Nick Davis's Blog, page 81

Our dreams must take flight and should never stop reaching for the sky

NASA did it, on August 8, 2012 they landed the Curiosity Rover on Mars right in the Gale Crater were it will wander around looking for the building blocks of life. This is a wonderful and horrible thing all at the same time. Let me explain… 

First the wonder… We did it again, jumped a technological hurdle and are sending Robots to an alien planet to explore, we are looking for signs of life and we are learning more about this amazing universe we live in. To not gaze in awe at what has happened here is cheapening it. This is the next step of our dreams taking flight before us. Mars is like a freeze dried version of Earth and really could be a first real step into a whole new frontier.

Now the horror… Now this is going to sound odd, but I grew up reading Dan Dare, 2000AD and other comic books were the exploration of the universe took place as manned missions – Astronauts stepping out onto desolate landscapes and scooping up that first handful of martian earth. Somehow a Robot doing this for us doesn’t feel like the same thing at all.

We should never stop reaching for the sky, there are millions of us who would take the risk to land on another planet, to reach out into the stars. To take a the first step in a journey of colonizing another planet, I know I would, not that I would stand a chance of passing any fitness test. Isn’t it time we took that jump? To reach out for the stars, to boldly go were no one has ever gone before?

This blog and website is dedicated to Pioneers Everywhere… Let the new adventure begin, let our dreams take flight and reach out for sky.

See you all at Baltimore Comic Con 2012 on Sept 8-9

The biggest event on our Alt-World Calender is the Baltimore Comic Con and we will be attending again this year in the Artist Alley.

I will be there along with Tristan and Wilma, we will bringing A Teddy Bear Tale, The Wonder Tales, the Graphic Novel mashup Fabula Exposition, The Tether Saga Novels and the Cuddly Hero Teddy Bear Sketch Cards (plus a few more surprises if we can rustle them up in time).

We also will be debuting A Teddy Bear Tale II, this illustrated story book tells the story of Tristan’s adventures as he begins to explores the World within a World.  So all you Teddy Bear Tale fans look out for this new book, plus will also have the opportunity to pick up a Tristan of your own to protect you from the Monsters under the bed.

Tristan also invites you all to take a picture with him, especially all the Cosplayers who will be attendance, he is hoping to double the number of pictures he took at Wizard World Philly.

That is all for now, if you are attending a Baltimore Comic Con please RSVP on Facebook here and we look forward to meeting you all!

First page of The Daughter of Frost is done come take a look

The Daughter of Frost – Illustration by Terra Bidlespacher

Terra Bidlespacher the artist for The Daughter of Frost Kickstarter project sent me the first finished page for this whimsical Fairy Tale. It is the Woodcutter and his wife making a snow family as Jack Frost looks on.

Together in the morning light, they rolled snowballs and built three snow people. One was the Woodcutter, the other was his wife, and the smaller was their snow child that they never had. Arm in arm they looked at the snow family and smiled, lost in the memory of what they might have had. The wife cried small tears of sadness. “I am sorry my dear husband, I know you mean well. I just wish for a child so I can see you glad.”

The Woodcutter smiled and kissed his wife on the check, “Do not worry my dear wife, we have lived a good life and one day we will get our reward. I love you deeply and wish for no more.”

If you enjoyed the art please check out the Kickstarter project of a Fairy Tale I wrote for my Daughter, help it get illustrated and let the magic begin…

Adventures in Acrylic with Tristan the Defender Teddy Bear

I rarely have that much spare time, with work, kids, life, the wife, fixing things that break off in the house, figuring out Tristan’s next adventure, getting The Daughter of Frost ready and run its Kickstarter, writing my next story etc… etc… So I’ve had little chance over the last month to pick up a brush, let alone explore a new art medium. This weekend I had the chance and after a series of Cuddly Heroes in using Watercolor I tried my hand at Acrylic paints.  And after surviving an exploding tube of Emerald Green you can view my results below.

New art roughs by Terra Bidlespacher for The Daughter of Frost illustrated fairy tale Kickstarter project

Aneira the Daughter of Frost by Terra Bidlespacher

I got the roughs today for the first three illustrated pages of The Daughter of Frost, the fairy tale I wrote for my Daughter which I am now trying to turn into an illustrated story book with the help of Kickstarter. The roughs are only light pencil at the moment, but you look at them and they capture moments of the story with whimsy and magic… 

But enough of my rambling checkout the Gallery below, enjoy Terra Bidlespacher’s art and if you want to help this story launch by please pre-ordering your copy of The Daughter of Frost illustrated fairy tale on Kickstarter please click here.

Sigmartyr – An Unofficial Action Figure Action Webcomic – End of the Line

The Unofficial Action Figure Webcomic Sigmartyr continues… It is the End of the Line and Leftenent Ide lays defeated, is this the end?  Click here to view this epic story…

Drum roll please… A Teddy Bear Tale II – Faithful Cover has been released!

A Teddy Bear Tale II – Faithful by Nick Davis, art by Dan Nokes

Roll the drums and a dramatic pause as we debut the cover for A Teddy Bear Tale II – Faithful and bring you news that the book is now at the printers for pre-press Don’t forget your can Pre-Order your copy of A Teddy Bear Tale II here.

A Reaction to the Media surrounding the Colorado Movie Theater shooting

“Why do we fall, sir? So that we might learn to pick ourselves up.”

Alfred Pennyworth – Batman Begins

Unless you were living under a rock, you cannot escape the Media attention around the shootings in the Aurora Colorado Movie Theater. While this situation is tragic and perpetrated by one nutcase with a collection of guns, and unclear motivations beyond I feel making himself famous; we are seeing a New Media feeding frenzy. 

To them this is manna from the Gods, a shooting connected to one of the most anticipated movies of the year? Instant ratings and page view advertisement winner for them – over the last few days we’ve seen little reporting, but lots of wild speculation based on half-rumors and misdirection because the News is a ratings game in the USA. It is all about 24 hour coverage, cool graphics, uninformed pundits jumping on the dark ‘Trekkie’ report and on the spot eye-witness interviews of people who were three blocks away. Leaving us all guessing at what was the cause? How did someone as unbalanced as these get guns? How did he order so much ammunition without a flag being thrown up and someone visiting asking why he needs 6000 bullets?

You are already seeing calls for tighter security at public events, the banning of Cosplayers at movie theaters, open carry be law (and how an untrained person with a gun would have stopped this shooting flat… Yeah right…) Heaven help us all if they turn up any comic book in his apartment, that will be the next target of this blame game. The evils of comic books will to blame… Everything and anything to keep the Media cycle turning, to keep those ratings coming in. Because when News becomes about the ratings, it stops being news, instead it is just a reality TV window and is treated as such.

All of them are forgetting one thing… This happened because of one unbalanced individual and if you are looking to place the blame then it lands squarely on James Holmes shoulders. He planned this, he pulled the trigger, he killed those people… No one forced him, no one was pulling his strings. It was a pure voluntary action on his part, he is a killer, a psychopathic nutjob out to make a name for himself, who surrendered the moment an actually threat turned up, and that is where the blame should stay.

Instead we get calls for us to lose more freedoms of which I have this to say…

“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” – Benjamin Franklin Feb 17, 1775

We live in the land of the free and the home of the brave; we all forget that this sentence is a combination and that we must be brave to be free, for courage is what protects our freedoms and that is what we must all remain brave and free. Because every freedom we lose in the name of security and safety is harder to get back than you think. Do you really want your child to go through a full body scanner to watch the next Shriek movie? Because it wont keep her any safer.

What happened in Colorado is tragic incident, perpetrated by one inadequate little man. Sadly mass-shootings are becoming all too common here, but it no reason to change your life. The moment we do we lose… Do not be afraid, live your life and be free.

So endth the lesson… Be gentle with the world now.

Drawing your way out a life moment…

Eeyore, Aang & GIR – Sketchcard Cartoon Characters requested by my kids by their Dad Nick Davis

The last few months for me, have been shall we say different? While now I’m back at work and things are starting to come to a steady level, immigration is slowing sorting itself out and everything I had to put on hold is now coming back. It wasn’t this way… The start of this year saw me fighting to keep my family safe, a roof over our heads, a chance to return to my job and a literally fighting for my right to remain in the USA. This was my state for almost the first five months of this year as things gradually got worse. My life turned into a badly written lifetime movie, good things happened, I jumped through hoops, immigration gave me a fighting chance. But my old job disappeared despite me doing everything they asked me to do… Money became tight, I couldn’t provide for my children and it all caved in… And after fighting for hope by the fourth month it seemed pointless… I stopped I felt defeated.

I came within an inch of giving up, to stop fighting, it was over. I lost the job that provided for all I care for, I was at least 60 days away from getting a new work visa. What was the point… And for a week I gave up, no more getting up early, facing the day… I stayed in bed late, sat on the sofa and watched TV, over ate, at one point I just stopped making the effort to even go to bed. I was on the sofa no need to go somewhere else to sleep right? I was spiraling… It was depression.

Then something really odd happened… I picked up a pencil and I started to draw. Up to this point I had not drawn anything for almost ten years since I moved to the USA in fact. I dug up my buried Superhero drawing kit I brought myself a year earlier in a burst of madness, it had everything I needed to get started and even raided my Daughters 400 piece art set to use the boxed watercolors. The first images were a series of Tristan pictures, which led to the Cuddly Hero Sketch Cards, slowly with the help of a that pencil I drew my way out of my spiral. There were still moments, but at that point things really started getting better.

Tristan in traditional box watercolor by Nick Davis

And that is how I beat my depression before it really caught hold, with a pencil and getting back in touch with a skill I long left dormant. While I never be a great artist I do have some skill albeit rough around the edges and fairly unpracticed with very rusty skills. So with this I will leave you with these thoughts.

Even if you don’t realize it in the darkest of moments the dawn will break and life will do something amazing if you open yourself up to it. Just don’t give up, find something to keep you going.

Promise?

Please Help Kickstart The Daughter of Frost a fairy story I wrote for my Daughter

Aneira the Daughter of Frost by Terra Bidlespacher

Once Upon a Time in a land far far away the Fairy of Spring and Jack Frost had a daughter they named Aneira. Who they gave to a childless Woodcutter and his wife so their daughter could experience the love and affection of mortal parents. This is her story, a classic fairy tale of winter, of love, of good, of evil and the power of innocence…

What is the Daughter of Frost?

The Daughter of Frost was written for my beautiful Daughter, so I could read to her a story that started with Once Upon a Time. She really enjoyed the story, and after awhile it became part of my original all ages fantasy fairy tale series called The Wonder Tales.

I want to do something really special with this story, I’ve recruited the services of the amazing almost ethereal Terra Bidlespacker of White Stag Art to help me illustrate this tale with some magical, whimsical illustrations. With her help I hope to turn The Daughter of Frost into fully illustrated fairy tale book, the sort of book we turned the pages of when we were young, that fired our imaginations to the magic and wonder of the world just beyond our fingers. A story that can be treasured and shared with your kids. Help this story get illustrated by helping it launch on Kickstarter at http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/altworld/the-daughter-of-frost-a-fairy-tale-written-for-my