Chatting with mph, who just kindly “linked the comic,”:http://mph.puddingbowl.org/archives/2005/12/release_early_r.php over lunch:

(13:49:59) Michael Hall: I also like the way the voice bubble in the second frame dips behind the character’s head. I never think to do that kind of thing. The scales have fallen from my eyes. :-)
(13:50:20) MetaEdward: heh. want to know the little micro-story behind my actually putting something up?
(13:50:26) Michael Hall: Yeah.
(13:50:53) MetaEdward: Ok, I’d been wanting to do a comic forever. But it’s *hard* to learn to draw cartoony when you’re used to working real.
(13:51:29) MetaEdward: I had been trying to concoct a “cartoon style” for a while whenever I’d had some drawing time, without much success
(13:52:05) MetaEdward: this time I tried drawing faces with nothing but two dot eyes and a mouth, that’s all. I drew them as expressively as I could, and got a few down on the page.
(13:52:31) MetaEdward: then I decided to give one a word balloon, and write whatever he looked like he was saying at the time. And then another, and another.
(13:52:54) MetaEdward: Then I tried giving them a little more detail and upper bodies, and got the characters you see there.
(13:53:07) Michael Hall: Cool. You should blog that.
(13:53:08) MetaEdward: and I kept doing the same thing, adding word balloons with whatever they looked like they were saying…
(13:53:10) MetaEdward: and there I was. :)
(13:53:23) MetaEdward: I just might; mind if I quote this IM?
(13:53:27) Michael Hall: Not at all.
(13:54:21) MetaEdward: Absolutely key, for me, was not drawing them in panels, just drawing them free on the page. It was the panels which had crushed me, previously.

Michael’s “post”:http://mph.puddingbowl.org/archives/2005/12/release_early_r.php links to a neat essay on art by his bud “sven.”:http://www.scarletstarstudios.com/blog/archives/2005/09/notes_on_making.html