{"id":68,"date":"2010-02-09T11:25:48","date_gmt":"2010-02-09T17:25:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/?page_id=68"},"modified":"2010-02-10T08:06:22","modified_gmt":"2010-02-10T14:06:22","slug":"faq","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/?page_id=68","title":{"rendered":"FAQ"},"content":{"rendered":"

Frequently Asked Questions <\/strong><\/p>\n

(Updated 2-9-2010)<\/p>\n

Movie Questions<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

How do you know so much about movies?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I actually don\u2019t know that much about movies.\u00a0 I probably haven\u2019t seen or I\u2019m not familiar with whatever obscure movie you\u2019re about to ask me about.<\/p>\n

But you\u2019re like a film student or local movie critic or something right?<\/strong><\/p>\n

No. I\u2019m actually just a regular guy with a regular cubicle job.\u00a0 I simply enjoy watching movies, and I have a good memory for entertainment and pop culture things.\u00a0 (You really want me on your team in a game of Trivial Pursuit.)<\/p>\n

So how many movies do you own?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not too many anymore.\u00a0 I used to own 300 to 400 DVD\u2019s but I realized I didn\u2019t have time to watch all of those movies, and about 50 or so were still in their original packaging having never been opened.\u00a0 At some point I realized that I didn\u2019t need to own everything since movies are pretty readily available through various other means.\u00a0 Now my DVD shelf contains about 30 \u2013 40 movies with the criteria that they have to be movies that I want to re-watch.<\/p>\n

So what movies do you have that you re-watch?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not going to list them all, but they\u2019re pretty standard movies.\u00a0 I watch the Lord of Rings<\/span> Extended Cut whenever I pack to move (and I\u2019ve moved 4 times in the past year and a half).\u00a0 There are some Wes Anderson movies, The Big Lebowski<\/span>, Kill Bill<\/span>, Casablanca<\/span>, Shakespeare in Love<\/span>, Pirates of the Caribbean<\/span>, etc.<\/p>\n

Do you have any Blu-Ray movies?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t have a Blu-ray player yet.\u00a0 I bought my wife Up<\/span> for Christmas and that comes with a DVD copy, Blu-Ray copy, and digital edition.\u00a0 So that\u2019s my only one.\u00a0 Because I let my DVD buying get out of hand in the past, coupled with the fact that movies are easier and cheaper to rent now, I\u2019m going to be much more selective with my Blu-Ray collection. Plus, Lord of the Rings<\/span> extended editions, the original Star Wars<\/span> trilogy, and the first three Indiana Jones<\/span> movies aren\u2019t on Blu-Ray yet, so there\u2019s no rush.<\/p>\n

Writing Questions<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Are the characters based on people you know?<\/strong><\/p>\n

While the characters and events might have elements of my friends, family, and coworkers, I made a conscious effort not to base them off single individuals that I know.<\/p>\n

Are you sure, because (such-and-such strip) was exactly like a conversation we had one time, so Scott must be you, and I must be (other character)?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not necessarily.\u00a0 The conversations might have been similar since I make mental note of almost every funny conversation I have in real life, but I assure you that a particular character is not entirely you.<\/p>\n

But my name is (character\u2019s name), so they must be me right?<\/strong><\/p>\n

No.\u00a0 Except for Scott, I came up with the names of the characters by sitting at a hotel with no internet access (so as not to look up names and name meanings).\u00a0 I scanned the keyboard on my laptop letter by letter until names popped out in my mind.\u00a0 Then my wife and I narrowed the lists down making sure they were not people we know.\u00a0 I assure you it was random and took way longer than it should have in the end.<\/p>\n

Scott\u2019s name came about because every now and then people call me Scott even though my name is Brian.\u00a0 When I mentioned this to one of my brothers, he thought that was weird because people sometimes call him Scott too.\u00a0 So I figured that was a sign that Scott was an everyman character name that would be good to use.<\/p>\n

Okay, but Scott looks like you, and Hope looks like your wife, so they must be you two, right?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Again, not necessarily.\u00a0 Scott looks similar to me, except for the nose, but that\u2019s not saying much since I look like most white guys with short brown hair.\u00a0 Hope kinda looks like my wife, because of the nose, when she wears her hair curly, but then again, my wife looks like most incredibly gorgeous women with blonde hair and a beautiful smile.<\/p>\n

Additionally, Scott is not an outright representation of me.\u00a0 He\u2019s the main character of the strip, and I write the strip, so my voice comes through him.\u00a0 But I write all the other characters too, so they all have bits and pieces of my personality traits depending on the situation.<\/p>\n

Drawing Questions<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

So who draws this comic for you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I draw the comic.\u00a0 That\u2019s why it has my name and signature on it.<\/p>\n

Oh.\u00a0 Do you draw the border too?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Either my wife or I draw and paint the borders.\u00a0 We use a stencil I had made to look like a large piece of 35mm film to outline the border with archival ink pens on a piece of Bristol board.\u00a0 Then we fill it in with a paint brush in permanent black ink.<\/p>\n

Why don\u2019t you just create the border on the computer and print it out?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I eventually want to be able to sell the original art from the strips to the readers.\u00a0 While the computer would make a cleaner line, most printer ink will fade over time.\u00a0 I want to be sure that I\u2019m inking these in archival ink so that whoever eventually buys a strip will have something that lasts.\u00a0 Also, all the little mistakes and boo boos in the border give it more character.<\/p>\n

Is that the same reason why you don\u2019t do the lettering of the computer?<\/strong><\/p>\n

That is exactly why.\u00a0 When I sell an original strip, I want the reader to have a complete comic strip, not just the artwork.\u00a0 So I hand-letter all the strips in the same archival ink that I use to ink the artwork.<\/p>\n

What size do you draw the strip?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I use a 5.5\u201d by 14\u201d piece of 2-ply Strathmore 400 Series Bristol Vellum paper, and the 35mm film border is about 5\u201d by 14\u201d<\/p>\n

What pens and pencils do you use to draw it?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I pencil the letters and artwork with a generic mechanical pencil.\u00a0 I then ink the letters and art with a Sakura Pigma Micron 05 pen.\u00a0 I sometimes use the Sakura Pigma Micron 08 if I need a slightly thicker line. If I need to fill in a black area, I use a Faber-Castel Pitt Brush Pen.\u00a0 I go back and erase any pencil lines with a Design Kneaded Rubber Eraser.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Frequently Asked Questions (Updated 2-9-2010) Movie Questions How do you know so much about movies? I actually don\u2019t know that much about movies.\u00a0 I probably haven\u2019t seen or I\u2019m not familiar with whatever obscure movie you\u2019re about to ask me[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-68","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","uentry","postonpage-1","odd","post-author-admin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/68","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=68"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/68\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80,"href":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/68\/revisions\/80"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmstripcomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=68"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}