Yesterday was a landmark day!!  I finally finished a script for a 54 page graphic novel!!!

Granted, it's a first part of a long line of stories, so much so that the subtitle for it is "Prologue," but still, I finished it!!

My wife Mandy is looking over it now, looking for plot holes and inconsistencies and such.  Once she's finished, I'll get started on the artwork.  Really looking forward to it!!

I'll be posting some pieces of art as I finish, hoping that you guys out there can give me some pointers on how to improve.  As I've said before, the Lord has shown me that I'm never so great at anything that I can't learn from someone else.  And what better place to learn than among my brothers and sisters in Christ!!

So excited!! Praise God for his faithfulness!!  

School has officially started for me this week. I haven't had any kids yet, but they'll be there on Monday. It's hard leaving my little buddy and beautiful wife to work all day, but I endure it because I want to provide for them.

Got some writing done yesterday and a little drawing done too. Oddly enough, even though I technically have less time to work during the school year, the structure of it actually helps me get more accomplished than in the summer.

Hopefully will have some new art to share soon, and maybe by this time next year I'll even have a book or two finished. We'll see.

Keep Soaring,
Branson

That's a question I've been dealing with lately.  

If you poke around my art posted here, you'll discover a web comic that did for a short time called Outcasts.  It was an allegory of how traditionalism was making our churches incapable of doing what the Lord called us to do.  Then, after actually serving on staff at a church, I came to realize that the argument isn't so cut and dried, that there are things on the "nontraditional" approach that are just as paralyzing.  (As I said in my previous post, the Lord had a lot to teach me over the years.)  So, I went back and started to rewrite my outcasts story, giving it a more balanced view.  Well, in the process of writing, I came to realize that it felt like it was the middle of a story more so than the beginning of one.  I needed a prequel to establish the world I was creating these characters in.  

Hence my most recent project, for now simply titled "MM."  I've drawn and redrawn the first page four times now, and the script that I started writing tonight is completely different from any of those four versions.  If I were to take all the time that I've spent starting this project over and over again, I might have been finished with it by now.

The good news, though, is that I'm very pleased with how the script is turning out now.  It took a while, but this project is finally starting to take shape in my mind.  

FYI:  If you spend the time figuring out the details of your characters and the settings, getting to know them as intimately as you can and fleshing out every detail you can think of, then writing the actual plot becomes so much simpler.  

Excited for where this is going, and what the LORD plans to do with it.

Keep soaring,

Branson 

Wow....to be honest, I completely forgot that I had this until I received a message a little while ago. How is everyone?!?

I've been spending the past couple of years honing my skills a little, reading some books and trying some different techniques and things. I can definitely see improvement in my work, so praise God that he's working in me still.

Still nothing new on the project list. Still have a ton of ideas, several started projects, and too little finished ones. But, given all that I've learned in the recent months concerning art and story writing, maybe I didn't need to finish them because I still had some things to learn. I look back at my artwork from four and five years ago and think, "Wow...I used to think that was my peak!!" But now, I can see how God has matured me and taught me that, while I can be satisfied in what He does through me, I should never think that I have nothing new to learn.

Encouraged about what neurons are firing in the brain. Perhaps one day soon, some of them will see the light of day. Until then, I will continue to wait as God grows me and changes me into what He wants me to be.

Keep Soaring,
Branson