Superfocus. Superprocastination. Sometimes there’s things I’m so desperate to put off I will literally ink an entire comic to get out of doing it. i mean, I need to do both jobs, but drawing is just, fundamentally, the easier of all the jobs.

So I become hyper focused, yesterday I finished four pages of inks. Granted, one was mostly done the day before, two finished during the day/evening and the final one came in around 1am – so strictly speaking, I completed inks on two pages (or three if I’m being generous to myself).

But I wasn’t half aware it was because I was hyperfocused on it, to the point that anything taking me away from it was annoying and I could think beyond those pages. It’s not terribly healthy, is it?

Inking though, (and especially if the pencils are super tight) I’ll sit down, stick on something on netflix (or, actually, more likely at the moment Disney+) and just start inking.

I’ve pretty much thrown my lot in with digital drawing, my clip studio process is now hyper tight, I’ve reprogrammed all the basic function keys and when you’re in that zone…

Galadriel turning bonkers mad is still one of my favourite, most used call-backs from the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy.

At some point I’ll have to write up my entire clip studio experience, it’s extraordinarily flexible.

Anyway, procastination, you’re now a party to it.

And if you’re here, why not share the worst kind of procastination you’ve done…?

(My wife preys on my weakness though, she knows I hate doing dishes, so she’ll suggest a chore she’s not keen on for me to do in exchange for doing the dishes. Walk to the shop to buy milk…? and you’ll do the dishes instead of me? Brilliant, you’re on…)

Prog 1544 to Prog 1630 July ’07 – April ’09 (the written label is a mess, and has the wrong progs, I’ll fix it…)

For the record, these volumes hold 27 progs which means this is averages about 14 progs per year.

This volume pretty much finishes up the 86ers, completed by Arthur Wyatt (originally written by Gordon Rennie). I think Gordon had felt he couldn’t do much more with the 86ers (he hadn’t entirely finished with the Rogue Trooper universe though and would turn his attention to the much more successful – and certainly much better drawn – Jaeger). Between the 86ers, futureshocks and odds and sods, I didn’t get another bite of a series until Al Ewing and I did Dead Signal in prog 1581 – set in two universes, one I greywashed the other drawn in more solid black and white (a trick I’d use to better effect in Numbercruncher with Si Spurrier). We had big, bonkers plans (well, Al did, I was content to go along for the spin) but sadly, this was another series that didn’t get the chance to go beyond one part.

My luck with series with 2000ad has always been pretty grim, there were strips I was originally talking to the writer to draw and didn’t (and then, sometimes would actually end up back on the art as another artist went off). And I’d generally figured my luck with getting a series was so awful even if someone proposed one I’d often tell them “this sounds cool, but honestly, you might be in a better position to pitch this without me first”. More than likely some parts bad luck some parts just a little paranoia on my part, but certainly in this period I felt like a reliable hand on the tiller, but not someone who could get a ship launched.

Of course, this has turned slightly, Chimpsky took off (though I put that down to the strength of the writing, anyone can draw a chimp) and Dept K – a fun little series Rory McCulloch and I came up with for the 2000AD regened progs went down so well, the editor has commissioned a series (sadly, I’m up to my eyeballs, so I couldn’t draw it – boo!)

So volume 2 done and I’m stuck a little as I’ve run out of the 2000ad “Thrill-Power Containment Units”. Need at least two more (maybe three?) to finish what I’ve started and room for the next few years.