New Cartoon!

Here's all you need to know for now

I've been reacquainting Newgrounds with Geoweasel, uploading all the classic episodes in order every Tuesday and Friday. Just go to geoweasel.newgrounds.com! They could definitely use your help voting on them and sharing with friends who are new to the series! But that's all worth mentioning for now I guess. Other stuff is happening but it's nothing to talk about just yet.

Adventures with clients

I've never done freelance work before, but it's something I've been wanting to venture into. I need some way to earn extra money, but I like the idea of working with other people's ideas instead of my own all the time. So I gave it a shot and while both of my first two clients showed interest at first, both projects just fell flat on their faces.
One was to animate some guy's prank phone calls, but he ended up just kind of saying "Nah, nevermind, not right now. Maybe another time." Hopefully there will be another time with him.
But the other one was going to be a cartoon (or possibly even more than just one) for the Streamy Awards. I just tossed the idea out to them on their Tumblr saying "Hey, I saw you guys had Blah Girls introduce a category last year, would you like another cartoon like that for this year's show?" and I was immediately contacted by a very nice who was pretty enthusiastic and he said it was a good idea and a possibility. So after a few exchanges with him, he was going to put me in contact with two of his fellow producers since they were more suited to the situation and he CC'd our conversation to them. I waited a couple days or so and never heard from either of them and I was worried that maybe I was supposed to be the one to contact them, so I did, and I got an email back from one of the guys saying we should toss around some ideas. So I emailed them back with some brainstorming and waited excitedly. For a week. I didn't want to pester them, but I sent them another email asking if they were still interested. The same guy emailed me back and asked when I would be available to call him, and I immediately answered back. I haven't heard from anyone since. I know the Streamys are looming and they've got a lot more important stuff to do, but obviously the one guy isn't really bothered by the lack of contact and the other never even got in touch with me at all. So I'm going to go out on a limb and say that one's over with since the awards show is in less than a month and I probably wouldn't be able to even finish a cartoon by the time they actually gave me directions.
It didn't even get to the point where the subject of money was brought up in either of these deals. If it had, maybe they would have dropped me sooner and I wouldn't have had to wait around for a few weeks, excited and anxiously waiting for instructions. I didn't work on anything else at all in this time period because I knew if I started something, I would have to go to this and then I wouldn't want to go back to my previous idea. Or maybe I still wouldn't have worked at all these few weeks. But still. If anyone's going to waste my time, it's gonna be me. Don't think I'm soured on trying to find clients for freelance/commission work; I'll still be trying for that. But I just needed to vent.

New Jersey hates cartoons

Earlier this week I spent 5 hours traveling across South Jersey to check out comic shops and found nothing that was even decent. Today I went across the river to Brave New Worlds in Philly and found exactly what I was looking for and more within 30 seconds of being in the store. I’ve been to BNW and made purchases there quite a few times just within the past year (not even a year, really) and the only reason I don’t go that often is because it’s over in Philly. Even though I only live about 15 minutes outside of the city, it’s kind of a hassle going across the bridge, getting through the crowded, narrow city streets and trying to find a good place to park just to go to one comic store, but it’s worth it. So today I got the first volume of Mega Man Megamix finally, and I had a little bit of extra money so I also got one of James Kochalka’s Super F*ckers. There were also a bunch of comic pages and little prints in the lobby by Box Brown, and I found a couple of his comics in their indie/local comics section (another thing that was noticeably absent from all the other stores) which I would have bought if I had enough money. I also asked the guy working there a little about the procedures of selling self-published comics to the store because that is something I would like to do at some point. In fact, I want to have a mini comic done hopefully in time for the MoCCA festival next month, or by the time TCAF rolls around at the latest. But that’s another story.

I'm not...not doing stuff on purpose

Obviously I have nothing to show you guys, but it's not (only) because I've been lazy, slacking, depressed, etc. I have two possible clients that are both...well, not staying in contact consistently, which is weird especially for one of them since they have a deadline and I still have no idea what they want me to do. Unfortunately I can't tell you who either one is, but if they go through, you'll see them, and if they don't, I can tell you then. But for now I'm like in limbo, waiting for instructions. Just so you know. If you care.

The same problems I've been having for years

I think it's time for one of my infamous long, over-thought blog posts. As always, it's mainly just for me to get my thoughts out in some sort of organization so bear with me here.
I guess I overthink everything I do. ...You know what, no, not "guess." "Know" is the appropriate word. If you've been following me for a while you've probably heard me say this multiple times before, but every time I think of an idea for something, I try to hop on it and I get all excited about it, but when the time comes to actually draw or animate the project, whatever it may be, I find that I just cannot bring myself to do it. Suddenly I'm tired of it, unmotivated...I don't know. It's not that I don't enjoy animating. But it's like there's this force where I sit down to work and I literally can't even make my hand pick up the pen. I don't know what it is. Sometimes I wonder to myself when I feel like this, "maybe I don't really want to be a cartoonist at all." That notion is always quickly shot down; I love cartoons, I love drawing, I love animating...I love everything about it, and I don't know where I'd be without it. So if I do indeed love this so much, what is holding me back from doing it? And whenever I don't follow through with something--which is often--I'm always beating myself up over it wondering, "Why didn't I just fucking do it?"
Truth be told, these cartoons...these things that I'm not even obligated to make stress me out so much. I mean, I put that on myself, but this is seriously just about all that I think about, all the time, and I always feel like I'm letting both myself and other people down. Really, I feel like if I were obligated to make cartoons, then I would make them, no question. I don't get it. I have no get-up-and-go. No drive. It's been like that for far too long, for years now, and I think that's what's making me go so nuts. I just want an answer, but there isn't one. It's either you do it or you don't. And I don't.
And I've talked to numerous other people and fellow cartoonists about this. Some suggest to force myself to do it, others suggest try to work on different things. I would love to work on different things. It's not that I'm totally bored of Geoweasel and I don't have any plans of quitting it altogether, but I really want to animate different stuff. But then of course the question is, "Well...why don't you?" There's always one of the following two reasons, if not both: I either feel obligated to finish the current "in progress" episode of Geoweasel, or I have absolutely zero ideas for anything else to animate. I would kill to be like Shmorky or Dan Meth; people who have the drive, the ideas, the talent, and can start making a cartoon from scratch at their whim. Plus I always end up thinking that if I do something that completely stands on its own, either no one will see it or no one would care. And I don't know why I care and don't just...do it. I guess it goes back to obligation again. Like I feel as though people expect me to just do Geoweasel and most people just want me to do that and only that, and I feel like I've made a commitment to...creating a series and I should be tending to it regularly. And even though there's that part of me inside that's screaming at the top of its lungs, "You don't fucking have to!" I still don't do it. What the hell is wrong with me?
At this point I'm even starting to doubt myself on Zane & Flick. And I'll be dead honest with you, I've never had any idea before that's wanted to burst out of me as badly as this one. It's something that I truly think if I don't start telling this story in some shape or form soon, I will seriously go insane. For the time, I've been pretty set on making Zane & Flick a comic series, not animated. (I also feel that it is necessary to point out to those who don't know that Zane & Flick, while it is a series, does have a beginning and end. It's one long story, just told in multiple parts. It's not a series that could just go on indefinitely) But the further I progress in the storyline and the more I figure out who these characters are, I start to think, is this project better suited for animation? Really, it probably is, between the goofy, cartoony designs and the unnatural things that the characters do (particularly Flick), like pulling things out of nowhere, for instance. That is very hard to show in comic form as opposed to animation. But if this is a project that I am to tackle on my own, I do not want to animate it. Why? It's not laziness. It's not that I fear I'll never get it done. I'm afraid of messing it up. If this were to be animated, I would want to have much more experienced people work on it and make it truly amazing. Because that's how this series feels to me. Amazing. And I want it to come out as close to how I imagine it as possible, but I'm just not confident enough in my own skills. I'm going back and forth worrying about stuff like this that shouldn't have even found its way into my head instead of actually working.
And this is why I'm so stressed, anxious, depressed...and the reason I lie awake at night just like Charlie Brown and ask questions into the darkness. Because I'm fucking crazy.

Help Geoweasel win a Streamy Award!

If you guys haven't been doing so already, please please PLEASE go to The Streamy's Public Submissions page and vote for Geoweasel for "best animated web series." And remember, you can do this each day until January 22nd! I don't know how many people have been doing this, but to those I know I am very grateful for their help and support and I hope I can count on you guys too! So get out there and vote like you've never voted before, and spread the word! Thank you all so much!

Also, I managed to never mention anywhere except within my own mind that my goal for this year is to produce at least two cartoons every month this year. And I mean actual episodes. They may be shorter than older episodes (still around 2 or 3 minutes per episode like the few done in 2009), but I'm not going to do a couple 30-second little extras, slap 'em online and go "here's your two cartoons this month, see ya." It's going to be a bit tough at first and I'm really going to have to force myself to just buckle down and work, but hopefully that will help me get back into the right groove. The one that lasted from March to May 2005. My short term goal is to get the now-quite-late Christmas episode done by this Sunday. I have a couple ideas and I may hold off of putting one on the internet and save it for Animation Block Party, which I intend to enter this year. So hopefully my outlook and reality will at least find a happy medium and Geoweasel can really pick up.