Category Archives: comics

Art, books, comics, my art, Science, SF, tardigrade

All Things Tardigrade

Among the Moss Piglets: The First Image of a Tardigrade (1773) — The Public Domain Review

The very first drawing of the microscopic “water bear” by a theologian turned microscope explorer.

Source: Among the Moss Piglets: The First Image of a Tardigrade (1773) — The Public Domain Review

What If Tardigrades Were the Size of Humans?

Tardigrades: animals with superpowers

The smallest bears in the world have almost superhero abilities. Actually, they are not bears: water bears is the popular name of tardigrades. They are virtually indestructible invertebrates: they can survive decades without water or food, to extreme temperatures and they have even survived into outer space. Meet the animal that seems to come from another planet and learn to observe them in your home if you have a microscope.

How to find a pet tardigrade and care for it

https://boingboing.net/2021/06/20/how-to-find-a-pet-tardigrade-and-care-for-it.html

The Tardigrade is a wonderful microscopic animal. I love them. In I used them in an SF comic once. You can read the whole thing here for free, or buy my small anthology book on Etsy.

comics, my art, Science, SF

Astronauts could use Mars soil for 3D-printing on the Red Planet | Space

Martian soil could serve as a 3D-printing material, researchers have shown, meaning it could be used to manufacture items on the Red Planet. 

In a series of tests, Amit Bandyopadhyay, a professor at the Washington State University School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, and his team used simulated crushed Martian regolith to demonstrate its capabilities as a 3D-printing material.

The results may be crucial for future crewed missions to Mars.

This reminded me of a 2 page comic I did a while back, which shows 3d printing buildings in passing

See the whole thing here: link

Art, comics

Some Comics Printing Advice from Chip Zdarsky

My early comics, like Monster Cops, were black & white, which was an easier thing to manage. There was a period where I printed the FCBD books for the Toronto Comic Arts Festival, which was a nightmare, because they were in full colour and have multiple cartoonists submitting work. But the biggest things I learned were:

  • Lettering should be 100% black, no extra colours or it’ll get fuzzy. You want lettering to be crisp and readable.

  • If the lettering is on top of a colour, make sure the lettering is set to overprint. That means the colour will be laid behind it and the black will be printed on top of it. Otherwise it’ll print the colour with white knocked out where the lettering goes and you run the risk of white halo around the lettering.

  • Your total ink value should never exceed 300%. Like, say I have a rich black colour that’s made up of cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. If I make all those values at 100% of those colours, the ink load will be 400% and that’s just gonna soak the paper.

  • Adding Batman will increase your comic’s sales by 65%.

You’ll have to scroll down past all the royals crap, but the relevent stuff is above.

From his newsletter.

Art, comics

Steve Ditko RIP

I didn’t know Steve Ditko. I only met him through the pages of Spider-man, Dr. Strange, Hawk and Dove. In later years he developed Shade the Changing Man, and squirrel Girl for the big companies. His other characters include Mr. A, the Question, and many more.
He became a recluse and declined interviews in the 80sI think, and worked mostly on his own B&W comics.
He was found dead in his apartment on June 29th, and may have been dead for 2 days according to the police.

Here’s one from one of his Mr. A comics, and a tribute I did as a portrait of a friend.

Ditko
Ditko Mr. A
Damien as Dr. Strange
Damien as Dr. Strange Ditko Tribute

Art, books, comics

Jeanne & Modigliani: Paris in the Dark

A story that was quite common in the early 20th century, beautifully illustrated. A graphic novel not to be missed. You can only get it for Kindle or via Comixology right now, but the physical book is (supposedly) on its way.

[showbookcover isbn=”B07C3TCWPC” action=”amazon”]