Robotboy

This is pretty much my favorite page from the newspaper batch. I think! I don't have much to say about it directly. It was a lot of work to draw but I think the visuals serve to the textual flow here pretty well. I'm not much of a writer (or at least I don't feel like one) and, let me be candid here, I don't feel like much of an illustrator either. This is a reason I am a comic artist. My drawings might not be stellar or my writing sublime, but I'm an okay combinatorial artist between the two. That's what most comic creators have going for them, being reasonably decent at two different crafts.

Enough about me, how about that robot boy. Have you noticed what a sad image it is, a vacant playground? An even sadder one is a playground with just one child there, alone. Steel yourself for the cruelty that follows is immeasurable, child.

For the lovers of comic art theory, note the open background panel that pervades the whole picture and on which the comic finally culminates on. The whole page is a cubist painting in this way, different viewpoints at the same time. Not so much literal time passes as spatial dislocation, until the end panel pulls it all together with a final symbolist reference.

A word about the robot symbol. This is a variation of the popular DESTROY ALL HUMANS! Red Robot. I think it was popularized by Diesel Sweeties, I am just now searching on Wikipedia about it. When I adopted it there was no Wikipedia. Usually it's portrayed like an emotionless destructobot bent on total human devastation (besides Bob Ross, who gets to live) but when I looked at its big red face with huge yellow eyes I just see a little kid so there you go. I've drawn this red robot a million times, it's not a pop culture reference anymore. It is mine, but in the interest of disclosure, I thought I'd mention it.

On other news, process post soon. Ptoing helped me with this wonderful little banner for the blog:



which I've attached as my signature in the forums I frequent. I don't know what else to do, so I've reverted to 1930 marketing practices "USE BRIGHT COLORS TO CATCH THE ATTENTION OF THE VIEWER" heh.

-Helm