What I’ve Been Up To Since Spring

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Halfway through the year, I’m dropping off an update of life stuff I’ve been up to and talk about future plans for art projects.

I’ve been in deep focus on working on my big personal projects, minimizing convention activity, and improving my body in an effort to make this year more fulfilling.

Wandering Conventions

This year, I minimized my convention tabling to I focused on finishing personal projects and have have new merch to sell for the next year. With that I’m taking time to visit conventions and enjoy myself.

C2E2 2025

Walking out to C2E2 helped me refill my art soul. I wandered the show floor seeing what’s new catching up with friends, and artists I know chatting abut life and business. I’m feeling the sentiment that these giant cons are becoming too costly for smaller vendors to try to return to. This mirrors some talks I’ve had at previous cons with other creators.

The venue and table costs are ballooning and people aren’t as interested in buying artist merch as they were in the past, so it’s a puzzle for sure. Through all this I can sing the praises of smaller conventions and it’s opportunities to be more personal with fans new and old.

I did encounter some merch that pique my interest. I made a video trying out a sample of Rocket Fuel by Merlin’s Munchies Coffee Company. It’s pretty alright. I like coffee and I’m willing to try out non-mainstream coffees to support the smaller businesses when I can.

Anime Central 2025

Despite not getting a table, I walked through Anime Central with my friend groups, catching up with their lives, spending that Saturday wandering to see what caught my eye. I resisted the temptation to buy more art books to fill my stuffed bookshelves. I even got over my shyness to ask cosplayers for pictures for once!

Cosplay of Guts from the manga, Berserk
Cosplay of Garnet from the cartoon, Steven Universe
Cosplay of a Sister of Battle and Imperial Guard from the tabletop game series, Warhammer 40k
Cosplays of two Nico Robins,Vivi, and Nami from the manga, One Piece.
Cosplay of female All-Might from the manga, My Hero Academia. She holds a bloody severed head of someone's face punched in.
Cosplays of human Miss Piggy and Kermit the Frog from the Muppets.

Visiting Artist Alley felt both crowded yet smaller, and it’s pushing me to the sobering thought that most of these artist alleys prefer fan art work of shows and manga I’m not as partial to. I’m falling out of touch and I’m interested in finding my own media tastes instead of pulling in recommendations so much.

Cosplay of a male Felicia and Morrigan from the video game series, Darkstalkers
Cosplay of Amy Rose from the video game series, Sonic the Hedgehog
Cosplays of Nero, Dante and Vergil from the video game series, Devil May Cry.
Cosplay of Joker Stencil, Madness, and Misprint, power up Joker Cards from the video game Balatro.
Cosplays of Cloud and Tifa from the video game, Final Fantasy 7

Going to these shows can be fun yet it bums me out to back to the boring day job. It’s still risky to leave it without kneecapping myself so I stick around. My heaviest bills are close to paid off and I do commissions and cultivate the store page, but it’s still a long way from taking the leap to full time art making.

Minuscule Selling at Conventions

Despite telling myself I was taking a year break from events, I still had some conventions set up that I accepted going to as it had little costs for the table, such as Schaumburg Library Comic Con and Oak Park Public Library Cons.

It’s been a few years since I’ve been to the Schaumburg Library, but it’s been great. Due to my lucky misreading of my setup email, I reached the Library early so I had time to enjoy the renovations before getting back to business.

Compiled Sketches of an anthropomorphic male giraffe. The left Marker sketch is of the giraffe wearing a green loincloth. His body burns with fire and his reticulated fur pattern is reminiscent of breaking volcanic rock, that cools towards the tips of his limbs.The middle pen drawing is a front facing view of the giraffe wearing a large cape, tunic and loincloth, with fire in his hands. His reticulated fur pattern is reminiscent of breaking volcanic rock that darkens towards the tips of his limbs. The right sketch is a detailed showcase his fur pattern.

Despite my lower expectations, I still sold well for the time I spent there. It was a great crowd for a library con, with parents bringing their kids to meet the local artists and enjoy the comic fun in the library. This convention was also the debut of my sticker packs and they were a success!

The Artist, Mastafran, at his artist alley table at Oak Park Public Library Fan Fest.

Weeks after, I went to Oak Lawn Public Library Fan Fest to sell more artwork. It wasn’t as eventful compareed to Schaumburg, but I did have a nice meal at Smashburger with my friends!

Close up of Mastafran's artist alley table at Oak Park Public Library Fan Fest. Displayed is a collection of various pastry cat stickers and self published comics books.
Close up of Mastafran's artist alley table at Oak Park Public Library Fan Fest. Displayed is a collection of various dog stickers and holiday themed cat stickers.
Close up of Mastafran's artist alley table at Oak Park Public Library Fan Fest. Displayed is a pastry cat deskmat.

I’d be lying if I didn’t say that the will-they-won’t-they tariffs of the United States weren’t among the reasons I was taking a break from tabling at conventions this year. Making merch is expensive enough and the price increases for anything higher end or the printers needing to stock their equipment and pass the costs to the customer will balloon those expenses. At my level, I have less to worry about than other artists with larger business problems, so godspeed to everyone staying afloat.

Draw Stronger

Finally, I’m reading Draw Stronger by Kriota Willberg.

Cover of the book "Draw Stronger" by Kriota Willberg"

It’s a book about self-care and physical fitness for artists and others who spend most of their time on the drawing desk becoming a slug. It a good short guide for entry level fitness tips with plenty of illustrations, so I give it a thumbs up!

Excerpt of the book "Draw Stronger" by Kriota Willberg" Left Page text reads "Good Poster means that your bones and muscles are organized to work with optimal efficiency. Good poster makes your taller and slimmer! And it may help your reduce pain from repetitive stress injuries." Example illustration shows standing and sitting characters with their spine aligned to show how good posture affects the body.Left Page text reads "Deviating from good posture puts strain on the muscles and joints of the shoulders, back and hips, sitting slouched fro long periods can tighten up your neck back and thigh muscles. Example illustration shows sitting character with their spine hunched over their drawing desk to show how bad posture affects the body.

Early March, I strained my back helping out with heavy lifting in my home garden and I still felt lingering soreness. I’m in my 30’s, getting fatter, and feeling the consequences of my sedentary lifestyle, so this is a nice book with short guides on stretches to do and signs of medical problems you might have as a cartoonist.

Excerpt from the book "Draw Stronger" by Kriota Willberg" Left page shows diagrams of the anatomy of arm muscles, tendons and how injuries affect the arm muscles and hinder drawing. The right page, shows diagrams of the rotator cuff of the shoulder muscle groups that guide and stabilize the shoulder joint. Poor poster and forward shoulders can stress these muscles and cause pain while drawing.

Streaming

I still make art streams still but it’s tough to keep up doing it.The more I edit and relisten to my steams, the more I want to unplug my mic and never speak in it again. I never know what kind of clips to make from these streams as many of them are uneventful regular drawing with arranged video game music playing in the background.

The rest of the year is sure to be same, but I can’t count myself out just yet. Me and my programmer, Adam are hanging tight working on the Blackmask demo with menus and music starting up. I’m improving my writing ability, writing more often and hoping to output more new comics.

Collection of Blackmask enemy test animations of an Owl character. This displays various idle animations, walking on the ground and taking damage until death.

Even now, we plan on showcasing a playable build of Blackmask at a future indie games event. We have a real deadline to complete this year, so we now have a direction to go. I still don’t feel ready or have everything together, but I’m probably just feeling like a mad imposter.

Monochrome Green Pixel Art of various statues of anthropomorphic owls with bear ears in various states of damage and wear.

I do plenty of cool art projects and ramble about life. If you want to keep up with my life and art, you can follow me on social media all over. You can also catch my weekly art streams on Twitch and YouTube that are now simulcasted! Don’t forget to browse my store for my fine wares! Plus, I have an RSS feed on my website! You can connect it to your favorite RSS reader and catch my updates on this sight whenever I make them!