something I am grateful for today

Over the weekend I drew finished pencils for the first two pages. (Sorry, haven't worked up the gumption to ink yet. Still, these are the first good pages I've done in years -- as I've said too often by now I know -- but I find this kinda exciting.)

So far they're turning out pretty good, and once I got a panel or two done I suddenly felt much more comfortable, as though a lotta rust suddenly got worked out in a jolt or whatnot. Very cool.

Another thing I noticed: I find myself wanting to try tricks that I've seen other artists do, and I can't always make them work. Example: faced with drawing a panel of a room full of people, I found myself thinking, Tezuka would draw more people in the background and make it really crowded... but when I tried that, it looked so cluttered that nothing was clear. So I trimmed back the background detail to what I would normally do, and it was easier to see clearly. And it made me realize that, for better or worse, I still see and visualize and draw like myself: I can't suddenly become someone else. A rather humbling lesson...