Welcome to Written Ward!

Aug 19, 2021

I’m copying most of this from my About page, because I can’t think of a better way to introduce the newsletter and because I’m lazy. Also, I’m not sure how many people actually read About pages. Anyway, my name is John Ward. I work as an illustrator painting images for self-published authors which they use for book covers. Here’s one I did:

Painting is solitary work. It’s a lot of hours stuck in a chair focused on a single image. At times, it can be exciting and other times it can be like watching paint dry. Literally.

That tedium part can be dangerous. That’s when I’m tempted to get up and find something else to do . . . which isn’t always compatible with deadlines. As a way of dealing with that temptation, I started listening to audiobooks. The stories provide just enough distraction to keep me in my chair, but not so much that I lose focus.

When I’m out of audiobooks or podcasts, I make up stories about the things I’m drawing or painting. I’d like to become proficient at writing those stories down. To that end, I’ve enrolled in Scott Snyder’s Comic Writing 101 class.

This newsletter is my attempt to put into practice the things I learn in the class. More than that though, it’s a written chronicle of my attempts to figure out what I believe are the best ways (for me personally) to present my efforts to create original comics and any prose narratives I might write.

This newsletter documents my efforts to become a competent writer and to connect with people who enjoy the types of stories I hope to tell. I hope you’ll come along.

As a reward for reading this far, here are a few old comics I did like seven years ago? Can’t remember, but it’s been a while. They were done for a call for entries that Wizards of the Coast put out for comics. I wasn’t chosen. Oh well. I still like them.