It probably doesn't pay to be a jerk

2005-08-26T16:29:00.000-07:00

Man.

I seem to be in the perpetual habit of going off the handle about how something or other sucks and then having to A) Backpedal my way out of it B) Dig myself in deeper once there's a response or C) Take the blame cuz I'm the stupid idiot that caused the problem in the first place.

A) Is no good and I rarely do it. They've gotta have a pretty good rationale for me to back off. I recently let some poor bastard have it on penciljack or digitalwebbing for his crappy Batman drawing. I called his wrinkles "half-assed" and he got all huffy about never ever doing it half assed. I halfway typed a response letter that amounted to admitting that calling something "half-assed" in criticizing it is more mean than constructive. But halfway thru the apology, I realized that the dude was trying to play it off like my criticism was inaccurate and his wrinkles were appropriate, when it was clear in grey and white that the guy only put wrinkles on Batman's crotch and stomach... I got all huffy again, which leads us over to...

B) I then halfway typed a message that amounted to saying "sorry, chief, I shouldn't have said 'half-assed' - I bet you put all sorts of time into your crappy drawing - I shoulda say "crappy." I'm a big fan of this option. It's fun and gives me a chance to vent. It probably (alright, definitely) doesn't do any good, but it feels kinda good to do it in a "blow out your candle to make mine burn brighter" sorta way. Yeah, I paid attention in 8th grade health class. Cram it. Before I sent it off, tho, I paused for a moment, which takes us to...

C) What the hell was I doing offering criticism to this spank, anyway? This industry is competitive enough without me offering advice to some joker who's going to want to take my job in five years. Posting crits on those boards as a struggling artist seems to be pretty foolish anyhow - if that guy remembers my name and what a jerk I was, maybe he won't buy my comic.
I've gotten a number of job offers when posting my art FOR crits, but what return to I get on my time for telling some guy why he sucks? I find myself, as I think many board monkeys do, coming up with more and more inflammatory statements just to piss someone off and get a response. No good. Perchance I'll learn my lesson one of these lives.

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I am not nearly as [insert adjective here] as my picture makes me look. It was created as a gag for a trading card I produced for my theatre company, The House Theatre of Chicago, and it's the only pic I have of myself on my computer.

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Here's a picture I drew of The Shadow for the hell of it. My convention portfolio was completely befret of pinup art, and I thought it needed something more eye-catching than just sequential art. In retrospect, I probably should have drawn The Thing or Wolverine. I doubt your average 13-year-old (hmm... did I actually see a single 13-year-old there?) knows who The Shadow is.

Please make an inflammatory comment about my lack of abilities. I'll do my best to berate you for your idiocy and crappy taste (hopefully getting in a few "your mom" digs) before calming down & accepting your argument and finally realizing it was my fault for asking for crits in the first place.

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Those wrinkles were half-assed tho. He didn't even go to the trouble of tracing them off the cover of a nationally distributed magazine.

Chris Burnham's Blog

It probably doesn't pay to be a jerk