12 September 2019

Never, Ever, Get Tattooed While Drunk And Crossdressing.

What's your favorite word to describe the current potus? (One of the only times you'll see me use that as a word. Since it sounds like a rude bodily function, it works here.)

Come on, folks. Break out those vocabularies!

FLIBBERTIGIBBET! 

BRUMMAGEM!

SNOLLYGOSTER! 

Show me what you got. 

Meanwhile, i've been rummaging through the past as old geezers getting senile tend to do; pulling files from old hard drives stashed in dark corners of the cave. I think i'm gonna dump some of it here so i won't lose 'em. Again. 

It's an assortment of old works, like some t-shirt designs -



I already ran the Jesus Saves! (And He Keeps Archived Back-Ups) design in a previous post, right? I think so. If not, it can always run later. That one's still in my wardrobe.

Some odd little fake movie posters, most of which were results of Warren Ellis's old remake challenges. Good fun, they were -




This one is nigh on 20 years old now - from way back when the younger son was barely starting his acting/comedy career -


And, no - despite basing the 'movie''s storyline on the Mayan calendar ending, that's not something i believed. I knew full well that there was a 'second page' to the calendar which continues right along from the end of the first. But it made a good movie set-up.

Some fairly random bits...


Hmm...   actually, i think that one came from one of Ellis's challenges, too.

This one's turn of the century -


Some guy...


A very different guy...


...and an only slightly even more different guy...


That one was contest prize from the old webcomic. The winner requested the subject matter.

There was another old webcomic called Who's Line Is It Anyhoo?, in which other webcomic creators stepped up to, in this case, answer the question of How Did The Dinosaurs Die Out?

Since i was, at the time, the 'star' of my comic, i appear herein to solve the mystery. They're tall strips, so the system tends to over-shrink them. You'll need to click on 'em if you actually want to read along. I should perhaps warn you that my strip was a bit surreal, a bit mad, y'know...


And a few bits of ink work/play, though i could never decide on several bits for this first one, not even how much white space i wanted to leave in the end...




Okay. Let's call that a post.

I twice participated in 24 Hour Comic Day. Once resulted in a piece of crap about which i can barely remember anything. The other turned out quite nice, and i'm still rather pleased with how it came out, even if there were unfinished bits (like the Raven was apparently albino since i didn't have time to ink the blacks) So far, i've found a small 500 pixel wide version of the pages. Hopefully, further digging will uncover larger images, and we'll see it here before long.

Okay. Let's call that a post-post teaser.
I'm going to go park my body and take off for a while.

Oh, yeah. Those are indeed real words up there at the top. Look 'em up!

Night!

art & stuff by -3- (1999-2014)

11 September 2019

Serve KOOBA

We've got a little add-on to the midnight post. This City, as the place i've been piddling with in RMMV is called, has only one soda available to its denizens. We were talking about it early last month - the soda that never existed, KOOBA. This also gives me an excuse to run one of the adverts omitted from the previous post -


The add-on to the tiles from this morning is simply three various coloured Kooba Cola machines:


These were reworked from some tiles for which i have no clue whence they came. I've been digging through old hard drives and folks may have noticed that i'm perhaps not the most organized individual on the planet. Never used to need to be before the internal Editor quit.

Anyway - KOOBA Lives!

It's Greek To Me, Too!

Mind still not cooperating, so let's follow it again to a bit more from the playing around i've been doing with RPG Maker MV. We've got a random collection of tiles here, both indoor and outdoor dumped together on one sheet. Anyone wanting to use them will have to cut them apart and drop them in to their own sets. (A handy grid is provided at bottom for sorting, just drop the transparent .png with the tiles on top of it in your favorite image editor.)



So - what's here? Obviously some artwork for the walls at the upper left, along with and assortment of simple wood frames down at the bottom. Most out there are rather ornate, taking up too much space at times. These are basic Dollar Tree frames. To the right of the paintings, middle sections for the standard 2-tile couch so they may be extended to 3, 4, or more tiles wide. Those two horizontal bars following are fence tops. Set them on top of wall tiles, tag them for overlay (star); be sure place them after placing the ground behind the fence. Nice when you don't want that massive wall top. The vertical bars just beneath are shadows for giving depth to building walls and such where the system doesn't place any. A blue dumpster. Bookcase alterations - the standard, moved up a half register for better placement against walls, and with some variety tiles to mix things up in libraries and such.
Below those, we've got a mix of custom signs and generic wall hangings. A camera on a tripod, some blank signs, vertical stairs down...
There's a ticket window down by the Help Wanted/Now Hiring signs. Ropes & barricades - white for boxing, red for Events.
Those are notices that can be overlaid beneath the corkboard. And down by the business signs, a basic newspaper dispenser for the free daily news. (It says FREE on the top)

And just above the red velvet ropes, you might note that one of the wooden signs is not blank. It sits outside the Sorority House in the game. (Kekko Kamen needs a University to patrol, y'know) The Sorority in question is taken from my old web comic, so let's go there to read the little sign on the tiles -

(Apologies to Mme Theuriau for putting words in her mouth)

(Actually, only a few on the council and the original founders - not the general membership.)

And there's that grid mentioned above. It's the same size as the tile image, just no need to display it larger here.

stuff by -3- from experiMental Theatre and This City (2019)

08 September 2019

Okay Now Mister! I Want The TRUTH!

Meanwhile...


You can frequently track what i'm doing by what appears on this blog. Though i may plan things, what really happens is i just tend to record where my brain wanders. So, when it kind of just stops - well, you get weeks like the one just passed. I tend to think most folks don't want to read the blog page equivalent of a dial tone. (Do they still have those? It's been so long since i touched a phone, and they've changed so much, i have to wonder...)

Anyway, while not doing tremendously better at the moment, i have managed to dig into some of those 'plan' piles to prep some work. Just a little bit back, in July, i made mention that we should look more at Eddie Eddings' work. If you don't recall, or never saw that post, it was the toon with Superman commenting on Jimmy wearing pink, too, that triggered the mention.

I believe i also made mention of him taking on some of the art chores for Don Rosa's Information Center, too -




Those columns were, of course, for the Rocket's Blast Comic Collector, wherein all of today's artwork appeared back in 1978 & '79. Some of these are deeply enmeshed in the times, others one could drop in an orange hairball and run them today -


















If you were perhaps wondering what some more traditional comic book art would look like from Eddie, here he is working with Kerry Gammill...


...and by himself -


Okay, that's about it. I'm exhausted and gonna stop wrangling the beast for a bit...

art by Eddie Eddings from RBCC #s 141-149 (1978, 1979)

04 September 2019

Rarebit Vs. Mincemeat

Two of the most famous early comic strips are from Winsor McCay - Little Nemo In Slumberland and the Dreams Of The Rarebit Fiend.  Both were hugely influential successes, and it's not surprising to find imitators out there.

But some are a little stranger than others, if perhaps not so immediately obviously. Let's look at a knock-off the latter strip - this one entitled Dreams Of The Mince Pie Fiend from this guy calling himself Silas -






Good work capturing the feel, eh? There were only 11 of these done for Superworld Comics. The book folded after only 3 issues, and the series died with it. I've never seen issue #1, so those three episodes are missing. The above four are from issue #2, and here are the rest from the final issue -





So - what makes this imitation comic so much more odd than the others? Silas.

Silas was an alias for Winsor McCay, so he was doing a knock-off of his own work.

No... That's not right. See, i hadn't realized that Silas was the name McCay signed on the original Rarebit Fiend strips because his contract prevented him from using his real name on work for the Evening Telegram. And now there's another story i want to know...

And this was 1940, three decades after the original Rarebit Fiend comics. So, not so much a knock-off as a revival, eh?
 
Too bad the title only lasted 3 issues. It could have been ... (Shut Up, Kor!) ... interesting.

Okay, gonna let the brain go wander now.

page art by 'Silas' McCay for Superworld Comics #s 2 & 3 (1940)

01 September 2019

RMMV Kekko

Brain in useless cycle. Won't go where i want, and it's a struggle to string words in sequence. But trying not to let blog go dark because it's being a frellnik. Again.

So... let's go different odd place today.

Familiar with RPG Maker MV? (AKA RMMV)

It's a simple interface engine for building games. Better than might seem at first, but another more talky time.

Pertinent bit - sometimes play around building a little city to keep mind distracted. Now have superheroes patrolling rooftops.
University District protected by Kekko Kamen.

My game doesn't use built-in RMMV battle mechanics, so i only use basic walk sprites.

But - if anyone wants Kekko Kamen walk sprites to freely use in their games - here ya go:

(Yes, this is a transparent PNG file, ready to use)

It's sized and laid out for RPG Maker MV, but feel free to mod for other versions or systems. No credits necessary, i'm just modding base game art there.

I use manga and anime shots for talk portraits. I like it better that way.

sprites by -3- for RPG Maker MV (2019)