Archive for ‘Blog’
So Dedlok made a “spray” from a Dumbing of Age panel for Team Fortress 2. I show it off now, because it is hilarious.
Sarah’s out of the top image. It makes me very sad. I have big plans for her, but all of these plans stem from her being avoidant and generally anti-people. And having her interact with everyone all the time right off the bat works against that idea, so there hasn’t been very much of her so far.
Regrettably, since she’s one of my favorites.
Meanwhile, I figgered I should have the actual top three DoA characters ranked by number of appearances up in the header. That, at the moment, has Joyce waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay in the lead, with everyone else sort of gathered around the middle battling for second and third place. Joe and Billie take that honor, respectively. Look at the tag cloud down in the lower left to see for yourselves. I think I might start swapping out the people up top as they jostle for position. (Man, this storyline has a lot of Dorothy. She has a real shot of getting up there in a month or so.)
In the meantime, a minor goal of mine is to get Sarah earning her place at the top again. Unfortunately, Sarah won’t like it.
Here’s something I’ve decided to crosspost from my DeviantArt:
So I’m thinking, man, my original model sheet for Dumbing of Age‘s Dorothy doesn’t really cut it anymore, but didn’t I draw it just — oh my Lord, that art is ten months old already! Whoa, how time flies.
Dorothy got redrawn. I’m not sure exactly what for, other than to satisfy myself, as it’s not like Dorothy’s full-body art is all over my website or anything. It was an itch I needed to scratch.
More important than representing the little nips and tucks she’s accumulated over the past year is her expression and posture. When I drew the first Dorothy, what was most prominent about her to me was “She Wants To Dump Danny But Hasn’t Worked Up The Courage Yet,” and so her pensive, almost sad look made sense at the time. But that’s not really what Dorothy’s about, and it certainly hasn’t been what she’s been about since about October! I wanted a bit more of the gung-ho, studious Dorothy. So now she’s standing up right, smiling, and holding a book.
The unfinished sketch in the middle had a more interesting pose, I think, but I didn’t like her head being down and her posture needed to be more defiant, so I started over with the finished version on the right.
Physical things that seem to have changed: Head’s smaller. Body’s thinner. Her clothes fit. Dropped coloring the lower lip at some point.
“Introducing Bible Belt” by Brian Daniel.
by David M Willis on April 18, 2011 at 2:21 pmStoolie the Amazi-Stool is the most popular Dumbing of Age character, isn’t he? God dammit.
(Art by Brian Daniel, of course.)
You’ve read her fanfic, now see the illustration! RebLaw envisions a world where Joyce and Billie can maybe share some special time together. If you know what I mean. She visited me in person at Wondercon and gave me the rough draft of this art, and it’s great to see it finished and in color!
I’ll be at Wondercon this weekend in San Francisco!
by David M Willis on March 31, 2011 at 12:13 amI kinda dropped the ball on building up to this con this week, what with the double-whammy of the Ethan statue preorders and my SP! book 4 fundraising blitz, but I’m gonna be in San Francisco this weekend for Wondercon!
I’ll be there with Kel McDonald (Sorcery 101), and we’ll be in the Small Press area, at table SP-29, I believe. I’ll have books and prints and some new posters! The one of particular interest to Dumbing of Age readers is the “Monroe Lake” poster, which is 11″x17″ and printed on thick glossy paper. And if you’re not gonna be in San Francisco this weekend, you can order it from the store.
It’s my first convention in the city where Shortpacked! takes place! (Is there one in Bloomington, Indiana?) I’m excited! It’s also my birthday this weekend. On Sunday I turn 32. If you’re there, feel free to drop me some extra booze money.
Preorder a book of my other webcomic!
by David M Willis on March 29, 2011 at 12:16 amThanks to everyone who stopped by to say hello at C2E2 last weekend in Chicago! This was the first convention that I had a bunch of people come up and say they enjoyed Dumbing of Age while completely neglecting to mention Shortpacked!. That’s exciting to me! It means this little comic’s starting to come into its own. (What’s the point of doing two comics with exactly the same overlapping readership, anyway?)
I also got a lot of Dumbing of Age character sketch requests. I’ve uploaded one of them here for this blogpost, and the others were simple medium shots. It makes me happy to be asked to draw Billie. (And sometimes by herself, not only while being strangled by Ruth.) These characters are old and dear to me, and part of the reason I started up this strip was because I wanted them to be loved again.
Thanks everybody for coming out to see me! You’ll be able to see me again at Wondercon in San Francisco in a week and a half.
If shipping schedules aren’t lying to me, there should be a new beach-themed DoA poster going up in the store tomorrow night…