sequential ramblings

Daily Drawings 1/23/12

2012-01-23T20:23:00.000-08:00

Throwing up a sample of my Daily Drawings from 1/23/12. I have finally segued out of the "ugh, this sucks, sucks, sucks" stage of my daily drawings and the last couple batches have loosened up and I am liking the images I am producing and enjoying the process again. I was doing some concept sketches for some new Rollr Girl illustrations and a Conan fighting a cyclops illustration and I am finding it is easier to capture the pose and figure quicker. So I feel I am seeing some of the benefits from this regimen of daily drawings manifesting in my daily work:)

I really liked the pose 21.. there is something about the pose that is slightly turned away from the viewer that I thought was cool. I have a natural tendency to draw straight ahead, straight profile or straight 3/4 turns so it is fun to see more subtle rotations of the masses of the figure.

Sucking and why you have to push past it.

2012-01-20T12:20:00.000-08:00

So...

... it has been ten days since I have posted any Daily Drawings and this is because they have sucked. I have fallen out of love with the whole idea and I did the drawings begrudgingly and the whole process became desultory. But I have slogged on. I have honored my commitment to doing thirty of these a day and though many of them I wouldn't show my best friend they currently reside in the folder marked "done".

Here are a few samples... "shudder"

2012-01-17T16:06:00.000-08:00

The highly anticipated "Rollr Girl" full color signed and numbered print is now available for purchase. I am only going to print 25 of these and as many of you know my last print run sold out very fast! So if you want to purchase a signed and numbered great full color Rollr Girl print just follow this link! If you don't have PayPal contact me and we can work something out! Thanks so much!
T$

Rollr Girl 2 inks!

2012-01-09T00:30:00.001-08:00

Inkf for the most recent Rollr Girl:) I thought these turned out pretty good! I will be coloring this this week and have prints a limited run of prints available!

Daily Drawings days 6 7 8

2012-01-03T15:31:00.000-08:00

So I still knocked out my 30 drawings on Sunday morning (new years day) even tho I was pretty slungover following some late night debauchery on New Year's Eve with the lovely wife:) I am finding that I am still struggling with the basic standing pose. I think I don't have a strong enough visual icon in my mind of what that pose should look like. The relationships to the lats and the rib cage as it extends past the chest and the juxtaposition of the pelvis the upper torso mass (especially in the 3/4 and profile view) is where I start to get lost. So I spent most of today working on standing male poses, some from reference others just from my imagination.

Yesterday I did a bunch of cool drawings from reference of gymnasts. There is nothing about the human figure in motion depicting strength, grace an dynamism that you can't find in gymnast images! Wow! Just really cool stuff. Figured some stuff out about the twist and bend of the female torso and the relationship between the stretch and squash of the planes as the figure contorts. Keeping on trucking:)

Day 6 drawings:) I Liked this male standing pose. The feet look very planted and the figure reads very well.

Day 7 drawings:) I liked this series of sketches they were fast and loose.

Da7 8 drawings:) I really liked the upper left sketch! Very powerful and emotive with a very readable silhouette.

The coming of Poop McDouche!!

2012-01-03T00:03:00.001-08:00

The first strip featuring Annie and Foosh and introducing an amazing new super villain Poop McDouche!

2011-12-31T11:03:00.000-08:00

Daily drawings day 5! I really did not want to do today's drawings.. wasn't feeling it. I was trying to convince myself to do them tonight or do double tomorrow... scramble all you want little brain but we're doing this:)

I got a little lost today doing some of these sketches.. I started out thinking about an exercise that Tom did when I was TAing in his Super Heroes class. He drew a fairly pedestrian figure of Captain America on the wall and challenged the class to draw a much more dynamic Cap by altering the pose. So I tried doing some dynamic powerful male poses... your standard superhero fare.. and I really struggled with it. Which then led to the usual internal monologue when things start going wrong "why can't I draw better than this... this is embarrassing... 7 years and untold thousands invested in an education in sequential art and I can't draw a simple dynamic heroic pose!" which I flagellated myself with for about 15 minutes as I got more and more frustrated.

And then I stopped doing it.
Because that is one of my patterns... this isn't perfect.. why isn't this perfect... what an awful artists I am and an awful person and blah blah blah..
Hyper self scrutiny leading to self doubt then self abuse. How tragically dorky.
But I know I do this... so once I caught myself I dropped the bullshit and went back to what the intention of these daily drawings is... quick, gestural dynamic drawings.
Structure first... specifics later.
And the next 20 drawings were super fast and energetic and really scribbley and loose...
and I dug myself out.
Knowing your stupid patterns and the means in which you will attempt to kick the shit out of yourself when you are down helps if you can catch yourself doing it. I am getting better at this. Better every day:)

These are from yesterday.
Using the Scalera "People and Poses". I like the pose of the crouching male with the arms crossed over his face. I am always trying to think about silhouette... how the drawing will read if blacked out so there is no internal information, only contour. Even though the limbs are kind of stacked I think this pose sill reads emotively as a nice silhouette.
I find more and more how important this is. The figure has to be an easily and quickly readable shape otherwise the viewer gets confused. As drawing is a visual language the letters in your visual alphabet have to be quickly identifiable otherwise your "reader" stops "reading" and starts thinking "what the hell is all of this?" The "reader" is taken out of the visceral experience of "reading". Whether it is comics or movies or music or a video game or a newspaper article maintaining the connection with the audience is imperative.
Otherwise the connection is lost and the story isn't heard.
Which is why we are doing this, right?
Making a connection and wanting to be heard.

And making dough....
... tons and tons of dough.

Daily Drawings Day 4

2011-12-30T10:51:00.000-08:00

Well here we are at day 4 of Daily Drawings. I did my quick sketches using Buddy Scalera's People and Poses. I am finding that initially when I am using reference for my quick sketches that they stop being "quick". I get a little lost in the minutia of the surface anatomy as opposed to just sticking the gesture of the pose and the basic contour and proportions.

Good lesson for me...

The details are meaningless if the structure isn't right. The goal is to capture the energy and attitude of the pose before committing time to the finer details of the figure. Structure, structure, structure... you see how important this is in solid draftsmanship... people who can really draw understand structure... by this I mean an understanding of the physical construction of the object.. how it relates to it's individual parts. It is how an artists depicts a three dimensional object in a two dimensional format convincingly.

Wow... look at me.... learning stuff:)

Here's some sketches from day 3. Again going for gestural and energetic. I realize after doing some of these that there is something going on between the torso and pelvis that I don't quite get sometimes. It is the relationship between the plane of the back as it inserts into the external oblique and the front of the ribcage and the obliques connecting to the crest of the pelvis. It is where all the turning, twisting and bending happens in the human figure and how you capture dynamism as opposed to stiffness. This juxtaposition is what can really make a pose POP and one of the aspects of my sketches I am going to keep focusing on.

2011-12-29T11:16:00.000-08:00

I didn't get a champion night sleep last night (my awesome wife seared off some drumsticks for me and I ate all three of them (plus a blueberry yoghurt) before retiring...kind of a "dream of the rarebit fiend" thing) but I still managed to slog through 30 sketches... can you feel my excitement.. can ya!! They actually went pretty good... I did several relaxed poses and some of them were cool.

Day three down.

Go me:)

These are from yesterday using Buddy Scalera's "Girls and Women" as a reference. Again, trying to be quick and gestural but capture the energy of the pose. One of the things I keep trying to remember is how "wedge-like" the female pelvis is as it protrudes in the rear.. especially when arching the back. And all of the "b's"... the "b" of the torso and the "b" of the arms and legs.. it creates a very organic feel to the different forms and is a a great device for quickly capturing the structure of the figure.

New Rollr Girl

2011-12-28T12:14:00.001-08:00

Just a fun sketch I did over the holiday after I finished my commissions:) Sometimes it is fun to just do something that you want to do for fun. Woo Hoo!

Daily Drawings Day 1

2011-12-28T10:12:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I started doing my daily drawings and, man, did it feel clunky! But I still managed to sit down and pound out 30 fairly quick sketches. I think I missed my 20 minute time mark by about 15 minutes but I am sure it will go faster as I get past the uncomfortableness of doing them (I hope).

Thankfully, today's drawings went a little smoother. Just a few minor interruptions because of my duties as the kitty butler... "meow" means "I want in"... "meow" means "I want out"... "meow" means "hmmmm. 'out' isn't all that great... I think I would prefer to be 'in' again" and so on...

Here is one page of the sketches I did yesterday. Nothing earthshaking here... just a guy and a pencil trying desperately to figure something, anything out :-)

Quick gesture stuff trying to capture the energy of the pose with on eye on proportions and basic surface anatomy.

the path of most resistance.

2011-12-27T08:38:00.000-08:00

I think this will be my first blog post on "Sequential Ramblings" with no art attached. I have been wanting, for a while now, to write a series of blogs about my process. By my process I mean the manner in which I get things done, specifically, my art. The drive behind these blogs is not that I labor under the delusion that there is some teeming audience clamoring for insight into my little world (though it is a fascinating little world, with exploding birthday cakes and hamsters with handguns) but rather that I find, like many others, that sometimes committing my thoughts to the written word seems to help clarify and organize my focus and intent.

The heading for these blogs is entitled "The Path of Most Resistance." The reason being that I often find that my life is defined by how I deal with the things in my life which cause resistance. You know what I mean... that hot and uneasy feeling in your gut when a subject or issue is brought up or broached that is something you need to do, or have been meaning to do or want to do but have been avoiding or putting off. We all have this, I think, to varying degrees. Whether it is going to the gym, doing the dishes or relationship or family issues. We all eventually find ways to deal with it. We put our heads down and push through or at some point we get frustrated enough or fearful enough and get it done. But I find that still, at the ripe old age of 43,that resistance, specifically in the area of my art but not confined to it, is something that I still really struggle with.

Bleh! Barf Barf Barf! Yup, there it is gang, my big secret... I'm not perfect even though I said I was and I even sold bumper stickers and T-shirts that had "Ted's Perfect" printed on them. I will buy them back at a percentage to be later determined.

So my idea for the coming year is to try a new approach. Traditionally, I put off that which I resist until there is no other avenue but doing that thing or facing failure, or ridicule or jail time. My goal will be that when I feel that resistance I will instead immediately do that thing. Simple! Right when my gut says "No, we don't want to do that thing!", we do it!
This blog will document some of this stuff mostly those things that have to do with drawing, my career and art. I will be starting with something that I have struggled with for years though I know it is one of the best things for me but from which I run like a rabid dog.

Daily drawings.

By this I mean a structured, daily series of exercises that are geared toward continuing to develop my skill set as an artist.

Easy, right!

Wrong! I hate, hate, hate doing this and my gut churns at the thought! Why? I don't know and I don't think that the reason really matters. It is a damn good thing for me and it is something I know I should do.

So for the next year, every day, starting today (gasp) 30 sketches. Mostly figures but lots of other stuff, too. Quick, fast gesture drawings developing my drawing technique and skill. Every day..... for a year. Yikes! At the most 20 minutes a day.

I will be posting some of this stuff, mostly drawings that come from the daily drawings that I think might be of some interest or are fun.

I should be interesting how my little brain tries to escape from this but I intend to persevere... I think it will be very informative to see what could happen in a year.

Here goes...

new avatar image!

2011-09-12T13:52:00.000-07:00

Here is a fun avatar I designed for the awesome Nicky Fabrini and her great blog Dirt and Martinis!
Please check out her blog and the accompanying face book page it is super fun great stuff!

Lady Death Print Fund Raiser

2011-06-10T20:42:00.000-07:00

So here is the link if you would like to purchase one of these limited edition "Lady Death Dancing" prints to benefit the great Heather and Ted cross country moving adventure! The print is 11x18 on firm glossy stock! Again, it is 20 dollars to buy one that I deliver in person or 25 to have one shipped! Thanks so much to everyone who checks this out

Foosh and Annie:-)

2011-01-18T15:01:00.001-08:00

Just a fun movie poster style illustration as a gift for my friend Annie:-) This also features the amazing Foosh and she and Annie wend their way the an ancient rat infested tomb with their trusty sea monkey and Pabst Blue Ribbon.
I love doing stuff like this:-)

Some images from my thesis:-)

2010-11-15T12:50:00.000-08:00

Just throwing up a couple of the images from the visual component of my grad thesis:-)

2010-08-09T11:35:00.001-07:00

OK.. OK.. not technically a "blog comic" per se.. but I had to just get this one out of my brain! I like this comic not just because Batman is evidently trying to return something at Target... but that also the World's Greatest Detective has apparently lost his receipt:-)
As always.... thanks for looking!
T$

2010-08-08T18:35:00.000-07:00

A new fun sketch that I just posted on EBay!
"Roller Grrl"!

lady death sketch:-)

2010-08-02T21:09:00.001-07:00

A fun sketch that I will be posting for sale on the EBay!

Buffet the vampire slayer

2010-06-20T19:37:00.000-07:00

I thought of this yesterday and laughed to myself all night at work about it:-)
Since I haven't has a chance to finish a blog comic recently I thought I would throw this up.

2010-04-20T12:13:00.000-07:00

Just posting a new fun commissioned sketch:-) New comic by Sunday!!

New art on ebay!!!!

2010-04-16T18:59:00.001-07:00

Another piece of original art that I am hawking via ebay. This drawing is pretty cool so check it out if you are interested in purchasing some Ted Helard original art!! Just click here:-)

Super girl original sketch! Bid now!

2010-04-14T17:52:00.001-07:00

Don't forget to bid! This is a great deal for an original sketch and it will be worth a gazillion dollars one day!
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=190387112308&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

Cross Country Trip Episode 4 "Nickleback"

2010-04-13T21:03:00.000-07:00

Cross Country Trip Episode 3 "Snow Bound"

2010-04-09T00:19:00.000-07:00

Some new drawings and such!

2010-04-04T22:57:00.000-07:00

Hey, all! No new comic until tomorrow but here is some other stuff I have been messing around with:-)

Cross Country Trip: Episode 2 "The Droid"

2010-03-27T01:40:00.000-07:00

I just wanted a goddam coffee!!
For some crazy reason the gps in Heather's Droid refused to work properly in Louisiana... hmmm.. maybe it's all the swamps

Updated Paypal Button for Colored Print

2010-03-14T16:01:00.000-07:00

The newest, fanciest, shiniest GRADE AAA paypal button. Buy a print now!

I will be offering this colored version as a limited run print of 50-- each signed and numbered copy a mere 15 bones a pop!! (5 dollars shipping and handling:-)) It will ship in a fancy tube and be suitable for framing and respectful placement in your home, office or prison cell.

Cross Country Trip: Episode 1 - "Away We Go!"

2010-03-10T15:47:00.000-08:00

*Whew*
What a crazy last couple of months!
However I am back in the proverbial saddle and will get back to producing blog-comics at least twice a week!
Huzzah!
This comic is the first in a series of comic strips I will be posting following Heather, Will and I's trip from Savannah, Ga to Blue Lake, Ca and then back again!
As, always..
..thanks to everyone for checking out my blog!

(also.. I still have a few prints left if anyone wants to buy one:-))

2010-02-13T13:55:00.000-08:00

The fast, easy way to purchase the color print "Conspiracy Theory"!

I will be offering this colored version as a limited run print of 50-- each signed and numbered copy a mere 15 bones a pop!! (5 dollars shipping and handling:-)) It will ship in a fancy tube and be suitable for framing and respectful placement in your home, office or prison cell.

Click on the link below to pay with paypal~

Rather than Scrabble--now in COLOR!!

2010-02-11T10:40:00.000-08:00

While Heather and I were on the road to Cali and back I took some time whilst not in the driver seat to splash some colors onto the latest "Rather that Scrabble" installment. I hope this in some small way makes up for not posting over the last two weeks:-)
I will also be offering this print for sale via my Facebook fan page!!
Check out the "Rather than Scrabble" Facebook fan page for all the exciting details--
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Ted-Helards-Comic-Blog/311543995168?ref=ts
..act now as supplies are limited..
...just in time for the holidays...
...not available in stores..
...be the envy of all your friends..
..still legal in 17 states...

'Conspiracy Theory"

2010-01-24T23:09:00.000-08:00

"Intern-al Trouble

2010-01-19T21:50:00.000-08:00

Dedicated to the memory of my dad.
As always, thanks for looking.
Ted

2010-01-15T08:28:00.000-08:00

The next installment of "Rather than Scrabble". Inked in the middle of last night:-)
I think the strip says it all..
Many of the my day to day concerns sort of fell away following Heather and I's house fire...
When your immediate concern is...
"Hey.. where exactly will we be sleeping tonight...?"
... you sort of stop sweating the smaller stuff.
Now that we have ironed out many of the difficulties stemming from the fire my other concerns and anxieties have shown back up for the party... and they ALL brought potato salad.
And it seems to always hit about 3:00 am. I will sit upright in bed in a cold sweat..
"Ahhhh... my thesis.. student loans... sample pages.. my job.. thinning hair... AUUGGGHH!!!"
I suppose that is just the nature of things and the goal is to channel that anxiety into manageable productivity...
...we'll see how it goes:-)

As always, thanks for looking!
T$

Rather Than Scrabble

2010-01-12T10:50:00.000-08:00

Please click the comic and it will be big enough to read:-)

So.. here is my first installment of "Rather Than Scrabble".
Many of you may know that the last couple of months have been pretty tough for Heather and I..
I have gotten very far away from drawing and comics, and when I have tried to work I have found that my process has gotten a little funky.. it's almost as if in an attempt to manage the discordant elements and crazy events in my life I have tried to over structure other elements of my life as well... my art, in particular.

Hence, this journal comic.

The whole idea is just to produce this sucker, thrice weekly, in a discreet amount of time so it doesn't impinge on my other endeavors.. i.e. relationships, my other comic work, my job, thesis, my health, alligator wrastlin' and cookie baking.

In essence I just have to knock it out!

This comic is at the opposite end of the other work I have been producing and as Heather can attest it about killed me to draw it. Half way through I nearly balled it up and burned it...
it sucked.. I was going way to fast and the inking looked like crap.. so did the lettering.. it looked like a moron had done it.. why was I doing this...
...blah blah blah blah blah..
...boo hoo hoo for me...

Heather made me finish it...
..and I must say that in its completion I am finding a certain measure of catharsis.
Not so much as to get out the trampoline and brown liquor...
..but a bit.

If any one ventures in here and sees what I am attempting to do here I hope they dig it. But I guess the whole point here is that it is for me. As imperfect and weird and goofy as it may be.. as I may be.. or as any of us.

As always.. thanks for looking!
T$

2010-01-12T10:48:00.000-08:00

2010-01-10T06:05:00.000-08:00

...ahem...

Because it has only been a year and 4 months since my last post... I will keep this brief..
I am intending on posting, in the spot, a bit of a "journal comic" type of thing.. I know this "internet" is all the rage with the kids and I am not above trying to capitalize on the hot new trend of the day..
I will be posting thrice weekly- Tues., Fri., and Sunday which will feature a longer, more traditional "Sunday" format style of strip.
I will be posting this coming Tuesday with my first strip and I hope everyone thinks that it is keen and a thoughtful endeavor and buys lots of the themed coffee mugs, stuffed pushies, wall calendars and dish towels that will soon follow in the wake of the strip's massive success!!

...as always, thank you for your tolerance and understanding.

Sincerely,
Ted Helard and everyone else here at "Ted Helard Sequential Art Studio and Gun Smithing"

welcome to me

2008-10-23T08:04:00.000-07:00

Word! This is the beginning of a blog I intend to use to discuss, dissect, disseminate and downright demystify all things sequential, primarily in how that term applies to artistic endeavors. That's right, friends, I' talking about comics. I will now pause to give most of you a moment to realize you that you took a tragic wrong turn somewhere on the information highway, pack up your personal belongings, and uncomfortably make you way to the exits. Now, for those of you still here, a quick bio. I am Ted Helard, sequential art grad student at the Savannah College of Art and Design, life long comic fan and a intrepid soul whose desperate dream is to carve a paying and creatively rewarding gig in the wacky yet wonderful world of sequential art madness. *ahem*
I will be posting my work here and the work of any who wish to show, discuss, compare...whatever. The whole point is to get some some dialogue going regarding what we as comic artists are doing; how we do it and why. I am extremely interested in critique and interpretaion of my work and process and very keen to check out about what others are doing as well.