She wore a ribbon on her left manolo



It was very hard to draw today's comic! Every time I tried to draw a heart it kept coming out as a skull instead. I'm sure that means something, but I don't want to know what.



Are you going to be at Sakura-Con next April? Because I will be! My arch-nemesis Jeph and I will be sharing a booth and doing some "educational" panels. My panel will be dedicated to educating people about Jeph. (Or more accurately, Jeph's many crimes against humanity.)



Finally, I want to point you towards the video for weird Al's Close But No Cigar. The song itself is a bang-on pastiche of Cake, but the real star is the animated video directed by John K. People who use Flash to create actual short films (as opposed to online content) need to watch this and learn a valuable lesson... that Flash is not an excuse to avoid using actual drawn animation.



Look how beautiful this thing is! Now imagine how much worse it would be if it consisted entirely of still drawings and motion tweens. Don't let that tweener be you. Actual animation is awesome!



Sam Logan

Smokes and booze



Tony Esteves has a new Cigarro and Cerjeva book out. It's a hillarious comic with a great bold art style, and it looks especially spectacular in print.



There is also a small guest strip from me in there that looks somewhat less spectacular because I got the resolution wrong. But it still turned out pretty good, I think, and it's stuffed in a book full of comics that are even better! So check out Tony's site, read a few strips and see if his book would be up your alley. Soon he may be your second-favourite Canadian black-and-white cartoonist.



(But hopefully not your first! *cough*)


Sam Logan

Stabby stabby



Until recently, the "next gen" of video game consoles was seriously underwhelming me, both in terms of graphics and in terms of actual games. But have you seen this new gameplay footage of Assassin's Creed? Now that's what I'm talking about!



It's great to see some visuals that are as impressive in art direction as they are in technical prowess. And more importantly, it's great to see the more powerful processor being used to open up new kinds of gameplay, as well as beefing up graphics. The crowd interaction looks amazing, if perhaps a bit clunky at this stage.



The crazy sci-fi element exhibited by the game menus just seals the deal for me. This is officially the first non-Wii game of the next gen that has me excited. Let me know if you find it interesting, too! (Or alternately, if you think it looks terrible.)



Sam's Story continues on Monday. See you then!



Sam Logan