Just Off Center

I'm starting to realize the fact that I can't draw for shit. You may recall a while back I was starting to feel somewhat creatively dry of late. So to give me a sense of artistic expression I decided to try out one form of creative writing, namely the development of a comic book. I'd give some of the details of my comic book concept here, but right now it's still so new and precious that I haven't even told Nina about the story. I'll just say that it's a comic book for kids.

I wrote out the entire plotline. I gave all the characters names and developed them for a sense of realism. I've even done a breakdown of the script and what each frame should look like. So the only part left was to actually draw and ink it out. Now here's where things got a little complicated. You see, I've never really been a visual artist. I've been know to screw up a stright line with a ruler. I haven't seriously tried to draw something since that Tyrannosaurus Rex when I was six. But that T-rex was the absolute fucking bomb, so I must have some natural talent. And I'll be damned if I'm going to have my hopes dashed simply because I'm rusty with a pencil.

So I started drawing on a big sketchpad that my father had bought for Nina a while back. It was also her set of colored pencils I was using. I drew things around my house at first, but then started to focus on my cats. I quickly determined that I was going to need to start drawing with regular pencils first. I went to the library and borrowed several books on how to draw, but they either were waaaay too advanced or wanted me to learn how to draw human superheroes. But I don't want to draw humans. I want to draw animals. Shit, kinda let that one out of the bag too. Alright, I'll just say that since I have three cats around the house I must have been inspired to base the story around animals.

I went back to the library and got a couple books on how to draw comic books. I got a couple of actual comic books from the library and from Atomic Comics. I went to an art store and bought some different leaded pencils and erasers, including that cool kind that changes shape when you squeeze it. But even armed with all of these tools, I still haven't learned how to draw very well at all. I have to admit that with work and school and a personal life I haven't put all that much effort into learning as I would have when I was six.

But still there has to be some way that I can learn to draw as well as what I see in those comic books, even if only for two or three of my own. I considered hiring an artist to pencil and ink the book, but that just sucks. This is supposed to be my own project, born of my own mind and put together with my own hands. Take my house for example. I'm intensely proud of owning it, but I didn't put one single solitary stick of wood into it myself. That counts. Maybe it's just bullshit male pride or ego, but I want to create something, and I want it to be this comic book, and damnit I want to do it myself. But I also don't want to spend the next five years learning how to draw before I get it done.

Not only that, but I already know how I want it drawn. I have the look already published in my mind. I don't think I could settle for some crappy rendition of what I was looking to create just because I was impatient. I was looking at Maddox's website this week and he has a post about how he's working with a comic book artist to make a Maddox comic. And the drawing in it is absolute shit. A fucking nine year old could have assembled that drawing. No, I simply can't reduce the quality of what I want to make just to get it out the door. Not that this would ever really get "out of the door". In complete truth, I don't really expect to make a dime. But if I can just get it done, maybe I'll feel like I'm ready to try a greater creative feat, like writing a book. Hell, I keep this blog running in a semi-literate manner I'd like to think. How much more difficult can a novel be? Just look at Hemmingway. That fucking guy wrote with the vernacular of a teenager, and his stories are the stuff of legends.

Fuck, if only this were some kind of marital or professional problem I could fix it in a matter of a few weeks. I guess you can't rush skill. Nothing really to do but buckle down and learn my fucking shapes, dimensions, and perspectives. If anybody's reading this in 2010, let me know and I'll put you down for a free issue.