This weekend I have the honor of being on a panel discussing comic book writing in the esteemed company of Dr. Theresa Rojas, D. B. Andry, and Eben Burgoon, and moderated by Jameson Rohrer at StocktonCon Winter 2025. Our panel starts at 11:30am on Sunday, February, 2/16, to hang out and talk about making comics for an hour! I’m super excited to not only talk about comic book writing but to hear what my infinitely more qualified co-panelists have to say––I’m there to learn as well as to share my own experiences!
This was fun to draw and I’m glad (with the magical powers of Procreate––ugh––on the iPad) I’m able to share that process!
The video mostly talks about the idea behind the card and how it came to be. One thing that you’ll see is that a sketch for the drawing appears fully formed at the beginning; so, it’s not a full look at my process behind the drawing. What had happened is that I started the drawing in a different file, but I realized it was a template that was low resolution and not appropriate for printing. So, I took that sketch before it went too far and dropped it into the print-ready file and started from there. However, the actual final drawing––the characters, their poses, and the final background––all start and end in this video.
Due to my general fear as an artist, I often worry myself into delay, which takes forever for non-comic stuff to get drawn. Because of that, we alternated our New Year’s card for years between one that I drew versus one that had photographs of us and our animals. I figured a two-year cycle would be enough lead time take the stress off and allow me to get something drawn. However, last year’s card was a hit, and I really enjoyed drawing it, so ideas for a new card intruded despite 2025 being a “photo montage” year.
Again, it was really fun to draw caricatures of my wife and I and our pets doing the things that we love to do: there’s me vibing and playing guitar, my wife camping, my dog staring at food, and the cats getting into situations caused by their curiosity. The entire image was inspired by the maniacal expression my wife often gets when immolating marshmallows for s’mores (especially while camping). While initial sketches really captured that pyromania, I feel the expression softened a bit during the drawing process, though there is no doubt she is loving watching that marshmallow suffer.
We’ll see if this trend of always drawing a New Year’s card continues, but with it being very fun two years in a row, I’m actually excited to see what I’ll come with for next year’s card.
