So here’s the title I’m expecting to go with. I have a black one too that I actually like better, but this one is good as well. Maybe I’ll put the black one up later.

Got the wiki going, so I hope to get back to drawing soon.

Ok–not really a drawing, but an image. This is one image that I plan on using for the logo or title of my comic.

Oh–did I mention that I decided on a title? Ex Tenebris — From Darkness. Tomorrow I’ll post the “horizontal” one, suitable for the top of the comic cover, or for framing.

Lately, I’ve been working on building a wiki for ExT’s universe. The two options I found were Tiddlywiki and MoWes.

Both offer a “wiki on a stick” (which sounds like something you’d eat at the county fair). Tiddlywiki is nice because it is fast. MoWeS is nice because it is a full-blown AMP/Mediawiki/WordPress install on a stick. So MoWeS gives you a great deal more stability and power, but TW is very, very fast. I still haven’t decided. The draw back to TW is that as the file (yes, it’s all one file) grows larger and larger, you can end up with problems–although those won’t show up until you get to big files (128MB? 2GB? who knows?). MoWeS will never get any slower, basically, because of the way it’s built–but you have to launch a mini web-server everytime before you use it.

Right now I’m mostly using MoWeS, but I’m thinking I might try to migrate to TW before I get too much farther. We shall see. We shall see…

Here’s one of the drawing I did while at work yesterday.  The important thing here (which, oddly enough, is off) is the eyes-nose triangle.  I learned about that yesterday from this site, and it was useful.  I, like many people, have been having a hard time with faces–specifically, noses and eyes that aren’t straight on.  Mouths at an angle can be difficult, but lips are easier to “cheat” at than the other things.

As you can see here, this fellow’s right eye is pulled a little too far to the right (his right)  It needs to be nudged over a bit.  But still, not a bad face for a minutes or two of drawing.  Probably, as Miss N likes to stress, if I just worried less it would all come out better.

I need to do a study of eyes & noses.  I think I’ll do that today.

Here’s one of several sketches I did today. Three turned out well, this being the best, IMO.  To really see this, you need to see the original, from the WSJ.  Please note that I do not support, endorse or even approve of the WSJ–I just saw the picture and thought I’d draw it.

All those little heads took a long time to draw.  And filling in between them, as well.

At any rate, this is an enormous crowd of people, and would be impressive if it were a one-time occurrence.  But nearly everywhere he goes he manages to draw crowds like this–even in foreign countries.  I’m not saying that rainbows come out of his ass when he craps, but it’s really nice to have a politician who is able to string several words together coherently, and doesn’t try to think with his nutsack.  Honestly, after the Chimperor, I thought we were doomed to like-minded single-digit-IQ twits as leaders from then on.  Glad to see that Cowboy Bush and the Penguin were able to screw things up so badly that even their own party had to stop and think for a minute.  We’ll see how long it lasts.

Another sketch tomorrow!

This is a quick sketch I did last night after work.  There are some things I really like about it–the hair, the shoulders, even the sleeves.  The left-hand gun is no so great, and I had a hard time trying to figure out how the smoke would move–or, rather, how to show it.  I know the smoke would rise up, toward the viewer, but how to show that?

With this post, I’m hoping to have a new drawing up every few days, but we’ll have to see what happens.  At the moment, I’m only going to promise one per week, although I’ll be posting to the blog during the week.

I hope in this post to at least begin to solidify what I mean when I talk about Nihilism.

First, the definition cliche’, from the Great Wiki:

Nihilism (from the Latin nihil, nothing) is a philosophical position that argues that existence is without objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value. Nihilists generally assert that objective morality does not exist, and that no action is logically preferable to any other in regard to the moral value of one action over another. Nihilists that argue that there is no objective morality may claim that existence has no intrinsic higher meaning or goal. They may also claim that there is no reasonable proof or argument for the existence of a higher ruler or creator, or posit that even if a higher ruler or creator exists, humanity has no moral obligation to worship them.

Let’s take these one at a time:

1. Nihilism…is a philosophical position that argues that existence is without objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value.

Agree 100%. You might find the tiniest hair of disagreement if you try to argue that this says that existence is no better or preferable than non-existence, but I would then call you a twit.

2. Nihilists generally assert that objective morality does not exist, and that no action is logically preferable to any other in regard to the moral value of one action over another.

This I disagree with almost completely. It seems that I fall under the category of moral universalist. Not only do I believe that an objective morality exists, I believe that other moral systems are perverted (sometimes intentionally) versions of this universal morality. This morality relates to what is Right and Wrong. Note that this does not mean that I am an absolutist. What is wrong in a given situation is wrong for everyone in that position, but that same action, in a different situation might be Right. Note that this also does not impose a punishment for doing the “Wrong” thing, other than one’s own shame or feelings. So, if you’re wondering, if you don’t think something is Wrong, that doesn’t mean it isn’t Wrong, but it does mean that you can do it with impunity. So, if you were waiting for some excuse to do horrible things, perhaps that will be what you needed. I would argue, however, that you were already Wrong and a bad person to begin with, you had only not manifested it yet. A brown horse in the dark is still brown, even if you can’t see it.

3. Nihilists that argue that there is no objective morality may claim that existence has no intrinsic higher meaning or goal. They may also claim that there is no reasonable proof or argument for the existence of a higher ruler or creator, or posit that even if a higher ruler or creator exists, humanity has no moral obligation to worship them.

Note the beginning of this sentence: “Nihilists [who] argue that there is no objective morality…” This sentence presupposes that there are at least two kinds of Nihilists: those who believe in objective morality and those who do not. Which then de-couples the idea of morality from nihilism–which leaves us with the first sentence as a definition.

As far as the second half: since there is no higher ruler or creator, the rest is moot. It may have value as a philosophical question, but not as a practical one, and I’m not much interested in mostly philosophical aguments (such as angels on pinheads)

So, our definition of nihilism is the first sentence: existence is without objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value. RAmen, friend.

This is where people get carried away into crying about how nihlism means that nothing matters, so they should just kill themselves, blah blah blah. This is absurd on its face. It doesn’t at all mean that nothing matters–it means that nothing has meaning. Make sense? Let me ’splain…

A man walks up to someone he has never seen before and punches him in the nose. Does this matter? Of course it does! It matters a great deal to the guy with the fat lip. But does it hold any intrinsic value or meaning? Obviously not. There is no cosmic scale, no great ledger in the sky, no sky-fairy to wag his finger at the puncher and say that this means he is evil. It’s not, in itself, an evil act. It was a senseless act, and a Wrong one, but it certainly mattered.

Another example: A man walks up to a another man whom he has never seen and gives him $1,000. Does it matter? Oh yeah, it matters. Does it mean anything? No.

Another way to see it is a story I call “The Parable of the Lobsters” which is basically an adaptation of “The Star Thrower” by L. Eiseley:

A man is walking along the shore when he sees a boy up ahead on the beach. As the man got closer, he saw that the boy was picking up something and very gently throwing it into the ocean.

The man called out, “Good morning! What are you doing?”

The young man shielded his eyes from the sun with his hand and replied “Throwing lobsters into the ocean.”

“Why are you throwing lobsters into the ocean?”

“The sun is up and the tide is going out. If I don’t throw them in they’ll die.”

“But there are miles and miles of beach and lobsters all along it. You can’t possibly make a difference!”

The boy squinted at the man, then picked up another lobster and threw it into the sea, past the breaking waves. “It made a difference for that one,” he said

Does throwing these lobsters back in matter? Certainly. Does it mean anything? No. Lobsters will still get washed out of the water. Some will be tossed back in and eaten. But if there is something you can do to help someone, how can you not do it?

It is true that there is no meaning to what we do–but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it. Because our lives matter to those around us, and we have a moral obligation to do what we can to make the world a better place for our having been in it even if, ultimately, that means nothing. Because it means something now.

UPDATE: Corrected HTML barf.

So here’s my last color image, marking probably the end of my color exploration for a while.  This was done with “markers”, although I think it looks strange because I used the palette knife to smudge the marker, which obviously wouldn’t be possible IRL.  The image isn’t really finished, as you’ll see there is no detail on the building or the moon.  By the time I hit this stage, it was clear that I didn’t like this, so I didn’t continue.

Miss N said the legs look out of proportion, but they don’t to me.  She’s probably right, what with the whole “art degree” and stuff.:P  I really like how the shadow falls from Cleo’s left arm.

Next time I’ll have some pencil drawings to show–maybe those will be exciting.

The second of the color images I’ll be posting, this is a picture of Cleo Ravenwood, the daughter of the Professor.  This image, like the last one, was done with ‘art pens.’  It wasn’t a complete drawing, however–I cheated a little.  I initially traced the outline of her from another image, then filled it in with color and shading.  So, not a real drawing.  More like a coloring book work.

I still haven’t come up with a good name.  Hmmm…

So here’s the start of my comic odyssey–the first of my drawings to be put up. This is a portrait of Professor Jeremiah Ravenwood, Ph.D, Occ.D. He is the founder of the team, the central, stable pillar around which the other members orbit–some closer, some farther, but all within his sphere of influence. He is the Gandalf to the team’s Fellowship; the Splinter to the group’s TMNT; the Jesus to their apostles.

This is also one of my few forays into the realm of color, and I’m not well pleased. It looks ok, I guess, but I like pencils better (well, simulated pencils). I have a few more color images to post over the next few days, but there won’t be many beyond that. I just don’t think I can make images as nuanced with color as I can with pencil. Now, once I create an entire panel or page, the question of whether or not it will be intelligible will remain. But we shall see.