Conformity vs individuality is a matter very close to the discussion about the originality of creative ideas, which I have gotten into before and I am sure I will again. The question of individuality was brought up again recently when I received a comment on my article about creativity and religious thought from Curtis who said:

If your life revolves around what others think of you, as these words seem to suggest, then Ayn Rand is not the author for you.

A grand pronuncement indeed on what was a personal story about my second-hand exposure to the works of Ayn Rand and how I hadn’t gotten around to reading them. I’m generally in the habit of questioning grand pronouncements, or at least digging deeper into them, so I thought it only right that I explore further this whole phenomenon of caring about what other people think of you, and also caring about whether other people think you care about what other people think of you!

My response to accusations about caring what other people think: So what?
Yes, you heard me right. So What? What devine herald declared caring what other people think to be incompatible with free thinking and individuality? Confusing? Let me attempt to make sense of it all.

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If my Mother was around today, I’m sure she would recommend I read a book by Ayn Rand, just as my Father does on a regular basis. I’m quite sure she had read The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged in her youth and would have thought highly of them. Her sister, my aunt, was and still is absolutely crazy about those two books. Needless to say she has recommended them to me wholeheartedly on numerous occasions. I remember seeing her copy of The Fountainhead many years ago, it was tattered and disintegrating at the spine from having been devoured on so many occasions over the decades. She guards that old copy with her life for fear of losing it to that scourge of bibliophiles everywhere, unscrupulous book borrowers.

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All good things must come to an end, as does this edition of Comic Konga with this comic. I haven’t been the most punctual participant, but I’m glad I completed the set of five, and that too keeping to my parameters of using the same character. It’s been a great exercise and I will certainly tackle comics with less trepidation in the future. Anyone interested can subscribe to Vishal’s feed to know when the next one is happening.

Day 5: Love is in the Air, and our everyman robot is reacting in his own little predictably unpredictable way. The point of this one was to continue with the more complex scene setups, and to end with a straightforward caption piece. I’m quite happy with the finished visual because I had a specific look in mind and it took plenty of redraws to get it right.

The final, much erased and worked over, pencil sketch on A4 photocopy paper was traced with a black finetip pen. The inks were scanned and vectorised in Inkscape. Blue tones and text were also applied in Inkscape.

I hear love is a wonderful thing. And yet, everytime you see love visualised in images you see the same symbols and the same stale imagery. It gets to be very boring — to me at least. My try with this was to make an image about love that was not churned out by the Valentine’s Day marketing department, or by the Jilted Lovers Anarchist Cell. Is it romantic? No, probably not by most people’s standards. I do hope it is at least a little funny though and makes you smile.

Samir

With this, the fourth entry into Comic Konga, I’m practically on a roll. A major part of Vishal’s inspiration to start an event like this was to get people who are not regular practitioners into the flow of making comics. If you stick to it, I think Comic Konga succeeds in that very well.

Day 4: In Green Consumer Behaviour, our serial protagonist returns. I also return to multiple characters and dialogue with this one. I’m a fan of both the dialogue-based and the caption-centric single panel comic. I think they each have their charm, and one often works better than the other depending on the specific situation. I’m also exploring the medium a bit more and spreading my drawing wings by tackling more complex scenes. Staging is a lot of fun.

A pencil sketch on an A4 photocopy sheet was traced with a black finetip pen. The inks were scanned and vectorised in Inkscape. Blue tones and text were also applied in Inkscape.

I have tackled the issues of consumerism, consumer behaviour and the ever growing fad of green consumers in my writing before, but the topic is ever relevant and sometimes a single comic panel can communicate the situation as well, if not better, than long articles. Let’s face it, we’ve made a mess on this planet, and now a vast population of people think all of it can be undone purely my buying more stuff. Astounding!

Samir

The third entry into the latest Comic Konga event is here. A good sign since it’s one more than I managed to churn out the last time I took it on.

Day 3: Margin of Error, continues with my brown-paper-bag-robot character. He’s proven to be quite flexible and enjoyable so far and his further versatility remains to be explored as I put him through the paces in more situations. In addition to the repeat character, the other challenge I am taking on is to come up with only single panel comics. Like a short story, single panels are often more difficult to create than multi-panel narratives. This boiling down the point and the humour to it’s minimal essence can be a tough ask.

As always, the pencil sketch on an A4 photocopy sheet was traced with a black finetip pen. The inks were scanned and vectorised in Inkscape before applying the blue tones and text.

This comic is meant to be about progress, growth, development, and the illusion of these. Living in a world and an age when we consider everything to be advanced and forever advancing, it’s nice to sometimes question our measures of progress.

Samir

After a forced hiatus — I was out of town for a couple of days — my foray into Comic Konga continues.

Day 2: Sometimes You’re the Dog, Sometimes You’re the Stick, is a further exploration of the character that I came up with for my first try at the event. He seems to be a perfect innocent character that could be used to expose all manners of truth about the human condition, and our reactions to the world. At once an every-man and a marginalised observer, let me see if I can at least pull off the the requisite five Comic Konga pieces with the same protagonist. At the moment that is enough of a challenge. If I can do that greater plans can be considered.

The original pencil sketch was traced with a black finetip pen. The inks were scanned and vectorised in Inkscape before applying the blue tones and text.

This comic could be about dogs and sticks, or it might not be about dogs and sticks. That interpretation lies in the eyes of the beholder. I just know that it was fun image to draw and I always enjoy playing with the meanings of popular idioms.

Samir

Vishal recently announced the second Comic Konga. Five days of original comic content to be put up here seemed as good an excuse as any to get me cracking on some new material. So here goes with my first try called What is Philantropy Philanthropy. Like last time, I’m starting a day late, and it remains to be seen whether I will stick to the schedule, but I do hope to get further than before (only managaed 2).

Day 1: I really need to be drawing more often, rather than on such rare occasions, which lead me to try to come up with a recognizable character I could use for my illustrative endeavours. He doesn’t have a name yet (and not quite sure he should), but the little robot with the paper bag on his head has potential.

The original pencil sketch was traced with a black finetip pen. The inks were scanned and vectorised in Inkscape before applying the blue tones and text.

I would very much like to explore this character further. I think he could prove to be a useful asset when I need to express a one-off idea or opinion but don’t want to elaborate too much. Let the testing continue.

Hope you enjoy this slightly esoteric (philanthropic) first in what I would like to make a more regular performance in the future.

Samir