Penny Arcade - Strip Search

Rad fighting game poster-style pic of the cast of strip search taken from:  http://periscopestudio.com/category/ron-chan/

Penny Arcade is currently running an elimination-style reality show for Webcomic artists called Strip Search.  The artists compete in activities and win small prizes, all competing to win the ultimate prize which is a bundle of money and a job with Penny Arcade.

I'm not a follower of reality TV, but I enjoy this show because of the webcomic theme.  Everybody on the show seems really nice, and very talented, and the sub-prizes they come away with are often really great, including a T-shirt design sold on the Penny Arcade website, and some quality electronic tablets for artists.   The stress of the elimination challenges is cut by the playful banter of the two creators.  The creators seem to be genuinely invested in the artists and the field of comics.

One of the best features of the show is a listing of all of the artists with links to their own websites.  So everybody gets promoted, no matter how they do on the show.  In addition, there's a spoilers section, that summarizes the episodes, but more importantly, allows the you to view the art they created each day. 

Right now I'm rooting for all the artists that are around 30 years old.  I find this to be a simple criteria to weed out most of them, and narrow down my preference.  Actually, one of these artists, Maki, does the Sci-ence cartoon to which I have linked in the margin.  The others I had not read prior to seeing them on Strip Search, and I am slowly making my way through each of their websites. 

http://www.penny-arcade.com/strip-search/artists
link to artists list

http://www.penny-arcade.com/strip-search/archive
link to the episode archive

http://www.penny-arcade.com/strip-search/spoilers
link to spoilers

Simpsons Drawing Club

http://25.media.tumblr.com/90b8b986bca3d5f56fc325e2eea8a843/tumblr_mklckiiBhS1rhf9zpo1_500.jpg

The Simpsons Drawing Club is a tumblr page that collects together different Simpsons themed drawings from a group of different artists.  There is a wide variety of styles represented here, with a striking amount of abstract and even kind of icky art styles.  There are also narrative comics following Simpsons characters, often with rather strange themes, much heavier than what is found in the show itself.

As a longtime Simpsons fan, many of these images resonate with me, as do their differences from the franchise itself.  I think it's great to see how many different ways these artists present these well-loved and familiar characters.  Even if some of it is kind of sick.

There's a real brilliance to this page.  Particularly some of the darker contributions, having Simpsons characters drawn slightly differently goes a long way to set a different tone.  I have a soft spot for post apocalyptic narratives, so I really enjoy Jack Teagle's contributions.

http://simpsonsdrawingclub.tumblr.com/

A lot of really gross art here.  Still pretty cool.

http://jackteagle.tumblr.com/tagged/comics
this is the guy who does the post-apocolypse simpsons

Urban Empathy

Urban Empathy by Dian Killian and Mark Badger

Urban Empathy is a series of clever and sweet stories written by Dian Killian.  The stories are centered around experiences in Dian's life in which she uses Non-Violent Communication skills to resolve conflicts she encounters in her daily life.  The accompanying art for these stories is by Mark Badger.  The art can seem crude but is expressive,  and I think Badger's drawings illustrate well, the subtle differences in the conflicting emotions between characters in these stories.

I think that this comic is a good example of how the comics format can be used to tell all sorts of different stories.  The plots are all 'slice of life' stories, with some great comics-style artistic license.  By Artistic License, I mean that there are talking cockroaches, and expressive physical exaggerations.   The cast of characters includes Dian herself, members of her family, and chance encounters with random strangers.  Dian uses the tenants of Non Violent Communication to reach out to people, rather than to push them away.

These stories are interesting, original and peaceful, and I think that it's great to read them in comics form.  Comics have been dominated by superhero stories for nearly a century, and violent combat is a defining feature of that genre.   I applaud the writer and artist for producing stories of the navigation of conflict toward a peaceful resolution.  This book is an earnest and effective effort that comes in an easily digestible form of short picture stories.  

I would recommend this book to anyone.  I hope you read it and enjoy it.

http://www.amazon.com/Urban-Empathy-Adventures-Compassion-Streets/dp/097706171X
to purchase a copy from amazon

http://www.kripalu.org/presenter/V0004679/dian_killian
little blurb on the author

http://www.nvcworld.com/urban-empathy
nvc site with resources

http://markbadger.org/?page_id=3
More on Artist

http://markbadger.org/
Artist's website with writing and thoughts on comics art

Vattu/Rice Boy/Order of Tales

I think  it would be good to highlight Evan Dahm's Vattu/Order of Tales.  I like the writer's imagination and art style.  Not too flashy, and I enjoy that.  It strikes me as similar to Jim Henson productions. Anthropomorphisim as applied to animals, and some sort of vague, not quite real animals.  Good stuff.

I also like his sensibilities.  In order of tales, the idea of the power of story, and then with Vattu tribal vs civilization.  Even in a simplistic construction, I think these are good stories to tell.  Perhaps I should send an email to the author.

Also, I should probably read rice boy, so that I have a complete understanding.

There's a TV tropes page for Vattu.  Pretty delightful.

Sulk #1 by Jeffery Brown

This a little black and white comic by Jeffrey Brown, featuring mostly the adventures of a character named Bighead.  I picked this up comic on a lark at my local comic store "Big Brother Comics."  I was pleased with the results of my grab.

The comic is a superhero comic, but it is also satiricle.  I love satire.  It reminds me of the Tick and other such things.  What I love the most about Satire is it makes me laugh, makes me think, and in the best instances, it is at least as effective at portraying drama as the thing it is satirizing.

The adventures of bighead revisits several different superhero tropes, but does it in an often child-like fashion, that tends to deliberately point out what is going on.  It brings to light how shallow much of the writing is for classic superhero comics.  But it still reminds me that I love them, mostly through the art.

The art appears rudementary, but is actually pretty darn good.  While the lines are messy, and sometimes the character's faces are inconsistent,, I have heard Jeffery Brown's style described as 'charmingly crude' and I agree with that assessment.  I will chalk some of this up to Jeffery Brown likely making no money whatsoever for this comic.  What the art does have is a good sense of pacing and of place, of angle and emotion, so that my immersion is never broken.  I appreciate this, and I give Jeffery Brown a thumbs up.  I will be checking in on him again in the future.

More on Jeffery Brown:
http://www.topshelfcomix.com/catalog/jeffrey-brown

Oh, hey, check it out: He was also featured on Inkstuds:
http://www.inkstuds.org/stumptown-panel-with-jeffrey-brown-and-brandon-graham/

Even more Comic(s)

http://www.shiftylook.com/comics/galaga/invasion-part-1
Galaga

This is a comic about the game Galaga, and it's written by Ryan North of Dinosaur Comics and illustrated by the guy who does Dr. McNinja and the guy who does Nedroid.  

Yes, a responsible blogger would actually find out their names, but for the time being, I'm the only one who reads this blog, and I'm just keeping the links here for my own purposes.  I'll go back and edit this post to give proper credit.

Christopher Hasting and Anthony Clark.   There, was that so hard?

More Comics

Here are a few more webcomics,

When I am King:
http://www.demian5.com/king/next.016.htm


Jason Turner Project:
http://www.jasonturnerproject.com/


Nowhere Girl:
http://www.nowheregirl.com/episode/01/03.html


The above links were taken from Making Comics - Chapter 5 1/2 by Scott McCloud:
http://www.scottmccloud.com/makingcomics/five_half/00.html