We're Back On The Air!
We're Back On The Air!
Shifting focus to more fanart, commissions, & conventions!
I’ve been sitting here hemming and hawing about what I wanted to say on my first post back on my substack. That’s not true. I KNOW what I wanted to say, but I wasn’t sure how I was going to say it is more accurate. I’m tired of talking about my shoulder and I’m sure you’re all tired of hearing about it. I’m not really promoting any new projects at the moment other than shipping out all the Midnight Tiger Hardcover rewards from the CEX Publishing Kickstarter campaign, but we’ll get to that in a second. So, that really leaves conventions!
Shayla & I just got back from Whittier Comic Fest yesterday and we had a really nice time. It’s a one-day show and this was the events second year. Showrunner Eric Hauser of Anytime Promotions, who I’ve know from Fisk Comics a while now, really did another great job at building the local show that focuses on community and the love of comics. It’s also a great show because we got to hang out with friends Lak Lim and David Avallone.
It was at this show that I premiered my new price list for sketches & commissions and delivered this 11x14 Doctor Aphra piece to it’s new owner…
Here’s the new price list, btw…
It was also on the drive home from the show did I decided to rearrange my focus a bit. Based on my experiences in December 2023 at Los Angeles Comic Con, all the way through to my first Emerald City Comic Con, Comic Con Revolution, and now Whittier Comic Fest in addition to my online presence, I’ll be prioritizing my art over my comics. Specifically doing more illustrative pieces featuring mainstream characters, doing more prints, and above all else doing more commissions and sketch covers. The name I’ve built, i.e. my actual name, doing mainstream work just carries more weight than the Studio Skye-Tiger name, at present.
No need to worry about my creator-owned comic work! Rest assured that t’s not going anywhere. I should be receiving the Midnight Tiger hardcovers in just a few weeks and I’ll have those for sale at every convention Shayla & I attend. However, the plans for the Midnight Tiger: EVO series has been adjusted to fit my current schedule. Midnight Tiger: EVO will initially be a 1-page a week webcomic. At least for the first few months. Between prioritizing illustrations & commissions, cover freelance work, and my responsibilities as Art Director on WTF Mama, I’ll only have enough time to do about four pages a month on MT: Evo. That means I’ll be penciling, inking, toning, & lettering those four pages a month at the highest level of my abilities! More than likely I’ll be posting the pages here and the weekly comic will be 100% free to read. Taking my time to build a following for the series and print the book totally completed at the end of every issue.
Drawing Cool Stuff! This Is The Job And It Always Has Been!
Sequential storytelling is still my passion and I’m still doing it, but I love making art and I always have. Doing commissions, sketching at shows, and posting fanart is what put me on people’s radar when I first started out. I was doing pretty well even being an unknown back then doing that and I had a lot of fun every time I handed someone their commission and watched their eyes light up. Someone recently told me that they still have the piece I did for them YEARS ago and had no intention of ever selling it. That truly warmed my heart. So, I’m going to enjoy going back to that as I head to my very first HEROES CON! For all I have ever been told about the show, it is THE artist show of all comic conventions and I’m here for it! This is the perfect show to kickstart my new focus. Hope t see a few of you this upcoming weekend!
-Ray