I’ve been kind of neglecting the blog. Interestingly enough its not because I was to lazy to post something this time. I’ve half written a half dozen things and then deleted them cause I didn’t end up thinking they were right for here. Its a case of I don’t know what the correct thing for here is, but I know it when I see it. This post should be different, certainly if you are reading this then it is.
I’ve been working on retooling Digital Integration, back into what it was always meant to be, a web comic. Its going pretty slowly, because I’m a procrastinator, and because I want to do it right this time. I’m even going to have a giant buffer to help me out this time, so I’ll have at least 30 in the can on top of whatever I decide to launch with. I always tried in the past to start at one a week with the hopes of working up to the magical 3 a week where the real sticky factor starts, but that clearly has failed. So I’m going to start at 3 and figure out how to keep up as I go.
Of all my characters, Billy has always been the least well defined. Here are the following things that I ever had planned about Billy from the first two runs:
- Billy was Chris’s best friend. (Chris and billy are just a little bit gay for each other)
- Billy is an FPS junk ie and if I ever went the route of making Chris’s friends also heroes, he would be a creepy good sharp shooter. (this is mostly inspired by watching too many westerns, because westerns were cool, but are also extremely racist and you should never watch them…)
- optional: Bi lly has a secret relationship with Emily.
Then again even that little amount is plenty for a character to start with and to grow as they get more time in the comic but Billy just never felt complete. I could never quite figure out why. I’ve got a lot less planned with other characters and I still feel I have a better handle of who they are then Billy. I think I’ve finally figured it out though, Billy never had a soul. I never really knew what it was that made Billy tick. Which seems odd because I always kind of figured one of the central themes for the comic would be that everyone is a geek about something, ie. really passionate. Its pretty hard to really know someone if you don’t understand what they are really passionate about.
I’ve set about final
ly rectifying my error with Billy, because while FPS and Western themed gun play are among his hobbies, they weren’t his motivating passion. So I’m playing around with him being super into math. Because math is cool and everyone loves jokes based on math. Not that I’ll be telling many math jokes. I suck at that. I’d much rather explore the humor surrounding people who are super into a thing, trying to explain there passion for it to people who don’t understand. But thats a topic I think I can make into a whole post all on its own. So heres a sketch of Billy will likely appear in the comic, except his signature stripe will be up higher on his chest so it doesn’t look so stupid. Also those glasses are prescription because I kind of like drawing characters with glasses.
