Hey everyone, I did an Easter comic for Scott Kurtz’s PVP comic!

the idea came to me while reading old peanuts comics. I was like, when snoopy throws all those eggs they would sure make a mess.

click on image or read it HERE.

: )

Butterfly is now in full color and today shows off the super team’s brand new costumes. Snazzy!

The Silent Kimbly site has updated to Wordpress with ComicPress, adding some extra functionality to the site (as used by a few other LBF comic sites). Also Silent Kimbly is having a “Best Of” week this week with updates every day.

Wally & Osborne returns after a month-long hiatus. Join Wally in his quest for Osborne’s beak.

Aki Alliance hasn’t been updated in a while, what has Ryan Estrada been up to these days? I’m calling him on the Boxphone right now…

[Ring… Ring…]

Hello?

[Heavy breathing.]

Tyler, is that you again? I told you, the Boxphone is only for emergencies!

Umm… this isn’t Tyler… this is um… this is the comic police, we’ve heard reports that a one Ryan Estrada is holding a certain comic celebrity, known as Aki, hostage while he goes on his own little adventures… know anything about that?

Don’t you know it’s 5:30am in India right now?

There’s a 5:30 in the AM too? It’s 5:30PM here, but I’m still in my jammies anyway.

I’m afraid it’s all India’s fault that Aki hasn’t updated in a while. Even without sleeping, there’s just too many adventures to go on!

What adventures?

Well, my latest project is a weekly show called “The Ryan Estrada Expeditions“. And anyone can send me missions that I then go out to complete and film. So far people have sent me to a temple full of rats…. hiking through the Himalayas…..They’ve sent me to interview bandits, ride on top of trains, and get into all sorts of trouble!

And this stuff is all real right? Do you actually get killed in any of the episodes?

Well, in the next episode I get beaten up by homeless people!

Yikes! It’s a scary enough adventure for me just going down the street to the local Wal-Mart.

You can find plenty of adventure there too, I was just reading about people getting attacked by snakes in their local Wal-mart! Which reminds me, I’m overdue for my mission at the poisonous snake farm!

What’s your mission at a snake farm?

I’m off to learn how they collect the anti-venom that they use to save snake bite victims. That way, if you ever get attacked at your local Wal-mart, I can come save you. An international Adventurer’s work is never done!

So are you actually going to milk a snake?

I hope they’ll let me! Many of my missions turn out more dangerous than I thought. Tomorrow I’m heading downtown to complete my mission of working in an outdoor laundry. But I found out today that all of my friends are afraid to go, because I guess it’s run by the mafia, and they launder money as well as clothes! I guess we’ll see what happens when I show up with a camera!

This may be the last interview with you ever. How often are you doing these episodes, and how many do you plan on doing, assuming that you survive snakes and the Indian mafia?

I do a new episode every week, and I plan to keep going from now on! In fact, starting this summer, my comics and my show will be my full time job!

So you are still planning your big move from India to Mexico this summer?

Yes, I’ll be setting up a little studio there, and cranking up my site to daily updates with videos, comics, stories, and who knows what else!

That’s going to be awesome, so will your show continue to be independently produced and available at your site, or are you going to go big time with it and sell it off to major producers?

The show will always be available on my site, but I have a lot of potential deals in the works that could make my missions get even bigger!

Cool. So now we know what’s up with you and your adventures, what about Aki? When will we find out what happens with her mission next? Will we have to wait till this summer and they are pumping out of the new studio?

I’m working on the remainder of chapter 2 now, as soon as I finish it, I’ll start running new pages again! Before Aki went on hiatus, I kept starting, and stopping, then starting again. Which is a very confusing way to follow a story! So I want to make sure I have all the strips done first, so that there will be no interruptions and the readers can enjoy it every week, even if I get bitten by a snake and can’t draw one that week!

I can’t wait to get back into Aki’s story again! She has so many more friends to make!

[Line suddenly goes dead.]

So, yeah, that’s either the faulty communication lines in India or perhaps that is the last we will ever hear of Ryan Estrada. We won’t know until we see him in another one of his adventures. Be sure to watch his new reality series, “The Ryan Estrada Expeditions“, where viewers send him on missions in India that often end up in danger. Also be sure to stay tuned for new updates to Aki Alliance, or subscribe to the RSS Feed so you’ll be notified right away of the next update.

Well, we knew it was going to happen, The Upside-Down Me would come to an end. It said so right on the site, a 62 page comic, we all knew it, but still, I feel so betrayed, how can you do this Trade Loeffler, do you feel good about this?!

Actually, I’m grabbing the Boxphone right now and dialing Trade up…

Hey Trade, it’s me Tyler, seriously… how could you do this to us?!

I thought I would be really sad when The Upside-Down Me got to this point. But I’m actually really excited. The reason for the excitement is called The Sky Kayak. It’s Zip and Li’l Bit’s next big adventure.

Oh phew! So Zip and Li’l Bit will continue to have new adventures. Each one as its own independent story?

That’s the plan at this point. I’ve got general ideas for a few more stories right now and I’m sure other stuff will come up. They won’t follow any sort of continuity or anything though. For example, Officer John doesn’t appear in The Sky Kayak, but he’ll be back for the story after that.

That’s a relief, hang on a second, I need to call off a lynch mob real quick… um, totally unrelated.

I’m sure we all want to know more about The Sky Kayak, but first there’s some things we’d like to know about The Upside Down Me. Where did you come up with the idea for it?

I thought of The Upside-Down Me when I was out bike riding one day. It was a long ride and I kept thinking of stuff, so when I was done I thought I had three different stories. Two of the ideas, were the roof sequence and the broken mirror sequence. The third idea will be The Sky Kayak.

Unfortunately, at that point, I had no idea of who the characters would be. I think it was about a year later that I had my characters dreamed up and was ready to start writing.

It’s a small but interesting cast of characters, are any of them based on people you know?

Thanks. I’m adding a whole new batch of characters in the next story too. I hope people will take a shine to them as well.

None of the characters are based on anyone I know, at least none of their personalities are. I do have to confess to stealing the Li’l Bit name from a friend of mine named Elizabeth who’d told me that her relatives all called her Li’l Bit when she was a child. I suppose people must always be careful what they say around writers.

What about the sheep, does he have a name?

The sheep does have a name. It’s “1″.

Ha ha, I like that.

The Upside Down Me has wonderful backgrounds, so complete and detailed that you are immersed in their environment. It has a lot of great architecture, furniture and clothing styles. Do they live anywhere specific? Are they in London? Should I have been reading it with an English accent that whole time?

I live in Brooklyn now, so perhaps it should be read with a Brooklyn accent. I do look at and borrow the house ideas from all the great brownstones I see in the neighborhood. The backgrounds add a bit of work but I realized when I started this story that it was essential to make the backgrounds an important part of the drawings. Once I started turning everything over and all, there was really no way I could have drawn it any less detailed and had it work. I’m getting better at it. I think I understand perspective a little bit, but I keep reading stuff about it and finding out different things, so I keep learning.

Well you actually warp the perspective of reality a bit. Did you ever confuse yourself in flipping things right-side-up and upside-down and juggling the two worlds?

My take on perspective is the same as they say about grammar, “You have to know the rules before you can break them”. I would completely confuse myself turning stuff all around. There are a few mistakes that I made in case anyone wants to re-read it and point them out. One cool thing I found out, though, is that if you turn your drawings over, it helps you spot the mistakes in them.

I’ve got one question I know everyone would like answered. The letter on the chest of Zip’s pajamas changes frame by frame, going through the alphabet incrementally. Only racking a new letter every time Zip is in the frame even if the actual letter is not visible at the angle Zip is at. What’s that all about?!

That was just an idea that I had. Originally, I thought it’d be cool to spell out messages for people to figure out, but that worked better in theory than practice. Once I started drawing it, I realized that Zip bounces around too much from panel to panel so it’s not possible to show the letter all the time so I had to stick with the alphabet. It’s nice, though, because I think it’s something that works best in comic format, for example if Zip were animated it wouldn’t be so hot. Also, it helps define Zip’s identity.

Is there an upside-down Trade Loeffler we should know about?

Gosh, I hope there isn’t an upside-down Trade Loeffler. I think if I saw myself, or anyone for that matter, walking around on the ceiling, it would be scare the socks off me. I guess it’s not a fun anymore when you’re grown up. Of course, if I saw a cop walking around in my house, that’d freak me out as well.

I worry when in the middle of the night there’s people walking around my ceiling, my kids are up and about, there’s a cop in my house and I never even wake up to check things out.

That’s probably for the best.

Ha ha.

It’s probably what Zip and Li’l Bit’s parents are thinking, too.

I’m assuming they are just really heavy sleepers.

So do you love Diana Ross’ “Upside Down” song as much as me?

It’s all right. My favorite would be Gladys Knight and the Pips. I’d love to have a backup chorus that would repeat everything I say for emphasis.

You know, Leaving on that Midnight Train.

I always thought it would be cool to have my own soundtrack, a theme song that played whenever I entered a room.

You can have your Gladys, I will just secretly play Diana’s “Upside Down” while reading The Upside-Down Me. Ha! I’ll also probably try reading it upside-down… boy you turn me… inside out… and round and round.

Now it’s going to be stuck in my head while I’m working on the drawings. Thanks.

Except that now you’ll be drawing about kayaks? What can you tell us about The Sky Kayak?

Whereas The Upside-Down Me was all about, well, being upside-down, The Sky Kayak is all about flying. I’m really excited about it. I think in a lot of ways it’s going to be better than The Upside-Down Me.

That’s sounds like fun, when will it start publishing to the Web?

Ah, this is the tough part. It won’t be showing up until early September. I hope Zip and Li’l Bit fans will bear with me. I want to make sure I’m happy with the story once I finish writing it, and then make sure I’ve got a good head start with the artwork so that I won’t miss any postings once it gets going.

September?! This conversation is over.

It’s probably not much consolation, but I think there’s a Harry Potter book coming out in the meantime.

Heh, well it’s definitely worth the wait. I can imagine you need a good head start posting those big beautiful full color comics twice a week.

Thanks. I hope everyone will feel it’s worth the wait after they wait.

One final question, can we expect to see Zip and Li’l Bit in print in the future?

That’s my plan. I hope I can find a publisher willing to do it, but if that takes too long, we may go the self-publishing route. Somehow, I’ll get Zip and Li’l Bit in printed form for everyone.

That would be great to see it in print one day, i bet all those nice little details and wonderful lines will look great!

So the final comic got posted today, make sure you go read it! And if you haven’t read Zip and Li’l Bit before, nows a great time to start, the whole first story is online and you can read it straight through without waiting for any updates.

We’ll be announcing it here when Trade starts up the next exciting story, The Sky Kayak, be looking for that in September, maybe we can get trade to share some sketches or other fun progress stuff until then.

This crazy creature was sited on February 18th causing reckless joy and cuteness in Chinatown, NY. I knew that New York resident, Lunchbox brother-at-arms and crazy-creature extraordinaire, Ryan Sias, would know something about something like this, so I immediately dialed him up on the Boxphone.

Hey Ryan, word on the street, the streets of Chinatown that is, was that a Kimblyesque character was running around blasting explosions of confetti during the Chinese New Year celebrations, do you know anything about that?

Aha… yeah, that’s what I did a few weekends ago! It was crazy and fun, and I made a video of it all.

Is this character a totally new creation of yours, or has it appeared in the Kimbly world before?

It’s just some random design… it has nothing to do with the Chinese New Year except for the fact he’s fun and looks like he’s ready to party! At one point I was going to make him look more “Chinese,” but then I felt that was wrong. I was already crashing there party, I didn’t want to copy their style also.

What was your motivation?

The reason I did this was I’ve been wanting to do more “art stuff”, getting out and doing art in the world instead of in my room drawing.

A lot of people don’t know, but I used to do a lot of puppet work. I’ve performed in HUGE concert halls and had month long shows at zoos and stuff… so this is nothing new to me… but all that was done before I was “online.”

But back to this current thing…

I had gone to the fireworks street party last year and had an amazing time, so this year I wanted to go back, but I wanted to help make it more fun and crazy. With the confetti fireworks going off all over the place and other people in costume, it was like going to another world… so I figured my weird costume thing would fit right in.

Were you worried about them getting mad at you?

Haha… yeah , I was a little worried… the Chinese new year is their BIG holiday… that and the fact I’m not Chinese… I didn’t know how they’d react. So I was nervous at first, but then once I put it on, everyone seemed to love it. so I relaxed and had fun!

What’s it’s name?

At the moment it doesn’t have a name… I call it the “Chinatown Guy.” I know that name is lame… I need to work on that! Got any suggestions?

Fred, I think Fred could work. I don’t know though, if we give him a name then we’ll get all attached to him.

Will he be showing up in any Kimbly comics?

Probably not.. it’s more a “Real” life thing.

What was the most memorable moment of that day?

Well, shooting off the fireworks was pretty awesome… and the meeting the clown was super weird… oh and I danced with this woman who had a little dragon puppet… it was all cool, but those were the top three.

Will we be seeing more of the “Chinatown Guy?”

Maybe… he’s sitting in my kitchen right now. I might bring him to some street parties this summer or something… or he might end up being too tied to Chinatown in my mind to do anything more with him.

It was a fun art experiment thing… I’m working on another one right now… called “Leaf Guy”, hopefully it can be posted in a month or so.

But it was all cool… make sure you watch the video. It’s wacky stuff!

You are wacky stuff Ryan, thanks for sharing!

Here’s the video of the event, and go here for pictures.

Astronaut Elementary creator, Dave Roman will be at the NY Comic Con this weekend, February 23-24th. He’ll be hanging out at the Comics Bakery booth with John Green, Raina Telgemeier and Marion Vitus in Artist Alley (Galleria) #A206. Dave will also be signing at the Slave Labor Graphics booth on Saturday and helping orchestrate an interactive Comic Slideshow for Nickelodeon Magazine on Sunday!