Search and Research #75

Can it be? It is! A new strip! Being that this was number 75, a color one, I wanted it to be worth coloring. I want the color to enhance the scene in some way, to be necessary, so I either craft the story lines so that an important scene falls on the colored strip, or, if I can't rush a story in order to do that, I'll do a strip that is outside of the story arc, which is what I'm doing with this one. I'm not much of a colorist yet, and I didn't want the backgrounds to be white, but adding the dark gray tones of our shelving really made it seem sort dark for a party. Oh well. Also, the colors of colored pencils always seems sort of weird when I scan them in. I'm not sure what to do about that.

My friend Bryan, a co-founding member of this strip, is moving with his wife, to Virginia this week, and so I wanted to commemorate him in the strip in some way. Bryan has always pitched the idea of 'Snacks In The Stacks' as a library function to welcome new students, an idea which we all find humorous, but has never been implemented. So, as a tribute to Bryan, I drew it into this strip.

Some of you may recall the watermelon reference as a story left as a comment back in strip #29. Bryan and I both found this story hilarious, and my buddy Jason thought this was the perfect place to put that into the strip as well.

So, farewell for now, Bryan. I hope that Virginia will prove an interesting, fulfilling, and rewarding place for you and Laura.

eli