Edmund Kearsley (00:57):
Hello, welcome to Let’s Make a Comic Book, season two starring Bitsy the Trading Cat. Today’s episode we have three great artists who are going to start the story off the epic tale of Bitsy the Trading Cat who lives in space. And so far that’s all we know.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:25):
That’s all we know.

Edmund Kearsley (01:27):
To introduce the guests, we have Mel Briggs, Chris Pit card, and Laura Smith tonight. Thanks for coming on the show you guys. Thanks for having it. So we will take a look at what happened last week. So we had Alex Major and Peter Wilson and Nick May all did a part of the character and we ended up with Bitsy who was named by the Retro Bros and HAI daughter in the chat.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (02:01):
Oh, cool. You took more notes than me.

Edmund Kearsley (02:04):
Sure did. So what we’ll do now, this will do the, we’ll pick the order of operations. So we’ll start with Mel, you get to pick a number. We’ll pick a 3, 3 3. Let’s

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (02:28):
See what three

Edmund Kearsley (02:28):
Is, is number two.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (02:31):
You have gone second my man,

Edmund Kearsley (02:36):
And then we’ll get Chris to pick one. Oh God four. Four is one. Oh no, you get to kick

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (02:48):
Us off. You can do it. You can do it Chris.

Edmund Kearsley (02:51):
And then Laura is going third. And now we can pick the panel. We’ve got the wheel of layouts and I’m going to the button and we’ll see what one it lands on. And it’s that one, the three long panel. That’s the one I did. So I’m going to remove that and I’m going to get that into the private chat for you guys to download and put on your drawing devices. While I’m doing that, si you could show off the fan art that we’ve got.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (03:38):
Yes, we’ve got some fan art. This is something we’re doing different for season two. So the first piece of fan art was actually sent in while the character was being designed last week by Dave Dye. So not the best of, what do you call it?

Edmund Kearsley (03:57):
Resolutions

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (03:58):
Resolution. Yeah, I couldn’t even think of the word there. Yeah, so we had that and then Emmanuel, her, I hope I’m saying that right, her sent this in. So that’s pretty cool. I love the drill. And Danny Nolan with his strange sense of humour sent this one in

Edmund Kearsley (04:19):
Humour.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (04:22):
Danger Gene sent this one in.

Edmund Kearsley (04:28):
That’s

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (04:28):
Cool. So that’s pretty cool. And Rob O’Connor got a bit of a crossover going. And then we have someone who’s on the show who also sent in fan enough, Chris.

Edmund Kearsley (04:52):
Oh, nice. Very sleek. I

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (04:56):
Very cool.

Edmund Kearsley (04:59):
All right. So do you guys have the template? Chris, you are starting us off. Oh God. So all we know so far is the character’s name, what the character looks like, and that they live in space, so you get to do anything basically.

Chris Pitcairn (05:25):
Well, gosh, I guess I mean like a tradie, right? So I

Edmund Kearsley (05:35):
Guess

Chris Pitcairn (05:36):
Maybe fix doing welding on a spaceship if they’re in the cat’s in a glass container, it has their own air supply. Yeah, in doing some welding. I’m just going to fix up my,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (06:01):
It’s really up to you, dude.

Chris Pitcairn (06:03):
Yeah.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (06:04):
All you decide. I’m going to try to read out comments. I’ve noticed a few people have done hand signals. Thanks a lot guys. I can’t read that. Heavy metal. Okay. Without my glasses. I can’t see them. All I can see is little hands carrie’s. Reading ’em out to me. Excellent. We’ll start with Nick May going, oh bitsy, where will you get up to tonight? What will you get up to tonight? Where I say, where I’m lovely at reading things, so I love that this is the choice that Ed had. Shane read the comments. This has got too many symbols on it, so I’m going to put this one up. This is from Kerry with lots of cats and so forth, celebrations, and then we’ve got the peace sign. People can see little Siz that’s from Lee Chaka and then Adam Gillespie’s doing the rock and roll. Then we’ve got horizontal panels. My Old Enemy. Yes, Nick May. Yes. And oh wow, this is so much fun. Che.

Edmund Kearsley (07:17):
Oh yeah, that’s Che’s. The named Bity came up with Bity. Oh,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (07:27):
A celebrity in the show. Cool. So well Laura and Mel sit there waiting for Chris

Chris Pitcairn (07:41):
To do something,

Laura Smith (07:42):
Right. I’m relearning how to draw while waiting.

Mal Briggs (07:45):
So am I

Laura Smith (07:47):
Need do a circle again. Is it like with the sharp angles?

Edmund Kearsley (07:51):
Yes.

Laura Smith (07:52):
Nice, nice.

Edmund Kearsley (07:55):
Well, let’s have a chat to the other guests. We’ll start with Mel at the top. Mel, tell us about yourself and how are you going to comics and drawing and all sorts of stuff like that.

Mal Briggs (08:16):
Does anyone really remember how they started drawing anyone?

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (08:21):
No, I don’t actually.

Mal Briggs (08:22):
Right. It

Laura Smith (08:24):
Might show my age, but I still have my first sketchbook, so yes.

Mal Briggs (08:29):
That’s amazing. I probably do somewhere, who knows?

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (08:32):
I do somewhere as well. I do somewhere. My mom gave it to me just a little while ago. I don’t think it’s handy. I don’t think it’s handy. It’d be very embarrassing images in it trapped in Australia and such.

Mal Briggs (08:49):
Nice. Yeah, I’ve always drawn, I always enjoyed drawing. I found comics were one of those things that it’s hard to not like. I mean they were always there in the newspapers and everything. I just see comics as more complicated versions of picture books and we give every kid picture books. So it’s almost like, it’s not that people didn’t get into comics, it’s that people just stopped reading pictures. Everybody starts reading pictures, but at some point people just stopped for some reason and I just never did. So yeah, it’s a funny thing. But yeah, I mean my job now is selling everyone else’s drawings and stuff, so it’s fun for me to pull out a pencil. I’ve got to try and relearn how it all works. But yeah, it’s cool. But yeah, I’ve been running Impact comics for 20 years selling comics and stuff. So yeah, I just spend my whole life around comics and I’m constantly amazed at the people who understand how they work. It’s really easy in comics sometimes to just enjoy the ride and not think about the mechanics of how a panel’s laid out and how the story flows from one panel to the next and all the pacing and everything. And I’m always

(10:44)
Awestruck when I hear someone who’s really see someone who really nails it or hears somebody who thinks about it intentionally and really understands that stuff. I think it’s kind of amazing. Yeah.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (11:02):
Excellent.

Edmund Kearsley (11:05):
Alrighty. Should we have a look at what Chris has got so far?

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (11:11):
Oh, yep. Here we go. Oh yes, welding. I love it.

Chris Pitcairn (11:19):
Yeah, just kind of blocking it out at the moment.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (11:22):
Oh, that looks awesome.

Edmund Kearsley (11:26):
That’s a really good use of the long panel.

Chris Pitcairn (11:29):
Yeah, it’s funny hearing long panels. My old Nemes says, I really like doing long panels, like long narrow ones and getting, that was a weird gesture, but being able to layer a whole bunch of different, I guess sequences and depths on top of each other and having something comedic in the foreground, something comedic in the background and layers that you can just have going backwards and forwards in depth, but also stacking ’em on top of each other. So yeah, and also welding, because I was like, oh, I can have a mini welders mask on bitsy.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (12:19):
That’s awesome.

Edmund Kearsley (12:24):
Alright, so Mel, your second. So is that enough info for you to, well, I’m looking, I’m just wondering what he’s going to put in the background so he

Chris Pitcairn (12:33):
Stars. Yeah, nothing terribly specific stars. Maybe a spaceship going past or a flying saucer. Okay, nice.

Edmund Kearsley (12:45):
BWS Blackwood stars.

Chris Pitcairn (12:51):
Yep.

Edmund Kearsley (12:51):
Cool.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (12:52):
Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to press that. Well while we’re here, here’s some more fan art that just came in.

Edmund Kearsley (13:01):
Oh, that’s cool. I like that.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (13:06):
Just came in, I was trying to move it, but I clicked on it instead.

Edmund Kearsley (13:13):
So let’s have a chat with Laura. This is your second time on the Let’s make a comic book. Yeah,

Laura Smith (13:22):
Yeah, it is. It’s good to be back.

Edmund Kearsley (13:28):
So tell us about what have you been drawing lately? What’s going on with

Laura Smith (13:34):
Your heart?

(13:36)
Yeah, I’ve actually not been doing much comic recently. I’m eternally working on the second volume of a comic that I’ve made Sophie’s world. But in South Australia we have an annual art exhibition called Sala, the South Australian Living Artists. And as of last year, I’ve been part of a art collective here in the city and some of us are actually working towards an exhibition. So that will start in August. It’s for the entirety of August. So I have been working with traditional mediums, acrylic pain on canvas, trying to get two pieces done. I don’t think I’ll managed to get a third done, but trying to get two pieces done for what will be my first exhibition as a practising artist. So that will be very neat.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (14:33):
Yeah, very cool. That’s cool.

Laura Smith (14:36):
Yeah, it’s quite fun. It’s a little bit out of my wheelhouse. So the theme for our exhibition is flowers and I am a horror artist and a surrealist. So I’ve finished one piece that is flowers with my big creepy grins that I do. And the one I work in at the moment are little green daisies with eyeballs in the middle. Oh,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (14:59):
Cool. Yes, it could just be me because the screen’s so small. But are you practising on the wall?

Laura Smith (15:06):
So this piece here is not actually by me, so that is one of my friends. She’s also an artist, but that one there is me the big Oh

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (15:17):
Cool.

Laura Smith (15:18):
And then I’ve got some little pieces down on the ground and that black line that you can see if I can point at it, that black line now, nevermind. You can see it. It has a hand coming out of it. Oh, cool. So yes, I’m drawing directly on my wall. It’s the pros of owning a place, apparently you just get to draw whatever you want.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (15:41):
I was about to ask, you’re not into rental bonds, but yeah, you don’t have to.

Laura Smith (15:44):
Yeah, not losing any bonds anytime soon. Yeah, so look, I’ve been doing it for a long time. You can probably actually look back on the session I was in the last time and he was probably only slightly less complete than he is now. Yeah, it’s good fun. It’s just with posca markers that I have absolutely destroyed because I didn’t prime the wall in any way, shape or form.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (16:13):
That’s awesome. Yeah,

Laura Smith (16:15):
I enjoy it. Not quite drawing on a wall.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (16:18):
Yeah, well that’d be cool if I did that. There’d be a lot of trouble. Oh, look at this. Nick May says he drew a Captain Australia comics as well. There you go. It wasn’t just me and Sean, she, sorry, I’ve never seen a name like that, so I’m going to get it wrong every time. Wow, that’s a great panel design. So I think that was to Chris because I don’t think we’ve seen anyone else’s, so it’d be funny if it was anyone else’s and feel free to make the cat fart. Thank you Alex. That’s really nice of you.

Edmund Kearsley (17:01):
So if anyone who’s watching wants to be on the show, we do have a submission thing Maji that Sue made

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (17:16):
There. It is there.

Edmund Kearsley (17:18):
And there’s also, if you want to send in some fan art to get shown on the show, there is one for that too, which is the same one, but it says art instead of interest, I believe.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (17:30):
I’m glad you said that because I haven’t actually made one. I’ll make it right now.

Laura Smith (17:37):
You can tell the future.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (17:41):
Hang on, I can’t do that. We will get us shut down for having songs of other shows.

Laura Smith (17:47):
That’s right. I think you were off that. They weren’t paying it.

Chris Pitcairn (17:53):
There

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (17:54):
We go. There’s the one. So fan art, throw it in there. It’s a page where you can submit art, one art piece at a time. You can put your Instagram handle in there and all that sort of stuff. If you do that we’ll share it on the Comex channels and tag you. So that’s the reason we’re asking for your handle there.

Edmund Kearsley (18:18):
Wolverine is the character for tomorrow for the drink and draw. So tomorrow,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (18:27):
That’s tomorrow drink and draw Wolverine as a character. You can send that in there as well. On that same page, you can pick which show you’re sending the art in for. So if I get a Wolverine for this show, I will be a little confused, but then I will realise what’s happened. All right. If I get a night crawler for this show, then I will be confused. I don’t know any show that we are doing at the moment with a night crawler, but if you want to do that, go for it. I’ll show it anyway.

Laura Smith (18:57):
Sometimes you just have to draw night crawler. It is what it is.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (19:01):
Little blue dude with a dale got to love him

Edmund Kearsley (19:04):
Happens to the best of us. Should we put up Chris’s

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (19:12):
Drawings? Oh yeah.

Edmund Kearsley (19:14):
Cool. It’s like he’s hitting the inks.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (19:20):
Well what am I pressing wrong? Oh, there it is. I see what I was pressing wrong. It was already on the screen there. Okay. All the buttons to bring it up were gone and I’m like, what’s going on? It’s just hiding in the background. I love the welding mask. That is awesome.

Laura Smith (19:45):
So cute. It’s got little whiskers.

Chris Pitcairn (19:48):
Yeah, little

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (19:49):
Kitty

Chris Pitcairn (19:51):
Kitty welding mask with whiskers to have whiskers on it.

Laura Smith (19:57):
Of course. How would we know

Chris Pitcairn (19:59):
Exactly? Oh, I meant to ask. I assume this is all in black and white like before?

Edmund Kearsley (20:11):
Yeah,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (20:12):
Black and white. I

Chris Pitcairn (20:13):
Don’t like that one.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (20:15):
No, no. Ms Paint all black on white. Sorry. We had someone on, oh God, Oz comic show and he admitted that he coloured his entire Comic Inn with Ms Paint bucket

Chris Pitcairn (20:36):
Two. Whoa.

Edmund Kearsley (20:38):
I think that was Adam Gillespie, wasn’t it?

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (20:40):
Yeah, it was Adam Gillespie and he also won a ledger for it

Edmund Kearsley (20:44):
And drew this

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (20:46):
And drew this.

Laura Smith (20:49):
My mom makes, we call it boomer huma. And by that I mean my brother and I call it boomer huma, but my mom makes comics that she puts on a website that she has and for the thirst couple of years, probably couple, she not only drew it in Emma’s paint, but she drew it with a computer mouse

Edmund Kearsley (21:12):
With

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (21:12):
A mouse

Laura Smith (21:14):
Cuts and cheese.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (21:15):
Wow, that’s impressive.

Laura Smith (21:17):
Yeah, it was crazy. She eventually migrated over to Photoshop and to a drawing tablet. But yeah, for ages it was a computer mouse and Microsoft paint.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (21:30):
That’s impressive.

Edmund Kearsley (21:32):
Sweet. So Mal, how’s your panel coming?

Mal Briggs (21:41):
I’ve just sent SA JPEG screen shot. I’m really

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (21:47):
Paying attention. I

Edmund Kearsley (21:49):
It’s alright. Classic

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (21:51):
Classics.

Mal Briggs (21:53):
I just started looking at it going, I wonder if it’s actually dark enough to see, because I’m being super timid here. I’m feeling intimidated by people who actually draw.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (22:04):
I’m looking at it and I don’t know if it is.

Mal Briggs (22:07):
Alright, that’s alright. We’ll put it

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (22:09):
On the screen anyway, let’s give

Mal Briggs (22:10):
It a go. I’ll make it a little bit darker and I’ll give you a better one. Hang on a sec. Okay.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (22:16):
Yeah. But then again this screen has issues with contrast.

Laura Smith (22:23):
Oh, we’re back to the tech issues. Are we?

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (22:25):
Yeah, I’ve got the tech issues. I’ve got ’em all. Baby, what was I going to bring up? Yes, we’ve been given a pronunciation guide and I’m sure I’ll still stuff it up. Sean Ake Sean Ake. Okay. I’ll forget within five seconds, but thank you. And it’s Doka, is that how you pronounce it? Doka.

Laura Smith (22:48):
Aka.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (22:50):
Aka

Laura Smith (22:51):
Say it differently each time and one of them is bound to be correct.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (22:54):
Yes. I’ll, I’ll get it right once tonight. That’s my mission. And we also have the WY mass reminds me of the Wuhan cat during lockdown that went viral on WeChat. I have no idea what that is.

Edmund Kearsley (23:12):
Many

Laura Smith (23:14):
Quite, you lost on

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (23:17):
So, yep. I’m glad that happened, Alex. Sounds great. That’s all I’ve got to say. I have no idea what you’re talking about, Alex. Terrible.

Edmund Kearsley (23:29):
Did we get Mel’s picture?

Mal Briggs (23:31):
Here we go. I’m going to send you through something a bit darker now.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (23:34):
Yep. Cool. I’ve got it open. Ready to check it out. Messenger’s been messenger. Jackie says, Hey, sausage scissor and game and save the downloads. Let’s see if my computer’s playing up a lot. I’m saving things to downloads and there’s three download folders now and my computer for some reason and I’m having a lot of fun figuring out which one is the one that saves it to, because every programme decides to save it to a different one.

Laura Smith (24:13):
Oh, with the one, the virtual, virtual desktop, whatever it is. Yeah.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (24:20):
Yeah.

Mal Briggs (24:21):
Microsoft really want you on OneDrive don’t they?

Laura Smith (24:24):
OneDrive. That’s one Microsoft does my head in. It’s such a virus.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (24:32):
Oh, we’ve got a creature.

Edmund Kearsley (24:35):
Got a smile. Space Octopus.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (24:39):
Space

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (24:40):
Octopus Aus. It’s not space without an octopus.

Laura Smith (24:44):
I’ve often said that.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (24:46):
I love it.

Edmund Kearsley (24:48):
Is that enough for you to go on with Laura?

Laura Smith (24:51):
Yeah, I think so.

Edmund Kearsley (24:53):
Sweet.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (25:00):
Oh, I got to write the first time and now I’ve got to look back at the pronunciation so I can say thank you. Thank you Sean Aki, there you go. How I’m not remember. Oh yeah, it looks different than that. Emphasis on the first syllable. Ah, I dunno if that’s the last name or the first name. And Rob O’Connor is a big fan of the Space Octopus.

Edmund Kearsley (25:28):
Space Octopus. It’s cool.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (25:32):
So straight into fighting. Well, maybe not. Might be a love octopus. Can’t really assume these things.

Laura Smith (25:38):
You can’t call her lover Octopus. Not on the internet.

Chris Pitcairn (25:42):
Oh God no,

Laura Smith (25:45):
That’s what I said.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (25:49):
That’d be my mistake.

Edmund Kearsley (25:53):
So it’s probably lucky we had Alex on last week then.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (25:56):
Yeah, not this week.

Edmund Kearsley (26:05):
So Chris, have you got any comic books coming out or that you’re working on or anything you can tell?

Chris Pitcairn (26:14):
So, pardon me. So I’m currently working on Foxen Hound six,

(26:26)
So that’s the last book in the current Foxen hound series. There will be a second one. As far as I’m aware, Nick’s already hard at work, drum up a story for, so that’s my current project, but I think one of the comics that I worked on with her, not last year but the year before, your Highness, your Highness has now gotten printed and she’s now selling that one. So at least I think at Premiere to ComicCon. So that’s really cool. We worked so hard on that one and had so many issues with, because it was with a publisher and then there were complications and yeah, it was a whole thing.

(27:28)
But it’s great to sort of see it finally getting printed and coming out. That’s awesome. And I think she was talking about doing some special cover variance down the track, which would be cool. What else? There was also Lucky Country, which I think we’ve pushed back a little to kind of focus on other stuff, but Lucky Country was the, it’s like setting a dystopian future version of Sydney where future, yeah, warehousing. Yeah, where it’s the future and yeah, it’s like housing is decided by lottery and it’s like this socioeconomic political, not quite satire, just like a commentary, which was really different to work on. Quite unusual for both of us. God, I’m doing this terribly. But yeah, that’s kind of it at the moment is just promoting those two and then focusing, good Lord I’m not doing this well and then promoting the next Fox and Hound, which is, oh boy, it’s a doozy. But it’s exciting and it’s fun to finally be working on it and can’t wait for people to be able to read it and yeah,

Edmund Kearsley (29:30):
I can people get the Fox and Hound and the,

Chris Pitcairn (29:36):
So they’re all available at, I think it’s ns kane comics.com. So let me just double check so that I get the, it’s not coming up, that’s mine.

Edmund Kearsley (30:00):
No

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (30:03):
Internet should be doing this. Okay, so it’s not.com. Let’s try.com au.

Chris Pitcairn (30:11):
Oh, it’s nsk comics.wix.com.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (30:17):
Oh, it’s a WIC site. Okay. Yeah,

Chris Pitcairn (30:24):
If you go to NSK and comics on Instagram, she has the links there that you can buy the comics from. Excellent. So yeah, all the comics that are out are available there. I do also have, for people who are interested in stuff, if that’s a bit lighter. I was the colorist on the first issue of SKS Transhuman and I also did, I was the illustrator for Wolf Cubs with him. The first issue is out and I think the second issue is currently in pre Kickstarter thingy, so you can also get those from him. They’re quite different from my usual style. They’re very kid friendly, so they’re much more cartoony because yeah, Nick stuff is not kid friendly, definitely friendly.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (31:41):
Speaking of not kid friendly. I’m just pointing the link up there so people can see it. I just found it, so it’s a nice complicated one. Thank you. There’s stuff which we’ll also have Chris’s stuff in there. Not kid friendly. Don’t go there. If you are a kid just saying kid, stop it. Okay. Yeah,

Laura Smith (32:06):
I got kid. Stop. Stop following the link.

Edmund Kearsley (32:15):
Have a look at Laura’s.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (32:17):
Yep. Let’s have a look. See,

Edmund Kearsley (32:23):
Yeah, we’ve got stuff happening.

Laura Smith (32:26):
Yeah, trying to remember what backs look like at the moment. Who even knows

Edmund Kearsley (32:35):
You’ll be the first person to draw bit’s back.

Laura Smith (32:38):
I know I was looking at the concept of bitsy, I’m like, what is that at the back? I’m like an exhaust pipe. I’m going to assume it’s an exhaust pipe.

Edmund Kearsley (32:53):
I thought it was as well, but I think it might be a scarf, but it doesn’t. I don’t

Laura Smith (32:57):
Know, but I thought exhaust pipe as well, but I mean to do it, it’ll go off here anyway, so there you go. That’s we’ll leave mouse panel. I know a little bit, although I going off a little bit up there, but that’s okay.

Edmund Kearsley (33:20):
Yeah, that’s fine. So while we have a look at Laura’s drawing, let’s chat to Mel about impact comics. Give us info

Mal Briggs (33:35):
And

Edmund Kearsley (33:35):
How you got into it and where it is. And

Mal Briggs (33:38):
So we’re in Canberra and how I got into it is I was selling vacuum cleaners and I decided I would not be wanting to do that for the rest of my life. And so I

Laura Smith (33:59):
Decision did it suck?

Mal Briggs (34:03):
I tried to work out how I could sell comic books and a lot of other links in the chain. But yeah, that’s sort of what really started me on the path to where we are now. I was selling vacuum cleaners and spending my money on comic books though. I was like, yeah, I think I need to do the other way around or something. Yeah, no, I don’t want to spend my money back in S either. No, don’t do that. Yeah, so we’ve been doing it. Yeah, coming up in September will be 20 years impact comics, so

Laura Smith (34:55):
That’s awesome.

Mal Briggs (34:56):
Yeah, 20 years ago we were having some very, very late nights ordering pizza and stuff while we were working out how to set up the accounts and literally drawing plans for the shop on napkins and that sort of thing. Yeah. And now we’re coming up 20 years. It’s not the easiest time right now to be in any small business or retail or anything, but I always say that some of my worst days are better than a lot of people’s regular days. I mean, yeah, I think I said that right. I think so. Yeah. I’m having a lot of trouble drawing and talking at the same time. I’m really trying to be polite about it. So yeah, we’ve sort of become a really, no, not really mainstreaming. I mean we do stop the mainstream stuff, but we definitely, we go out of our way to find things that you are unlikely to find in a lot of other places. But at the same time, we don’t have as much small indie, especially local stuff as we used to. And I think part of that is things like Kickstarter and stuff are filling that role that comic shops

(36:50)
Used to do and the odd places that you’d find zines, independent record stores and stuff that aren’t around so much anymore and all of those sort of things that used to be the places you’d find indie zines. I think in a lot of ways Kickstarter almost is like a constant artist, Sally. People can be discovering new stuff all the time online and it makes the whole economics of it different. The trade off is the quality of the finished product that people are able to produce now is so much more professional than it was when you expected an indie comic to be photocopied and stapled and that sort of stuff. But it does mean that the economics of that doesn’t leave a lot of room for a shop to basically pay for the space it takes to display an indie comics. And that unfortunately is a big reality of things is rent. Rent is one of our biggest bills every month we’re importing pallet loads of stuff that’s getting air freighted from America every single week, but our rent is one of our biggest overheads and so it’s really hard for us to getting things that

(38:28)
We like unless they’re paying for the spot and that’s the gut-wrenching part of being in a business where you’re actually excited about the product and you want to do these things is it’s really, really easy to make bad financial decisions because you’re just passionate about the product. And so we’re constantly checking ourselves and trying to make sure that we’re staying on top of those things, which is, man, you guys don’t want to hear that all. I’ve just ranted on for ages about why I can’t sell indie comics. Sorry about that.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (39:11):
It’s

Mal Briggs (39:11):
Okay. My mouth needs to be supervised. Yeah, my brain’s too busy supervising my drawing hand.

Laura Smith (39:18):
I feel like it’s so accurate for so many people though. So it really reigns true for I think nearly everyone in the industry at the moment. Not everyone has a storefront brick and mortar that result in overhead costs like that, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t see where it comes from and the expenses to create batches of comics without the support of the various sections that come together you did use to get from comic shops that are being pushed out by things like Kickstarter that’s not as accessible to everyone. Kickstarter is great, but not for everyone. And the change in how people can go about doing things is enormous and ever changing. Everything is a fad in so many ways at the moment. You’re always learning something new because the thing that you learned six months ago is no longer valid.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (40:20):
Very true. Okay. Just to throw it in a totally different direction, Alex says, the octopus reminds me of from a romance cartoons from Japan. Thanks Alex.

Laura Smith (40:34):
I told you that you can’t say octopus on the Instagram,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (40:38):
So Yeah, I think he thinks everything’s a romance.

Mal Briggs (40:42):
My poor octopus is studied blush.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (40:50):
Oh, I’ve got to keep going back. Shay. Sorry. S Shay said giving ideas. So I waited over on a drawn so that these ideas don’t filter into the art of the actual artist. But Shawan Key said maybe she’s just fixing the space octopus tank at the Space Aquarium.

Laura Smith (41:18):
Oh my God, that’s precious.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (41:19):
Well the space octopus is the captain of the ship and she’s repairing cause maintaining pressure of the water environment in space is hard. Okay. Yep. And Robbie’s saying octopus, I guess that’s a reference to oh seven. That was last week wasn’t it? What are we talking about oh seven for now? I don’t

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (41:43):
Know.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (41:47):
That’s what I’m going with. That’s what I’m going with. I’m not going to go anywhere else with that word.

Laura Smith (41:52):
That’s fair.

Edmund Kearsley (41:55):
Okay, so we’ve got the idea of what everyone’s drawing. Is anyone going to have any dialogue or narration or anything on their panel?

Laura Smith (42:11):
Not me. I’m a silent comic artist.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (42:15):
Ah. Cannot hear them scream in space. Isn’t that it? Although I think we had a discussion about this last week about how you can, and I wasn’t listening, it was Alex telling the story. So, oh, sorry. Did I say that out loud?

Laura Smith (42:37):
So you did that. That was great.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (42:38):
I love you Alex. You know that, so the story is about the octopus seducing bitsy. No, I don’t think that’s it.

Chris Pitcairn (42:48):
That’s one of the romances.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (42:51):
Yeah. He’s always after romances old Alex,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (43:00):
Should we

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (43:01):
Have a look at Chris?

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (43:04):
Yep. Ooh.

Chris Pitcairn (43:13):
Yeah, just putting down my flats so I can start.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (43:18):
Is there someone in the window?

Chris Pitcairn (43:20):
Yeah, I’m sure of no particular consequence, but I just drew someone in the window looking very surprised or

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (43:33):
Nice.

Mal Briggs (43:36):
Oh man, I didn’t even spot the window. I think I might’ve aced the window.

Chris Pitcairn (43:43):
The window’s on a different side of the ship.

Laura Smith (43:50):
The window is a social construct.

Chris Pitcairn (43:52):
Yeah,

Chris Pitcairn (43:55):
A social construct.

Mal Briggs (43:56):
The window

Mal Briggs (43:56):
Is the friends we made along the way.

Chris Pitcairn (44:01):
It’s Schrodinger’s window. It’s both there and not there at the same time.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (44:06):
Nice.

Laura Smith (44:09):
I’ve often said that about Windows,

Chris Pitcairn (44:16):
Occasionally experienced it walking into them.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (44:24):
I am doing it again. Ed, I’m forgetting. I’m on a show and I’m watching the art.

Edmund Kearsley (44:34):
Are we going to comment

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (44:35):
Much? You guys draw

Edmund Kearsley (44:37):
From Peter?

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (44:40):
Oh, I just saw Peter. Yep. Peter said evening or earlier. I missed that I to have a few silent panels to begin with. There you go.

Mal Briggs (44:53):
I’m toying with putting in a sound effect, but like you said, it’s space and I’m robbing my head.

Chris Pitcairn (45:00):
I was thinking of putting in a sound effect,

Laura Smith (45:02):
Just put in a really small sound bubble, but I

Chris Pitcairn (45:07):
A really

Mal Briggs (45:08):
Big one with nothing in it.

Chris Pitcairn (45:10):
Yeah.

Laura Smith (45:12):
Yes.

Chris Pitcairn (45:12):
That’s actually a lot funnier is isn’t.

Mal Briggs (45:16):
It’s happening.

Laura Smith (45:18):
Your entire panel is just the sound like a speech bubble.

Chris Pitcairn (45:27):
Oh no.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (45:30):
You’re going to kill Chris. Oh

Chris Pitcairn (45:32):
No. Do that. I’m not finished yet.

Edmund Kearsley (45:34):
He has to finish his panel

Chris Pitcairn (45:35):
First. Yeah.

Laura Smith (45:37):
Deep breath. You can die later.

Chris Pitcairn (45:39):
Yeah.

Laura Smith (45:43):
Things I never thought I’d say to Chris today.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (45:47):
It’s all good. Finish it in the afterlife. It’s all good.

Chris Pitcairn (45:49):
Yeah, I’ll just die at the end of the stream. You’ll get big ratings.

Laura Smith (45:56):
It’ll be all over the news.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (45:59):
Drawing kills man comics to blame. That was

Chris Pitcairn (46:07):
Bad. That was also bad

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (46:10):
To take charges.

Laura Smith (46:12):
Mothers across the nation, revolt against comics.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (46:21):
Yeah. Even Peter’s saying here, Peter, don’t die. Live on the stream, mate. I don’t know if that’s his way of saying wait till we finish to die or just not to die at all. I’m not sure what he’s saying.

Laura Smith (46:36):
Yeah, don’t give us paperwork to do and you’ll be fine.

Chris Pitcairn (46:39):
Yeah, that’s it. It’s that. It’s the paperwork.

Laura Smith (46:43):
It’s the paperwork.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (46:44):
Oh, it’s always the paperwork.

Laura Smith (46:46):
No one wants to do paperwork and if they do, they’re lying

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (46:53):
Or they’re paid a lot for it,

Laura Smith (46:55):
Even then they don’t want to do it.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (46:57):
Well that’s true. Oh, I’ve been checking for new art. New. No God, no more fan art. Yeah, that’s because we’re all too busy watching you guys.

Edmund Kearsley (47:13):
I put one into the to the thing, sis.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (47:17):
Oh shit, I didn’t see

Edmund Kearsley (47:19):
Language.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (47:22):
Ooh,

Laura Smith (47:24):
That was English. I think

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (47:25):
Another red. Oh yeah, that’s one that is, oh, hang on. Oh, that’s the one I gave everyone as reference. That is wicked. Yeah. On what? More to say.

Edmund Kearsley (47:46):
Oh yeah. Peter Wilson

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (47:48):
Did the logo too. Oh yeah, good point. Thank you Peter Wilson. Much appreciated

Laura Smith (47:55):
On you, Peter.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (47:57):
Thank you Mel.

Laura Smith (48:08):
Oh, I am glad you’re not watching my screen for this bit. I

Laura Smith (48:11):
Dunno how to draw

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (48:12):
Mine. Oh, he’s out of the window.

Edmund Kearsley (48:15):
That looks awesome.

Laura Smith (48:16):
Hey,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (48:21):
And you were worried, Mel. I’m still worried. Don’t be worried. That’s awesome. Oh, I don’t know if you said at the beginning, you don’t have to fully finish these pictures during the show as well, so don’t stress. We just need enough that we can put the picture. Ed can put the picture together and give everyone a feel for what the page is going to look like.

Edmund Kearsley (48:52):
That is true.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (48:55):
And I just realised I’m meant to do all this other stuff for you guys that I haven’t done. So I’m just going to, oh, there’s a whole bunch of comments coming in now. That’d be Brian. That’s fantastic. Future cover and looks fantastic. And police report. Hang on. What’s that for? Hang on. What? For

Laura Smith (49:15):
The death of Chris?

Chris Pitcairn (49:17):
Yeah,

Laura Smith (49:18):
Paperwork. The paperwork. I don’t want to do.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (49:21):
Yes. I wasn’t there.

Laura Smith (49:24):
No saw nothing heard nothing saw

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (49:26):
Nothing heard, nothing.

Laura Smith (49:27):
Don’t even know why you’re bringing it up. Really

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (49:32):
Good point.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (49:35):
Okay,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (49:36):
Let’s see.

Laura Smith (49:38):
Why did I give myself so many long lines? Who decide on the layout of this panel? I’m an artist, I swear. Oh,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (49:54):
Hang on. Yep. Found it cool. I can rely on Google after all. Okay, that’s one. Now let’s get the next one and I must stalk you Mr. Because I know your Instagram tag off by heart. I’m the one giving all the love hearts to the pitches. That’s me. Oh, I pressed the wrong one. I don’t know who that dude is. I You’ve got a dot. He doesn’t. Oh

Chris Pitcairn (50:51):
Yeah,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (50:52):
We can still show this on the show maybe.

Chris Pitcairn (50:55):
Oh, that’s dangerous.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (50:59):
I haven’t scrolled yet, so. Oh no, it’s fine.

Chris Pitcairn (51:04):
I’ve been trying to put little warnings before I post anything. Ready?

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (51:09):
Yeah. You’ve got nothing here. That’s bad. Nothing here. That’s bad. I saw the two pictures and went, does it get more intimate as I go down?

Chris Pitcairn (51:18):
Absolutely. Oh, am

Laura Smith (51:18):
I

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (51:23):
Not? Cool and I’m guessing, I’m curious about this one actually. I’m guessing you don’t have an Instagram with all your art on it, mal?

Mal Briggs (51:37):
No.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (51:40):
You should

Edmund Kearsley (51:42):
Website for Impact Comics or something.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (51:45):
Yeah, that’s what I’m doing. Nice. But I was just going to hassle him that he didn’t have No

Laura Smith (52:07):
So many little suckers

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (52:09):
Canberra. Cool. Right one. There was quite a few impact comments came up then

Mal Briggs (52:16):
I shall have to hunt them down. There can be only one not on stream. We’ve been through this.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (52:35):
Okay,

Edmund Kearsley (52:35):
So let everyone know once again that we are taking submissions for fan art and if you want to be on the show as well. Yes. If you want to draw a panel or be on recent reads as well,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (52:51):
There is a page, the interest page has little tick boxes next to every show We do tick the ones you’re interested in. It can be multiple. It can be one. It just can’t be zero. That’d be silly. Why are you sending me these emails? Seriously. But yeah, so say what show you want to be on. I’ve already contacted a few people who’ve done this and put them on shows, so yeah. Oh yes. So if you want to be on any of the shows, if you want to submit your art, that’s the link there. You can submit it for this show as fan art. You can submit it to drink and draw and I think there was another show I put it up for. I can’t remember what it was though. Oh, you can submit art for amateur hour if you want me to show off how much better you are at drawing than me, I’ll put that picture up. Cry a little, take it down, continue drawing.

Edmund Kearsley (53:54):
Sounds good.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (53:55):
So it’ll be fun. It’ll be fun. Makes his cry. Maybe we should change the name of the show. Makes his Cry.

Laura Smith (54:04):
Gives a goal for everyone, like a Target for the night.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (54:08):
Make it so awesome that Siz will cry.

Laura Smith (54:12):
So awesome. That

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (54:12):
Brought

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (54:13):
Tears

Laura Smith (54:13):
On

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (54:14):
Are very much, oh sorry. I was just going to say people, amateurs, as you know the nice way of saying that you like me, you are welcome to send in your art. All levels of art are appreciated. We had a guy who was using, it was like a programme, I can’t think of what the programme is, but they’ll blocks putting ’em together and making drawings that way. So that is all acceptable.

Laura Smith (54:45):
Love me. A cheeky bit of Pixar. You said that in Minecraft all the time.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (54:51):
Yeah, it wasn’t Minecraft, but it was similar.

Chris Pitcairn (54:54):
Roblox.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (54:57):
I wouldn’t know. I saw the finished product. Sorry. But yeah, it was cool. They were sending stuff in the drink and draw for about three or four months and then just stopped a bit Sad.

Laura Smith (55:14):
Did they get a block?

Chris Pitcairn (55:17):
Oh God,

Laura Smith (55:21):
I’m not even, sorry. I’m not even sorry.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (55:34):
Chin yes. Yes, Sean Noke. I’m going to forget your name every fricking time I go to say it. Yes. You can put your name down for Chinwag as well and we’ll pass that over to Lee and we’ll say, Hey Lee, here’s somebody who wants to go on your show. And he’ll go, yeah, we’ll go. Oh, maybe later. I dunno. I don’t know what Lee will do. Actually. I know him that well. He’s stranger to me

Laura Smith (56:01):
Once more with the puns. We’ll leave it to him.

Laura Smith (56:06):
God.

Laura Smith (56:07):
God has nothing to do with this

Edmund Kearsley (56:13):
On that one. I’ll throw it to you. I’d say it’s about that time for you guys to send in what you’ve done so far on the panels and then I’ll stitch ’em together and make up a little mockup of what the page is going to look like and then we’ll be able to finish the show.

Mal Briggs (56:37):
Oh Lord.

Edmund Kearsley (56:41):
Just send them to sis in messenger.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (56:45):
Yeah, just send em Messenger is the easiest way if you know me. If you don’t know me, then stuff you, I’m not putting you on the show anymore. You can just share it down the street or something in the letterbox. I know what I’m saying. I’m talking garbage now.

Edmund Kearsley (57:03):
Now

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (57:04):
Just looking for a button and it doesn’t seem, oh, there it is. This is what happens at once

Edmund Kearsley (57:13):
While you do that. I shall,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (57:19):
That sounded like, what the hell are you talking about? Ss? Shut the hell up and let me, you

Edmund Kearsley (57:23):
Got one Save the show. Where is my thing?

Edmund Kearsley (57:30):
Get there.

Edmund Kearsley (57:31):
Oh yeah, I already done that. Where is it my, there we go. So this is the Comex shop comic shop.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (57:50):
Oh, you found the new one, COMEX net au slash shop.

Edmund Kearsley (57:56):
Yes. I typed in comics shop and it went here.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (58:00):
Yeah, it went there. Yeah. If you look at the top, if you scroll to the top, see where it says store, it’ll take you to a better looking shop top. Right,

Edmund Kearsley (58:12):
I see.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (58:15):
Because that’s the default with WooCommerce site that you were seeing just before.

Edmund Kearsley (58:23):
So these are all Australian comic people. A lot of them have been on this shoe and it helps to support the other shows as well and the comics network and getting comics published by all these awesome creators. That’s my one.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (58:52):
My mouse isn’t working. Hang on. Oh, there we go.

Edmund Kearsley (59:00):
I have two pals. I’ve got three

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (59:04):
You three now. My mouse wasn’t working. I was clicking and clicking and clicking and I did not want to go to Chris’s page.

Laura Smith (59:13):
You did clicked once more.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (59:16):
I did and that’s when it finally worked.

Edmund Kearsley (59:20):
I’ll put this while you do the other things is

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (59:25):
Yep. I’ll do the other thing, which hopefully is, well, we got some fan art. Someone must have felt guilty about me giving crap to everyone that someone is. Nick May.

Edmund Kearsley (59:38):
Oh, that’s cool. So Nick may designed the leg.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (59:42):
Yeah, he designed the legs so he should know the legs well. Okay, so now I need to boost this up. I used to have this fifth set up before we started,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (59:59):
Started.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:00:00):
I’m so organised. Watch me go. There you are. Yes. That’s what we want. Sorry, Nick going to have to take you down. I sorry.

Laura Smith (01:00:22):
Emotionally

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:00:22):
Aside, last time we did the show, it’s working. I like the way the Let’s make a comic book is across the top and my screen’s not taking it over.

Laura Smith (01:00:31):
Hey, it’s me.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:00:33):
It is.

Laura Smith (01:00:34):
You can see my eyes.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:00:36):
It’s all the flowers with the eyeball.

Laura Smith (01:00:39):
So the eyeballs are the one I’m currently working on. And then the pink, yellow, and blue one with the face. You can kind of see. Yeah, that one is the one that’s finished. That’s a part of it.

Mal Briggs (01:00:56):
That cool.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:00:57):
I’m liking this one.

Laura Smith (01:00:59):
Yeah, I’ve had to pause it so that I can do the S ones. I need to finish some of the black background. But that one and the one next to it with the hands holding the world are going to be a pair.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:01:19):
Very cool. Indeed. Well,

Laura Smith (01:01:24):
Oh yeah. I started making little minis. You can see the little figures on the right hand side.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:01:33):
Oh

Laura Smith (01:01:33):
Yeah, those. Yeah. So I play Magic the Gathering a lot. And I also play d and d, but I decided I want little treasure bags for treasure because

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:01:43):
Cool.

Laura Smith (01:01:43):
Yeah. So I’ve made a bunch of little minis that I’ve been selling. They’re just little poly mac clay ones like oven baked clay that I paint. They’re little haunted treasure bags.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:01:57):
Now I don’t know how quick I need to go. How are you going, ed?

Edmund Kearsley (01:02:01):
I’m still going.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:02:03):
Okay. We can always circle back. We’ll look at Chris’s now. We got some mermaids. Mer mermaid, what do you call ’em? mfo? Yes. I like it much better. There’s afo trying to drown someone that’s not very nice going into the horror theme there, Chris.

Chris Pitcairn (01:02:35):
Always

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:02:37):
Lucky. I remember seeing this picture.

Chris Pitcairn (01:02:40):
Yeah, A little bit of Elden ring, a little bit of Shadow Hearts fan art for anyone who played Shadow Hearts. Best game ever. No one’s heard of. It’s a mashup between Final Fantasy and Lovecraft and it’s set in the first World War.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:03:08):
Oh, well

Laura Smith (01:03:09):
Now I have to play it.

Chris Pitcairn (01:03:11):
Yeah. Yeah. It’s so cool. In the second game, one of the characters you play as is Princess Anastasia and she attacks people with a faberg egg.

Laura Smith (01:03:26):
That’s so fabulous.

Chris Pitcairn (01:03:28):
Yeah. Yeah. Shadow Hearts. The first one actually came out around the same time as Final Fantasy 10. But yeah, it’s just like Lovecraft meets Gothic fantasy and it’s just set in the middle of World War I.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:03:49):
Wow.

Chris Pitcairn (01:03:50):
It’s very cool.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:03:54):
If I played games, I’d be totally into it. We’ll flash over to Impact Comics in case Ed’s going faster than I think he is. If not, we’ll go back and look again.

Mal Briggs (01:04:06):
Hey, what’s going on? We’re

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:04:08):
Looking at your Impact comic. I hope this is yours. Says Canberra.

Mal Briggs (01:04:16):
Nice. Yep, that’s ours. Yep. It’s got the post up about the DC marble thing. Yep.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:04:22):
Oh yeah. Oh, they’re doing another one of those. Oh, I’m a bus. Yep. Let me boss. So there’s some cool things from your shop from the Impact Comics in Canberra. If you’re anywhere else in Australia, go to Canberra if you want your comics. There you go. How’s that?

Mal Briggs (01:04:39):
Yeah. Oh look, circling back to what I was saying before about not stocking stuff, something I should have mentioned was as a solution to that we came up with a few years ago this idea of essentially having our own little convention. We’ve got a terrific pedestrian area in front of the shop and so a little bit like Comic Street in Brisbane and a little bit, oh cool. Like a few different zine fairs and stuff. We started doing this thing out in front of our shop and we were thinking we should be doing something again for our 20th anniversary because I think it was our 10th anniversary where we started doing it.

(01:05:19)
But the thing is now in Canberra we’ve got a Comic-Con Gamma Con Geek Markets, something else. When we started there was nothing. So I still can’t let go of the idea that we’re going to do something again. So yes, keep your ear to the ground. If I find the motivation to organise something, it’s going to have to happen real fast so that I don get distracted and do something else. So yeah, if you’re the sort of person who likes to show up to Art Sally’s and stuff, do keep your ear to the ground. We might do something again if we find a gap in the calendar and I get myself sorted for that sort of thing. So yeah, because like I say, I love being around all the comics I can and the more people I can get around the shop discovering new things the more I want.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:06:35):
Awesome. Excellent. I’m going to go through all these comments that I missed while I was doing all that. We’ve got Shauna. Yes. I’ve been told that’s what I’m allowed to call saying Call me Shauna. There you go. So thanks. Thanks, thanks for letting me skip a few bad pronunciations. Hey and guys from Nathan. Then he also said you can submit a comic for the store. Yes, you can do that as well for the, unless you’re talking to Mal I’m

Mal Briggs (01:07:10):
Assuming. Oh, feel free to hit me up. If you’ve got something that I think I’ll sell, I’ll check it out. But yeah, me as well get it up on Comex first.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:07:19):
Tell me as well. Nick May is the only one who noticed. I never drew the towel for the cat. You didn’t? Oh that was Alex saying that, by the way. Well God tell now you’re out of the story. Sorry Alex. You’re no longer part of it.

Laura Smith (01:07:38):
It’s a’s tale. It’s sad sometimes. It’s not

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:07:43):
Probably a no-brainer. Who’s going to acon? What’s acon

Laura Smith (01:07:49):
Adelaide Festival this weekend.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:07:52):
Oh, okay.

Laura Smith (01:07:54):
It’s really good. I am not going on account of, I don’t have the money for that, but No, it is really fun. People should definitely go if they have the chance.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:08:07):
And then the question was thrown out for me, Shane, are you appearing at the comics market? At Comics Plus on Sunday? Yes I am. Comex will be there with all comic studio books going to Smash instead Alex, I guess that’s another event or whatever. Good luck to the people next week carrying the story on Stu. Oh, that’s funny. That Stew’s one of them. Yeah. So at least I think he is is now. If he wasn’t before

Laura Smith (01:08:44):
Surprise

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:08:46):
Surprise on the show, had to make a fourth panel. Damn it. And Ed has put up the comic. He’s just waiting for me to shut up.

Edmund Kearsley (01:08:57):
So here we go. Have a look.

Laura Smith (01:09:00):
Oh, that’s going to look so cool.

Edmund Kearsley (01:09:02):
It’s the page in full

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:09:04):
That looks so awesome.

Edmund Kearsley (01:09:06):
Looks amazing. A up look. Those stars look great.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:09:18):
Some people the opposite of what mine will look like

Edmund Kearsley (01:09:23):
And there’s there

Laura Smith (01:09:29):
The shock is actually from the outskirt shop that that lady has through the window.

Chris Pitcairn (01:09:36):
I didn’t even think about that. Oh my god.

Edmund Kearsley (01:09:41):
That’s a good detail here of bitsy taking off the world as helmet to have a look.

Chris Pitcairn (01:09:49):
That’s really cool.

Edmund Kearsley (01:09:50):
This thing coming in.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:09:52):
Wow. That’s so cool.

Edmund Kearsley (01:09:55):
And then we’ve got the big tentacles.

Chris Pitcairn (01:09:57):
That’s so cool.

Edmund Kearsley (01:10:01):
That is an amazing looking page.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:10:03):
That is, that’s an awesome first page. And we’re still going for the no words in the word bubble.

Chris Pitcairn (01:10:13):
Bubble. Yeah. Yep. I’m just leaving it. I love it.

Laura Smith (01:10:22):
The temptation to do a tiny little bubble between the tentacles as if it’s talking back. But

Chris Pitcairn (01:10:29):
Do it. Do it.

Laura Smith (01:10:31):
I might have to. I might have to. I

Chris Pitcairn (01:10:33):
Think you have to.

Laura Smith (01:10:35):
You said it now.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:10:36):
You put it out there.

Laura Smith (01:10:37):
I don’t make the roll. I just put the weird word bubbles.

Chris Pitcairn (01:10:41):
I was going to do a sound effects for the welding, but I think I might just leave it. Just have it no sound.

Edmund Kearsley (01:10:58):
Yeah, it works really good. It

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:10:59):
Works and

Chris Pitcairn (01:11:03):
Done.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:11:05):
Yeah. It’s just Sunday. Yeah. Sorry. Darker half. Why aren’t I drawing casin? Well that’s because I will be eventually. Ed has made it a rule. Siz has to do one panel

Chris Pitcairn (01:11:21):
Somewhere

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:11:21):
Along the lines. I will ruin the book. That’s what happened. And don’t forget, comic Street is the following weekend. That’s true. It’s true. And Shauna, I’m allowed to say that. That is amazing. So I think that was towards the whole page. The comics looking great so far, even though you gave yourself so much work with the tail. Thanks Alex and great stuff from Nick. May I agree? That was bloody awesome. First page.

Edmund Kearsley (01:12:00):
So what’s next? We will be back

Chris Pitcairn (01:12:04):
Next week

Edmund Kearsley (01:12:05):
With three new artists doing another page of randomly selected layout to follow on the adventure of Bitsy the tradey cat.

Chris Pitcairn (01:12:21):
And awesome. I

Laura Smith (01:12:24):
Just realised, I dunno how Photoshop works.

Chris Pitcairn (01:12:30):
Does anyone

Laura Smith (01:12:32):
Go to my screen for a second? I didn’t know it does this. I don’t normally do speech bubbles, right? So I’m just like, oh yeah, do the thing and do the custom tool to do a little tail. So I’m drawing the tail and I get a cat.

Chris Pitcairn (01:12:53):
That’s cool. I mean honestly, cat shaped speech bubble.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:13:00):
That’s awesome.

Laura Smith (01:13:05):
So yeah, sometimes you It’s got

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:13:07):
A tail.

Laura Smith (01:13:08):
It’s got a tail. See it’s got a

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:13:10):
Tail. There you go.

Laura Smith (01:13:11):
You said there was no tail look. Tail just

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:13:13):
White out the bits you don’t want.

Laura Smith (01:13:18):
Wow. See look, my lack of skill strikes again.

Chris Pitcairn (01:13:24):
No, I think that’s pretty amazing.

Laura Smith (01:13:27):
How’s that for a speech bubble? Just background. Anyway, that was my contribution to the day. Just thanks. Thanks for coming. Don’t mind, we’ve got a lot

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:13:41):
Of comments coming in about Awesome, brilliant. All those sort of words. I won’t read each one, but they’re pretty much saying fricking awesome page. They’re saying it nicer than I just said it, that’s all. And Alex is going on about something, but I’m not going to read that. It’s only Alex and yeah, so I think we’re ready to say goodbye and goodnight. Is that right?

Chris Pitcairn (01:14:10):
There’s,

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:14:11):
I’ve missed

Edmund Kearsley (01:14:13):
Thank all Chris and Mel and Laura for coming in tonight and doing some awesome drawing and everyone in the chat who’s commented and everyone who’s watching and don’t forget to like and comment and subscribe and what else? Thanks to CS pressing the buttons.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:14:36):
Yep. Bit better than usual. Not great, but bit better. Well, hey, we’re proud of you. Well yeah, it was still a bit better. Come on. Come on Ed. Come on. Still going to

Edmund Kearsley (01:14:47):
Have a meeting

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:14:47):
After. Totally useless. I was just mostly useless. It’s the small things in life. Thank you everyone. Goodnight. See you next week. Anything else, ed?

Edmund Kearsley (01:15:04):
No. Play the video and we’ll see you next week.

Shane ‘Sizzle’ Syddall (01:15:08):
Yep. See you next week and see you at Drink and draw tomorrow as well. Drink and draw.