So those nice, upstanding people at Huffington Post have decided to crowdsource design work. Jerks.

Update Aug 16, 2011: AntiSpec has featured my cartoon above on their page about Huffington Post’s crummy contest.

Hey kids. It’s been a few weeks since the last HoN comic was posted and you may have been thinking that I was busy on a secret mission for the government. You know, save the world type stuff. You were half right: while I was super busy with work, it wasn’t for the government or secret. Things have settled down a bit and I’ll be resuming a weekly update schedule. A new Horde of Neurons is finished and will be published on Tuesday. In the mean time, here’s a sneak peek:

Pencils:

Finished pencils:

Inked:

Midway through coloring:

This weekend Ryan and Casey from Gin an Comics are hosting the web’s first ever online comic convention – Non Con. So far (and it’s only mid-day on Saturday) we’ve had artists livestreaming as they create (myself included), creator and fan discussions and a lot more. Comic panels are coming up along with a store and sketch commissions. Check out the site for more details and jump into the Non Con video chat room to talk with other participants.

Years ago I used to regularly draw with a quill pen and india ink, but lost my pens somewhere along the way and didn’t replace them. This week I picked up another set and then had to ask myself what the hell took so long. I’ve been hunting for decent brush tip pens in order to regain line quality in my drawings, that variation from thick to thin in a single line and single stroke without having to “manually” fatten it up. None of the brush tips I’ve found have worked at all since the tips always shred after just 15 minutes of use. I’m about to give the Pentel Pocket Brush pen a try, and maybe a Kuretake brush pen I’ve been hearing so much about. But the quill pen really hit the spot for me this time around. Drawing today’s comic – Leave It To The Passion Of The Beaver – was a little odd for me in that I didn’t lay it out in pencils first, which probably shows. The grays and dialog were dropped in with Photoshop but aside from that I didn’t do any clean up. I used the new quill pen and tried to just draw what felt natural rather than tracing over pencils. To draw rather than trace when I ink is always the goal, but sometimes the pencils can be really distracting and the drawing suffers as a result. This time I just dipped the pen in ink and started drawing, and it felt great. Hopefully that shows in the result.

Kurt at TGT Webcomics has been kind enough to add a Horde of Neurons banner to their Friends of TGT page. I’m honored to have a link there among so many great comics. If you’re into podcasts and comics, you should really check out the TGT podcast. Just skim the episode archive to get an idea of just how awesome this is, loaded to the brim with guest hosts and interviews.

If you’d like to link to Horde of Neurons yourself you can use the banner below, a plain-jane link, a nudie picture or ask me for a custom banner size. I hereby officially promise beer to any and all that would like to link to Horde. Hurry, while supplies last! This is a limited offer to the first 1000… yeah who am I kidding.

And lastly today, I drew a quick sketch to contribute to Noel Curry’s excellent #TuesdaySketch twitter group. Every Tuesday, Noel tweets a new sketch topic and then posts the art to the Tuesday Sketch site. It’s a blast and I’m really looking forward to contributing regularly. Here’s my sketch for this week’s topic: pigs

Yeserday I was told that this Horde of Neurons strip was Zorphbert and Fred‘s webcomic pick of the day! It’s not everyday that highly intelligent alien observers disguised as housepets pick one of my comics for anything. Be sure to check out the Zorphbert and Fred comics and say hi to their uber awesome creator Dawn Griffin.

Also from yesterday, I drew an evil sock critter. That is all.

I used yet another new inking method for this comic, and so far am loving it. The process feels great and allows for all of that nice line variation. You’ll also notice a wider format with a little more room for me to muck around. Expect this to be the norm going forward (took long enough to settle, eh?).

If you like it, leave a comment and let me know. If you don’t, please email your complaint to dev-null@example.com

I drew today’s guest comic at the excellent Gin and Comics by Ryan Fisher. Check it out, tell your friends and go see Rubber. I was able to catch it last weekend at the Music Box Theater here in Chicago during their annual sci-fi marathon. No matter how weird, WTF or dumb you think this movie looks you really should check it out. You’ll be pleasantly surprised in one way or another. If you aren’t, tell me and I’ll draw you a free cartoon. It’s a win-win.

I just received my mailing list for this year’s Doodle Swap Project. The basic idea is that artists sign up online and Doodle Swap sends them a list of 10 other artists along with their mailing addresses. You draw/illustrate/paint/artistically-defile 10 trading card sized pieces of paper and mail one to each of the artists’ addresses assigned to you. This is my first year participating and it should be a total blast.

Yesterday I had a blast co-hosting the Universal Geek podcast with Sean Francis. We both hit the Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo (C2E2) last weekend and talk about the con, the panels, the artists’ row and a lot more. Check it out, and take a look at Sean’s site.