The Complete “Nocturnal” – All 11 Pages Of The New Halloween Comic By C. A. Brown

Well, in case you missed any of it, here are all eleven pages (including the cover) of my new Halloween comic in one easy-to-read post 🙂 You can also find loads of other comics featuring these characters here too.

This comic went surprisingly well and was a lot of fun to make 🙂 The initial inspiration for it was a phase I went through where I re-played “Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines” almost obssessively. I then realised that whilst I’d made a haunted house comic in 2015, a zombie comic in 2016 and an “evil alternate dimension” comic in 2017, I hadn’t made a vampire comic yet.

Unlike last year’s comic, I initially decided to return to black and white artwork (mostly for time and/or sanity reasons, given the length of the comic). But, this soon mostly turned into limited colour greyscale after I realised that I could use red ink for blood effects. And, well, you can’t have a vampire comic without blood in it…

Anyway, here’s the comic 🙂 I hope you have as much fun reading it as I had making it 🙂

As usual, all pages of this comic are released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence. Likewise, you can click on each page to see a much larger version of it.

“Nocturnal – Cover” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 1” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 2” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 3” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 4” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 5” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 6” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 7” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 8” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 9” By C. A. Brown

“Nocturnal – Page 10” By C. A. Brown

All Ten Of My “Halloween 2018” Short Stories :)

Happy Halloween everyone 🙂 In case you missed any of them, here are links to all ten of this year’s Halloween stories. If you want more stories, be sure to check out my 2017 Halloween collection, my 2016 Halloween collection and the interactive story that I wrote in 2015. You can also find lots of other short stories here too.

Anyway, the theme of this year’s collection was “The modern world”, which allowed me to include a good mixture of horror, dark comedy, satire and even a little bit of dystopian sci-fi too 🙂 If you don’t have time to read the whole collection, the best stories are: “VR“, “Zero“, “Update“, “Void” and “Killer App”

The production for this collection was also a bit random too. In short, due to being busy with lots of stuff, I’d expected to only have time to write five stories rather than the full ten. Because of this, I also wrote (and queued up) this year’s stories in the opposite order to the order they were posted here. So, if you want to read the stories in the order I actually wrote them, then start with the tenth one and work backwards.

Anyway, here are the stories 🙂 Enjoy 🙂

–“VR“: In the neon-drenched future, Trey is on the run from Blue-Corp’s security bulls after a hack went wrong. But, things aren’t quite what they seem.

–“Rules“: University students Joanne and Toby have got tickets for the Halloween party at the student’s union. But, can they comply with the union’s costume policy?

– “Zero“: Bert is congratulating the branch managers of his company after a few contractual changes have resulted in increased profits and relatively little grumbling from his employees. What could possibly go wrong for him?

– “Update“: Sally isn’t enjoying her date with Tom. There’s just something strange about him…

– “Pop Up“: When a giant ossuary appears in the middle of the high street, Dan and Tina aren’t sure whether to go inside and take a look…..

– “Limelight“: Two people sit in a cafe and discuss the sorry state of the modern horror genre.

– “Void“: Reza is combing a field for historical artefacts. But, just as he detects something, it starts to rain…

– “Let’s Play“: ‘Tis the season for low-budget jump-scare indie games and two people are determined that their ‘let’s play’ video will be hilariously watchable.

– “Remnants“: Driven off of the high street by the rain, Steve takes refuge in a large chain bookshop. But, something is very wrong with this shop…

– “Killer App“: Laura is bored, so she goes shopping on her phone’s app story. One of the apps on offer looks a bit unusual. But, hey, it’s free…

Today’s Art (31st October 2018)

Happy Halloween everyone 🙂 Here’s the final page of “Nocturnal” 🙂 But, don’t worry if you missesd any of it – I’ll be posting a full retrospective here later tonight. In the meantime, you can find lots of other comics featuring these characters here.

Wow! Although the ending ended up being a little bit compressed and contrived (eg: I didn’t have space to include an explanation that the main characters survived because they were only recently turned into vampires), making this page was a surprisingly eerie experience.

Basically, my drawing pen ran out before the last two panels. So, I was forced to switch to one with a finer nib when drawing these panels. Then, when I was editing the page on my computer, I suddenly had vivid flashbacks to my early experiments with comics (using a finer pen than I normally do) during 2010. It literally felt like no time whatsoever had passed since then. It’s a difficult experience to put into words, but it really caught me by surprise.

Anyway, I’m rambling. So, here’s the comic page. Enjoy 🙂

As usual, this comic page is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.

[CLICK FOR LARGER IMAGE] “Nocturnal – Page 10” By C. A. Brown

Top Ten Articles – October 2018

First of all, Happy Halloween everyone 🙂 Anyway, since it’s the end of the month, it’s time for my usual list of links to what I consider to be the ten best articles about making art, making webcomics, writing fiction etc… that I’ve posted here over the past month. As usual, I’ll also include a few honourable mentions too.

All in all, this month probably wasn’t the best one in terms of articles. Partly, this was due to being busy with a couple of other projects at the time of preparing this month’s articles in addition to problems caused by tiredness and/or writer’s block. Still, there were some good articles posted here this month.

So, without any further ado, here are the lists. Enjoy 🙂

Top Ten Articles – October 2018

– “Three Stress- Reduction Tips For Making Comics And/Or Webcomics”
– “Why “Less Is More” Applies To Blood In Horror Comics – A Ramble”
– “Time Travel And Art Mediums- A Ramble”
– “Are Games Art? – A Ramble”
– “The Joy Of … The ‘Hedonism’ Genre”
– “Three Things An Old Computer Game Can Teach Us About How To Add Some Heavy Metal To The Fantasy Genre”
– “Three Unusual Things To Do If You Write Yourself Into A Corner”
– “Single-Location Comedy – A Ramble”
– “Three Ways To Deal With Comparing Your Own Creative Works To ‘Great Works’”
– “Making Art – Do The ‘Graphics’ Matter? – A Ramble”

Honourable mentions:

– “Using Fake Anachronisms In Historical Art And Fiction – A Ramble”
– “Creativity, Subcultures And Fandoms – A Ramble”
– “Four Reasons Why Creating Stuff With Older And/Or Low-Tech Tools Is Awesome“

“Killer App” By C. A. Brown (Short Story)

Nestled amongst row upon row of icons, the little grey square with the smiley face on it didn’t stand out. Beside it, a crimson chameleon and a maroon camera jostled for Laura’s attention. They had the advantage. Warm colours get people’s attention. Every app designer knew that. It was one of a million little brain hacks that should have been second-nature to whoever made the grey square.

Laura’s finger hovered over her phone screen. Against the red tiles, the little grey square receded like a stone at the bottom of a pond. Below it, the words “Happy Time” sat forlornly. Her eyes drifted over to the camera beside it. It was a “Blood Red Halloween Selfie Filter“. Only ninety-nine cents. It looked suspiciously like the “Rose Red Valentine Selfie Filter” she’d bought a few months earlier.

Her eyes drifted back to the grey square. It smiled back at her. Happy Time. There wasn’t a price below it. Her eyes flitted over to the chameleon icon. ‘Privacy VPN‘. Ten bucks per month. She thought about tapping away and doing a currency conversion. Ten bucks had been about seven quid the last time she’d checked. The economy couldn’t have gotten that worse in that amount of time, could it?

She shook her head. What the hell did she need a privacy VPN for anyway? If any of the five intelligence agencies currently watching her internet traffic actually paid any attention, the worst thing they’d discover was the obscene amount of time she spent on Facebook.

Her pattern of likes was so bland that every political party, even the fringe ones, thought that their campaign ads might stand a chance come election time. Maybe that was suspicious in and of itself? Maybe some suits in an undisclosed location had thought she was covering something up? Maybe they had people watching her right now? Maybe she needed that privacy VPN after all?

Laura sighed. No, that in itself would look suspicious. Her finger hovered above the icon. This was silly. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. Plus, seven quid a month too. It’d be smarter to buy nothing. It wasn’t as if her phone’s memory chip was short of apps. Half of them cried out for updates every day. It was hit or miss whether she recognised their names.

Do the smart thing. Buy nothing. What’s the point of buying something new if you aren’t going to use it? Her eyes flickered back to the grey square again. No price. It could be free. She tapped on it.

The square expanded to fill half of the screen. Below it, the words ‘Happy time fun‘ appeared in tiny print. It had to be a scam. A virus that would brick her phone at best. She was about to go back when she spotted the review score. Five out of five. She swiped down and read the reviews.

Don’t be put off by the shoddy icon, this game is really addictive. A real indie project too, no micro-transactions. Just don’t expect to get past level thirty. (5/5)

OMG! Downloaded this 4 a laff on my old phone. Stayed up half the night playing. Awesome 🙂 (5/5)

The list went on and on. Each review looked real. There was enough variation in register, syntax and tone to tell her brain that humans had written them. There were enough grammatical errors, mispellings and sloppy phrases to tell her that whoever wrote the reviews hadn’t been paid for them. She tapped the icon.

A pop-up appeared: ‘This app collects personal data in order to improve the user experience.‘ She tapped it without thinking. A few seconds later, the program downloaded. She opened it.

To Laura’s delight, it was a fun game. As simple as Tetris, but with all of the complexity of chess. Sure, the animations were a bit primitive and the sound effects reminded her of computers in old ’90s TV shows, but that didn’t matter. It was fun.

Every now and then, her phone pinged and buzzed. Laura didn’t care about the notifications. The Facebook messages could wait. She reached level thirty. The review was right, it was tough. Something tinkled behind her. The wind howled. She almost beat the level. Nearly. Another go.

As the blade whipped across her throat as swiftly as a bullet, Laura barely registered the single second of stinging pain. Her final thought before the choking darkness engulfed her was ‘Goddamn it, I was so close.’

The masked man stood over the cooling body. An unseen smile played across his lips. As he wiped his knife on his lucky cloth, something buzzed in his pocket. He trembled with glee. Peeling off his gloves like a surgeon after a long operation, he tapped his phone. So many downloads, so little time….

Today’s Art (30th October 2018)

Woo hoo! I am very proud to present the ninth (and penultimate) page of “Nocturnal” – this year’s Halloween comic. You can check out previous Halloween comics here: 2015, 2016, 2017.

If you’ve missed any of this comic, you can catch up here: Cover, Page One, Page Two, Page Three, Page Four, Page Five, Page Six, Page Seven, Page Eight,

You can also find lots of other comics featuring these characters here too. Stay tuned for the final page of this comic tomorrow 🙂

As usual, this comic page is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.

[CLICK FOR LARGER IMAGE] “Nocturnal – Page 9” By C. A. Brown

Creativity And Learning Random Factoids – A Ramble

Well, for today, I thought that I’d talk about how learning random amusing factoids can be good for your creativity. I was reminded of this topic when I happened to discover that the background music for the American national anthem was taken from none other than the official song of an Ancient Greece-inspired 18th century drinking society.

But, what does learning random factoids have to do with creativity?

First of all, even if you don’t remember all of the hundreds of random factoids that you’ve found over the years, they can still spur your creativity.

This is because the reason why most of these factoids are interesting is because they either show that things are different to what we would expect (eg: like how archaeologists in Sweden during the 1950s found a small Buddha statue in a Viking-era site ) or they show that familiar things have more of a strange history than we might think (eg: the standard keyboard layout on most computers was originally designed to stop typewriter keys jamming.). In other words, they are irreverent things that make us think about everything slightly differently.

So, coming up with interesting pieces of backstory or interesting fictional background details is a lot more easier if you have the vague memory of hundreds of amusing factoids for the simple reason that they put you in the right frame of mind to come up with intriguing details for your story or comic.

Plus, random factoids can be used to make stories more memorable or interesting too. For example, although it’s an incredibly boring book that I had to read when I was in sixth form, one of the few surprising things about John Fowles’ “The French Lieutenant’s Woman” was the staggering statistic that something like 1 in 50 houses in Victorian London were brothels. Then again, thanks to it’s stuffy and uptight reputation, Victorian Britain is fertile ground for surprising factoids.

For example, drug use was surprisingly common back then. If you don’t believe me then read Thomas de Quincey’s “Confessions Of An English Opium-Eater”, read about Laudanum, read the first chapter of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “The Sign Of Four” and/or read about how Queen Victoria apparently took “tincture of hemp” for monthly cramps etc.. Most surprisingly of all, it was all perfectly legal back then too.

Of course, if random factoids contain an element of mystery or horror then they can also be the starting point for stories or comics in their own right.

Finally, knowing lots of random factoids will also improve any dialogue that you write since, as long as they are relevant to the story and/or your characters, you can liven up the dialogue in your comic or story by including some of the amusing factoids that you know.

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Anyway, I hope that this was useful 🙂

“Remnants” By C. A. Brown (Short Story)

There was half an hour to spare and the rain had picked up. Steve thought about ducking into a cafe and passing the time there, but there wasn’t a good wi-fi signal and it was four quid for a cup of coffee. The wind howled and gnawed at him. He scanned the high street. Betting shop. Cafe. Clothes shop. Cafe. Abandoned shell. Cafe.

Then, salvation. The bright expanse of the chain bookshop beckoned to him. Fond memories flashed through Steve’s mind. Those halcyon days where he’d lose himself in these temples to literature every couple of weeks. With a stifled laugh and a whisky-warm glow of nostalgia, he rushed inside.

The new book smell hung heavy in the air. Row upon row of pristine covers stared back at him. Each one featured either a muted neutral design that would go well with modern interior design trends or a single striking image that would look good in a tiny online thumbnail.

Whatever. He thought. Don’t judge a book by its cover. There were, after all, better things to judge a book by. Genre for starters. So, with that wisdom in mind, he slid past a shelf of literary novels – all of which proudly carried stickers proclaiming them winners of various awards. For half a second, he wondered if there were more awards than authors. A book with three stickers on it confirmed his theory.

As he turned the corner, the shelf shook. A 900-page boulder crashed down mere inches from his head, clipping his shoulder and fluttering to the ground like a wounded bat. Ignoring the throbbing ache in his shoulder, Steve glanced around. No-one had seen it. Good. He knelt down and picked up the doorstopper. Winner of Britain’s foremost literary award. Figures.

Carefully sliding the book back onto the shelf, Steve resumed his search. A grey cliff face of gritty crime thrillers stared back at him. The crushing uniformity of it was only broken up by the occasional moody blue rectangle. He continued his quest.

The garish primary colours of the childrens’ section told him that he’d drifted off course. As Steve turned away, his eyes fixed on a multicoloured mosaic of spines. The titles sounded suitably dramatic. Steve’s eyes lit up. He reached for one of them. Sci-fi & Fantasy? He looked at the book cover. It contained a picture of a sullen teenager staring into the distance. Nope. Young Adult fiction.

He continued his search, giving the “Travel” and “Mind, Body & Spirit” sections a wide berth. His eyes fixed on three bookshelves wedged into a tiny corner. Above them, the words “Sci-fi & Fantasy” smiled at him. He rushed over to them. There were interesting books here – an assortment of classics, both past and present. After ten minutes of searching, he selected a couple of interesting titles. But, there was more to find. Where was it?

Steve kept walking. He passed a pastel rampart of romance novels before almost crashing into a random table of books. When he glanced down, he saw that it was filled with popular bestsellers. 3 for the price of 2! 70% off! He didn’t recognise a single title on the table. He kept looking.

For a second, Steve’s eyes lit up again. In a forgotten corner, a single sliver of darkness stood out. A solitary rectangle of gloomy, heavy spines. With a smile spreading across his face, he rushed over to it. Finally.

As he got closer, his heart sank. Above the shelves, the word “History” glowered at him. He turned away. It had to be somewhere.

The voice startled him: ‘Are you looking for something?’

Steve spun around. A bearded guy in a staff T-shirt stared back at him. Steve smiled: ‘Yes, I’m looking for the “Horror” section.’

The guy stared at him blankly: ‘Er… There might be a few Stephen King books in the general fiction section.’

Steve’s face went pale. He should have expected it. But, when he trawled his memories, there was always a horror shelf. Even when it was just a token row of books that was one-third Stephen King, one-third paranormal romance and one-third Victorian classics, it had always been there.

It wasn’t right. A bookshop without a horror shelf. Something in Steve’s mind began to come loose. Had he been gone too long? Was there no place in this trendy modern age for the simple joy of a blood-spattered paperback about giant flesh-eating rats? It wasn’t right! Steve started hyperventilating. His eyes bulged. His head ached. The guy took a step backwards and shielded his face.

What happened next never made the papers. It was overshadowed by the cataclysmic shock of an offensive celebrity tweet. Within days, the cleaning staff had finally managed to scrub Steve’s stubborn brain matter out of the carpets. The manager had returned the damaged books to the publisher. The police had issued an incident number. Life went on.

Today’s Art (29th October 2018)

Woo hoo! I am very proud to present the eighth page of “Nocturnal” – this year’s Halloween comic. You can check out previous Halloween comics here: 2015, 2016, 2017.

If you’ve missed any of this comic, you can catch up here: Cover, Page One, Page Two, Page Three, Page Four, Page Five, Page Six, Page Seven,

You can also find lots of other comics featuring these characters here too. Stay tuned for the next page of this comic tomorrow 🙂

As usual, this comic page is released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND licence.

[CLICK FOR LARGER IMAGE] “Nocturnal – Page 8” By C. A. Brown

Three Things An Old Computer Game Can Teach Us About How To Add Some Heavy Metal To The Fantasy Genre

Although I have a weird love/hate relationship with the fantasy genre, I recently happened to find something really cool in this genre which made me think about how to add elements of the heavy metal genre to the fantasy genre.

Although I don’t know when or if I’ll review it properly, it’s a fantasy/action computer game from 2002 called “Enclave“. Although this game has somewhat clunky combat and was clearly designed for consoles rather than computers, I still absolutely love this game.

This is a screenshot from “Enclave” (2002).

Why? Because it is about as metal as you can get 🙂 Whether you’re playing as a chiselled barbarian-like knight or a scary halfling warrior (yes, there are other playable characters, but these two are the only good ones I’ve found so far), this game exudes badassery in every way.

Seriously, it’s like the epic fight scenes from the “Lord Of The Rings” movies, but with added gloominess, mindlessness and general epicness. Although the game includes a vaguely movie-like soundtrack, I found myself fervently wishing that “Tonight We Ride” by Unleash The Archers was playing in the background of some segments of the game instead. In other words, it’s a brilliant example of heavy metal-style fantasy.

So, what can this game teach us about adding some heavy metal to the fantasy genre?

1) Simplicity: Although the game has a lot of vaguely Tolkien-esque lore (with lots of unpronounceable names like Dreg’athar etc…), one of the reasons why it is so metal is because the story of the game is relatively simple.

I hope you like fighting monsters…..

If you play as the “good” faction, the story involves breaking out of jail, defending the city from orcs, going on an epic quest through some scary wastelands etc…. I haven’t played the “evil” campaign, but the fact that you can also play as the villians is pretty cool.

Both stories are suitably heavy metal, but why? Simply put, they’re simple and focused. They don’t get lost in the minutae of mythical politics or magical lore. Although all of this stuff is still there as a background detail, the basic story is just a simple goal-orientated thing that allows for lots of epic feats of combat and dramatic battles. It doesn’t require you to keep track of twenty character names, memorise seven family trees or anything like that, it’s just a thrilling story that is there to be enjoyed.

So, if you want to add some heavy metal to your fantasy story, comic etc.. then keep the basic underlying story relatively simple.

2) Lighting: One of the best visual ways to add some heavy metal to the fantasy genre is simply to focus on gloomy lighting and death/destruction-related imagery. Again, “Enclave” excels in this respect. So far, I’ve seen creepy old castles, a besieged city, a decrepit ancient temple and some kind of hellish underworld. All of these locations are lit by fire, magma and/or moonlight. And they look really metal as a result.

Seriously, this location is pretty much an album cover in it’s own right…

So, when making comics, art in the heavy metal fantasy genre, then make sure that at least 30-50% of the total surface area of each picture is covered with black paint. Likewise, make sure to include lots of fire-based light sources too. If you need more examples of this type of art, then just look at some classic-style heavy metal album covers.

3) Character design: The character designs in this game provide some instructive examples of both good and bad heavy metal fantasy character design. The good examples, which I mentioned earlier, are the “Knight” and “Halfling” characters.

The knight looks more like a Roman gladiator (in terms of his spiked shoulder armour etc…) or a muscular barbarian than a traditional medieval knight. Likewise, the halfling has spiky blond hair, grins maniacally, has scary-looking facial tattoos and looks genuinely fearsome. Although her costume design (eg: dark trousers and a crop top) doesn’t include any armour, her character design still has a rather practical and rugged look that wouldn’t be out of place in a lawless wilderness or a 1980s heavy metal concert.

Yes, THIS is how to design a badass heavy metal-style character 🙂

And this Roman-like area just makes the Knight look even more like a grizzled gladiator too!

The common factor with both of these characters is that they look like hardened warriors. They look like they’ve been forged in the heat of battle and exist to strike terror into the hearts of their enemies. Their general character designs are meant to exude toughness and they seem like they genuinely fit into a harsh world that is ruled by the sword and the bow.

On the other hand, the “Druid” character is a terrible example of heavy metal fantasy character design. Simply put, she’s wearing a swimming costume.

I’m not exaggerating, this outfit is more suited to a beach party than an epic battle with the forces of evil!

Even though the game recognises the sheer absurdity of wearing something like this into battle (by drastically reducing the level of protection against damage she has), her design comes across more as blatant fanservice than actual heavy metal character design. In other words, she seems like she wouldn’t last five minutes in the game’s world. And this completely breaks the immersion for the audience.

So, design your characters with toughness and practicality in mind and they will come across as considerably more “metal” than if you aim for fanservice or ultra-stylised character design.

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Anyway, I hope that this was useful 🙂