Look! It's a Bird!

I like to set a Friday-at-noon deadline for these YouTube episodes, but here we are at 11:55am, and I don’t think I’m going to get this up for another hour or so. As I edit these videos, I think to myself “next week, gotta make this simpler.” And then, as I’m planning, I’m still thinking “okay, this is simpler.” But it hasn’t worked out that way yet. At 35 minutes, this episode is a few minutes longer than the last one. The drawing-and-talking format made the editing more complicated, and I have to say, I’m worried it might not be as exciting as the previous episodes. I say that with only a hint of tongue-in-cheek, because I think most normal people would think that talking about art supplies in any format would be boring as hell. But if you’re reading this, you’re likely one of my people, and you know what I mean. More than any other episode, however, this one is most certainly the epitome of sitting around and talking about art supplies.

I knew that I’d be drawing and talking this time, as I wanted to go through my process and maybe figure out why I use so many pencils. I thought I’d have the final drawing for this picture book about buildings to work on, but the sketch has yet to be approved. So, I use that wait to lead into the video, and then decided to just draw one of my wrens, these murderous bastards who cause problems for a stinkbug in a story I’m writing.

I hope you watch it, I hope you enjoy it, and I hope you like and subscribe.

My channel crossed the magical YouTube threshold on Tuesday, so that it’s now able to pull in a few bucks. I’d apologize for your having to watch ads while I draw my bird, but I realized you were probably already seeing them, and at least now I get a fraction of whatever whoever is paying whomever. A month ago I joked about making money on YouTube.1 But I guess it’s a real thing, and the channel reached much quicker than most.

Related, I’ve also been asked to be a Blackwing Pencil and a Blick Art Supplies affiliate. Early on, I considered these possibilities and have thought alot about how to handle the optics of making dimes on the stuff I talk about with integrity. But I think I’m pretty up-front about how I use these tools, whether I like the tools, and whether you might like them too.

I sent out my first post about The Walk to paid subscribers yesterday. I’ll be writing and drawing this graphic novel, and posting sketches, ideas, and updates. You’ll probably like it, and I hope you check it out.

We’re dog-sitting this week, and Basil has issues with this. Sits partially behind that door for a quick escape, if needed.

Thanks for reading!