The Adventures of Chedwick and Sven Comic Blog part 3

Hi there again. Thank you all for the wonderful feedback everyone has been given me about the comics. It is really appreciated and really makes my day to know that my comics bring a little laugh to everyone that reads them. Also, I'm very thankful for Truth for doign a front page article on the comics as it has really spread them for a lot of people to see. I often forget that people don't check the Fan art and Fiction section or the gallery section of this website. Getting it on the front page has attracted a bunch of 'Scapers that don't usually check out those sections.

This week I'm gonna talk a little bit about Mike Savisky and the history he has with me. In case you didn't know he's the other guy who works on the comics.

Mike is also 23, graduated from the same High School as myself, and just recently graduated from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh with a filming and writing degree if I remember correctly (I am probably wrong and Mike probably has a Doctorate in Clinical Parapatetic Restructuring or something). Anyway he spends his time writing, filming short movies, and various other things in the movie biz. He has made several award winning movie shorts and I'll go into more detail in a future blog about those. He is a great friend, a genius writer and filmmaker, and an hilarious artist.

Although we have a great friendship, this has not always been. Our long and illustrious history together started in High School on a more sour note: I was the new kid, he had been there for a few years. I admit I was really annoying in that I tried to butt in on inside jokes and stuff in a feeble attempt to be accepted into the groups at school. Mike was one of the ones to actually do something about it.

It was a fairly normal school day so far. Boring classes, unfinished homework, dreaded Latin class, pretty much what I expected in a day. The time came around for lunch: one of the best times of a school day. I decided to try and sit down with some of the "cool" kids in the class. Mike happened to be one of them, and our own friendly happyjosiah happened to be another person in the group. As I was setting my tray down Mike turned to me and said: "This seat's taken, we don't want you to sit here" (this is probably misquoted but the gist is the same). The situation was directly out of the Forrest Gump bus scene. I was crushed. The seat was obviously not taken, Mike just didn't want me to sit with all of them because he either found me too annoying or just plain hated my guts. It hurt. This was our relationship throughout most of freshman year.

By the end of my Sophmore year things improved quite a bit. I became a little more well known on the soccer field (I actually started getting off the bench and scoring goals), I was getting popular by getting better roles in the school plays, and all of this contributed to my increase in popularity in school. I have no idea what changed Michael's mind about me. I actually think it was something like how Andy operates in the show "The Office": It came from my ability to "slowly, and painfully, wear someone down" (I think that's the quote). Anyway, whether it was my increasing prowess on the field of soccer, or my interegator-esque ability to sway people to like me, Mike decided I wasn't that bad a guy.

He nonetheless still found joy in tormenting me by drawing pictures of how he imagined I actually looked like on the chalkboards of the school. I will have to post a picture of the "Early High School Brad" somewhere on here as they are ridiculous and funny. These drawings, as well as a shirt that apparently made me look like a vampire, led to the animated short: "Bracula".

This was the start of Caterpillar films. Well, not really, Mike and happyjosiah had been making Flash shorts for a little bit by now such as "Island Bob" and "Pandora's Ninja Box", but their breakthrough hit was the 8 minute long epic: "Bracula". It starred me, as an awkward and evil vampire bent on world domination, glory, and an attractive girl in school. It was a short fileld with inside jokes, funny Flash animation, and a bunch of voices. I myself contributed to a couple of the voices but actually didn't do my own. Another friend that had the mockery of my voice down to a science did Bracula. The "movie" was a hit and sealed the friendship between Mike and myself.

A couple of years later we graduated from High School and Mike and Josiah wanted to do the sequel to "Bracula". This was to be called: "The Son of Bracula" and it would star my little brother. This time I was fortunate to do my own voice, although I had to mimic (at least a little bit), the old mocking tone. I also did a bunch of other voices, including a minion who happened to be named "Chedwick". Notice the pattern of silly, glory-bound characters of mine that are named Chedwick. This movie was a whopping 30 minutes and was also a hit. Much better Flash animation and funny gigs that anyobody could enjoy, not just inside jokers. Both of them are available on DVD if anyone's interested I believe, and the 1st one is on Newgrounds I believe. I'll have to post a link.

Anyway that is a short hsitory of Caterpillar films. When I first started to make the comics I ran the ideas over with Josiah and Mike, and using my figures, terrain, etc, and Mike's camera and computer comic program, the comics were born. I needed a name under each comic and didn't really wanted it to be my name, Mike's name, and Josiah's name. I instead instantly created a branch of Caterpillar films called "Caterpillar Comics". Original, I know.

Mike is the wonderful guy who takes all those awesome pictures that make up the comics. His work on the computer program "Comic Life", is what makes the production value so good.

The next comic I reveal to Heroscapers will showcase Mike's artistic talent even more. Mike is a wonderful artist when it comes to drawing. He could make his own drawn comics if he had a mind to. He instead just enjoys making little doodles. The next comic will see Sven drawn on paper. I will do another blog talking about the comic in more detail later, but this should serve as an adequate teaser.

Thank you to all who read the comics and I hope you will continue to do so as I continue to release them. Please let me know what you think and PM me with suggestions, comments, etc. I hope this blog, and the one to come, will help people appreciate Mike's work on the comics just as much as mine and really appreciate the artistic talent that Mike has.

Thanks for reading and have a great day!