Lucas Delves into Comics

Hello Internet!
So, some more stuff happened in the last week. Remember those valentines day cards? Well, I enjoyed making them so much that I decided to do more! Well, they're not cards but little comics with the same style/humour. It's really just me doodling and captioning them but I'm having a good time at it. I'm trying to do one every day. Just as a challenge to see if I can actually come up with something funny that regularly. Here's the link http://thebakerycomic.com/ I think it's going pretty well so far. I put up the site on Wednesday and I'm getting just about of 100 page views every day that I put up a comic so if I keep this up I should have an audience in no time.

Lucas is a Crazy Romantic

Happy Valentines Day!!! It's actually a little late seeing as how this is being written on the Saturday but I hope that makes up for it. I had a... interesting valentines day. Long story short, I was stuck with nothing to do on a Friday night so I sat down on Facebook and asked if anyone wanted me to draw them valentine's cards.

The response was overwhelming.

I only had time to get 18 of them done but I think they're pretty funny. The drawing in them is pretty bad on two accounts:
1. Time constraints
2. I can't draw.

However, I think the point was communicated. I had a pretty good time doing them overall. It sort of led me to pick up Adobe illustrator and attempt to get the hang of it for if I ever wanted to do something similar. Maybe I could do a comic-like-thingy. I think that'd be fun. Some people at SGS could give me some pointers.

Meet Our New Production Intern, Elizabeth

Hi! My name is Elizabeth Barr, and I’m a student from Humber College. I’m doing a post-grad program in Television Writing and Producing and I’m interning with both iThentic and Smiley Guy Studios.

I’ve been here for about a month now. I think I’ve memorized about half of the names in the office so far! Other than that I’ve been helping out with a few things on the second season of iThentic’s Guidestones, as well as their new series, Space Riders. I’m slowly mastering the art of Google Docs and ACTRA’s independent production agreement!

On the Smiley Guy front, I’ve helped out on a few things for the upcoming co-production, Warren United, as well as the continuing series Teleporting Fat Guy.

I’ve been taking moments from each episode of TFG and turning them into high-resolution stills. I use Flash and then Photoshop in order do it. I’ve never used either of those programs, so it took me a little while to get the hang of it. But I think they’re turning out okay!

Lucas Makes Smiley Guy Look Good

So, this week was the co-op job fair! I made a presentation board and made Smiley Guy look really good. (At least I think) A few of the grade 10 students seemed really interested so don't be surprised if next year my position is in high demand. As well, I found out that my school has a video game making club. I was sort of baffled that I had absolutely no idea about this. So I went and found out why. The club isn't much to scoff at. It was really just a bunch of people sitting around and playing Dota. So I got an idea.

For the past few weeks or so I've  been going to events at this place called Bento Miso. It's a space for gamemakers to go and work during the day. I know whole teams of people who's entire production just work out of Bento. They also host events by night. So I figured, why not see if I could book a night where the club from my school could come out. I could get a speaker to talk about the industry and how to get a good start. That sort of thing. It wouldn't just be for Northern, I could speak to other schools and do a general High-school-aged event. That sort of thing doesn't exist as of now so why not give it a try? I think it would be fun and really get the ball rolling. 

Lucas' Eye on Waterloo

Ok! So, this week was pretty sweet as well. First of all, The game jam was awesome! It was super intense and straining (I barely had time to sleep.) It was also pretty rewarding seeing as how I have something to show for my time there.

I'm sorry to say that anyone reading this will have to wait one more week to play it just because me and my friend are in the process of cleaning it up a bit before we put it up anywhere. I can say however that you play as a giant eyeball and navigate through a maze without touching the walls. I hope that explanation is sort of adequate.

Also, I'm going to be entering the Junior Waterloo Programming Competition. It sounds big and fancy but it's really just a test. If you score high enough, you can win money and scholarships! It takes place near the end of February so I'll be going in for extra help sessions at school. I'm really looking forward to it.

Lucas Goes Above and Beyond to the Toronto Global Game Jam

Today is very exiting! I have basically been looking foreword to this weekend for the last month or so now. It's so exiting because, this weekend is my first game jam! Yup I'm going to be in the 2014 Toronto Global Game Jam (TGGJ) For those of you who are not familiar with what this is; A game jam is basically where you make a game in a set amount of time. Usually that amount of time is a bit un-realistic though. So basically you binge game making and eat a lot of Chinese food.

Today I'll be going down to the George brown campus for the entire weekend to work my butt off, only leaving for minimal amounts of sleep. I've never really been to one of these so I'm not sure what to expect but hear they're super intense and awesome.

Also, I'll hopefully have a game to show for my time there when the weekend is over. I'll be honest, the game's probably going to suck. That, however, is to be expected. It's more about the experience. No matter how it turns out I'll be posting a lint to it here next week so get hyped! 

Lucas' Game - First Stage

So now that I'm back from the break it's time to get down to business!

Me and Julie mocked up a schedule before I left for the break. It basically plans out my time from now until the end of the school year so that by the end I have a kick-ass game to show for my time here. The first week is dedicated to concept.

So far, the first week has passed and my little prototype/concept game was approved! It is a little odd so I'll do my best to explain what it is:
 It's a 2d top-down game. The whole point is that there are puzzles but all the puzzles are hidden. I plan to make subtle hints with oddities in the tile sets to lead people in the right direction. I hope that made sense.

I'm still using images that I either downloaded from the internet or spent maximum 30 seconds on so it's not really visually appealing but I'll include a picture.

Over the next few weeks I plan to expand on the idea and figure out new ways to keep it engaging. I also just realized that this is the first blog that was entirely on something that happened at work. Sweet!