Zander's 24-Hour Comic Online!

I'm not quite as on-the-ball as Kevin is, but here's my 24-hour comic, The Caterpillar Space Force of Robots, in glorious black and white.

I do 24-hour comics as close to the original concept as I possibly can: I don't plan out what the story will be beforehand, write anything, or design characters. Partly this is to stick to the rules; partly it's to keep me (and others) from having high expectations for the story.

At the starting bell, I draw a Pictionary card from the box and use the five words that are on it to launch the story. Sometimes I do know what kind of story I want to tell, (this year I wanted to do a space adventure story) and that does help focus my efforts, but I never think about characters or plot until I draw that card.

This year's comic was pretty grueling compared to previous years, in that I had no idea where the story was going from page to page. I was almost halfway through before I had any ideas of how to conclude it, and so I was not that amped about the story anyway. Reading it now, it's not that bad. Kind of funny. Pretty random.

The Pictionary Card words were:

Caterpillar
Box
Sapphire
Victory
Yodel

Enjoy! Click on image below to start the madness:

The Shanksizer! -- Naturalized Handwriting Font Tool

A few weeks ago I was complaining to Mr. Stwalley about a special problem I have. You see, using Todd Klein's great book, "DC Comics Guide to Coloring and Lettering Comics," I developed a couple of fonts of my handwriting. Each font has two sets of alphabets -- one set as uppercase and one set as lowercase. Each set is exactly the same (roman, bold, etc), except that they have very subtle "writerly" differences.



The biggest problem with handwriting fonts is that they're easy to pick out as computerized when you see two of the same letters next to each other. Having just a subtle difference in the way the same letter is written helps trick the reader's mind into thinking that a line of text is ACTUALLY hand-lettered, when really it's not.



Getting back to my PROBLEM: Right now I have to manually differentiate between upper- and lowercase letters to make my fonts look authentic. Currently, "balLoOn" has to typed out by hand. That takes time. Time I don't have. So I was complaining to Mr. Stwalley about how I wished there was a simple Flash program to do the work for me.

So today he surprises me with "The Shanksizer" -- a fun and simple way to alternate your caps! Drop in a block of "normal" text, hit the fish, and out comes your text with alternating text! Of course, the best part is that it's a fun tool to play with even if you don't give a hoot about the problems associated with naturalized handwriting fonts. And if you hate fish.

Click below to play with The Shanksizer:


Note: Concurrently, BTA and PUNY are working on a similar program aimed at professional letterers who deal with naturalized handwriting fonts on a daily basis.

SLOTH FORCE SEVEN

Here's my story from this weekend's 24 Hour Comic Day:

You can read all about the Minneapolis event and see photos of the artists and work in progress at 24-hourcomic.blogspot.com

Orville Redenbacher 2 Minute Pick-Me-Ups

We recently produced some illustrations for Orville Redenbacher's website. You can check them out here ("Milk Jugs" is our favorite):



Recognize that guy? Yep, it's Line Art Zander. The illustrations were drawn over photographs in Adobe Illustrator and then imported into Flash. Zander drew the counter in Google's "Sketch-Up" -- hopefully he'll write about his love for that program in the future.

The interactivity and concept was handled by Steven Stwalley and Olson.

24 Hour Day is 24 Hours Away!

Zander says that the sleep you get two nights before the event is the sleep that really counts, so I forced myself to go to bed at 10pm last night (an unthinkable feat). Fortunately I'm housesitting for my parents in their soundproof suburban home, so I didn't have to contend with the always-loud-until-midnight Yelly McDrunkersons who live in the apartment directly below me in Uptown. Anyway, here's a banner for you:


Also, if you're looking for some pre-game advice, Mr. Steinlicht asked me to jot down my tips, and they are available here.