Excuses, excuses

Been busy. Deadline crunches. Last-minute jobs. No time for drawing. No time for painting. No time for verbs.

But now I'm back into the groove. As usual, time away from this project encouraged me to improve it. Hence the new, streamlined look and a couple of new features. Now when you click “Forward to a Friend” up top, a new email self-generates that both directs your friend to the Blog and automatically cc's me, thus guaranteeing your extra contest entry. If you hit “Subscribe,” an email will automatically be created with my address and a request to sign up. And if you hit “Unsubscribe,” I burst into tears without any annoying lagtime.

My one regret about this format is that I'm no longer including the entire project as a readable page in the email. It's not gone -- it can still be found on the blog, or when you click on “Read the Story So Far” at the top of the page. But because it was Flash-based, enough people couldn't get it to work in their email reader that I figured I might as well drop it. (If you want it back in, or if you find any features aren't working, or if you have anything else to say, please send me a note.)

More soon, promise. In the meantime, keep sending in dog photos (thanks to all of those I got this week!!), write me emails, make some comments on the blog, read the story so far or check out seltzerstudio.com. By the way, to see the Studio's portfolio in the same great format as Part-Time Dog, just click here.

Open publication - Free publishing - More satire

Tom Seltzer Will Draw Your Dog

As I've said before, thanks to everyone who sends me a picture of their dog to use in the book. Of course, I will draw your dog absolutely gratis, and send you a print-resolution of the drawing JPG as a thank-you. I could not be more grateful to everyone who participates.

But I have gotten inquiries as to whether I would be willing to draw or paint dogs on commission, not for use in the book. And I said I'd post on that.

Here’s what I’m thinking: A pen, brush & ink – with or without a color wash added – on acid-free archival paper, up to 11” x 14”, will go for $150, plus shipping. (That’s the same technique as I’m using for the dog pictures in the book.) A full-on watercolor painting on acid-free archival quality paper, up to 11” x 14”, will go for $350, plus shipping.

I do believe that I’ll have to charge sales tax on these, too. I haven’t checked officially, but my understanding is that when an actual object changes hands, as opposed to merely the rights to reproduce the objects, the boys in Albany want their cut.

All New!! All Different!!

Welcome back to the brand new Not-So-Daily Dog. Sorry for the long layoff. Around the beginning of April, I suddenly found with the urge – no, more of a compulsion – to do my taxes. That done, I had to dig myself out from under my actual paying work before I could get back to this book.

The break gave me a chance to re-work the book a bit. The most radical alteration was that I changed the book into a square format. This required reworking a couple of pages, most importantly the cover (see above. Ain't it pretty?) I'll be unveilng the new look over the next couple of updates. 

I've also changed this little email blast. No more hopping to the blog to see the complete post, and I'll be featuring all the text in legibly sized type right below the picture. I know, I know, will the innovation never stop?

More soon, I promise. In the meantime, please, please send me emails or make some comments on the blog.

Work and re-work

Sorry for the skipped day. I ended up reworking this picture a couple of times. The original version was too tightly drawn. I lost the sense of spontaneity that the subject matter requires. (The sketch I ended up using is shown below, by the way.) Also, now that I've decided to work with watercolor, I'm realizing that the artwork has to be conceived with a stronger sense of light. Originally, I was thinking that I would handle each page like a poster, with large flat areas of color, but with watercolor, that's really failing to use the medium.  

Finally, you may have noticed that the type has changed. It turns out that my handwriting can be fairly hard to read, something that should have been apparent to me in the last 39-odd years, but that somehow I managed to ignore. I will probably continue to play with the formatting for awhile, though.

More fun, tomorrow..