Friday, January 4, 2013

Blogging frustrations: It Is Hard to Seduce the Internet

And now: a rant about the internet brought to you by the internet.

The internet is an exhausting place.
        On every "promote your blog website" (it is my personal belief that there are more blogs about blogs than blogs about anything else) a humble blogger is commanded to join approximately a million sharing sites. Thus, I have spent the last eternity joining: imgur, reddit, linked in, technorati, stumbleupon, tumblr (which mocks me by its privation of the letter e), as well as rededicating my life to twitter and attempting to get an rss feed. The internet might have eaten my soul.


Are you possibly experiencing blogophilia - an obsessive love and addiction to blogging?
Here are 3 common symptoms of blogophilia:

  1. Subject is unable to part with computer, even attempts to bring it with them into the bathroom. Check: I think I spent all three weeks of Christmas vacation on the internet. I am surprised that my eyes don't glow in the dark like little luminescent computer screens. Hunched over near the screen I mutter, "my own, my precious...pageviews".
  2. Subject fears computer code. Check: The letters "html" throw me into a violent state of shock and trembling fear.
  3. Subject envisions throwing popular internet icons into a junk heap. Check: I am going to draw a picture of this. Maybe it will make me feel better.




Twitter is unsympathetic to my plight.





You have 0 and 1/2 followers on twitter.


But the internet fairy is bipolar and can down vote you to oblivion on a whim.


I feel like the unsuccessful pied piper of the internet

If you are thinking right now, "the pied piper is a really creepy story", you are correct.

12 comments:

  1. Hehehe. You said privation.
    Deep thoughts of the day...brought to you by Monica

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  2. It really is annoying though, tumblr ... yuk

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  3. How long does it take you to draw all that?

    - Quidam

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  4. Painting can take 2 hours or more, the cartoons in this post did not take that long though. Luckily, I really like painting so it is cathartic anyway.
    These two posts took a really long time to paint, but they are more interesting visually:

    http://seizetheabsurd.blogspot.com/2012/07/google-battle.html

    http://seizetheabsurd.blogspot.com/2012/10/octoberween.html

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  5. I am always surprised how fast other people are able to paint/draw way better than me. It looks like you are hand painting/drawing these and then scanning them. Why not use gimp/photoshop? Just curious...

    - Quidam

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  6. Yes I am hand painting them and then scanning them.
    I use paint to crop and stuff but that is pretty much it. I don't use photo shop because it costs money to buy and I am not very familiar with the program.
    In the beginning I kept telling myself, "you cant start a cartoon blog yet because you can't use Photoshop," but eventually I realized that I was just making lame excuses for my laziness. I also just like painting, with real paint. Additionally most of the online cartoons that I see are done with Photoshop, so this at least makes me a little artistically different.
    Do you think that the cartoons would be better with Photoshop and how?
    Also I am more than happy to answer any questions, ask away.

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  7. Gimp is free and it is what I use(for fun). I used to admire a lot of people's artwork online and think that there was no way I could ever replicate it. I asked someone(an online cartoonist actually) once and they referred me to gimp and it is incredibly awesome. I have heard that it does basically the same thing as Photoshop with some minor specialized differences that I have not discovered.

    I personally find painting in real life to be fairly frustrating because my hands have a fairly strong natural tremor and it is just difficult to paint fine details and/or edit things.

    I tend to think that if you are making things for the computer it is just easier and more natural to use a computer which is why I thought it was a little odd that you appeared to be going through the extra effort to hand paint everything. Seems like a lot of work. Many artists complain that it feels odd to paint/draw with a mouse... but I don't suffer from that since I am not hardly a painter and only barely one on a computer. Might be worth it to check out Gimp if you ever felt like lacking Photoshop was what was holding you back.

    - Quidam

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  8. What do you use gimp for? Are you also a cartoonist? I enjoy painting and it is part of what makes the cartooning process fun for me. Also, I have been painting for years so I am pretty familiar with it (though it still takes awhile).

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  9. I use gimp for "art." (http://thelittlepurpleelf.deviantart.com/gallery/)

    I am definitely not a cartoonist... I really only paint occasionally as a hobby and have to relearn everything whenever I get into the mood for it. I also struggle with a certain degree of perfectionism and end up spending forever on miniscule details on corner of a picture and eventually I just give up. I think the main reason I actually "finished" the two pictures I posted on deviant art is that I was experimenting with blurry dark atmospheres instead of details.

    - Quidam

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  10. I am not on deviantart so I can't comment but it looks neat. The creepy moon is fun, and your clock is very realistic.

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  11. Adobe put up a real old version of CS, might be worth looking at? Apparently they did away with the requirement of activation / serial numbers. I think technically you aren't supposed to download it unless you bought it years ago? Yet, it's there, on their site for free. Odd, but, it's there! Here's an article about it:

    http://www.techspot.com/news/51316-adobe-offering-creative-suite-2-for-free-but-they-didnt-mean-to.html

    I draw and paint too, I usually start on paper, then scan to at least crop and clean up, then sometimes use Photoshop sometimes to add color and such. I use an old wacom tablet when I do that.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks! I will look into it. It would be really nice to have something that I can do faster. Even though I like it, painting takes a really long time, and the colors are not the same through the scanner so that can be really frustrating.

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