Hunter WILL return though. As soon as I get a little buffer going of The PKF, Hunter will return, with a PROPER schedule.

Anyhow, now that the depressing stuff’s out of the way! SUMMER FUN! Well..END OF SUMMER FUN!!

Either way, I’m AMAZINGLY happy with this picture. It’s just so damned good.

You can find the High-Res of the picture in my Deviant Art Page. AND for the first time EVER (for a Summer Fun pic, anyhow) you can get it in Wall-Paper size to adorn your computer! Check it out HERE with the rest of the Wall Papers.

The previous pictures can be found in Deviant Art Page: 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005.

I’d appologize for it being so late, but honestly I never really set a date for the picture to be done…But as long as it’s before the end of August I’m in good shape. Which today is the last day of! So I’m clear! I was actually done last week sometime, but I decided that I needed the filler today, so I held off on posting it.

Which brings me to my next bit of ‘bad’ news. Wednesday’s comic might be a little late, Or there could even be some kind of filler.

Short version of the troubles: I’ve basically got until Friday to finish all the stuff I have to do to become a Substitute teacher and if I don’t do it I’ll have to start the WHOLE process over again. That’s not happening, so I might need to put the comic on the back burner this week.

But, to be quite honest, last week was rather nuts with me trying to get this all done AND handle what I thought was going to be a devastating semester at school (It’s not going to be, I’ve got a handle on it now and it might be my lightest yet). But I NEED to get these papers into the CCSD’s office BY FRIDAY. So It’s a mad rush to the finish line.

Wish me luck, and enjoy the wallpaper.

-Peace

First, you’ve probably noticed a few changes…yes…I made the content area closer to the top of the page, and I made new set of directory images. And yes, they roll-over. This was all kind of spurred along when I posted on Comicpress’s forum asking for opinions about the site…they were all positive but the size of the space between the top and the comic was a theme…so I spent today playing with it.

I think it looks nice…I did my best to try and keep the thing the same feel…just more…compact. I also moved the ‘Vote’ and ‘Share’ doo-dads…Share appears below the comic and Vote on the right of the blog. Also, share is everywhere now…every comic page in the archives…so…uh…feel free to abuse it?

Second, remember when I said I’d link a page with the wall papers? Well, it’s up. I’ve also got a few avatars up if you’d like them…they only took a few minutes to make…so I hope you all enjoy.

Third, I’ve discovered that the thing I WAS using for my Fanart and Older Pictures is down. I don’t know for how long. But I’ve decided to not deal with it any longer…so Fanart is HERE and Old Pictures are HERE you also may be interested in a new ‘Old’ PKF picture I put up…check it out here. It’s a VERY old picture of Mark and Pat…dating back to when they had their old names. When I first started the comic I was a little too candid with talking about upcoming plot points…so when I did a new design I removed it. But it’s back now. Enjoy.

Last…How about that Darasoon (Pronounced how you guess: Dar-Ah-Soon)? He’s actually an old character that I’ve given a facelift for this arc…he wasn’t supposed to appear just yet, but I needed someone for Sam to run into when he got where he was going. And Dara’s alwasy been a fun character, he’s always hung around the temple…but previously Sam’s gem wasn’t here.

Dara was (maybe he still is) guarding something other than the gem Sam is looking for.

I was dreading Dara’s character design…because he’s one of the more recent parts of the story that eventually became The PKF. What does that mean…well…He’s from when I started to describe everything in detail…and I rarely drew it. So I went nuts with Dara and when it came down to the wire I wasn’t sure I could get him to look the way I wanted…but damned if I didn’t.

Oh…and he’s got fur AND scales, before you ask. And yes, he’s usually rather innapropriate. And that IS weed he’s smoking. (don’t do drugs kids, he’s not human, so he can get away with it).

Heh.

Enjoy the upgraded site. And awesome comic.

-Peace

Second, I have a confession to make. I’ve been cheating this comic the last few months. No, I haven’t been stealing art or plot lines (I’m too honest for that crap) but I’ve been…half assing my art. A while ago I started to SKIP a step in the comic process. The layout. The layout involves me drawing blue guiding lines so the characters are more fleshed out before I try to ink them.

I’ve been drawing a basic, loose, design of the charaters. That’s why the art has been fluctuating so much from panel to panel. I’m basically trying to INK without any lines. Now, with my tablet this isn’t a HUGE deal, but it DOES leave things looking both a little flat and slightly ‘off’ every panel. This comic, mid way though, I started using those guides again. The last three panels particularly.

I’ve already done one comic (Friday’s) that’s totally done the RIGHT way and I’m much happier for it. It adds a little more time, but it’s worth it. I mean, why would I spend ANY time on this comic if I’m not spending ENOUGH time on it. Right?

So I’m sorry. Art will start to improve again, because all I’ve been doing is playing it safe…and I can’t get better if I’m playing it safe.

Finally, I was being serious with the title of this one. I really did start to carry gum in High School because people ALWAYS asked me for it. It drove me NUTS so it only made more sense to me to just tote the damn crap around.

I’m glad we’ve got our two new characters finally, they’ve been poking around in my head for ages…if I think about I’ll try to dig up some OLD (early Book One) pictures of Mark and Pat…they’ve changed quite a bit, but not as much as you’d think.

Enjoy the comic and expect Fridays to look even better.

-Peace

And I know it seems like I’m referencing Book One more than I should since I tried to ‘self contain’ this book, but honestly, all you have to know is that it tried to kill them. Nothing else was really relevant from the last appearance of this critter.

I’m seriously going to have to do a ‘behind the scenes’ after this story arc, because I really have to explain why I decided to bring a bit character back from almost three hundred comics ago. This arc actually had a whole other villain attached to it at the beginning of the comic (and I mean pre-Chapter One, Book One beginning of the comic) but the villain never made any sense to me. It was basically a super advanced giant robot built by Sither to destroy Earth.

But, ‘Sither’s a geneticist’ you say?

Well, there’s my problem with it too. Sither’s the best geneticist in the universe, but he’s not exactly a mechanic.

So about mid way though Book One, Chapter Five I decided that I’d bring back the ‘Unknowns’ (my private name for them) and use them in place of the giant, angry, robot. I didn’t think I’d be bringing back the original Unknown, but I left it open.

It wasn’t until I started the pre-writing for this arc that I decided to include him again…why? Because I suddenly called him ‘Fluffles Wuffles Kuddly Kins’ in my head…and it made me giggle like mad.

And when I start to spontainiously giggle in the middle of my living room with the TV off that can only mean I’ve thought of something made of pure awesome extract. And thus it was including in the comic.

So I brought back Unknown Prime and gave him a middle-aged-crazy-cat-woman as an owner/care giver. Pamm Blinkly is there purly to call Fluffles ‘Fluffles’. Her other purpose us pure fluff (hehe), I assure you.

Also, she’s wearing a Choo-Choo Bear tie, Choo-Choo is the amorphous blob of a cat, from Something Positive (sometimes NSFW), which is one of the fantastic comics I read that isn’t in my Links page.

Which makes her awesome.

More about Fluffles and Blinkly will be explained in the next comic comic or two. Don’t worry, there’s only a little downtime until they strike out and seek out the balls of light (or gems, whatever).

So sit tight. It’s only going to get more fun.

-Peace

I originally had a large, complex, picture planned. I had thought about going back and redoing a VERY old picture that seemed to have disappeared in my move to DA…however…I decided to forgo that for the very cute picture of Hana.

I did, however, find that old picture…from the first year of the PKF. It was buried in an old hard-drive that I had written off as ‘totally @#$%ing broke’…if you’re looking for a little more holiday cheer, check out this blast from the past (now placed in a gallery created for any Ancient pictures I stumbled across). I’ll probably go though said old hard-drive and see what I can find that you guys may be interested in, old character designs, scrapped comics, that sort of thing. Stuff I don’t want on my DA account but wouldn’t mind sharing.

So this is the last bit of filler for this little break, be here on Friday for a one-shot comic then on Monday the next chapter starts, with a bang. Literally.

Have a Happy Holiday and spend some time with those you love. And if you’re not celebrating anything this week, well, spend some time with your family anyway. I know they drive you nuts, but they love you. Probably. I don’t know…they’re your family.

Go ask them yourself. Needy. Gawd. XD

-Peace