Big fat life/work update

Hi Patreon supporters,

It's time to give you an update as to what I've been working on!

Rolling a whole bunch of miscellaneous news into this big post, broken up under the headings below:

Parenting / life update

As you probably gleaned from my earlier Patreon updates, 2023 was a year where I largely adapted to the task of being a first-time parent.

This involved lots of hands-on time looking after our son, including lots of days where I was the one solo parenting at home while my wife went to work. At one point I was able to have 1 day per week in the studio, and the other 4 weekdays were spent parenting.

Our son is now 1¼ years old, and doing excellently. Walking, but not yet speaking any intelligible words. Which is lovely phase that I'm happy to luxuriate in for now!

As you can see, he doesn't mind getting dirty while out and about.

My wife and I have now gotten into a work/life/daycare routine whereby we each get to work four days per week. Three days at paid daycare + one day of us each independently caring for our son + the weekend together as a family.

This new ability to work four days per week feels like a godsend. The consequence is that whereas I only dared to work on smaller projects during 2023 (such as the production of my 'greatest hits' comic books available in my comic book bundle), in 2024 I have been able to dedicate significant time to working on my biiiig project...

The Town Without Television

Yes, I have been able to dedicate extended brainpower towards The Town Without Television, a project that I left largely untouched during my 2023 'year of parenting'.

Re-reading my earlier work on The Town Without Television with very fresh eyes at the start of 2024, I saw that there is lots of great material in the book. It is a totally worthy of being my first full-length book.

My major task this year has been adapting the scope of the project from the web-scale early chapters, towards something that feels natively book-scale.

What do I mean by this? With website-published content, there is an underlying need to get to the point as soon as possible. Creators need to hook their readers immediately, or they will simply close the tab and read something else. However, when a person has made the decision to read a graphic novel, there is a little extra latitude for expansiveness from the comics artist. The artist can let the reader marinate in the story for a little longer than would be appropriate for a website-published story.

So, I've been taking my earlier drafts of my Town Without Television project and expanding it outward like an accordion. Paying particular attention to the 'page turning' moments of the story, so that each of the double-page spreads of comic artwork work as a combined unit, with an appropriate moment for the reader to turn the page.

All of this is very time-consuming, with very little to show an outside observer. But the wheels are turning.

After realising that the scope of the project was too big and unwieldy to manage in a standard MS Word file, I took the time to download and install the software Scrivener, which is aimed at writers who are working on large projects. This software has proven invaluable for me, allowing me to easily visualise and rearrange the order of ideas in my book. (Check out Scrivener's 2-minute introductory video if you'd like an overview of what sets it apart from traditional word processing software).

After rearranging the ideas of my storyline in Scrivener, I then turned to my illustrating software Clip Studio Paint, to set up some page templates that I can use when drawing my artwork. This has involved making lots of crucial early decisions about page layout, including the text size, margin sizes, border thickness, etc. All pretty daunting as a first-timer, but I think I've made some sensible decisions.

True to the maxim "if you're going to steal, steal from the best", I decided to steal the page dimensions of my book from Kate Beaton's Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands (2022), which is one of the very best comic books that I've read in recent years. As well as having great content, the book had an excellent 'hand feel' for me as a reader. Not too big, not too small. My publisher is able to print books in any size that I ask for, so I have asked for it to be printed in the same dimensions as Ducks.

After lots of trial and error, I made some test pages, with double-page spreads of artwork from my website comics, refashioned to the dimensions of Ducks.

(I deliberately chose to do page layouts with some of my existing page artwork that I found a little on the 'boring' side. The pages where it is the data of the Notel experiment that is leading the dance, rather than interesting imagery of the town, Tannis, etc. I was hoping that if I could make the layouts work with those 'boring' pages, it will be a good sign that I can make it work with all pages of my project).

To simplify things in the future, I've made some page templates that will allow me to choose from common panel arrangements, without having to dream it all up on every single page. Here is a look at the grid with the page divided into increments of thirds and fourths, which are common layouts that I'll use within my book.

Once again, all of this work doesn't look like much to an outside observer, but I feel like I am making very valuable progress on my book, with a stack of work that is laying the foundation for the project.

Other comics artists have told me that it is the high-level planning stages of a book-length project that take up the most brainpower, and then the later artwork stages flow freely after these early decisions have been made. Let's hope that they are right!

Stay tuned for more updates on this process, but rest assured that your Patreon donations are definitely keeping me energised as I undertake this vital creative work on The Town Without Television.

Upcoming matched crowdfunding campaign

Some exciting news is that recently I have been approved for a matched crowdfunding, backed by the Australian government.

My longer-term readers will remember that I've done this before: in 2016 and 2018 I ran success crowdfunding campaigns whereby my reader donations were matched by the Australian government. Each time, I received an extra $10,000 of government funds on top of the $10,000 that I was able to raise from my readers.

Plus I released a few memorable crowdfunding videos...

My readers loved donating to me, knowing that their donation would be doubled by the Australian government. Additionally, Australian donors get a DGR certificate that they can use as a tax deduction in their ATO tax return.

Well, I'm about to do it all over again. I'll soon be shooting videos promoting this new 2024 opportunity.

If you wanted to do me a favour, you could be an early donor to this new fund via my project page. As I've mentioned in Tip 7 of my blog post with tips for running a crowdfunding campaign, the early donations to a campaign are worth their weight in gold to a creator. It is so important to have the early 'icebreaker' donors who will take you from, say, "0% funded" to "5% funded". Ideally creators should get their true fans to be the early donors, laying the foundation for the more casual fans who make the later donations that nudge them closer and closer to 100%.

You'll hear more about this new matched crowdfunding opportunity in the coming months. (Right now my crowdfunding page only has a placeholder video with general information about my Town Without Television book, not specific to the new matched crowdfunding opportunity).

But, as mentioned, I'd really love if you could be one of my early donors to this matched campaign before it gets into full swing. Donate via my ACF page, and know that your contribution will be doubled by the Australian government.

My work exhibited in Luxembourg

My comic Energy Slaves is being exhibited on permanent display in Äerdschëff in Luxembourg.

Äerdschëff is an environmental learning centre in Luxembourg built using the principles of the Earthships pioneered by Michael Reynolds. The building is built with re-purposed and sustainable materials, like earth-packed used tyres. The building hosts a variety of workshops and events, relating to environmentally-friendly living.

Luxembourg is a country with three official languages: French, German, and the national language Luxembourgish. (Äerdschëff is the translation of “Earthship” in Luxembourgish.) Besides the three official languages, English is also commonly spoken. The team behind Äerdschëff asked me to provide them with the German-language translation of Energy Slaves (Energiesklaven), and they have printed versions of the English and French language comics on hand for people who prefer those languages.

The photos show my comic broken up into six frames, displayed on easels. The frames have since been mounted on the walls, but I do not have any photos of the new installation to share at the moment!

My work exhibited in India

7,500 kilometres away from Luxembourg, my comic Peak Oil is currently being exhibited at the Science Gallery Bengaluru, in the city that is also known as Bangalore.

The gallery is part of the network of international Science Galleries, which each holds various artistic exhibitions and lectures with a view to science outreach and art-science collaborations. At present, there are Science Gallery locations in seven cities around the world.

My comic Peak Oil is being displayed as part of the current CARBON exhibition that is on display in the gallery between 28 November 2023 to 31 July 2024, highlighting the role of energy and carbon in our modern world.

As you can see in the bottom photo, my artwork is displayed next to an art installation titled Energy Slave Tokens by Disnovation & Baruch Gottlieb. More info here.

The Energy Slave Tokens consists of a series of weights made of bitumen, which are the energy equivalents to specific quantities of physical human labour time: an hour, day, week, month, and year of human effort. The different sizes are scaled according to the different amounts of energy that would have been needed to create those weights. (This is a similar concept to my Energy Slaves comic, which was a possible piece that we earlier discussed displaying in the gallery before settling upon Peak Oil.)

Ongoing markets stalls around Canberra

Although my comics work is still my major focus, I also have my sideline art project selling my Canberra Birds greeting cards, postcards, and art prints. As well as selling these through my online store, I occasionally appear at markets events around Canberra.

My two next confirmed appearances will be at the Handmade Markets on 6-7 April (this weekend!), as well as at the National Museum Markets on 4-5 May.

Come along and say hi if you are in Canberra and want to attend one of those markets events! It is always interesting to chat with people. Last time I was surprised to have someone show me that they had one of my Canberra Birds artworks as the desktop background of their phone. Interesting to know that I am a part of that person's life in that specific way.

That is almost as surprising as the time in 2021 when a guy from Brazil messaged me to show me the St Matthew Island reindeer tattoo on his elbow (see below - it is partially cut off in the photo).

Can't say that I saw that one coming...

Podcasts

Finally, thought I'd plug some interesting podcasts that I've recently dug.

Yesterday I listened to some great podcast episodes from ABC's Conversations series. On a serious note, ecologist David Lindenmayer talking about his work as an scientist, and the work done to preserve the habitat at Mulligans Flat near Canberra. On a lighter note, I loved the episode with writer David Goodwin talking about amusing tales from his years working the graveyard shift at service stations. Lots to discussion about what strange spaces petrol stations are, and the eccentric people that they attract during the early hours of the morning.

I've also been digging the Comic Lab podcast, whereby two American comics artists talk about some of the decisions that they use to stay afloat as independent creators. A good mixture of art and business discussion. Perhaps a little too 'inside baseball' for non-artists to appreciate, but it gets me into a nice thoughtful place.

That's it for now. Will update you next month!