{"id":49,"date":"2016-09-18T20:04:29","date_gmt":"2016-09-19T01:04:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/?p=49"},"modified":"2016-09-18T20:28:53","modified_gmt":"2016-09-19T01:28:53","slug":"the-bfs-recommends-angela-melick-and-wasted-talent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/2016\/09\/18\/the-bfs-recommends-angela-melick-and-wasted-talent\/","title":{"rendered":"BFS Recommends: Angela Melick and Wasted Talent"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Because<\/a>
Because Jam is “tha very bessst!”<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Straight behind my love of the written word is my love of visuals: photographs, movies, drawing, painting, and… comics\/graphic novels. In writing, there’s little better than\u00a0an author’s distinctive voice, which adds another layer to the story or narrative of the piece, moving it beyond mere information. With comics and graphic novels, the artist’s renderings add a whole other dimension to the ideas being communicated, whether they are laugh-out-loud hilarious or profoundly insightful. I’ve loved this ever since I started reading Peanuts and Calvin & Hobbes, and this love has only deepened\u00a0as I’ve discovered so many wonderful artists in the webcomic community.<\/p>\n

One of my favorites\u00a0(which my wonderful wife, Jessica, introduced me to) is\u00a0Wasted Talent<\/a>, which is written and drawn by Angela Melick, also known by the\u00a0nickname Jam. You’ve been introduced to her work already. See, over there? On the right side of the screen? I lucked out and commissioned\u00a0an avatar by Jam, and you can see the wonderful added dimension\u00a0her drawing and coloring style bring to her\u00a0work (she is really good at Viking beards, too, since she drew one of\u00a0her husband and a truly epic hockey playoff beard<\/a>\u00a0before she drew mine).<\/p>\n

In her online archives, it’s also a true joy to see her rougher beginnings\u00a0in black and white ink<\/a>, her uses of color<\/a>\u00a0as her ability\u00a0deepened, and her style shiftings as she found her own artistic voice. Whether she’s making use of\u00a0markers <\/a>or watercolors<\/a>\u00a0(or a mix of the two), Jam’s style\u00a0is now something that is uniquely her own, though there are definitely\u00a0anime\/manga influences. **<\/p>\n

Jam’s commitment to excellence and desire to push her abilities are also things\u00a0any writer or artist can learn from (and be inspired by). While working full time as an engineer, she practices her art regularly above and beyond her weekly comic for Wasted Talent, tries out different comic forms\u00a0(she has some travelogues and other short comics), and also pushes herself whenever she publishes Wasted Talent in book form.\u00a0When publishing her earlier drawings in\u00a0We Are the Engineers!\u00a0<\/em>(her first book), she went back and redrew them all, showing how much she had grown over a few years of honing her craft.<\/p>\n

But what truly seems to drive the thriving vitality of Wasted Talent and Jam’s work is humanity at its best: joy and love. Wasted Talent is an autobiographical comic, so while Jam generally aims for a humorous take on life, she doesn’t hide from its ups and downs, whether it’s a lost job, the pains of a job search, a desire for something more from life, or the almost annual trip to the hospital for her or her husband, thanks to the broken bones mountain biking seems to encourage.<\/p>\n

I’ll take the humor, though, whether it’s this wonderful malapropism of “for all intents and purposes<\/a>,” a bit of everyday silliness<\/a>, or a scene that seems right out of my own household<\/a>. Seriously, if you ever want to\u00a0know what my marriage is like (and\u00a0I know everyone was wondering about that), you can get it\u00a0within the pages of Angela Melick’s work.<\/p>\n

*coughs*<\/p>\n

Or you can just read it for Jam’s wonderful take on working and living.<\/p>\n

**I’ll also note that the\u00a0original of that\u00a0last watercolor example<\/a> is proudly displayed on our wall: it’s a perfect synergy of Jam’s\u00a0artistic and comedic\u00a0capabilities.<\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Straight behind my love of the written word is my love of visuals: photographs, movies, drawing, painting, and… comics\/graphic novels. In writing, there’s little better than\u00a0an author’s distinctive voice, which adds another layer to the story or narrative of the piece, moving it beyond mere information. With comics and graphic novels, the artist’s renderings add […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58,57],"tags":[59,62,60,61],"class_list":{"0":"post-49","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-recommended-comics","7":"category-the-bfs-recommends","8":"tag-angela-melick","9":"tag-jam","10":"tag-wasted-talent","11":"tag-webcomics","12":"czr-hentry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":127,"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49\/revisions\/127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gilbertredman.com\/bigfrickingswede\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}