blog: drawings

Here are a handful of the Roll-a-Sketch drawings I did for folks Seattle the other week!

Later this spring I will probably do a round of Roll-a-Sketches by mail, for folks who can’t make it out to a convention. I did it once before that way, and it was a ton of fun but also a lot of work!

If and when I do announce it, it’ll be for a limited window and I’ll tell the folks on my Patreon about it first.

I took out the commercial ads on this site, by the way (except for Project Wonderful ads, which don’t inject all kinds of weird tracker code into the website). Just had one too many complaints about something annoying auto-playing, or popping up on mobile, or generally making the site run slow.

Ads for years have been a bit of a necessary evil, but the money they provide is no longer worth having that garbage on my site, considering that their scripts get more invasive all the time. So I threw ’em out.

To replace the income the ads used to provide, I’m trying out site sponsorships through Patreon! There are two types of sponsorship opportunities now available as Patreon tiers. I’ll share the promotional messages of site sponsors here on the blog! Doing it on Patreon “keeps it in the family,” I think; it’ll be giving Wondermark readers with promotional needs the chance to reach other Wondermark readers, who by definition are tasteful, intelligent, and lest we forget, my mother. We’ll try it for just a bit and see if it’s a viable thing to continue doing.

In general, though, the commercially-served ads are gone for good, hooray!

SKETCH TIME! (Click the images for a closer look.) We’ll start with BATMAN VILLAIN + CHEERLEADER:

WIZARD + UNICORN + DALEK + LUGGAGE:

FANCY + ANGEL:

FAST FOOD MASCOT + EAGLE + MARKER + CELEBRITY:

DOUGHNUT + MASTERPIECE (my friend who works at the Getty Villa approved of this when I texted it to her):

And of course, DILBERT + FIREFIGHTER:

If you missed them, I’ve done some “deep dive” posts on Patreon writing at absurd length all about my favorite Roll-a-Sketches! Those posts are here.

And I just posted another Wondermark Archive Dive post for patrons only, that (and its free-to-read predecessors) are here! The new one is titled “Five Wondermarks That Could Improve The World.”

Here are a few of the Roll-a-Sketch drawings I did at San Diego Comic-Con this year!

And I’ll also be at Gen Con in Indianapolis, this weekend. I’m at the Blind Ferret booth, #2129! It’ll be my last convention of 2017.

Stop by and get your own drawing possibly as lovely as any of these (click the images for a closer look):

FARMER + RHINO:

ELEPHANT + MAD MAX:

SUPERMAN + STEAMPUNK + SPORTS + MUSICAL:

SHREDDER + PIRATE + STEAMPUNK + MERMAID:

And finally, CHICKEN + DOCTOR:

 

I went back to my collection of Roll-a-Sketch drawings (of which there are many, many that don’t make it here onto the blog) and put together a sort of BONUS PACK of never-before-seen entries!

And I also wrote some commentary on each, which is a new thing that I haven’t done before and which I frankly find fascinating. Perhaps you will too?

The post is available to all $5+ members of my Patreon! The patreonauts who support me and Wondermark and the other things I make for you are all cherished jewels of humanity to me, and if this BEHIND-THE-SCENES oversharing of drawings is of interest to you, I would like to make it a more regular thing.

[ PATREONAUT BONUS: A bunch of Roll-a-Sketch drawings! ]

Here are a few of the Roll-a-Sketch drawings I did in San Diego last week!

BUT FIRST: I want to thank the patrons who’ve supported Wondermark this month on Patreon! All of you are precious to me, and I appreciate your kindness more than I can say.

But I want to especially thank members of this month’s Cast Card Subscription Program: Miri B., Jack T., Rahul J., Scarlett L., Colin M., lograh, Michael I., Emily R., Brian M., Nicholas M., and Janet O. As top tier supporters, they deserve mention here where everyone can bask in their reflected glory.

These fine patreonauts, and many others, have my thanks and a promise of a firm handshake or mutual respectful nod if we ever meet in person.

Now, here are some drawings!! (Click any image for a closer look)

PANDA + DOG:

VADER + BEE + PHILOSOPHER + MOOSE:

New at San Diego was the introduction of a FULL COLOR OPTION at the Platinum Reserve level. Here by way of example is MILKSHAKE + MERMAID + GHOUL + TMNT [Ninja Turtle] + MOOSE + C-3PO:

This particular gentleman has for years brought around a sketchbook with captions pre-written on the top of every blank page — as a challenge for the artist to draw something matching the caption. Here is BEAR + ANTELOPE + HE-MAN + YAK:

Thanks to these fine folks and many others who dropped by in San Diego!

Want a strange but haunting drawing of your very own? My NEXT stop will be Gen Con in Indianapolis, this coming weekend!

I’ll be hanging out at the Blind Ferret booth, #1437, along with a whole plethora of pals such as Sam Logan, Jeph Jacques, Kory Bing, Alina Pete, and Phil Foglio.

I’ll also be repping T-shirts from TopatoCo pals Kate Beaton, Ryan North, KC Green and more, so come take a browse!

KC even let me make a wooden magnet out of his world-famous flammable dog:

We’ll have them at Gen Con, booth 1437! See you there!!

Here are a few of the many Roll-a-Sketch drawings I did at Maker Faire this year!

Thank you to everyone who came by and said hello; I saw a lot of returning faces. Maker Faire is a super fun environment to be immersed in for a few days — you’re surrounded by robots, and art cars, and 3D printers, and drones, and everyone’s just interesting. I had many lovely and surprising conversations with creative folks.

I have never been to any of the other, subsidiary Maker Faires — only the flagship show in San Mateo, which has a wholly enclosed, Vatican-City-style craft fair section that is technically what I am there as part of. But in the coming year I hope to make fewer papergoods and more tangible “weird things” so who knows, there may be room for me at another city’s Maker Faire yet.

FLAMINGO + TELEPHONE:

BLENDER + ROLLER DERBY:

SNOWMAN + BUG:

PUNISHER + 8-BALL:

VEGETABLE + VIKING + BATMAN + CINDER BLOCK:

BLENDER + COP + BUTLER + BEAR:

WALRUS + HELICOPTER + DOLPHIN + 8-BALL:

ALSO: We’re getting close to the end of May, which means it’s time to reveal the Wondermark Cast Card that’ll be going out to Patreon subscribers!

This month’s card features Boutrous, the camel from the classic Wondermark #558, “In which a Camel is merely ordinary”.

(This particular comic was also narrated in audio form by voice actor SungWon Cho, here. It’s…super good.)

The monthly Patreon Cast Card subscription, so far, has been going out to a HIGHLY EXCLUSIVE GROUP. Later in the year, there will be another new “achievement” Cast Card that you’ll be able to get in a different way… And of course, the Roll-a-Sketch “Patron of the Arts” card is available at all my convention appearances this year.

Thank you very much to all you Patreonauts, at any level! We’re very close to a $500 goal that will prompt the start of a monthly annotation series, in which I go back through the archives and puzzle out just what I was thinking for comics deep in the archive.

Last month we crossed the THIRTEEN YEAR MARK with Wondermark. A decade ago, I was a very different person, in a very different place in my life. I don’t write comics the same way now as I did then, mostly for the better (I hope), but who knows. I think it’ll be interesting to go back and interrogate my younger self. That’ll become a monthly thing once we crest $500 on Patreon.

I am very grateful for your support via any method: Patreon, the store, saying hello at a show, or just a word to a friend. I’m thankful for every kindness — it’s always been, and continues to be, a privilege to do this for you, and by reading this you are by definition a Cool Person with Good Taste.

NICE

WORK