not dead, just busy working away.

as i mentioned in my last post i’ve been away from the drafting table on a personal level for the past couple months for a variety of reasons. the main one of which is that i was buying a house. i decided to take that big first step into being an official adult (it’s a facade really) and become a homeowner, especially after all my renting woes of the past few years. it took an inordinate amount of time, and a lot of hunting, but i found what for me is the perfect place. after writing the biggest cheque of my life i made the move on july first weekend and have been slowly unpacking and settling in over the past few weeks. the place feels great – like i’ve lived there for years – despite still having much of my stuff still in boxes. though i hope to rectify this in the weeks to come.

so what about kukuburi?

i’ll be honest there’s been a little more focus on unpacking, catching my breath, and building up my coffers over the past month, but in my spare time i’ve been writing the end of kukuburi chapter one. once i feel happy with what i have i shall begin my doodling endeavour – of which i’m not too far from starting. however – rather than begin updating as soon as i have drawn a couple of pages i am going to wait till i have the majority of the remainder drawn. i’m hoping half. the initial arc of the story is ending and i want to make sure it goes up uninterrupted, so i won’t begin updates till i feel i have a comfortable buffer.

hope y’all can respect that.

that said, when will updates begin? gimme the remainder of the summer to get unpacked, settle in, and do some doodling, and i promise you it’ll be worth the wait…

i’m aiming for the end of august/beginning of september…. i’ll post a more exact return date as the time get closer.

best,

ramon.

ps/ since a few folks requested, below is a wallpaper based on the image of nadia from the last blog post! click on it to make it big and make it your own… desktop that is.

hey there everybody,

it’s been busy days – i’m not making excuses cause i’m done with that, i’m just gonna work at the pace that i am able, so i’m just here to tell it like it is.

since mid january, on top of my regular workload, i have been spending 10-20 hours weekly hunting for a new home. not a home to rent, but to buy. i recently came to the conclusion that my renting days had to end. so to stretch my spare time even further i have also been taking on extra work to build up my savings to make realize this endeavour.

i thought i could continue with kukuburi through out this – but my time has been monopolized.

nothing is concrete yet, so i don’t wanna jinx myself, but as the month closes i might have some good new. and once the dust settles i can get back to focussing on what i love; comics – specifically kukuburi and butternutsquash. the above picture of nadia is the first thing i’ve drawn for myself since the last kukuburi update. it’s been crazy here.

thank you all for your patience. i look forward to returning when i can – i just wanted to let you know what was going on.

cheers.

something amazing and awesome has just happened!

but i can’t share quite yet…

it is something that has been eating up far too much time in my life over the past couple years in spurts, and a little more so recently. but things look good and positive.

unfortunately there are some immediate side effects that are going to eat up most of my time over the next few weeks, but after that it should be smooth sailing and life can FINALLY return to normal. well normal for me anyway.

to survive this onslaught on my time, i’ll only be able to update one page a week till the end of the month, but afterwards we’ll be back to twice weekly. i’ll share the full details of things next week if i can!

thank you all for your patience over the past few months.

r.

this week was a frenetic blur – i really don’t know where the time went.

i am currently working on page 166 and will post it as soon as i can – i hope in the next day. i will also, for the sake of my sanity be moving the kukuburi update days for now to thursday and fridays.

a little update;

my scanner is still, essentially, broken so if any artist’s could recommend a good large format scanner that tackles both colour and b&w well it would be appreciated. to survive i am scanning pages in pieces and assembling in photoshop. joy!

new home search still continues! yesterday i spent a fun three hours looking at different places – and that was, comparatively, a short day! i can’t wait to find a place and be able to devote that time to working on kuku and bns again. hell, this week alone i think i spent a good tallied 24hrs looking at potential places…

alright studio is overheating,  time to escape for a late late lunch and then look at more home potentials!!

ps/ for those who might be interested, some photos from TCAF 2010!

…and as promised.

i saw a few people comment to their surprise about the scanner price. once you move up into large format professional scanners – they ain’t cheap, they’re dealing to a small market, so the prices are high. my original one cost me $1500… but it gave me many good years. well worth the price :)

so, yeah, looks like no rest for poor nadia… but i think she’s getting closer to resolving a few things…

[ UPDATE / MAY 25TH]

howdy all! working away on kukuburi – but have to rush out for some apartment viewings…. will wrap things up and post once i return!

hey everybody!

thank you all for your patience – it’s great to be back. everytime i have to pause kuku i feel a little pang inside. april and may seemed to be months of never ending chaos. some good, some meh.

the good; two outstanding shows that i had a great time at. thank you all that swung by and said hello at either chicago’s C2E2 or toronto’s very own TCAF. as well, for those interested, next week the dazzler special that i was asked to work on is hitting the shelves at your local comic book retailer!

the meh; getting sick twice within one month! going crazy searching endlessly for hours on end for a new home… but hopefully it all comes together.

oh, and then my scanner went kaput after 8 years of quality service. so now i either figure out if i can fix it (i need a new bulb i think) or i come up with an extra $2000 and buy a new one!

whew.

but yes, good to be back despite the hecklers in the crowd.

things seem to be a little quiet for nadia post flaming head and mr.bones going boom… or so it seems :)

tomorrow’s page will go up later due to the domino effect, but next week things’ll be back on track.

just dealing with a bit of a domino effect here of work and a scanner that decided to quit at the most inopportune time.

new kukuburi will be up later tonight…. :)

* UPDATE *

hey all, after a long day of fixing  (or actually temporarily patching up) my defunct scanner i was able to scan in the new kukuburi pages, and mostly colour them, and as much as i’d like to continue i am about to pass out. so i am going to leave the remainder and head home and return in the morning spry and full of energy and wrap things up.

so new pages up tomorrow… the 19th.

first off i’d like to welcome new kukuburi readers who have meandered over from PVP and today’s guest strip courtesy of moi! thanks again for the opportunity to play in the pvp sandbox scott!

secondly, i’d like to apologize for my absence over the past week, my schedule just got out of hand with too many obligations stretching me too thin. of the many things that were on my table over the past few weeks one i’d like to promote is the dazzler one-shot for marvel comics i’d like to promote. the book hit shelves on may 26th and features art by kalman andrasofszky and myself embellishing the story by jim mccann. for some sneak preview art please visit ramonperez.com

still updating over this short hiatus is my other web comics effort butternutsquash co-written with my good friend rob coughler…

for those in the toronto area this weekend of may 8-9th feel free to swing by and say hello to myself and all the txcomics creators at the toronto comic arts festival being held at the toronto reference library. tcaf is a now yearly free event celebrating independent comics culture – don’t miss it!

…and i think that is all.

see you all on the 18th!

hey all,

keeping this simple as it’s been a crazy week and i’ve had about 12hrs sleep throughout the past 7 days. so, yeah, i need to crash… which i will do momentarily.

i had hoped to have a character update for today but it looks like a no go. i’ll try for next week, and then begin the story again come the 11th of may. as next week i will be prepping for tcaf being held locally in toronto on may 8th and 9th at the reference library. it’s free admission, so if you’re around please swing on by!

i’d like to do a print for the show…. any suggestions? i was thinking something along the lines of picnic in the valley of the sleeping giants… or maybe something showcasing the landscape and crazy creatures of kukuburi… thoughts?

oh, and the above doodle was done for matt forcum, of robot beach, at C2E2 a couple weeks ago. he was kind enough to send me a scan…

there’s only one candy with the hole in the middle!

alright, i’m a tad delusional from lack of sleep. my apologies ;P

i’m home, returned from chicago’s c2e2, and working my proverbial butt off on dazzler and a handful of other things at the same time. i’d like to thank all who made it out to chicago’s first (and hopefully not the last!) comic’s convention and entertainment expo. i had a blast discovering the city and meeting all the great people that swung by my table – you know who you are! –  to make me feel at home. thank you – you made my experience exciting and memorable.

i’ve attached a couple of my favourite kukuburi related sketches that i did at the show. i did many more – but often forgot to take a photo.

i had originally planed to return kukuburi to it’s story updates next week, but things are looking grim as i am going to have to work through the weekend and into next week wrapping up my two current projects; dazzler and my regular monthly gig of max finder.

so look for thing to return to normal, or what passes for normal, on may 3rd.

this week’s update sees a little look into the bluebirds that seem to pepper kukuburi’s landscape and nadia’s dreams… if you haven’t check out the rest of the cast page, you should, you never know what you may learn…

till next week!