Brian Fies's Blog, page 21

The Intellectual Life #22

A Peek into the Intimate Intellectual Life of a Long-Married Couple, Part 22:

(Delayed a day to not spoil yesterday's puzzle.) Karen and I both play Wordle first thing in the morning. She gets up earlier and does it first. After I do it, we compare notes. Neither of us has a go-to start word, we try to use a different one every day.

Brian: Got it in three.

Karen: So did I!

We compare results.

Brian: Oh, neat, we used the same first word!

Karen (ominously): We used the same second word, too.

Brian: That's weird. You must have read my mind.

Karen: I solved it first. You read MY mind!

Brian: No, I'm bad at that. You must have telepathically pushed the answer into my mind!

Karen: Why would I do that?

Brian: To help me?

Karen:

Brian: Worst superpower ever.

This has been a peek into the intimate intellectual life of a long-married couple. 

My Origin Story

Me around age 14, holding a tempera painting I did of Dr. Strange. I didn't have much juvenilia even before my 2017 wildfire; now I don't have anything but a few photos and scans that survived on my computer backup drive.
I've just discovered a thing going around where artists and cartoonists talk about how they got their start. I don't usually bite at "things going around" but this one intrigued me, so:

"My whole life as far back as I can remember."

That's the short, best, honest answer. Always loved to draw. Always loved comics, or any text combined with visuals in general. I remember being very young and transfixed by rotating neon signs and animated logos on TV. If words were colorful or moved, they had my rapt attention. 

I began submitting comics strips to syndicates when I was about 13. Was sure I'd be the world's first 14-year-old syndicated cartoonist. I wasn't.

I also submitted pages of superhero art to DC and Marvel in my late teens and early 20s. (For a long time, my drawing style was "realistic"; I didn't develop the more "cartoony" style I've used in all my graphic novels until I was 25 or so.) At one point, DC asked to see more samples to decide if I was worth hiring. I wasn't.

Did cartoons and graphics for my college paper. After graduation, when I got my first job as a newspaper reporter, I also did cartoons and graphics for my small daily paper. Learned a ton about photostats, paste-up, color separations, and the nuts and bolts of printing that still serves me well. Tried to get work at bigger papers. I didn't.

An illustration I did when I was a newspaper reporter. This isn't my best artwork, even for the time, but I did it very fast on deadline so I'm inordinately proud of it. Graphic journalism. And yes, there is a street in Woodland, Calif. called "Dead Cat Alley."
Spent my 20s and 30s submitting comic strips to syndicates. Caught the eye of King Features editor Jay Kennedy, who worked with me for more than a year to see if one of my strips was worth signing. It wasn't.

Me trying to be Gary Larson. I wasn't.
Tried to see if I could be a single-panel gag cartoonist (like in The New Yorker). I couldn't. 

Created and tried to sell a children's picture book. Didn't. 

One picture book idea: a girl is drawn through a telescope and explores the universe. Kind of a Magic School Bus thing. All watercolor, I liked this one.
During those years, I also picked up whatever freelance cartooning and illustrating work I could. I illustrated a lightbulb catalog once. They come in a surprising assortment of shapes and sizes.

A lightbulb in its package. I drew about a hundred of them for a catalog once.
When I was in my early 40s, my mother was diagnosed and treated for metastatic lung cancer, and I decided to tell my family's story in the form of a webcomic. Although I had scant professional cartooning credits, I had sufficient experience and skill to pull it off. 

Went viral. Won some awards. Got a book deal. Instant 30-year success story. Now enjoying a half-assed career and working on my fifth graphic novel. 

I use my story as an example of perseverance. I didn't "make it" in my teens, 20s or 30s as I'd hoped, but I kept trying. I wasn't single-mindedly obsessive about it--I had other careers and a marriage and kids and a life. But I plugged away as I could. 

I also use my story to explain how nobody has the Magic Answer or Secret Recipe. This is why I have no advice for anyone starting out; what worked for me won't work for you. Everybody I know who made it has a different origin story. 

All I can suggest is this: do a lot of work and cast it out into the world however you can. Someday, if you're skilled and lucky, one of those seeds you plant will bloom, but you'll have no idea which one until you look back years later, when it will seem like it was inevitable.

New Year's Process Post

Watercolored pages scattered all over my work table and floor.

Starting 2024 with Process! I'm painting a library of watercolor textures to use in my comics. They're abstract blobs in a riot of colors that I can digitally insert into my art to (I think) give it some uniqueness and pop. I did a bit of this on Last Mechanical Monster and A Fire Story, and plan to do a lot more.

Why not just watercolor on the actual art? I've tried. I wish it worked. But I draw my comics on smooth Bristol board, which doesn't take watercolor very well. And I've tried drawing my comics on watercolor paper, which doesn't take ink very well (or more precisely, takes ink TOO well). Plus, for printing purposes, it's much better to keep black line art and colors separate.

"Smoke and Clouds." Keep in mind that I can make these shapes transparent so that any color under them shows through, so a red cloud on a yellow sky turns orange. If I wanted to, I could even change them to different colors, although I'd probably rather paint new blobs in the color I wanted.
Why not just do it ALL digitally? Photoshop has a lot of "watercolor" "brushes" that can fake it pretty well. Well . . . I don't want to. So there. I find myself increasingly drawn to *authenticity* in comics and art. I want to see the imperfect hand of a creator, not the perfect pixels of a machine. Nobody else could duplicate my abstract blobs. Even if I cheat by marrying them with the art digitally, they're still all from my hand. 

I hope you get to see them in print in a year or two.

An example of how I digitally merged actual watercolors with line art in Last Mechanical Monster. Both the green wall and the blue sky are real watercolor. I like the look.

Swaller Dollar Cauliflower

For the couple of decades I've been blogging, I've marked Christmas Eve with a rousing round of revelry from the man who, depending on the day and my mood, I consider one of the three best cartoonists who ever lived, Walt Kelly. From his great comic strip "Pogo," please accept this gift with my wishes for a good holiday and excellent 2024.

Adventures in Slumberland

"Little Nemo in Slumberland" by Winsor McCay, one of the three or four best cartoonists who ever lifted a pen.
I hate it when people share their dreams as if they're interesting and anybody else would care. Anyway, I had this weird dream last night....

It was the classic anxiety dream about being in college and late to class but realizing you don't remember where the class is and also you've forgotten to attend the entire semester. Last night's twist was that, within the dream, I thought to myself, "Hey, this is just like that classic anxiety dream about being in college and late to class!" And then I tried to test the situation by examining the world around me and asking myself questions to determine whether I was dreaming or awake--and I concluded I was awake!

It wasn't quite a lucid dream, in which you realize you're dreaming and guide the story. I've had those and they're fun. In fact, it was kind of the opposite, in which I wondered if I were dreaming and decided, "Nah! This is real life! Better get to class!" 

Now I'm not sure if I'm really awake and writing this. Further research is needed.

Happy National Twin Day! Happy National Twin Day!

Hey, it's National Twin Day! And I happen to have a pair of 'em who LOOOVE being embarrassed by their Dad! Ha ha! One of the best days of the year as far as I'm concerned!

The girls were about 3½ in this photo, which is remarkable because we very rarely dressed them in matching outfits except to make older relatives happy. In fact, this might have been around Christmastime, and I'll bet their grandmother had something to do with it. 

The girls themselves were done with the entire "twins thing" at a very young age. If you want to know what it was like being a Beatle in 1964, try pushing a double stroller with two cute, blonde, identical tots through a mall or restaurant. No interest in show business, thanks, although we got offers.

I don't believe in telepathy but sometimes I think they have it. 

I also think they have planned the perfect crime but haven't committed it yet--unless they have, and it was so perfect I never found out about it.

In our experience, twins were MUCH more than twice as hard when they were babies but got much easier than twice as hard when they were older. Your mileage may vary.

Happy Twin Day, Chiquitas! No regrets on my end, although you may be rethinking your choice of father right about now. No Take Backs!

The Intellectual Life #21

A Peek into the Intimate Intellectual Life of a Long-Married Couple, Part 21:

Karen and I notice a covered box, like a small bench, on a neighbor's front porch.

Karen: I wonder if that's for putting packages in, like Fed Ex or UPS, so people don't see them stacked up by your front door.

Brian: Or it could be full of murder hornets that would swarm out and sting you to death.

Karen: Or Christmas presents.

Brian: Or a loaded crossbow! You open the lid and PFFTTT, right between the eyes!

Karen: Really?

Brian: If you open that lid, it's your own fault.

Karen: This is the difference between girls and boys. I was thinking nice things, like ribbons and bows.

Brian: I was thinking of bows, too! Crossbows!

Karen (much later): That bow thing should be a peek into the intimate intellectual life of a long-married couple!

Brian: Really? You don't think it makes me sound kind of stupid?

Karen: 

This has been a peek into the intimate intellectual life of a long-married couple.

Onward Christian Soldiers

From the Spitting Into The Wind Dept.: Someone on a local history group moaned that they missed the days when they could wish someone a "Merry Christmas" without triggering woke snowflakes. I replied:

There is no war on Christmas. One cranky person who once said something to somebody you know is not a "war."

Christmas is healthier than ever. More music, decorations, TV shows (Hallmark channel is nothing but), movies, sales, etc. etc. It comes earlier every year. Big stores like Costco, Target and Home Depot put out Christmas stuff before Halloween's even over. Christmas dominates the culture; no other holiday or event is even close. It's bigger than Thanksgiving, Halloween, the Super Bowl, the World Series, and the Olympics combined. Say "Merry Christmas" to whomever you want. Nobody cares.

Here's the thing: some people WANT you to think there's a war on Christmas. They want to make you mad about problems they completely made up. Think about who those people are and why they want you mad. Spoiler alert: it's not because they care about Christmas.

Say, Jim!

A Peek into the Intimate Intellectual Life of a Long-Married Couple, Part 20:

Karen and I are walking our dog, Riley, when we wave to a neighbor named Jim half a block ahead.

Brian (not loud enough for Jim to hear): Say, Jim! That's a BAD outfit!

Karen (puzzled): Is that a thing?

Brian: It's from the first Christopher Reeve "Superman" movie.

Karen: Ohhhkaaaay.

Brian: When Clark Kent runs into a revolving door to change into Superman, and he comes out and there's a pimp who says, "Say, Jim! That's a BAD outfit!"

Karen: Uh huh.

Brian: Then Superman says, "Excuse me," and flies away.

Karen:

Brian: I think of it whenever I meet someone named Jim.

Karen:

Brian: This is why A.I. will never replace human beings.

Karen: It might be an improvement.

This has been a peek into the intimate intellectual life of a long-married couple. 

What the Dickens?

My girls and I went to the Dickens Christmas Fair on Sunday. Think of it as a Renaissance Faire set a few hundred years later and indoors, at the Cow Palace in San Francisco. The theme is Dickens's "Christmas Carol" but if you hit anywhere within the early to late Victorian era you wouldn't go wrong. Lots of vendors, entertainers, and costumed cast. For taking place inside a large warehouse, it's surprisingly immersive. 

One of our favorite things to do there is a life-drawing salon--about 45 minutes of drawing three models posed to duplicate classic works of art. Just 50 people sitting in a room drawing, nothing more frantic or high-tech than that, but it's a fine time. 

I try not to post photos of my daughters without their OK, but they don't mind if I make myself look ridiculous. So here I am piloting a time machine (in my opinion, THE BEST time machine!). 

My girls pointed out that, given the time period, someone walking around in full cowboy regalia would be totally appropriate. We didn't see any cowboys. Maybe I'll go as a cowboy next year.