Sometimes I feel like I’m floating through life. Like I’m aimlessly wandering, looking for something to get me excited. I don’t mean for that to come off as negative, but I can see how someone would see it that way. Let me follow it up by also saying that I am very happy and thankful for my life.
I haven’t been doing a whole lot of art lately, and for that I apologize to James and Curtis. I know they’re expecting their commissions soon, and I promise there won’t be much more of a wait.
Instead I’ve found my inspiration in writing. I’ve tried writing in the past, most recently being The Honorbound comic I wanted to get up and running but ended up abandoning. That’s generally what happens; I start strong and stop very quickly afterwards. I think I set unreasonable goals and become discouraged when I crash back to reality.
The process I’m going through writing this new book has been different though; instead of jumping in head first and and getting frustrated later (like I did with The Honorbound when I realized after the second page that I only had a vague idea where the story was going), I have been furiously scribbling chapter outlines and detailed character descriptions. I am compelled to write while waiting at the mechanic, coffee shop, DMV, or just sitting at my desk. There has been this urge to create a believable story with believable characters in it, characters that I am quickly becoming attached to. The latter has never happened to me before. I’ve created several characters during my 4 year stretch trying to become an animator as well as in my brief ventures into trying to write different comics and children’s books. I have never liked a single one of them. Not one. They all seemed like character stereotypes I was trying to pass off as original. This time however, after I forced myself to really consider choices and experiences these characters have had, I noticed my fondness of them began to grow.
Creating an interesting, and emotional story is what I so desperately want to do. It’s what I’ve always wanted to do. Animation, art, music, and now writing are just the tools I’ve tried to use to do it. I believe this manuscript is shaping up to be just that and I can’t wait to share it with the world.
The image by the way is a sketch card a started several months ago and came back to today as I tried to get some painting done. Any guesses to the character?
