Alec Longstreth's Blog, page 5

Isle of Elsi Adventures!

Like so many other authors who had a new book come out during the pandemic (or just before it), I am so disappointed that I have not been able to get out and promote Isle of Elsi: The Dragon's Librarian (Book One). I got the book back from the printers in late 2019, and was signed up to exhibit at three shows, all of which were canceled. I did my best to promote and sell the book online during the pandemic, but with my kids home 24x7 and high levels of life/work stress, I didn't make much progress.

I was more productive at my drawing table, where I hunkered down every morning, drawing a page a week. I am only a few months away from finishing the 164 pages of comics that will make up Book Two. But not being able to exhibit at shows has caused two big problems: 1) I have not been able to sell many copies of Book One and 2) I have not been able to promote Book One.

The Kickstarter for Book One funded by the skin of its teeth, in the last 48 hours of the campaign. My hope was that by exhibiting at shows and getting those books into peoples' hands, I would build up my audience, and have an easier time raising funds for Book Two. But right now it feels like I'm still back at square one. The thought of launching a Book Two Kickstarter in early 2022 fills me with dread. Plus I physically do not have the space to store Book Two without first moving more copies of Book One. So what to do?

Well, after a bunch of self-publishing soul searching, I've decided to begin serializing Isle of Elsi in a comic book called Isle of Elsi Adventures! Over the next year I will self-publish the contents of Book Two over five issues, with the hope that sending these out through the mail will help me build that readership that I have missed out on and in turn, promote Book One. I'm also hoping it will help get these comics into the hands of young readers (the intended "middle grade" audience, ages 8-12). The comics are all available and free to read on isleofelsi.com but kids have been so maxed out on screen time during all this madness, it seems like print is a better way to go.

I set up a Preorder Pack which allows people to sign up for issues #1-5, which will be mailed out as they become available. If you know a kid who would like to get some comics in the mail, please consider sharing this with them.

It's all an experiment, but one I'm very excited about! Even after the first five issues are done, I hope I can keep releasing future issues to get chunks of the webcomic in print.

Sorry I only seem to blog these days when I'm selling something. Maybe I should go back to monthly posts in 2022... I'm so burned out on social media right now! Anyway, I hope everyone is hanging in there and staying safe.

Isle of Elsi is Eisner Nominated!

Isle of Elsi has been nominated for a 2021 Eisner Award for Best Webcomic!

There are just TWO WEEKS left until the voting deadline, on June 30th.

Comics pros can register to vote here or if you're already registered, ballots have been emailed! (check those junk folders).

I'm very excited about this! Hopefully I'll be back on here soon to do another post to catch up on some of the things going on in my life. For now, that's the BIG news!

Phase 7 #024 is (finally) available for ordering!

I finally overcame four months of pandemic inertia/torpor and got Phase 7 #024 up for ordering on the Phase Seven Comics website! It's 28 pages and costs $3 + shipping. You can read a free 7-page excerpt on the site (my 2020 Hourly Comics Day comics).

Since my last post, our cat Webby got super sick (like, she almost died - didn't eat or drink for days, stopped going to the bathroom, etc.) We took her to the vet and after $1,300 worth of tests they had ruled out many things but still had no idea what was going on. Back at home she slowly started act more like herself. Then finally one day she crapped out 16 inches of nylon thread (eaten off of Claire's sewing area in the studio - now safely locked in a box!). It was tangled into a few turds that she was dragging around the house, with one end still up inside her. Delightful! A few more inches of thread were passed yesterday - I hope to see the end of it soon (both figuratively and literally!).

Meanwhile, in the backyard Penny went broody for like the fourth time. She's ripping her own feathers out, clucking continuously, never leaving the coop, she stopped laying eggs but any time Henny lays one she obsessively sits on it, we have to physically push her off the nest so she'll go eat and drink, etc. etc. etc.

I feel like all the pets are somehow picking up on the general vibe of the pandemic right now and it's making them act crazy. I can relate, but wish they'd knock it off - I don't need the extra layer of stress right now!

A Year of Pandemic

Earlier this month we celebrated my daughter Wendy's third birthday. The small gathering for her second birthday was the last time we gathered with family and friends, including Wendy's godmother Liz, who was visiting from Maine. Shortly thereafter the pandemic really hit the USA and everything went into lockdown. We've been hunkered down at home ever since.

I remember shortly after lockdown began, hearing about a kid who had their birthday and didn't get to have a party, and thinking how sad that was. I guess now, we have all had a birthday during the pandemic. Or, I guess, all of us who are still alive...

2020 was incredibly stressful in so many different ways. Now, heading into the second year of this process I feel so completely burnt out. Coping mechanisms that worked great early on are less effective now, and I find it harder and harder to do my day job, to find fulfillment in my creative work, and to enjoy time with my family. Anything that adds a little bit of stress to my life feels like a much bigger deal than it actually is. And I keep hoping I'll wake up the next day feeling refreshed and ready to start a new day/week/month, but instead I just feel exhausted.

In my experience as a parent, you go through periods where everything is relatively stable -- there is a routine, and you've developed methods for dealing with the current state of things -- and then everything changes. We are going through one of those big transitions now, where Suzanne is having a lot of trouble getting to sleep at night (she's up until sometime between 10pm and 11pm) and Wendy has begun potty training and is... being three. Again, these things aren't unmanageable, and in "before times" Claire and I would just deal with it, but right now it's an extra layer of stress that is draining what little reserves of patience and energy I have.

I'm just venting, with the hope that expressing some of these feelings will make others who feel the same way feel less alone. Everyone has their own unique challenges during these stressful times. Shoutout to all the parents struggling through this, and extra points for anyone with a three year old who is screaming/crying about anything/everything all day long.

It's depressing watching so many people jump the gun and starting to relax restrictions, start traveling, etc. before most people are vaccinated. I wish people could hang in there a little bit longer, so that we don't have to prolong this horrible situation any longer than necessary. It's disappointing, but not surprising. We're trying so hard to combat this with science and guidelines and laws and restrictions, but at some point human nature seems to overpower everything else.

Anyway, I'm glad winter is over and it's starting to feel like spring here in Santa Fe. I'm trying to just take it one day at a time at this point, and have not lost hope that over the summer things will start to look better. Hang in there, everyone!

Animate EVERY Day!

My New Year's Resolution for 2021 was "Animate EVERY Day" (for 15 minutes or more). I actually started doing this back in October when I turned 41, and of course I've been drawing comics every day since July 2002. That has become so central to my art practice, and just "who I am" that I wasn't sure what it would feel like the process over again with a new medium. It has been amazing! It's so much easier to learn and get back into the flow on projects when I work on them a little bit every day.

I've been documenting my animation progress in a dedicated Instagram account, but back in January I also set up a vimeo page so that people who aren't on instagram can check out my animation work.

This also gives me the capability to embed my animation projects on other sites... like this one! Here are all the original short animations that I created in 2020:

And here are all the animation exercises I completed from online courses, and out of various animation book (all listed in the video!).

It has been such an incredible stress relief to lean into this hobby during the pandemic. I am learning so much, and often the highlight of my day is getting to animate for 15-30 minutes after the girls are asleep and my work is done. It's like a tiny reward at the end of these long, challenging days of parenting, remote day job work, freelancing, and comics projects.

December!

Well, this goddamned year is finally over. Good riddance! My 2020 New Year's Resolution was "write more." These monthly blog posts grew out of that goal, and also as a way to back off of social media a bit. I (obviously) didn't know that it would end up being such a bizarre year to document. It often felt like I was writing the same post over and over again as the months blurred together, but December actually felt a little different.

A big part of that was just Christmas. The girls popped out of bed each morning and ran to open the next window on their advent calendar, and the countdown (or build up) to Christmas kept things chugging along. The day itself was stressful, but the infusion of new toys and puzzles has made these past few days of parenting a bit easier.

Another thing that felt different was I actually managed to complete a few personal projects. Claire and I put together our annual family zine (which doubles as a Christmas card) and after three and a half years I finally finished another issue of Phase 7. I am slowly chipping away at shipping out issue #024 to subscribers, and will have ordering information available in the new year. The very first issue of Phase 7 was also published in the last days of December (eighteen years ago!) so I always get a pang of nostalgia when sending out an issue during this time of year.

At the end of November Rivers Cuomo released 2,500+ of his demos from the last twenty years for sale on his personal website. For weezer fans this is the holy grail. I'm taking my time listening to them all - this month I made it from pre-weezer days up to about 2002. It's been an amazing experience. There are so many things I never thought I'd get a chance to hear, and it's incredible to hear songs form from riffs, lyrics, chord progressions, etc. It's given me much deeper insights into Cuomo's songwriting process, and the creation of so many songs that I love. I was initially upset about the delay of Van Weezer (their new album) until sometime next year, but now I'm like, "Take your time!" I've got plenty of music to dig through.

Okay, so... how did I do? Did I write more this year? Let's look at the numbers:

I wrote twelve monthly "backer blog" posts (about 6,000 words) for the Isle of Elsi Patreon (only $1/month if you'd like to join)
I wrote eleven posts for this blog (about 10,000 words)
I wrote four drafts of the fifth Isle of Elsi story, Liz Tekcar in The Contested Contest, which ended up being 29 pages. It is currently being serialized online, click here to go to page 1)
I finally wrote a blog post about Edward Lear that I've been meaning to write for a few years (tonight! I wanted to get it in before the buzzer).

This blog makes me feel two ways: 1) I want to delete it, along with all my other blogs and just start over with a simple, clean website that just has some of my work on it and like a CV or whatever. 2) If I delete it, it feels like the social media corporations win. Like the only way you're able to share anything online is through their toxic capitalist system. UGH.

I don't think I'll keep up the monthly blog posts, but I guess ideally I'll keep writing here. I think the key might be smaller posts, not big monthly recaps. We'll see how it goes...

Anyway, if you read these posts this year, thanks for following along with my pandemic experience! Here's hoping 2021 starts to head in a better direction for all of us.

November!

Well, Biden and Harris won the election... thank goodness! Thank you to everyone who worked so hard to bring about this result. Trump's ridiculous refusal to accept the election results is frustrating and embarrassing for our country, but not surprising. One of the many valuable life lessons I learned from my beloved soccer coach Mr. Innes (who sadly passed away this year, RIP) was how to lose with dignity. Hustle to half field, line up, high-five every member of the other team and their coach, make eye contact, tell them "good game," go home and take a shower, then get back to work trying to improve your skills. Trump obviously never learned these lessons. He even cheats at golf when he's only playing by himself. What a despicable human being. I look forward to watching him being dragged, kicking and screaming, from the White House. Good riddance.

There's still so much work to do. In the short term, flipping the two Georgia senate seats would allow democrats to make some real and lasting changes. In the long term we need to hold Biden and Harris accountable to the ideals that helped get them elected.

The predicted late-fall COVID-19 spike is currently happening, and New Mexico is one of the hardest hit states. We therefore were one of the first states to shut things down again. My family is very hunkered down and are trying to prepare for at least another six months of staying safe at home, to protect ourselves and our community.

Earlier this month I wrote a long blog post over on my illustration blog about how I have been using animation to help me deal with the stress of the pandemic. I also bought a resistance trainer for my bike, because I kept reading about how exercise can help with your mental health right now and I was definitely not getting enough of it. I put it out in the book shed, where I ride for 15 minutes a few times a week while listening to antiracist audiobooks (stronger body, stronger mind). While I'm in there I also try and visualize the 1,500 copies of Isle of Elsi Book One someday not being in my shed, but in the hands of readers. Shoutout to any cartoonists (or authors) with a new book out this year that they are unable to properly promote. It is very dispiriting and frustrating. Hopefully someday when things open back up we'll be able to get our books out into the world!

We try our best to get the girls outside at least once a day, either to play in the backyard, to ride bikes on our street, or to take a walk to one of the nearby parks or public spaces (of course being careful to socially distance from others while wearing masks).

I'm not going to pretend that this is easy. The girls often bicker and fight (they are 2 and 4 and are both learning how to share), and Suzanne especially has been having some really massive meltdowns where she is yelling, slamming doors, throwing stuff, etc. Can you blame her? I often find that kids are just mirrors of the stress surrounding them, and this situation is very stressful. We're trying to take it one day at a time, and to be kind to each other and keep working on communicating with each other. There are good days and bad days.

Wendy has been making some really beautiful paintings at the easel in our kitchen. She talks more and more each day and it is amazing to see her growing in so many different ways. I am very thankful to have this extra time at home with her.

Suzanne has rocketed into a new level of creativity with her daily drawings. She now creates original characters and draws their houses (usually with multiple stories), and incorporates writing, and various objects from around the house or from her books, movies, music, etc. I can't help but think of all the incredibly talented 20th century cartoonists who have similar stories of growing up lonely and isolated. I don't hope that for my kid, but maybe someday there will be an increased output of creativity that will come from all this time of everybody being stuck at home.

I hope everyone reading this is staying safe in your part of the world. Hang in there! We're gonna get through this.

October!

October felt like a month where a lot of things that had been in the works for a long time finally came to fruition.

On the art front, my friend Aron Nels Steinke's new book Mr. Wolf's Class: Field Trip was released. I had the pleasure of coloring this book (with some help from my wife Claire), plus my daughter Suzanne loves the series, so it was great to see the fourth book in print. I will begin coloring book five soon!

On the teaching front, The Center for Cartoon Studies announced that it will be offering Winter Workshops for the first time ever! This is something we've wanted to do for many years, but it was never feasible because of how hard it is to travel to/from Vermont during winter break. After the success of our online summer workshops however, we decided to offer three workshops 100% online, including my Introduction to Hand-Drawn Animation workshop. They all run January 11-15 from 11am-5pm ET. Check them out!

In conjunction with the new Winter Workshops, CCS also launched a new merit-based scholarship to support professional development for BIPOC cartoonists. Submissions are due December 1st and one scholarship will be awarded per workshop, which covers the full tuition. CCS alumni and current students also receive 50% off tuition for any of the workshops!

After a long, hot, dry summer which seemed to be dragging into autumn, it finally began to get cold at night in October, which made the leaves begin to fall. Suzanne and Wendy really got a kick out of making leaf piles and jumping in them this year, which was fun to watch. Then, a week ago we had a big ice storm that dropped something like eight inches of snow over two nights, which was very exciting. We made lots of short expeditions out into the snow, and then rushed back inside to cuddle up by the fire.

For a few days this month we had access to a car, so we drove out to Claire's dad's land, to pay him a socially-distanced visit with masks on. The girls have been cooped up at our house since March, so it was nice for them to get a brief change of scenery. Even just walking around his property and playing with Grandpa's dog Nina was very exciting for them.

Suzanne wanted to be a bat for Halloween, so Claire dutifully made her a costume, which she wore once (luckily I snapped a photo!). We were never able to get her to put it back on, not even on Halloween. I can't blame her because we didn't go trick or treating. Wendy did not request a specific costume, but she also wears a dress-up dress seven days a week, so I guess every day is Halloween for her.

Claire's mom dropped off some pumpkins, and my Mom and Liz sent care packages, so we did our best to make it a special day with pumpkin carving, cookie decorating and some candy too. Suzanne has been obsessed with The Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack, which has been on repeat for the past few weeks. She's watched a bit of the movie, but most of it is too scary.

For about a year now Claire and her father have been working on a new front gate for our house, to replace the '70s Sears chain link fence that was on there when we moved in. Four months ago she submitted scale drawings, photo mock-ups, and plans to the city, and finally this month our permit was approved. We've been chipping away at it on weekends (literally - chiseling out old concrete to remove the Sears posts) and then finally this past weekend we got the gate in place, which Claire's dad had built months ago. There are still a few small steps that need to be completed, including the fabrication and installation of the decorative steel plates which Claire designed. Hopefully we can have it all done by the end of the year.

Other than that? We all got our flu immunizations (shown here are the post-shot donut rewards), and are planning on hunkering down as much as possible through November and December, so that we do not contribute to the rapid spread of COVID-19 in New Mexico, or anywhere else for that matter.

Claire and I voted by mail the day our ballots arrived. I'm writing this on the eve of Election Day, to try and separate all of these October events from whatever is going to happen tomorrow (and in the following weeks). Obviously, if you haven't already, please get out and vote tomorrow! Thank you to all the poll workers and postal workers who have been working so hard to make early voting possible. I'm nervous and anxious about the whole situation, but still hopeful we can climb out of this mess and restore some sanity to our country. Hang in there and stay safe, everyone!

September!

Today I turned 41 years old, which is the age Carl Barks was when he began his life's work, drawing Donald Duck (and eventually Uncle Scrooge) comics. Over the next 25 years he created one of the most impressive and beloved bodies of work, totaling more than 6,000 pages of comics.

I talk a lot about Barks's age in my comics lectures (he was 61 in the photo above), because I think it's an inspiring antidote to the all-too-common worries I hear my students express, about "starting too late" or comparing themselves to other cartoonists who met success much earlier in life. It's exciting to think that I'm just at the beginning of creating my best work.

For the last few years I secretly hoped that I would accomplish the goal that I set twenty years ago, of drawing 2,000 pages of comics, on or before today. It would have been very meaningful to me to complete my "training" and begin my "real" work at the same point in life that my favorite, "North Star" cartoonist did. I've only reached 1,844 pages so far, and at the rate I'm going it will most likely take me another three years to reach that goal. Oh well, I'll get there eventually!

On September 12th the National Cartoonists Society finally held their Reuben Awards ceremony, which had been delayed for months because of the pandemic. I was surprised and very pleased to find out that Isle of Elsi won the Divisional Reuben Award in the Online Comic - Long Form category!

It's incredibly validating to receive this award after all the hard work I have put into creating Isle of Elsi over the last decade. It's going to help keep me motivated for many years to come!

As I write this, the election is less than 30 days away. If you don't have a plan yet to vote, please head over to vote.org to check your registration status, find your polling location, etc. etc. etc. Claire and I have requested mail-in ballots which we plan to drop off at the election office in Santa Fe in person. Please everyone do whatever you must to vote in this crucial election!

September was a weird month. At first it was unseasonably hot. I was done with this summer back in June, and it had been a long, sweaty slog through July and August, so I was very grumpy about the continued warmth.

Then in the second week of September it snowed one night?! We had a few days of unseasonably cold weather. I far preferred this to the heat, but was worried we might be skipping over autumn (my favorite season).

Finally things settled down and the weather has been very pleasant the past few weeks. I've been taking more walks with the girls (while wearing a mask, obviously - I'm not an idiot), and it has been wonderful to be outdoors a bit more.

Claire and I are doing our best to keep Wendy and Suzanne in good spirits through all this. We have themed weeks which help us have some focus for our drawing and reading and play sessions. We try to make certain days special (Saturday morning cartoons!) or celebrate when we can (Pizza to celebrate that we made it through another month!) but I'm not going to lie, it's exhausting.

I wonder what Wenday and Suzanne will remember from all this, when they are grown.... I wonder how it will shape their lives moving forward....

Stay safe out there everyone!

August!

My original goal with these posts was simply to "write more" as part of my New Year's Resolution. I now see them as a chance to keep a record of a very strange year in my life, documenting what it's like during this pandemic and all its related stress.

I was dismayed to hear in this NPR story that to only 30% of white Americans have taken steps to better understand race in America after the murder of George Floyd back in May. If you are white and have not yet engaged with the ample resources that are currently available, please step up and educate yourself about the history behind everything that's happening right now.

I linked to various enlightening books that I read in both my May and June/July posts. I'm still working my way through Stamped From the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi, which traces the formation and mutation of racist thoughts throughout America's history. It's incredibly eye-opening.

This month I also watched Ava DuVernay's documentary 13th, which examines modern day slavery in America, which still exists in the industrial prison complex because of a loophole in the 13th amendment. Netflix has made the entire documentary free to watch on YouTube. Here, please watch it:

Seeing this film helped me put Trump's current cries of "Law and Order" into their historical context of a racist dogwhistle message to white supremacist voters. As he tours around the country campaigning on hate and division, I hope as many people as possible spit in his face. If anyone deserves to catch COVID-19, it's this dirtbag who has done nothing (or worse than nothing) while 185,000+ Americans have died from the disease.

In August Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were chosen as the democratic candidates who will be running against Trump and Pence in the 2020 election. My favorite "take" on this news was from Mohamad Safa on twitter:

Best voting advice: Voting isn’t marriage. It’s public transport. You’re not waiting for "the one". You’re getting on the bus. And if there isn’t one going exactly to your destination, you don’t stay home and sulk. You take the one that’s going closest to where you want to be.

— Mohamad Safa (@mhdksafa) August 8, 2020

Are Biden and Harris my "dream" candidates? No. But the thought of having Trump in office for another four years is so abhorrent, it sidelines any concerns I have about Biden and Harris. We need to get Biden and Harris into office, and then work to hold them accountable. I still remember acutely how horrible it felt to wake up on November 9th, 2016 to find out that Trump had been elected president. Four years ago I shamefully felt that I could have done more, and I am determined to not repeat that mistake this time around. Claire and I are donating as much money as we responsibly can to the Biden Harris campaign and other organizations that help people vote.

Republicans are making every effort to sabotage the elections -

I managed to put a new roof on the girls' playhouse (using leftover roofing materials from the shed I built with my father-in-law to house the Isle of Elsi books). It felt good to accomplish something tangible, especially something that's been on my to-do list for so many months. Claire also added some curtains, so it is feeling pretty homey in there. We might try to chip away at a few other house projects in September. I need to fix some stuff on our stupid flat roof.

Well, that's what's going on out here in Santa Fe! I hope that wherever you're reading this, you are safe and healthy and taking care of yourself and helping others in whatever ways are available to you. Together we can all make it through this!