Frenzy

I've been working like crazy.  A bunch of different things like writing, drawing commissions, drawing pages for my anthology someday.  And at this rate I'm pretty happy, it's a good side thing and amounts to a bunch of totally different stories done in totally different ways.

I have about eleven comic stories I want to copywrite and I figure the best way to do that is to do short stories in those universes so I get a lock on those titles and concepts to revisit in the future.  It's also like planting my flag on that idea.  I love variety and totally different moods so all the stories are different genres and styles.  It will take a while but I'm already half way through one story and started on a next and that's just while I've been doing the computer work for my pitch.

Adobe

I spent one day reacquainting myself with lettering on the program Illustrator.  Then I experimented with my current scans.  Lettered the whole issue.  Then reedited my new scans.  And today I'm pasting the lettering on those old pages on to these new scans.  I also have to letter two pages which will take about twenty to thirty minutes.  I already lettered the cover, the Map title and credit page, and the cast list(my fantasy book influences really show through with that stuff, but why not expand the audience or be more reader friendly if you are able, and I am able).  It's really hard to get inspired to do it.  But there are moments, like after I did the cover, I was excited and did more pages.  Basically I'm done with the hard part and have that nervous anticipation that once I'm done with this lettering, I'm done for real.  It's ready to turn in.  Well, except for--

The Pitch

I really have to write it.  I have written a few.  One of the issues with me is that I have no interest in the common story structure.  Only because it bores me.  I search for satisfying ways to make the audience happy but not have the same story structure(The first book/season of game Of Thrones is fascinating precisely because of this).  I like to follow characters to their inevitable ends. It's the surprises that are fun.  It's all plotted and figured out intricately, but the trick is to make it magic.

Magic Of Storytelling

The magic is in how the world interests and surprises you.  I think a good story interests you, and then surprises you.  You have to like it, and then be surprised by how the characters change it all(for better or worse).  It's never about stuff happening to people.  It's about people doing things.  Making decisions good or bad.  A story can be about a villian as long as it is interesting(Breaking Bad, The Sopranos).  It has nothing to do with morality.  And the thing that makes it special are the unexpected, but inevitable twists.  The inevitable part is important.  It's the feeling that this isn't out of left field, this is supposed to happen.  That's a good ending.  

So me doing a story is me taking a journey, with points I have to get to, and an ending that is supposed to surprise and be inevitable.  It's not formulaic and it's not simple.  

I need to work over the next 24 hours to spell check and write this pitch.  It will only be one page.  I've read other pitches and it is immediately apparent that they are saying too much worthless information.  And luckily I finished a whole issue and lettered and inked it, which is at least fifteen more pages and several more stages than most pitches.  

But many times people get no reply or somehow are not looked at(it is an online submission form so you never know until you get a reply).  There are other people I will be sending it to so that is not my only avenue.  But still, people are busy and sometimes not quick so I can't get my expectations up about a quick reply.  

I will be sending it on Monday.  I gave it all I got, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Sitcom

I wrote 19 pages of script on Monday and Tuesday.  That's a shitload.  But it comes out when it comes out.  I know this because I can write like crazy at times.  And most writers I meet cannot.  I think it comes from my liking of short stories, the art of it, and the writers who do it well.  I sort of have a hard time writing short stories. I love including a little of everything.  I like thinking of all the various things I can do in whatever world my story takes place in.  So with short stories I have a really hard time fitting in everything.  This is apparent in most short stories I've written(there's a few that are simple).

So I wrote the second draft(most from scratch, but I had a ten pager that I recycled some dialogue from).  I just had to wait until the sew came together.  By stew, I mean how you put all the ingredients in the pot and the longer you let it simmer the better it tastes.  That's the reason to wait and not just write any old trash that comes out(also why I threw out nine pages of that first draft).  You sort of have to wait until you have so em inspirational spark of some sort.  Even a small one.  So I waited and at some point it came and I powered through a script.

It was for my acting group and basically voted on conceptually.  I pitched a nickelodeon type story with a dark edge.  The second draft got the specific mood I was going for and people seemed to like it so I guess we'll be filming it.  Doesn't sound like my style, but the weird/dark edge is clearly me.  I tried to see if there was any sort of Nickelodeon/Disney style sitcom I would ever watch and this is what I came up with.  And I'm one of the main characters.  Could be fun.

Anyway, more work to do. 

Adrian

P.s.: the first picture is of the under drawing for a painting commission.  Fully painted ones like that are $150.  Then two pictures of buddies I drew in costume during class(one of the best things about my school is all the dressing up...or down).