Flying in Pajamas Cover

It was past 9:00 on a Wednesday night, April 3rd, to be exact.

I was sitting in the living room in front of the TV, with my CD changer loaded up with a couple Kenshin CDs, "Hybrid Theory" by Linkin Park, Save Ferris's "It Means Everything," Luna Halo's "Shimmer," and Garbage's "Version 2.0." I had all my equipment set up (three different kinds of scrapbooking markers, a pad and a half of bristol board, a brand new pack of erasers, my all-purpose lap desk, a T-square, and my ever-trusty Triangle of Doom). I knew I was about to embark upon a journey that few had tried before, and had a bit of apprehension. But I started anyway.

Much survives from that strange and perilous journey, including a written record of thoughts, which is probably nowhere near as interesting as it would be if I rewrote it today. But what are you going to do?

9:25 PM 4/3/02 - start--already yawning; may not be a good sign

10:00 PM - 11:30 PM - watch 2 Simpsons and a 3rd Rock from the Soun while working. I'm a multitasker!

12:05 AM - 1:05 AM 4/4/02 - Watch Conan O'Brien and work. Do some dawdling.

1:05 AM - 1:35 AM - Watch Carson Daly. Because Andy Dick was on and he was in Newsradio. Yup. Work hard.

1:50 AM - 6 pages drawn; inking page 5. Bored enough to write another journal and what I missed after first entry. Finally have an idea of where story is going, which is good. Still cannot answer question, "What is it about?"

2:?? - Where's my wristwatch???

2:37 AM - Done with pages 1-6. 1/4 done, almost 19 hours to go.

Yay!

I am taking the weasel/US doujinshi approach in that all my pages are only numbered in tiny numbers in the top left corners. So if I wind up behind I can just make a cheat text-only page and stuff it between two other pages. I will finish!

4:42 AM - Done with page 8; still a bit ahead of schedule, even after helping my journalist mother edit one of her articles. On the down side, I'm quite tired and want to go to bed. (This is about the time I went to bed last night...) Hoping for second wind. Or to choke on a pretzel. Nah, it's not that bad.

Yet.

Still miss Alison Stewart; Liz Cho just isn't the same.

5 AM - I didn't know Plaza Sesamo was on! Now I can learn Spanish and finish my comic, right?

5:30 AM - Oh, it was "Amigos." Oops.

I'm 1/3 through the time. My grammar is slipping.

5:38 AM - finished with page 9; taking slight computer break (leaving clock running of course)

5:56 AM - Get back to work. Skip sleepy Kenshin BGM instrumentals.

6:30 AM - page 10 done

6:34 AM - rediscover lukewarm several-hour-old cherry Pepsi. Ick. Drink it anyway.

7:13 AM - stretched

7:24 AM - finished page 11

7:41 AM - You can sleep when you're dead!!!

7:55 AM - Ha! Page 12 finished! I shall celebrate with the adding of chocolate to milk. And maybe by 409-ing my lap desk, which is currently several charming hues of gray (it once was white, honest).

8:02 AM - Wouldn't quite kill for a nap, but sometimes almost feel like it. Of course, one minute later, I'm suitably awake. Weird stuff.

8:03 AM - You know, if I just put in a cheap text page or splash page between each page I have now, I could be done by 10 AM...

8:06 AM - Turned on TV and wondered what bizarre cheap space cartoon was on. Turned out to be Disney's Buzz Lightyear series. Ouch.

8:15 AM - returns to fighting the good fight (but--for how long?)

9:14 AM - finished page 13 I'm sure I have lots of hard pages ahead but this was absolutely the worst so far. 12 was too much of an ending point I guess.

9:30 AM - finished page 14

By the way, I often draw 2 pages at once and then ink them one at a time, so that's why I sometimes have absurdly short intervals between pages.

9:55 AM - Taking car to get fixed, going to post office, getting replacement pen, etc.

11:00 AM - Back

11:55 AM - finished page 15

12:25 PM or so - finished page 16

1:04 PM - I have a blister on my drawing finger. I have arrived!

1:21 PM - finished page 17; I think I'll take a nap...

4:40 PM - Done with nap, all refreshed. Actually, I ache more than before I took a nap and I'm groggy. Oh well. 4 1/2 hours for 7 pages; there's a real challenge!

5:44 PM - finished page 18. You know what'd feel really good right now? A nap.

6:05 PM - finished page 19. You know what'd feel really good right now? A nap.

6:50 PM - finished page 20. I want dinner.

7:04 PM - finished page 21

8:00 PM - finished page 22; 23 and 24 are penciled. Taking bets on if I do a cover or not. (Well, I would if anyone cared!)

8:17 PM - finished page 23

8:50 PM - seem to be done with everything, currently #ing pages and such

9:13 PM - declared comic finished!

Afterthoughts (written 4/11/02): As I noted in the journal, page 13 was the very worst. At page 12, I was halfway done, and making myself do more was quite difficult. (8 AM is my sleepy time, too, regardless of when I went to bed, or if I went to bed.)

You'll note that I took quite a lot of time off. It seems to me that part of the 24-hour comic, probably the main part, is that it's a limited amount of time to do something, and therefore hard. But for a quick artist like me, an hour a page is really too long. But I was so afraid of failing, I started the comic after only the most rudimentary of plans. If I had it to do again, I'd probably take the two or three hours it'd take to really plan a story on the page, and then start drawing feverishly.

If I had to do it again, I'm sure it would be due to someone offering me a large sum of money to draw 24 pages in 24 hours. The concept is nifty, and the experience taught me that I really really like to have my sleep. And that I sometimes prefer to work under pressure.

But I think I'd rather not do it ever again. ^_^

--Julie
4.11.02