January 11, 2012
I actually spent a good amount of time thinking about whether I should have Greg deliver the cop’s second message to Ted. The thought of confusing the readers by having a full on kiss between the two was tempting. But then I thought about it a little more. Decided it was a little too risque, so I went with the safe route.
The double perm was a no brainer for me. As soon as Greg got the electro-perm, I knew I had to include Ted in on the fun as well. So both of them got perms. I think that’s all the analysis I have for today’s strip.
Anonymous asked: What is the stupidest question someone ever made on your "ask me anything" button?
Hmmm … there’s only been one question asked by a person unless you count tumblrbot’s question. But your question isn’t stupid. I’ll let you know when I get more questions.
January 9, 2012
First actual blog for a strip outside of the website. Well, I uploaded the artwork for today’s strip. Yea, that’s pretty much what I drew with pencil and pen before scanning it and letting photoshop do it’s magic. I actually tried to post the unedited work onto the facebook fanpage, but I dropped the idea. Mixture of me being lazy about it and not wanting to clutter up people’s walls with random crappy looking artwork. Well, at least I have this blog to clutter up with my unedited stuff.
Well, Mei’s going to be Greg’s across the hall neighbor. I think I plan on having the apartments in the building arranged like so: odd numbered apartments on one side, even numbered on the other. Probably has more potential for ideas for strips that way. But yea, I really wanted to get Mei into the strip earlier, I just kept on getting side tracked by other strip ideas. I felt like the strip needed more of a female presence. One who is less trashy than most of the random females that had been hooking up with Ted. Hopefully I haven’t given away too much at this point, but I’m looking to Mei to fill that void. Not sure how she will be received, but well, we’ll see in time. That’s it for now, see ya all next update.
January 8, 2012
Hey guys and gals, thanks for making the jump from my site to this blog. Rather than copying and pasting all that other stuff you all just finished reading, I thought I’d write about something strip related.
I guess I got a little overboard with dragging Greg through the mud as some of you noted (thanks for reigning me back in by the way), so I drew Greg getting his revenge on me in comic form. I sketched that watching the Saints v. Lions (American football) game to be honest, so the lack of concentration might be more than a little evident there.
But yea, at least Mei finally makes a significant contribution in the strip. She was actually one of the first six characters I created (guess which number she came in). But I didn’t get the chance to introduce her properly until this story arc. Whether she will play a big role in the strip? Perhaps. Being first six doesn’t really mean much considering Ben came in fifth. But we’ll see. Well, it’s about 12:30 pm and I should be getting ready for bed. I’ll see you all Monday with my next blog.
Click here to reach the Greg site.
December 18, 2011
Theme of today’s sketch, progression. I was digging through my pre-website work and came across a strip that I ended up remaking six months later. I think it does a good job of illustrating my progression within a seven month period. In terms of both artwork and storytelling. Here’s the finished remake that I published on the site : http://gregcomic.com/2011/11/11/storyline-teds-place-part-6-2/.
I used to draw out each panel on paper, then draw the characters within the panels, before scanning them for photoshop. Now, I draw each character independently, scan them, then move them around pre-made panel templates in photoshop. This new method (new in comparison to how I first started) of doing it provides me with a lot more flexibility. Say I decide to alter the script a little so that one of the character’s pose doesn’t match, rather than scrap the entire drawing or tediously editing the entire picture, I can just work on the offending character. It is a little more time consuming since I color each character individually, but I feel the most at ease doing it this way. You might also notice that I try to save time by using the same pose, but editing the face or changing the pose of particular limbs rather than the whole on my characters. I like to joke about it and say I’m being lazy when I do that, but it’s more a byproduct of necessity than laziness. I think if I didn’t try to cut corners on certain aspects of the strip, I would not be able to meet my update schedule. Sad, but true. Although the strip looks incredibly simple, and would take most artists a tenth of the time to finish or less, it still takes me just about forever to finish one.
As for the storytelling, I think I try to one-up the original idea until I can’t anymore. For the old strip, I was pretty happy with the way I wrote it back when I completed it. Pretty much the same concept, Ted bribing his way in by offering a sausage to Tag, then a candy bar to Greg. When I was remaking the strip, I thought the candy bar was pretty weak. What if Ted offered Greg a porno mag. I chewed on the thought a little, then I thought, well, porno mags are kind of obsolete. I haven’t read one since I upgraded from a 56K modem to cable. Side story, I remember me and my friend actually purchasing a porno mag from a newsstand when we were in high school. We felt like big men at the time, but in retrospect … sad, dateless teenagers. But yea, when the thought of it being obsolete entered my head, I made the magazine a 3-D porno mag. The only way to one-up that, is to make the magazine a pop up, which might be taking the joke a little too far. “Pop Up Jugs”. But yea, I kind of picture my thought process as combo-ing in a video game. With the jokes and story arcs. I’ll try to stretch the original idea as far as I can before the story arc starts to feel stale. The story arc would be the combo and each strip would be an individual combo move and I’ll try to keep the combo going as long as I can. (Yea, I can’t help it, I’m a gamer at heart) Sometimes it does end up feeling stale (kind of felt that way to me with the “Moving In” arc and parts of the “Back to Campus” arc.) But I think I’m still relatively new at it, so hopefully I’ll continue to improve at it as I go along.
Well, I guess that’s it, a little insight on how I make the strip. On tap this week, the usual, and me in all likelihood losing in the semi-finals of my fantasy football league because the IR gods claimed another one of my stud running backs (Demarco Murray against the Tampa Bay defense). Cruel indeed.
Click here to reach the Greg site.
December 11, 2011
As promised, here’s the commentary to page four of World of Gregcraft as seen here: http://gregcomic.com/2011/12/08/world-of-gregcraft-page-4/. Not much of a punchline I’ll admit, and probably comparisons between night elves and Na’vis were made as soon as the movie came out. But oh well, I was never known for being on top of things. Heck, I was never known at all before this strip and barely known now. But it’s just an observation I made while watching the movie. The Na’vi are eerily similar to the Night Elves in World of Warcraft. From their appearance, to their beliefs, to that giant tree that got destroyed. Still an entertaining movie though.
Turning to an entirely different topic, I think it’s been a couple of weeks since I launched advertisements on my site. I really procrastinated on that one out of fear that my comic wouldn’t make anything off the ads and people would be able to see my crappy stats by clicking on the bidding area of the banner. Turns out I’m doing a little better than I expected. And thanks to everyone who clicked on my sponsors. The ads are starting to help me combat the cost of promoting my strip which goes a long way. I also started to link the voting page to topwebcomics at the bottom of every comic blog update to try to get a little free publicity. So far I get about one person clicking on my site per day, which is still good. One beats none, and if that one becomes a regular reader, then it’s all worth it. So thanks everyone for helping me out by voting for my strip on that site.
Other than that, I was hoping for a release date announcement for Diablo 3 tonight during the video game awards. I think a semi-recent post on the Blizzard’s Diablo 3 forum had half the people convinced that the announcement was coming today and that it would be released between January 17-24. The hopeful optimist in me was convinced, unfortunately, the hopeful optimist in me got shot down once again. Sigh, the D3 myth continues. I guess the best way to approach the release date is, “it’ll be out when it’s out”. Lastly, an update on my fantasy football team (yea, bragging time until I lose next week). I forgot when I posted my fantasy football team, but that team and some waiver wire pickups got me a bye week as the top seed in my league heading into the playoffs at 9-4. Pretty much the same team I had from the start except I lost Fred Jackson to IR, but managed to pick up Demarco Murray, Laurent Robinson, and Dan Bailey off the waiver wire. Go Cowboys! (ahem… for fantasy purposes) Well, games are tight, and anyone can beat anyone. Wish me luck, I could use the winnings to get me two D3 collector editions and 5 large two topping pizza pies.
Well, on tap this week, another remake of a character introduced awhile back… Thanks for reading everyone, and enjoy the rest of the weekend.
Click here to reach the Greg site.
December 4, 2011
“Greg” is six months old! Technically, four days over six months, but close enough. I want to thank everyone for ignoring my early crappy artwork and my now crappy artwork to still give the strip a chance. And for those who have actively promoted the strip, many thanks as well. I think we’ve come a long way even from the three month mark in which I posted a similar message. Thank you all for continuing to read the strip.
It’s funny how six months might not sound like a long time, but for me, it sure as heck felt like it. I started this strip with lots of uncertainties surrounding this project, and even looking back at my post three months ago, celebrating the three month anniversary of the strip, those uncertainties were still very prevalent. I was pretty much stressing out everyday over the strip, worrying about how I was going to be able to sustain it given the slow readership growth, non-income, and the pressures of family a long with a host of other obligations and responsibilities. I was feeling down on myself, down on the strip, things seemed pretty bleak then. Not much has really changed since then, lol. I still stress out over the strip, the obligations and responsibilities still remain, but readership has grown a decent amount since then and some of you guys and girls have started to comment on the site. It’s given me hope that perhaps my dream of being able to make this my career, is still within reach. And for everyone who has commented and gave me encouragement (you know who you are), thank you. Your comments truly mean a lot to me. I check up on all sorts of stat tallying web sites, I see my readership gradually growing, but none of that puts a smile to my face like your comments (Well, except for the detractors that comment. Those philistines … lousy free speech … the interweb!) Many thanks to my wife as well for believing in me and nurturing the house husband in me. (I’m hoping I will be able to look back at my current role in the household and laugh about it. Oh man am I ever hoping.)
It’s only been six months and I have no clue what’s going to happen from here on out, but I am definitely feeling more confident about the strip and my own abilities. And I have all of you readers, guys and gals, to thank for that.
Well, that’s as sappy as you’ll see me write, being a manly bear of a lumberjacking dude and all … no? didn’t buy that, huh? Average joe-ish bulldog of a carpentering dude? … sigh, fine. Wimpy daffodil of a nurse maiding dude. But yea, being so sappy makes me uncomfortable so I thought I’d ruin the moment by posting up this classy link:
http://www.listaholic.com/138-slang-words-for-breasts.html
Pretty self explanatory. And you can see how it’s related to today’s sketch. Well, enjoy the rest of the weekend everyone, new strip on Monday as usual, along with a new Gregcraft on Thursday.
Click here to reach the Greg site.
November 27, 2011
Some of you might recognize this from the latest story arc, “The Facebook”. It’s Greg dressed in Monkey D. Luffy clothing from the anime, One Piece. Like me, Greg loves One Piece. It’s an anime about pirates with superhuman abilities, adventures, and friendships. It’s a pretty awesome watch and if you have the time, I would recommend that you watch the unedited version. Reason I mention this is because One Piece along with Avatar the Last Airbender were probably my biggest inspirations for working on my own comic. I’ve been wanting to write an action adventure comedy ever since I started watching both series. Think I watched them simultaneously which was pretty brutal when I held down a full time job. Lot’s of missed sleep as I stayed up way beyond my bedtime as I gorged on episode after episode. While I haven’t started on my original adventure comedy yet, I’ve been trying to hone my skills through Gregorius and now Gregcraft. Maybe when I feel confident about my abilities, I will attempt to work on it for my Thursday strips. But yea, originally my idea before “Greg” was to try to write an adventure comedy, but one chapter in, I realized it was a rehash of Avatar the Last Airbender, but a lot worse, with a lot of ideas “borrowed” from One Piece. Something stupid like Chang D. Chimpanzee, a swashbuckling abbot, running from the Lava Nation while trying to find the Two Piece. Yea, I had a brief period of insanity.
After that failed attempt at writing, I thought about what else I liked to watch, and came up with Greg. I always liked to watch the buddy dynamic between Chandler/Joey and Frye/Bender on their respective shows “Friends” and Futurama. So that’s pretty much my inspiration behind Greg and Ted. Added a little of my personality to both of them and they were born. Tag was created because I always wanted a dog but never got one. I live my puppy love vicariously through friends with dogs and now through Greg. How come I never got a dog back then? My parents figured they would do most of the pooper scooping so they vetoed that idea when I was kid (they were right). Why not get a dog now? Well, my wife is deathly afraid of dogs, so it was one of those compromises I had to make. Hmmm… as for the other characters? Lucas is sort of based off one of my college room mates. Shout out to Frantz if he’s reading. As for the rest, I guess they are pretty random.
I guess that’s it. On tap this week, a new storyline arc. More Gregcraft, don’t worry, Greg will eventually make his appearance in the strip or else I would have named it “Tedcraft”. Football has been a lot harder to watch lately, with the Jets scrubbing it, but I shall continue to watch them. Being also a fan of the Mets and Diablo 3′s release date, I’ve become pretty hardened to disappointment. Enjoy the rest of the weekend guys and gals.
Click here to reach the Greg site.
The Sunday Sketch #18
November 20, 2011
I think this might be the earliest that I have published a Sunday Sketch in awhile. Reason being, I’ve been playing around with shadowing for a little bit on Saturday. Working on coming out with a new ad and wanted to add shadowing and lighting effects to make it a little more eye catching. I’m still in the baby steps phase of it, but hopefully I’ll be able to apply it to the strip without embarrassing myself too much eventually. Reason for the new ad is that growth of the site has stagnated somewhat. Not as many people are clicking on my current ads which have been running unchanged for a couple of months on various web comic strips. Greg has been floating between 1770 and 1850 readers according to comicrank.com for the past two weeks. My strip is listed on the second page if anyone is curious to see how well my strip is fairing or if you want to check out more quality web comics. They have a pretty decent list compiled there. I found a web comic that I really enjoy on their list called Two Guys and Guy (http://www.twogag.com/). Guy is actually the name of the girl character. But yea, I’m not getting that many new readers, so hopefully the new ad will work.
The above picture is the progress that I’ve made. Yea, not much, but I’m hoping it’ll get better with time and practice. I’m not sure if I’m going to apply it to the storyline strips, but I definitely would like to try it on the adventure comedies. Other than that, I guess that’s it for Greg news. New story arc this week and World of Gregcraft, perhaps with shadowing. Looking less forward to football this week, as my Jets got Tebowed last Thursday night. But I will watch for the sake of my fantasy team which might be facing the same fate, being perched precariously at 6-4. Lastly, I’ve started listening to diablo 3 podcasts. I think I have totally hit rock bottom in my wait for D3. It started with watching youtube vids of guys frapping their D3 beta runs, and it evolved to listening to dudes discuss the latest beta patch notes. My gut feeling is that we are about three months away from the release. But my gut feelings have always been wrong, so expect a release date in 2014.
Click here to reach the Greg site.
November 13, 2011
Some more love for one of my least developed character. And a wordplay on another music group for today. Well, this past week we saw Ted become Greg’s room mate finally. I’ve been meaning to have them become room mates since the onset of the strip, but I got carried away writing the previous four story arcs.
While this is just a jump from one paragraph to the next for you, I have sat here, staring blankly at my screen for the past thirty minutes. Argh! I think it’s from me working out for the first time in five months yesterday. And by working out I mean using a heavier fork to eat my greasy deep fried pork chops. Well, that and lifting a couple of dumb bells for one rep of ten. My brain must not be used to having blood diverted to parts of my body other than my stomach. And is it still considered a rep if you only do one? I’m not too familiar with work-out lingo being that I rarely do it, but rep stands for “repetition” right? If I only do one “rep” of ten, then I’m not repeating anything, thus there is no repetition. Would it be better if I called it a set? Man, this is like a foreign language now. Anyways, long story short, I have the writer’s block.
Well, rather than butt my head any longer, I’m going to prep for a full day of watching football, which surprisingly helps with writer’s block. At least that’s what I tell my wife … so far she hasn’t bought it. On tap this week, more Ted moving in and the debut of World of Gregcraft, an action comedy following in Gregorius’ foot steps, but with a little more action. In the words of Vash the Humanoid Typhoon, “Love and Peace” everyone. Enjoy the rest of the weekend.