Saturday 29 June 2013

Millie Week 95: Mon 29 Jun - Sat 4 July 1992

This romantic comedy material was not the normal kind of stuff I'd produce at the time, bitter twisted singleton as I was then. But it's good to let the soppier side of your nature go every now and again, and it provided a nice sort of contrast to Richard's anguish of a few weeks previously.

Friday 28 June 2013

Gnar Gnar Gnar

When Billy and Annabelle are playfighting I'm amazed at some of the contortions they get into. It's also interesting to see the different fighting styles. When Smudge and Cholmondeley fought it was usually a frontal assault, with Smudge trying to pounce on her brother, and him restraining her with a paw to the forehead. Billy is more of a kung fu cat, with a sideways attack style, leading with one of his back paws to where his opponent's belly was just a second ago. Bella prefers stealth, and gets her wallop in and runs away again before Billy even realises he's been attacked.

Monday 24 June 2013

Gznp!

While the cats are having their mad moments, I'm making them make random noises like their brains have short circuited. It helps to convey the ragged, jagged mad action you get when a cat gets like this.

However, I can't help wondering if it's all a cover for some other nefarious purpose. Billy and Annabelle have developed a taste for nocturnal papier mache. Annabelle's job is to pull old newspapers out of the recycling bin and onto the floor. Billy then has the task of hurling himself at the newspaper and sliding it towards their water fountain. The net result of this is that Linda and I wake up in the morning to find a mass of sodden newspaper on the living room floor.

Saturday 22 June 2013

Millie Week 94: Mon 22 - Sat 29 Jun 1992

Suddenly, these two boys who played a bit part at the party that played out over the past few weeks take centre stage. It's time for Millie to play romantic lead against a gentle well meaning oaf. I like Moose - he's very much how I imagine Chumley to be, big gentle and slightly dim.

Friday 21 June 2013

Fdxgt!

I enjoyed drawing the caffeinated Smith so much that I thought I'd involve all the cats in the fun. Once again, this is Billy and Annabelle making their influence on the strip apparent. The next few strips are no so much written as transcribed from the mad things they do when they have their mad moments…

Wednesday 19 June 2013

Klonk

 The other option for Jones is, of course, the patented 'I meant to do that' look that all cats are taught at kittenhood.

Monday 17 June 2013

Pssschht

We have one of those electric squirty fragrance releasers in the mens toilet at the office I work at. The idea is that it's on a timer, and once every twenty minutes or so it squirts a soothing bursts of perfume into the smallest room. Alas, this soon builds up so that if you're the first one in there in the morning, it stinks of a combination of artificial lavender and fly spray propellant, and it's almost impossible to breathe.

A few weeks ago it went mad and started spraying every fifteen seconds or so. We opened the window, and for three days afterwards the car park outside stank of the stuff. We've now disconnected the machine.

Saturday 15 June 2013

Millie Week 93: Mon 15 - Sat 20 Jun 1992

The story's not over yet... this party will have repercussions. And they're not all bad...

Friday 14 June 2013

...aaaand rest

We'll be sleeping all weekend, but we'll be back with more madness on Monday...

Wednesday 12 June 2013

Colouring mistake

There's a flaw in the character designs of Smith, in that a lot of the cats have the same body type. It's something I recognised a long time ago, but as I've been living with these cats for thirty years I decided it was too late for me to change them. You'll notice that the newer characters tend to look a bit different in order to counter this.

One of the problems this brings up is that Jones and Smudge look identical to one another until they are coloured. And sometimes they get transposed, which is what happened in frame two of today's strip. Jones is supposed to be continuing the speech she started in frame one - you'll notice that the cat speaking is positioned closer to us than the silent cat. But as they also switched positions and I was listening to an especially good Thrilling Adventure Hour podcast, I lost concentration and Smith and Jones swapped positions.

If you're one of my select few blog readers, don't tell the others. Let's see if anyone notices...

Monday 10 June 2013

A cartoonist mutters to himself about pens

You'll notice that I've given up on using Italic Pentels for my lettering. They tend to spread and become too broad too quickly, and the lettering tends to overpower the artwork style that has developed over the last few years. It's also become a bit unclear to read when reduced to GoComics 600 pixel wide size. So I've returned to plain old Tempo pens from Paper Mate. However, pen snobs will be glad to know I continue to use obscure Japanese stylus pens for the main artwork, and a Muji brush calligraphy pen for filling in the blacks.

(Secretly, we're all stationery freaks, aren't we?)


Saturday 8 June 2013

Millie Week 92: Mon 8 - Sat 13 Jun 1992

I'm reliving my 18th Birthday party to a certain extent here. Halfway through that I left to see if anyone would notice - no-one did! Still, at least I had enough self awareness to know that it was potential comedy gold and the situation reemerged here, years later.

I especially like 'Blancmange... Pah!'. That's my book title for the collected Millie right there.

Incidentally, I'm contemplating putting together ebook collections of Smith ready for this Christmas - one for each of the first three years of the strip, probably being sold at the £1.99 price point. Anyone got any ideas for titles?

Friday 7 June 2013

Framed

I was just staring at the frames trying to work out how to fill them and this happened.

Wednesday 5 June 2013

Skittles

Like I said. I now share a house with two adolescent cats.

Monday 3 June 2013

Swipe

One of the things I have planned to introduce next year, after Smith returns from its five month hiatus, is Smudge's mastery of the feline marshal art of Swipe. We've seen that she's got a lethal right paw before, especially when she's defending her sacred wall - there's a whole backstory to go into there. I just have to work out what it is...

The influence of Builly and Annabel is really starting to be felt now. The next month's strips are much more frantic, and reflect living in a house with two mad adolescent cats tearing around the place all the time. Caffienating Smith seemed to be the best way to bring about this temporary character change.

Saturday 1 June 2013