I don't guess I need a reason: I'm just in the mood to look back on the past year, what I've accomplished, and where to go from here.
Let's start with my comic project. It was supposed to be a small project, just seven pages, that I could complete within a year's time. The beginning of 2019 marked the passing of that deadline. Now, nearly two weeks into the new year, I'm wrapping up the pencils and almost ready to start inking.
On the bright side, I've been making reasonably steady, albeit slow, progress over the last few months ever since I got past the costume design hurdles. Page 1 wasn't ready to ink by January 1, 2020, like I had hoped, but it's still pretty darn close.
My day job kept me fairly busy in 2019, which is part of the reason I haven't been able to focus much on personal projects. I'm not going into detail here, but let's just say it hasn't left me a ton of time or energy to spend on drawing. That looks like it's about to change, though: my workload will be getting a bit lighter thanks to some new hires. I'm hoping that will translate into, if not much more time, at least less exhaustion.
Another positive development this year has been an increase in time I've been able to spend with my family. We've had trouble getting together now that we're all adults with jobs and in some cases school to keep us busy. Lately, though, we've found more opportunities to hang out together. Of course, this has taken time and energy away from the comic, but I'm not going to apologize for prioritizing my family over a hobby project.
Speaking of hobby projects, this was also the year that I started posting about the video game project I've been kicking around for several years. I've made a small amount of progress since that post, but I've been prioritizing the comic over the game lately. I've done more tinkering, of course, but nothing that's shown up in the actual game yet.
I finally bit the bullet and signed up for the TIGSource Forums. I've been following a few of the devlogs there for a while now, and figured I may as well sign up and start posting. I haven't started a thread for my game, though. I figure that can wait until I'm a little further along. Devlogs I'm following include Leilani's Island, Whiskers & Wags, and Apple and Worm: Patching Holes in Spacetime.
I've also been doing a little work on the Web site. I'm in the process of converting it from HTML 4 to HTML 5, which will make some future upgrades easier.
So that pretty much wraps up 2019. Where to next?
Obviously, I'm going to keep working on the comic. I have another piece of art for the gallery that I'm working on getting scanned and ready to post. I've also been playing around with a nice set of brush pens that I got for Christmas, and I'd like to draw something with those and post it in the not-too-distant future, but we'll see.
I'm also going to keep working on the game. I need to figure out level file formats, menuing, and a format for storing sprite/animation details, among many other things. I don't anticipate completing the game any time this year or even next year, but I'd like to hit another milestone or two.
On the Web site front, once I finish the HTML 5 upgrade, I think the next project will be to add an RSS feed. (Probably actually an Atom feed, but I think “RSS feed“ is like “SSL certificate”: That's what they're called, regardless of which protocol is actually used.) I'd also like to redo the Archives so that the main page of that section isn't just a clone of the homepage.
I'd mention some of the reading material I'm planning to get through, but this post has dragged on long enough, so maybe I'll make another reading list post instead.
Here's to more positive change in 2020!