Hey, folks!

I knocked out a bunch of No Raccoons in Hell pages and then stopped knocking them out! Boo! I just had a rough couple of weeks there as far as having to time to consistently work on pages. I am hopeful that some of the non-comics projects that have been occupying me will be coming to an end shortly. Meanwhile, I've been doing lots of little drawings. I also did the "Vals and her Pals" image at the top of the post.

I was trying to work on the latest comic page Sunday, and I had trouble drawing. I really wanted to draw, though, so I decided I would draw something related (to get me back into the swing of young Val) but entirely unconnected to No Raccoons in Hell (so that I wouldn't feel the pressure to get the art right that I felt like I kept tripping over). Basically I needed to loosen up.

I've been thinking about doing some gag strips set in the nineties, and this was one of the jokes I'd had floating around for a while. I have mentioned before that Archie Comics are an influence on me as a cartoonist, and even though Archie is about high school kids and Val and her Pals at they time they are depicted in the Val Cannon Mysteries are in their twenties, the jokes that have come to mind featuring them feel a lot like Archie-style jokes to me. This one in particular felt like it would work as a single panel or cover to me, so I decided I would draw a comic cover with the joke, including a logo and cover treatment.

Here are some examples of what I was referencing:

The facts that there was an Archie title with "Pals" in the title and and that Veronica starts with V were both helpful to me in this endeavor. I decided not to exactly try to duplicate the style of cover, just to make it feel enough like an Archie cover than even though I'm not trying to draw like Dan DeCarlo, people will recognize it.

Maybe this will be a real zine cover one day! I think it would go over well at shows.

I need to finish No Raccoons in Hell, though. I did start working on the page again after this, and successfully knocked out a couple of little panels, so the warmup worked. I intend to continue on with the page tomorrow.

Here's one more page from the TINA AND ELLIE BAKE A CAKE zine:

I have not received my payment from kickstarter yet, but once I do, I will be ordering TINA AND ELLIE TAKE THE CASE.

And here are some drawings of Vals and Toris and Tinas and Ellies I've done on lunch breaks and at other assorted moments of free time:

OK, take care!