IndyComicReview.com has posted a review of the preview chapter of Broken Chain I was selling last year at SPX.

I sent them the finished book last month, so hopefully they’ll get to review that too.

Did I mention that Broken Chain makes a GREAT Christmas gift??

I am back home from the Small Press Expo. Show went very well. I managed to sell around 27 books, and gave the rest out to publishers, retailers, and press. Big big thanks to Matt Silady for introducing me to a ton of people, helping sell my book, and keeping me laughing for those two days. Everyone go buy his book “The Homeless Channel“.
I also have good news for all 3 of you out there who have been waiting for it. You can now buy Broken Chain online over at lulu.com!

I’ll be posting a more thorough post about the weekend over at my livejournal soon.

I posted this over at my livejournal already, but just in case you don’t have that bookmarked and RSS feeded up, I’ll post it here too…

I realized soon after I uploaded the PDF to Lulu for printing and ordered a proof copy, that I had forgotten to properly order the PDF pages, and insert blanks, etc.

Too late. So I have a proof copy of Broken Chain here now that looks fine, except for the fact that it’s all in the wrong order. So the title page is on the left of the 2nd page instead of on the right side (page 3).

No biggie. The correct copy will be here next week (those guys are insanely quick! I put this order in on monday, chose a pricey 2-day ups shipping option, and got the book today. 4 days for all that? Awesome) for me to OK before I go and order the full batch for SPX.

Anyhow, the book looks great. I love that it ended up being the size (in thickness) that I initially had planned. That sounds sort of dumb, but early on I remember not wanting it to be something that could be stapled. I love perfect bound books.

Here are some crappy, blurry cell phone pics since I’m too lazy to get my real camera to take photos.

That page on the left is supposed to be on the right. That page on the right is supposed to be on the next page….

Wow, over a year since the last post here…

But ok, here’s where we stand: I am finishing up the last 15 pages this month, and the book will debut at SPX in October. I was going to post up the next 30 pages or so, but have decided instead to just focus on getting the rest of the book finished for this month, leaving me September to take care of printing, etc.

So once I get back from SPX, the entire story will be posted here online, and it will be available for purchase online too. 2 months!

I also recently bought a new tablet, which is much much better than my first in terms of speed and workable area. You can see some photos of it, and read up about that over at my livejournal page.

The 40 page preview of Broken Chain is finally online here.

It’s also linked on the right menu as well.

It’s viewable online and downloadable as CBR or PDF.

Go check it out!

(also, I coded the comic viewer in PHP a few hours ago, and my brain is sorta mush.  If anything breaks or isn’t working, please send an email or let me know somehow. Apologies in advance!)

The pen that came with my tablet is fat and more geared toward writing text than drawing of any kind. Lately, it’s been annoying me when I draw using it.

I’ve been very happy with my 12×12 Intuos Wacom tablet’s pen, but unfortunately, though Wacom makes both the Intuos tablet and the technology used in the Tablet PC, the pens are not interchangeable.

However, Wacom does offer a few pens on their site for Tablet PC users that are closer to the Intuos ones I love. I bought one on Amazon Monday for $35 or so.

So far it’s doing exactly what I wanted it to. I love it.

There is one small problem though, and that is that the stylus slot in my tablet it way too big for this new pen. Having to remember to carry this extra pen was not going to happen, and I would most likely lose it soon. So what I did was buy some velcro and added a small strip to both the pen itself and my travel portfolio case I carry the tablet it.

It works out pretty well, actully.

Here are some photos:

The Intuos pen (left) and the tablet pc pen (right)

A better shot of the velcro I added to the pen

You can view more photos over at my Flickr set.

And finally, here’s a short video showing how the pen is taken on and off the case. That small strip is stronger than I thought.

If you are getting errors when trying to comment, check out this site:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Enable_Sending_Referrers

particularly this section:

http://codex.wordpress.org/Enable_Sending_Referrers#How_do_I_Enable_Sending_Referrers.3F

Having referrers turned off will trigger the anti-spam thing in Wordpress and you won’t be able to comment at all.

Sorry.

I finally got a tablet PC to use as my mobile drawing/inking/coloring pad. It’s an HP tc1100. Perfect size (just smaller than a sheet of paper), the keyboard detaches so I can draw right on the screen alone, lightweight, etc.

Since I was sick all last week I lost lots of drawing time for Broken Chain, but now I can work while on the train commuting in to work!

I took a few short video clips with my camera and put together a 3 minute video that shows me working on the book. Page 16, to be exact.

You can see me drawing a panel fresh (since I didn’t like the pencils I had done for that particular panel) and later, drawing over my pencils and coloring.

It’s a sneak peek into my work process and what’s been eating up all my nights.

Enjoy.

Inking Broken Chain on a Tablet PC

This first two chapters will most likely be put online here this weekend sometime.

Stay tuned!

Still a whole lot to do on this site, but I’ve at least started to work with the customization of the wordpress theme.

I’m especially proud of the homepage flash with the random flies. Neat eh?