Yeah, So That Happened.

Hello, friends. Strangers. No, check that, I don't think any strangers actually read this. Probably because I don't post anything besides sub-par bizzaro "Doodle Book sketches" and hints about my upcoming comic series you all know nothing about.

Which is why this year, rather than looking back, like I did last year, I'll be looking ahead.

Now that 2013 is over, I can break last year's "resolution:" to not give you expectations, like due dates, or anything. So, without further ado, here's what I've got planned for 2014:

• An annual story publication of some form, be it improv shorts or exercises, or maybe an ongoing tale.
• Essays, or ramblings, on storytelling, pondering the concepts of characters, dialogue, plot, and anything I happen to be thinking about at the time.
• More art; I've got a good list of potential sketch ideas I can pick and choose from, and maybe I'll even bust out a Wormhole promo every few weeks.
• I have other interests than comics, including filmmaking, TV, comedy, roleplaying games, and others than I'm eager to work on and you probably had no idea about.
• I had one last thing... it was important, I remember. Huh. Well, I'll tell you when it comes to me, I suppose.

Have a happy new year, and thanks for sticking with me through all the nonsense that was 2013.

- John Rioux

An Airship Thing

Here's the latest in the ol' Doodle Book. I messed up on that kid's hair, and it took a strange turn. Oh, well. To see all the other Doodle Book sketches, click here.

Some Joey Han Art

These are a few pieces by my friend Joey Han. He needed to put them online, but he doesn't have a blog yet, so he asked me to post them here. Enjoy.

Two Wormhole Characters and Some Clouds.

Here's another Wormhole sketch with two of the main characters.

And now for the News:

I recently learned that I could directly edit the code of my blog, rather than being limited to the Blogger template. Now I can use the power of CSS to edit the look and feel of the website even further. As you might have noticed, I made the border of the blog more sharp, and added shadows.

This probably doesn't interest you the slightest, but as a designer, I find it pretty exciting.

Now, I originally wanted to change the background to a sketch of some clouds, but it didn't look as good as I planned. Here they are anyway, in all their cloudy glory:

The Hulk. Punching Mimes.

Okay, today's Doodle Book page was pretty vague. it was just a "Danger" sign with the caption: "Whoops!"

My mind immediately went to a quicksand pit, but there was no inspiration there. In the end, I couldn't think of anything that would utilize the "Danger" sign, so I just threw Hulk into a circus and had him punch a mime.

Happy Halloween!

Here's a little vampire guy.
UPDATE: I added a splash of color.

Now, I originally had a plan for a much bigger, full color sketch involving a crew of LARPers and some terrified children, but I was pressed for time. Maybe some other day...

Wormhole Promotional Image

This is an advertisement for Wormhole that I'll be using across the internet, showing the main characters of the series. (As you can see, it greatly differs from my last Wormhole sketch from February.) ENJOY!

Horse Sketch

Well. These are just getting weirder and weirder, aren't they?

This is another color technique I've been messing with. A more hand-drawn look, with a halftone (tiny dot) effect for the shading. (It turns out you can't see the dots unless you zoom in 100%, but this is experimentation, folks.)

Oh, and this is my 100th post! Holy mother of moley! And how to I celebrate? With a freaky horse, that's how. Cheers, mate.

Scary Shields Sketch

Look. It told me to "Make their shields scary." And scary I made them. So, cover your eyes, if you must.

Alien Invasion Sketch

This is the second sketch in my "Doodle Book." It's an alien invasion.

Today I decided to color the sketch. I've experimenting with a lot of different coloring techniques, and I'm trying to find the coloring style that I'm using for Wormhole. I like how this one turned out.

There were actually two pages for this entry in the book. This is what the first page looked like.

Robot Sketch

Here is the first page in my sketchbook-thingy. It's a robot.

Doodle Book Thing

Last Christmas, I got this weird book called "The Boys' Doodle Book." I never thought I'd use it, and it's just been gathering dust lately, but now, I think I've found a use for it.

Each page has a different doodle prompt, with little side drawings to assist you.

So, whenever I want to do a sketch, I can flip to the next page in the book, draw whatever the heck it tells me to, scan it, and put it on the blog. This works better than my "random sketches," because not only does it suggest things for me (because you guys never give me suggestions), but it stretches my creativity. It's an excellent exercise, I do believe.

So. This should be interesting.

Blog Update!

Hello, everybody! As you can see, I've updated the blog! The blog navigation tools are on the left, while the social networking gadgets are are the right. Plus, I created a new favicon! Look at that!

Also, this week my friend Joey and I helped out at a cartooning camp. These are a few of the many drawings and excersises I did while I was there.

New Google+ Page

Google+ is confusing.

For a while, I've been posting things regularly on what I now realize is my personal Google+ profile.

Then I got a Facebook account. After using Facebook for a while, I went back to Google+ to learn that it's almost the exact same thing. So I reworked my personal profile into a more personal profile, then created the actual John Rioux Comics page.

So, if any of you out there actually use Google+, you can follow my page here.

Oh, and if you don't already follow me on Twitter/Facebook, here are a couple of random sketches I've done this summer:

News Update!

And now for a News Update!

Wormhole is NOT going to be a webcomic!

Well, the first issue will be published online.

…and possibly subsequent issues.

But my ultimate goal is for it to be published in PAPER form!

Thank you. Enjoy your day.

Art Room Mural

Many a month ago, my friends Joey Han, Zack Wright, and I were chosen to paint a mural on the closet door of our Art teacher, Mr. Adams. Now, it's just about the last day of school, and we've finished. We all took part in the design, painting, and outlining, and now all it needs is a name. Hmm…

June News - Blog "Hiatus"

Good evening, everyone. It's time for the monthly tradition of apologizing for previous falsehoods and filling your expectations with new ones. If you really care, that is.

But, no, this month I won't be promising anything. In fact, this may well be the only post I do in June.

I don't know what it is, but I've just been unable to do anything (but writing, which I've been doing just about every night). The max number of posts per month this year is three, only half of them are actual content, and just last week on Towel Day I sat down in front of a blank sheet of paper, thought to myself: I'm gonna do a Hitchhiker's sketch! and, after several long minutes of not thinking of anything, I simply gave up, went to my friend's house, and played Magic: The Gathering. This sad cycle will not end unless I stop saying "I haven't been posting much lately, but this month will be different!"

So, I should probably stop writing these monthly "News" posts. I never have any news anyway. I'll probably be on brief hiatus from blogging for (more than) a few weeks, so I can finish writing my script. Good day.

Iron Man Sketch

It's Iron Man. Have I much else to say?

May News

Brace yourselves, folks. May is going to be relatively awesome.

First we've got some big movies coming out (Ahem. Iron Man 3. Ahem.) which, looking back, tend to spawn sketches here on the blog. Did you hear that? SKETCHES! I've started the first one already! Hoho!

After Iron Man, we've got Free Comic Book Day this Saturday! Go to your local shop and get some FREE COMICS, people. I bet you'll discover something new. If you don't, you'll probably get a full refund anyway.

The Maine Comics Arts Festival is May 19th! It's a great event. If you live nearby, come and see all the local exhibitors, including special guest Jeff Smith (creator of Bone).

We've got some cool holidays this month too, like Towel Day. Unfortunately, nobody knows what Towel Day is. I cry into my towel as we speak.

Joey's Doodle

Lastly, I want to congratulate Joey Han on his Doodle 4 Google nomination! You can vote for Joey's doodle, and you should, too, because it's pretty brilliant.

So, that's all for May News. Let's see if we can recreate the pattern from last year?

Doctor Genius Sketch

All the way from the far reaches of time, it's Doctor Genius!

What? You've never heard of Doctor Genius? Google him.

Nothing? Man, he must not be too notorious in 2013. Just you wait.



UPDATE: This is a character from my upcoming comic, Wormhole. Who could he be? You'll just have to wait and see. Bwahaha. Ha. Ahem.

April News

Hello, blog reader people. It's April. I've got news, starting with this little red circle thingy here. It's my new logo for my social networking sites. Pretty neat, eh? Pret-ty neat.

Secondly, I want to remind you all that Wormhole has no release date yet. It could come out tomorrow, or it could come out in three years. (That's the beauty of independent publishing! I wonder why everyone hates it…?)

I'm going to be spending a lot of time improving my drawing ability. The artwork of Wormhole is going to be a pretty major part of it, seeing as it's a comic, and I can't draw all that well quite yet. It's sort of a pilgrimage thing. You artists out there should understand.

In the meantime, I might do some stories, or some other writing project. I have some plans for something that I might reveal sometime, someday soon. Or something.

Tabletop Day!

Hey, fellow geeks! Today was International TableTop Day! A day for all to gather and play their favorite board games, card games, and RPGs! My friend and I held an event at our local library, and this is the art I did for the poster:

Oh, yeah, and Doctor Who premiered today. It was amazing. Just sayin'.

The Republic of Texas Sketch

As you know, I've missed the past few weeks in terms of "Weekly Sketches," but now I return! Well, actually, this is a drawing I did for my Social Studies class, depicting the Battles of the Alamo and San Jacinto. But to heck with the educational part – there's COWBOYS! WOO-HOO!

March News

Greetings, folks, and welcome to another month!

I missed a couple sketches the last few weeks, but I'm planning on doing more this month, and am still hard at work writing my upcoming webcomic "Wormhole!"

Attention Facebook users! You've probably already seen that "Like this on Facebook" gadget on the side of the blog, but I've recently created a Facebook page.

UPDATE: I've added the Like box gadget to the blog. Check it out!

Wormhole Sketch

This week's sketch is a preview of my upcoming Science-Fiction webcomic, Wormhole!

Happy Birthday to the Blog

Today marks the first-year anniversary of this blog! To celebrate, I was going to post a cool weekly sketch for you all to see, involving something I've been rather quiet about for the past couple months.

Well, I'm not quite finished with it yet.

So you'll all have to wait just another day before seeing the fantasticosity that is this drawing. Here's a little preview (in the blue pencil stage):

X-Men Sketch

This week's (well, last week's) Weekly Sketch is the X-Men! We've got Professor Charles Xavier, Cyclops, Beast, Wolverine, and Storm! This sketch was recommended by Joey Han.

Got a Weekly Sketch idea? You can recommend it in the comments or via one of my social networking accounts (see my About page.)

The Avengers Sketch

Introducing the Weekly Sketch! It's a thing where I do a sketch. Every week. The first of these Weekly Sketches is The Avengers!

January News

Old Logo

Happy New Year! It's a new month, and that means it's time for a "blog news" post.

First of all, you've probably already noticed the new blog logo. I recreated the old one for a fresh new look to the blog. I'll be adding art to the header sometime soon!

Sadly, Holiday Vacation is over, but that means I'll be back to work on my webcomic! As a rule, I'm not going to say how far I am with it, but I will when it's ready to be published, so stay tuned!

I'd like to start a "Weekly Sketch" series of posts, and you can take part! You can make requests for the sketches in the comments here, or on any of my social networking accounts (see my About page). Suggest anything you want! The goal here is to draw a variety of things.

I've hopes for another fun year! Adios.