Birds and Dinosaurs Might Not Have Gotten Along

I was thinking, if Satan hid dinosaur bones to trick us, would God find those little T-Rex arms funny? The poor guy can't even pick his nose with those things.

Maybe those tiny arms are vestigial remains from quadrupedal ancestors. Nah, that's crazy talk.

Oh, btw, by popular demand I'm doing daily stick figure comics again at popstrip.com

-swb

COMMENTS (42)

No chance of an RSS feed for popstrip? =]Andrew10 months ago#1917reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

Thank you for the stick figure goodness. Do you think there will be an RSS feed for those?

Also, go you for avoiding the obvious masturbation joke.Anonymous10 months ago#1919reply

and you'll be doing good. stick people are awesome. just imagine if instead of chinese people there were stick people. The world would be almost perfect.diego10 months ago#1922reply

PopstripYayyy! ^.^Josh10 months ago#1926reply

I don't see why you couldn't continue posting both "styles" under the same RSS feed. Look at Sinfest, for example - it alternates between being a mature humour comic (its main cast of characters) and a sickly-sweet family-friendly comic (when showing the adventures of a pet cat and dog). It all seems to work together well enough.

Also, this is by far the funniest comic since you changed styles. Congratulations on finding your feet again. The T-Rex's outraged expression is great.Esn10 months ago#1930reply

And to think today I drew a T-rex myself.

Could you add an RSS feed to popstrip thanks.Waltz10 months ago#1933reply

In reply to Andrew, comment #1917:

RSSI'll add an RSS feed as soon as I have two comics! :)

I hope you guys stick around /s too. Your feedback is really helping me improve my drawings.swb10 months ago#1935reply

i lovez the new drawrings you haves makingz. Beautifulz they arez!Teazer10 months ago#1936reply

Steve, the drawing is decent (i can't do any better, I think)

Personally, I don't like it when the colours contrast too much (bright green on bright red for example.)

I could see this comic being turned into a shirt in some time.

As long as you're happy with what you're doing Steve, then we should be happy too.Raven10 months ago#1938reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

Darwin sucks!Dinosaur: Oi! I'm your ancestor, show some respect.

Bird: Tweet.Slippy Lane10 months ago#1939reply

In reply to Raven, comment #1938:

I honestly don't like the bright colors, unless done right. And I didn't do it right. I think my shtick is simplicity -- keeping things to minimum. If you refresh you'll see I've taken the color out of all of the paper drawings. And now I think I'm going to drop the pen for a while and move to plain ol' pencil drawings.

Keep the feedback comin'! :)swb10 months ago#1941reply

Raven replied 10 months ago.

no comments on popstrip?

:(Anonymous10 months ago#1943reply

Funniest comic since style change! Ha! Dinosaurs!Anonymous10 months ago#1944reply

Wait wait wait... this isn't right... you're continuing making stick figure comics because of 'popular demand'? Screw popular demand, man! Do whatever the heck you want!Zerp6410 months ago#1945reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

Hey, where did the colours go? I liked the presence of colours. :( (not the specific colours necessarily, but I think colours are better than no colours in this comic. Plus, if you're going to have no colours, why keep the yellow?)Esn10 months ago#1946reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

P.S. Your new comic "Microwave Oven" at http://popstrip.com/ is hilarious! I couldn't say that over there, as there is no comment box there.

If you're going to keep them separate, do you think you could add the popstrip.com RSS to isitfunnytoday.com? I subscribe to most of my comics (including yours) on that website.Esn10 months ago#1947reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

Elegance in SimplicityGood call. ^.^ Looking forward to seeing what you try out next. =PJosh10 months ago#1950reply

In reply to swb, comment #1941:

Ahh, that's better now.

Simplicity is always good, you can spend more time on the jokes that way!

Also, before this comic, I never really thought of the use of the T-Rex arms. Thanks Steve.Raven10 months ago#1951reply

In reply to Zerp64, comment #1945:

popstripI want to make people happy. /s is where I experiment and try to push myself. That's why the stick figures left -- it was getting too easy. But a lot of people still want the POPsickle stick figures, and I still enjoy drawing them, so.. why not?swb10 months ago#1952reply

In reply to Esn, comment #1946:

Lines and ColorsThe yellow is just to keep the focus on the words. With the style of jokes I was doing, the pictures were detracting from the joke. Also, learning to draw while learning to color at the same time is a bit much. I'm thinking I should lay off the colors until I get better with the lines.swb10 months ago#1953reply

In reply to Esn, comment #1947:

IIFTI sent them my new RSS feed yesterday. It's just a matter of them adding it. You might send them an email requesting popstrip there if you don't see it pop up.swb10 months ago#1954reply

CompressionAs a response to your high bandwidth costs, I have looked at the latest popstrip.com comic, to see if it was possible to reduce its file size. It turns out, it is possible to reduce it by roughly half by joining all frames and using pngcrush (a free utility, found using Google). Small table:

308k - currently

224k - pngcrush individually

150k - pngcrush on a joined image

Hopefully this will help you keep your costs down.Simon10 months ago#1955reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

In reply to Simon, comment #1955:

pngcrushThanks for the tip. I would have to experiment with it to see how it affects image quality. The separate images are needed to allow different formatting options later (including frame by view, the intended viewing format of POPsickle comics), and they also allow me to show the strips without the watermark.

But even if I cut bandwidth down by half, it doesn't address the larger issue of me not having any model to pay for the remaining bandwidth used, or my time in making comics. Even without pngcrush, the file sizes are relatively small. 308k is pretty small for a 40 frame comic. But I will give pngcrush a try if I get a chance.

If you post an after-pngcrush version of a full image for me to compare, I'd be much more likely to download it and try it out. Thanks.swb10 months ago#1956reply

Simon replied 10 months ago.

In reply to swb, comment #1956:

pngcrushI have uploaded the crushed image at http://i574.photobucket.com/albums/ss190/simonlindholm10/e645426f.png. I don't think there's any visible difference between that one and the original, since pngcrush only re-compresses the image and removes meta-data.

It might work to have both framed and full versions of a comic, or perform some other trick like CSS sprites to save bandwidth.

And no, this does not address the larger issue. But it does lower your costs until you find a way of supporting the site. (I for one would love merchandise.)Simon10 months ago#1960reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

In reply to Simon, comment #1960:

Yeah, it doesn't look bad. Only problem is, it doesn't seem to gain any compression. The original is 284KB and the crushed is 283K. I'm guessing that 1KB is just the removed header info.swb10 months ago#1962reply

Simon replied 10 months ago.

Money...again...You ever checked out one of those publishers which specialises in books based on Internet Phenomena? Based on Half a Tehrabyte of bandwith...and many drawings being made a day...surely a book of Stick Figures would generate SOME money...albeit it would take awhile...and be hard...and there's no guarantee on publishing...and it might not sell...

Eugh, it sounded good in my head!

Try signed prints, or stuff like that...maybe a bit similar to the XKCD store?5butjam10 months ago#1963reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

In reply to 5butjam, comment #1963:

I don't feel like I have artwork which is paper-book worthy. Although, I am working on an e-book. It will be filled with new formatting, lots of commentary, and be available for free on a donation basis.

A store is in works. The only thing holding me back there is the overhead for investing in some products. I may put up some ads and use all those funds towards a store.swb10 months ago#1964reply

In reply to swb, comment #1962:

pngcrush283K? That doesn't seem right. My file is at 168K, so Photobucket must have re-converted the images.

New link: http://www.2shared.com/file/6271624/3ebaca4a/pop-crush.html . Hopefully that might work.Simon10 months ago#1965reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

In reply to Simon, comment #1965:

Yeah, that seemed to do the trick. If I can get it integrated with php, I'll probably try it out on the site. Thanks!swb10 months ago#1966reply

Well thenIf you're gonna' opena store, maybe you'll want to get a large signature piece, liek XKCD has done "Height" as a 9"x36" maybe you should finish Dude goes to Linux, and make a large framed print of all the chapters, so ypu can hang it on a wall. A nice, large price on it and wealthy geeks will buy it!5butjam10 months ago#1967reply

I <3 SWB & POPstripCarry on you beauty!Teazer10 months ago#1971reply

PopStrip...Well that fell through fast. Then again, you havn't been updating /s either. Something Up?Josh10 months ago#1974reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

In reply to Josh, comment #1974:

Workin'Don't worry, I'll get caught up soon -- I've got a few comics in the cue. Just got to finish some work first.swb10 months ago#1975reply

PopStrip*phew* Was worried. Progress moves steadily forward at OverCode. We took on a quite project to test our skill and integrity. Its going marvelously. If the competition goes well i'll alert you to the media buzz. =] Then its a few more weeks of work on OmniTouch and its yours. Yesterday I was using it to play starcraft. =]Josh10 months ago#1976reply

swb replied 10 months ago.

In reply to Josh, comment #1976:

sweet!swb10 months ago#1979reply

SWB if you're not going to be up dating /s why not try shading that dinosaur? A shading job can add a very nice elegance to something simple. Rhubarb 10 months ago#1986reply

Regarding money, have you considered adding some ProjectWonderful ads, like most other webcomic authors are doing? It's owned by Ryan North of Dinosaur Comics. As a reader, I don't find them annoying - it can actually be interesting, because many of the ads are interesting in their own right.

You could also try offering T-shirt prints of your most popular comics. I don't go for buying T-shirts myself, but a lot of other people must like them.

Heck, you could also publish a book if you wanted to (i.e. on CreateSpace, which also sells on Amazon.com). Maybe you think that you're not good enough and that no-one would buy something that they can find online for free, but why not find out?

Personally, I think that some of your strips are really a great deal better than anything else I've seen, and the quality of your visual art has nothing to do with it. (for example, the "ideas about life" strip)Esn10 months ago#1990reply

Since Popstrip lacks commetns right now."Some sort of terribly unpleasent virus has gotten a hold of me"

Quick, delete 'Brain32'!Waltz9 months ago#2009reply

already tired of making non-stickfirgure comics?Anonymous9 months ago#2038reply

swb replied 9 months ago.

In reply to Anonymous, comment #2038:

NahJust deathly ill.swb9 months ago#2041reply

Anonymous replied 9 months ago.

In reply to swb, comment #2041:

I disapprove.Anonymous9 months ago#2043reply

Oh, I hope you get better soon! I have to agree on diapproving on the deadly illness of one of my favourite cartoonists! Anonymous9 months ago#2049reply