With thanks to Martin Zalba for the stock photo. Merry Christmas everyone!
Character: Percy Whitebucket
The star of the comic; a short young man who aspires to become Santa Claus. An adept inventor who has begun to incorporate alien technology into his designs. Currently a biochem major at Edona College. Dating Nikki. Fun Fact: His middle initials spell “pew”, a smell often associated with mad science.
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North Pole Arrival
The wooden crate behind Percy is the bathroom, FYI. I know that was need-to-know information.
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Psychology
Ref: Using parts | PIZZA!
This comic may be one of the most interesting in terms of production. I made this comic at my mother-in-law’s in Colorado, 550 miles from my not-very-portable desktop computer. Using a crummy school laptop (my own laptop has all but died) and the LogMeIn program, I controlled my home desktop to make this comic. The wonders of the internet!
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“We All Live in a Yellow Submarine”
Ref: Leonardo | Sleigh is waterproof | Yellow Submarine (you’re welcome)
And Leonardo is back! I retrofitted the inside a bit; there’s now only two seats but the back is a portable lab of sorts. I also unfortunately lost the pink curtains.
This comic was drawn entirely digitally; while not a first for me, this is a first in terms of it being good quality (i.e. not the iPad). As I’m using backgrounds more, I’m finding it helpful. If I had a drawing tablet, it would be even better, but for now I’ll take what I can get.
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Percy Shrugged
And thus begins the penultimate story arc of Spoofy Randomness!
I originally considered altering the art of Atlas Shrugged, but then I looked at the cover that would have stuck with the same style as The Featherhead and came to two conclusions: no one wants to see that much of Percy (although it was tempting to bring back the anti-fanservice box) and that would have taken some severe editing; Percy is not in THAT good of shape! My second plan was to show Planet Earth in the background, but as I was putting the finishing touches on the page, I decided underwater would be more appropriate despite losing the extra Atlas reference. I’ll probably be wishy-washy in years to come as to whether that was the right decision, but for now I like it.
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Intermission
Refs: Roark | Mikhail and Stefan | Not being left behind | Monica
I was quite pleased with how this comic turned out, in terms of both dialogue and art. I even managed to make the Mulinix Hall nameplate visible!
Next week begins a new arc!
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Jorocks Used Growth!
Ref: Glove
I like how Percy’s short speech ties everything back to the dreams in The Fountainhead. It also amuses me that both times that Jorocks has been called the titular name of this arc, he hasn’t actually been wearing a feather at the time…
I was FINALLY pleased with how the size comparisons came out. Pity it had to happen on the last comic of the arc! I debated about having the anti-fanservice block back, but decided the ongoing frizzy Jorocks joke was better because his hair cracks me up. Disagree? Let me know (nicely) in the comics and maybe it will return!
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Campus Security
Ref: Percy gets attention | And again
A while ago on Twitter I mentioned that I wish I would have given Percy ear hair. I satisfied this urge with Jorocks’s elf form. I was happy for a change with how the sizing turned out with the elves. Chris’s face is a little off though. In a way, I like it as he kinda looks like his dad this way.
Having a bit of trouble with my mouse. Apparently when I updated to OSX Maverick, the Logitech driver doesn’t play nicely. It makes dragging text boxes a royal pain. If anyone has a fix to cover this until the driver update comes up and can explain it to someone who still isn’t quite familiar with Mac programming yet, I’d love to hear it!
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North Pole Obtained
Refs: Gogol | First appearance of Gabriel | Ding-dong? | Left behind
I know, I know, you all wanted to see elf-Jorocks. He’s still getting dressed. But hooray, Percy now owns the North Pole! Yes, there would probably be a huge pile of paperwork involved. No, I’m not going to show it. Paperwork isn’t usually funny.
This wound up being quite text-intensive, which is something I’m working on. However, in this case I felt it was justified, especially as I cut a large amount of material out to make this whole legal matter go faster, and hey, there’s a lot of details that needed to be presented but don’t need to have a whole arc devoted to them. If the comic updated three or five days a week, I would have spread that out more, but once a week calls for a different scripting strategy, especially when I know what needs to happen by certain dates.
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More of Jorocks Than Anyone Wanted to See
Ref: The Shadow! | The Shadow? | THE SHADOW.
Couldn’t resist the link pattern above. 🙂 It is, of course, a reference to The Gamers.
Nikki is really hard to draw shorter than Percy! She’s a little too tall in this strip. Her face in Panel 3 as she’s attempting to follow Percy’s example and make scientific observations but at the same time REALLY wanting to look away is priceless.
This comic had its issues. First, I couldn’t get GIMP to play nicely with my newly installed OSX Maverick. Then, thanks to Brianna, I got it working and finished the comic well ahead of the deadline…only to realize that in taking that one weekend off, all of my dates were off a week and I had drawn NEXT week’s comic! Then as I was frantically trying to finish up this week’s comic (by this point, it was already late…), GIMP crashed on me and, being the nincompoop I am, I hadn’t saved my last hour’s worth of work. But hey, it’s done now and I have a buffer for next week!
No sketchbook this week, though. I want to make sure the main strip gets some love.