skrtchscrtch asked:
Marceline + OP idea sketches, idle animal doodles, notes for the class I teach. My sketchbooks also double as my weightlifting journal nowadays, complete with sweaty/chalky hand stains.
Hello! Believe it or not, there is a new Octopus Pie story for you to read in its entirety! You can start at the beginning here.
Perfect Tides trailer #2. Coming in 2021.
Hey all, if you’d like to reread Octopus Pie as a daily comic strip with commentary - or you never got through the whole thing while it was updating - you can start today! I won’t be x-posting to Tumblr this time around - it’s just too time-consuming in addition to my other work - so be sure to bookmark http://www.octopuspie.com to enjoy a new strip every day!
Hi Tumblr people, it’s been quiet for a bit!! But I have been working on something that you may want to hear about: my first ever game, Perfect Tides!! It’s a point and click adventure about being a teen. Written, directed and animated by me, with environments by Soren Hughes.
I’ve just begun fundraising on the game. If you’d like to preview the trailer and initial art, and maybe be a part of making this project a reality, click the link and have a look!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/465155699/perfect-tides
There’s less than 48 hours to get in on backing Perfect Tides! We’re now very close to a 40k stretch goal, where the minicomic for backers will be in full color. Check out the trailer if you haven’t, and considering pledging to my next big project!
fahbraccini-deactivated20210204 asked:
I appreciate the sentiment! Something you could do is contribute to my ongoing Patreon campaign. Since I’m reserving the KS bucks for freelancer payouts, Patreon is the part that actually pays me to work on the game. Anything at all is a big help!
I’m back from my USA book tour, and finally have a window of time to sell some Octopus Pie books directly! If you’ve been waiting to get a signed copy of Volume 5, this is your chance. The other books are also available individually or in a 5-pack. Each copy bought from me is signed - optionally, you can add a sketch as well! This sale will end on Sunday night, August 6th, so hop over there now!
If getting a book isn’t enough, there’s a cause as well! Proceeds from the first 50 books sold will be donated to Black & Pink, an organization working with and advocating for LGBTQ inmates. Even if you’re not getting a book, check them out and support the vital work they do.
A note on buying books: if you get a 5-pack, there’s a good chance you’ll need to wait a few weeks while I order stock. I appreciate your patience. If you need a book by a deadline, let me know and I’ll do my very best to accommodate. :)
If you’re at San Diego Comic Con, come see me today between 2-4pm at the TopatoCo booth, #1229! I’ll be selling books and signing anything you’d like to bring. Mike Holmes will be there as well with books and prints! Hope to see you there!
Meredith Gran and I are traveling across the country this month!
OCTOPUS PIE Vol. 5 - the final book - just came out, and we’re gonna hoof it across America, Plus I’ve got Secret Coders Vol. 3 and more! We’ll be doing signing events in a few cities - if you live anywhere near them, come on out to say hi!
Today we’re in Austin TX! We’re signing at Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy from 4-7. Then I think we’re going swimming. I love Austin.
ALSO! On Sunday, we’re at Big Bud Press HQ in Los Angeles (2121 N. San Fernando Rd) from 5-8pm with SPECIAL GUESTS:
Frank Gibson & Becky Dreistadt (Capture Creatures, Tiny Kitten Teeth)
Sam Alden (Wicked Chicken Queen, Adventure Time)
I hope we see you there!!
I’ll be in Austin, TX TODAY from 4-7pm! Come by and chat if you’re local! On July 16th I’ll be doing an event at Big Bud HQ in Los Angeles! Details above.
Hey Tumblr people - I’ve been posting updates about OP touring over on my new blog. I know if you’re using Tumblr you’d rather be following blogs HERE, but I figured I’d post a link anyway. Follow along if you’d like to hear about future projects - I’ll be posting on Tumblr less often, but will try to crosspost whenever the news is big.
Thanks to everyone who’s sent me a nice message lately. I read everything and it warms my heart.
Three cheers!
I check the webpage out of habit, but Meredith Gran’s comic work Octopus Pie is over. I feel like this is how sports fans feel when a jersey is retired and lifted to the rafters, forever in its untouchable place, time divided between when it was active and whatever comes after.
That might sound grandiose, but in my mind, nothing tops the ten year run of Octopus Pie. And in the lifespan of what we call Webcomics, 2007-2017 is a granddaddy of a run, worthy of names like “pioneering,” “influential” and “groundbreaking” because in the space of those years, in this new medium, there was room to be those things without any hyperbole. The comics landscape of the past decade needed filling out and Meredith carved her space out with precision, showing a polish and drive and a talent from the beginning that set a high standard.
I’m guessing that I started Hark a Vagrant about six months after Octopus Pie began, but Meredith’s was already a name to be reckoned with, due to the solid reputation of her previous comic Skirting Danger and because she was an honest to god trained animator in a sea of stickmen comics or two-dudes-on-a-couch comics (RIP forever *kisses fingers, holds them to the sky*). I was intimidated by her sheer capability. But inspired too. I did not need to be intimidated, she was one of the first people I met in comics, and easily one of the best.
Meredith and I briefly shared an apartment and a studio, and I can tell you, she can draw circles around everyone you know. I later shared a studio with Mike Holmes, who could also draw circles around everyone, and now the two of them are married in some sort of talent supernova. I am happy for them, even though I feel like I make grade three crayon pictures next to them. But the other thing that being friends with Meredith for a long time has shown is the cutting wit, the care for stories done right, the love for a medium that will take you through highs and lows that come with comics, and lately through her job as a comics professor, the nurturing of upcoming talent. I see all of this in Octopus Pie, a comic where character was paramount, where plots were expertly moved, a fine balance was found between the messiness of people and the fun you can have with stories, where subtle emotional movements where rendered with room to breathe, where I felt like I could reach deep into the hearts and minds of the characters on the page because they had been fleshed out so well over the years that they seemed as real people, people that I loved.
I don’t really like that phrase “comics will break your heart,” commonly attributed to Schultz, or Kirby, it doesn’t really matter. You see it all the time, mostly when people are reckoning with the fact that they work in an unforgiving medium. I don’t even know what it is about the saying that I don’t like. Maybe it’s because we all know that comics are hard work, we all know that you might put your life and blood and heart into something and you might get nothing back. There are no surprises to be found there - it’s not a bad day you had, it’s a life you’re well aware of living, if you do. But we love the perserverers in comics. The people who live the phrase are the ones who inspire us the most.
I’m saying all this, and pardon the segue, because I have seen Octopus Pie, some of the finest story work of my generation, passed for recognition time and again and it confuses the hell out of me, truly. I don’t want to turn a tribute to a work I hold dear into sour grapes, that’s not the intention here, but lord above, if I can’t point this out now, then when can I? We all know that there are no guarantees in this life (comics will break your heart) but I’ll say this once and then leave it: this is a comic of quality that was miles ahead of so many of its peers, and it deserved better, industry wise. To wrap up the earlier point, maybe I don’t like CWBYH because it implies that you should shrug your shoulders and not ask for better every time, that a short end of some kind of stick is expected even. That’s easy when it’s yourself, but speaking as a fan now, I say to heck with shrugging, I want to put Meredith on my shoulders and parade her around and dump her into a Scrooge McDuck thing full of awards.
Actually that sounds pointy and bad and the Ignatz awards are bricks to begin with so maybe forget that analogy but you get the idea.
I hope you read Octopus Pie, I hope you buy the books. I hope the legacy of it is long and full, because it always will be for me. And I think readers will agree, because I know this devoted fan base pretty well. I read the comments, I’ve sat next to Mer at comic shows, I’ve listened to some of the emails that touched her. I know this is a comic that meant a lot, to a lot of us. In this world of work we put our hearts and souls into to begin with, that is a wonderfully worthy thing.
I do not know what Meredith will do next, but whatever it is, I am here for it, seat pulled close to the stage. The retired jersey is in the rafters, the game is still being played by the people who dreamed better because it was there. Aw what can I say, I’m sentimental!
Thanks, Meredith. <3
Much love to my dear friend Kate for this very kind tribute!
