Howdy folks. That Bob Guy here.

Do you know how I got the "Bob Guy" name? Years and years ago, when I was at a party with some of my college friends, I met a friend of a friend. When I introduced myself, the guy said "oh, so you're that Bob guy I keep hearing about." Thus, was born one of my screen names, ThatBobGuy... which later just became, Bob Guy.

Anyways, back to why I am making this journal. I just wanted to say that I've been quite distracted the past two weeks, so my replies to comments has been, well, dismally slow and pathetic. I am trying to get back to it all, but until then I just want to say, "thanks for all the kind words and for the favorites." I have been trying to really reinvigorate my creativity. Right now I'm still struggling, and I've really been wanting to try some new stuff but just haven't found the right thing yet. So, until then, you get the little 30-50 minute doodles I've been posting. Sorry.

Well, how is everyone else doing?

-Bob Guy

It's been over for three days, and I'm still exhausted. I walk/jogged/ran up the stairs dozens of times. Most nights I got 6 or less hours of sleep, and even that sleep was crap.

So, I kept it fairly secret, but by now most people know that I was a part of staff this year. This of course came with it's share of headaches. Balcony had terrible traffic on Friday, and questionable traffic on Sat/Sun. (I say questionable because a few artists said it never picked up for them while others said it went well for them, or somewhere in between). Mezzanine also had questionable traffic. Sure, there was lots of people, but from my time spent talking to artists down there, many of them weren't happy with sales. The problem with all of this is trying to accurately compare all the data. Obviously, some artists will always sell better than others, and poor sales could be due to a number of factors, location being only one. Etc etc. I do know I sold poorly, but I also know I was away from my table half the time on Fri/Sat and on Sun I was solely trying to give away the inventory I didn't want to keep. Whatevers. It was chaos all around.

As for general problems, my list:
1) Dumbasses throwing a nerf football in the Mezzanine. I wish I had seen it or known, I would have called security to escort them away.
2) Sarah was spat on from above, as well as having stuff thrown elsewhere. Never caught the spitter but we got the thrower. Dumbasses.
3) To the idiots on the elevator hitting every button and dancing: yelling at you was the highlight of my Sunday.
4) To the idiots yelling "Marco" "Polo": I hate you.
5) To that one girl who shall remain unnamed: screw you for all the crap I dealt with from you. And, be glad I didn't directly overhear what you said on Saturday, for I would have rained hell upon your life. You took a situation you knew nothing about and made it worse for me. And I loathe you for it.
6) To those that are just simply ungrateful for the amount of time, sanity, and patience that goes into what we do: life isn't fair. Get over it.
7) To the kid who knocked on our hotel room door at 2:50am: dammit all to hell.
8) To the douchebag who stole my Castiel sketchcard: I hope it gives you paper cuts under you fingernails. If you actually paid for it and I just forgot or wasn't there when it happened, then I wish no harm upon your fingers.
9) To the douchebags that stole from other artists I talked to: see above statement, the same hell awaits you.
10) Oh, and to the douchebags throwing a nerf football in the alley: *sigh* really? Be glad I didn't see it. Your football would have been mine and your ass woulda been booted out

The nice list:
1a) To my friends (who I will list below): thank you for all of your help. As chaotic as my weekend was, it would have been worse without y'all.
1b) I'm sad I didn't get time to hang out with all of you.
1c) Dusty, Leech, Myque and Christina (sorry if I misspelled any of your names), you all rocked hard core. Thanks for all the help.
2) To those that do not fall into Number 6 above, and actually appreciates our efforts: thank you.
3) To the rest of the staff that do this every year, and who run the con as best they can: thank you as well.
4) To all the cool people I met, be it staff, artist, or con goer: you rock.
5) To anyone who found one of my ninja's placed around the con: hope it gave you a smile. I plan to do that again next year.

Finally, the list of cool people I worked with, talked with, or whatever. I will add to this as I think of names, so if you're missing forgive me.

(in spirit)
Mel, you need a DA so I can link you.
Paula and Maria, do you two have DA accounts? I can't remember.
Laura Vaughn and her cohort, whose name I can't recall. If either of you happen to see this, shoot me a "hey". You two rocked.

Ash, as usual thanks for the help. Rebecca, you're cool. Jacob's cool. Jen and Matt are awesome. BobD rocks hard. Su kicks ass.

Blah blah blah. Shutting up for now. This "name dropping" list will keep growing later on, I'm sure.

-Bob Guy

Well, there are 22 days until Animazement. For those of you selling art, that's 22 days left to pump out the arts, yo. So get crackin'.

That said, I, myself, have not been drawing. Not art block, just art apathy. I have ideas, lots of ideas. I just don't care enough to draw them right now.

So, how is everyone? How's life?

-Bob Guy

Well, there are 55 days until Animazement. For those of you selling art, that's 55 days left to pump out the arts, yo. So get crackin'.

The past few week has been a blur of Animazement, terrible sleep, work, and sickness; culminating in an exhausted and grumpy Bob. This is me complaining.

So, DUH has been very sporadic and slow to update, hasn't it? See above sentence for the reason. Really. It's not dead, it's only on a sorta hiatus. As in, I'll update WHEN I can. This might be once every three weeks for the next two months. I don't know. But I promise you, it's still alive and kicking, only if in my head and my sketch pads.

Also, aiding in the sluggishness of DUH updates is my recent interest in drawing fan arts. Now, I've talked to many artists in my life, and I see a lot of varying views on "what is art". Some artists argue that original art is better than fan art, as it's more pure. Fan artists argue whatever it is they argue, including "there's nothing original left" or "Sailor Moon ROCKS!" Some "elite artists" claim anything cartoony isn't art so no matter what I choose, original or fan art, it doesn't matter. Whatever your stance is on this subject, rock on. My stance? Draw what makes you happiest. For me, that changes with my mood. At times, original work (DUH) is what makes me happy, and I focus on it fully. Other times (now), I really just feel happy drawing characters I know and love from my various fandoms. Or I might just want to draw a unicorn barbarian with an axe (okay, so there are unicorns in this journal afterall).

In the words of VNV Nation: "Just do whatever the hell you want to do, because who gives a damn what your friends think? Why waste your time obeying the opinions of others?"

-Bob Guy

Hello all, my friend Lacie is offering some kick ass commishes right now, as she is in need of money. Check out her gallery and consider getting some kick ass art drawns.

Her journal entry with prices : [link]
Her arts : [link]

Do it!

-Bob Guy

Hello all, this is a friendly notification that the registration for Animazement's artist alley is now up. A few notes of interest:

It is no longer first come first serve, instead try to make sure your application is as accurate and useful as possible. The applications will be accepted until March 1st, so that gives you 17 some days to fill it out.
We no longer have the ballroom, which is sad but just how it is. A portion of those tables will move to a new hallway. The prices have also gone up, to handle demand and rising costs of renting space at the convention center.

Now, go register!

-Bob Guy

Congratulations *Sempaiko for a spectacular win! It was a landslide victory!

THE TOP THREE:

First place :
by

Second place :
by

Third place :
by

I will contact the winners to discuss their prizes.


THE RESULTS

Curious how all the contestants did?

1st - Sempaiko, with 58 points, from 20 votes
2nd - RobD4E, with 39 points, from 20 votes
3rd - OrShouldI, with 37 points, from 17 votes
4th - Liza88, with 29 points, from 13 votes
5th - Mafer, with 12 points, from 5 votes
6th - RebanadaDePan, with 11 points, from 5 votes
7th - NecrophobicZombie, with 9 points, from 6 votes
8th - Hartter, with 6 points, from 4 votes


Congratulations to all who participated, keep your eyes open for the "participation prizes". Also, thanks to all 27 individuals who voted on the great artwork. This was a lot of fun for me, and I hope everyone involved also enjoyed it.

Feedback is highly appreciated. Who wants to see more DUH related contests? What sort? More art contests like this? Other contests for those who are less artistically inclined? Ideas for prizes? Suggestions welcome!
Let me know!

-Bob Guy

Well, I hoped everyone had fun with this, I know I did. I feel like we got a pretty good turn out of art, and a couple people who wanted to participate but didn't really have time. If people want it, I could see making this a recurring contest... more on that later. Now, let's get on to the voting!

THE VOTING PROCESS:

Everyone can vote once.
Each piece is assigned a number, when voting, you can vote by the art number or the artist name
You can vote for up to three
List your top three, in order of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, 1st being your fav
For each "1st" vote, the picture will get three points. 2nd gets two points, and 3rd gets one point. The image with the highest score in the end wins.
Oh, my vote will count for double. Because I SAID SO.
You cannot vote for your own artwork, because that is just sad.

the voting will last until Feb 4th, at which time I will tally the final scores and reveal the winners.


THE ARTWORK

#1 Downsizer by Hartter
#2 B.I.I. by RobD4E
#3 Manjula by OrShouldI
#4 Downsizer by Liza88
#5 Dr. & by Sempaiko
#6 DUH by Mafer
#7 Snork by NecrophobicZombie
:thumb194288171: #8 Gert by RebanadaDePan

I will also post these in a deviation in my gallery, so people who don't watch my journals can vote.

-Bob Guy

UPDATE: Actually, it will be more like 18 more hours... Okay, the deadline is midnight, three hours from now. But, I will likely be asleep within an hour (Bob is very tired) so honestly, I really won't put up the "voting journal" until sometime tomorrow. I'm pretty sure we have most of the entries, minus one from Taylor who is having trouble scanning it, so I don't expect any more entires. BUT, we'll just see, I suppose. Anyhoo, voting will be up at some point tomorrow. Prepare yourself for the excitement, or whatever. The entries are all rockin', so it shall be quite a fun finale.

Details are as follows:

TEH DEADLINE: Jan 20, 2011, at midnight EST

TEH RULES:
-Entries may be of any media. Digital, traditional, photomanip, whatevs. No poetry or fan fic. But haiku is acceptable, bonus points if it's in Japanese.
-Each contestant may submit one piece to the contest. Although if they want to make more for fun, that's cool.
-The only requirement of subject matter is that it must feature a character/ship from my comic DUH. Reference can be found here: [link] [link] [link]
-As I currently lack higher quality reference material, accuracy is not uber-important.
-Characters do not need to be created in my style, in fact I specifically am looking forward to seeing my characters in new styles.
-The winners will be decided by public vote (and my own personal votes as well, which are worth more points, bwahaha)

TEH PRIZES:
First place - an 8 1/2"x11" color drawing of any character of your choice (in my usual stumpy chibi form), and a cameo in a future DUH strip
Second place - an 8 1/2"x11" black and white drawing of any character of your choice (in my usual stumpy chibi form), and a cameo in a future DUH strip
Third place - a doodle and a cameo in a future DUH strip

All other contestants will recieve a randomly chosen complimentary prize of my choosing. Bwahahaha.


Now... GO!!


The entries so far:

Downsizer by Hartter, B.I.I. by RobD4E, Manjula by OrShouldI, Downsizer by Liza88, Dr. & by Sempaiko, DUH by Mafer

-Bob Guy

So, it occurs to me I'm not always able to properly convey what is going on in my mind. Take for instance my recent poll, "Should I make a spinoff comic just for the Downsizer?" [link]

I assumed I'd get an overwhelming response of "YES!" but that wasn't the case, and it is my own fault, as I did a horrible job of explaining what I had in mind. I think what got most people confused is that the "yes" answer also said "his stories do not fit well in DUH", which most people assumed meant I would remove him entirely from DUH, possibly even the "DUH universe". Don't worry, this is not the case at all. Think of it like other comics, like when Wolverine or Gambit got their own solo title. They were still very much a part of X-Men, but they had their own comic to run free in.

(In case it isn't yet obvious, moments after posting the poll I knew I was going to make the spin off, regardless of the response)

Here's my plan. DUH will continue to update Monday and Friday, and schedule/time willing, Downsizer will update on Wednesdays. So, this firstly means we will go from seeing Downsizer three times in almost five months (his current rate of appearance) to weekly (again, time willing). I keep mentioning time willing, I might miss a week here and there, but even twice a month is better than three times in five months, right?

And, Downsizer will still appear in the panels of DUH, usually when it in some way pivotal to the rest of the cast. And a lot of the cast will appear in Downsizer, giving more jokes of Blix and Maria and so on. And, sometimes story lines will start in one comic and jump to the other, jokes will appear in one comic that reference the other, and so on. The Downsizer comic will very much contribute to the universe of DUH.

So, I hope with this proper explaining of my intentions will serve to clear up any confusion, and hopefully recieve the response I was shooting for, that of excitement. Or at least "okie dokie, I can handle that." And look out for the debut of this... in a few weeks, when I get my butt caught up on art projects.

-Bob Guy

So, my good friend Taylor has been bitten by the DUH bug (which has results similar to being bitten by a rabid raccoon), and went and made a DUH DA group page:

[link]

Currently the "join group" option is not available, I'll see what's going on there.

Anyhoo, just thought I'd show this off. It's my first official "fan club" for something, so it's pretty cool.

-Bob Guy

This is kind of a minor deal, but kind of a big deal for me. My orignal comic, Daily Universal Humdrum, is now being hosted on Smack Jeeves as well as DA:

[link]

This isn't a big deal for any of you, as you get the comic delivered to your message box. But it's a big deal for me because I like having actual comic navigation and it allows non DA members to read it more easily. Although, with the help of being able to preload my comics days in advance of when I plan to post it (secret, I have three more comics completed that haven't been posted yet), it's definite the SmackJeeves site will get the new comic before DA does by a few hours. OH MY! Amazing, I know.

I'm still working on the site, as it's not really how I want it to look just yet. I want graphical buttons for the first, back, next, and latest navigation. I also want to alter the menu layout, add a cast page, a FAQ page, etc etc etc.

So, for those of you interested in this project of mine, you have more options for getting your DUH fix, for those not interested, this journal will be of no interest to you.

-Bob Guy

My buddy Rob drew me (as well as himself and another friend) as zombies, for halloween:
[link] <--CLICK IT!!
Totally awesome. He randomly snapped the pic on his phone at work the other day, he runs over to my cube and goes "make a zombie face!" So I did. And this is the result.

So, speaking of zombies, some of you might have noticed I've been drawing a bunch of zombie work lately. There are three reasons for this. 1) It's getting closer to Halloween, and this time of the year seems to bring the zombie love out of me. 2) I've been playing wayyyyy too much Dead Rising, and smashing zombies is making me happy. 3) This is actually kind of common for me. I tend to go through waves with my zombie love. I mean, I always love zombie crap, but I'll go months with no real effort to indulge in zombieness. Then I'll see something that reignites the zombie flame, and for the next few days, weeks, or months I'll be obsessed with the culture. About a year ago, it came in the form of buying zombie toys and zombifying my existing art. (Sometime I need to take a photo of my zombie shelf, with the toys). Anyhoo, I guess my point is, if you don't like the zombie art, I'm sorry, but expect more to come. If you do love the zombie art, get excited that more is coming, but don't get sad if I suddenly lose interest in it or get burned out.

That's all I have to say for now.

No, wait, one more thing...



"braaaaaiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnssssssssss"

-Bob Guy