Posts Tagged ‘webcomics’

We’re about to round a corner with the completion of this week’s two pages from The Utopian. Page 31 is now live, but Friday’s strip is not only the tense conclusion of Part 4 of the serial (“Out of the Closet”), but also will be the last page in the first print collection, which will be released this fall. I received cover art from Mark T. Zeilman (also bass player in a certain awesome local rock band) last week, and, well, I am trying really hard not to post it yet, because it’s pretty rad.

As I’m heading to San Diego for Comic-Con International tomorrow, there will be no new Utopian pages posted next week, but I’ll be back with Part 5, “Revelations,” the first week of August. Which is, coincidentally, 33rd Annual International Pj Week. Bring your party hats.

I’m sure I’ll have all sorts of news for you after I get back from Comic-Con, but until then, chew on the latest article I posted on Examiner.com about Nevada Ballet Theatre’s fall season, and keep your eyes out for tomorrow’s Las Vegas Weekly, in which there should be a Pj-penned article about fast-rising Vegas electro-core band This Romantic Tragedy.

Oh yeah, if you want to be really amused, check out Cracked.com’s “Worst Webcomic” forum, in which the forum trolls dwelling there do their best to ooze snarky criticisms all over The Utopian. Of course, since someone started posting links to my webcomic over there, traffic on my site has increased hundredfold, so I guess that goes to prove, once again, there’s no such thing as bad press. If I get really bored one of these days (because, you know, that happens), I might address each of their complaints in a blog post in my own refined and delicate manner.

And to end on a more positive note, how about good press? Internet pals Kevin Church, Benjamin Birdie, Max Riffner and others get some love for their webcomics over at NPR.com, which is about the most awesome sauce you’ll ever taste.

As I mentioned last week, San Diego Comic-Con starts next week, specifically July 22 (preview night) and runs through July 26.  It’s by far the most well-attended and media-saturated pop culture convention in the United States, a fact that has become both a boon and drawback for both creators and fans over the last few years. Sure, it’s great that the sequential art/animation/genre fiction industries are experiencing such popularity and growth. But it’s also created a clusterf*ck in San Diego for about a week every July, both in and around the San Diego Convention Center.

Unlike Las Vegas, San Diego does not have more than 100,000 hotel rooms within minutes of the convention center. Hell, it barely has 50,000 in the metro area. Rooms get reserved quickly and the ones left are pricey. I reserved mine back in the early spring, maybe even winter, and even then, the closest I could get to the center for less than $200 was a Courtyard by Marriott near the airport. By comparison, our last trip there in the spring got us a room five or six blocks from the bay with a towering view of the city for about $125/a night.

But I digress. While I was able to get my professional credentials for this year’s geekfest, I missed the deadline for a small press or Artist Alley table reservation. So, as described over at Pop! Goes the Icon, I’ll be wandering around the convention halls with a bag full of goodies, including the items found inside this box:

Yep, extremely limited-edition (only 50!) Comic-Con exclusive print samplers of The Utopian, ready for the unsuspecting public. These will be handed out for free to whatever suckers want them in San Diego, so if that’s you and you’ll be down there, I highly recommend letting me know ahead of time, and I’ll hold a copy for you to grab from me there. Otherwise, if you want a print edition of my ongoing webcomic, I recommend waiting for the official first issue this fall, which will have nifty bonus materials well worth the $3.50 cover price. More on that later.

Oh, you have been keeping up with the webcomic, right? Because some sh*t is going to happen next week you’ll need to be prepared for.

I will have other comic-related news to announce soon, including the next title from Pop! Goes the Icon. Stay tuned.

HEARTY DISCLAIMER: The girlfriend and I are in the middle of buying a house, and the lender is playing the shell game with the closing date. So there is a chance this whole trip could get borked, but I’m really hoping that doesn’t happen. If it does, I will make sure a deputy is down there to distribute materials, but I would like you all to pray to whatever god or demon you love that everything goes fine next week. Thanks for your support.

As I mentioned last week, San Diego Comic-Con starts next week, specifically July 22 (preview night) and runs through July 26.  It’s by far the most well-attended and media-saturated pop culture convention in the United States, a fact that has become both a boon and drawback for both creators and fans over the last few years. Sure, it’s great that the sequential art/animation/genre fiction industries are experiencing such popularity and growth. But it’s also created a clusterf*ck in San Diego for about a week every July, both in and around the San Diego Convention Center.

Unlike Las Vegas, San Diego does not have more than 100,000 hotel rooms within minutes of the convention center. Hell, it barely has 50,000 in the metro area. Rooms get reserved quickly and the ones left are pricey. I reserved mine back in the early spring, maybe even winter, and even then, the closest I could get to the center for less than $200 was a Courtyard by Marriott near the airport. By comparison, our last trip there in the spring got us a room five or six blocks from the bay with a towering view of the city for about $125/a night.

But I digress. While I was able to get my professional credentials for this year’s geekfest, I missed the deadline for a small press or Artist Alley table reservation. So, as described over at Pop! Goes the Icon, I’ll be wandering around the convention halls with a bag full of goodies, including the items found inside this box:

Yep, extremely limited-edition (only 50!) Comic-Con exclusive print samplers of The Utopian, ready for the unsuspecting public. These will be handed out for free to whatever suckers want them in San Diego, so if that’s you and you’ll be down there, I highly recommend letting me know ahead of time, and I’ll hold a copy for you to grab from me there. Otherwise, if you want a print edition of my ongoing webcomic, I recommend waiting for the official first issue this fall, which will have nifty bonus materials well worth the $3.50 cover price. More on that later.

Oh, you have been keeping up with the webcomic, right? Because some sh*t is going to happen next week you’ll need to be prepared for.

I will have other comic-related news to announce soon, including the next title from Pop! Goes the Icon. Stay tuned.

HEARTY DISCLAIMER: The girlfriend and I are in the middle of buying a house, and the lender is playing the shell game with the closing date. So there is a chance this whole trip could get borked, but I’m really hoping that doesn’t happen. If it does, I will make sure a deputy is down there to distribute materials, but I would like you all to pray to whatever god or demon you love that everything goes fine next week. Thanks for your support.

Now with 100% more trench coat action!

As I threatened a few weeks ago, I’ve decided to slightly modify the posting schedule of my weekly webcomic, The Utopian. Previously, I was promoting two pages as “episodes” released every Wednesday. Due to the restrictions of the ComicPress template I am using, what was actually happening was the posting of one page on Tuesday, one on Wednesday and then a bunch of confusion among people who go directly to theutopiancomic.com looking for the start of a new, two-page episode but actually get the second page.

So to undo that confusion and, honestly, make it easier for me to write, draw, letter and color two pages a week, I’ve opted to post one page every Wednesday and Friday instead. Yes, it’s the same number of pages weekly, but it allows traffic to spread out across the week AND hopefully will increase the quality of the strip and leave me more time to work on other things, like, you know, freelance writing, playing music and even top secret comic projects. Yep.

Of course, if you subscribe to the RSS feed for The Utopian, none of this matters to you, because you will get the updates as they drop anyway, right? RIGHT. OK, as you were.

What may not be entirely obvious to readers of my weekly webcomic, The Utopian, is that I’ve pretty much drawn entirely on my own high school as the model for the setting of the strip. A few things have been changed, but from the brown-and-gold colors to this week’s outdoor quad, The Utopian owes quite a debt to Bonanza High School.

That being said, Part 002 of the comic comes to a conclusion today. In the next chapter, “Special Interests,” we’ll start to see both the consequences of The Utopian’s activities as well as some of the ugly politics going on behind closed doors at Sagebrush High. And then you’ll want to sit tight for Part 004, “Out of the Closet,” in which we go off-campus for some face-smashing action. You won’t be disappointed. I hope.

I should be able to keep up the pace, but I’m also working on tweaking the first 16 pages of The Utopian for a print sampler I’ll be publishing in a limited run and giving away at San Diego Comic-Con in July. As I posted over on The Utopian blog, I’m looking for cover artists for these upcoming print editions, and I have to move pretty quickly on the sampler, so if you know a good artist who may be interested, send him or her my way.

In other comic-related news, um, I sent out another proposal this week for the “big” series I’ve been hinting at for a few months now, and am wrapping up the plot of a potential Zuda entry with a new artist to be announced. Yes, I know, I am being vague again. You know how it is, kids, no specifics on projects until they are done deals.

But I did finish off another article for the Las Vegas Weekly, so look for that in tomorrow’s paper. Or when I go on about it here.

Oh hey, I meant to post this yesterday, but I must have been … doing something else.

New two-page episode of The Utopian went online, as scheduled, on Wednesday, featuring the most awesome use of a high school football scoreboard you’ve ever seen:

Yeah, I know. It doesn’t get much better than that, so get clicking.

My view for four days. Well, add some rain and maybe a fire.

Yep, kids, I’m back from the wilds of Michigan. I spent four days in the middle of farms, lakes and various wildlife doing a whole lot of nothing. Well, that’s not true. I did drink a lot. And eat cake (it was my girlfriend’s birthday). And chuck wood. And draw. And write a bit. But mostly, it was nothing.

However, that’s not why we’re here. We’re here because this week’s episode of the internet’s favorite emo high school dramedy webcomic, The Utopian, is now live and available for your perusal. Even better, I got the hair up my butt to launch it on a brand-new website, so, yeah, go check it out: www.theutopiancomic.com

Here’s a totally out-of-context preview:

Jocks, murder and parties? GREATEST COMIC EVER.

Yeah, you can’t go wrong.