**This is cross posted from my website***

I really do enjoy going to various types of conventions and I've been to several different types: science fiction, fantasy, horror film, anime, comic and culture. Despite only starting to visit these things about twelve years ago, I feel that I have a well rounded perspective on what's out there in the United States. I can't really speak for other areas of the world but I imagine that there are a lot of similarities.

Not only have I attended conventions as a spectator but I have now been to quite a few as an artist. You really do see these gatherings from a different point of view when you're on the other side of the table. No matter how you go about it, though, it is work. Having to smile and be social all day is quite taxing on my poor brain.

Whether I go as an attendant or an artist, the ability to have a good time is always somewhat of a gamble. I find that your chances often have to do with the size of the convention itself. Small conventions are nice and intimate but they often lack enough substance to keep one busy. Large conventions, on the other hand, are a mixed bag. As an attendee, you have a wide variety of things you can do but with that comes a number of problems that can leave a sour taste in your mouth. As an artist, you're overlooked when compared to big named celebrates that headline these events.

When a convention becomes too big, they often forget why the show was started in the first place. From what I've read, San Diego Comic Con is the poster child for this problem. The only super sized convention that I've attended was Dragon*Con. I enjoyed the show but it was one of the most exhausting experiences I've ever had. I can't imagine going to it every year like many of my friends do. Sure, you can meet some really awesome celebrities but that gets really expensive and you usually have to wait in various lines for many hours.

Is it the nature of conventions to eventually evolve into mammoth sized beasts that trample the dedicated souls who gave birth to these shows with their blood, sweat and tears? It seems that way but there are exceptions. First of all, it helps to keep a convention run by the fans themselves. Once you turn things over to the corporate monsters, you immediately look a lot of the intimacy that makes a convention memorable.

When you go to a convention, I urge you to always spend some time in the artists alley or wherever they have the independent guys. These are the people work out of love for their chosen medium. These are the innovators and the game changers. They are the future. Tell them that they matter and buy something if you are able to. It's important to support the things that you love or they'll eventually just disappear.

2012 is already shaping up to be very busy year for me. Aside from the typical comic, I'll be doing several conventions including my first appearance as an artist at Katsucon. I also plan to keep going to conventions such as Anime USA and Intervention.

On the music side, I've decided to take some orchestration classes from Berklee to get me on the right track with a production of Julius Caesar that I am on board with. I also hope to complete Binary Birth so that I can get back to performing live again. These two projects may force me to alter my comic schedule somewhat so that I can make sure everything is completed on time. I'll keep doing three comics a week for as long as I can but I may miss a day here and there. If it becomes too much, I may go down to twice a week but I'll just play it by ear.

With only a few weeks left in 2011, I still have a few things that I want to complete before the first of the year. I have to finish my gift for the Webcomic Secret Santa gift exchange and I'm working to complete my first video game music remix. I also need to get back to work on a piece of music that I'm writing for another webcomic friend of mine. With Christmas coming up, though, that last bit may have to wait till after the first of the year. If only I didn't require so much sleep.

In honor of this binary day, my album, The System Is Down, is priced at just $0.99! Pass it on! [link]

Kate and I had a wonderful time at Dragon*con but we're both pretty tired. I'm now fighting an allergy cold that may or may not clear up quickly. Here's hoping!  

Anyway, if you'd like to see everything that happened to us at Dragon*con, you can check out all of my pictures and posts on my website!

See all Dragon*con related posts by clicking here!

This year will mark the first time Kate and I will go to Dragon*con.  Since I didn't end up getting a table in the artists alley area, we're just going to go and enjoy ourselves. I'll probably bring a handful of comics and CDs to give away as freebies but I won't be selling anything.

Since I have a ton of stuff to do before we get on the road tomorrow, there will not be a comic today. I'll resume a normal schedule a week from today until Intervention comes up in a couple of weeks. It's going to be a rather busy September.

One of the things I wanted to do prior to our trip this weekend is set up a couple of play lists on my iPhone for Kate and I to listen to. In the past I've had a habit of loading up various albums of interest but Kate tends to get bored with that very easily if there aren't plenty of songs to sing to. So, I created an 80s and 90s playlist that consists of about twelve hours of music that we both know fairly well. Doing this just reminds me of how many albums we actually own!

I plan on updating the website during the convention as best I can with photos and any stories of anything interesting that might happen. One thing I'm really looking forward to is meeting up with a handful of friends that I haven't seen in quite a few years. It should be an interesting weekend!

Since Kate is still recovering from her surgery, I decided it'd be best if I just spend Saturday afternoon at Otakon. It turned out to be a lovely afternoon as I walked around the Baltimore Convention Center visiting some of favorite artists and authors. Little did I know that one of them would be a rather big surprise.

While I had read that Peter S. Beagle would be at Otakon again this year, it somehow slipped my mind and got lost in the sea of things going through my brain. Luckily, Peter was right near the entrance to the dealers room and he immediately caught my eye. You see, I'm a huge fan of The Last Unicorn which he is the author of. Not only is it one of my favorite books but I have been a massive fan of the animated movie since I was a young lad. I ended up buying his latest collection of short stories, Sleight of Hand, which he autographed. I was also ecstatic that I got to have my picture taken with him.

Another artist/author that I always enjoy talking to is Jenny Breeden from The Devils Panties (it's not satanic porn). Not only is her sense of humor somewhat like my own but she has a wealth of knowledge on the inner workings of a successful webcomic. I ended up getting the second book of her comic collection and she's always happy to scribble in it for you.

As always, I ended up meeting some new people as I browsed through the Artists Alley. One group of people that really caught my interest was J1 Studios. Like myself, they do a mixture of music and comics. I'm always interested in seeing others do this sort of thing and I have to say that I'm rather impressed with what they have to offer. The art is lovely, the music (by Ray Riley) is fun and they have a good sense of humor mixed into it all. I'm definitely going to keep up with their endeavors.

With a lot of the conventions that I go to, I usually run into a number of artists that I've met from previous adventures. While at Balticon a few months ago, I ended up meeting the creators of a comic called Snow By Night. Their comic is a nifty combination of the American colonial time period with the fantasy of alchemy. I had a wonderful conversation with both Eric Menge and Brittany Michel and I picked up the first collection of their comic.

Despite the fact that I was only at Otakon for about six or seven hours, I got to hang out with some of my favorite people. Aside from those listed above, I got to see Gina Biggs who is behind the comic Red String, lots of folks from Overclocked Remix, Brendan Becker who is also known as Mr. MAGfest and quite a few others. It was a good day but now I feel totally wiped out from all that walking around and dealing with being out in this lovely heat wave. So, today is mostly going to be a day of rest but I'll be back to working on BS/OD tomorrow!

Track four of Binary Birth has been completed and is now available for you to download! As usual, it'll be free for the first week. After that, it will be set to the normal price of $1.00.

This particular track contains something that is a bit new for me. Most of the music I write is in 4/4 but I was inspired by another musician to do something in 5/4. Sub-Zero Grave Robber is mostly in 4/4 but there are a couple spots where it switches to 5/4.

Now, head over to the Binary Birth page to grab the new track!

Since T-MODE has been turned into a fund raising event for Japan quake relief, I decided that I will do my part to help out.  All the procedes from comic book sales this weekend will be donated to the Red Cross.  Also, those that buy a comic book will get a special free button that will have the design shown above.  This little dango is holding the flag of Japan and he's got a little Red Cross bandage.

T-MODE will also be the first convention that I'll be actively taking requests for commissions.  Now that I have a laptop that is fast enough to do some 3D rendering, I'll be able to deliver any commission that I'm able to finish while at the convention. Just stop by my table in the artists alley and ask me about it!

Next week is going to be quite a busy week for both Kate and I.  While I'll be attending T-MODE, she will will be at her own convention for Book Crossing. That means that I'll be flying solo in the Artists Alley with all of my wares. I have a feeling that there will be a lot of coffee involved.

If you've been trying to decide on whether or not you're going to T-MODE, there is a new and quite wonderful reason to go.  With devastating earth quake and tsunami that hit last month, T-MODE has decided to convert this years convention into a charity event with a percentage of the procedes going to the American Red Cross. I plan on donating a percentage of what I make in the Artists Alley to the Red Cross as well.  I'll make sure to post something about that next week.

As you can see, I didn't post any new music this week.   This was mostly due to the fact that I spent a great deal of time yesterday with our cat, Echo, who wasn't feeling very well.  After a trip to the vet and a lot of sleep, she seems to be getting back to her old self.  So, there's nothing to worry about.

This week was definitely one where I got some really awesome packages in the mail.  Today I received the five disc version of Tron Legacy which was one of my favorite movies that came out last year.  Yesterday, though, I received my signed copy of the new album by Brett Domino. Brett is most certainly one of the coolest things to ever happen to the internet and I suggest you check him out.

For more information on T-MODE, follow this link: [link]

I'm proud to say that I have released the first song for Binary Birth! Let's Begin The Build serves as an introduction to the album but it paves the way for what's to come.  This track will be free until 01/08/11.  So, make sure you grab it now!  Check out the Binary Birth page for more information. [link]

I truly had a lot of fun at MAGfest this year.  It was good to hang out with friends that I don't see often enough.  I can't deny, though, that I really enjoy playing a lot of the arcade games from my childhood.  I got to take in a couple panels (OCRemix and the Composers Panel) which always inspires me to get better at what I do.

As far as purchases go, I did buy a couple notable things.  I bought a Turbo Grafx from a guy on Craigslist back in the fall and I really thought it looked like crap when I hooked it up to the TV via the RF output.  On the first day of MAGFest, I noticed that a dealer had a Turbo Booster for sale and I quickly grabbed it since it's a rare find and I'm too lazy to build my own composite video cable. Now I just need to hit Starland and pick up a few more games.

Another thing that I took home from MAGfest is a Neo Geo CD.  Most people know that I collect video game consoles and this was one that I did not have.  Well, my friends Stevo and Brushfire from Overclocked After Dark were having a contest and the Neo Geo CD was the prize.  The contest was actually rather simple.  You had to beat their score at the Blockbuster Competition II game which consisted of NBA Jam and Judge Dredd. Well, their panel was at 2 A.M. on Saturday morning and I knew that I would be quite asleep by then.  I pretty much figured that my chances would be slim anyway.

When I found Stevo at MAGfest later that afternoon, he told me that no one had beaten their score last night and that the prize was still up for grabs.  So, I sat down and gave it my best shot.  It so happens that I used to play NBA Jam quite a bit back in the day when I used to hang out at friends house.  I did rather well at that part of the challenge but I did terrible at Judge Dredd since I never played it before and it's a crappy game.  Luck would have it that I scored enough points to win the challenge! Go me!

Today I'm sticking around the studio to get a little bit of work done and relax my brain.  I'm a little peopled out and my legs are a bit sore from walking around a convention for three days in a row. All in all, it was a great weekend.  Thanks to everyone who put a smile on my face and reminded me that there are indeed people out there just like me.  Geeky and proud of it!

Boo! Hiss! Since no one was in the spirit of doing my little holiday contest, I decided to go ahead and cancel it.  No biggie, though! I'm still feeling in the spirit of giving!  So, from now until the day after Christmas, I'm making my album, The System Is Down, available for FREE.  Just go over to my Garage Band website and grab it! Spread around the news! Oh, here's the link: [link]

I've decided to hold a little contest for the holidays. Actually, I'll be holding two contests. Both are quite similar in nature but each will have a separate prize.

Contest #1 – Guess how many songs I have in my iTunes library!

Basically, you need to do just that. To make it slightly easier, I'll tell you that it's a 5 digit number.

Contest #2 – Guess how many days of music I have in my iTunes library!

Again, it's very simple. I will say that it's less than 100 and you can guess up to one decimal point. For example, you could guess 24.2 days.

The winner of each contest will be the one who gets as close to the number as possible. If there is a tie for the winning guess, each person will receive a prize. I hate tie breakers. Oh, yeah! One guess per person!

What can you win?

Contest #1 Prize – You can win the special edition copy of my album, "The System Is Down". If the winner happens to guess within 15 songs of the actual number, the winner will receive some extras.

Contest #2 Prize – You can win a digital copy of the special edition of , "The System Is Down".

How do you enter? This is the fun part! You need to write your guesses (you can do both at once) on a pice of paper. Next, take a picture of yourself holding that piece of paper. It needs to show your face! You can stink your tongue out. You can flip me the bird. Do whatever you want! Keep your clothes on, though. Please, keep your clothes on! Once you have that picture taken, e-mail it to contest@bsodcomic.net and that's it!

You have till Midnight on 12/20/10 to get your submission in to me. On 12/21/10 I will look see who the winner is. For the winner of Contest #1, I'll contact that person via e-mail to get an adress where I can send their prize to. The winner of Contest #2 will get a link where they can download their prize. Now, let's see how many people I can get to do this.

Kate and I aren't exactly the typical married couple.  Both of us like to do a wide variety of things and neither one of us is extra passionate about any of hobbies.  Kate is the bread winner of the family while I take care of the house and other various things.  The closest thing we have to kids is two cats and two turtles. We don't care at all about professional sports. When it comes to holidays, we definitely choose a route that some might see as 'different'.

While we enjoy spending time with our respective families, getting to see them on any particular festive holiday is a pain in the ass and/or expensive. So, we choose to spend them here in Northern Virginia.  Since most of our friends are off doing family stuff, we keep to ourselves most of the time.

Since it's kind of silly to cook a huge turkey dinner for just the two of us, we go out to eat for the big holidays.  Where do we go?  Well, for the past several years, we have been going to Todai for their lovely sushi buffet.  After our bellies are full of raw fish, we try and see something new at the movie theater.  I suppose that's not too out of the ordinary, though, since quite a few people go to the movies on Thanksgiving.  This year we saw the new Harry Potter film and we liked it quite a bit.

One of the other reasons we tend to keep to ourselves during Thanksgiving is because our wedding anniversary falls on or around the holiday.  Tomorrow will mark five years that we've been married.  It's good to be us.

Oh! By the way! Since tomorrow is our anniversary, I probably won't be doing a comic.  I think that I'll have better things to do.

Here's what I did in August...

1) I got to visit with my friend Rachel while she was back in the country and we had some fun touring the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia.  I figured it was a fitting thing to do since she was such a wonderful host while we were visiting in Japan (she teaches English there).

2) I got to go to Otakon this year but just as a regular patron.  While I did miss having a table in the Artists Alley, I sometimes feel like that con is just getting TOO big.  So, I'm looking to give some other largish conventions a try.

September was a VERY busy month for me...

1) I attended (and had a table) at the first Intervention Convention that was held it Rockville, Maryland.  This particular con concentrates on things like webcomics and blogs. For a first year con, things went rather well and it was a lot of fun. I'm definitely looking forward to next year.

2) I got to see my favorite band, Rush, for the 2nd time.  It was definitely one of the best shows I've ever been to.  

3) I attended the Celtic Classic in Bethlehem, PA for the first time in several years.  It's really one of my favorite festivals and Bethlehem is an amazing town to explore.

So far this month has been bus with the usual stuff as well as playing a lot of Dragon Quest IX.  In my opinion, this is really the type of RPG I love the most.  There's lots of exploring and quests to go on and it's got an interesting plot.  I find that the biggest issue with most RPGs on the bigger consoles (PS3, XBOX 360) is that they concentrate too much on pushing the hardware to its limits and skimping on the rest.  Right now, the it seems that only the handhelds are getting the good RPG titles.  Sure, I enjoyed Final Fantasy XIII but it was far from what I'd call a great game.  It just seems like the Nintendo DS is where it's at if you want to play a fun turn based RPG these days.  

Speaking of DS, I ended up getting a swanky new light blue DSi since my black DS Lite decided to break on me after about 3 years (a piece of the hinge just cracked off all by itself).  I have to say that the controls on the DSi are far better than the DS Lite.  I suppose I could have waited and got a 3DS but I'm not really keen on the whole 3D thing just yet.  I never buy a console when it first comes out anyway.

I plan on ordering some of the 'Welcome to the Madness' t-shirts in a couple of weeks and they'll eventually be for sale on Indyplanet.com. If you pre-order the shirt now, though, you can get it at a cheaper price AND you'll also get a copy of the first BS/OD comic book.  The deadline for the pre-orders will be July 13th.  These shirts will be printed via a full color direct to garment printer on a white shirt.  Hopefully we'll be able to do other colors in the future. The shirts will be delivered to you in the middle of August.

Please click here to order: [link]

[link] - Click this!

While it's still a little on the short side, I'm very happy with how this came out.  It feels good that I'm releasing new material again and I think doing those one hour compositions each week has been great for my confidence. This song is exclusively available at Bandcamp.com for the time being but it will eventually be part of a full album at some point.  Oh yeah! If you like it, please buy it! It's only fifty cents after all!

Kate and I went and saw Iron Man 2 this morning at Tysons.  Despite it not getting extremely high marks from some reviewers, I enjoyed it as much as I did the first one.  When it comes down to it, both Iron Man movies aren't really about good versus evil.  It's about Tony Stark.  Iron Man 2 showed us a rather different side of Mr. Stark compared to the first movie.  Go check it out.

After last weeks Free Comic Book day, I decided that it's time I start becoming a bit more familiar with some titles that are out there.  Yesterday I received my first order from Things From Another World, although, it was just the first issue of a three part Fraggle Rock collection that is being put out by Archaia.  Compared to other releases of Fraggle Rock stuff that I've seen, this one actually has some decent art work.  My only complaint is that the Trash Heap looks a bit more like a green blob than a pile of trash.  

I really do love Fraggle Rock and it's probably one of the few shows I watched as a child that stood the test of time.  I was raised on just about everything Jim Henson and there was even a time when I wanted to work with puppets and such.  I've always been fascinated by them and I often feel that you just can't replace them with CGI.  I twitch when I try to think what movies like The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth would have been like if they were done with 3D creatures instead of puppets.  

Unlike a lot of people my age, I really didn't read a lot of comic books when I was younger.  The only one I read with any sort of frequency was Richie Rich and I think that was mostly because I liked the robots.  I kind of have a thing for robots.  Now, I'm not physically interested in them because that would just be creepy and seven different shades of wrong.  Even after watching a show like Chobits, I do not have any dreams of having...well, you know.  After all, I'm happily married.

While I knew about comic books like Spiderman and the X-men, I was more interested in their cartoon form when I was younger.  Actually, when it comes to super hero type stuff, I still don't have much of an interest in those sort of comics.  I totally enjoy animated shows and movies but the comic books don't draw me in.  Getting these Fraggle Rock books are really just to satisfy my love for Henson stuff.  

Now, I do read an fairly large assortment of manga.  I'm into typical shonen stuff like Bleach, Death Note and Naruto but I also love stuff like Kare Kano and Love Hina.  In the recent past, I considered American comics to be mostly super hero books and I didn't look further into the situation.  Once I started working on BS/OD, I started becoming a bit more aware that there was more to American comic books than Superman, Batman and an assortment of titles for little kids.  So, I decided to finally give some of them a chance.

What am I going to start reading?  Well, I'm still looking into things but I have settled on a couple titles. One is a new series called Scarlet by Brian Michael Bendis. Other than the premise given on TFAW's site, I don't know much else about the series but it sounds like something I would be interested in.  The other series is called Devolution and it's going to be put out by Storm Lion comics. I caught the preview of it in one of the free books I got on Free Comic Book Day.  The art and the story look interesting and it's got mechs.  I like robots and I like mechs.  I like them a lot.

People are often interested in another persons working environment. I've taken some pictures of my studio in the past but most of them never turned out that great since I didn't use my tripod. So, I decided to take a few shots this evening to show you where I work and what things currently look like.  There's a bit more 'stuff' in there since we came back from Japan. By the way, clicking on any of these pictures will giving you a larger version.



I've had the above iMac now for almost a year.  It's a 24in iMac and it's serving me quite well for all of my graphic needs.  This is where I do all of my comic stuff and other artwork. The thing hanging on the wall behind the desk is something I picked up a number of years ago while I lived in Texas.  I can't remember exactly where it came from but I've always liked the pattern.  There are some Larc~en~ciel posters on the wall to the left along some postcards that I picked up in Japan (mostly from the Ghibli Museum).  On top of the iMac is a little fox-squirrel which is one of my favorite Ghibli creatures. In front of the iMac sits a Death Note (Light) Nendoroid figure as well as Kamen Rider helmet bust that was acquired from one of the many capsule machines we saw in Japan.  To the right of the iMac sits some Laputa figures, my Jet Fire transformer from my childhood days and a Evangelion figure (yes, it's Rei Ayanami).  Other than that, there are various CD (K-On!, Larc~en~ciel, YMCK) sitting there as well as other little things.



The above picture is where all of my original music is created as well as some of the instruments I end up using the most.  On top of the desk sits another iMac but it's an older 17in that was sold right before the aluminum iMacs came out.  The size of the screen doesn't really bother me that much but having the second monitor there helps quite a bit.  In the rack section is a Digidesign 002R, a Behringer patch bay, an Alesis 3630 (modified by Blacklion Audio) and a power strip.  On the table top sits an Edirol PCR-M50, a Korg Nanopad, a Behringer BCF-2000, a Dave Smith Mopho, a couple ART tube preamps and a little Line6 interface (it's really just a dongle for Podfarm).  The instruments to the left of the desk are my 82 Les Paul Custom that I inherited from my uncle and an early 90s Carvin LB70 bass.  

While I do have some other equipment laying around the studio, what you see in these pictures are the things I use most often. It really is an ideal working space for me and I always feel comfortable working there.  Some folks consider it a cave, though, since it's rather cold and dark but that's the way I like it.

So, we made it home from Japan yesterday. Our Plane took off from the Narita airport around 11am on Friday and we arrived at Dulles international at just after 10am on Friday. My brain still has problems with trying to figure that out. I'm a little jet lagged but I don't feel too bad. After working a bit, I've managed to put all of our pictures and videos online. I think I'm pretty much out of energy to do anything else productive.

Right now I'm too tired to write much more about the trip but I plan to write a number of rants on various things that have been rattling around in my noggin during the next couple weeks or so. I also have a TON of stuff to scan in that I'd love to share with people as well. So, I'll be posting a lot of that too. Well, have fun checking out the videos and pictures!

Video - [link]
Pictures - [link]