New Last Martian story begins!

As promised, the newest chapter in the Last Martian saga begins today. This time... the Rover fights back. This one will be nine pages long. A new page will be put up every Tuesday.

Check it out, Earthling!

Sketchiness

Hola! This sketch is another one for the CCN Sketch Challenge. It was fun to do some pencil rendering. I colorized it a bit in Photoshop after I used a woodless graphite pencil to draw it. That's right... woodless. I'm hardcore.

I'm working to get some more real content up for your eyeballs. By "content" I mean "stories." But first you'll have to make due with some more sketches. On the Rook City page I've posted just about all the sketches for that series that I have... some old, some new. I'll be putting some more up as I gear up to continue the "Convention Blues" story.

While you're waiting for that you'll be able to enjoy a brand new Last Martian story! This will be his longest tale by far and I'll post the first page on April 17. That's right... I'm giving you a date. Hold me to it.

Sketches for your eyeballs

Yeesh... been awhile since a post here. Sorry about that. Here are some things I've been doing for the CCN Sketch Challenge. Been trying to get better at drawin' on the ol' computer. These first two are characters from Hellboy.



These last few were from one where the challenge was to redesign some of Spider-Man's classic villains. I guess I'm attracted to the ones with animal names. These were done pretty quickly.




I've been working hard on an 8-page comic story. Unfortunately, I can't show it to you yet, as it may be included in an upcoming anthology. Possibly.

Thanks for looking!

Sketches galore

A new lyric is up. Check it out.

Here are some recent and not-so-recent sketches. As always, click for a larger view.

Another moody lyric

This new one is by a band whose lead singer actually hails from Montana. So you know he's cool. I might only do one more of these. They're taking longer than I thought they would, and there's other stuff I want to get done. But don't worry, we'll still have new stuff for you to look at every week... probably a new short comic.

We have a lot of cool stuff in the works here. I will let you know more as it develops.

Thanks for checking out our stuff!

Gollum and lyrics

Another lyric is up! This one is in the form of a comic. See if you can figure it out.

The CCN (Kansas City comic creators) message board is doing its sketch challenge again. The first one involved the Lord of the Rings. Here's a Gollum sketch I did for it. Look grumpy, huh?

Rook City Remastered

There's a new illustrated lyric picture up. But it's already been correctly guessed. I really enjoyed this one, as it's from my favorite U2 song. And U2's pretty much my favorite band.

In bigger news... I am finally done with getting Rook City #1 ready to print! I should be sending it to the printer the next couple of days. Once I get the proof copy back and all that jazz, you should be able to order a copy right here. So stay tuned.

In the process of getting all these Rook City stories together, I went ahead and "remastered" the very first tale, "Bullets and Bedpans." That story was originally drawn before I knew anything about Photoshop, so the lettering and gray tones looked completely different from the other Rook City stories. To make everything flow together better, I relettered those pages and added new gray tones. I even touched up my old drawings in a couple spots. I also updated the webcomic version of these pages. You can see the results below. The changes might not seem that big, but I think it will really help with the overall quality of the book. What do YOU think?

A new lyric

Only a bit late... there's a new illustrated lyric up. There may even be a clue to this one in the picture.

Christmas break has just begun. I'm hoping to get lots of artwork done, yadda yadda... we'll see. It's crazy how time seems to slip away on these breaks. I never feel like I use them as well as I could.

Belated

Well, I didn't post this last week when it went up, but there was a new Illustrated Lyric. Andy Jewett (another Indie Spinner Rack guy) correctly guessed "I am Trying to Break Your Heart" by Wilco. One of my favorite bands.

The next installment will be a week late. The last week of the semester is always crazy at school, so my time for artwork is very limited. But there will be a new one up next Tuesday.

Also, for those of you interested in the progress of our adoption... we've started a blog all about our daughter Grace. We'll be updating everyone there with pictures and news.

Great happenings!

The fourth lyric in our ongoing contest is up! Check it out, and e-mail us your guess to win original art and other cool stuff!

On a personal note... this Thanksgiving break was particularly awesome for my wife and I. We have been in the process of trying to adopt a child from Taiwan since June. Well, on Thanksgiving day we received the great news that they have a little girl for us! Her name is Grace Savannah, and she was born about two weeks ago. We won't be able to go get her for a few months, but it's awesome just knowing that we have her! I'll keep you updated as more develops.

Anudda one

Alright... last week's winner was Michael Muranaka, who correctly guessed "Brothers on a Hotel Bed" by Death Cab for Cutie. Man, people have been sending in their entries less than an hour after I post the new artwork. So, if you want to guess this week's lyric... better do it quick!

I'm looking forward to the upcoming five day weekend. Going to try to get lots of comics done. And much football shall be watched.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Another chance to win

Well, quite a few of you sent in entries for last week's contest. Everyone guessed correctly that it was Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here", but Ry Spanos (a fellow Indie Spinner Rack listener)was the first. So he won the original art and a free copy of Random Ink #1.

Here's your chance to try again... another illustrated lyric is up and ready to be guessed. This one's a bit more obscure, but not very old. Have at it!

A CONTEST!

While Rook City is on hiatus for the next couple of months, we will be running a weekly contest here at Three Trees. Anyone who knows me would tell you that I'm obsessed with music. Well, every Tuesday I will be putting up an illustration of mine that is inspired by a certain song and features lyrics from that song. The first person to correctly guess the artist and song title for that lyric (in an e-mail to us) will win the original art for that illustration and a free copy of Random Ink #1! Cool, huh?

The first illustration is already up. Some of the lyrics I choose will be somewhat obscure, but this one shouldn't be too hard... give it a shot!

Slight pause whilst I adjust my accoutrements

Some of you will recognize the character in the last panel. It was fun to draw him again.

The Big News: This will be the last Rook City page for a couple of months. The series is going on hiatus until January, which will allow me to finish up a few comics projects. These projects include getting Rook City #1 ready to print, submitting Evil Ain't Easy to some weekly newspapers, and submitting a story for new anthology that I would love to be in. I've been struggling with trying to finish these things and keep Rook City on time, and it just wasn't working. Stopping for a while will not only let me get these things out of the way, but also make sure that Rook City is always on time when it returns.

HOWEVER... even though Rook City will not be updated for the next couple of months, we will still have new content up on our site every week, including our first ever contest! It's sort of a "first come, first served" thing, so make sure you check back here next Tuesday for more details.

Thanks for reading!

The plot thickens

Page numero ocho is up for the current Rook City story. I hopes ya likes it.

Should have a big announcement next week...