Month: April 2023

I’m writing this up a few days in advance, because I’m planning on uploading this early in the morning, and I won’t have time to do it before heading out to the first day of ComicCon Cape Town!

Due to a combination of illness, intermittent electrical problems and malfunctioning wi-fi, to say that this past week was “a lot” is a bit of an understatement; I barely felt like we had a weekend up until the last 8 hours of Sunday. Fortunately, we seem to have our business together, and we’re going to be making the most of the long weekend by making it the best convention we possibly can.

Also, since Monday is a public holiday, the Fifth Ace Showcase will be resuming on Wednesday May 3rd, after I have recovered from a post-convention coma.

That’s all I’m going to say for this week, I’ll let you know next time how it all went; if you’re one of the lucky people who managed to get a ticket to ComicCon before they all sold out, come swing by The Dragon Wagon over in The Block and check out our wide variety of dice!

Ciao for now.

Blaze it! There, now that’s out of the way…

Bit of a late post today, the day job has basically turned into an assembly line; I’m going to be stuck on the current job all day tomorrow, and it will have to continue into the weekend to be ready by Monday. However, I don’t get paid overtime, so I’m not going anywhere near the office on Saturday or Sunday; so-called “company loyalty” isn’t going to pay for my lunch off the food carts at ComicCon next week, so if they want me in there, they’ll have to show me something a little more substantial. 

Speaking of ComicCon, with only a week left to go, it’s a bit of a madhouse around the home as well, though not really for me. My lovely fiance is in crunch mode for getting her cosplays done, on top of juggling her online studies, her part-time job, and the stock for The Dragon Wagon table; I help out where I can, but I can only do so much. My best bet is to just be here for emotional support, and I’ve been told I’m very reliable in that regard; if there’s any job where “company loyalty” matters, it’s being a partner in life to someone you love.

Also, after ComicCon is over, it’s going to be back on the grindstone for comics on this site again. I’m looking forward to getting back to the Showcase; I’ve been doodling a lot in my free moments, so I think I’m a little artistically deprived at this point. I’ll be aiming for the regular three Showcase pages per week, along with Magic Beans on Tuesdays once more, though don’t be surprised if updates become sporadic at any point; “company loyalty” means a lot to me when it comes to my own work, but it’s a lot to fit into my timetable these days. Hopefully, a major disruption in uploads will be due to moving house rather than any kind of burnout, though still nothing confirmed on that front.

With regards to moving, Sparrow is still quite comfy here in our little space. Our landlord hasn’t brought him up in conversation at all in the past month, so he seems to be okay with Sparrow still being around. We’re not bringing up the subjects of his vaccinations or foster homes, so we’ll cross that bridge only if we absolutely have to; our loyalty to having Sparrow’s company – okay, that’s stretching the term a little bit, but long story short, we don’t want to give him up, and we’re not planning on doing so. We may need someone to watch him over the ComicCon weekend, since we’re going to be out for most of the time, but we’ll make something work.

So after all that, I can say that my loyalties lie with those that grant me good company.

I have no idea where I was going with all that, I’m going to get an early night.

Ciao for now.

Another week rolls by with little to talk about; I could complain about my sleep schedule being thrown for a loop, but reading back such a thing might actually fix the problem, yawn-inducing as the subject is…

Progress is being somewhat made on the art front; I’ve gotten my next round of Critical Role postcards printed and ready for ComicCon, and will be picking them up on Friday. Hopefully these will be just as big of a hit as they were in September last year, as these are a different batch of characters; I printed a bunch of last year’s ones as well, hopefully they will shift too. No chance of getting the ashcan origins issue of the Showcase done, I haven’t had nearly the time or energy to draw that, but it was very much in the “maybe” pile of stuff anyway. I’ve had to focus on the things I can complete that would at least give some more immediate financial relief, such as my paid D&D gig.

Any additional cash coming in right now will help, as it’s been quite an expensive month; having two kitty cats that need checkups is obviously a lot more pricey than just the one, and there’s also the additional food costs involved. I’ve also had to pick up an additional bill here and there, with the need for dice to stock the ComicCon table also requiring some investment. We’re really hoping for a big haul when ComicCon rolls around (only two weeks left to go!), though if last year was any indication, we should do just fine (fingers crossed).

All of this makes me keen to get back to creating; I still intend to pick up the Showcase and Magic Beans again next month, though potentially staggering out the update schedule a little. I was on the verge of burnout with the last Showcase issue, so reducing the upload schedule to twice a week might make it a little more manageable; it would mean the stories come slower, but I do have my mental health to consider. It’s not a set-in-stone decision, we’ll see how I progress.

It’s telling of me how as soon as I typed those words, I considered how staggering the schedule might allow me to insert updates of another potential project into my routine; this is how my mind works to destroy me from the inside out, people. There is so much I want to do, that any free time might hold potential for additional content; my inherent need to get my ideas out is inversely proportional to how much energy I actually have to spend on doing so. I think the past couple of months focusing on brainstorming and writing have let the other ideas rise to the top and compete for my attention, which doesn’t help when there are barely enough hours in the week as it is. Maybe when I find a day job that is more accommodating, or leave it behind entirely, I’ll have the time to do whatever I want; I’ll still need a decent office setup so that I’m not forced to work sitting up in bed like I currently do, the actual desk being overloaded with other stuff, so add finding a new living space to the other necessities, and now I’m being a broken record again.

Bottom line: as a creator, I want to create, and if something is preventing me from creating (whether that something is internal or external), I get frustrated. As such, to one day be able to create what I want, whenever I want, is the ultimate dream, even if it is just a pipe dream at best.

Ciao for now.

Okay, the coffee is finally kicking in, time to type.

Kitten update: Sparrow went for his shots on Tuesday; he’s put on 0.6kgs of weight in the month since his initial checkup, a growing boy. He’ll be due for a rabies booster in another month, so we should be able to swing that as an excuse to keep him around a while longer, fingers crossed. He also spotted our landlord’s dog for the first time yesterday and was NOT impressed; I think Sparrow may have had some bad experiences with dogs during his brief time on the streets. Nevertheless, he’s still full of beans and enjoying life, so let’s keep hoping for a new home for us all in the near future.

I mentioned last week how I’ve been tinkering with some old ideas, one in particular that I’ve had knocking around since at least 2015, according to the dates on the old files still lurking in the corners of my hard drive. I did concept art, character bios, pitch documents, sample pages; it’s quite well developed for something that I haven’t touched in a while, or the basic premise is, at least. There’s a lot of interstitial stuff that I’ve brainstormed but haven’t fleshed out much, but that’s been mostly down to the nebulous nature of what media format it gets developed for; I’ve conceptualised it as an animated series, a graphic novel, a webcomic, and even a prose novel, but I’ve held back on settling on one. This concept is one that I feel could work in multiple media, and I don’t want to give up on pitching it around in various formats, just in case. In addition, revisiting it after several years away, now with fresh eyes and new concepts, I think it could benefit from some revisions, and even complete overhauls in some areas.

Enough with the vagueness, here’s as much of the pitch as I’m willing to reveal publicly:

On an alien planet, a newly ascended young queen must learn to navigate the politics of her position following the death of her father, and the splintering of their former empire, while also hunting down the traitor that caused it all.

A sci-fi action adventure political drama, if you will; think of it as being like the She-Ra reboot, with (relatively) harder sci-fi instead of magic, and if season 4 Princess Glimmer was the main character instead (if you know, you know). 

The overall setting draws on a lot of different inspirations, most of which are derivatives of older sci-fi stories anyway, so originality is in the eye of the beholder. The most recent influence has been Stellaris, like I said last time, but a lot of the older ideas came from Will Wright’s space sim Spore, which wanted to be Stellaris before it existed but fell short. However, the entire premise came from playing around on the Seventh Sanctum random generator website; one of the generators showcased there is a “merchandisable cartoon” generator, which produces titles for stuff that echoes back to the 80s and early 90s, the days of the original He-Man, Silverhawks, Biker Mice from Mars, etc. I gave the generator a spin, and it showed me the most glorious title ever:

Queen Midnight and the ChronoBats.

That’s mine now; everything about this concept sprang from that title, and it has remained unchanged from the beginning. I don’t know if it will ever be a merchandisable cartoon, but I’m sticking with that title. What is a ChronoBat? Sorry, I’m keeping that to myself for now; suffice to say, it’s something awesome, by my standards at least.

That’s all I’ve got for this week; hope everyone enjoys the long weekend, Happy Easter to those who celebrate, and I’ll see you next time for something else.

Oh, and the Dungeons and Dragons movie was amazing, go see it.

Ciao for now.