Young
Edd Gould always enjoyed drawing comics of himself and his friends. Growing up in the internet age, his
doodles evolved into Flash animations of increasing complexity, and in time Edd and pals
Tom Ridgewell and Matt Hargreaves teamed up to produce an
"Eddsworld" series of online webtoons and
comics.
At first crude and halting, the group's
"eddisodes" progressed from
surreal shorts and
one-shots into full-fledged productions that pushed the boundaries of amateur web animation, with
expressive characters,
full soundtracks, complex effects, and a fast-paced, off-kilter sense of humor:
MovieMakers -
Spares -
WTFuture -
Rock Bottom -
Hammer & Fail (
2).
At its height, the college co-op was producing shorts for
Mitchell & Webb and the
UN Climate Change Conference,
fielding offers from Paramount and Cartoon Network, and racking up
millions of hits on YouTube.
Work slowed, however, when Gould was
diagnosed with leukemia -- a relatively survivable form, though, and Gould carried on
working gamely through his hospital stays. So it came as a shock last week when Matt and Tom
announced that Edd had passed away, prompting an
outpouring of
grief and
gratitude from
all the
fans he'd
entertained and
inspired in his short 23 years.
posted by Rhaomi
on Apr 2, 2012 -
5 comments
Larry Gonick is a veteran American cartoonist best known for his delightful comic-book guides to science and history, many of which have previews online. Chief among them is his long-running
Cartoon History of the Universe (later
The Cartoon History of the Modern World), a sprawling multi-volume opus documenting everything from the Big Bang to the Bush administration. Published over the course of three decades, it takes a truly global view -- its time-traveling Professor thoroughly explores not only familiar topics like Rome and World War II but the oft-neglected stories of Asia and Africa, blending caricature and myth with careful scholarship (cited by
fun illustrated bibliographies) and tackling even the most obscure events
with intelligence and wit. This savvy satire carried over to Gonick's
Zinn-by-way-of-
Pogo chronicle
The Cartoon History of the United States, along with a bevy of
Cartoon Guides to other topics, including
Genetics, Computer Science, Chemistry, Physics, Statistics, The Environment, and (yes!)
Sex. Gonick has also maintained a few sideprojects, such as
a webcomic look at Chinese invention,
assorted math comics (
previously), the
Muse magazine mainstay
Kokopelli & Co. (featuring the shenanigans of his
"New Muses"), and
more. See also
these lengthy interview snippets, linked
previously. Want more? Amazon links to the complete oeuvre inside!
[more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Jun 6, 2011 -
29 comments
Romantically Apocalyptic is a morbidly funny webcomic from Russo-Canadian digital artist
Vitaly Alexius (
interview,
gallery). Set in the
starkly diaphanous wreckage of post-nuclear Manhattan, it follows
an eccentric contingent of Soviet soldiers as they poke through the detritus of the past and contend with the mutants, cultists, aliens, and other horrors that inhabit the ruins. The comic's
striking art style is the result of an arduous process, using
"Photoshop, live actors, dead actors, sexy assistants, greenscreen, a camera, and a Wacom tablet" to composite "6 years worth of textures: 1 terabyte of stock footage, shot in real abandoned, forgotten places of our world." This multimedia ambition has burgeoned into plans for a
community-powered animated/live-action web series (
teaser video,
animatic,
fanart). While waiting for that to come together, be sure to spend some time on
Kimmo Lemetti's excellent
Gone With the Blastwave (
previously), a very similar webcomic project with a more subdued palette that turned out nearly fifty pages of richly-illustrated post-apocalyptic humor before going on indefinite hiatus.
posted by Rhaomi
on Mar 3, 2011 -
18 comments
It's a simple story about a responsible owl, trying to raise a curious (human) son and a geeky (human) daughter in their giant treehouse while dealing with his longtime bear buddy (and honey researcher), Steve. Though it
debuted, humbly enough, in the Cracked.com forums,
Benjamin Driscoll's drolly sweet comic
Daisy Owl soon gained a loyal following, earning
a regular feature there (courtesy of David Wong) and routinely making the front pages of sites like Digg and Reddit. In March 2009, Driscoll went pro, quitting his job to work on the comic full-time and making Daisy Owl one of the few
self-sufficient webcomics on the net. Its quirky, character-driven humor, focused mainly on children, friendship, and families, has earned more than a few comparisons to
Calvin and Hobbes, as well as plenty of
fan art. Highlights:
Basement -
Honey -
Parenting -
Shampoo -
Skittle on the Moon -
Nightmare -
Movie Night -
Thrift Store -
Classic Dad -
Wallpapers
posted by Rhaomi
on Apr 21, 2009 -
24 comments
