The Pick of the Day

As long-time readers of this blog know, in my Twitter feed I have a "Webcomics Pick of the Day" as a semi-regular feature. Some weeks I have more to share than others, but in the past week or two I feel that we've had some particularly tweet-worthy picks.

Thus, it's time for a special #pickoftheday edition of...

• In this post-fourth-of-July strip, Greg Dean of Real Life offers a useful lesson on physics and photography for those attempting to photograph fireworks. Informative and irascible!


• Toy Story 3 has made a well-deserved splash not only at the box office, but also among webcartoonists. I've seen a number of strips and reviews, but what stood out to me was this touchingly geeky tribute from Hijinks Ensue.
  (Also, if you haven't seen it yet, go see Toy Story 3.)


• In addition to its regular storyline and some timely Fourth of July tales, Axe Cop also brings a one-off spin-off introducing the Zombie Vampire Hunter team Jack and John. It's not the first time Axe Cop has addressed matters of theology, but Jack and John's story sheds further light on the nature of God and good vs. evil in the Axe Cop universe. You know I'm a sucker for religion in comics...


• Zorphbert and Fred, of Dawn Griffin's comic Zorphbert and Fred, have their own twitter accounts by which to provide an alien perspective on human culture--including their own Webcomic Picks of the Day. Lately they've taken a liking to Max vs. Max and the insights that it provides into the online dating experience. Zorphbert and Fred, you guys have good taste in webcomics!
  One thing I enjoy about Z&F's picks is that they regularly read an entirely different segment of webcomics than I do. If you're a twitterer, checking out their feeds (@Zorphbert and @and_Fred) can expose you to some good comics that you might otherwise not encounter. It's a good way to broaden your webcomic horizons.

C2E2: Part 2 of X, where X = (However Many of These I End Up Doing)

Meeting Chris Hallbeck of The Book of Biff for the first time

Our conversation more or less went like this.

When you are a cartoonist, you talk to people by putting together words and pictures. Most of our talking happens with noises we make from our mouths, so cartooning is kind of an unusual way to talk. Some cartoonists are equally at home talking with noises or with silly pictures, cartoonists like Tom Brazelton or Kris Straub, cool guys who generally seem at ease chatting with anyone, even perfect strangers who visit their booths at conventions or dudes they know wholly through the internet.

But some cartoonists are most comfortable talking through cartoons. Nothing's stopping these cartoonists from coming to conventions, and if you go up to their booth, it's not like awkward silence is a given or anything. But your conversation will probably be weird, and if they do feel completely comfortable talking, it's probably because they're talking with you about what you'd like them to sketch for you. At comic conventions, you can meet cartoonists from all across the social spectrum.

I met a lot of cartoonists at C2E2.

It was undeniably cool to meet Chris Hastings of Dr. McNinja fame. I got to watch him draw awesomeness onto a fan's interactive poster, we talked some about creating the kind of comics you want to read and finding something marketable inside your heart, and we had not one but two deliberately awkward silences. I talked with Evan Dahm, who has plans to develop his fictional world of Overside even beyond Rice Boy and Order of Tales. I talked to people whose work I'm familiar with, and I met some new faces too.

Ed Conley creates the comic Ed Contradictory, a bizarre foray into self-aware cartooning, in which the characters berate the cartoonist, search for new characters for the comic, and travel back in time to keep themselves from time-traveling. The central cast includes a cute-mascot panda bear, a gentleman scientist and the fellow gentleman scientist whose brain he placed inside a robot, a mercenary, and the Magical Booze Fish. It's utterly nuts and unabashedly anti-fourth-wall, and Ed Conley was wearing a necktie when I met him. That's pretty cool.

I also got to meet Dawn Griffin, creator of Zorphbert and Fred. Her comic is about two aliens who don dog disguises in order to observe and study humans, but I'm largely aware of her work because her two lead characters have been sharing their webcomics Picks of the Day via their Twitter accounts. Dawn and I talked about a whole crazy spectrum of things, from balancing your day job and your comic, to her illustration work for the Abby's Adventures children's books, to self-criticism and self-confidence and how it's a good idea to get up and actually do athletic things once in awhile. Dawn is a pretty cool person with a pretty cool comic.

Do I have more things to say about C2E2? Certainly. Can I find time to say them? We shall see.

Don't forget I got a new "I am a Purchasing Rockstar" strip going up at Borderline Boy tomorrow.