Pringle, the creator of Prophet Buddy, is also known South of the Border as the inimitable Señor Chips… a master craftsman of Calaca art! 

Calacas are a traditional Mexican folk art which are used to celebrate the Day of the Dead. One can find little skeleton people in all manner of scenarios and occupations!

 This is just a sampling of Pringle’s Calaca art, but you can find lots more at Señor Chips!

Join us tomorrow, Sunday, for a special farewell from the man himself.

Many of you may remember James Russo from his awesome guest strip Meet Douglas Leather. I dig James work on that strip, he has such a distinctive style that reminds me of 1950’s film noir. So I was ecstatic when James submitted this strip for the Earthward-Ho! portion of the Great Dumm Tryout. One of the things I really like about this take on Earthward-Ho! is how James uses two totally different cliches ( alien anal probes and college sexual experimentation) and seamlessly combines them into one hilarious comic.

If you’re not familiar with his work, I highly recommend you check out his website www.milkmoneycartoons.com There you will find hours of awesome cartoon entertainment (this guy is prolific!) I really like his click through comics that often start out innocent and familiar but end up with a slight subversive twist.

Thanks, Congratulations, and Welcome Back Mr. Russo!

Hailing from Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Lance King has a one-eyed cat named Willy, and plans to venture into the world of webcomics in the near future.
Lance’s winning strip had a certain flare, a certain panache… which instantly made it stand out and was an obvious choice! Thanks so much to Lance and all the contestants!

See more of Lance’s art at www.lancekingart.com!

Thanks to Ben Forbes for sending us this adorable and hilarious comic!!

Choosing a winner for our Skadi guest strip was a bit hard at first since there was two of us trying to agree on one strip, but in the end we both agreed that Ben’s was pretty darn awesome…so here it is!  I really like the soft and dreamy color scheme and the funny designs, and the joke in the end is great and so true to Skadi’s nature!!  And that close up…what’s not to love??

Ben is a Canadian artist and student at Sheridan.  His blog, Dirty Little Scribbles, has tons of cute and funny drawings and paintings.  I love his squishy cute girl art!

And look forward to his webcomic “Jo the Faux,” coming soon!! Yeeeeeeee!!

Congratulations to U! (aka Uriel A.Duran) for winning the Through The Port-Hole contest!

I picked this strip because, basically, I thought it was overall awesome.  First of all, it’s just beautiful to look at.  I love the semi-realistic design of the characters mixed with the strong graphic inking.  It’s not something I would have expected, but it suits Through The Port-Hole perfectly.

Second, it’s really funny!  I love the overly depressed Captain and how the sly sea lion takes advantage of him.  The acting is great, and the actual drawings and expressions are hilarious!  They seem really specific to me, which is always a plus.  And I love how the seal gets his in the end.

Third, I just like how Uriel uses combination of pantomime and emoticons to tell his story.  It gets across the message perfectly without the use of cumbersome dialogue.

U! hails from Mexico City, and if you want to check out more of his work, here’s his website:

http://www.garabatorama.com/intro.html

Thanks again U!

On a different note, I have some other news to report. 

I have decided to stop making Through The Port-Hole for the time being. 

It wasn’t an easy decision, but I believe it to be for the best right now.  This was my first foray into comics and I am extremely proud of the work I’ve accomplished for almost a year.  But unfortunately, I was falling further and further behind in my deadlines to get the strip done and as a result it was becoming more of a chore than something fun to do, as it originally had started.  The rest of the artists here at Dumm Comics were as patient as they could be with me, and I thank them for that.

As a final going out, I intended to air all of the contest winners that I had chosen for the next coming weeks.  They were:  Winner - Uriel A. Durán, aka U!,  Funniest Fan! - Johnathan Mastron,  The K.I.S.S. Award (keep it simple stupid) - Tom Rollinger,  Doppleganger Award - Bob Cavin 3,  Best Character Concept - LFW,  and Most Cinemetic - Sergio J. A. Ragno III, aka SergeXIII.  And then a final Through The Port-Hole Strip to top it off. 

But, all of the other Dumm artists think that you guys, the “viewing audience,” wouldn’t like to see that many of your own contest strips in a row.  But hey, that’s all I got.  So if you want to see these last Through The Port-Hole strips for the next 6 Tuesdays and a final comic by yours truly, then please leave a comment saying so.  The other Dumm Artists need convincing!

“So what will happen with Tuesdays after you leave?” you ask.  Well, don’t you worry.  We have an amazing new artist lined up with great comics that I’m sure you’ll love.  I don’t know if I’m supposed to announce who it is quite yet, so that’s all I say for now.

Once again thanks to all of you who enjoyed my strip the past year.  It was a joy to read your comments every week!  And don’t worry, you may still see the Captain in the future, just possibly in book and/or animated form.

Sean Szeles

The wait is over! Here they are, all of our first placed winners from the GREAT DUMM TRYOUT!!

These comics were all drawn by you the fans and then hand picked by each of the strips’ creators themselves. And speaking for all of us, it was hard to pick the winners! There was so many funny, charming and well drawn strips from all of you! You all did an amazing job! Thanks for contributing to Dumm! You all make this site a pure pleasure to do! Thanks from all of us Dumms!

This strip is titled “Magic Pants Mouse” drawn by Cheezy Weapon.

I picked this strip as my first place winner simply because I thought it was really funny.

I always approach the Big Pants Mouse comics as a glimpse into this little world of theirs. This strip does that so well explains so much without showing too much. The last panel speaks volumes of Big Pant’s Mouse and Suzy’s relationship.

Congrats Cheezy Weapon!

As you can tell from the comic above, ole Gandalf has fallen on hard times since LOTR wrapped back in 2003. Fret not, though…as The Hobbit is scheduled for release in 2012, and Gandalf will surely be riding high on the hog once again. If you’re a huge LOTR dork like me, you can follow any news on The Hobbit’s progress (as well as news on all things Tolkien) at TheOneRing.net.

I’ve been romantically stalking the creator of Prophet Buddy and I’ve dug up some interesting facts!

*His full name is Eric Pringle!

*He invented the revolutionary Flash Technique known as “The Pringle”!

*Pringle’s father is an an honest-to-goodness rocket scientist!

*Pringle was the lead singer of the Frankenburies!

*He loves it when people walk up to him and say: “Yo Pringle… where da chips at?”

*From John Kricfalusi’s blog: “All you young Flash wannabes, grovel respectfully in the giant shadow of this monument of the Flash animation world.”

and last but not least, here’s another animated Prophet Buddy cartoon!

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Stay tuned for more Pringle facts and Prophet Buddy cartoons next week!

Jeez I used to really hate Valentine’s Day. While my experiences weren’t quite as horrible as poor Gabe’s it’s always been one of my least favorite holidays going all the way back to elementary school. I can remember being forced to get a valentine for every single person in class, EVEN THE BOYS! I never quite understood why they tortured us so, I expect it was because they were tortured as children themselves. So to continue this horrible chain of child abuse, here’s this weeks Earthward-Ho!

As a side note, I love Valentine’s Day now. I started dating my beautiful wife Jeannie exactly 10 years ago yesterday, two days before Valentine’s day, and we’ve been happy ever since!

Hooray!!

Luke and I were inspired by Fred’s alternate ending, so here’s one for today’s Skadi!

You know I don’t really have any sentimental feelings about Valentine’s Day…I don’t celebrate it or have any fond or hideous memories attached.  I’m not really a huge candy lover, either.  I’d rather have cheese, or something.  Actually I do remember one thing…in first grade our teacher gave us “love juice” on Valentine’s day…I think it was cranberry juice or something.  I totally bought into it and thought it was real…anyhow after I drank it I was sure that it had affected me because I ran over and kissed Ben Paine right on the mouth and spilled juice everywhere and all over the floor.  My teacher put me in the corner and I was not allowed a pink cupcake!