Yes, I am still here.

I am absolutely sorry about the silence this whole week, and no, I'm not gone or kidnapped or anything, and to reasssure you, I have decided to put a posting.

It's just that I have been so terribly busy this whole week! With presentations and recitations and so on! Currently, I am doing a course on Modern Japanese and Asian Literature. I realize it is not easy understanding these texts since they are coming from a very different cultural perspective. At times these texts are extremely anti-Westerm, so models of Western literary citicism doesn't really apple to them at all.... yes, the struggle continues!

Page 94 is almost ready, and all I really need to do is to color it up and it will be ready for upload!

In the meantime, all you, be nice and take care

Later!

93rd Street (Tuesday and Friday)

All of you must know by now that SKOOKUM! will be updated twice a week, specifically on Tuesday and Friday. At the same time regular readers will also have realised that for the past month or so, that had not been the case, meaning, SKOOKUM! had only been updated ONCE a week, either on a Tuesday or a Friday. I have been meaning to apologise and appeal to your higher reason to understand that I do have quite a lot of things at hand that required my attention.

Now, being in my senior year, I do find the task of updating twice a week extremely taxing on me. Reason being that college has just become so much tougher due to the fact that I am now in my senior year. I have long heard about the horrors of being in the senior year; that people tend to lose every ounce of free time they have to the unreasonable amounts of readings that is to be done. While, that is certainly an exaggeration, what is true is that I DO have tons of readings to do, not to mention tons of essays to write.

I intend to take a week off SKOOKUM! while to see to the fact that I finish all of my readings as well as read ahead so to ensure that I get to dedicate more time in the completion of a page. Well, actually, I already did… noting that there was no update last week! Well, I have to take another week off, just to ensure that I am on firm ground with my classes and research. And I will try to promise that Page 94 will come up better and more enjoyable, given that I now have more time to work on it. Well, I know it is never a nice thing to keep readers waiting a week later just for one page. It is a bad idea and most readers will tend to be put off rather than impressed by it. Which makes me feel that the chief antithesis of webcomics is College itself! Then again, maybe it is just me, for I can’t decide which is more important to me: My Work or My Education?

By the by, I do hope you enjoy Page 93! As you can see, I have grown more adjusted to the tablet, I am not entirely fluent at using it yet, but I sorta figured out how to use it to create better lightings and effects. For once I did enjoy the entire coloring process! I can’t wait to experiment with other coloring techniques that I hope will sit comfortably with all of you! The sad thing or course is that Yoruki has gone anti-social yet again!

Later guys!

iPod

I have gotten the precious precious precious iPod nearly two weeks ago, but it took me a while to find the image above, which is taken from the website of a very talented freelance Japanese illustrator who likes to be known as Miyahan. He is the owner of Miyahan's Web World, which consists exclusively the games he wrote, pictures he taken and more importantly, the illustration he produces. He produces some really really good works, which includes Anime illustrations so good that they are no different from those produced by the animation studios. Check out his Web World at:

www.miyahan.com

Incidentally, I am using his wallpaper (not this, but another one!) as my Desktop picture, seriously, it looks good. The catch is however, that the entire site's in Japanese, so some knowledge of the language would be more than useful.

But I digress...

Back to my iPod... well, what can I say except I LOVE IT SO MUCH! There's something about the iPod that enchances to quality of the songs it plays. As if it contains some intelligent chip that recognises if a song requires more bass or tremble, and adjusts accordingly. I may seem to be exaggerating, but I am not! I feel for some reason, songs tend to sound better and more importantly, clearer when played through an iPod compared to a discman.

Although I am an Apple User/Fanatic/Supporter, I was thinking that maybe the other MP3 players have the same characteristics as well, namely, the ability to enahnce to listening pleasure of the user. It is certainly a must for me these days. Then again, it is scary that we are attaching so much emotions to inanimate electronic things! As I believe, we may really be entering the age of Posthumanism, where we start assigning identities to entitites.... We treat our personal computers like our closest kin, and we cannot pass each day without having some form of contact with an electronic device.

The electronic device has therefore assumed the role of a human being, and in fact, it has become capable of providing more joy than a human being (at times). Posthumanism is not a myth, it is already here; and I think we should embrace it, especially when we have advanced to a stage that it is no longer impossible to deny the integral part computers and devices have in our puny human lives.

Torn Between Duties

Page 93 has been penciled and inked, what's left is the tedious part of coloring. There are times when it is exciting to balance college and web-manga drawing, but there are times when it can reach a unmanageable level. Well, I think it just did. College in Senoir Year is unlike any other year. It seems that every other guy/girl is dying to get into Graduate School, and they are trying all kinds of ways to make sure they are the star undergrad of the year. Some people even resort to personal attacks, they try to put you down, so you will forever live in the illusion that they are better than you are. Those Fuckers...

In happier news, I have been (as usual) surfing the Internet a bit, and I stumbled upon this webcomic called "FAIL" by Nate Wootters. The drawing's average, but this guy has an unusal talent for humor. Check it out here:

http://fail.keenspace.com/

The photo above is taken from his site, where he pokes fun at the description behind a packet of dog food. I liked it so much that I have decided to put it here; so as to give you a taste of his humor.

That's all for now... back to my readings.

SquirrelWorks: BattleGate

The webcomic community is increasing everyday, with up to 5,000 webcomics and counting, it is probably not an exaggearation that webcomic reading and creation is fast becoming a leading form of entertainment in the Internet Age. I managed to stumble on this truly awesome comic by Chirs Moujaes called "BattleGate".

What is so special about BattleGate is that it gives the readers the impression that the entire comic has been drawn and rendered in color pencil. For some reason, there is something special about traditional media that gives that special "feel". It is exactly this "feel" that made me love Battle Gate so much.

In addition, he has a style of drawing like no other, a hybrid between American strokes and Japanese style. It is simply beautiful! I know I should sorta tell you what it is about, but I really want you to go and check it out yourself. Do so at:

http://www.squirrelworks.com/zones/battlegate/current.html

Good art; Great Story. Whatcha waitin' for?!

Onmyo Taisenki

I have been watching this new anime called "Onmyo Taisenki", which means "The Great Battle of Darkness and Light". I saw some pretty cool character designs with awesome coloring, so I thought this gotta be one of the "A" Grade anime to be released of late.

It turns out that behind the wonderful character design and the more than awesome coloration and 3-D graphics is but an overused and recycled storyline. This anime has its roots in Pokemon and Digimon; it is all about summoning monsters from weird hand held machines (Sounds familiar?) And the best thing of all, these monsters gotta keep fighting to gain experience points... no they won't evolve or something, but both the monsters AND their masters will gain new skills.

The only thing saving this anime is that animation is really cool, and the monster Byakko looks really cool! Another thing, the monsters are based on ancient Japanese monsters. What made me feel queasy is that the protagonist, like the one in "Sonic X" is some freakin' washed-up geek with a character weaker than Barbie. That is just plain irritating!

For those who like loud music, bright colors, awesome action, brainless flicks in the tradition of Pokemon/Digimon this is the anime for you!

92nd Street (New Tablet. New Start?)

Folks,

I have gotten myself a Tablet. A WACOM Graphire 3 Tablet.

Well, it is something that I should have gotten before I started SKOOKUM!, so I am 92 pages late before I realise that I really need a tablet to do more effective coloring. Price of the tablet was a major concern, it is still a major concern, which was why I got the Graphire 3 and NOT the famous WACOM Intuos Tablet.... That would be THE tablet to get, but it comes with a hefty price that I am not sure will sit happily with my funds! Well, it is a start.

Contrary to believe, the WACOM tablet ISN'T the easiest thing in the world to use! In fact it took me a full hour to get used to how the entire thing works. It is so sensitve and has 512 points of pressure - I think it is more of a hassle than a help to a novice for I find myself clicking on things I certainly did not intend to click. I think the Photoshop took a while to get used to it as well. However, once I gotten over the initial discomfort, it became a joy to use, and for once coloring is FUN. The Pen thankfully comes with left/right click function, so it was easier for me to change brushes, which is crucial when it comes to coloring with the tablet.

As Professor Robbie Goh noted, the devil is always in the details. It is the details and the attention paid to it that makes a difference in so many things in the world! The Tablet, of course is used to accentuate the details in a piece of work, and it is hte details of the manga that I am trying to perfect.

I must admit, that despite the use of the Tablet, the page still doesn't look impressive enough, for I have only started to explore the ways in which I can use the Tablet to create more amazing and unsual effects. For now I am still kinda stuck with cel-shading, and I am hoping to do MORE than just that with the WACOM tablet; which will mean that future updates will be delayed.... I know this may be upsetting, but I think a continual improvement is a must. I hope all you guys understand.

Later guys! Thanks for reading!

Disney's Tarzan 2

Disney's Tarzan, released way back in 1999, had always been one of my favorite Disney animated movies, and I was actually surprised that it took Disney this long to release Tarzan 2, which details the adventures of Young Tarzan, and explains how he became the man he eventually became. I mean this is a good idea, people always like to know a little more about their favorite characters and how they came to be the way they are.

I had been reading online reviews and most of the reviews were good, so I thought it couldn't hurt to try it, after all, Young Tarzan DOES look really cute on the cover, and for once Disney knows how to cash in on the cute, young characters it has in its collection of works. I was however still hesitant on buying it, for I could have bought other really cool and exciting looking anime for the same price! I was seriously having second thoughts of purchasing the DVD.... but I did it in the end. I felt I needed to renew my faith in Disney once more - after all I grew up with Disney.

Well...

For starters it is a good straight-to-video movie, not the best, but it is a very digestable piece of animation, the art's great and I can see the tremendous amount of effort the animators put in in coloring every vine and tree that it looks as good as the 1999 original. The storyline however, is kiddy at its best, and it is so apparent which age group Disney is targetting at. No one older than 15 should watch this; Unless you're a great Disney fan like me who appreciates every artistic detail in Disney animations... Of course, there are the usual lessons in most Disney animation, and for this one, the message is, blending in isn't always the best way out.

Sometimes instead of blending in and do what others do may not always give one the best result. Tarzan tried so hard to be an ape, but he is not, so instead of keep trying to be an ape, he learn that he can still pass off as an ape, but he has to do things that is extremely un-ape like. And in doing that he stands out and fares better than all the other apes.

Well, so long for that important lesson.... in the end, well, I feel just nice and comfy, just not blown away like the other Disney movies would do to me.

BUZZCOMIX'S BACK!

The once magnificent and influential Buzzcomix maakes a comeback after an absence of over 3 months.... It used to be the top of its game till its disappearence that many webcomics (SKOOKUM! included) left the system and signed up under other Webcomics voting sites like Top WebComics and Webcomics List.

This time Buzzcomix returns with a Version 3.0, will it reclaim the title to its former glory as THE voting site webcomics desire to be on? Or have they simply, moved on?

Only Time will tell. Check it out at www.buzzcomix.net, and don't forget to VOTE for SKOOKUM!

Below, is the opening note by the Buzz Boss:


Welcome to buzzComix v3.0!

BuzzComix has been through a lot in the past 3 months - and no one knows it better than you guys. I've had some frustrating times these last couple months, but I can only imagine how frustrating it must have been for you guys - with little explanation and so much downtime. There was actually a week where I was very close to just throwing up my hands and closing shop.

But you guys were there to encourage me and keep me going. I'd specifically like to thank Fuitad and Threeboy for encouraging me to continue. It was with the buzzComix community in mind that I endevoured to code buzzComix v3.0.

It was clear the old system wasn't working. My old host would shut down the site without any warning and had very little information on how to fix the site. Then all the databases of the site disappeared with no explanation. It was clear that the host wasn't going to work out in the long run.

When I made the decision to switch to a new host and code version 3.0 (instead of just give up), a number of things were clear. The site would have to be 100% rewritten. BuzzComix was the first website I'd ever designed and the coding showed it. The backend was very amatuerly written and poorly designed. It was also clear that I had to automate EVERYTHING. When somebody (namely me) had to manually reset the list, or add ads to the ad cycle, or reset passwords - I would inevitable get lazy and things would get left undone. I had to make sure everything would be automated in version 3.0 to ensure that the site's quality never wavered.

Lastly it was clear I would have to overcome a major hurdle to get webcomics to return to buzzComix is the numbers they used to. Many had justifiably gotten very frustrated with the spotty service and left buzzComix for lower caliber toplists. I decided to win back the audience in three ways. First, only the best quality. When I re-wrote the page I made sure the code was 100% perfect. Every feature was watertight and rock-steady. I also realized I would need to compensate my users for the spotty service and nearly 3 months of downtime. So I gave everyone 3 months of Premium Membership. Thirdly I wrote in a number of new, cutting-edge features. This is not the first time buzzComix has had to face some discouraging odds - but everytime it has, it has overcome by being the best and offering features no other toplist had. This is why I added groups, automated advertising, gift certificates, enhanced avatars, improved FAQ, group searching, jumped Fav*s, and buzzBux.

So all I ask is that you give buzzComix another chance. This is literally a fresh-start for buzzComix and I hope you all come along for the ride.

EDIT: Obviously there will be a few kinks to be worked out these first few days, so bare with us