October 2012
For the first time, I am asking readers for money to support my cartooning. I am using crowdfunding to finance a sequel to War on Drugs, entitled Rat Park.
August 2012
This is a reflective essay about my comic Thin Air, about the counter-intuitive fact that trees build themselves from carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen. They are built from exactly the same stuff that breezes past their trunks! This essay describes my research process, including my view that van Helmont was actually a bad scientist.
August 2012
This is a reflective essay about my comic Type III. I describe the underlying concept of ecological succession, and reveal how I decided that Mount St. Helens should form the backdrop to my comic. I also mention real-life examples of Type III systems, such as the Kalundborg Eco-Industrial Park.
August 2012
This is a reflective essay about my comic Supernormal Stimuli. The comic is about the work of ethologist Niko Tinbergen, and was inspired by reading a book by psychologist Deirdre Barrett. I discuss where my dinosaur 'reptile brain' artwork concept came from.
July 2012
This is a reflective essay about my comic Purpose. The comic was hugely influenced by the book Ishmael by Daniel Quinn. This essay shares the headspace I was in when writing Purpose.
July 2012
This is a reflective essay about my comic St Matthew Island, which is one of the most popular items on this website. This essay describes my research process, including the real life story of St Matthew Island's reindeer.
March 2012
Released to the web in 2009, my comic Amusing Ourselves to Death was the most popular thing on my website, and a mini internet phenomenon. So how come I decided to remove this comic from my website?
January 2012
Ishmael by Daniel Quinn was my favourite book that I read in 2011. Broadly about the concept of 'sustainability', it is a book about the author's quest to understand the deep reasons why our civilisation acts in destructive ways.
January 2012
Blankets by Craig Thompson was my favourite book that I read in 2010. It is an autobiographical graphic novel which tells Thompson's experiences growing up in small-town Wisconsin in a religious family.