Every month there will be a new wallpaper to download for your computer and/or cellphone

When I was a young and impressionable teenage girl I had a small seed of a dream. I wanted to make webcomics like the ones that I enjoyed reading during the lazy hours of IT class while trying to avoid the mind numbingly boring information on network architecture. I would read Megatokyo and be amazed that people would come back to the site a few times a week to read the pages as they updated. Then, as I have been prone to do, I told myself it was perfectly possible for me to do that too and even be successful at it.

Thus began my long and sometimes difficult journey into the world of comics that has led me here. I love Even in Arcadia. I love drawing, writing, sketching, promoting, doing all the boring bureaucratic paperwork for this comic. To be honest, I want to do more of it, more often.

I have created The Atheneum to help me realise this dream. It’s a subscription based site dedicated to giving donators more content, and it’s now up and running. I’m really excited because I’m looking forward to making wallpapers, illustrations, tutorials, blog posts and all sort of other fun stuff to fill it with. Every month there will be a new wallpaper available for download as well as a limited edition Artist Trading Card for anyone who donates more that $7 USD. The ATCs are my particular favourite because I get to send stuff to my readers in the mail, which is such a satisfying gesture. Perhaps I’m just a weird creep, but mail makes me happy.

I would not be surprised if you’re saying to yourself, “This sounds all well and good Anise, but how does it work?” Good question, small voice in my head. If you donate (using the big, red donate

For a donation of $7, you will receive a limited edition ATC in the mail. Because I <3 you.

button), you will be brought to a page upon completion of your payment. This page will have a password on it. You may use this password to access all the content over at The Atheneum for the calendar month. Any donation is good, be it $1 or $1,000 (if you, for some crazy reason, donate $1k to me, I will feel so guilty that I will send you multiple things in the mail until my guilt is sated).

If you donate late in the month, within 7 days of the end of the month to be precise, I will also email you the password for the next month. It’s only fair that people get as much access as they can for their donation, of course. Currently, the Atheneum is a little sparse, mostly because I still have a ton of content to upload. Not to worry, if you donate in September, you will get access until December 31, 2011, 3 whole months of goodies (including all the fun holiday stuff to come).

If the donations go well, I may even be able to add another update day to the schedule. Mostly because I’ll be able to drop a teaching day (which I’m dying to do).

Now that everything is up and running, I want to hear a little more from you guys! If you were to donate, what kind of content would you like to see? I have ideas for wallpapers, icons, avatars, tutorials, videos, sketches, blog posts, reviews, and all sorts of stuff, but I’d really like to know what everyone else is interested in too!

I know I must say this a lot (it feels like I say it a lot), but thank you very much for reading. I honestly count every new reader as a little piece of success that keeps me going. You guys are amazing to come back week after week to see my little comic. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

If you are interested in donating, you can do so here:

This weekend I’m heading down to Portland Oregon to table at the  Stumptown Comics Festival! It’s going to be a genuine blast and I’m looking forward to hanging out with some fine folks. We’re at table A-23, so come say hi!

I’ll have copies of Lotus Root Children, Anatta, Tomato Chicken, a few prints and art cards. I’ll be happily doing commissions all weekend.

You should also check out Cloudscape Comics and Lost City Comics, our fabulous neighbours, Miriam Libicki over at table D-29 and Katie Ellis O’Brian, whose table remains a mystery to me right now.

Don’t be afraid to say hi, even if you can’t buy anything, I love chatting with people and it’s better than sitting at my table feeling like a total  loner ^^

Every once and a while Cloudscape Comics gets together and does a bakesale to fundraise for all sorts of great comic related stuff. This time around we were asked to do one at Metropolis Comics and Toys in Burnaby for their High Score game competition night. The games of the evening? Settlers of Catan and Street Fighter. I’m sure it was street fighter something or another, but I must admit I was far more interested in the Catan.

As a theme for the event, I made Catan inspired cookies. They were ginger cookies, of course, to celebrate the game’s German heritage, in the shape of the hexagon tiles, roads and settlements. Apart from being completely playable, they are also delicious. A warning though, I had to make my own hexagon cookie cutter out of card stock paper, because it’s an almost impossible shape to find in the baking aisle of the store.

Here is the recipe for the cookies:

Catan Ginger Cookies

2 1/2 cups flour
1/3 cup crystalized ginger, cut into tiny pieces
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup butter or margarine
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup molasses
1 egg
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
1 1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1/2 tsp ground cloves

Preheat your oven to 350F. In a bowl mix together the dry ingredients: Flour, baking soda, crystalized ginger and salt until well mixed. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat together butter and brown sugar until fluffy. With the beater on the lowest setting, mix in the egg, then the molasses. Add the ginger, ground ginger, cinnamon, allspice and cloves. After it is well mixed, add in the dry ingredients slowly, in batches, ensuring that each batch is fully blended before adding the next.

For the Catan cookies, I pounded out the cookie dough on my counter, without flour, and cut the shapes. If you just want to make regular cookies, I recommend rolling them into small balls and placing them on your cookie sheet a few inches apart. You can even roll them in a bit of sugar if you’d like, it gives them a nice holiday feel. Bake them, one sheet at a time, in your oven for 12-15 minutes or until the tops are cracking and set. Allow them to cool for a few minutes before moving them to a cookie rack.

I decorated my catan cookies with decorating icing in different colours. I did this by mixing 1 1/4 cup of confectioners sugar with an egg yolk and a dash of lemon juice with the food colouring of choice. I then spread it on the cooled cookies and allowed them to set. I made Brick, Sheep and Wood. Ore, wheat and perhaps the desert can be made at your leisure

Here’s the Brick, Sheep and Wood hexes, setting with their icing!

If you haven’t had a chance to check out our new anthology, we’re doing an Indie GoGo fundraiser for it. It’s an extensive colour graphic novel featuring short stories from some of the best comic artists in Vancouver and British Columbia.

I also made a facebook fan page for my new comic, Even in Arcadia, that is taking all my precious time away from cooking and making new Tomato Chicken recipes. The comic will be launched on Epidigm this coming March 22!

Yuna and Ashe from Final Fantasy. This is a painting I did for the Cloudscape Fundraiser to help pay for the printing of 21 Journeys. If you’re interested in the piece and want to put some money towards a good cause (supporting comic artists!), then stop by our Etsy Store. There is only one of these for sale, and $40 is a pretty good price for an original ^^

If you don’t have the money, but still want to support, please tweet, share on facebook or reblog this post. You can also check out our fundraiser page on Indie GoGo for some sweet comics and cheap donation gifts!

I’m in a bit of a pickle. I really want to keep making recipe comics because they’re fun, but with the new and more serious comic on it’s way I find myself increasingly strapped for time. I hate abandoning projects, and I, in fact, refuse to abandon this comic, but I can’t keep up the one recipe per week schedule for the next two months.

Sadly, Even in Arcadia has to take priority. It’s a more involved project that I feel really matches my skill as a comic artist, and is far more suited to my goal of being a long form story teller.

Nonetheless, I refuse to let my fellow cooks go without encouragement. I will make a comic recipe whenever I can, and in between I will post different vegetarian recipes in writing here on the blog. These written recipes will have a tag of the same name, and also be searchable under the regular recipe tag category (dinner, lunch, appetizers, etc). I will also be around to post videos, illustrations and sketches of Tomato and May, and cooking in general.

So, without further adieu, today’s recipe!

Pasta with Tomato Pesto and Roasted Red Pepper

Ingredients:

* 3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
* 1/4 tsp crushed red pepper
* 1/2 onion, diced
* 3 stalks celery, sliced
* 2 large tomatoes, diced
* 1 large red bell pepper, sliced into strips
* 1/2 cup frozen peas
* 3/4 cup pesto
* 1/2 cup cream or milk
* 1 tbsp flour
* salt and pepper to taste
* veggie oil or olive oil
* 2-3 cups dried small pasta (penne, eg)

Prep:

Preheat oven to 400F. Toss red pepper with oil and salt and spread in one layer over a baking sheet. Roast pepper until soft and blackened, 15 mins. Let stand.

Heat a pan full of water for pasta. Add salt and oil to the water, as well as a small amount of dried basil if you wish. It will add a little more flavor to the noodles.

Heat a dollop of oil in a medium sauce pan on medium heat until shimmering, but not smoking. Add garlic and crushed red pepper. Sauté for 3 minutes to release the flavour into the oil. Add onion and celery, sauté until soft, about 5 mins.

Mix diced tomatoes with flour until evenly coated. This will stop the flour from clumping in the sauce, while helping to thicken the milk. Mix the tomato flour mixture into the sauce pan and cook with the veggies. We need to cook the flour to get rid of it’s “floury” taste.

When tomatoes are heated through and starting to release their water, mix in pesto. Stir until evenly coated. Add milk and peas. Heat through until peas are cooked and sauce is thick, no more than 5 minutes Don’t allow the sauce to boil.

Cook the pasta until al dente. Drain, but do not rinse. Season sauce to taste with salt and pepper. Serve pasta with sauce and strips of roasted red pepper on top. Accompany with fresh French bread and a simple salad with oil-vinegar dressing.

Oh great, now I’m hungry. Serves me right for posting delicious pasta recipes at 1:30 in the morning.

Wei and I are huge fans of Day[9] and his daily cast of Starcraft replays and strategies. Much like good little comic artists, we couldn’t help but think of how these wonderfully laid out methods could translate to our medium and how they could be used to help artists work through some of their more difficult patches.

In our first video we’re looking at why Starcraft and what it has to offer in terms of basic methods. Two things you should draw from this discussion: you should be analysing, and refine, refine, refine your work!

We will be doing weekly casts (sometimes with Wei and sometimes only myself) on comics, storytelling, art and general interest every Thursday at 7Pm PST on my ustream. If you miss it, not to worry, I will be recording and posting all of our videos here for your viewing pleasure. If there is anything in particular you would like to see, or have work that you would like analysed on air, feel free to leave us a comment here or send us an email!

I’ll be posting these videos in sequence over the next couple of days, if you’d like to jump into all of them right now the series playlist is on youtube! I hope you like it!