Minor changes

Funny how a little change can make a big difference. I'd noticed that some of my cartoons were more difficult to draw, in part because my hand simply isn't as steady as it was for many years. It occurred to me that I could start drawing in a larger format, so I increased the size of the original panel(s) from 13" x 4-1/4" to 15" x 4-5/8". This means that details are easier to draw smoothly. There's still a certain roughness to my line work that I accept as part of my style, but now a circle doesn't have to come out like an oval or a cursive "c".

I also bought a set of new pens, thinking that I'd expand from the .7 mil size I've been using to a 1 mil thickness, to account for the larger scale. But I realized as I began the first drawing that I'd bought roller ball pens, not the gel pens I prefer. Rollerballs, like ballpoints, tend to skip upon first touch---not an issue for regular handwriting or note-taking, but critical when one may be drawing a line that's only 1/4" long and the lines are supposed to connect. So I'm sticking with the .7 ones, at least for now. Maybe I'll go with thicker lines later.

I also ordered PhotoShop CS5, an upgrade from the Elements version of PhotoShop I've using. It will enable me to do color separations for the calendar and newspapers. (In the past, I had to send the files to my son, Dan, and have him use his computer program to convert the files to four-color for the calendar.) CS5 will also allow me to resume exploration of an unusual approach I was toying with for the strip, and which I had abandoned as too difficult with Elements.

None of this affects how you see or receive the cartoons--that'll come later--but it makes me feel that, like spring, there's a reawakening in this process of creating QlownTown. All hail Spring, bigger paper and CS5!