LIFE

GRRRR

2008-08-28T03:32:41Z

So...it would seem that my computer is sick.

And by "sick" I mean it has a virus. Or something similar. Not the kind of virus (from what I can tell and what I've been reading) that spreads itself, but the kind that makes using your computer a living hell, and no one on the internet really tells you how to get rid of it. Instead, they each give different theories, which apparently work for everyone except for yourself.

It started out by changing my background to a fake windows window about how I was infected with spyware. Then my computer started going through a cycle of erroring and rebooting. This turned out to just be a screensaver, thankfully. It made my background and screensaver tabs disappear in the control panel of Windows, and it blocks out numerous websites, especially any that contain information about spyware and viruses. It also makes a number of websites look really weird...pretty much it's messing with the CSS of the page.

So anyways, I took care of the screensaver and background issue, but nothing I do will fix the web problem, and I've run every spyware and virus software I can find out about. I think I'm just going to have to save the files I need (programs, drawings and music) and reformat the hard drive. *sigh* It just gives me more reason to build myself a computer, which I've resolved to do. It's just that I'll need to save up the money.

So..yeah. I haven't gotten any drawing done lately thanks to this stupid virus. Should have some drawings up next week. Boo.

Cause I wanna be cool

2008-08-15T19:51:26Z

http://www.faceyourmanga.com

It feels weird to use a comic character generator, being that I'm a cartoonist. Ah, but it's fun!

As for real updateness, look forward to the future. In the next couple days I should have some random sketches, and at least one page of the comic I've been working on. Yay!

I know! I gotta believe!

2008-08-01T19:34:05Z

Well everyone, I have to say something -

I've been feeling so much better since I've gotten out of White River Junction. Life has meaning again!

As far as moving to Chicago...might have to go on hold - unless of course another job calls me up and offers me 20 hours a week or so. We'll see.

As for other things, I did a comic for the Kate Beaton thing of talking to your younger self a while ago, and just now inked it. Hopefully y'all can read it. Lemme know if you can't.

Also, I just got a new pair of glasses over the interwebz. I think they look pretty good

However, I'm getting closer to looking like this guy...if I lose about 100 pounds and let my goatee grow out.

In other news, I'm working on a 16 page comic that I have to have finished in 18 days. Also, I've started playing online RPG's again, and I'm already back to obsessed. I knew I shouldn't have started, but maybe I'll keep it in check.

Game Over

2008-07-24T17:51:50Z

Hey! I've got stuff!

Since I keep forgetting, here's the final page for the 1 UP series. Whee

1UP pg 1
1UP pg 2
1UP pg 3
1UP pg 4

It's a little anti-climactic, but it's done! Whee

I also tried my hand at writing a song. It came out ok - it's a pretty rough recording, because I can't play any instruments - at least not yet, so I did my best with what I have. Hope y'all enjoy it.

A song!

Freedom

2008-07-03T17:18:20Z

I'm out of White River Junction. And I have to say - it's been nice. Really nice. The only thing bad about being back home is the lack of a car, but I don't need to waste money on gas anyways.

But anyways - long time no update, so here's some stuff!

First off, I was randomly going through stuff on my computer and found some sound recordings I had made while playing Lucy's copy of Electroplankton, which is a game for the DS where you make music and stuff like that. It's a ton of fun!

Anyways, I was using the part of the game where they lay a beat down for you and then you can tap stuff to make music and what-not, so, it's pretty much just me messing around with that.

Behold the Electroplankton music!

Secondly - you may or may not remember when I started a comic about my experiences with videogames throughout my life. 1-UP. Well, I've got the next page finally! But, if you need to catch up, here's the links to the other pages.
1-UP pg 1
1-UP pg 2
1-UP pg 3

Last, here's some random sketches.

This is stuff doodled while hanging out with my friend Tiffany.

And these are me trying to figure out a character for a comic

Lucy and the Doctor

2008-06-21T20:56:42Z

Hey all,

So, Lucy told me that as payment for taking me back and forth from the airport that I should draw her a comic. So here it is - I tried to do it in similar style to that way she does her comics about this kind of stuff. whee!

Mind Reader!

2008-06-20T21:23:43Z

Lucy's Comic!

New Duet!

2008-06-15T02:48:58Z

A fabulous song written by Lucy Knisley, performed by Lucy Knisley, and yours truly, Mark Thisse about Valentina, the first woman cosmonaut. Enjoy, by clicking on this beautiful link

Whoo! New song!!

So, Lucy and I need a band name. Any ideas?

Old Cars - and now a comic!

2008-06-11T01:46:46Z

Hey everyone,

First off - MoCCA was awesome! I'll be posting some more about it later, along with (hopefully) a short little 1 page comic thingy. whee!

First off, though, I recently listened to the song "Old Cars" by Lucy and it really touched me a lot. It's a really beautiful song about the passage of time, age, and love...it really gets me every time I listen to it.

Anyways, I keep singing it to myself, and doing harmony while I'm listening, so I decided to record myself doing said harmony along with the song. Hopefully she doesn't mind, and hopefully it sounds ok. I really really love this song, and it really really makes me emotional about family and friends and stuff...it's fantastic.

Old Cars Duet by Lucy Knisley and Mark Thisse!

So, my roommate got Wii Fit recently. Here's how that went down...

As for MoCCA - it was a ton of fun! I was so wore out after both days. And NY was so hot. SO HOT. It was my first time both to MoCCA and to New York city, so it was pretty interesting! I think I'd like to visit it again when I
a) don't have a comic convention
b) don't have to deal with ninety-some degree weather

lucylou was kind enough to let me have some space at her table, which was a lot of fun. We kept pretty busy!

I got to meet up with some LJ people, and that was cool! piratecore and joshpm stopped by a few times, and they were absolutely rad.

I also got to talk to Lynda Barry some. I missed her! So I gave her my comic and got a big hug...she's so great! It was really cool to see people that I'd met through friends or at the shcool and to be able to chit-chat with them!

Let me see if I can remember all the comics I got (I took a picture, but it came out terribly. I didn't get that many, so I should be able to get this)

LifeMeter - Videogame anthology
An Army of Lovers Will Be Beaten - Bernie McGovern
Phase 7 #11 - Alex Lonstreth
Sweet buttons and minis and stuff from piratecore
HxC Dan, buttons and CD from joshpm
Chiggers Bandanna from Hope Larson

Umm...I know there's more...but it's 3:12 am, and I still haven't really recovered from MoCCA. Maybe more list later? Yeah. I'm gonna go to sleep now...

Oh wait. Sketches and stuff that I found.

Jet from Cowboy Bebop

Lucy drew this of me. Just because I have a bunch of Highschool Musical mechanical pencils doesn't mean anything.
...neither do the posters or the CD's.

A character I had to design for one of our last class projects. He was a rebel leader in an old west type story.

Peace!

Just in Case

2008-06-05T15:15:31Z

In case anyones interested, here's the schedule for the next few days.

Today (Thurs) - finish greyscaling/lettering the main comic. Take it to Kinko's by 5 pm
- Finish website by 9ish
- If I have time, finish 1-UP 9-ish to when?

Fri - pick up main comic from Kinko's around 9 or 10
- Collate, cut and staple said comic
- Leave for MoCCA at 2pm
- Go see Lynda Barry at 8:15

Sat - MoCCA!

See you all there!

MoCCA is coming soon!

2008-05-29T04:27:57Z

I was having trouble getting myself to work on the stuff I needed to work on, so I just started drawing random stuff. It actually really helped me to get in the mood to draw what I needed.

What's going to happen? Why is Noe Aenglisch Mann there? Will I ever actually finish this comic? Who knows!

I was also reading some futuristic comics and listening to a lot of techno over the last couple days, so I felt like drawing something more futuristic.

Lucy, Jon, Jeff and myself. Yay for futuristic hyper teams!

Have you been to the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull?

2008-05-26T03:22:15Z

Indy has been to the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Indy went there, and Steven and George made it dumb. Good job guys.

Got a better scan of the drawing. Whee.

The Nutty Professor

2008-05-17T21:36:57Z

Nutty Prof. is such a good movie! And NO, I don't mean the terrible Eddie Murphy remake - I mean the one with Jerry Lewis.

So here's a simple drawing I did of his two personas from the movie. Dr. Kelp and Buddy Love. I'm gonna color them later - right now I'm too tired and hungry.

yeah...it's like a playing card. So?

Time to have some PHUN

2008-05-15T03:01:24Z

Guys. This looks like a lot of fun! I'm pretty sure I'm going to be wasting way too much time with it.

THE VIDEO

THE PROGRAM

Can anyone say "Amazing time waster?" I can!

Flurry

2008-05-14T03:30:52Z

A flurry of stuff is coming your way!

And by a "flurry," I mean two comics.

First off is the true story of working at the deli...

And then we've got another page of the 1-UP story. If you haven't read the rest...

1-UP pg 1
1-UP pg 2

and without further ado

Hopefully those are legible...since I was having trouble with Photobucket resizing my images, I'm trying out Flickr. We'll see what happens. Anyone know any other good places to host my images that won't resize them?

Infestation

2008-05-12T00:03:08Z

of Zombies.

I'm fairly sure that White River Junction is going to be overrun by zombies tonight, and I have many things to confirm my theory.

1. Over the past week or so, around 11 pm there has been a pervading sent of decaying flesh for the rest of the evening.
2. Around 12 or 1 a thick fog has rolled in on each of those nights.
3. Today at work I was unable to stop thinking about zombies.
4. Many people who came into work exhibited classic signs of the beginning of zombieism. Slow response time, if any response to stimuli at all. Slow movement/dragging of feet. General unattentive and unpleasant demeanors.
5. I was listening to the Sufjan Stevens album, Illinois, as I was showering, and had it on random. The moment I opened the sliding door of my shower, the song switched to Sufjan's only song about zombies. When that song ended, it played a song about mothers. (and it's Mother's Day.)

That all combined with the fact that WRJ is the very essence of every horror movie town ever...

KAPOW!

2008-05-09T21:21:28Z

Whether you asked for it or not....

BATMAN

For more Batman goodness...
Lucy's Batman comic!

Boxes of Light

2008-05-09T17:46:49Z

So, the other day Lucy and I decided to make some portable lightboxes. And boy, did we ever...

It's a pretty simple design. We used wooden office paper-holder things for the box and some semi-thick plastic for the top.

The lights are those dome touch lights and they're held in with velcro for easy access to replace batteries.

Would you believe that you can't find shadow boxes anywhere around White River Junction? Come to think of it...I guess I'm not that surprised...

Thanks to Rosemary for the inspiration and to Lucy for the help with the putting together thereof!

I've also got a batman comic I'm going to post, but I have to color it. I started to, but I was messing it up a bunch, so I'm gonna draw some other stuff then color it. Maybe have it done by tonight? Yeah...tonight.

Piez.

2008-05-05T16:59:07Z

I'm busy busy with comic stuff. whee!

Sketches

2008-05-04T17:58:07Z

Here's a life study I did of some White River Junction locals.

And also, here's something we had to do for class a few weeks ago. Doing portraits from pictures. whee.

Also - good news - I've finished scanning my final project for class. Now to see if I have time to grayscale and place everything.

Sleeeepy

2008-05-01T05:35:07Z

Hey all.

And also - because it really was one of his finer moments....here's Dave.

...It's an inside joke that...maybe 3 people will get.

sleep.

VTS again

2008-04-19T16:38:08Z

Hey all. It's a lovely day. But as with every lovely day here....it's still Vermont Spring.

But in other news. Got a bunch of pages of my comic scanned, and I'm gonna be working on finishing the rest of the inks and pencils within the next few days. Almost done with school!

Beside that, I started a small comic about something I've always loved and how it's changed for me throughout the years. I thought I'd let myself freely explore the idea, so right now it's only one page (and by page, I mean it's only four panels) but I'll be doing more pages as the thoughts come, and let it resolve itself with no real page limit or quota in sight.

I've also decided that I hate drawing myself as a child.

Also - once I've got some time I have a pseudo-children's book in mind. About adventures of a young boy. More to come on that.

STOP READING LIVEJOURNALS AND GO OUTSIDE AND ENJOY THE DAY!!!

Vermontian Spring

2008-04-14T03:49:53Z

So I've got a stupid head cold...and I'm blaming the fluctuation in weather. And so without further ado...

Also, I've realized as I inked the second comic that it could very easily be turned into a Garfield comic. Simply rewrite the first dialogue balloon, change me into Garfield and have the last balloon say "I hate Mondays." Fun for the whole family!

Also - just found out that my friend waldflieger may have to stay at his job, not only for another 8 hour shift, but it would mean that he'll have to work from 3pm to 7am straight. That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard of. [EDIT] He got his manager to come in. Good thing!

And just so he's not mad anymore - here's my good friend jpekin. You should go tell him what a good friend I am for linking to him.

And then I'd link to lucylou, but everyone who watches me already watches her livejournal...or at least I think so...

Cheerio!

Experiments

2008-04-13T03:18:28Z

Hey all.

So...think I can keep semi regular updates? Well, we'll see. Once or twice a week with a short comic? I think I can do it. It's experiment #1 when it comes to comics. Don't know if I'll be too burned out soon. Anyways

Today

2008-04-12T15:58:09Z

...is a day for grilled cheese sandwiches and drawing.

and watching cartoons.

and if I feel better - a bike ride.