expressed this in a cartoon. Maybe you could’ve but you chose to with words. Now, about jumping back and forth, yes, why not! Scott Adams’s Dilbert Blog is a good example.
In short - whether words or cartoon you bring it.
In other, shorter, words - ditto babychaos.
January 3rd, 2008 at 10:03 am
To add one more thing - I’d recognize your cartoon’s main character even if you dropped him in a different cartoon. I think that’s a great achievement on your part.
January 3rd, 2008 at 2:12 pm
Well, thanks guys. It’s nice to know you guys like the comics…I’ll have to definitely keep them going into the new year, although I don’t know if I can keep up to the one a day standard I put on myself.
January 4th, 2008 at 10:40 am
Without your blog, the blogosphere would be super dull, dude! I appreciate everything that you do here.
January 4th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
Hey JD, happy new year! Love the comic strips, love the written posts, keep ‘em both coming!
January 6th, 2008 at 10:36 am
Comics are great, don’t stop, but don’t stop writing either. Like you said, some things can’t be expressed without paragraphs.
I’d totally be using the comic format if I had any artistic talent…then again Drew at “Toothpaste For Dinner” gets away with it, so why can’t I?