A short hiatus...

Wednesday morning we take off for beautiful Montana! Yesssss. For those of you that don't know... Elton, Dusty, and I all grew up in the mountains of northwest Montana. I'm heading up with my wife and my older sister's family. I didn't get to go up there last year, and it about killed me.

The only downside is that this means there will be slight pause in the Rook City updates for a couple of weeks. The next page will be posted Tuesday, July 18 (or possibly sooner). In the meantime, you can check out these new Rook City sketches for some behind-the-scenes info on the series. Thanks for your patience!

Also... I went ahead and posted the next Evil Ain't Easy strip. I've got one more in the bag, and I'll put that up next week sometime, barring technical difficulties.

When next I post, it will be from my mountain homeland!

Forums are swell

It has finally happened... Three Trees Studios now has its own FORUM! This is the place to go to discuss anything and everything about our webcomics, books, or whatever. We'll even be posting some exclusive content over there. So check it out... you can interact with us and other readers!

OTHER GREAT COMIC FORUMS...

-Flight Forum: This was setup by Kazu Kibuishi, who puts together the excellent Flight anthologies. Just a great community of talented and supportive artists there.

-ChristianComics.net Forum: One of the best networking places for Christian comics artists... members run the gamut from "just starting" to professional creators.

-Parable Forum: This forum was started for creators working on the new Christian anthology Parable, but it is also just a great place to interact with some extremely talented artists.

-The Drawing Board: A huge board with tons of designers, comic artists, and other creators. There is almost too much great stuff to take in at this board!

-Kansas City Comix Scene Board: The place for comic people from KC (and surrounding area... I guess we count).

All of these forums are full of amazing artwork. Dusty and I use these as artistic inspiration... just looking at what others are doing for a little while gets you really pumped about drawing.

New Rook City Story

The new Rook City story started yesterday. It's called "Road Block" and it features the return of the Vlad Squad! This one was written by Elton and me. Elton originally came up with the Vlad Squad idea, and then we developed it together. Same thing with this story. "Transformations" introduced these characters, but we're trying to show you a lot more about them in this tale. This will be a four-parter probably, and then we'll start our first major Rook City story arc (by major I mean over 20 pages).

Here's a Vlad Squad pin-up some of you might not have seen:


And don't forget... a new Evil Ain't Easy strip will be up tomorrow!

S.P.A.C.E.d Out: Part 3!

Here's even more of the great loot I acquired while at S.P.A.C.E. It's taken me this long to get a chance to read some of these.

Zig Zag by J. Chris Campbell- This guy is just way too creative. Zig Zag is a one-man anthology full of quirky stories of hypochondriac robots, killer store owners, and of course... Attic Bugs. This book is a blast to read! So many styles all done so well.

Owly by Andy Runton- What a great book for anyone to read... kids to adult! The wordless adventures of a loveable owl and his friends. I really love Andy's work with a brush pen- just a really clean, fun style to look at. There's a reason this book is really taking off.

Superior Showcase by Bertozzi, Dawson, and Trippe- A great little anthology of superhero tales by some indie creators. I especially enjoyed Nick Bertozzi's convenience store heroes and Dean Trippe's tale about the sidekick Butterfly (a great webcomic, by the way).

Turtletown by Steve Hamaker- Steve is the incredible artist who has worked on Flight, Bone, and his own series, Fish N Chips. This is a cool book about obedience he illustrated for a pastor. Very well done! He showed us some pages from his story in Flight 3 (coming out June 27) and they looked so great. Cannot wait to get that book!

Fanci-full Friends by Gustav Chompe- A print collection of a highly quirky webcomic. Very original and eccentric stuff... and I really dig it.

Happy Town by Justin Madson- Justin had several collections of his series there, and I only purchased the first of them. I'm really impressed with his very unique style and the size of this series. It includes everything from superheroics to fantasy to sci-fi to slice-of-life... all in one cohesive tale. Ambitious and engaging.

Creature Tech by Doug TenNapel- I picked this up at the Top Shelf table. This is just a crazy fun book about scientists, space eels, ghosts, and surprisingly... faith. This is probably my favorite thing I got at the con. I've got to track down more of Doug's stuff!

The Amazing Cynicalman by Matt Feazell- Dubbed the "King of Mini-comics" by the Indie Spinner Rack guys, Matt has obviously been doing this a long time and has got it down. At his table, if you did a quick sketch of Cynicalman (basically a stick figure), you got a free webcomic. I traded our book for the collected Cynicalman... a very good swap. Lots of simple and yet witty humor!

Probably the most inspiring thing at this show was the chance to see so much great, creative stuff being produced by so many cool people. It really got us excited to work even harder on our stuff. This was Nathan's first con, and he was especially jazzed about it all.

Whew... that's it for our S.P.A.C.E. report. Can't wait to go again!

S.P.A.C.E.d Out: Part 2!

When we went to the S.P.A.C.E. convention back in May, we traded comics with a bunch of the cool creators from the Kansas City area. These are people we have been corresponding and collaborating with over the last year. KC has a pretty noticeable comics scene... a lot of very talented folks just doing this for the love of it and not afraid to offer encouragement to others doing the same thing. I know they have definitely spurred on my creativity. Check out their site for more info!

Anyway, here's some of the groovy books we got:

- Matt Hawkins: Cowboy Clyde & the Pirates (a hilarious strip that ran in the KC Star a few months ago) and Melvin & Frank Comics #1. Matt has a really well-developed and fun cartoony style that compliments his off-beat humor.

- Rob Schamberger: Rob Schamberger Makes Comix. Rob is one productive guy, and this collects some of his recent stuff, including stories, sketches, and the his "Empty House" series that also ran in the KC Star.

- Duane Cunningham: Band on the Sun. Written with Rob, this is a high-energy tale about a band and their adventures in the last days before Earth is wiped out by an asteroid.

- Shaun Gray: Odd Jobs. This is a fun idea- a strip about gamers but from the perspective of the other characters in the game. Shaun draws it in a clean, simple style that really fits.

- Michelle Arcand: Being Different. This is a pretty dark and yet somehow meaningful tale about kids and how things really work.

-Kyle Strahm: Girl Friday and March of 10,000 Undead Gabors. Kyle's stark black & white artwork is so fun to look at and these stories are a hoot! Gotta love Scottish warriors taking on the undead!

Anyway, you all should check out the sites of these fine creators. Hopefully, they enjoyed Random Ink as much as we enjoyed their books.

Updates

Just another reminder that there are new Evil Ain't Easy and Rook City pages up. Check 'em out and leave a comment... I dare ya.

We've just started work on a jam comic that all four of us are working on. We're all pretty jazzed about this. Each artist is doing a page and then passing it on to the next guy. Should be pretty crazy and fun. We'll be posting more about it here eventually.

New things

The second Evil Ain't Easy strip was posted online today. Check it out... and let us know what you think!
We have our first Three Trees Studios swag now available for purchase! That's right... you, too, can be on the cutting edge of fashion with this stylin' t-shirt. It features artwork from Dusty, Nathan, and I on the back and our logo on the front. Check out our store at CafePress for ordering details!