The first chapter is finally finished. Now go read it, HERE.

So….chapter one. I HATE IT. It took me OVER A YEAR to create due to several problems such as it sucking, hand strain, having to move to another city and coming up with the rest of the story while drawing it. It’s a clichéd, rambling, incoherent mess of a fantasy story. It makes me want to slap it around but unfortunately it’s digital. NO, WAIT, IT ISN’T. I still have the original pages!

RAAAAAAH!

Anyway. I’m working on chapter two right now. It’s about 60 pages long and a whole lot better. Well….back to work, I guess.

I’ve somehow managed to get a hold of decent mac, a student licence for Adobes CS5 Design Premium and Manga Studio 4 Debut. I’ve also finished the second japanese course, started training and waking up early. Now I just have to find a job and things might start looking up.

Here’s some of the stuff I’ve been doing:

A Nausica-fanart I drew this summer before moving. Never got around to coloring it.

A test in Manga Studio. Character slightly inspired from a creepy woman in the TV-show Millenium.

A random crappy water color-painting. Used some ink and dry pastel pens as well.

Here's that pic again, in colour.

Some anatomy practice and figure drawing.

I drew this while listening to the storm outside.

This is random. I might colour this later.

Last but not least - UNICORNS.

And that’s that. The rest of the time I’ve been busy learning japanese. Oh, and working on a certain comic. More about that, in a day or two.

My father died this october.

Yeah…..so I’ve been feeling physically unwell, have had to deal with this and had to quit everything for a while. I’ve almost catched up to the japanese course now but not had much time to draw stuff. Anyway, the rest of this post will be a kind of transcript of the funeral for those who knew my father but couldn’t attend it. If you’re just here for the pictures, scroll down to the end for one.

So, what happened? Let’s start with the facts. He suffered from not one, but two strokes, each on my and my brothers birthdays. Then he died two days later. I haven’t cried much but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t hurt. It really hurt like hell. After what seemed like an eternity, I was finally able to go back to my hometown to attend the funeral. My mother and a select few of fathers closest friends helped arrange all the matters that needed attending to. I have nothing but thanks for my mother who despite being divorced for years went through a lot of trouble to make everything surrounding the funeral work.

The funeral was finally held on the 28 of october. Attending were a diverse group of about 20 neighbours, old friends and family. My father was not a fan of big events so we felt it appropriate to make a priority of quality over quantity. No priest, a modest hall and coffin and an array of flowers yet a whole lot more feeling put into it than an overly expensive thing.

The ceremony clocked in at around 45 minutes, where my brother, I and my mother held it by ourselves. My brother started off with looking back at father’s life. He was an excellent football player and later on trainer for the Yugoslavian team called “Sloga” (sorry if I misspelled that). Apparently they won some big cup in the day. He continued on with how strong father had looked in his youth (to which I can only agree, in the seventies he looked like a character straight from a Tarrantino-movie). He then ended with speaking of his feelings. In between every speaker we had short snips of classical music played. Next up, I spoke shortly of how my father had been ill for as long as I could remember but how he despite that always greeted you with a smile. Last up was my mother, who had written a really good poem about life in general (I had no idea she was that talented with poems).

Then every one got to place a flower on the coffin and say one last goodbye. When we exited the hall a neighbour and friend of my father told me that it was a very odd funeral, but that it was all the better for it. Lastly it started to rain lightly when we exited the chapel. All these coincidences are enough to make a man religious. Father himself had chosen to be cremated and we felt that this funeral would honour his wishes. As I left the church I felt slightly relived and all the memories of a man who could make friends with anyone in 10 minutes after he met them only made me happy somehow. Is that how you’re supposed to feel after a funeral?

Well anyway…

I’ll leave you with a picture I drew the night before he died. Next update will have some of the material I’ve been able to produce these last two months…..and maybe a little news of a certain comic.

Yes, it’s true. While my arm doesn’t hurt anymore it’s still a bit worn. It gets healthier every day though, I can feel the strength returning. You might think I’ve been resting a lot after hearing that, but no. I’ve actually been drawing like crazy. The reason for the recent inactivity is actually due to moving to another town (Gothenburg) and no longer having easy access to a scanner. So what is the reason for this swift and magical recovery? Well……training. I’ve started exercising a lot, especially in the arm-department. I’m sure the 3-week period of resting I had back in june had some effect but it wasn’t until I started doing push-ups and grip training that the weariness started to go away. I’ve also found that hour-long walks help, especially after sitting still and working on a piece for a long time.

So anyway, I mentioned drawing like crazy. Well, there isn’t much I can show at the moment. But it involves a certain webcomic I’ve been whining about for a while now. So I’ll just give you a small teaser:

P: 51/51 I: 41/51 ST: 0 D: 0

Speaking of teasers. Here’s another one for a project I’ll start working on soon:

BLARG!

That’s enough teasing for now. The rest is just some random stuff. Here’s a test-page I made while trying out Deleters manuscript-paper:

I kinda feel sorry for him.

I also bought a sketchbook with fine paper that I’ll be using for random Illustrations. Here’s what I’ve got so far:

Creepy brush practise.

That’s all for now!

These were kind of relaxing.

The ink ran out of every damn pen I used for this.

Before I took the train back I went to the local zoo with some friends. It’s called “Parken Zoo”, formerly known for its white tigers and the attraction called “Fantomens Grotta” (The cave of the Phantom, yes the comic book character). Both of those attractions are now gone. The cave was modeled after the cave in the comics (I think, I’ve read very few of the comics) and it had a throne, treasury and an employee dressed as the Phantom who walked around the zoo giving kids ink-stamps with his skull-ring. I’ll talk about that more soon but first, some animals:

"WUT?"

This guy was climbing above us in the new house of reptiles. Not sure if he was actually supposed to be outside his cage.

Snack, please?

That is one badass turtle.

This one had something up its sleeve. I didn't dare go closer.

This fellow seemed a bit lonely.

I know, the photos suck. I took them with my phone camera and I suck at photography overall but it’ll have to do anyway. Most of the animals in the front of the park were missing or largely bored but some of the ones in the back were interesting to see and a bit more lively. Well then, let’s return to the cave. I remember going there as a kid and thinking it was cool but nowadays I’m more or less ambivalent about the place. Still, I was curios to see what they had replaced it with. What do kids like these days?

Is that a....pirate flag?

"The piRATs nest." .............Seriously?

God, they ARE serious.

.....................................

….yeah. I’m not sure what’s worse. The things I saw or that I actually miss the phantom. Google “fantomengrottan parken zoo” if you want to see how it looked like before. Well anyway, after that last disappointment we left.

They kept the statues at the entrance though.

We went a bit closer...

...but were careful not to touch.

Also......lol?

I was sitting between Linus Remahl (far left) and Fredrik Svensson (third from left) at the Comic Royale-table. We were selling books and fanzines between 12pm and 2pm, saturday. -Thanks to Lyn Karlsson for the photo.

This years Comic Royale is loaded with good comics. One of the high points of this years SPX, though, was the fact that the 2nd years from Gävle university’s Comics and Storytelling-program won the people’s price with their beautiful anthology “7 Oktober”. Congratulations, you guys.

We wandered around a whole lot in Stockholm and it took its toll on me. The only thing keeping me from being a total wreck right now is lots and lots of sleep. I’ve been kind of lazy these last few days as well but I’ve still managed to draw a little. With my left hand.

Random doodles.

Yes, this is left hand-drawn as well.

I’ve also started working on the storyboards for the second chapter of my webcomic. If I have any luck I might be able to start drawing the actual pages again soon. Anyway, the final japanese exam is coming up in a week or so and I might not have time to work on any pictures for a while. We’ll just see. If I know myself at all, I’ll probably get something done anyway.

By the by, I’m going to be at the Small Press Expo in Stockholm this weekend. If you happened to stop by, have a look at the Comic Royale-table. This years Comic Royale is loaded with awesome comics, amongst them is mine (see what I did there?). Here’s a small preview:

Lips!

Vampire and bad anatomy!

By your powers combined….

……no. Well anyway, I’m still recovering and trying to learn how to not kill my hand when I draw stuff. That last pic is an old one I did on one of the comic royale meetings. We exchanged lyrics for songs we picked and were supposed to illustrate the one we got. I got some lyrics about a person sending a red balloon into the air from a mountain. It was a japanese song translated into swedish so it was a bit weird. I just felt like putting a morbid spin on it since it seemed a bit too happy.

I’ve been working a bit on my webcomic as well (the one I’m not updating yet). I’ve drawn a few pages and have also been drawing concept art since I need to know how some things should look before I introduce them in the actual pages.

As I said, I’m still working on it. I just can’t ink the pages with my hand being as it is so I’m doing what I can with the storyboarding and penciling. Well, that’s all this time, except for this picture:

It is very metal.