Sometimes ya just....yeah?

I tell ya what folks, being self-employed is tough, tought when you have zero customers which means zero profit. Thus is what I am suffering from, I still work diligently at my comic "Masters of Fiction!" everyday now but ya know, it doesn't pay the bills yet. I'm looking for Illustration work or Writing work and it's really tough to find here in Utica, "The city, trying to be a city.." that's my quote, yup.

But you know what I mean if you live here, there's no real market for creative people here that I can find (if there is and I'm missing it, please someone give me a call) except for stuff that I just really don't have much interest in. Teaching art is great and noble and everything but I'm just not into it, I want to create things for clients and myself and make my dues that way.

I'm going to dabble in advertising and marketing for places maybe a little bit, I'm trying to anyways. Oh and I've found some great books for you guys to read most def for Illustrators and Writers; there's Everything you need to know to be a Freelance Illustrator and Guerrilla Marketing both available at Barnes and Noble, the first is in the Art section and the second is in Writing Reference.Also a really great series I just got into is Victorian Undead it basically is a Sherlock Holomes versus book the series is Sherlock Holmes continued adventures with Dr. Watson and pits them against all sorts of supernatural threats!! It's awesome and amazing writing, the art is amazing to the twentieth level man, check it out!! And a really great graphic novel I just read is I Kill Giants it's funny and sad and has great heart to it! It's an amazing read!!

Well until next time amigos, I'm off to draw more and create and what not, and figure out how to get paid for it all....

Corel Painter 11

Messing around with coloring in Corel Painter 11, fun stuff I have to say. I'm not all that familiar with Painter or any of its previous incarnations, so I'm trying to teach myself how to use this program. I figure the more programs I know how to use at least semi-efficiently the more likely I am to be hired somewhere. Also I've found that a lot of fully finished portfolio pieces are good to have (obviously).

This is a sketch I did of my Panda sleeping on the couch one night, I threw some inks on there and then digitally painted it up in Painter 11 like I said. Ha-Ha. Anywho also, on the seventh page pencils of "Masters of Fiction!". Been inking a lot of stuff lately check out my DeviantArt page stuff. Hope you guys enjoy.

Panda by Mike D. Burke

Looks like little sneaky Panda is up to her old ways again....
She's been drinking Monster for weeks now and just can't seem to control herself...
Not again!!

Just a little strip I thought up today haha hope you like it

Creativity and Getting stuff done

Once again my loyal friends and comrades I sit here typing to you of the adventures of my day to day somewhat not that much exciting days. This morning I feel quite productive to get as much done as humanly possible, you ever get that feeling? First off let's start with a progress list shall we?
1. Still don't have a full-time job in writing or illustrating
2. Still looking for a better job in these fields to get the hell out of retail
3. Sent out emails today to the Observer-Dispatch editor; Mike Bova of M3P Media and the new upcoming Oneida Courier, and Dan Fusillo of the Utica Players because I haven't heard from any of them
4.Retail sucks
5.On the seventh page of my comic book, "Masters of fiction!"
6. Been writing a lot for my novel, "A Little Valentinus in your Samhain"
7. Been writing script and actually getting shots done for the "Max Carnage" film

And there's my progress list for now, still working hard on everything and trying to from a damn group of like-minded artists and creative people to form this multi-media group.

Forming a Crew

I'm trying to desperatley form a crew for this MULTI-MEDIA group/company thing I want to get started. Basically my idea is to form this group and to get started and done projects that seem really interesting and should definetly see some sort of publishing or showing. I'm talking about doing things like comics;graphic novels, short story anthologies, novels, childrens books, commercials, movies, calendars, web-comics, web-series, etc. I mean everything under the sun that is media to the world!!
If you have a talent and you are willing to work in a group with a bunch of people gunning for your project while you gun for their projects as well then lets join forces because that's what I want this group to be about. We wouldn't just be working on one project at once, no way, we'd be following that Poly-Project thing I mentioned a while back. Even if your not an artist of some kind, if you just have a talent for Organization or say idk you just want to help in some way shape or form, let me know!!
On a different note, here is an Illustration I did a while back of my character Ananami from the graphic novel I will be working on after 'Masters of Fiction!' the graphic novel he is in is called, 'Three White Wolves'. I'll get into a synopsis later with you gentle people. But anyways, the illustration was done with a mechanical 0.5 pencil, inking pens and copic markers. It took me a while to really find the right way to do this one but I think I really got the colors to look great in this. All the characters in the background are my inspirations over the years for this character and many other characters I've created. Hope you like it.

And so it begins, 2011.....

This is it people, this is the year! This is the year we take charge, we break free from all this monatony and such! I'm very serious about this, this year I'm doing big things, this year I'm getting done what needs be done. I'm going to start a company, finish and publish my graphic novel and do more as well; write, act and film some amazing movies; finish and publish my books I've been working on; write, act and film some commercials; even get a play I wrote performed;and do even more amazing things like, get MARRIED!! Yes, this is also the big year of my fiancee and I's wedding! Wicked exciting right!! PUMPED UP!

So get ready for amazing artwork and get ready for the crazy shit coming ahead; be ready to be stunned by pure awesomeness, to laugh, cry and yell in complete emotional explolsion!!

Yeah, get ready/this shit's about to get heavy/I just settled all my doubts/fuck you FREDDY!!/Now this looks like a job for me/so let me see........whoops sry Em!? Stole some of those lines...heh, my bad.

It has already started my loyal random people who check out my page, I've already begun shooting a film so far entitled, "Max Carnage". In it I play the main bad guy, an assassin named Slaythe. It's a film my friend Andrew Reinhardt has been wanting to film for a year I think, we finally just began, we're writing and filming on the fly, ad libbing the dialogue for the most part and completing the story as we go, we have five minutes of it edited already and it actually looks pretty good!! More news soon....

Mike D. Burke

Newness!!

So today I officially started my new job as the Syracuse Comic Books Examiner at the Syracuse edition of the Examiner. Pretty awesome indeed, I basically get paid for reviewing awesome comics that I love heh. It's a neat set up as well, I just have to post frequently and get lots of views and comments as well. Yes yes pretty great I have to say haha.

Check out my first article and the many to come as well at: http://www.examiner.com/comic-books-in-syracuse/michael-burke

Thanks!! Leave comments and view it a ton!