Can we just forget about 2020?
In the late months of 2019 I would catch short headlines in my news feed about some new virus half way around the world. I didn’t pay much attention to it. I remember thinking to myself, “Huh. This is how horror movies start: mysterious outbreaks the main characters ignore as they go about their business, and then the next thing you know—zombie apocalypse!”
Somehow I think zombies would have been better, a threat that would have been difficult to deny and somehow call a hoax. Eh, who am I kidding, I’m sure we would have politicized the walking dead as well.
But what we did get was a pandemic lockdown.
Convention Lockdown
2019 had been my return to the convention scene—after years of only attending a handful of the bigger shows in my area, I had actually ramped up to 17 shows. I invested in new books and a brand new set up, worked hard, and had the best sales in, well, ever! I was looking forward to building on that success in 2020, even planning to try my hand at doing some higher risk, out-of-state shows.
2020 had other plans.
I attended a few small toy and collectable shows in January and February, before anybody really knew what was coming. Turns out those shows were the last chance I would have to hang with friends and sell some books. Soon after, one venue after another began to cancel or postpone.
All my previous momentum was lost, like tears in rain. All my inventory and art sat idle, packed away as convention season came and went. And while I had a ton of artwork for another art book (Inktober 2019), it just didn’t make financial sense to print up more books in a year when there were no shows to sell them at.
Virtual conventions became a thing. I did a handful, but virtual artist alleys didn’t prove too successful. I sell books and prints at shows by being there in person, greeting passerby and enthusiastically talking up my work, making new fans by putting books in their hands and chatting them up. Virtual alleys don’t let me do that, and the sales just weren’t there, even when participating in interviews and other online events.
Lockdown Blues
Conventions were out, the lockdown was in. So many of my friends and family were affected, their lives turned upside down in big and small ways—kids out of school, people working at home, (or in dangerous situations as essential workers) and plenty of local businesses struggling.
The early days were nerve wracking, and I kept one eyed glued to news and events. But I soon realized the best thing to do was throw myself back into my projects.
Somehow, the lockdown didn’t actually change my routine much at all. I was already working at home, the quintessential “absent minded professor,” working solo on my projects, really only getting out on the weekends. Outings with friends—dinners, brunches, writing group, and game nights—turned virtual, but my day to day work was pretty much unaffected.
So I socially distanced and kept working every day on comics, art, and writing.
Salvage Hounds
I spent the first half of 2020 designing costumes, props, and hardware for a new comic, Salvage Hounds, including tons of spacecraft and mecha. I even busted out some video game developer skillz for the latter, building the major hardware in 3D. The book began as a 24 page story, but ballooned to 28 pages as I finally got to penciling the art in the late summer / fall. I’m currently inking, a task which should be done in early Jan. From there, it’s on to art finishes, lettering, and painting a cover. I plan to pack the back of the book with tons of my design sketches, including character profiles and information about the setting and world, so look for a 3new book in the spring.
Commissions
I ended up doing a handful of commissions this year, all of which were much more involved than I’ve usually done in the past. I completed four rare color commissions for a long-time patron, rendering a few of the femme fatales of Borderlands as the aces in a “gentleman’s poker deck.” I did a few Septerra commissions for fans who were digging my 20th Anniversary retrospectives, and a new Barsoom piece—I’ll take any excuse to draw Martian princesses! The Borderlands and first Septerra piece are up on the site, and the others will be up soon.
Septerra Core 20th Anniversary
Speaking of Septerra Core, late 2019 was its 20th anniversary. I marked the occasion with a series of retrospective articles throughout 2020. I tracked down every team member, dug up the old archives, and unearthed a treasure trove of artifacts from the making of the game. Septerra Core is near and dear to my heart, so my aim was to chronicle my personal journey over the course of its development, a sort of oral history for the fans, but also a keepsake of memories for myself and the team who breathed life into it. Each entry has proven to be a labor of love requiring quite a bit of research and preparation, with old photos, footage of early demos, and lost, never-before-seen art painstakingly added for each new chapter. Expect a handful more in 2021 as the saga of the game’s development and publication comes to a close.
Fantasy Novel
My prose novel had taken a back seat in my life for years—when I was working a day job full time I would only find a few hours each weekend to devote to it. In 2019 I was able to get back it, spending several days a week hammering out the final revisions to an extensive rewrite of a major plot thread , but I was left with a massive pile of notes to tackle, the result of historical research, reader feedback, and evolving ideas about the story and world. It was supremely satisfying to cross off each and every item on that “to do” list in 2020. I set the book aside for several months to get a little distance and to concentrate on other projects, but in the last quarter of 2020 I was able to begin my final read through. I’m aiming to hand a draft to my beta readers in early 2021!
The Future
2020 is over. Good riddance and goodbye.
Will 2021 be any better? I hope so.
It will see the publication of Salvage Hounds, a book that I am beyond excited to share with you. I already have ideas for a second story, but, I also have a Soul Chaser Betty story that I’ve been eager to write. I don’t have the bandwidth to do more than one comic a year, so we’ll see which one gets my attention first. On the prose fiction front, once my novel is off to the beta readers, I plan on writing a short story set in the same world, as well as start plotting a sequel, all while figuring out how to get the first one into your hands (Self publishing? Traditional publisher? Not sure yet). Finally, I want to get back to doing some new illustrations this year and finally get some ideas out of my head and onto paper.
Thanks for following me on my adventures in creativity! I hope your 2021 will be a better year!
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