Search and Research #35

As you may have guessed from the last panel, I'm not planning on updating the strip until the new year. I'm planning to really relax and enjoy the upcoming holidays, and I hope you do too. So, here's wishing you and yours a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year! See you in 2007!!

Search and Research #34

Ok, I've finished this one. Again, sorry for the wait. It took me several tries to get a composition for that party scene that I liked, and by the time I got this one, I was just too tired to ink it. Enjoy!

Search and Research #33

...and continues. I'd like to clarify here that Opal is not a thief, simply a woman who loves books and picked one up that she thought would be interesting. SCOM may be intelligent, but he's not too bright. Decoy books in a library? Honestly. Anyway, happy Friday everyone, enjoy!

Search and Research #32

The saga of the library thief continues...Enjoy!

Search and Research #31

We really are having trouble with people taking things recently. I think it has to do with it being the end of term, and people needing extra money or something. We had to go as far as putting up caution signs. Anyway, enjoy!

Search and Research #30

This is strip number 30, which means....color!!! Yay!

We've been having a weird guy come in to our library recently, but unlike in the strip, he doesn't smell like anything near as nice as apples. So, that was sort of the inspiration for this one.

For anyone who cares, this is my homage to Rene Magritte, the famous surrealist painter, and his work, The Son of Man. Enjoy!

Search and Research #29

The day that my buddy Jason wrote this one I had to work late. That night, for the first time, I saw a dude walking around the library with a pizza box. I think that now, I'm going to be asking Jason for the outcomes of sports games! Cha-Ching! Enjoy

Search and Research #28

And now, the follow up to the previous strip. As much as the idea of a 'Google Classroom' service is fictional, I wouldn't be suprised to see it announced in the near future. It seems like the next step. Anway, enjoy!

Search and Research #27

I did actually have a guy ask me this...but unlike Marc, I really didn't know what to say.

Please keep sending in your ideas for the contest in strip #26. Did I mention that the sender of the winning idea will receive a piece of original art drawn by yours truely? Well, they will, so keep the ideas coming! I've gotten several good responses already. I'll keep the contest open through next Wednesday.

Enjoy!

Search and Research #26

Ok, I would like to hear your ideas about how this vase could have wound up in the library. I've been racking my brain trying to come up with a good story for it, and clearly I have yet to hit upon anything interesting, so I put it to you, the viewing public. You can leave comments if you like, or you may send an email with the word 'Vase' somewhere in the subject line to us at researchcomic@gmail.com. Enjoy!

*edit* - I realized that if people leave their ideas as comments, when it comes time to make a strip out of this, everyone will already know the story! So, please send in you ideas to the email address above. If you've left a comment, I've saved the suggestion and then hidden the comment. eli

Search and Research #25

Ok, we're back after the holidays. I've been wanting to put Randall into another strip because he's such a weird looking guy, and this was my chance. Enjoy!

Search and Research #24

Well, once I was done with this one, i realized that I'd used the wrong pen for Elsie's skin tone. One size too large, so it looks a little weird but I couldn't go back and change it. So I apologize for that. If you are celebrating Thanksgiving, Happy Thanksgiving! We'll be back on Monday with a new strip. Enjoy!

Search and Research #23

Welcome to a new week everybody. I just want to prepare you all for the fact that there are only going to be two strips this week due to the American Thanksgiving holiday.

On a separate note, a couple of the friends who have seen today's strip were confused by the main premise, so I'm going to leave a comment that tries to further explain. My friends couldn't offer any good suggestions on how I could improve the strip, so, I inked it as is. Hopefully it will be funny. If anyone can think of a way I could have done this better, please comment. I'm still learning, and can use all the help I can get.

Thanks and enjoy!

Search and Research #22

And now, the thrilling conclusion to this week's little mini-story. Enjoy!

Search and Research #21

Well, I apologize for not putting up a strip yesterday. I try to get them up every other day, but...I was preoccupied yesterday by 'The Office' on DVD. Totally slipped my mind. So, to make up for it, I'm going to put up another one tomorrow too, so that we can bring this particular story line to a close this week, and start fresh on Monday. Deal? Deal. Enjoy!

Search and Research #20

"Eli, why in the world would SCOM have guns?"
"Look, it was really late at night, and the image just struck me as funny"
"Interestingly enough, he still manages to look cute!"
"Yes, it's all about the eyes."
"Will we see more of him like this?"
"Yes, this is my first three part series, so this story will carry us through the week. Enjoy!"

Search and Research #19

I was thinking the other day, "Man! You never see librarians compared to bartenders!" So, here you go. Enjoy!

Search and Research #18

This one was completely written by my friend Jason. I usually look to him for sarcastic comments or punchlines, but when I started discribing the character of SCOM to him, this leapt into his mind. Thanks Jason! Enjoy.

*I suppose that I should take credit for SCOM's final line there; the idea of being proactive about laziness struck me a funny that day.

Search and Research #17

Sometimes I'm not sure what people are thinking when they check out 30 or more books at a time. It seems like they always ask for a bag, and they wind up with a full backback, and three bags full of books. Those times, I really do wish I had a wheelbarrow I could lend out. It would make my job so much easier. Enjoy!

*On a side note, the book you see this girl holding is a book my friend Matthew and I are working on. While it's not yet published...we hope to see it soon!

*Also, that turtle in the back is a character named Turtlewax that my friend Jason created in American Government class in college. He always seems to die in ironic ways in the little comics Jason draws. I needed a picture to be on the wall, so why not throw in a little inside joke, right?

Search and Research #16

It is my pleasure to present number 16. I don't really know what to say about it except...Enjoy!

And, thanks for all the comments and encouragement you've been sending my way. I'm really enjoying drawing this strip.

Search and Research #15

Well, my buddy Jason convinced me to do some color strips, and since #15 was next, it got the watercolor, marker, and colored pencil treatment. So now, I think I'm going to do every 15th one in color. Enjoy!

Search and Research #14

Number 14, comin' at ya! As you can see, I just couldn't leave Opal versus SCOM alone. How might Opal fight this new addition to the library? A fun question to answer....Enjoy!

Search and Research #13

Well, I couldn't stand it...I can't wait, I'm posting the next one today. We'll let this one carry us through the weekend and see more of Opal and SCOM on Monday.

I just now noticed that I forgot to write Marc's name in on his nametag, so let us pretend that the light is glaring off of his nametag in such a way as to obscure the text. Good? Good.

Enjoy!

Search and Research #12

Well, I was going to wait until tonight to post this one, but...let's go ahead and let it carry us through the weekend. Or, maybe I'll post another one tomorrow! Who knows? Enjoy!

Search and Research #11

Alright! Strip number 11, we are movin' here folks! What can I say about this one except that the idea of a destructive library machine strikes me as funny. Enjoy!

Search and Research #10

I love the idea of a cantankerous self check-out machine. When I was in the public library system, ours was certainly uncooperative. We will be seeing more of SCOM in future strips. Enjoy!

Search and Research #9

Alright! Strip #9! This is based on the comment left by Caroline for #3. This story was so funny to me that I had to do it. Enjoy!

Search and Research #8

As I mentioned last time, we're celebrating in this strip!! 1 week worth of strips, so we're commemorating this historic event in #8. Enjoy!

*PS - In case you're wondering "why would anyone think this is funny?" I've left a comment that will hopefully shed a little more light on this strip. - Eli

Search and Research #7

I'm sure this happens to every person at a library, and usually the patron is very apologetic, however...I think we all like to gloat a little when the patron is unapologetic, huffy, or otherwise rude in these situations.

I'm sure that some strip somewhere has done this Mastercard commercial but I haven't personally seen it, so please don't hate me for turning it to my own purposes.

Also, this is strip number 7! If you were enjoying this in a newspaper, this would be one week of strips! We will be celebrating this in strip #8, so stay tuned! Enjoy!

Search and Research #6

Fortunately for us right now, we do NOT have any student workers like this! However, I wanted to show the supervisory side of Marc's job, so here we go. Enjoy!

Search and Research #5

This actually happened to me...it didn't resolve as nicely as this, but a man asked me to get one of our female librarians so he could ask her to type a paper for him!!! I mean, he was a nice old guy but...anyway, enjoy!

Search and Research #4

Well, we might as well get number 4 out tonight. I appreciate all the comments we've gotten so far and am pleased to hear the positive feedback. I put up a link to this site's 'Atom feed' for those of you who use RSS, and I am planning on going back and rescanning my first two strips and posting them at the larger size. I think I've found a pen that is comfortable for me to use in lettering, so hopefully the strips will be a little easier to read, and in case you didn't already realize this....you can click on the images of the strips to read them at a larger size. Well, Enjoy!

Search and Research #3

** UPDATE** - I've uploaded a copy of the image that is more horizontal!!

I would like to point out a couple of things about today's strip. I am NOT picking on cataloguers here. I actually don't know any cataloguers like the one in today's strip, but my friend Bryan tells me that this is sort of a stereotype of cataloguers. I guess it is unfortunate that the story I'm basing today's strip on involves a cataloguer who fits the stereotype. I just heard the story and thought Marc's final response would tickle some people.

Also, I know that the image is running a little downhill, as opposed to parallel to your screen. It's just the way it was scanned in. I don't have a program on my computer that will allow me to do a 'free transform'. I may fix it later.

And, since the guys over at Unshelved did such a quick job of picking up this blog and telling their constituents about it, I should mention that my wife only recently put me on to them and I'm in the process of reading their archived strips. I'm through 2002 and moving on to 2003 as I have time!!! However, should I inadvertantly touch on something that they have already covered, please know that it was unintentional and must have been from strips I've not read yet.

Well, all that said...I hope you enjoy!

eli

Search and Research #2

So far, the two strips that I've done are based on real questions or incidents that happened in our library. A college research library. I've asked some of the staff to relate interesting or curious incidents or questions and a couple have responded and their stories have been turned into strips. However, I can't always come up with sarcastic responses for Marc (our main character) and when I'm stuck I can usually rely on my friend Jason Watts, which is why his name is in the credits.

Search and Research #1

I work at a Research Library at a University and there are a lot of funny things that happen, so my friend Bryan and I decided (after several other staff members told us we should) to create a comic strip about a Research Library. Search and Research is the result.

Our main character is Marc. Marc Record. If you work in library cataloguing, you might think that's funny, otherwise...it's an interesting name I guess. I'm trying to be careful not to replicate the themes and characters that are present in another library related cartoon, Unshelved. It is about a public library, so making ours about a research library presents us with many different story options. I hope to post a new one every few days, but I do these as I have time and that's usually when I'm manning the service desk. So, bear with me.

If you have had experiences at libraries that you would like to share, please feel free to do so in the comments section of any of these posts. I'll read them and if I think they would make a good strip, I'll draw something up. I hope you enjoy it!