The Lady Cartoonist

Greetings, all, from somewhere next to nowhere in Nevada. More specifically, I am at the BurningMan production facility (here on: ‘the ranch’) building, well, The Man.
This is my third year on Man Krewe (and fourth man). My productivity has been waning in the cartooning department so I decided to add a little challenge while I’m up here. I am going to write and draw a comic every day of the build, from sticks and timbers to fully built Burning Man. I’m just taking photos so bear with me.
Pal Aaron Muszalski is liveblogging the whole build at the official Burning Man Blog (fancy!).
Here is yesterdays:

and today:

Hey, wanna see my guts? Well, my guts 5 years ago, anyways.

This is from a PET scan. They injected me with a radioactive sugar, then scanned me for three hours to see what parts of my body used the sugars the fastest (highest metabolism). It’s used to locate tumors (which have a high metabolism). Apparently, it’s also used to diagnose certain types of schizophrenia. I was the former, and this scan is pre-chemotherapy. I’m going to try to obtain the PET scan images from after chemo to compare. My tumor is one of the two large blobs in me chest, next to my heart.

(P.S.- doesn’t it look like I’m looking for my wallet?)

Momentum is a tricky mistress. It is extremelly dificult to start on a new project, and often just as hard to keep it moving. I have always grappled with artists’ block; it makes me miserable and useless.
Almost my whole cartooning career I’ve been a page-by-page girl. I would write, pencil, and often ink each before moving to the next. This is a terrible way to work- the end of each page affords a gap where momentum can brick wall itself.
I’m breaking that habit with this new (!) comic. Breaking a project down into steps allows me to see the whole book; reduced to easy-to manage bite sized nuggets. Each step leads into the next. If you must take a couple days off, having a whole book roughed out makes it infinatly easier to pick back up again.
Here are my steps:
Page/ narrative roughs; narrative fine tuning; full sized pencils; final narrative and pencil tweeks (and speech bubble placing); ink outlines; ink detail, cleanup, color.
I encourage all cartoonists- rough it out!

I’ve just added a bunch of illustrations to the gallery, go check it out! I am going to be a total watercolor walk-through soon, as well as a ‘tool box’ post with some more of my favorite bits-n-bobs.

Ani Niow (steamfuck.me) has created the most perfect marriage of the above, by creating the SteamVibe, a hand-machined steam-powered vibrator. The piece was machined out of a solid hunk of stainless steel (no easy task), and fitted with the world’s itty-bittiest Tesla Turbine (if you’ve never heard of a Tesla Turbine, check it out). It’s truly a wonderful bit of engineering- the Tesla turbine is hard to create even in larger sizes, and this one is fitted into the base of the shaft. It uses a set of smooth disks in it’s mechanism- and in a stroke of brilliance, Ani used high RPM dremel disks.

The whole she-bang is powered with steam from an as-yet-to-be-completed external boiler.
It’s is luscious itself as an object. It’s heavy in your hands (or, I assume, other places), and cold- until you turn the steam on.It’s sleek and damn sexy- 50s retro-futurism, android-porno-scifi, and steampunk. Also, shiny.

More photos on my Flickr stream.

While wandering around Tokyo, I happened across this amazing little brush shop, tucked in an alley not to far from Akihabara (the electronics district). It was filled with wooden drawers and cabinets, in turn filled with hundreds of different pigments and thousands brushes of every shape, size, and hair.
I spoke little Japanese, and the man who owned the shop spoke little English. We managed to get across the basics- we happily pantomimed and guessed our way through the delicate and important business of brush selection.
Essentially, there are few animals from who’s hair decent brushes can be made, and each has their own characteristics. Sheep’s hair holds a lot of water, is firm, but won’t hold a point; squirrel is the same but softer; sable is superbly springy, holds water well, and has a great point- but is expensive; etc.
He pulled out drawer after drawer, pulling out brush after brush (reminding me very clearly of harry potter), helping me find the perfect brushes for my needs. One brush had a little more sheep’s, for mopping; one a little more sable, for stiffness; long and thin to short and squat. Pantomiming the animal the hair came from was fun for both of us, and at the end of the day, I spent a little over a hundred dollars on brushes (some of which were for my father, also a painter). I mailed these Japanese brushes to myself and have just retrieved them.

Here’s the line up, with some of my regular brushes. From left to right:
- Mop, mostly sheep with some sable in the center. Holds lots of fluid, medium point, bamboo body.
-mop, mostly sable, with some sheep around the outside. Medium springy, medium fine point.
- ‘chisel’ brush. sable. Excellent for edge work and fills. Springy, but not much fluid retention. Neat bamboo construction.
- Liner. Boar hair (I know!), excellent springy-ness, amazing point, makes a damn find line, but steers like a cow (wont do sharp corners- to much springy-ness)
- regular American mop. Cheapest sable you can buy. Loew-Cornell. This is my mop-workhorse- readily available, will hold a decent point if you aren’t too fussy about it.
- Windsor-Newton series 7, size 1. Beloved series 7. One of the few times where the expense justifies the cost.
- Windsor-Newton series 7, size 8. I effing love this brush. It was a whole weeks food budget in one go, but I lucked out and got a anniversary pack of two (the other is in storage). Most of my thesis was painted with this brush and I guard it with my life and a small, lock-on tip protector.

So there you go. I love my brushes. I have far more, but these are the chosen ones that follow me everywhere.

The time of internet vagrancy has ended for me. No longer will I surf the tubes, hoping to find a place to lay my weary words, letting my comments fall where they may. No! Now, I am a real, grown up blogger, with a URL of my very own. Sure, it may lack the pizazz of some of the fancier web sites out there; but like the blank canvas of a new apartment, I’ll grow to fill this here fish tank.
I’m excited, filled with my usual youthful idealism. Ill be posting here regularly, with my latest projects, drawings, and mental bits of fluff. Also, moonshine.