Just after covid hit in March 2020 I started hitting my stride with drawing digitally. I'd had my iPad for just over 4 months and had been dabbling even before that. Up until this point I hadn't felt comfortable with the drawings I was making digitally. I could create something on paper that was personally satisfying, but I digital drawing felt like I was drawing with a sharpie with my left hand.

Around this time two years ago I launched my new website spare parts press. Initially, I intended to use the site to publish my own anthology comic under the name of spare parts. Spare Parts would be a publication that collected my ongoing comics. I released the title under that name, and as I was working on the second, with most of the content written and about a 1/4 of it drawn. Then the pandemic hit.

I miss the old days of finding unique material in weird places. Walking into a comic store, an old books store or a zine library and finding something weird and unique someone had made. It was then a further challenge to find more of that person's work. It was exciting. While it is true that you get a similar thing with the web, the same kind of serendipitous discovery, it is missing the same excitement, there is less of an urgency to try and track someone down. Maybe it's because we feel that if it's worth seeing or knowing, it will have some sort of presence on the web. A quick google search of any artist and you will instantly get a smattering of their work.

I would like to see it become the norm that comic artists sell copies of their digital work. I’m not sure if everyone is used to this idea. There is often a negative attitude or disinterest whenever the subject of digital comics is brought up. If a digital copy is mentioned it is an afterthought to the print version. The comic book itself is such a revered item, the love of the printed form overrules any other medium.