You may have noticed last week’s blog is missing; I was informed that it may compromise our agents in the field, so it has been annulled for the sake of national security.

Real talk time: I’ve not been doing so well lately. I’ve been frustrated at the day job, stifled in my living space, stressed out socially, blocked creatively, and just all around exhausted. Individually, these problems would be nothing new, but they’re each building pressure from a different angle, and it’s really starting to get me down. All of this pressure could be released if we could just move to a new home, but there is literally nothing we can do about that except wait for the people who are in control of that situation to actually do something, and good luck to that happening anytime soon; we’ll be lucky if we get to move out before the end of the year at this rate.

I’ll be reiterating all of this to my therapist at some point; I’m currently organising my first therapy session in almost 18 months. Therapy has helped me a lot in the past; I started in 2019, back when my living situation was simultaneously better and yet so much worse than it is now. I won’t say that I’ve backslid to where I was, but I’d rather avoid letting myself go that far down again; I have more responsibilities that I did before, and I can’t afford to slip up now.

Speaking of which, the Fifth Ace Showcase is still on track to resume on the 5th of June, barring any major upheavals, like, say, moving to a new house (I can still dream). I’ve been trying to keep my creativity sharp by doodling in my spare time at work, mostly characters from my Twitter neighbour MakeMineAmalgam and his Fodderverse line of custom action figures. It’s low pressure fanart with no deadline i.e. quick and simple to produce with little to no judgement involved; he likes the fact that I draw his characters, and I enjoy drawing them, so win-win.

Also, kitten update: Sparrow is getting big; I swear he’s twice the size he was when I brought him home, and he’s absolutely full of beans. He’s been keeping us up at night by bolting around the place and trying to climb on everything; the sooner we can get him more space and a decent sized cat-tree to keep him satisfied, the better (again, that new house would be very nice, universe). Since he’s around the right age for it, we’re looking to get Sparrow neutered in the near future; the last thing we need is him tearing up all our stuff in a fit of heat. At this point, we are more or less committed to keeping him, and every foster home we’ve looked into is full anyway, so we’re in this for the long haul.

That’s all for my angst this week, though if any of it gives the great cosmic consciousness a hint that we would really like to move into a new house very very soon, it was worth it.

Ciao for now.

I’m running out of excuses here, aren’t I?

So I’m almost two weeks overdue for new comic pages, and it’s looking like the hiatus will be lasting longer still. I could go on about how the day job is sapping my energy, how our continued hurry-up-and-wait situation when it comes to house hunting is frustrating me, and all the usual reasons I give; I mean, they’re all true, but that’s not the point. Instead, I’m resorting to “dissatisfaction with my art” for a semi-fresh option.

I’ve been agonising over the opening page for this next story; the establishing shots are relatively more ambitious than what I’ve done in the past. I’m shooting for a certain atmosphere and feel, and I’m just not quite getting there. I’ve found some nice downloadable materials and I’ve been looking up relevant references to figure it all out, but it’s still missing the mark. I know that I may not be up to the level I want to be when it comes to art, and I’m never going to get there unless I push myself a little; the trade off is that the artwork itself is delayed.

So, in light of this, the Showcase will return in June, rather than any time this month. That doesn’t mean I won’t still be working on stuff until then; I’m going to use the rest of May to work out the kinks in my art, and maybe even build up a buffer for a change. I hate to delay things so long, but if I try to rush out all the pages before the end of May, not only is the artwork going to suffer for it, but I’m going to just burn out a lot quicker again.

Though I’m never going to be perfectly satisfied with my art, I still want to make sure it’s as good as I can get it; a wise man once said: “You develop taste faster than you develop skill.” I know why I dislike my art, I just don’t necessarily have what it takes to make it better yet; the sooner I can get on that the better, but I’m not going to subject you all to the entire gruelling process. At least, not unless I start streaming again; wouldn’t that be a novelty?

If I can shift the blame anywhere else, it would be the inconsistency of the day job; normally I’d relish any chance to use any spare moment to draw when there’s a slow work day, but that’s not conducive to doing comic work. If I’m working on a sketch or a doodle, that’s no problem, as I can put it away in between work assignments and come back to it later on. Comic pages are a different story; not only does breaking the flow of work disrupt the creative process, I also use Clip Studio Paint for my comic work, and because I can’t install it on multiple machines, I have to use my laptop for that; it doesn’t look good when I pull out my laptop to do my own stuff at my work desk. Starting to miss those two hour load shedding breaks…

I occasionally keep myself sane by doodling on Photoshop on the work PC; keep an eye on my Instagram and Twitter (for as long as that still exists) and you might see my random flashes of inspiration that I manage to squeeze into the spare minutes. 

Okay, enough excuses for this week, I’m going to go try and wrestle some results out of myself, and I’ll hopefully have something better to complain talk about next time.

Ciao for now.

Okay, so maybe ComicCon hit me a little harder than I thought…

I fully intended to get the first page of the new Showcase story out yesterday, but I had forgotten how much essential recovery time after a convention was required. Don’t get me wrong, ComicCon Cape Town was a resounding success, I’m sure it will continue to be so in years to come, but holy cow are we out of practice when it comes to conventions. It’s been three or four years since the last full-fledged pop-culture convention took place in our city, and we’ve been so eager to get back to it that I don’t think we fully appreciated just how much energy it takes.

That said, I had a truly fantastic time being there. While I wasn’t running my own booth, I did spend about 95% of the convention at The Dragon Wagon, selling my fiancé’s TTRPG dice; I’m totally okay with this, I’ve always been more at home behind a table and greeting people as they go by. Sure, it means I have limited contact with my fellow attendees, but it does help prevent my introverted brain from being overwhelmed. In any case, I still saw a bunch of old friends; some were from my former workplace, and we could reminisce about the past traumas of that crapshoot; one of my best friends still based in my hometown, showed up unannounced and surprised us; I even had a few strangers come up and tell me that they follow my comics and this blog, so shout-out to all of you for letting me know that people actually read this stuff! 

Also, a big congrats to my fiancè herself, MittelElfCat, for winning Best Wig at the regional cosplay competition, and for her TV news interview that allowed her to show off her Geralt cosplay to the nation, love you hun <3

The most astounding thing was how well our stock was doing; most of the more expensive dice sets were gone before the end of Thursday, and we dwindled down to almost nothing before we even got to Sunday; never underestimate the allure of shiny math rocks to those in the D&D crowd. To say that we made an absolute killing is an understatement; I won’t give specific numbers, but let’s just say that we made more money in four days than I usually make in four months. I don’t know exactly how to feel about that, but it shines a harsh light on my day job, that’s for sure…

All this to say, the Con wiped us out in the best ways possible, and coupled with a sudden spike in workload at the day job, I’m still getting myself back into the swing of things with drawing. On top of that, I made a last minute decision to swap out which story I would be presenting first for this next issue; it wasn’t the one I initially had in mind, nor one that I even had lined up for this issue, but it’s the one I wanted to tell the most. Plus I already had a breakdown of it prepped in advance, so we’re going with it.

Hopefully I’ll be able to kick off this story tomorrow, if I get a chance to breathe at all today.

May the Fourth be with you.

Ciao for now.

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.

Oh wow, yesterday was so dull that I actually forgot to make a blog post! That’s an indicator of the day job if there ever was one…

So, my blogging streak hits a bump; I’m surprised it didn’t happen sooner, to be honest. One of the reasons I used to give for not blogging back in the day, was that I lead a fairly average life, so I didn’t figure I’d have much to talk about in this space. In fact, I often still don’t, which is why you’ll notice me repeat myself a lot week to week; we’re still trying to find a new place to live (the townhouse we wanted to place an offer on got snapped up already), which will determine whether or not we can keep our little kitten Sparrow. He’s due for his next round of vaccinations on Tuesday, so his time remaining with us is limited if we can’t secure a deal on a home. To say that we’re upset is an understatement, but we’re not the ones in control of the money, so it’s out of our hands; all we can do is suggest properties and hope for the best, not that it’s helped so far.

Maybe the reason nothing much else has been happening is that I’m trying to keep myself distracted from all the “what ifs” surrounding our living situation; I’m tired of not knowing what’s going to happen, so I turn to things I can control. I tried doing it with art, but I’m still in a bit of a funk regarding that; I have a quota I need to fulfil before ComicCon next month, but I’ve been slacking on that too; really starting to miss those load shedding breaks at the day job…

My main distraction has been gaming instead, and I’ve been on a bit of a sci-fi kick lately. I’ve been attempting to pick up Ironsworn: Starforged again after a long time away; I backed the Kickstarter, I should probably get my money’s worth for it. It’s a solo tabletop RPG, like Dungeons and Dragons but for a single player, and with a used-future sci-fi theme. I did a few videos of my playthrough of the classic Ironsworn over on my YouTube channel, and I’ve wanted to get started on Starforged for a while, though I never seem to get beyond the setup phase: I get my universe built, my character created, my inciting incident plotted… and then never get round to playing it proper. Maybe I’m trying to look too deep into the fiction too fast, but it’s meant to be a story based game, so perhaps I just don’t want it to feel like more work when I’ve already got enough on my plate.

In digital terms, I took a deep dive into Stellaris, a space empire simulation game that is incredibly intricate and detailed; in basic terms, you try to get ahead in a galaxy full of alien empires, and you have approximately 400 years of game time to get the highest score before the end. I’ve bounced off of it a few times due to the mechanics being difficult to work around, but I’m well on track towards my first real finish; I’ve placated two ancient empires, fought off a legion of psychic space squids, and proclaimed myself God-Emperor of the Galactic Imperium, so all that’s left to do is wait for the endgame crisis and hope my economy doesn’t collapse before then. Yeah, it’s that kind of game.

Both of these games, Stellaris especially, has got me thinking about a concept I came up with several years back, one that I’ve been tinkering with on and off ever since. It was a sci-fi story that I pitched around as both a graphic novel and an animated TV show, but never got any bites. With the intricate level of politics involved in Stellaris, I’ve since come up with several new concepts to add to the original idea, and might try pitching it again from a new angle, even if only to myself.

I’d explain more, but I seem to have actually managed to talk about something enough to fill space (hehe, space) for this week, so maybe I’ll get into it properly next time.

Anywho, time to get through the work day, and then it’s off to see the new Dungeons and Dragons movie tonight; see you all next week for…something, I dunno, but it should be on schedule this time.

Ciao for now.

I’m one day away from turning 34; another year and matriculating from high school will officially be the midpoint of my life.

There’s really not a whole lot to talk about this week; we’re still waiting for word on any new living situation, and not much else has really been happening. Sparrow is getting on better with Silver, and some friends have offered to look after him if we cannot find a place in time to keep him, so that’s good at least.

So I’m just going to go into the weekend and enjoy my birthday as best I can; after my 21st, I haven’t been all that enthusiastic about my birthdays since, but I already glurged out all my angst about it in the previous draft of this blog entry, so you won’t have to read it. All you need to know is that I’m doing okay, and no matter how I feel about my birthday, it’ll pass just like any other day.

See you on the other side.

Ciao for now.

So much for recovery time, I think this past week has seen me the most tired I’ve been in a while; beware the Ides of March and all that…

I don’t want to blame all of my fatigue on the new kitten, but I can’t deny he’s been a contributing factor. Sparrow is a very energetic little guy, especially in the evening when we want to go to bed, so we’re often up an extra hour or so just to let him burn off steam. It might not sound like much, but you start to miss that extra hour of sleep when it’s not there. Silver is also being slow to warm up to him; she’s either perpetually grumpy with us, or hissing at Sparrow whenever he gets close. If we’re going to get these two used to each other, and let Sparrow explore without climbing every surface in our two-room rental, we’re going to need more space; Sparrow’s arrival might have even expedited something on that front…

I mentioned earlier in the year that we’ve been looking into a new place to live, and we might be on the cusp of finding one at last. I don’t want to jinx anything, but a very nice house showed up on our radar, and although it already has an offer on it, we’re not out of the running yet. We’ll hopefully know by the end of the week if we have a shot; put out some positive thoughts for us, we could do with all the help we can get.

It’s funny to think about moving again; we’ve been comfortable in our little space for a while now. We moved in shortly after the initial pandemic lockdowns started to alleviate, and though the space couldn’t grow, we’ve made good use of what little there is to fill up both the space, and our lives. It’s especially odd to think about how much I’ve moved about in the latest phase of my life. Growing up, I lived in the same place until I was in my mid-twenties; the same city, the same house, the same room for twenty six years, before moving across the country for study and work. Since then, I’ve lived in various different spaces: a friend’s spare room, a hole-in-the-wall by the beach, an inner-city apartment, a semi-detached in yet another city, back in my old room at my parent’s house, my future in-laws’ spare room, and finally our current space. All in all, I’ve changed living quarters on an average of about once per year since 2016. For someone who prefers a reasonably sedentary lifestyle, I don’t think I ever pictured myself moving around so much.

Where we are now has been home for nearly three years, which is the longest I’ve stayed in one place since leaving my hometown; I’ve enjoyed it, appreciated it, but it really has become far too small for our little family. We need room to breathe, to craft, to grow; we are becoming stifled by our lack of space, and it’s only a matter of time before we start to get resentful of it. I can only hope against hope that we can cinch this new house, because we need it now more than ever.

Will let you all know next week if we missed out or not.

Ciao for now.