Good and Bad. Mostly Bad.

Oh, hi. Just though I'd do some updates here. Me? how am I? Well, not great. Not bad. Not great.

I've been plagued with some health problems and chronic pain. It looks like I have Trigeminal Neuralgia. I'm seeing doctors for it, so we'll see what's going on. Trigeminal Neuralgia is often described as the worst pains a human being can experience. Just imagine the feeling of being stabbed in the face with sharp electric jolts every second of your life and that's basically how I feel. Trigeminal Neuralgia has earned the name "The Suicide Disease" because so many living with the disorder end up killing themselves.

This explains the pain I live with.

Or here

And here's some happy reading.

Like many with TN, It started off as a "toothache" (around Jan. 2010). I've seen more doctors and dentists than I count on my fingers. First I got a root canal, than another, than drugs , than extraction, I've been going to the Orafacial Pain Clinic, then more drugs, then painkillers, then acupuncture... it goes on and on. Nothing is working. I've had to take on more commissions than I would like to because I am getting destroyed by medical bills. It's been really, really hard lately.

Do I have TN? I don't know, but all signs lead to yes so far. I'm getting an MRI today and I'm praying it gives me some information...all of it positive and good I hope.

Why tell you this? Mainly, to confess that the Funrama #2 comic I've been working on will probably be delayed for a while. I have all 32 pages drawn! Yeah! But I still have to script it, letter it, tone it and do a cover and I've just lost the energy and motivation for it. I haven't had much energy to make any art for the last few months. Also, I might have to take on more commissions. Maybe. Maybe not. I don't really want to, but I don't know. Not looking for pity here, and I definiteIy don't want any extra attention, it's just that I might need some commissions if things get bad. The good? I AM working on some new projects, trying to get them off the ground. Slowly but surely. I've been really slow but I hope to pick up some steam.

Sorry. So um, how are you? Great weather we're having! :)

Trees. Lots of Trees. And Snow. Wheat. Fields Of Wheat. An Immense Amount of Wheat.

Tomorrow is March. March is going to be bad. March is Red Alert Warning Warning DefCon 5 Children Of The Corn: The Final Sacrifice. I'm going to be killed in every direction 100 times this month. I've known for months now that March was going to happen and I had no way of stopping it.

I've very lightly placed myself into a bit of quadary. I have to pencil, ink and tone 24 Local #12 pages by about April 5th so that we can all enjoy The Local Collection sometime before the polar ice sheets melt and drown us all. That's a pickle on it's own. But I have to be on my inking job everyday. That would be The Vinyl Underground. It looks really cool. I think. I hope. even though I have to work FFAASSTT, with a capital Fast.

Oh, while I'm doing this I have to do a 13 page colored anthology story for a super secret summer project that I can't mention but it's for The Comic Book Tattoo Tori Amos Anthology with writer John Ney Reiber. It's Incredible. Oh yeah, that's also due on about April 1st, and I haven't even started on it. Will I be able to do this? You Make The Call!

Oh yeah, and I took on some illustration work for some cash. Oh right, and I'm teaching 2 studio classes.

But it looks like after that, I'll be venturing onto my biggest, most high profile job yet, and that will take me through the rest of 2008. Good news for any freelance artist with kids and a mortgage. This will be my best art yet. I hope. All the while, negotiating the time for my own creator-owned project. and hopefully some new things for 2009.

I've also began the practice of hiring out for assistants. Temp work. I have no choice. filling in blacks. dead, monoline inking. scanning. toning. It's a Ryan Kelly factory. So I guess I don't sleep this month.

The best news is that with my new project, I 'll get to draw lots of trees. And Nature! Water! Rocks! Expansive landscapes. No time-consuming Skyscrapers!

And Look. Local #12. Trees! lots of them. Not a large detailed building that someone might actually live in. No one can say that I drew that train station wrong. Because, it's a tree!



I'm not allowed to ever show my Tori Amos pages, but look at this panel sketch. Trees. And Snow. Lovely snow. Snow doesn't look anything like large clusters of ornate and detailed office buildings! It's just snow. All I get to do is draw a round shape, much like a circle, and be done! I never though art could finally be...Easy.

118 Pages In A Month And A Half

70 New York Four Pages to pencil, ink and tone.
24 pages Local to pencil, ink and tone.
24 pages American Virgin to pencil.

This is pretty much what I have to in the next 6-7 weeks. Things are going to be really bad for a while. And I'm not bellyaching because I wanted to draw comics for a living. I just wish I got hit with all this when I was 24, childless, and begging.

All this would academically be possible if I didn't have 3 kids and twin babies who wake up crying at 3 am. But I love my comics and babies. This is the challenge of my life, for sure.

I'm saying this because I'm sure people hate me for never returning phone calls or emails. Unless it's a job or work-related, I'm pretty-much out-of-touch and lost in my own world. Sorry all, I should be done with all this in late October. It's all for comics! Comics! Comics! New World Order! Attica! Rickyyyy!!



NY4

American Virgin

Local

Watcha Doin' ?

Local #10 is getting really close to being done. I'm going to post some art from that momentarily. I'm rushing Local like never before. It isn't a great disability though, as I think the art is as good as it will ever be. So, no matter what I do, the quality is better than issues #1-3, I believe/hope. Things will move briskly. Read Local!

I’m a 1/3 of the way done with my Unannounced Graphic Novel. That doesn’t sound like much, but I’m taking care of my babies a lot of the time. I’m not “taking the piss”. It doesn’t matter too much because the pages go really fast when I do get to work on them. By the time San Diego Comicpalooza ends I will be furiously elated to not be addressing it as Unannounced Graphic Novel anymore. It’s been classified over a year now.

I’m going to be pinch-hitting for Becky Cloonan and penciling a few issues of American Virgin. Which is happy-joy for me because I really love that book. Steven T Seagle writes. Jim Rugg inks. So, for the time-being, I’m back to drawing 3 books at once. It’s going to hurt, but it’s a good kind of hurt.

Hmm…I get to draw a short story by young adult novelist and Minx author Cecil Castellucci. Not much to say there. I guess the official people will announce it officially in the official time.

I gotta to draw some art for Greek artist Ilias kyriazis and his book Manifesto.

My pitch has now been sent to four publishers which I don’t know if that means much yet other than I gained a few contacts along the way that I’d like to reach out to. Not much to say. Pitching is not a good activity for my self-esteem issues. I think I’m much better at making comics, not pitching them. I’d just like to say, “Good sir or madam , this will be the best book I will ever draw, That is the greatest promise I shall ever make.” and then they shall reply, “ Gracious me, you are a scholar and judge of good wine, we would like nothing more for the greatest book you will ever draw to be published by our company. Salut! Sign here. Kiss.” And then it would all be over and I could sleep.

I will likely get to draw a one-shot Vertigo title later on and some possible other stuff. This freelance artist has stuff draw for the rest of the year.

My paintings. People are always asking if I'm doing any more paintings right now. More on the later, but for the Summer and Fall, I'm just doing comics. I am going to do a new heap of paintings later in the year, hopefully. They'll be really different and not like anything else I've done. I have to learn how to do high quality painted work quickly and not spend 2-3 weeks on a painting that might not sell.

An Internet Warrior actually hassled me for changing "styles" (more factually, changing my "media", I suppose). Isn't it terrible that I'm an artist that wakes up every morning and wants to do something new and different? Isn't it shameful that I want to move in a direction? Isn't that just worse than war and poverty? What if The Cure just made albums like "Faith" for the rest of their career? We would never have silly things like "Why Can't I Be You" (Internet Warrior: " Now you're comparing yourself to The Cure! Jerk.") I get bored with my art. I get antsy and I have art-ADD and I want to do something different all the time, which is actually, for servicing a career, not a great idea. I should really just settle on one way of making art and milk it out for the rest my life. Art has rules, I must follow them.

I don't have an official website yet. Sorry, I suck. Sometimes I don't see the point with free things like Blogger and Paypal and Flickr. Plus, I don't know how to make a website. And who would want to on my 56k dial-up connection?

It looks like I'll be mixing it up more with a certain writer and doing original books, small press, short visual stories, mini comics, and picture books. I'm most excited about that. I'm going back to MOCCA next year and I'd like to be equipped with some real home-made mini comics. MOCCA is a good event for that and I just felt like one of the more "Mainstream" entities this year. So , hopefully, back to my roots and doing some self-published home-made things in my spare time ("spare time") through 2008.

I like MOCCA because I get to have friendly-time with creators I admire like Rick Spears, Rob G, Brian Wood, Hope Larson, Becky, Zander Cannon, Zak Sally, Tania Del Rio and Will Staehle. I met Tara Mcphereson for the first time. It all makes me want to be a better artist.

Although, I think I really messed up Hope Larson's Kiss Book. I didn't know it was a "Kiss" theme! Maybe I wasn't listening carefully. I thought it was just "utilize the ribbon.". SORRY Hope!!

Stop Wasting Your Life Away, You Fool

I'm dropping everything, EVERYTHING, in my life right now to do something I have to. I must do. Right Now. I don't want to do it, I NEED to do it. I've woken up E V E R Y morning for the past 6 years saying to myself, "Ryan Kelly, you HAVE to do this, NOW". I then I don't do it.

Everyone close to me knows what it is. My gallery name, The name of this blog, My flickr name, my ebay name, etc, etc,.. should all clue in to what it is. I need to mention that i'd rather fully write and draw 20 books rather than write a "pitch". But, Here I go. Character sketches, eearggh, Here i go. I got to get in the game, especially when i'm sitting on the most important thing I feel I'll ever do in my life.

In other news:

The best darn sketch pen (and extremely hard to find) Tradio pen by Pentel is now a prominently featured item at Wet Paint on Grand Ave, Saint Paul:



Pros: Everyone describes the "juicy" ink flow. Dries immediately on copy paper. Makes a great bold comic line.

Cons: It can take up to an hour to dry on comic bristol. Sometimes catches on the rough paper. The Pen itself is a little pricey. Refills there are $3.50 a pop.

Light Table-Ikea style

Are you sick of your lightbox/table taking up all your valuable table space? Well, you don't have to suffer this hellish injustice any longer. Here's a hot tip for any local comic artists/ Ikea shoppers.

Now that my 4-year old has reached the height requirements for untamed playland independence, I can drop him off with wage-earning strangers and roam, childless, in the lighting section at Ikea.

I found this NIAN wall-shelf with built in-lighting.. Ikea has the shelf in sizes 11X17 inch and 11X22 inch. It's suplied with a small flourescent tube unit and it lights from the top and bottom. You can't buy it on the website, and I don't know about other Ikeas around the world but the store here, over by the Mall, has it on sale for 24.99, marked down from $70.00, RIGHT NOW. Tht's quite a discount. Check it out.

For comics, I've switched to blue-lining, but I still have to do the occasional light-transfer. It's a just a wee-bit small (I bought the 11X17) for full comic pages, but for small, quick transfer jobs, it's just fine. For me, this wall light is perfect. It's out of the way, and when i'm not using it transfer, I can use it display Star Wars toys!

My Magical Funhouse of Inking Horrors

Last week, Hope Larson talked about her inking tools during her presentation at the school. I got a buzz when I found out she uses the same tools as me, and I always love to hear tool and technique talk by other artists. The tools are of the comic artist are pretty common and inexpensive. I spend a lot more on materials when I'm painting.

Here's my Dollhouse of Inking delight. Behold. My Star Wars figures are normally propped up like that. It's workplace flair to brighten up my day. Some people have pictures of their children or a Gary Larson calendar; I have Han Solo and Admiral Akbar. I also have a complete 1980 Hoth playset from Empire Strikes Back in case you're interested in knowing that.




Here's what I use to ink most all my comics (See photo above, from left to right):

Windsor Newton Series 7 Brush #2
I used this for half the page duty on Lucifer. I switched to using it almost exclusively for the first few issues of Local. Now, I'm back to using it for about %50 of the mark making. The #2 size is superior to the #1 because it has a larger "belly", holds more ink, snaps back perfectly and makes the same point as a #1 while providing a thicker line as well.

The problem is, I go through WAY TO MANY OF THESE. And, I don't know why. Ink gets in the ferrule and the brush is useless forever. I do not overdip. I assume the problem is that I don't clean out my water enough and I'm swishing my brush in inky water way too long. If the brush makers of the Series 7 knew how many of these I go through, they would ring my neck. Every single one of these brushes are MADE BY HAND, very delicately, by experts, maybe 12 people, and no machines involved in the formation of the series 7 pure kolinsky sable hair into the ferrule and black lacquer barrel. It's a time consuming process and that's why the damn thing costs so much I guess.

THE G-PEN (Niko, Tachigawa)
This Japanese nib is my absolute favorite right now, hands down. And I've gone through a TON of nibs by Gillotte, Brause, Hunt, EsterBrook, etc, etc. I did a ton of nibwork in Lucifer, but then I stopped it on Local. Now, I'm back to using nibs because I miss the unique line that it makes, a line that's full at one end and not a cursive line like the brush. This G pen is amazing. It's large enough and flexible enough. and I can go back and forth with , side to side and it makes a nice full line for profiles. And. It's super durable! Love it.

HUNT 102
A standard nib in comics for a long time. The only other nib I seriously use. It's great for hatching and line patterns. It's dazzling on the smooth paper. I don't do back and forth strokes with it. It's a "drawing" nib and I realize every company has a nib equivalent to it but this one is my favorite.


PENTEL TRADIO STYLO
I found out about this pen through Peter Gross. Linda Medley also uses it, I believe.
It's non-water proof ink and it can take UP TO AN HOUR TO DRY ON BRISTOL PAPER. I kid you not. But, it dries instantly on copy paper. Bizarre. It's my secret weapon. Like a lot of Pentel (japanese) products, they're hard to find in the United States.


Faber-Castell PITT PEN
The felt tip sketch pens. Blah. I use them for some things. Some basic outlining. The Pitt Pens seem to last a long time for me.

THE PENTEL BRUSH PEN
This is the brush pen that everyone's talking about around town right now. I admit, It's pretty darn nice. A nylon tip, I suppose, but in no way can this replace the natural sable brush. It takes refillable ink cartridges (non-waterproof) but I've heard of inkers pouring their own ink in the empty cartridges. It's very convenient. I don't use it that much on my pages but it's great for traveling around with and sketching. Next to it is the Pump Pen by Ackerman pens. I'm not a big fan of it. and next to that, are my "Japanese Water brushes", one filled with ink, one with pure water. These can be fun and easy to use for sketching and spotting blacks or doing quick gray washes. They're about $6 a pop and they don't dry out. But they can be a little leaky sometimes. You can buy different tips.

I also use a lot of different India Inks. I don't have a clear favorite though.

I've been teaching an Inking class this semester so maybe I'll use this Blog to post some Inking tutorials. Fun!

A Wall Of Work. Last Week, This Week, And All The Weeks Beyond.

Last week was completely unacceptable on all fronts. I got absolutaly nothing done last week no matter how hard I tried. I don't even think I got a single panel done, and I woke up every morning with an overwhelming urge to complete quite a bit more than one panel.

I don't ever recall having a more pathetic work week. The pillars of my life that held up the frameworks of fairness, decency, and cooperation came tumbling down scattering its particles everywhere and they lay they at this moment , staring up at me , mocking.

I've been in a terrible mood all week, and everybody close to me knows it. I never want to return to that period of my life again (again, last week, to reiterate). I have to do twice the usual workload this week, as last week was so completely deplorable for work. Completely appalling in every sense of the word.

Don't ever bring up last week to me again, please. Nothing went right. Everything was wrong last week. This week is already off to a bad start, but here's to a better week anyway.

How was your week?

Taxcuts and Tipjars

©art by Ryan Kelly

On Wednesday I had to do every annoying task apart from actual drawing. Yesterday, I had to teach. And today, I have to do my taxes. So no work is getting done for three days and if you work in comics, that's a mountain of pain. I'm a little nervous of what my outcome will be today. That "Self-Employment" tax can be especially unkind.

I'll save my usual rant on taxes for some other day when I'm not swimming through a pile of receipts. What a disgusting mess, why couldn't I stay organized this year??! It's not very punk rock to talk about this, I know.

Atleast I have 3 kids now. 3 tax deductions. God Bless America!

Animals! 3-22-07

Went to the zoo yesterday to draw animals!



Totally going to use that Palm tree in a Batman vs. Poison Ivy pin-up.

Views from the Bridge

A short Interlude inbetween the very important art blogging.


Just Drawin'. Lapdesk by Levenger. Pitt pen by Faber-Castell


The Flying Burrito Brothers. 7 months.


In the studio. Comics, comics, comics.