Sketches for an upcoming project

Christine tells it like it is...

Comics Roundtable

A couple of weeks ago I participated in this Comics Panel Discussion at Chapel Hill Comics along side Ben Towle, Jamie Hibdon, Flynn Smith, Rio Aubry Taylor, & Mr. Jan Burger. Click the link above to see pictures if you're into that sort of thing.

Headaches

Warning: this is a little self-indulgent, but it was necessary at the time. 

 

So, disclaimer, things are much better than they were when I drew this comic about a month ago. My doctor had put me on a crazy anti-seizure medicine in hopes it would help with my migraines. Not only did it not help with the headaches, but I had really bad side-effects. I had trouble thinking and focusing, I would forget words all the time which made it very difficult to hold conversations, I was running into things while walking, I lost weight because I would forget to eat for a whole day, my fingers would tingle all the time like my hands were falling asleep, and I was having panic attacks. I was on this for a little over a month and for that month it became really hard to deal with daily life because now I was not only in pain but I felt like my brain was failing me.
It took so much energy just to get through work that I didn't really have energy for anything else so I mostly stopped hanging out with people because it was too hard to hold a conversation. I didn't go right back to my doctor to be taken off of it because I no longer trusted myself and I thought, maybe this is just what I'm always like. The headache specialist I started seeing this month took me off the medicine right away and things got better fast. Now that I'm seeing this specialist I feel much more hopeful that the headaches will pass with hopefully as few unobtrusive medications as possible.
I wasn't going to post this one originally because it just felt too personal, but I also wasn't really talking to people about what I was going through at the time so I will share now.

Zoy!

So I've been working on a few longer comics, or longer for me and it's been a slow process so I haven't had much to post. I did, however, find the first two comics I ever made when I was 13 years old. I thought they had been lost years ago, but apparently were hiding out in a folder somewhere, so I thought I'd share. I posted them ridiculously large because they're nearly impossible to read at the next smaller size.

Can you tell it was the 90's?

This one is only a very mild exaggeration of the ridiculousness of my Global Studies teacher, if exaggeration at all.

Turtle in a Forest Fire

Did I ever mention that I once saved a turtle from a forest fire on my lunch break? Well, I did.

Majka is a Hotdog

It's True!

Today in the Kitchen

I drew this a couple of weeks ago when Lyra caught a bird and brought it into the house. Majka seemed very uncomfortable and didn't quite know how to react to this lifeless body. However, a week later when Lyra caught a bird in the yard, and didn't kill it, Majka was happy to finish the job and gobble it up. Sorry birds.

Row Your Boat

My first attempt at working with water color and playing with grey scale.

An Oldie: Russian Lessons #2

Some more old comics. These are probably from around 2006. I recently discovered that my old comics had gotten infected with mold during the great mold outbreak in our house back in December, so I am digitizing them all so I can (sadly) dispose of the originals.

An Oldie: Kirill in... Dear Diary

(Click on image to enlarge) 

I drew this comic about 7 years ago right around when Kirill and I started dating. I drew comics through middle school and high school, but then stopped for many years. I started drawing again right around the time Kirill and I got together and he's the one who really encouraged and inspired me to keep drawing, I suppose that's why he's so frequently the star of my comics - my muse.

It's kind of interesting for me to look back and see how much my drawing style has evolved. It's also interesting that the early Kirill comics are purely fictions that he happens to star in, where as my comics about him for the past few years are all non-fiction.  

The Dragon and the King

 

(Click to make image larger)

1984

Majka's Dream

Fun-A-Day 2012

This year I am not running a Fun-A-Day and I will admit that not worrying about who's participating and organizing the show is making the whole experience much less stressful. Since there will be no Fun-A-Day NC I'll be participating in the Buffalo Fun-A-Day that my friend Curtis is organizing. Last night as I was trying to figure out a theme for this year's comics, something different from strict daily diary comics, and it occurred to me that this is a leap year so there are 29 days in February, and this is my 29th year so I'm making a comic for every year of my life.
February 1983 I was about 7 months old.

The Proposal

I actually drew this comic about 6 months ago, but alas, I'm slow. This is how Kirill and I decided to propose to each other at the same time.

I would like to point out that the conversation leading up to this point was a discussion about how we should get married (and not me demanding a proposal). Kirill wanted there to be an official proposal because saying we had a discussion and decided to get married doesn't make for a very good story.

Superhero

It's been a while since I've posted any comics. My computer died, we moved to Durham in July and I have yet to set up my office with scanner and such, so I just haven't been on top of digitizing. Here's a comic I worked on for an exercise for the now defunct drawing group. We had to pull 2 genres out of a hat and draw a comic that mixed the two. I got "Superhero" and "Real Life".

The editing is a little inconsistent because I still haven't set up my new computer with Gimp so this is all done on Picnik, but I figured if I wait for that I may never post again. 

 

Oops.

and 3 months later I still can't touch my toes. 

Majka wants to eat a squirrel.

and maybe someday she will get to try one that isn't already flattened on the road.

This is why I'm shy around people I don't know very well...

because when I talk things like this come out of my mouth.

Gogol Bordello

Kirill and I have an unexpected secret obsession with Gogol Bordello. Well, I do, and Kirill plays along, but we have on occasion found ourselves on long walks playing Gogol Bordello 20 questions. 

This one's an annoying grumblefest. Sorry.

I try not to have my fun-a-day comics be grumblefests, but somedays I can't avoid it. This was one of them.

Pleather Elvis

Haircut!

and months later my hair still looks more or less like, this so it's still relevant, or something. 

Lost in translation.

Sometimes Majka's love and excitement for Lyra gets lost in translation and just leaves Lyra terrified. 

The woes of chronic migraines.

I've suffered from chronic migraines for 10 or so years. I used to get migraines multiple times a week and now, thanks to lots and lots of dietary restrictions and regular acupuncture, it's only a few times a month. But occasionally I get hit exceptionally hard with a crazy headache, and this was probably the worst I've had in years, if not ever. 

How Yann Tiersen broke my heart.

All I'm saying is, you don't go see Yann Tiersen to hear post-punk art rock. I'm not saying an artist can't change their sound, but if you do, change it to something interesting. If you've never heard him, (and if you've ever seen Amelie, you have) give a listen. This is currently one of my favorite songs. 

Elder willing to listen.

The fun thing about being a slacker and posting these comics months after they occur, is that I get to remember all this fun stuff I forgot. Like this dude. Not an entirely uncommon site at the coop. However, what I found noteworthy about him was that he wasn't especially "elder", late 50's maybe, but I suppose it's relative to who he ends up talking to.  When someone finally sat down with him he did a lot of talking and not much listening - but I appreciate the sentiment. 

An ill-fated attempt at racquetball

Me and ball sports do not mix. My first (and likely last) attempt at racquet ball. 

Zombies Vs. Unicorns = meh.

We read Zombies vs. Unicorns, a collection of Zombie/Unicorn themed short stories, for February's teen fiction bookclub. Despite being a big fan of many of the authors included in this compilation, I did not like it. All of the authors generally write novels, not short stories, so most of the stories either felt like the first chapter of a book (not a complete story), or everything got really rushed to finish up at the end. I don't recommend it. 

Kids Comics Club

This was from a kids mini-comics workshop I was doing at the library to promote the Comics Fest, one mister Patrick Holt and I organized for our library. The above link is to a blog post Lunch Lady author, Jarrett Krosoczka wrote about the event. He was particularly excited about the young artists displaying and signing their mini-comics. Two of the kids in this comic (the girl talking about the flea, and the kid with the machine gun arm) are featured in Jarrett's post.

Bow and Arrow

 

What we really look like

I know you must think that myself and everyone around me are walking skeletons with massive heads and gaping eye holes but - I'm about to blow your minds - that's not actually what we look like. This is what Kirill and I really look like:

a lumberjack and a ghost.

Exploring Durham

So we didn't get to find a neat abandoned cemetery, but we did get to see parts of Durham that we probably never would have found otherwise. This is also Majka's first full bodied appearance in a comic. The real Majka is even cuter than her snowy white comic self.

This is why I shouldn't be the top of the pyramid

This was from Katie's scavenger hunt/birthday party. Apparently when you get a bunch of circus enthusiasts together acrobatics ensue - unfortunately I can't do the acrobatics so well.

Koshka Lyra

I have no commentary for this one...

If you want to see more Lyra/water themed comics you might appreciate this.

Kinch and Marina Come to Visit

This is Majka's first appearance in one of my comics. I'll admit that I put the blanket on her because I still hadn't gotten the hang of drawing the lower half of a dog and so I cheated. That's how you know I'm a good artist.

High Angel Low Angel

The hardest part of my aerial education has been getting over my fear of heights. Strength hasn't been much of a problem, not that I don't need to get stronger, but it's easy to build muscle. If there's a move I'm working on but not strong enough, I just keep working and exercising until it happens. My fear of heights surprisingly didn't bother me that much when I began to learn the silks a year ago. It wasn't until I started learning drops that my pesky survival instincts - you know, the ones that tell you it's a bad idea to willingly let yourself plummet head first toward the ground from 15 ft - started to be an issue. It sometimes takes me weeks of going up into the drop and just sitting there and slowly backing myself down before I can let go. Once I finally do it, I have no trouble doing it again - it's just that first time. No matter how much I want to, and know I can - my body will not listen to my mind and allow my hands to loosen.

In any case, I've been working on the High Angel/Low Angel drop (aka crucifix drop) for about 2 months. Going up into the balance at the top every time I'm in the studio, but unable to let go. I finally let myself plummet head first to the ground and trust that the silks would catch me. In honor of this moment, I drew this comic.


This is a video of me doing an admitedly sloppy High Angel/Low Angel during a workout session. 

Fun-A-Day Comics

So I'm finally getting motivated and editing my Fun-A-Day comics. This year I decided to do one panel comics in hopes that it would take less time and I'd be more likely to complete all 28 days. Alas, it did take less time - 1 hour a night to last years 2 or 3 was definitely an improvement. However, I still didn't make it all 28 days. For most of the month I'd leave the house at 8am and return home around 9pm and there were too many nights I didn't have the energy to dedicate an hour.

I'm not good at picking reasonable daily projects. Bad Fun-A-Day organizer! I definitely don't set a good example.

In any case, drawing one panel comics was pretty interesting. It ended up being way more different from multi-panel comics than I had expected. In general, when doing diary comics I pick an interesting interaction from the day, but that doesn't work so well for 1 panel. Conversations happen over multiple moments - but I'm only capturing one. So I don't necessarily end up picking a moment that sums up the day as much as picking a single moment that can be a complete story on its own.

It was more difficult than I had expected - but a good challenge.

Ivan Ivanovitch

More comics will be coming soon. I've been lazy about scanning lately. But now with Fun-A-Day underway I have an ever growing stock pile of comics waiting to be digitized. So, until then here's one panel from a comic I wrote about 5 years ago entitled "Kirill and Ivan Ivanovitch in the Land of the Former Bolsheviks".
The story is based on the time Kirill and I went to MediaPlay to get him a new discman (oh how things have changed....) there was a wall of discmen and Kirill complained that there were a million choices but they would all break in a week. He then went on to declare "say what you will about the Soviet Union, but at least back then when we'd go to buy something at the store there was only one and it would work".
So in the comic Kirill and Ivan Ivanovitch (who was the cartoon persona of our big orange cat, Bandit but with glasses) go back to Russia to buy a proper discman only to discover that his favorite marketplace from childhood had been replaced with a Walmart - where he ends up buying the discman anyway.

Probably not one of my best comics ever, though there are some pretty good panels. This one, of Ivan Ivanovitch in front of St. Basil's Cathedral, is my particular favorite.

Tree

This is a comic I've been working on in the Chapel Hill Drawing Group. A better edited version of it should be in our upcoming mini-comic. I'm hoping to make this the first in a series of comics following this soldier as he builds the world.

Russian Lessons

Lately I've been practicing Russian, drawing cats and inking with brushes - this is where they all come together. I've had this plan for a while to put together a Russian Tutorial mini-comic. It will be something along the lines of a Children's Picture Dictionary, though more specific to things relevant to my life - like the parts of a cat, for example.

This is a photo of the real Koshka Lyra - much stripier than her snowy white comic counterpart. But her eyes are just as giant.