Waccoon has created a meme that is actually useful! I recommend all artists do it. The Expression Meme is a very good exercise to stretch your artistic muscles. Click on the image to see my work.

You can get the template here.

Finally watched Kung Fu Panda this week and loved it. I don’t know why, but my favorite character was Mantis. Also surprising to me, this was the fanart that came of it? I gotta say, that punching bag was just too goofy-looking for me to NOT draw it.
I also watched it in Spanish last night to strengthen my Spanish. I watched the English version first, of course, and followed by the director commentary. Always like those. I wish I had time to watch it in English again, because Jack Black did a great job, but this was a rental.

In other news, Wall-E is now out! I hope to rent it next. Haven’t seen it, but I’ve heard great things about it.

I’m taking Thanksgiving off because; internet traffic is traditionally slow on Thanksgiving, most webcomics take it off as well, and the fact that I need a day off. If I drew up a comic for today, though, here’s the script I typed out:

Funky Skunk: “You are such a turkey.
Kenny: “Mmmmm, turkey.”

The Tales Of Beedle The Bard is almost available!
Remember that book mentioned in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows? J.K. Rowling has written a full version of it and is selling it to benefit the Children’s Voice campaign. Pre-orders end on November 30th, and the book comes out December 4th.

Here’s a sign that companies are REALLY liking gift cards. Best Buy now has a gift card with a built-in SPEAKER! That’s right, a gift card that requires AAA batteries! The reviews are decent, as long as you’re in a quiet room. Plugs into your mp3 player or whatever. These gift cards start at $15.

But that’s nothing. Target wants to outdo them with a gift card with a DIGITAL CAMERA built in! Okay, technically it’s just a digital camera with a minimum of $50 credit on it and 40 free prints. I don’t know how that thick thing is swiped at the register(edit: it probably has a barcode, judging by one of their other cards). Maybe I should see if I can find them at our local Target. The reviews are horrible, though, but it’s basically a free camera with a $50 purchase, so they don’t need it to be great. It’s just enough for a “gee-wiz” factor.
They could have branded the gift card camera better, though. I don’t see their logo anywhere on it, and it’s gray and red! Target’s colors are WHITE and red. Oh wait, I think that’s their tiny logo embossed in the silver label that says “Gift Card”. That logo is not designed to be embossed. It just looks like a circle, or a button when embossed.

So, there are your interesting links today.

As you know, cartoonists love Christmas presents as much as the next person. Well, I’m not going to ask for Christmas presents from you. I’m going to ask for BIRTHDAY presents! I’ll be turning 27 on January 6th(the REAL 12th day of Christmas), and would like to make it possible to give me a present, via Paypal. If I reach certain levels, I’m using the money on the highest level reached. Here are the possible presents:

$3: 3 movie rentals via Redbox.

$7: A nice meal.

$10: A nice meal with dessert.

$20: New antenna designed for digital tv.

$90: A new phone with a text-messaging keyboard, so I can update Twitter more often.

$900: A new computer that’s NOT 8 years old.

I’m also open to other suggestions, but I do reserve the right to default to this list or somebody else’s suggestion.

No cash? Fan art is a great gift too! I plan on including a fan art section when I do my site redesign in a few months. I’m waiting for the next version of ComicPress before redesigning.

The Sequential Artists’ Pub is a get-together of cartoonists of all types. We record the podcast every 2 weeks, and tonight(December 27th) is yet another exciting roundtable discussion! I most likely will not be there due to work. I’ll take any chance I can to join, though. I’m on there right now!

Join in at 8PM (CST)! Click here to join in or listen to the archives!

Update: Recording is complete. Nice talk about branding and advertising today.

I have an image editor installed on my camera’s SD card just in case I load the pictures onto a computer that lacks a decent image editor. If you go to PortableApps.com, they have lots of useful open-source programs that can be installed onto a flash drive or ANY kind of portable media. I’ve loaded my flash drive with more software than I’ll likely need, but you never know when you might need to edit some audio on a computer lacking an audio editor(Audacity), or edit a Powerpoint presentation on an Office-less computer(OpenOffice). I now never leave home without an FTP client.

You can find the image editor here. You don’t even need to install the PortableApps menu.

Previously, my new flash drive ran U3 for its portable apps, but they can’t keep the software up to date. If I’m carrying Firefox with me, it has it to be 3.0 or higher, because they don’t support 2.x anymore.

For my birthday, my mom got me the first ever Kenny Chronicles hardback collection! No, I’m not selling these, heh. She put several of my latest comics into a scrapbook so I can show my comics to people. Useful!

Hey, if YOU want to get me a birthday present too, you can use the button below to send a little something via Paypal. These donations might be put toward some movie rentals, a meal, or something even bigger if people are generous… like a phone with full text keyboard for more Twitter updates, maybe?

No cash? Fan art is a great gift too! I plan on including a fan art section when I do my site redesign in a few months. I’m waiting for the next version of ComicPress before redesigning.

On Christmas(2008) I offered up a downloadable/printable action figure of the robot that kidnapped Kenny. If you missed this present, here’s a direct link to that update.

After the dudes of  Webcomics Weekly discussed their New Year’s resolutions in their latest podcast, I decided that I actually DO have some resolutions for this year! So, even though we’re already 11 days into the year, here are my New Year’s resolutions for 2009:

1. Build a buffer. I’ve considered making the update time be a different time than everybody else’s update time, but I think anything after midnight is considered “late”. I need to stop updating at 6am. To do that, I need to stop finishing my comic at 6am.
2. Construir un buffer. The Spanish version of Kenny Chronicles normally updates at 11pm on the update day because I have a day job that I need to be awake for. I need the Spanish version online at 12:01 am on the update day. This means having the English version finished at least an hour before that.
3. Speed production time to 3 hours, or get paid for the full 6 hours I normally take. I do this for free, yikes. Figuring all work on the comic, including translation and website stuff, this is often a 20 hour per week job. I know I can speed myself up. Getting a new computer would help.
4. Better art, better stories. Coupling #3 & #4 will be difficult. This will come with practice.
5. Watch more movies. Yes, they actually fuel the imagination.
6. Get linked to by somebody popular! Pleeeeeease??? I’ve seen other comics thrive tremendously from this happening. One happened to have a popular friend, another simply struck a chord with another popular person. Then the traffic stuck because they were awesome.
7. Draw every day. Preferably on the comic. I currently do the comic all in one shift. Remember me saying it takes roughly 6 hours? Break, please!

In addition, here are some specific plans for 2009:

• Site redesign. This has to wait until ComicPress 2.7 comes out, plus my development time. I have a layout planned that looks nothing like the standard ComicPress theme. I want to look different than the other webcomics.
• Offer prints. Income. This is currently planned to be included with the redesign, but doesn’t HAVE to wait for that.
• Include a fan art page. Planned for site redesign, but doesn’t have to wait for that either. I have 3 Kenny fan arts already, just so you know.
• Start including sub-sites related to the comic. One business in the comic has a site in the works. Waiting for site before introducing its name.
• Create merchandise in addition to prints. I have a store, but it’s all old designs. These will be discontinued as soon as I have new stuff to sell.
• Secret projects. They’re secret because I probably won’t find the time to actually do them.