Nachos

It's been a while since my last post. And I know that (all seven of) you can't function without getting to read comics on blog. So I thought I better help you out and post something up.

OK, OK you don't actually need a posting from me, but I do feel somewhat bad when I neglect the blog for a bit. I just haven't been able to make the time to sit down and draw, and then post. I've actually been sitting on this comic for a week or two now. I the lack of me regularly drawing these characters is showing too. These frames aren't consistent with each other at all. But hey, the joke is still funny. Well to me at least.

A big part of the reason I've been posting less frequently is just how busy I've been with other projects this semester. I was heavily involved with I-News this semester working as a producer, you can check out my video projects at my other blog. I also took an HTML class this semester and spent a good chunk of time designing some websites. The main one being my portfolio. It's still a work in progress. I'm adding content and still trying to get things to look right, but I'm fairly happy with it. Well, to be honest I'm already thinking about overhauling it, but I need to find the time to do that and find a design that I like better as well.

You'll find the other sites I designed this semester under the web design tab. The first one is really a rough looking site. The second I'm happy with but I used some fonts that aren't common to most computers so chances are you'll be seeing it in the second or third choice of font, which is not as strong as my first. I have my last class project site finished though it's not yet linked on my portfolio. It can be seen at paul-e-reilly.com/lessons. There are some typos and a few other things that I need to iron out on that site too, but I'm happy with the overall look of it.

My other blog will be receiving more updates soon. I'm covering the dedication of the new auditorium here on the BYU - Idaho campus for I-News. That includes a press conference and the actual dedication. So those will be up. I also produced a short documentary on the Legacy Flight Museum in Rexburg, Idaho for my senior project. That will be up there soon as well.

The semester is coming to a close. I have my last two finals on Thursday, which considering it's only 10 minutes from midnight I guess that means they are pretty much going to go down today. Wish me luck.

Peanut Butter

The fact that the peanut butter you get when you buy a jar of Reese's Peanut butter is not like the peanut butter found in the candy seems almost like false advertising. But then again it would be pretty gross to eat the candy peanut butter on a sandwich so maybe its a good thing.

I've updated my other blog. You'll find my latest news package there as well as a link to the latest full I-News show that I produced. Check it out.

Flying

The latest full I-News Show that I produced is now up. A link can be found on my other blog, or you can just go to byuicomm.net and check it out now.

I picked up Guster's newest album "Easy Wonderful" the day after it's release and have been listening to it almost non-stop. The title is right, the album is wonderful. There is one song that doesn't do much for me, but the other eleven tracks are excellent. I highly recommend checking it out. And hey you can preview most of the album for free thanks to the Easy Wonderful website where Guster has been posting music videos for each song. My three favorite song off the album all have videos up. They are "Architects and Engineers", "What You Call Love", and "Jesus and Mary".

Time Travel

When I was working at Hobby Lobby this summer the Christmas stuff started going up in July. . . and the Halloween stuff started going up the next aisle over.

Elephant on Couch

I have a new video up on my other blog. It's about the seven cities open house that happened here on campus this past week. I'm currently working on getting my first show that I produced for I-News online. I've been having some difficulties. But when I get it up I will post on my video blog about the whole experience and include a link directly to it. You can check out all of I-News at byuicomm.net. I produce a show every other week.

I went with a friend to Sammy's, a new burger joint in Rexburg, last night. Sammy's apparently has another location in Provo. It opened a couple of weeks ago here. The reason that I went was to see Allred play. Sammy's has a side room for performers to do shows in. Since I was there though I tried the food. I had a chicken sandwich called a "Hey Nikki Your So Fine". Basically its a grilled chicken sandwich with BBQ sauce, lettuce, tomato, and two onion rings on it. It was delicious. I also tried one of their pie shakes. The pie shakes are apparently their claim to fame. They blend a piece of pie right into your shake. Not low calorie by any stretch. But it was good. Not the best I've had. I think that I'll be happy with drinking soda when I go back. I'll skip the shake.

Allred was great too. I've been enjoying Allred and his music for a couple years now. His shows have always been interesting since he overdubs on stage. Recording bits then looping them to create a full song by himself. This show he was backed by a band for a good number of songs. He just released his latest album called "All We Are." On the album I think he uses the band to back him. It's his best album to date. More upbeat than his past offerings. The band adds a nice dimension too. He still did some looping on stage by himself. But the band added a nice element -- read, more energy -- to a number of his old songs. I've mentioned Allred on this blog before and if you haven't checked him out yet then take a look at "All We Are."

Fun Sized

This has nothing to do with fun sizes but I can say that Abba Mania is a great show. I wound up going to the show with two of my reporters that were covering it to give them a hand. I enjoy the filming and interview part of making stories and I'd be with two people that are pretty cool so I expected to have a decent time. I did not really expect to enjoy the Abba show so much though. Surprisingly I did, it was a ton of fun. If you see it come your way then you might consider going.

For the Birds

It feels like its been a while since I've posted. And it has been more or less. Two weeks or so since the last post and I wasn't very good at posting over the summer. I'm going to work on getting stuff here a little more regularly again.

I'm back at school starting my second to last semester. My classes seem like they should be all right but that after only attending each of my classes once. I'm also starting my job here as an I-News producer. Honestly that is what I am most excited to be doing this semester is I-News. I'll keep you posted on when my first show will be up so you can check it out.

Amazing Adventure

It's been a while since I posted a comic and it may just be another week or two without one after this one. I'm headed back up to school soon. My internship was great. I received full credit from the university and had people at the station say I could use them as references and that they even recommended that I be hired if I back around looking for a job. Good stuff.

This will be my last week framing at Hobby Lobby. I liked working in the frame shop over the summer quite a lot. It's a fun job. My replacement has been hired and I'll be working with her over the next week.

Mockingjay the final Hunger Games book hit shelves on the 24th and I breezed through my reading of it. It's a bit different from its predecessors in the way that it moves. It is a war book. I liked it quite a bit, it is a strong ending to the series. It reminded me a bit of Ender's Game which is not a bad thing. If you haven't been reading the Hunger Games I highly recommend the series.

Shifty Eyes

My sister's question: "Why a roadrunner?"

My answer: "Why not?"

Fourth of July

Happy Fourth!

Even though the fourth is almost past at the time that I'm posting this I thought I ought to get something up to mark it.

I had a pretty good week this past week. I now have a much needed job working at Hobby Lobby in the framing center. I officially start on Wednesday but I'll be heading in Monday to fill out some paperwork and to watch some training videos. It should be good.

My internship continues to go well. I'm having a blast at the station getting to see everything that goes on and following reporters or writing stories for the nine p.m. show. It's all good fun.

My brother, a friend, and I caught The Last Airbender this weekend. It's getting reamed by critics but I'm really not entirely sure why. It's a decent movie, not great, but enjoyable. It could stand to be a bit more light hearted and the dialogue could stand to be punched up. It's a little heavy on exposition; the characters seem to spend a lot of time explaining the rules of the world. But the actions scenes were fun and the special effects are solid if unspectacular.

We saw it in 2D which is the way it should be seen anyway. Not just because 3D is a pointless distraction, but because like Clash of the Titans this is a movie that was shot in 2D and then converted to 3D and apparently they did not do a good job with the conversion. (That's what I read anyway.) That may be one reason why the reviews are so poor. I have my suspicions, though, that a big reason why the reviews are so bad is because its written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan. Shyamalan seems to be the popular director to hate now. After his last two movies, which were admittedly bad, I'm noticing more and more people are bad mouthing him and his film making skills. Some even claiming that he hasn't made a good movie, but I think most will agree that The Sixth Sense, Signs, and Unbreakable were good movies. You don't have to rush out to see this movie but there are worse ways you could spend your money at the theater.

Hockey

Daisy

I haven't come up with an idea for Steve's computer in a while. In fact I still haven't, my brother came up with this one and wrote the script for it. So it's his script my drawings. I'm surprised I hadn't thought of this one. The scene in 2001 where Hal sings "Daisy" is one of the best. I had modeled Steve's computer on Hal, but the thought to parody that scene never occurred to me. I guess that shows that my brother is a smart kid.

Roger Ebert found some interesting videos on why Hal 9000 sang daisy in 2001.

My family and I caught Toy Story 3 on Saturday. If you have not yet seen it may I ask why not? I mean it's been out for four days already and it is the best movie of the year so far. We all enjoyed it immensely. It manages at least to be the equal of its predecessors which for the third movie in a series is no small feat.

My internship is going well. Everyday that I go in I don't really know what I'll be doing that day. And that is not really a bad thing. So far I've been out with reporters, photographers, sat down the with producers, I've written VOs for the 9 0' clock, and have researched stories with reporter. From hearing the people who work at the station talk, it sounds like only two weeks in I'm having a much better internship experience then many of them did. So not bad.

No comic

No comic today. I'll have one up next week. I found myself starting another drawing today rather than doing a comic. The other drawing is not yet finished but will be on my Deviant Art page when it is finished. I'll put a link up to it.

I started my internship last week. It was fun to get a view of how things go at the news station here. I'll be going in twice a week for the next few months. Good times ahead I'm sure.

Ducks in a row

I would have had this one up yesterday but Photoshop started to act funky and wouldn't let me color.

I hope everyone had a great memorial day. Mine was excellent. My family spent the day at the zoo something I haven't done since I was kid. It was nice to walk around and check out the exhibits.

I start my internship today. It's election day for the primaries. Should be fun.

Shapes in the Clouds

Well I managed to get this one up even if it is a bit later than what I usually shoot for. I may wind up posting regularly again if I keep this up.

I'll be starting my internship at KRQE Channel 13 next week. I went in this week and got all the paperwork finished up. It will be good to get started.

Just a feeling

Its been a while since I posted anything. I had misplaced my sketch book and so I couldn't find the comics I had to upload. I have found it though and so now I should be back to posting regularly. The coloring in the first and last panels is kind of funky. Since I've stopped doing the frames on the initial drawings I think I didn't draw enough on those panels.

Call in sick

Steve shows up much less than some of the other characters I do. I really haven't come up with much for him to do. But he is the only one of my characters with a discernible job, so I thought about what other comics do with jobs and Dilbert came to mind. Which may be partially the inspiration for this one. I also thought back to my days making calls for surveys for inspiration on this one. I thought it would be good to have a series of Steve thinking aloud to himself how he should call in sick which I thought about doing numerous times as I walked to the call center. But somehow I always wound up there, and I worked a full shift and earned the money they were
paying me.

It was fun as I really didn't plan this one out beyond there would be different scenes of him finding some reason to call in sick and then just put down what came to me as a I went. I may do more with the coloring on this one. I had planned to but when I had finished the colored squares I thought it actually didn't look too bad. I may change my mind though and do more coloring. I saved the working file just in case.

*Update*
I went in and did more with the coloring than I did originally. For some reason I liked the loose monochrome frames when I first laid them down, but with each passing day I liked them less and less. So I finally decided that it was time to finish up the coloring on this one. The frames are now clearly defined and more colorful in general.

I may also have an internship at KRQE which is very exciting. I am incredibly excited to be working there. There is still some paperwork I need to do so to get started there, and I have to wait on the school for part of that. But I think it will go through. EXCITING! I will be working at a TV Station!

No comic

No comic this week. Due to my finals which were followed by traveling from school to home I have not had time to finish up a comic for this week. I should have one up next week I should think.

No Pockets

Happy Easter! I had a great Easter do in part to my awesome cousin. Thanks again!

You can see my last story that I did for I-News on the I-Comm website here

The trailer for Shark Brown, the TV pilot I was a part of making is up on the Shark Brown Blog, I've also embedded it on my other blog.

How Suessical

Good ole Dr. Suess, the creator of Wockets which of course always reside in pockets. I drew this one without frames but added them in as I colored. I think it looks good with the differently shaped frames against the black background. Not drawing frames in the first place actually give quite a bit of freedom on how to draw frames later.

There is a now a blog for the TV pilot that I'm a part of making. You visit it at www.sharkbrown.blogspot.com. The blog was put together by one of my group members Doug, who also did the story on our project for I-News. We wrapped shooting on the project this weekend, and we have head start on post production. We're going to hold a premiere for the pilot on April 7th in the Spori building here on campus. If you are anywhere near Rexburg at that time you are invited to attend.

I also have a new story up on my other blog that is about the Mechanical Engineering seniors and the "Capstone" projects they are working on. It's pretty cool I think.

Digging Myself Deeper

I've decided that I'm not going to draw my comics in frames for a while. Maybe for here on out. I like the process of not having frames quite a bit. It is quite freeing, we'll see how long I stick with it. I may add frames in as I color for some, but that it why there are no frames on this comic.

I have links to my two latest bits for i-News up on my other blog. You can check them out if you want.

I'm also working on a TV pilot currently. We should wrap up filming by next weekend. Once we're done with that I think we should be able to get a trailer together and I'll get that up for you to view as well.

I saw Alice and Wonderland last night. I enjoyed it thoroughly. You're probably aware by now that this is not really a adaption of Alice in Wonderland or Through the Looking Glass but rather a sequel to them. I thought both Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter and Helena Bonham Carter as the Red Queen were magnificent in their roles. The movie was funny, and of course being from Tim Burton it was visually stunning. If you haven't seen it yet I'd definitely recommend that you catch it.

Storage

I didn't have anything drawn for this week, so I was going to go without posting. But after finishing reading Catching Fire the second book in the Hunger Games trilogy (I find myself wanting August to come faster so I finish the trilogy which I am liking so far) I was in a drawing mood. I drew a drawing I'm quite happy with that will likely appear somewhere sometime. And then I did this. Other than the Penguin (which I am happy with) the rest of it I don't think is my best work but it made both me and brother laugh so hopefully it does the same for you.

Elephant returns

Just a quick little drawing today. Amy gets her first new outfit in this one. I don't know what prompted me to change from her usual pink shirt deal but I did.

I have a link up to the latest VOSOT I did for i-News up on my other blog. I also forgot to post the link last week for my video on tuning a guitar that is up there. So if you're interested you can check those out.

I discovered a new band this week. I went to show this weekend and one of the bands playing, Spondee, turned out to be a nice discovery. They put on a great show and their music is nice and fun. My brother bought their CD and they gave us snap bracelets with the purchase. Snap bracelets! Anyone remember those? They are on iTunes and are worth a look.

I also caught Sherlock Holmes this week. It was fun. Robert Downey Jr. was spot on, I thought, and very fun as Holmes. There is more fighting and general action than I would expect from a standard Holmes story but considering that this is an original story simply using the character and that action movie director Guy Ritchie is at the helm this is perhaps to be expected. Fun.

Out of place

I didn't do the background. The interior design students have their display up in the campus art gallery, and they had some pages for students to color to the "place" furniture in. I picked up a sheet and drew William in it, and then decided I wouldn't hang it. So I took it home and since I didn't have a comic for this week I decided that I'd color this up and make it my post. I hope you like it.

Dish Fairy

A roommate of mine thought this comic came about because I got stuck doing the dishes for everyone for a week, but actually I thought of it when I came home and the dishes were already done. The dish fairy had paid me a visit.

This was a pretty good week. We shot both episodes of our news magazine show "Just Like You". The first one was a little rough but turned out to be pretty good. We had a live musical performance from one of the students we were profiling that episode and my roommate showed up to accompany him. That was cool. What was even cooler is that we where running short by about 2 minutes and he did a us a solid and sat down to do a short interview so we could fill the time. It was very cool of him. The second episode was pretty much flawless when we shot and I was very happy for that. I will keep you posted on when the episodes will be available.

I did a VOSOT for i-News this week. Which means I shot some video to play while our anchor read a quick story I wrote and the story featured a brief interview as well. On my other blog you'll find a link to the iComm website where you'll see the video as it aired, as well as a version I did with myself doing the VO.

Empty Swing

No real joke here today. I came up with this idea at the same time that I did this one. I decided that I would run it some day and well now here it is. I still haven't built up much of a . . . fore-log (?) whatever you would call an advance catalog.

Oh, and its Valentines Day today. Hope you're having a good one. I should have some video up on my other blog next week. We're shooting our news magazine show next week too. I don't think I can put my segment on my blog. I'll have to check on that, but it should be going up onto the school website at some point. I'll keep you posted.

Watermelon Juice

I'm almost late. Well maybe I am late, while I am still technically posting this on Monday, it's basically Tuesday now. I colored this more sparingly so that I could get it up here before it was officially Tuesday, there may be too much white as a consequence.

This was inspired by hearing some guys who were stocking the juice in the grocery store talk about how they now carried watermelon juice. I figured that I should include at least one of the regular characters in the strip since these two grocery store employees aren't likely to re-appear. As I look at it now I don't know if that was my best decision. It's supposed to be that Ben is overhearing this but that idea only came to me by the second panel so now I look at it and think it just looks weird. Oh well.

I don't have any new video up on my other blog as I haven't been getting any video assignments but I'll let you know when something does go up.

No comic this week

No comic this week. I've fallen behind, I was ahead of myself, but now I've fallen behind. I started to do a comic earlier today, but I found that my pen was out of ink. I'll likely pick up a new pen tomorrow. I'll try to get back ahead of myself again.

I have a new video up on my other blog. This time I'm covering the auditions for the upcoming Acoustic Cafe show here. I was told that there were some problems with the playback so I'm going to upload the video to Youtube and then embed it into the post.

I should have something up here next week so check back next Monday.

Pockets

There wasn't a whole lot that went on with me this week. It was a good week, but nothing really to report. I am starting to get to work on my video projects. So I have a story that I'm working on for I-news that will be shown on Thursday, and I will even be on camera. You can subscribe to I-news (that's BYU -- I's newscast) on iTunes. Just search BYU-I or even I-News and it should pop up. I'm planning on posting the video projects I do this semester on my other blog as well. I hope your week is awesome.

Penguin

This week was a week of movie watching for me. My school projects are still in the planning in the planning stages so I haven't had a lot of work out side of class just yet. So I wound up seeing three movies this week.

First The Princess and the Frog- which has the distinction of being the first hand drawn film from Disney in a long time and having their first black princess. This is all anyone seems to talk about when they talk about this movie. It's a good one actually, it was quite funny and it looks great. The songs are not particularly memorable. I couldn't have hummed you a single one as soon as the film ended but they weren't grating or really all that bad. So that's two years in the a row that Disney has released a good animated movie with 2008's Bolt and now The Princess and the Frog. I hope they are able to keep this up.

Second Whip It - Apparently my friends haven't been getting too much homework yet either, because I found myself going with a friend and my brother to Whip It. Whip It is a comedy about a girl who joins a roller derby league without her parents knowing. It's directed by Drew Berrymore and she plays a small role in the film as well. Ellen Page stars. And it's a lot of fun, the girls in the roller derby league all take on aliases that sound both feminine and violent and funny. Smashly Simpson, Babe Ruthless, Rosa Sparks. The movie thankfully explains how roller derby works and while the roller derby is prominent like the best sports movies that's not all there is to it. This one was my favorite out of the movies I saw this week.

Lastly The Fourth Kind - We saw this one more out of obligation. When my friend heard that there was a movie called the fourth kind coming out she asked me what the fourth kind was. We researched it and learned that a close encounter of the fourth kind is an alien abduction. Since we did all that research we figured we aught to see it. And it was at the cheap theater. It's not really all that scary of a movie like we thought it might be. There are a few tense moments but really not that scary. And in spite of its claims of truth --it goes so far as to have it's star Milla Jovovich introduce the movie and explain that its a dramatization of real events and that real video will be used along with dramatized video from time to time -- we did some poking on the internet after wards and it looks like there is suspicion that the whole things was faked. Like the fact that no one can find any record of a psychologist named Abigale Tyler, and Universal paid $20,000 in settlement for some newspaper articles they frabicated. Can't say I'd recommend this one even as just a piece of entertainment. We got a lot of laughs out it, but the movie didn't intend them for sure. I'll never look at owls the same way again though "The Owl is smiling at me! I hate when it smiles."

My brother was looking up anagrams on the web today and tried one for Clint Eastwood the anagram he got was "Old West Action." The man's very name destined him to be a star of Westerns.

Water cooler

I've never worked anyplace where people stand around the water cooler and talk, but it seems to be on TV fairly often. Maybe people actually do this, but I've never seen it. That's where this one came from. I don't know if I like the falling cup in the last frame. I thought that having Steve's other hand up to his mouth didn't look good though, and so when I switched hands I realized that something had to happen to that cup, so I drew it falling.