Tales From The Gag Master

I found THIS the other day, printed it out and built one. It's called the Gag Master and it is from a 1963 book titled: How to Make Money With Simple Gags.

I've always liked the idea of random elements as inspiration and constraint for making a comic. See my 24 Hour Comics with their random song-title titles.  Today I did my first Gag Master Comic, using the random elements presented by the wheel. Each selection on each ring of the wheel is numbered. From the outside in, here is 68, 34, 08.

Discordian Quote Comix: Quote 00018

Discordian Quote Comix: Quote 00012

24 Hour Comics Day 2010: FINISHED!

I once again completed the 24 Hour Comics Day Challenge using the wonderful tools at Bitstrips. I began at 9:00 am on Saturday October 2 and finished at about 6:30 Sunday morning.

I made a conscious decision this year to avoid the romance/relationship theme of my last two 24 Hour Comics, from 2008 and 2009, and decided in advance to try to do something more action oriented, possibly with a sci-fi or fantasy approach.

I began with no script or preconceived characters, and once again used a random song title from iTunes to give me a title. The first track to play on Saturday morning, Wish I Had An Angel, by Nightwish, inspired the notion of guardian angels. My initial idea was that there are these space pilots aboard a space station and their technicians are sort of like the pilot's guardian angels, keeping the ships running, communicating with the pilots and protecting them from 'the heaven' of the station.   With that in mind I decided that the characters of this tale orbit a planet named Midgard, from a space station named Asgard, and went with Norse naming scheme for the solar system in the story.  This Nordic inspiration was due in part to the fact that Nightwish is from Finland.

Unfortunately I misspelled Yggdrasil, the name of the sun and solar system in the story, in the first caption in the first panel of the tale.  Later I named a moon Mani' continuing the Nose Mythology naming conventions, but a couple of hours later I mentioned the moon again and called it Madi' which it remained through the rest of the tale. These things happen when you're 12 or so hours into the process, not completely lucid and working improvisationally.

As usually happens with these 24 Hour Comics, my initial idea mutated pretty quickly, turning into a friendly rivalry between two techs, and their pilots.  I had decided on the darker aspects of the ending of the story early on, but I surprised myself in exactly how I got there.

Changing genre made for some difficult artistic choices. Spaceships are difficult to do in Bitstrips!  Otherwise, I found the work moving along really quickly.  This is due in part to the advances made in the builders in the last year, and also to a new computer, purchased over the summer.  I did 166 panels total, well within my goals of 144 to 180 panels.  The ability to do more complex art continues to get easier, kudos to the Core Matrix team for continuing to make Bitstrips so great!

I once again had a great time doing this comic, it is certainly not without it's flaws, I tried something different this time, and was pleased with the result.  Here is page one of Wish I Had An Angel:

24 Hour Comics Day 2010 is Coming!

24 Hour Comics day is right around the corner and once again I'm planning to participate.

The date:



Once again, I'm encouraging Bitstrippers to join me in the monumental task of creating a full length comic story in a single 24 hour window:



Some people, can't commit to the whole day, but there are other options:



Of course the whole exercise is about spontaneity, originality, and creativity:

24 Hour Comics Day 2009: Finished!

I began my 24 Hour Comic yesterday morning at 9:00 am and finished at 6:30 am this morning, falling 8 panels shy (152) of my intended goal of 160 completed panels. Using the first random track to come up once the challenge began, I ended up titling my comic 'I Don't Wanna Rock 'N' Roll Tonight'a song by the Donnas. This was a much more specific title than last year's 'Perfect Gentleman'.

It was a much different experience this time around, as I knew what to expect from the challenge, and my approach to it. Just like last year I found that the most difficult stretch was hours 9 through 12. Fatigue starts to set in around then, and you still haven't reached the halfway point, so it gets pretty grueling in that period.

I also noticed some parallel elements with my comic from last year, possibly as a result or rereading that comic earlier this week. I probably shouldn't have done that.

I have apparently missed some sort of calling as a writer of dramatic Romance Comics, as that is what I deliberately wrote last year, and accidentally did this year (in a backhanded sort of way). It's funny the way these things run off on their own. I had a little trouble getting the story off the ground this time, as I'd intended to take a somewhat episodic comedic approach, but the drama swallowed up the comedy right at the halfway mark.

There is a particularly dark and uncomfortable scene that bugs me for the cruelty shown by 'Frank'. Late at night you can tap into some pretty weird bits of the subconscious, and this stuff often flows out without much thought.

Once again a really rewarding creative experience. I will most likely do it all again next year.

Here is the first part (of 26):

24 Hour Comics Day is Coming October 3rd!

I am participating in the 24 Hour Comic Challenge again this year. Once again I will be using Bitstrips to complete the challenge, and once again I've modified Scott McCloud's parameters specifically for Bitstrips.

Last year I targeted a minimum of 144 panels (6 finished panels per hour), but I finished with about 3 1/2 hours remaining. This year, I am aiming for a minimum of 160 finished panels (which breaks down to a little less than 7 panels per hour or 20 panels every 3 hours). McCloud's web comic rules for the challenge say 100 panels, but Bitstrips allows you to copy and paste characters, props and backgrounds so many of the art chores are greatly simplified, speeding up the process.

Last year I randomly titled my comic using a song title chosen at the start of the challenge by the shuffle function of my media player. This gave me the seed for the story that would emerge. I liked this random element so much that I will do the same this year, and have already built an iTunes playlist in excess of 24 hours.

24 Hour Comics Day is next Saturday, October 3rd. I will be starting my comic at approximately 9:00 AM MT.

24 Hour Comics Day: FINISHED!

I participated yesterday/today in the 24 Hour Comic Challenge at Bitstrips.com and finished my story while also achieving my set goal of at least 144 published comic panels (I did 147) in 19 Hours 20 minutes.

The Comic is titled Perfect Gentleman: A 24 Hour Comic. The title was chosen at random by a Windows Media Player play list. On Friday night I assembled a 24 hour long play list to listen to during the challenge. I had already decided on randomly generating the theme/concept of the comic and while I was pulling together music, I decided that the first song to come up in 'shuffle' mode once the challenge had started would be the name of my comic. The winner was 'Perfect Gentleman' by Helloween from their album Master of the Rings. The strip (other than being a great title) has nothing to do with the song.

It was a great deal of fun to create, and a genuinely rewarding experience. I was pleased with the little romantic comedy story I told, and I was very surprised at how much affection I developed for the characters in such a short time. The biggest surprise was that the main characters I'd created (Sam and Lena) ended up getting pushed to secondary status as a pair of 'sidekick' characters (Nick and Melody) began writing themselves, taking over the focus of the story.

In Scott McCloud's original challenge he suggests 100 panels for a web comic, but Bitstrips automates a lot of time consuming tasks, letting you copy and paste elements so I bumped the panel count from 130-160. I easily hit that target with 4.5 hours to go. Next year I might suggest 140-175 panels, depending on what kind of story being told. All in all a really good time. I'm tired today, but it was worth it. Here now is Episode One of Perfect Gentleman: A 24 Hour Comic-Some Competition:

24 Hour Comics Day

I am going to participate in 24 Hour Comics Day at Bitstrips.com tomorrow. I have attempted to draft other Bitstrippers to participate as well via a series of strips describing the challenge, giving some tips, and answering questions. A few people have show interest, but I don't know if there will be anyone joining me or not.