After issue three I decided to really try and plan out an issue in its entirety before proceeding to the publishing stage. My goal is to give a reader a complete experience within eight tiny pages, including the cover. The result of my trying to encompass a total experience in one tiny issue was UbboZine Issue # 3.5.
For this issue, my first ideas came about from watching the Discovery Chanel. They were airing shows on undersea exploration, and the old sepia tone photos they showed depicting the diving apparatus worn by undersea explorers fascinated me. I mean come on... those helmets are awesome. They remind of of Mike Mignola's designs for Johann Krauss's ectoplasm containment suit. Or more appropriately, vice versa. Well Issue #3.5 began as a sketch of a diving helmet, and evolved from there. To be really honest, it was originally going to be sky blue with birds flying overhead and one pooping on the Ubbo logo, so change is good.
After that image, I sought out new patterns or designed pages to use as backgrounds. I wound up using the striped yellow cardboard from inside a McDonald's French fries container. Yes, I'm ashamed that my punk rock creativity relied upon corporate heart disease inducers, but it didn't even photocopy well, so back off.
I learn something new with each issue I make, and in this issue's case I learned that construction paper is NOT 8.5 inches x 11 inches. It's actually a tad bigger, just big enough to throw off my photocopies for this issue. If you hold one and read it, it's skewed to the right a bit, and the text is cut off by the folds I made after folding it. This is what I got for trying to skip inking in each panel with black Sharpie and ink pens. One cool result of doing it in all black though was being able to use whiteout to create bubbles and flimsy and blotted looking effects for artwork. Those came out to my liking.
While at work one day, I had doodled a fish-thing with a lot of needle-like teeth, and so I dug out that sketch and tried to work it into an inside cover design. This was my first attempt at incorporating artwork that actually had something to do with the story or information contained within my zine issue. I think it worked out decently though in retrospect I should have made this issue that nice sky blue color.
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The inside cover featured a fish-thing leering with its needle-like teeth, and swimming in from the letters page.
The Letter Page:
For this issue, my first ideas came about from watching the Discovery Chanel. They were airing shows on undersea exploration, and the old sepia tone photos they showed depicting the diving apparatus worn by undersea explorers fascinated me. I mean come on... those helmets are awesome. They remind of of Mike Mignola's designs for Johann Krauss's ectoplasm containment suit. Or more appropriately, vice versa. Well Issue #3.5 began as a sketch of a diving helmet, and evolved from there. To be really honest, it was originally going to be sky blue with birds flying overhead and one pooping on the Ubbo logo, so change is good.
After that image, I sought out new patterns or designed pages to use as backgrounds. I wound up using the striped yellow cardboard from inside a McDonald's French fries container. Yes, I'm ashamed that my punk rock creativity relied upon corporate heart disease inducers, but it didn't even photocopy well, so back off.I learn something new with each issue I make, and in this issue's case I learned that construction paper is NOT 8.5 inches x 11 inches. It's actually a tad bigger, just big enough to throw off my photocopies for this issue. If you hold one and read it, it's skewed to the right a bit, and the text is cut off by the folds I made after folding it. This is what I got for trying to skip inking in each panel with black Sharpie and ink pens. One cool result of doing it in all black though was being able to use whiteout to create bubbles and flimsy and blotted looking effects for artwork. Those came out to my liking.
While at work one day, I had doodled a fish-thing with a lot of needle-like teeth, and so I dug out that sketch and tried to work it into an inside cover design. This was my first attempt at incorporating artwork that actually had something to do with the story or information contained within my zine issue. I think it worked out decently though in retrospect I should have made this issue that nice sky blue color.
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The inside cover featured a fish-thing leering with its needle-like teeth, and swimming in from the letters page.
The Letter Page:
April 2008
Dear Reader,
It's April, and that means that spring is officially here! Get on out there with your bad self and be inspired. Enjoy the GREEN! <3>Page 4-6:
Humankind is made more admirable when it admits its fears - rather than deny or hide from them.
Into the water he tumbled, but it was not the odd temperature, rather the lack of any buoyancy which disturbed him the most. He sank like an anchor, downward, and what he noticed immediately as his precious supply of oxygen trickled upward forever away from him, was the Stygian opacity of the water into which he had plummeted.
He was drowning.
He had been far below the catacombs of the Ward estate when he fell, but this impenetrable darkness was the final hole in the reserve of fortitude he had built in his mind, and fear burst from its confines and inundated his person. He felt the shameful warmth of urine passing out of his system and was horrified even more as quickly the warmth of that liquid floated away from him on his submerged descent.
His mouth, eyes, and nose stung as the foul liquid wore at him. He slowly tried to calm his frantic mind into a prayer, for he surely knew this would be his demise. Suddenly, a new sensation made its presence felt upon his skin, and a deeper, more primal terror surged in him far greater than the fear of a watery death.
He suddenly became agonizingly aware that he was not alone in the depths. Even as his brain shot spots before his eyes, demanding oxygen, he felt the water moving about him, churned by some unseen force in motion. Through no flailing of his limbs could he elevate his position in the water, and again he felt shame pass through him as he wet himself in response to the shock of a sliding bulk brushing against him.
It was solid, absolutely there, in the water with him, and of a size of greater immensity than his own. As his mind reeled from a lack of air and a desire to pray for salvation, the final thoughts that raced through his mind were of the atrocious pain from having foot-long teeth plunged through him, penetrating his torso.
He did finally gasp a final breath. It tasted stale and acrid, the air that entered his lungs as he gasped in pain under the water. The air stank of rancid meat and of death; the air from the beast's throat, and he was swallowed down whole in the swirling blackness of the water-filled pit beneath the catacombs. Where the beast dwelt, and a man had no business investigating.
Into the water he tumbled, but it was not the odd temperature, rather the lack of any buoyancy which disturbed him the most. He sank like an anchor, downward, and what he noticed immediately as his precious supply of oxygen trickled upward forever away from him, was the Stygian opacity of the water into which he had plummeted.
He was drowning.
He had been far below the catacombs of the Ward estate when he fell, but this impenetrable darkness was the final hole in the reserve of fortitude he had built in his mind, and fear burst from its confines and inundated his person. He felt the shameful warmth of urine passing out of his system and was horrified even more as quickly the warmth of that liquid floated away from him on his submerged descent.
His mouth, eyes, and nose stung as the foul liquid wore at him. He slowly tried to calm his frantic mind into a prayer, for he surely knew this would be his demise. Suddenly, a new sensation made its presence felt upon his skin, and a deeper, more primal terror surged in him far greater than the fear of a watery death.
He suddenly became agonizingly aware that he was not alone in the depths. Even as his brain shot spots before his eyes, demanding oxygen, he felt the water moving about him, churned by some unseen force in motion. Through no flailing of his limbs could he elevate his position in the water, and again he felt shame pass through him as he wet himself in response to the shock of a sliding bulk brushing against him.
It was solid, absolutely there, in the water with him, and of a size of greater immensity than his own. As his mind reeled from a lack of air and a desire to pray for salvation, the final thoughts that raced through his mind were of the atrocious pain from having foot-long teeth plunged through him, penetrating his torso.
He did finally gasp a final breath. It tasted stale and acrid, the air that entered his lungs as he gasped in pain under the water. The air stank of rancid meat and of death; the air from the beast's throat, and he was swallowed down whole in the swirling blackness of the water-filled pit beneath the catacombs. Where the beast dwelt, and a man had no business investigating.
Back Cover:
When was the last time you wrote something? I don't mean a text typed with your thumbs or a typo-filled e-mail. REALLY WROTE? You're a human right? Go express it...
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There it is. When I was little, I would read a lot of books on monsters, and I recall reading one about the Loch Ness Monster. It had a picture of the infamous "Surgeon's Photo" on 
the cover, and was a book all about the history of
the monster, dating back hundreds of years, and the scientific research that went into investigating it. Naturally, no conclusive evidence was presented, and the book ended without ever giving any concrete proof for the animal's existence. What fascinated and terrified me however was that divers voluntarily went into the Loch in hopes of finding this creature. I've never liked deep water, something about not being able to see the bottom always frightened me. The notion that water could be so black and opaque that even a flashlight couldn't penetrate it save for a yard in front of me, like they described Loch Ness in this book, scared the hell out of me.
I woke up from a nightmare one evening after reading this book. It involved me diving through the water of the Loch, shining my flashlight to and fro, swimming with my mask and air tank on. I swept the light to the left, nothing. Swept to the right, nothing. Then, three feet from me, so I could feel the water rushing by me. Something. Big. The last thing I remember from that dream was shining the light and just seeing an eye glaring at me, and then a mouth with teeth.
This story came about as a result of that dream still haunting me, and that listless summer spent working on campus as I entered my senior year of college.
the cover, and was a book all about the history ofthe monster, dating back hundreds of years, and the scientific research that went into investigating it. Naturally, no conclusive evidence was presented, and the book ended without ever giving any concrete proof for the animal's existence. What fascinated and terrified me however was that divers voluntarily went into the Loch in hopes of finding this creature. I've never liked deep water, something about not being able to see the bottom always frightened me. The notion that water could be so black and opaque that even a flashlight couldn't penetrate it save for a yard in front of me, like they described Loch Ness in this book, scared the hell out of me.
I woke up from a nightmare one evening after reading this book. It involved me diving through the water of the Loch, shining my flashlight to and fro, swimming with my mask and air tank on. I swept the light to the left, nothing. Swept to the right, nothing. Then, three feet from me, so I could feel the water rushing by me. Something. Big. The last thing I remember from that dream was shining the light and just seeing an eye glaring at me, and then a mouth with teeth.
This story came about as a result of that dream still haunting me, and that listless summer spent working on campus as I entered my senior year of college.
Hey, I saw your panel at the Ocean County Library on 1/10/09, just wanted to give you a round of applause on it, it was great!