Wanna look inside my sketchbook?

This way lies madness

I don’t often let people look inside my sketchbook. Part of the reason is that it’s mostly words and, therefore, not too exciting unless you can read my scrawl. The other part is a very natural resistance towards sharing unfinished work. But at the risk of oversharing, here’s a look at a few images from the last several weeks. They’re all brainstorming sessions for the single-panel cartoons I share on Patreon on Mondays. Some of them, like the first, have already been turned into comics. Some of them eventually might. And a few of them, god willing, never will.

You may also pick up a little signal I give myself. If I think there’s a concept worth pursuing, I’ll put a star-inside-of-a-circle near it. If/when I do the finished price, I color-in the icon — as you see in the bottom left corner of this sketch. That way, if I’m ever looking for an idea to work on, I flip through my sketchbook and look for the circled stars.

This is one of those rare moments in which the sketch and the final art are pretty similar. More often than not, I end up making significant changes. Even then, if you watch the timelapse, you can see me experimenting with different visuals along the way. For example, for a hot minute, there was a minister included in the composition.

For some reason, I’ve been focusing on mimes lately. I think this is because they present such a striking visual. But even more so, it’s because the “no talking” aspect of their character leads to some pretty funny situations. Speaking of “no talking,” I’ll shut up and just show you a few ideas I was wrestling with.

I like the “podcast” joke, but it’s really difficult to land a double-negative punchline. And I have no doubt the rainy-day gag has been done a dozen times. I love this next idea, but I think it’s better suited for animation…

It’s a scene in which a pregnant woman is getting an ultrasound. Her partner, a mime, stands proudly by. In the monitor, the baby is pushing against a series of invisible walls (maybe even looking as if it’s pushing against the “inside” of the monitor). The ultrasound technician makes a comment about skipping the paternity test.

In the upper right, you see a fragment of a punchline to a completely different sketch: “Y’know, this is why mimes don’t get laid.” But I can’t show that one to you.

Since it was July, I also tried out some ideas involving anthropomorphic firecrackers.

This next one ended up as a finished strip, but it was very different once I posted it on Patreon.

The same goes for these next two…

I might try to use the next few sketches in final cartoons, so consider this your spoiler warning. Most of them need… something. But that’s part of the fun.

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On the left, a medieval fellow reads a scroll: “Hath thou tried sheathing and unsheathing it?” as a knight holds his sword backward against a rushing foe. Caption: Medieval tech support.

The burly faerie on the right says, “…Same deal as the tooth faerie, except with kidney stones. And instead of leaving money under your pillow, I usually just toss a handful of ibuprofen.”

OK. I like this one. It’s a bear in a job interview. The interviewer says: “Your resume says you spent the last five years in the woods, but what did you do in the woods?”