Catherine's New Smol Dog

Catherine's New Smol Dog is pretty cute, huh?

She's even livestreaming him for her audience.

But...

He seems to be growing some horns and a vicious attitude towards his new owner.

Uh oh. Looks like when Kamiko "healed" that pupperino she didn't quite do it well, or right. Maybe she skimped on saying the right words or maybe she didn't put her heart into it.

But he's growing horns, what's the worst that could happen?

Projects

I've found myself with a few projects now that take up my free time, but that's fine. I'm enjoying the projects and I'm learning new things to boot.

The Static Website

I've been continuing down the road of learning how to use Gatsby and React.js to build a static generated website. So far things are going great. I'm learning a lot about node.js, react.js, and what's new in the world of web programming.

This has also given me a chance to shuffle through this website's old blog posts, art pieces, and comics and figure out what to do with them. Like, for instance, most of the blog posts from the past decade aren't really useful. Sure, most of the posts are journal entries about the production of this comic (from the super early days), but they're not useful content and clog up the blog.

So I pulled a Marie Kondo and removed them. I actually removed all the blog posts.

So, let's take a moment to thank those posts for what they were. They were the stepping stones that helped me develop The Rabbit and the Moon, the website, and the Shrine all those years ago. They've helped me develop into who I am as a creator. But, at the same time, I'm not those things anymore. I've grown from them, and so those old thoughts and memories don't need to be on the new version of the site.

There are some blog posts that folks seem to go to a great deal -- ones about 2D animation, blender non-photorealistic rendering, and so on that might be worth keeping going forward. There are also some events I did such as sell physical merch of This Mortal Coil at two different conventions. Those posts would be worth keeping too as live memories.

You can see the progress of the new site here: dearkamiko.com.

There's a lot of work left to do. I'm taking it a piece at a time. And you know after a lot of pieces are done, I'll find myself with a new website to deploy and replace this old Wordpress site. When that will be? I'm not sure.

Magical Girl Kamiko Continuation

Yes, I am storyboarding new content for Magical Girl Kamiko. One goal this year is to at least post a new comic every Saturday. I have, after this comic, 6 weeks of buffer for new pages, and then a backup of 4 weeks of assorted illustrations. I am storyboarding new pages and it'll be a juggling act to do both the website and the comic, but hey, it's all for the same end, making more of This Mortal Coil.

Webcomic Underdog Anthology

The folks over at Webcomic Underdogs started talking about kickstarting an anthology of comics, which sounds really cool. Of course, I want in. It's at least 4 pages. I've been mulling over ideas in the back of my mind and I think I've settled on something. I want to do a set of 4komas, a la, Lady of the Moon that'll feature both Kamiko and Catherine.

It'll be a continuation of Magical Girl Kamiko, but a story you'll only get via the anthology book and not the site -- at least for the time being.

Lots to Work On...

So yikes, it is a lot to think about and do. Like I said, I'm enjoying it. I would love to continue to meet my base goal of a new comic every Saturday, and so far we are. I hope to continue that trend, but you know, life sometimes gets the better of your best intentions.

Anyhow, that's what's new (and ongoing) project-wise.

Have a great Saturday!

Oh, and I'm getting my first COVID-19 vaccine dose this Monday, so I'm looking forward to that. There is a light at the end of the tunnel, so please consider getting your vaccine. I hear it's pretty much available to everybody over age 16 now (in the US).

Have a safe and great weekend!