comics Archives - Page 33 of 38

December 5, 2014January 18, 2015

Interview with the Cast of “Seeing Him”

The following is an interview I had with the cast of Seeing Him, which is currently on KickStarter raising funds to launch it online. There’s also an extended interview, but you can only read it by claiming it (and other swag) as a reward on KickStarter.

Interviewees: (From Left to Right in the image below) Kate, Adam, Julianne, and Greg.

seeing him cast bust shots for mock interview for kickstarter — Click to enlarge.

KELCI: So what’s your day job?

Kate: I am a small business owner.

Adam: I’m a doctor. Specifically an OB/GYN.

Julianne: I’m a personal assistant to Ms. Betsy Brookes. You might have seen her face on benches around town. She runs the number one realty agency in Nagadan.

Greg: I teach high school Spanish at Charles Strite High. Go Hawks!

What are your hobbies outside of work?

K: I like to hang out with my friends. Play video games sometimes. Plus, in the winter I like to crochet and sew things.

A: Every other Wednesday we have league bowling. Greg and I are on the same team. I also go to the gym a good bit. Sometimes I go out to the movies.

Juli: Outside of work I like to do puzzles and books of brainteasers. I also like to watch horrible TV movies sometimes.

Greg: Well I do a few after-school groups as the faculty leader. I teach sign language and I manage the sci-fi club. Completely non work related I go bowling, I hit the gym, and I like to cook. Particularly baking.

Have you always lived in Nagadan?

Kate: I grew up here, but I went away for college.

Adam: My mother and I moved here when I was 2. Since then the only time I’ve lived anywhere else was when I was in med school.

Juli: Born and raised here, but then I went away to school. That’s where I met Kate. We were roommates freshman year.

Greg: I moved here after college. I grew up in a little town in the south end of the state. You’ve probably never heard of it. I always wanted to live in the big city though, so when I got the chance, I moved.

Favorite animal?

Kate: Ocelots. They are just too cute.

Adam: Dogs. They aren’t called man’s best friend for nothing.

Juli: Narwhales. The fat unicorns of the sea.

Greg: um. I don’t know. Penguins?

Favorite food?

Kate: Chicken and broccoli. Preferably from Mr. Wong Wong’s in Ostmeadow.

Adam: Mint chocolate chip ice cream.

Julianne: Definitely ham. I love having it for dinner and then getting to have real ham sandwiches all week.

Greg: Butterscotch muffins. Big ones.

How do you feel about musicals?

Kate: I love them but I haven’t taken the time to watch a lot of them. I’d love to see one live one day but right now I just watch my DVDs on repeat.

Adam: Meh. They aren’t the worst thing but I’d rather watch something else.

Juli: Some of them are good. Some of them are godawful. No one is that happy all the time.

Greg: …I’d rather not answer that in an interview. My friends might read this. So, on the record, I’m not a big fan.

Adam responding to Greg: You’re going to stick to that when I know for a fact you own at least 5 original cast CDs?

Greg: Yes, that’s my story.

Who is your role model/idol?

Kate: Adamantine Woman. Playgirl, philanthropist, badass.

Adam: My mom. She’s the reason I got into medicine. She’s made me who I am today.

Juli: I don’t have one. I am my role model.

Greg: The teacher from that one movie in the 80’s. You know, the one about the English teacher, they call him captain? That guy. Oh and Professor Y from the Y-Guys comics.

What is the nerdiest thing you have done?

Kate: I went to a comic convention dressed as Madame Majesty once. It was really fun.

Adam: Does being on dean’s list in college a lot count?

Juli: Kate made me dress as Monsieur Majesty at a convention once, but it turned out really fun actually.

Greg: I regularly played Orcs and Oracles with my friends in college. We had a campaign last 3 semesters once.

The following are questions about which of the options you prefer:

Ketchup or mustard?

K: Ketchup.

A: Mustard.

J: Neither. Mayo.

G: Ketchup.

Dandelions or dandy lions?

K: Dandy lions. All day.

A: Dandy lions would be a sight to see.

J: Dandy lions. All day.

G: Dandelions. I don’t want to make someone dress up a lion. Sounds dangerous.

Pancakes or waffles?

K: Why not both?

A: Pancakes.

J: Pancakes.

G: Waffles. Not the frozen ones though, real, homemade waffles.

Cupcakes or muffins?

K: Cupcakes.

A: Cupcakes.

J: Muffins. Cupcakes have too much icing on them.

G: Cupcakes.

Small gatherings with close friends in your living room or big dance parties with lots of people?

K: Small gatherings with friends.

A: Smaller gatherings are more fun.

J: Definitely big dance parties. I can meet new people that way. Plus show off my moves.

G: I like big parties, but house parties rather than dance parties. I like to be able to hear people.

Santa or the Great Pumpkin?

K: Great Pumpkin. Hands down. If I believe, he will appear someday.

A: Santa. I never did understand the great pumpkin idea.

J: Santa. He shows up more consistently.

G: Santa. I like how excited all the little kids at the mall are to tell him what they want for Christmas. If I ever get fat I’m going to be a mall Santa during the holidays.

Dinosaurs or dragons?

K: Dragons. They breathe fire so that makes them cooler.

A: Dinosaurs. The real life dragons. They actually lived so it makes them cooler.

J: Dinosaurs. I was really into them when I was a little kid. I even had a little stuffed T-Rex.

G: Dragons. I wish that scientists would splice them in the lab so that we can have fire breathing air travel. That would be badass.

Nerd or geek?

K: Me? I’m a geek.

A: I was always called a nerd, but I think I’d rather be a geek. They seem to have more fun.

J: Nereek. Everything is better when it’s a hybrid. Cars, dogs, ligers, everything.

G: Jock? But if those are my only options, I think I’d go nerd.

Click to enlarge.

There’s also an extended interview!

The extended interview is available as part of our new rewards, available only on the KickStarter!

The KickStarter is barely to $300, and we have 10 days to go. If you can contribute, awesome! If you can’t financially donate, donate by using your words and telling everybody about it!

Thanks for reading, (thank you for contributing to the KickStarter), and I’ll see you again on Tuesday.

December 2, 2014January 18, 2015

Today is My Day Off

There’s actually quite a few house-keeping things I want to take care of in this blog post.

First, I’m taking December off from making comics.

I’m doing this for a few different reasons.

So I can make presents and finish up private commissions for folks.
So I can get some writing done for next year.
So I can spend more time with my family for the holidays.

Second, though I’m taking a break from making comics, all of them will still update regularly in December.

This is because I worked extra hard in October and November to make extra pages.

So don’t worry! Validation will still update Mondays and Thursdays, Johnson & Sir will still update on Tuesdays, and Charlie & Clow will still update on Wednesdays.

Third, I’ll still be promoting the “Seeing Him” KickStarter.

Speaking of which, we are down to 13 days left and we’re not near our goal! Please help by spreading the word and contributing if you can.

But yes, there will still be a lot of posts about Seeing Him, mostly because Kia and I are super eager to get this story out. While Validation is a cool webcomic about a trans girl, Kia and I don’t feel like there are enough webcomics about and starring trans men. We’re hoping that by making Seeing Him we can make a story to fill that gap.

Those are the major updates at the moment. There will probably also be tweaks made on this site, like updating Sketches.

Hopefully, too, there will be more, better blog posts here. If you have any suggestions, please leave them in comments below.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you on Friday.

November 28, 2014January 20, 2015

New Rewards, New Sketches: A KickStarter Update

Click to enlarge.

The Seeing Him KickStarter is still going, and so far we’ve raised $102. We still have a long way to go until December 15th. (I know I’ve been saying the 14th in previous posts. My bad.)

To that end, Kia (the writer on the project) and I added a new reward option: if you contribute $10 to the campaign, you can get an ebook of behind-the-scenes sketches, including…

character designs
sketches of Nyan Noodles Restaurant (where Kate and Adam meet)
behind-the-scenes development of comic pages
and more!

We also lowered the prices of some of the higher-priced rewards. To contribute, check it out. And help spread the word!

Here’s one of the sketches that will appear in the eBook sketchbook reward:

julianne character sketch for seeing him trans webcomic kickstarter — It’s a development sketch of Julianne, Kate’s best friend! Click to enlarge.

P.S. Thank you for putting up with all my blog posts about the KickStarter. Kia and I are just really hoping we can get this webcomic out into the world, because that would mean more positive trans representation – trans men need more comics for and about them.

Thank you for reading, and I’ll see you on Tuesday.

November 18, 2014January 20, 2015

Seeing Him: Now on Kickstarter!

A few months ago, my sister, Kia, approached me and was like, “I have a new story I’m writing and I want you to draw it because it would look awesome!”

Ok, maybe she didn’t phrase it like that. But it was close.

So we worked together to build up this story a bit, and now, we’re raising money to get it off the ground!

Click to enlarge.

What’s the story about?

“Seeing Him” is the story of Katy, a young lady who runs her own skating rink, but wants a little company in her life. So she meets a trans man named Adam at a Japanese noodle restaurant, and so begins a romantic comedy of unique and silly proportions.

Of course there are plenty of friends to help them along, like Greg, Adam’s friend and a tough guy who loves baking cupcakes.

greg from seeing him the trans man webcomic — Click to enlarge.

I love drawing Greg!

There are other friends, too, including Katy’s friends, Rachel and Julianne, who work at the skating rink.

character sketches from seeing him the trans man webcomic — Click to enlarge.

So what’s going on with this story right now?

Well, Kia and I are now raising funds on KickStarter to get this up and running as a webcomic online. The money raised will help pay us for making the project, as well as get you awesome perks, like stickers, bookmarks, and even posters and other cool prizes!

To give you an idea of how the comic will look when it’s funded and made, here’s a preview of page 9:

seeing him trans man webcomic comic page preview — Click to enlarge.

The both of us would love your support, whether you donate, spread the word about it on Facebook and Twitter, or share the project with your friends/family/readers/sentient pet dinosaurs.

The KickStarter will be up until around December 14th, and with your awesomeness, hopefully it can be funded!

Thank you for reading, and I’ll see you on Friday.

November 11, 2014January 20, 2015

Why I Make Diverse Comics

There’s been some… “intense discussions” online about “including” women, people of color, and other minorities in fiction.

These discussions include articles all over the internet, Twitter hashtags, and a good chunk of GamerGate.

The discussions I have witnessed seem to boil down to “We need more diverse books” vs “writing about minorities is hard and uninteresting, so let’s stick with something comfortable.”

Here’s what I have to say about it.

Saying that writing stories with minorities in them – much less as lead characters – is “hard,” shows a tremendous lack of imagination and empathy. Even, I daresay, an unwillingness to try and empathize with them.

Now, you’re probably thinking, “But I’m not a black woman/asian person/lesbian/gay man/blind person/ etc. and I don’t want to write something and risk offending them by saying something wrong.”

And that’s a fair enough concern. Everyone’s experience is different. My view on life as a poor white genderqueer person sexually attracted to dudes is very different from, say, a black lesbian woman, or a wealthy white heterosexual man, or…you get the idea.

Should that deter us from trying to understand the point of view we want to write, that is outside of our realm of experience? No.

If anything, it should encourage us.

Part of the fun and challenge of writing any character (that is not a white man) is that you can talk to people of that demographic, and learn about them. And you take what you learned and make stories with that knowledge.

Even if you don’t do the research, you’re still a step ahead of those who won’t even write these types of characters. Just the act of writing characters outside of your experience is rebellious and rewarding.

Here’s the thing: I love the comics I make. The main characters I draw include a young trans girl, a genderqueer elf policeman, and most recently, a young, black, goth punk woman.

: Her name is Charlie and I love her.

Am I any of those? No.

Do I make stories starring these characters? Yep.

I write and illustrate these stories because I want to understand my characters. Making these stories helps me explore their world, what they experience, and how they feel about their experiences, because I don’t get that easily outside of fiction.

I do my best to research as much as I can. If I get something wrong, that’s ok – I learn something new everyday. And if I get to learn about people outside of my experience, that’s awesome!

In making these stories to seek understanding, it helps me become more empathetic to others out in the real world. It helps me understand the lives of others. It makes me want to listen and learn more about them.

Writing these fictions helps me to become more human.

That’s why I love making diverse comics, and why I believe we need more diverse media.

For those of you who want to stick to writing about white dudes, that’s ok. Just be warned that

1. There are already plenty of stories about white heterosexual men, because

2. mass media tries to make characters generic enough that the audience can empathize with them immediately and have traits that are desirable. So they make their main characters white men. They figure white men are simple enough and common enough to create that the audience can insert themselves into that character. However,

3. White men become the default main character because they fit mass media formulas so well. And therefore

4. It makes women and PoC main characters hard to empathize with because they are not the default main character and don’t fit the formulas very well.

Hank Green did a really good job of discussing this in regard to Batman. You can watch that video here.

And if you still have reservations about writing or even reading stories with minority characters, please check out this awesome speech by Gene Luen Yang. He made some truly excellent points. (If the video won’t work, here’s a transcript.)

Don’t be afraid to make diverse characters and stories!

If you have any reading suggestions for books starring minority characters, leave them in comments below!

Have any questions? Still have reservations? Voice them in comments, too!

Thanks for reading and I’ll see you on Friday.