Incoming Sketch Off
It has been a while since I've thrown one of my (in?)famous Sketch Offs! But it's almost Halloween, and Halloween is always my favourite Sketch-Off theme. SO: Sketch Off ahoy!
For those who don't know, Sketch Offs are when I pitch a theme to readers -- for example, Sam and Fuzzy characters dressed in Halloween costumes -- and then spend a day drawing all my favourite reader suggestions. I'll be throwing this year's on Monday (the 26th), in the afternoon and evening. So start brainstorming your ideas! (But please don't send them to me until the actual day of the event, or I'll lose track of 'em all.)
Here's a sample of some of the pieces I drew last year. Woo!
-Sam Logan
C & E
If you're looking for a brief refresher on Candice and the Emperor, Sam recounts the story to Devahi in this strip and the couple that follow it.
Or, if you haven't read it before, you could also dig into the whole big original story arc itself -- in the "Classic" section of the archive, or collected in the print or digital collections of the Sam and Fuzzy Omnibus! It's not required reading by any means, but you'll probably get a little something extra out of our current and upcoming chapters if you have consumed the whole archive!
Come back on Wednesday for our next comic. See you then!
-Sam Logan
Friends! Topatoco needs to make room for some new designs... which means it's time to say goodbye to two of our oldest shirts. If you've been waiting to pick up a Tanuki Plumber or Winners Don't Use Save States shirt, now is the time! Once they're gone, Topatoco won't be restocking 'em.
Sam and Fuzzy Q & A: Logo Edition
Got a question you want answered? Just drop me an email with "Q & A" in the subject line!
"How has your S&F logo changed over time? It’s just that I noticed that your oldest logo is still visible in your earliest comics. It is quite different! Also, nostalgic." -Jake
Yeah!All the comics in the "Classic" era of the strip have a big Sam and Fuzzy logo at the top. It's a legacy of the comic's origins as a strip in the University of Victoria's student newspaper, The Martlet.
In the earliest strips (like this one), I drew the logo manually every time. But I switched to this pre-drawn one in strip 24, and in strip 66, I fancied it up a little into this version, which last the rest of the Classic arc. The logo is rough and scratchy-looking... ostensibly to match the art of the comic, but also just because I drew it by hand, and that was what my art looked like back then!
By the time I started the Noosehead arc, the comic wasn't running in the paper anymore. And honestly, it looked a little weird having the logo on the website twice (once in the header and once in the comic.) So, I took the opportunity to remove it from the strips themselves. For many years after that, I didn't really have an official Sam and Fuzzy logo. I would create some sort of logo-looking thing out of a blocky font any time I needed one for something.
Years later, when I finally started making books through Topatoco, I figured it was finally time to make a proper, consistent logo for the comic. With the help of my old pal Brian, we put together the Sam & Fuzzy graphic that is still being used to this day here on the site and in all my books! We kept the ampersand scratchy as a bit of a nod to the old one.
"Awww, Sin's real body looks adorable! Can we get some 'Adventures of the Adorable Real And Maybe Not Evil Sin Who Is Not Going to Instantly Get Destroyed By Brain On His First Appearance' sometime? Maybe Rikk Estoban would be interested in drawing them?" -Matt
I think we've seen as much of Sin's true form as we're ever going to! I actually debated whether or not I should show as much as we did. (It's hard to live up to the picture that people create in their minds!) But in the end, I decided that revealing it (at least partially) and then immediately, uh... taking it away again... gave the scene a sense of weighty finality.
"Why are all your Mario Maker levels so HARD?!?" -Allen
My Mario Maker levels are all designed around my own (approximate) Mario skill level. I just play a lot of platformers, I guess. That said, there are plenty of other levels on Mario Maker I don't even have a chance of beating... yikes!
OK... That's a wrap for this week, friends. See you on Monday!
-Sam Logan
