vampire comics from my (@sn0wbat's) sketchbooks! irregular schedule - if there is anything in the queue, it posts at 6 PM CEST. turning on the notifications may be recommended.
I make these for fun, so I don't really put too much pressure on myself to keep up with deadlines and such.
It's chill. It's chaotic. It's not written in the correct order. It's... well...
Low Stakes is my rather light-hearted comic about my queer vampires - I don't really try to restrict myself to any genre, so anything is possible really. Friends have described it as a supernatural slice-of-life, which probably isn't too far off.
Essentially, this is just me thinking about my OCs and documenting it on paper. Bits and pieces of their undead lives.
It all started with an unwanted turning, and it just kinda snowballed from there! :D
The full comic is found mainly on Toyhou.se, but this tumblr is fairly caught up. New comics will pop up now and then - the schedule is set to 6 PM CEST, if there is anything in the queue.
Tag system and navigation below the cut.
The Tag System
A mobile-friendly, brief overview of the tags I use here.
For more information and on-blog chrono tags, click the headers. (desktop only, probably. also very WIP.)
Sketchbook tags
01 small beginnings
02 the pink one
03 teddy bear
04 linnanmäki
05 moomin
06 duct taped spine
07 the green one
08 navy blue
09 wine red
---
📚 misc sketchbooks
-
Story tags
📕 main story
Things from the main story section of the toyhouse mirror. The red book emoji notes that it is in sketchbook order - so yes, it will be a bit jumbled up, as it is appearing in the order it appears in my sketchbooks. The order I draw them in. Sorry to say, I do not always make these in a linear, chronological order. This became a coherent story by accident.
📗 bonus bits
Things from the bonus section of the toyhouse mirror. Mostly still canon, unless it has the "old and outdated" tag!
📘 linear story
Not really a thing yet, though ideally, this will be the version of my comic that you can read linearly on tumblr. Singular page per post. Flip through them like a book. Will it ever happen? Who knows!
For now, if you simply want to read the whole thing chronologically, there's always this.
The chapters
Titles are, of course, subject to change, in which case I will change the names of these links.
📕 prologue
📕 obliviously undead
📕 batventures
📕 slayer intermission
📕 getting used to this
📕 the hunt
📕 vanpires
📕 viking discovery
📕 sailing
📕 abandoned grounds
📕 more sailing
📕 home to mother
📕 most pathetic slayer
📕 there has been a timeskip
-
Cast tags
For when you'd like to see specific characters!
Vampires 🦇
Main guys: Morten | Bat | Rune | Einarr
More: Helena | Loki Nyx | Eli | Rupert | Stone | Pyrite | Moonstone | Aurinko | Simo
Ancients: Tiberius | The Lord | Laugar | Hvasshár | Kvikindi
sometimes miis will ask me if it's okay to change their hair, and just for the hell of it, i tend to accept. just to see how it looks.
rune kept it like that for like a week bc the pastel green was honestly cute and i could see it happening, but tbh i changed mort back immediately. because no.
well gosh. thing is, i do have character playlists, but whether they'd actually listen to what's in the playlist is another question.
so basically,
vague details under the cut
morten: just... nerd shit, honestly. whatever spotify called "otacore" a while back.
my playlist for them is mostly kinda silly-sounding stuff that's mostly lighthearted with maybe screwed up lyrics, as well as thematically appropriate angsty stuff, but really, they have the music taste of a chronically online autistic nerd. they're also not super deep into any particular genre, as they just kinda vibe with whatever catches their ears, you know? toss in some norwegian stuff too ofc and u got it. heck, toss in some vocaloid too, why not. very likely to listen to hours long playlists of video game OST compilations.
bat: my playlist for him somehow ended up being full of emo stuff and just generally harder stuff. he's a perpetual teenager who likes shit LOUD. or at least as loud as his ears will allow. which isn't very. so he may listen to things at a surprisingly low volume??? but that's just the vibe he enjoys a lot. he is also very likely to listen to stuff on repeat and not give morten back their phone for hours.
rune: my playlist for him is full of 80s stuff with lyrics that remind me of him, as well as maybe some other songs that also remind me of him. would he listen to that? maybe - it sure is a vibe i associate with him. and, i do know that queen is probably one of his favorite bands. but yeah. he did have some mixtapes in his car and he did expose bat and morten to them at some point.
einarr: not exactly the biggest music listener. my playlist for him has a lot of nordic folk and just generally viking-sounding vibes, lots of fiddles and ancient instruments really, as well as songs about the sea and exploration, just generally chill stuff that reminds me of him. however, would he listen to all that? that's unlikely - he's just really out of the loop when it comes to music. he literally hasn't owned any music player (grammophone.) in maybe a century, and even back then, he wasn't using it very often. honestly i think he prefers live music... as long as it's not amplified like hell, his ears don't really like that. just completely acoustic stuff, you know.
(however, it should be noted that liv tried to introduce him to her goth playlist once... he didn't hate it?? specifically the more echoey stuff. he liked that.)
alright, time for a little transparency. what has this months long hiatus been about?
so here's the thing: for the past year, my workflow has been entirely disrupted, and i have been absolutely wrecked from it.
that's the short version of it.
i go into more detail under the readmore.
see, i would normally do these comics at work. that's where i'd find the time for them, in between the actual work tasks, which was pinning curtains ready for sewing. i'd do the pinning, and i'd be thinking a lot about my comics while doing it. it just long enough to take some time, i worked fast yet accurately, as i'd be itching to get back to my sketchbook to doodle, do the thing i actually cared about. the department manager did get grumpy about it sometimes, but i drew some things for work sometimes too, so it was fine. the higher ups at work actually loved my art.
drawing when i'm supposed to be doing literally anything else is simply how i work best. this has been true since my school days. of course, at school it actually helped me pay attention. and as i entered the workforce, i desperately tried to hold onto the habit. it worked for a while!
however, as of last year, my work department, the way i knew it, is basically gone. it's a complicated situation, but when it disbanded, i was left alone with way more time on my hands than i knew what to do with.
i'm still at the same workplace, but they didn't entirely know what other department to place me in, so for the first half of the day, for nearly a year now, i've.. been mostly on my own?? nothing much to do the first half of the day, besides drawing - that was the idea of it. they cannot fire me anyway, that's not how it works in my country. so instead they made drawing my official task. i did not actually want that.
and sure, there are some other minor tasks i do here that are still important, but i do them fairly quickly, and then i'm back to basically nothing. in theory, this should give me plenty of time to doodle my own things, but in practice, this is really not optimal conditions for getting inspiration, whatsoever.
my old coworkers would come back for the second half of the day, so that's when things would actually happen again, but that's also when i'm not really allowed to draw, because "i've had plenty of time the first half". even though it's the second half of the workday i'd usually be the most inspired. you see the problem here??
the delicate balance that allowed me to create comics for eight years without immediately burning out... gone. it's gone. i did burn out.
drawing time stopped being a reward for my hard work, and instead became a bit of a burden. i hate it. i want it to be fun again. i don't know how. doing it all at home does not work as well - that is not the sketchbook zone. i don't know how to make it one. historically i've mostly made art in defiance of having to do other things, it has been my favorite procrastination activity. what is there to procrastinate on, anymore?
combine this with the whole existential crisis of turning 30 recently and you can imagine i haven't been doing all that well. frankly, i've mostly been feeling like shit.
i miss my vampires so much, man. i miss them. i had so many comics written down, several ideas too, in hopes of getting to draw them when i have the time, energy and motivation again. sure, i would have done them spontaneously - writing the script same time as i was drawing it out - but sometimes that just doesn't work out and all i can do is write, so that's why scripting still happened. it's better than nothing.
all the comics i've managed to do these past months have mostly been short one-shots. some of them are already on my toyhouse. i've been meaning to post them here too, but then i have to deal with my tag system.... and that's when it becomes a burden again. why did i think a dedicated blog was a good idea... getting help would be nice...
low stakes is meant to be just that. very low-stakes, for the characters, and for myself. a comic i am not under any obligation to do, something i just wanna do for fun, when it's possible. over the years it grew from a silly vampire gag comic into a story on its own, kinda organically, out of order. i do want to wrap up what i have. i want to rewrite+draw some scenes that still need it. there's an end point, and the rest after it is epilogue/sequel shenanigans, which also already exists, due to the nonlinear nature of this all.
i think it's filled with a sense of hope and escapism i might have lost currently. a sense of closetedness i am all too familar with. it's a reflection of my very soul, each character with a facet of myself within, but my self love is currently at an all time low.
do people still care? i hope so. it's honestly kind of hard to tell. is it all still worth it?
so yes, i guess you could say i'm a bit depressed at the moment. i guess it caught up with me. how long can one stay in the closet before it tears down one's mental health? hell, do i even want to come out to my family, ever? i've been avoiding it so hard. i'm scared. i do not fit into their mormon worldview, and if i ever actually showed them my comic, it would probably be equivalent to sort of outing myself anyway.
anyway. this turned out a bit long, it's probably way more information than you ever needed to know.
i don't want to say my comic is over. it's on a major break. maybe i'll post some small comics from time to time, but it'll mostly be bonus stuff. rare bursts of inspiration.
i just need to find myself again. develop better habits, better adapted to whatever's going on. find my sense of hope again. i really miss it. i miss whatever drove me to draw over 600 pages and bits of comics. i just want it back, man.
