Anonymous asked: what really gets me about your duck doodle comics is how warm and cosy and 'just like the Barks ones' they feel- like, if I had to say one example it's how you get Magica just right; she's not a pushover, can be stone cold badass, but we can empathize with her and there's a part of you that wants her to succeed! but you know she won't, and that's okay because she shouldn't- she's greedy and powerful but not evil, not toxic, just a not really 'bad' bad guy who's cute, fun, fallible and fantastic
(read more for rambling) oh my, anon this means an awful lot to me-
Anonymous asked: hey uncle mod, this might be dumb or just, idk it's so small and I feel stupid even for being hurt by it, but someone recently just made fun of the fact that I like something and draw and write about it a lot- but it's a safe space for me, creating and thinking about that subject. It's just fanart and theories and such, but the world is so bad rn and when I see you being a pro artist and still geeking out making fanart it it's so energizing and comforting- do you ever have to deal with cynicism?
anon, I’m so sorry; it really does hurt when people do that, and half the time these people have no idea how to create things, which is why it’s all they can do to attack people who do in an attempt to make themselves, in some way, significant. It sucks! And it will hurt, for a while, but don’t let them destroy your love for your subject. Take time to talk with friends about it, cry if you need to. You will recover and each time it gets a little easier to do so; especially when you have folks like Alex Hirsch who can spout little pieces of wisdom like this-
It’s great having this kind of attitude put into words to follow, and he put it better here than I ever could. Don’t let them get to you friendo- the reason I can and still am drawing as much and as often as I do is because the satisfaction in making art For Fun and the happiness it’s bringing people compels me to create far and above any other incentive. The world’s going to hell; as long as you’re not hurting anyone take joy in what you love and stuff the rest. Create good stuff: destroy your enemies (p.s. the best part? The easiest way to stop people like that from getting to you AND annoy the hell out of them is to make more stuff! If you have the ability to block them do that too; keep doing what you do and ignore them entirely = The Ultimate Comeback)
Anonymous asked: uncle mod this might be kinda personal but, how? how do you stay so motivated. you have EDS just like I do but you don't seem to slow down at all and you don't let it dent your love of things, you don't hide the fact that you have it and when you've talked about it you don't sugar coat but- how? I'm so tired, of being so tired, how do you still be so... cartoonish? about life?
Well, firstly shucks you’re welcome and thanks gosh didn’t really know I was doing that, but in terms of method I think it’s because I tend to love the characters I’m drawing? It’s also very tactile, like, I try to imagine what it would be like to hug them, or pat them on the head! It might sound silly but having an idea about what texture they have, how cuddly or boney they are, what holding their hand would feel like- it helps me learn to draw them and I guess respect them as people. I like having that sense of volume and interaction when I draw, but a lot of it is about respect. There’s also this thing called ‘appeal’, which is in the list of the 12 basic principles of animation that Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas introduced (which are just really good things to know about in terms of drawing too) so I guess it’s something related to that? Having said that it’s all a bit vague and I’m not really smart enough to know what I’m doing, or what about it makes characters ‘look attractive’, I just draw and try to get it there.
Anonymous asked: Hi there! I love your art, and it makes me want to draw characters like Gladstone too! But every time I try, I can't come up with a nice, neutral pose (like where the heck should the arms go) and the drawing will end up really.. odd.. What would you do in such situations?
I don’t really know how to help, but I guess I always run through a sort of check list when I’m sketching characters that I learned in animation/storyboarding;
1) can you tell who the character is by their silhouette alone?
2) can you tell what the character is doing by their silhouette alone?
3) can you tell what the character is feeling by their silhouette alone?
This doesn’t apply to all pictures (you can have the feeling/motive of the character solely relying on the face, as with a close up, or a change of expression with two identical poses) but it’s a really good exercise to get your body language clear and keep the ‘acting’ of an image to the point. Try to keep limbs held away from the body so you can ‘read’ them, and remember you can use the hands in communicating emotion too.
Anonymous asked: how do you plan the length of your comics?
You mean page count I’m guessing? Well, a lot of the time I don’t, really, especially with doodle comics; I thumbnail focusing on the key events, join them up, and then see where I stand. Much of the time I end up shuffling things around to give the story enough ‘breathing space’ but try to edit out panels that double up or just feel like clutter. The exception to this would be TPoH, where I wanted every chapter to have the same number of pages (19), so I thumbnail those with that limit in mind, but again, I often end up shuffling panels about to let it have enough room. Cramming too many panels onto a page can make it difficult to fit the speech bubbles in, and sometimes an image just begs to have a whole page to itself. My job is to listen to the story and give it the best environment I can, and on the whole I put that priority above page count.
Anonymous asked: Hi Uncle Mod! I just have a simple, yet important think to ask. Are you okay? I feel like everyone in the world is shaken up and stressed out at the moment, and if there's one person that needs this ballooning of stress the LEAST, it's you. Plus, I had a nightmare last night in which you were anxious and sad, so I was really scared and concerned for you. Don't apolagise if you have to take a break or something, because you deserve peace. Love you!
anon??? I love?? you????
but thank you my dude my pal my friend o’ mine I have been a bit stressed and tired lately but really I wouldn’t imagine more so than everyone else- all things considered. My hands are a bit janked up at the moment so I will be slow on extras, and I’m visiting my sister next week so there might be another week without TPoH coming up (sorry) so I guess I feel bad about that? But knowing how patient and kind you all are makes things so much easier and I will try to recover so I can bring myself back up to speed. Thanks buddy.
Anonymous asked: (seeing as we're on random question answering hour YAY) so I noticed you seem to use lilac as a recurrent colour theme for Reigen, which is awesome because it's my fav colour and I don't see it around very often; any reason to that?
oh! hehe kinda pleased you picked up on that, because
a) I really like lilac too
b) when Reigen gets his ‘own’ aura in ep12 it largely seems to be of the lilac-magenta spectrum, albeit with some rainbow variance
c) I was looking up stuff about auras for a different character a while back (hey remember Justin Case u guys) and indigo/purple has connotations of not only intuitive wisdom and clear mindedness, but also of spirituality- it can be seen as the 6th layer of an aura which is supposedly the ‘angelic’ body of an aura- which I think fits Reigen pretty well!
d) not even related to the character so much as mp100 on the whole but the association I grew up with was that lilac is worn as a symbol of recent death and has ghostly connotations, so symbolically speaking I feel it always has an edge of melancholy and the supernatural to it, I don’t know if that’s just a UK/Europe/me thing or what though…
Anonymous asked: okay you gotta stop killing me with all these adorable happy feelings for mp100 when I just know you're going to utterly destroy them later down the line I KNOW YOU I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE CAPABLE OF
I DON’T KNOW IF I AM THOUGH asjfkas I mean really, all these characters have been through so much already (are going??? through??? holy shit) dear god I can’t be giving them more to deal with when all I want is for them to be happy and eat nice things and like maybe? eventually all the espers end up working in shifts for Ultimate Dad Master Reigen so it’s like Spirits n’ Such becomes Rent-an-Esper and it’s legit a massive success and they all have enough time to do it and cover for each other and not get stressed and maybe they get together on Thursdays to eat ramen and then watch a movie and fall asleep and end up being slightly late for school or their day job the next day or whatever the fuck but they don’t care and I don’t CARE
I JUST WANT THEM ALL TO BE LOVED AND LOOKED AFTER WITH A STABLE INCOME
