On days like today, I need to trick myself into composing a page of comics. The blank paper looks intimidating, and the panel borders feel cramped. So I sketch loosely and scattered on a cheap scrap, then scan, and shift things around in Photoshop. It seems contrived, but sometimes drawing in all those claustrophobic little

Photos by my buddy Alessandro Q. Ferrari

a new piece of Chunky Rice art — a birthday card for my mom, actually — continuing with the Hawaiian theme.

Just a quick note to say that COMICS TOOLS BLOG interviewed me – along with Erika Moen, Bryan Lee O’Malley, and Hope Larson – about brush techniques. Worth checking out if you’re curious about process. Or compare notes with my previous TOOL TALK posting. For the record, with today’s page of HABIBI, I’m back on

Seems like it was an amazing year to be at the Angoulême festival in France. A huge exhibition of presidents Dupuy & Berberian’s work … plus Blutch won the Grand Prix! Three of the most inspiring/influential cartoonists in the universe. Unfortunately, I wasn’t in attendance this year. Nipping the travel after my indulgent Hawaii escape

Thanks as always for your outpouring of encouragement. Very motivating to return from vacation to so many comments! As Kurt mentioned, there are still four more chapters to go, but the book is two/thirds finished, and now I’ve the energy to dive back into it. In Oahu, I visited my French friends Laëtitia & Frédéric

After seven months, chapter five of HABIBI is finished. It’s 125 pages long (the entirety of Good-bye, Chunky Rice) and brings the total page count up to 405 pages. The original art is filed away in portfolio sleeves. Here’s the stack thus far. And here’s a glimpse inside each one of those portfolios. I look

… and on the drawing board today …

Here’s three scribble doodles from my pocket-sized travel sketchbook. I’m partial to the sleeping nuns. The shark plane idea worked its way into an homage I drew for LITTLE NEMO: Un Siécle de Rêves published by Les Impressions Nouvelles. Safe travels, folks!

Work on HABIBI is progressing, but recent pages feel like spoilers, so it seemed like a nice time to reflect on my first book ~ GOOD-BYE, CHUNKY RICE. Below is a page I drew a decade ago — on December 9th, 1998 to be exact. (The page preceding it was drawn November 20th, but I