A Colourful Ghost From The Past.

I recently had to scan some old documents for reasons best not gone into, and one of them was my old college library card. I scanned it on the wrong setting at first, but kind of liked the effect I accidentally got, so I thought I’d share it here (or at least the photo.) If you ever wondered what I looked like ten years ago and with a reduce colour palette, it would look like above. I think it’s got a cool screen-print vibe about it.

You’re gonna need to wrap up warm as things head outside this week (or rather the weekend just gone) on Babayka-Lives.

The Mummie Returns.

I’ve actually been meaning to post this re-jig of an old sketchbook doodle from last year for a while now, but you know… the scanner’s on the other side of the room… my sketchbook was under a massive pile of books. yadda, yadda, yadda.

I went off the original sketch pretty soon after drawing it, so at first I just tried to strengthen the line work, but before long I had my markers out, and was adding colour, too. While it’s important to learn when to let an image go and not over render it, I actually think it looks a little bit better. I still don’t love this doodle, but at least now I can tolerate it. I re-jigged it into submission.

What with getting the web-comic going, and working on new sequential pages lately, I haven’t had much time for doing quick drawings in my sketch-book recently. I’m not saying there will be a Babayka: Book 2, but this week I did commit to buying a new hundred page folder for keeping these new pages in.

The Plot Sickens.

I think some webs are differently being spun in this week’s instalment of Babayka-Lives. 

As I mentioned on my deviantart account last weekend, I have actually done a piece of art to mark my page hitting 10,000-views. It just needs cleaning up and scanning, and it’s ready to go. No doubt I’ll probably post it on here too, but not until my account hits its target in a couple of months. So please be sure to check out my deviantart page, and help fatten up my page views, so I can post it ASAP. I don’t want to big it up too much, but this pin-up is one of my favourite things I’ve drawn so far in 2014. Dare I say it’s a little bit sexy.

Here’s how my page view counter looks as of now: 

Elevator Pitch.

It’s maybe not my strongest point, summing up my web-comic, but I recently had to write a small blurb for my Project Wonderful account, and I thought I’d share the results here. Think of it like an elevator pitch to sell the concept to a new reader. Mine currently reads:

“Ongoing horror web-comic series about the shadowy figure of Babayka, and the poor, unfortunate individuals who cross his path . Aided by his beautiful Brides, very few have lived to tell the tale of the monstrous Babayka, and his misadventures in his tucked away lair deep in the Russian wilderness. By UK comic book writer\artist Andrew Reed. Web-comic recommended for older readers.”

I heard it’s a good idea if you can get your web-comic pitch down to three words. This I haven’t been able to do yet, but it’s something I’m gonna be trying to figure out in the next few weeks. The closes I’ve got is:

“Survival Horror Pot-Boiler”

Which needs work (for a start, I’m not 100% sure ‘pot-boiler’ isn’t two words… but anyway.) The three word pitch is a work-in-progress, really.

Very much looking forward to watching this program tomorrow night. Wish there were a hell of a lot more inside comic-book artist’s studio shows on TV.

Sneaky Peek.

For anyone who can’t wait until Saturday, I remembered earlier today while signed into my deviantart account that I already had Page 28 up posted on there as a sequential sample page (best to avoid sequential sample pages on my devaintart account full stop if you don’t want any spoilers at all. Not that I posted any spoiler heavy pages, or even any pages from Chapter 4, but still…) There’s no word-balloons on it, so you’ll still need to tune into Babayka-Lives this weekend, but any eager beavers can follow this link and get an early peek.

Worth following this link if only to push my Deviantart counter closer to 10,000-hits. I’ve been working on something to post when I do reach that magic number, so that’s something to keep an eye out for later this year.

The Teddy Has Spoken.

Well, now the bear’s said it, it’s official… Tomorrow I’ll be posting two pages, but just a reminder that after that, I’ll be updating Saturdays only from the 15th. Considering we’re one chapter in now, and all the characters have been introduces (well… except you know who), I figure as a reader you’re either in or out at this point. Chapter one was very much the set up.  Now everyone knows the score, things can get a little darker and a lot bloodier in Chapter Two.  

A web-comic is an ongoing thing, and I’m slowly feeling like I’m getting organized now. I’ve still got a million things to do to get Babayka-Lives out there, but with the first Chapter finishing today, I feel like I’ve taken my first couple of steps and I’m well under way now. Hope people reading Brides Of Babayka feel the same way.

Please send any and all feedback to the usually Email address. I have readers, but I don’t know who a single one of them is yet? Currently you’re all just statistics on a webpage. So please, feel free to drop me a line and say “Hi!” If you’re feeling brave. I promise to respond to all (troll free) correspondences. Considering I’ve just unleashed my first ever cliff-hanger today, I’d love to hear what people thought?  

I’d like to end this blog post by asking for a moment of silence for poor Colin Mack. We hardly knew thee, Mr Mack.(Also I can’t remember if I mentioned it before, but I included the character sheets in the extra’s section at the back of the graphic-novel, as a bonus with the exclusive pin-ups and cover art for anyone sitting on the fence about buying the book, who might want to see those character sheets in print. There re-jigged from landscape to portrait, and I think they came out looking pretty snazzy.)

Page Upload Update.

There’s good news and bad news. The good news is I’ll be uploading three pages this weekend, instead of two. The last page of Chapter One on Saturday, then on Sunday, a solid black page with ‘Chapter Two’ written on it, and the first sequential page of the second chapter (complete with partial nudity.) The bad news is that next week I’ll only be uploading a page per week after that. I need to give myself some time to draw new pages when Brides Of Babayka ends, so I’ll be posting one page every Saturday from the 15th of March onwards. I really want to post something every week without hiatuses, rather than blow-my-wad (of reserved pages) and then go for weeks without posting anything as I draw new material. I’m playing the long game with Babayka-Lives, and part of that is no gap weeks or hiatuses if I can help it. Plus a page-per-week seems to be the norm judging by most other web-comics. 

It’s not a 100% certainty there’ll be a second Babayka book. We’ll just have to see how the next couple of years play out. But just so people don’t think I’m not doing any new artwork, here’s a photo I took on my phone recently to show I am generating new sequential pages. It’s in black-and-white because I got a new mobile for my birthday last month, and the camera had a black-and-white filter on it, and I wanted to test it out. It gives my snaps a classy look, I think. By-the-by, if you accidentally get a shadow outline of your head at the bottom of the photo, does it count as a selfie?        

Feeling The Love.

Maybe it’s because I’ve been running an ad campaign over on Project Wonderful these last few days, or (hopefully) maybe it’s because people have been reacting well to the climax of chapter one. But whatever the reason, this weekend I’ve got my highest site visits rating since starting my web-comic back in December, which was a nice surprise. I’m sure some of those hits were things like people looking for a place to dump spam and so on, but it’s a big buzz to know I have returning readers. It was a massive worry of mine that I wouldn’t be able to build up a readership with this web-comic, so I was really glad to see so many tune in this weekend. It feels very awesome to have an audience.

Anyone who hasn’t checked out this weekend’s action, should get over to Babayka-Lives, where things are going from bad-to-worse for poor Colin.