Radio Silence

While packing to go home for the holidays I left one very important thing back in Michigan; The Speed Racer glasses case which contains my ultra fine black sharpies (for inking) and my flash drive which also has all my photos on it so no new posts until after the New Year, so later!

While I Was Out Part 3: Three Day Project at the Nahant Marsh

Towards the end of CTI all the teams had a short three day project so that the teams can get a feel for the kind of work they'd be doing throughout the year. This was the first time that any of the teams spent time off campus and the first time we really got to find out what it means to be a team. My teams project was at the
Nahant Marsh where we were helping to create a path down to their board walk that was more wheelchair assessable.We had a good time there, and we had a cool sponsor. We also declared a very affectionate turtle named Bobby (seen here) as our official team mascot. We also started our Spike tradition of going to a local China Buffet for dinner. (because they're everywhere.)

Intermission 2: The Drama of the NCCC Yearbook Cover

So every NCCC class has a yearbook profiling all the teams and their projects, and our class is no exception. There was a contest to determine who would get to design the cover of the yearbook and seeing as I was the only one who expressed interest I won by default. So I worked on my design, and worked, and worked, because as all artists know stuff like this takes a long time and in addition to all of the other Ameristuff we have to do you don't get that kind of time too often. So after about a little over a month of working on it, I finally submitted my original design (top left) only to find out a week later that staff decided against using my cover for various reasons, which included and not limited to, fear that the person on the cover was suppose to be me and that the person on the cover was not in full uniform. So taking this with a grain of salt I was given the opportunity to do a new cover, (seeing how they still needed one and I was the only one who actually did one.) and submitted the second image you see here which was approved.
There are different things I like about each cover more but ultimately I still like my original cover more, just because I feel like I had a really cool concept going with it visually and I got to showcase all the teams and their work better (because of limited space I could not include as many photos on the second design.) not to mention I spent a lot more time on it, where as the second cover was a picture I drew earlier in the year that I repurposed because I had not the time nor energy to start from scratch. What also really sucked about the whole situation, was the idea that they thought I was drawing myself with the original cover, when in actuality, I was trying to go for an indistinct person because the idea I was trying to get across was the an NCCC Corps member can be anyone and can come from anywhere so to get the exact opposite impression is really unfortunate and speaks on my ability to convey my thoughts using images. My original cover will still be featured in the yearbook in full color, it just won't be the cover. Basically what I'm taking from this experience (and this is the most positive spin I've been able to put on this thing.) is that when I enter the field of art professionally I'm going to have to get used to people I'm working for on commissions or other things to not want the same thing I necessarily want and be ready to adapt to their demands and expectations.

Intermission: Portrait of a Sleepy Hipster

A break from my Ameristory for something a little more current. This is just a quick sketch I did during work last Saturday when I had some down time. The random people heads didn't turn out well but I really like my yawning scene chick. One of my favorite parts of doing character designs are the costumes and I really love drawing hipster clothes for whatever reason.

While I Was Out Part 2: CTI Continued

Moving right along with my merry little story, after that community meeting I then joined the rest of the Corps in a little something called CTI (Corps Training Institute)One thing you'll learn about the government while working for them is that they love their cute little acronyms, I swear I almost needed flash cards to remember what all of them stood for. CTI is the 5 weeks of training that all Corps members go through before they're sent out into the field to save the world. Through out CTI we took all sorts of classes and trainings in shelter management, paperwork stuff, using power tools, and a LOT
of team building stuff. One of these team building exercises was the ropes course. Sure working together to solve rope based obstacles sounds very summer campy (teehee, it's a pun because I mean campy as in camp like but I also mean cheesey) but it was actually a lot of fun. This is a picture of my team lifting me through the spider web. I have also been keeping up with my art during CTI of course. Here's a character sketch I did for an idea I had for a comic about a Catholic High School Cheerleader who gets pregnant by means of Immaculate Conception. This is a picture of her cool hipster aunt.

While I Was Out Part 1: CTI in Vinton Iowa.

It was a dark day May 10th when I left Cleveland, (It was dark mostly because I left at 4 in the morning.) and it took me two sardine can airplanes to get me from Cleveland to Chicago and then finally to good old Vinton Iowa, a small gem in a sea of corn. I was picked up from the small airport by the support team leader Joy Whitt, who I would get to know better at a later time. When we arrived at Campus (The Iowa Braille and Sight Saving School.) there was already an all Corps community

meeting in progress led by, of all teams, the one I had been assigned to! You see, the day I arrived on campus was 5 days later than the majority of the Corps. Class 16A officially started on May 5th and I got the phone call telling me I got in, asking me if I can arrive by the 5th on the May 2nd. (I know right, thanks for the heads up.) Not just that but I had my then Girlfriend's prom to go to and there was already some drama there so I didn't want to make things any more miserable for her. So I got approved to come in later. I basicly went straight from the airport to the community meeting and got to sit on stage in front of the whole Corps with the team who I only just then met. Oh but it gets better, this was also before I knew that it just so happened that on my team there was another Avery and a Girl named Bailey (not Bailie like my name.) and they were starting the meeting, so when I heard our team leader call up "Avery Bailey" I was dumbfounded, luckly one of my teammates stopped me from standing up and making an ass of myself. So after that community meeting I got all my uniform items and went to that day's traings with the team and settled in and such. This picture is of part of the team from the Van inspection training in when it started to rain.

Before I Was Out...

So right before I found out I got accepted into AmeriCorps I was starting a mini comic for some of my friends from high school called the Vaginal Avengers. The story behind this was when I was a junior in high school my cool senior friends asked me to draw a comic of them as Slutty Super Heroes. From Left to Right you've got the Chasity Champion, The Canyon, and The Exotic Enchantress, and then the villians from top to bottom the Homo-Homewrecker and the Dike-a-saurus. Sadly enough the day I started it was the day before I got confirmation that I was leaving for AmeriCorps so I haven't really had the time to work on it since then.

I'm Not Dead! (promise!)

So it's been several months since my last posting, (sorry!) I kinda stopped after I joined AmeriCorps NCCC (B.T.W I joined AmeriCorps NCCC!) and I figured no one really reads this anyway so who's gonna miss out. Recently however I've started to read my friend's blog about our elementary school comic wars and then catching up on Tim Fish's blog about his life as a comic creator so I got re-motivated. So the next couple of posts I'll spend catching everyone up on where I've been since I've joined AmeriCorps with my art and my life and cool shit like that. In the mean time here's me doing my best Professor X from Kirby's classic run.

Quarter Life Crisis Page 5

Hello Again. So this year's Lakeland County Community College Comic Symposium is coming up along with it's comic contest. I entered the comic contest last year, in the high school graphic fiction division and won first place. This year I intend to enter again, this time in the post high school/ Adult Graphic Fiction Division as well as the post high school/ Adult Comic Strip Division. The reason I'm telling you guys this (besides for the obvious reasons in that this relates to my blog and my comic work) is because I'm going to be focusing a lot of my time and energy into working on my contest entries for both divisions. Now this doesn't mean I won't be posting at all, it's just going to be older stuff that I have had in reserve and I'm hoping to get photos up of some of my paintings and painted projects. But for now please enjoy this regularly scheduled page of my comic.

Clue Party Illustrated: Day 2

Hello again. Day 2 of the Clue Party Illustrated got pushed back a day do to circumstances. (circumstances meaning that I got totally wiped out after playing Wiifit Plus and fell asleep at 8:00 and never woke up.)Anywho here are three more drawings with more on the way. This first one is a picture of my good friend Claudine after many, MANY, drinks. (If she was a Hindu Goddess she would have been like Octofisting) After she became incredibly drunk to, frankly everyone's surprise, She was obsessed with this notion that everyone was judging her. Which is why the word balloon says "They're totally judging us in there." which is admittedly hard to see because I didn't have enough foresight to ink the lettering before scanning in the picture.

This next picture is another batch of the party guests specifically the guys. I can't say I really got the chance to talk to any of these fellows very much, and I'm not 100% sure on there names. To the left is Kyle who made the entire meal at the party (which tasted amazing) I always have a hard time drawing plaid, I thought about working some computer magic, but I figured that would take too much time and I was already behind on posting this. Center is Sara's date who I believe was named Matt. I remember seeing him and thinking, "whooh, he certainly looks collegial." but then when I drew him I made him look less collegial and more Clark Kent (non-Smallville). Then to the right is if I'm not mistaken Erika's boyfriend who's name was possibly Alec? Unless that was someone else. Anyway in person this guy looks like a butch version of Justin Long who could very easily kick your ass, but probably won't because he's nice. He was handing out those cigar things (I don't think they're technically cigars but they're those things with the little plastic mouth pieces that you always see on the ground all over Cleveland because everyone smokes in Cleveland.) to everyone at the party and a bunch of people just had them sitting in there mouth because you can't smoke in the building.

This next picture is one of Kyle again, while he was cooking dinner. As I said before everything was amazing, but there was an unfortunate (but humorous) incident with some Brochette, in that it got burned after being forgotten about. Luckily nothing caught on fire, and Thomas and Erika were able to make a quick trip to the local grocery store and buy some more bread for another try, which was very successful. Well that's all for today. I would also like to wish my friend Jeff Cole a happy birthday, Razzle Dazzle! (inside joke)

Clue Party Illustrated: Day 1

Okay, this is the second time that I am typing this because the Internet decided to be stupid and delete everything I had typed out already as I was typing (and I had a lot done already) Anyway today is the first day of a series of pictures relating to the clue party. Why several you may ask? Well the Clue Party had so many memorable moments that I could not just limit myself to just one image like I did with the Pirate Party. So to start things off is an image of my best friend Alex in one of his... less than finest moments. Clearly he had one waaaaay to many and spent most of the later half of the party puking in the trash can... and the toilet... and then the other trash can... and then Thomas' blanket. Basically nothing was safe from his puke, and yet none of this stopped him from singing along with the rest of the party guests to The B-52's Love Shack between purges. Today oddly enough, is also Alex's birthday so Happy Birthday Alex!!!

I'm not sure if I mentioned this in previous posts but this was a formal dinner party so everyone had to dress up (unless your name was Tyler apparently) So these next two images feature some of the beautiful guys and gals and my artist renditions of what what they were wearing. I would first like to apologize to my friend, Brittany (left, girls) because her dress was much longer than I have drawn it here, where I made it look like something a 1960's go-go dancer would wear. Our next party go-er Sarah was last party's puker. (Not this time though :D) I was particularly mad at Sarah when I started drawing this because of the complicated pattern. When I first saw this I thought "No biggy I'll just google Zebra print and work some computer magic." EXCEPT IT WASN'T JUST ZEBRA PRINT WAS IT SARAH!?! NO IT WAS SOME CRAZY SHIT WITH STRIPES AND SPOTS AND AMORPHOUS BLOBS!!!" Never the less I worked it out and once I did it it wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it was going to be, I'm just giving Sarah a hard time. The next girl (right) is a friend of Thomas' that I met for the first time, Erika, who also had a complicated patterned on her outfit but it was okay because she wasn't Sarah (cough cough, SARAH!!!)

As far as the guys go everyone was looking sharp (except Tyler, but I really don't think people were expecting much from him in that regard.{Tyler if you're reading this I'm only teasing you, please don't be offended}) First up (left) we got one half of our hosts for the night Albert then next to him is the other half Thomas and to the right is Jon. I'm not sure if anyone noticed this but you will now after I mention it, but I did not color any one's eyes because every time I do I always color them the wrong color. So this time I left them white.

This next image is what I think was the highlight of everyone's night, When Albert and Thomas did their Dream girls routine. It was pretty amazing in that, between the number of drinks it took for it to happen and that it was two white boys singing parts done by black women, it still sounded pretty damn good. They're two regular dream guys. Well that's it for today, I'll be back Wednesday with more Clue party pictures of people and the stuff they did. Until then!

Late Night Posting: Good Mornin' To You and You and You

So here I am, drawing pictures of the Clue party just being awake and I noticed, oh it's 12:13, it's tomorrow, or today, anyway I figured, "eh what the Hell I'm up anyway and at the computer, why not post the next page of my comic?" it being Sunday. Today is Also my sister's, Chloe, Birthday so happy birthday Chloe!

New Profile Picture

So last night I went to another party hosted by my friends Albert and Thomas. For those of you who remember Thomas and Albert were the hosts of the Pirate party last month. They have a party in there apartment every month, and this month the theme was a formal dinner party around the game of Clue. There was a lot of people jammed in the tiny apartment and a lot of drunken buffoonery taking place. There are plenty of memories that I will be drawing out for this so expect pictures of that. Today however focuses on my new profile picture for Facebook that I got inspiration from a music video from a band Thomas introduced me to called Rilo Kiley. The song is Breakin' Up which is currently my favorite song of theirs and I suggest that everyone should give them a try.

It's Been A While

It's been a while since I posted on my blog, 8 days, I've been kinda busy lately and really feeling the melancholy lately. I'm getting ready to move to Milwaukee in May and as you can image that does not sit well with some people. This next page of my comic Quarter Life Crisis is kinda fitting.

Argh, This Be the Pirate Party!!!

So I have finally uploaded my picture of the pirate party. You can tell it was a lot of fun from the sketch. So a lot is going on in hear so I'll explain it all as it happened at the party. My friend Rosa who is on the couch got real cozy with this guy (who I call Billy D. Williams) who she brought to the party, and then they started macin' on the couch in front of everyone. Then you got one of the hosts to the party my friend Albert, dancing to the Spice Girls with my other friend Claudine. The Girl behind the couch (who's name escapes me at the moment) is thoroughly sauced, which later led to so alcohol induced vomiting in the toilet... and then the garbage can. Then next to Rosa on the couch is the other host of the party, and also my friend, Thomas, as he sees it all unfold and is just "oh, ok" about it. Now you maybe saying to yourself, "well none of this sounds very piratey to me. Why was it a Pirate Party" well person who thought that exact thought just now, it was a pirate party because we were mostly wearing pirate costumes, and we watched Muppet Treasure Island, and we drank (a lot) of Rum! (which led to the toilet/garbage can vomiting) I think I am going to do a color version of this picture at a later date.

Just a Sketch.

So for sure the Pirate Party picture will be uploaded tomorrow, I have it drawn out and finished I just don't have access to the scanner until tomorrow. So tonight we have a sketch from my senior year sketch book probably from around January-ish, no real story behind it, just me practicing my people.

And Now... My Comic!

Yikes, not even a week in and I've missed a day! Sorry about that, this weekend was rather fun and insane at the pirate party (in all the good ways) and I ended up having a surprise guest Saturday night (that sounds worse than what I'm actually talking about, I just had a friend stay the night last night.) so I didn't get to update the blog yesterday. So I didn't didn't stayed true to my word of having party based ilustrations (though I did draw something at the party, I will not post it because I didn't check that adult content button in the blog options) I've got nothing at the moment but expect something either tomorrow or tuesday.

Today however as promised is the begining of my comic that I've been working on for about a year now called Quarter Life Crisis. It's semi-autobiographical and about how much growing up sucks ass. A nice coming of age story if you would. The main character Trevor Mitts is in his senior year of high school and is quickly aproaching graduation, and if that wasn't nerve wracking enough he's got friends who he fears hates him, a mother who thinks he won't graduate, a teacher's who thinks he needs to grow up, and a girlfriend who seems to be really pissed at him to deal with all during spring break. Naturally it's a comedy.

To get things warmed up (and to make up for yesterday's neglect) I've posted the first two (three if you include the cover, which I always do.) pages for your reading pleasure. Enjoy and see you all tomorrow.

When I'm Board.

So tonight I'm going to a pirate party and my friends Albert and Thomas's dorm so expect to see some sketches related to that on tomorrow's entry. Today however I'm uploading two sketches of comic book characters I created that I always seem to draw when I'm board. The first is a character for a comic that I've always mean to start but have never had the time to. This is Rita Appleseid, she is a witch that is part of this super hero team that is owned by a major corporation and charges money for their heroic deeds.

The next character is from my first ever comic (that I will never post do to the absolute suck of my talent at the time that I drew it.) her name is the Queen of Hearts. She was a character that my sister helped create when we were little that I built upon as the years went by. Her background story was that she was an assassin/ bounty hunter that worked for this organization all based off of playing cards called the 52 clan that's run by her mother the Joker queen.

RTA = WTF

So yesterday morning was a bad day for public transportation. For those of you who don't know me, (or anyone for that matter seeing how no one has yet to read this and make their presence known, but it's only been like four days so I'll quite the belly aching) I volunteer at the Cleveland Food Bank twice a week every Monday and Wendsday. I also take a train and a bus to get there, which leads to the ranting. Wensday morning I get on the number 37 bus at the same time I had been for the last couple of weeks. (I say the last couple of weeks because I had started to catch an earlier bus to the food bank.) Well Yesterday the bus driver decided that it would be a good day to screw with me and went the exact opissite direction. So I had to get off wait for another bus (note it's very, VERY, cold out side) to take me back to the bus station, to then get on another bus that actually would get me to the food bank. Oh, but it gets better, once I finally get there, a half-hour later than I had been (once again earlier bus, ect.) the doors weren't even open! They were locked, because whoever it was who was in charge of unlocking them had for whatever reason forgot to do so again. So I waited another 10 minutes (it still being cold outside.) until someone noticed I was outside and let me in.

The next image is a tribute to my nerdiness, because like all children of the 1990's I was (and unlike most am still) a Pokemon fan. I found out that they started putting the old episodes online so I started watching them because it's been like 10 years since I saw them (and they're a bit of a guilty pleasure) The last episode I just watched was the one where Ash gets a Squirtle after running into the Squirtle Squad so this is my tribute to that.

Something Old...

I wasn't feeling all that well today so I got a little lazy and just posted something I drew a while ago. I don't really know why I drew this, it's just a chick in a bumble bee costume, no real story behind it other than being board. I did a painting of this girl over the summer that turned out really weird so don't expect to see that anytime soon. Cooler stuff will be posted tomorrow.

Dear Ghost of Julia Child...

On the subject of blogs, last week I saw the movie Julie & Julia, which I was totally expecting to hate but ended up really enjoying it. (and not just the Meryl Streep parts) So one of the big reveals in the climax of the movie (Spoiler alert! if you haven't seen the movie yet and wish to be surprised than don't read any further) is that Julia Child really hated the blog created by Julie Powell... a lot. It got me thinking, if Julia Child really hated the blog than how crazy pissed do you think she would have been pissed if she was alive to see the movie based on it?

My First Post!!! Hi Everybody!!!

Hell0 everybody my name is Avery Bailie and this is the first post of my sketch blog. What's a sketch blog you may ask? (Or not because chances are if you are reading this you already have some vague idea as to what I'm talking about.) Well what a sketch blog is is a blog... with sketches, it's pretty damn simple. I got the idea to do one from reading Tim Fish's sketch blog, which if you haven't you should because it's really funny. What I want to accomplish with this is to post a new sketch or finished image every day (new or old) and at the end of the week a completed page of my comic book, Quarter Life Crisis. A little about myself, I am 19, a member of the graduating class of 09, and an aspiring comic book artist/writer. If I had to describe my own style I would call it a mix between Bryan Lee O'Malley and the previously mentioned Tim Fish with a hint of manga from the east. I am also interested in a wide variety of comics including western (American/Canadian) and manga. I hope for this to be the fist of many posts and you enjoy the further adventures of this blog.