Until further notice Digital Strips Adventures has gone on hiatus. There are years of material still left untold so I will be looking for another artist to pick up the pin. There is even an Edmund Finney script completed and waiting for an artist. So if there are any out there who like what they’ve seen so far or would like to pick up an extra $20 per page with a large potential audience, then send us an email and we’ll take a look at your work.

For those of you concerned over the blog and podcast don’t worry. Steve and Jason are sticking around on the main site. The problem is the 8-12 hours it takes to pin, ink, and color a full page strip, on top of the time for reading comic archives and produce a podcast, that has pushed Jason to back out of this strip.

So that’s a big sorry to the fans we’ve earned and I hope you continue to stand behind Digital Strips.

Time to wrap this puppy up! And what better way than yet another room to explore? Overall, while this one has been a challenge and a treat to draw as I got to illustrate everything from an Indiana Jones-ish tomb to Washington D.C. itself. In the future, however, I’d like to see the individual arcs a bit more condensed and self-contained. After a few pages, this one feels like it got away from me and all the group had to go on was an ever-changing landscape. That’s great for an artist’s sensibilities, but for the story, it takes a strong story thread to hold everything together and I think this one lacked that focus.

But for now, I see a table with tea cups on it, so that must mean the end is near! Come back next week for the final page of our Finder’s Keepers arc as well as the announcement of the next story!

I’ve never played Stratego. I’ve heard of Stratego, but never really even knew what the board looked like, nor the pieces used to play the game. So it was Google to the rescue, once again. I was hoping for a bit of catharsis when I got to blow up all the little blue and red men (soldiers? troops? remember, I Googled the images, not the game itself) but was robbed when it became nearly impossible to cram all the dialogue and character beats into one page along with showing each, oh-so-satisfying explosion. In the end, I had to settle for specks and dust, all that remains of the larger-than-life Stratego board. Worth it.

All that, and I’m really happy with how Brigid turned out in those last two panels. The next page will be our penultimate episode of the Finder’s Keepers saga, so stay tuned to see how it all shakes out!

What a fun sequence to draw! I’d make every page a series of traps that have to be creatively avoided if I could work it into the story. The great thing about Finder’s Keepers is existing in a world created by imagination. Anything can happen, from doors opening seemingly out of nowhere to visiting the Library of Congress, and all that you could possibly think of in between. And The Geek has developed quite a crush on Bona based on her… limber avoidance techniques. I’ll be enjoying playing that out as we move forward, you can count on that.

Also, even though I was quite happy with how the style on this page turned out, things will likely be changing with the next arc. Possibly not until after that, but if you’d like to see a peek at the changes in store, head over to my Tumblr page where I’m posting them as they come along!

After 60-some-odd comics, finally, FINALLY, Heiko relents and I’m able to do the robot vs. robot, Eye of the Tiger parody that I pitched when we started this crazy thing! And you can be sure that next time I pit one robot against another, the fight will be much fairer. In this case, however, it seemed only right to help Midnight overcome the odds and achieve victory above his underdog status.

Fight scenes are so much easier to do on my end, because I don’t have to consult with my collaborator, who is so busy with real life tasks and demands that he can’t check in to see if I’m following the script. Next arc? NOTHING BUT ACTION SCENES.

UPDATE: Ok, so the uploading isn’t going so well, so for now, please click on through to the Tumblr page where all the sketches thus far are uploaded and ready to view.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it until this arc ends: the idea of changing the location on a whim is something I want to make into a comic. Sure, DSA is good for that on a longer-term basis, but changing from strip to strip, update to update? That’s something I could quickly get behind. And hey! As proof, here’s a secret lab that houses two giant, strangely familiar robots. I’m not going to spoil the next page, but the title should tell you where things are going. Stay tuned for the Thrilla!

Oh, and I’ll see what I can post this week about a possible new look for the DSA cast. Really excited for this, so check that out sometime around mid-week!

One thing I love about the constantly changing setting, mystically-based or not, is that it gives me the excuse to change the scenery in the blink of an eye. Maybe I can get Heiko to work that into every story we do from here on out?

The two groups that have naturally formed during this arc will be much closer for the remainder of the storyline, playing off one another until everything neatly dovetails at the end. Or it could be a huge train wreck. Not for nothin’, but a train wreck would be so much more fun to draw.

Onward they go, making their way through Washington, D.C., which may or may not be the real Washington D.C. Seriously, we’ve wrapped the script for this arc and I still have no idea what’s real and what’s reality. Is anything reality? What is reality? And… I’ve gone cross-eyed.

Regardless of the state of being this setting might lie in, I had a fun time with playing with the backgrounds in this week’s comic, particularly the artistic license I took with both sky and ground in the middle set of panels. I knew it was going to be a walking and talking series, so I figured I’d try a little something different and much more abstract. I’m very interested to hear your thoughts on whether or not this experiment succeeded.

Join us all next week when we explore the Library of Congress! Or do we? I’m confused.