Author: Ethan Nicolle

Today is a great day.  Today we release the Micharl Maher painting print and we find out if Axe Cop has ever been in a band in Ask Axe Cop #36:

And now, I know a lot of you have been waiting for this one, so here it is.  We are now offering the Axe Cop painting by Michael Maher in the Axe Shop.  We are offering 25 signed by Malachai and I as Axe Cop's creators.  I realize it would be great to get the artist to sign this, but it's not really within our means to make that happen, sending prints all over the US, packing and unpacking them would become kind of a mess.  So if you really want yours signed by Michael you can probably try to catch him at a convention.  This is a very beautiful painting and will look awesome framed on anyone's wall.

If things go as planned we will be doing Chop Cast #5 tonight.  Stay tuned.  More Baby Man revelations on Friday, and the story Malachai and I are working on now… I can't wait til you read it.

Ethan

Today Malachai and I were signing Wexter prints with silver sharpies and he said “I love being famous.  Do you love being famous Ethan?”  What made it so funny is that he really doesn't know what fame is, he just liked writing his name in the cool marker on the prints.  To him that was enough awesomeness right there.  After we finished signing and I packed all the prints up, I finished today's episode…

On wednesday, if all goes as planned, we will be releasing the second full color Axe Cop print in the Axe Cop Art Shop.  It will be the Michael Maher painting pictured below. 

Like the Wexter print, we will be offering a limited amount signed.  We will only offer 25 up front, but the signed edition will cap at 100.  But to not wear Malachai out we are doing them in sets of 25.  So while your print may be numbered #2 of 100, #50 of 100 may never be made… it just depends how much Malachai is willing to do.  So keep your eyes on the store for that and I will announce it when the prints are made available.

I am looking forward to the Ask Axe Cop coming out on Wednesday… “Has Axe Cop Ever Been in a Rock Band?” 

Ethan

Friends,

If you have not yet listened to the CHOP!, I want to let you know we have adopted it as the official Axe Cop pod cast and I have decided to become a regular part of the show- this week's episode featured an appearance by Malachai and I.  But first, today's comic episode brings us new information about Baby Man…

So, back to CHOP.  Here is the situation:  the downloads have not been real substantial on the show, and if they don't pick up over the next few episodes we will have to chop its head off.  We have different things we want to try on it, but the main thing we are using it for is as sort of a commentary on the comic itself.  James and John discuss the comic as fans and I chime in and reveal some of the inside baseball and how different things came about.  It's a lot of fun.  We also plan on doing some contests where you could win a signed Wexter print or become one of the background stand in characters on an Axe Cop page.

If you have listened and have suggestions, feel free to send them our way.  I think that if you are genune Axe Cop fan this show is a lot of fun.  So please subscribe on iTunes or go to the site and give it a listen.  Last Wednesday's episode featured anappearance by Malachai himself:

We have more work to do on CHOP and most of that I am leaving up to James and John because I have comics to draw, but I hope you'll give CHOP a listen, and become a fan on Facebook.  If you enjoy CHOP and have friends who like Axe Cop, please spread it around and share it. 

Remember we are on a M-W-F schedule now with pages.  I am looking forward to next week's Ask Axe Cop.  See you Monday!

Ethan

It's good to be back to the birthplace of Axe Cop.  It's been harder to get work done, but here is a new page for you… thanks for being patient during the transition.

I wish I could give you more details about the purpose of the trip, but it I will say it is to work on an epic Axe Cop story.  My brain is a little drained right now (as it usually gets when I get up here… I am not used to the environment, my 6 year old brother, 12 and 13 year old sisters all battling for attention… it's exhausting).  I will still have to strategize to get Malachai's brain open.  In general I have been bribing him by trading him Axe Cop writing time for time playing games on my iPod Touch.  I am pretty sure it's the chainsaw in Zombieville on my iPod that inspired the chainsaw in Chapter 2 of Axe Cop.  Whatever happens, we have an big month ahead of us.  With any luck I will get Malachai on the Axe Cop podcast soon.  Thanks for keeping up.

So, my plan is to try to do a Mon-Wed-Fri schedule with an Ask Axe Cop usually falling on Wednesday.  Today I didn't have any Ask Axe Cop material, and I felt the story had been on hold long enough, so I did a story page.  Expect a messy month, since writing time with Malachai takes priority over everything, I'll do my best to keep it on schedule, but my number one goal is to write an epic with Malachai.  I love this kid!

Ethan

photo by Zero Dean

I arrived in my little brother's home town last night.  My computer is now set up and a new page is started, but as you can imagine I am in a new environment.  We had Zero Dean come by today and snap pictures of Malachai and I.  He is on a trip all over the US taking pictures.  If you have a moment, check out his web page.

I am pretty disoriented still… I am hoping to get onto a Monday/Wednesday/Friday schedule with the comic, so I will update tomorrow.  Wednesday would usually be an Ask Axe Cop day, but I think I will do story pages on Wednesday and Friday this week.

My level of distraction is way up now that I am in a house full of younger siblings, and especially since this is the beginning of my first visit back since the Axe Cop Christmas that will go down in infamy.   Bear with me this month… getting work done will be hard, but the big goal is writing.

I was interrupted about 17 times during this blog.

Ethan

Axe Cop in a go-kart… it's like mario kart but with more killing.

Keep your eye on the downloads page.  I don't have time right this minute, but later today their will be Wexter desktops available for download… and I will have some widescreen resolution files as well.

In case you missed the announcment yesterday, we have the new Wexter Print available in the store.  The signed prints sold out already… and most of the people who bought them got a hell of a deal because we screwed up on the pricing… pricing everyone for a 14×24 print when the prints are actually 23×40.  We actually had the price way wrong when the very first guy ordered and he got a $35 off.  Ah well… learning to be a web merchant takes time and mistakes.

Anyway, if you haven't read the last couple blogs, I am heading off to Washington this weekend to start a big new Axe Cop project with Malachai.  We are going to work together in person for a month, so expect a lot of goodies from us and some more videos.  This will be my first visit since that fateful Christmas when we made up Axe Cop.  The effect this trip will have on the current strip is this… there will be no axe cop strip tomorrow or Monday.  Once I get set back up and in the swing of things up in Washington I will try to put out two episodes and one Ask Axe Cop a week (mon, wed, fri).  You will get less Axe Cop for a while, but it's all for more down the road. 

Good job tricking the bad guys!!

Ethan

Today, two big things happen… first, an important development in Baby Man's duck chase…

And now, finally, we present to you the Wexter print!  There are a few options here… a coupel sizes in the non-signed category.  The signed prints are limited to 25 (cost extra too) and started selling before I even have had a chance to announce them, so if you want one you better get on it!

People are wanting more details than I can currently give on my coming trip with Malachai.  Let me say for now, we are working on a big Axe Cop story.  I also want to make another video with him (or a few), get some pictures together, and create together… we have been doing Axe Cop together since Christmas over the phone.  I think you will see new life breathed into the comic when I am creating with him in person.  I also just really like to visit my family.

I'll post wallpapers of this image tomorrow.  There will bemore prints becoming available soon… we wll be selling the Axe Cop painting by Michael Maher, and we will also be selling a run of prints of episode 1 signed and Ask Axe Cop 8 signed.  We will also be implementing an option to get a print of your favorite episodes or panels too.  More to come… I need to get tomorrow's episode done so I can start packing.

Ethan

Another slice of Axe Cop's childhood.  Today we find out who raised Axe Cop after he and Flute Cop's parents were brutally slain (see Axe Cop 0 if you didn't know about that). 

If you did not read yesterday's blog entry, do!  We are releasing our Wexter on the Moon print tomorrow as soon as the new episode goes up (around 2pm pacific time most likely).  So if you want to get one of the first 25 signed by Malachai and me, it may be wise to be watching the site.

Other than that, Curtana made a bunch more icons and they are now up on the downloads page.  If you use one and enjoy it, send her a thankyou on her page.

Also, a reminder that there will be no Friday episode this week, and starting next week I will be going down to a 3 episode a week schedule to give me more time to write with Malachai.  I will be driving up to see Malachai for a month, so I need to spend as much of that time as I can writing with him, I can do all the drawing later.  I'll have to play it by ear.  You will get less Axe Cop for a while, but it's all for more in the future.  I should say that there will most likely be no new episode up Monday either.  It is a long drive for me, it will take a couple days and I need to see some friends along the way.  It's the great Axe Cop road trip.

Ethan

Hey head choppers!  This is a big week…  I have a lot to talk about, but first let's get to today's episode.

Now, you may remember the Wexter project from blogs gone by.  Well, FINALLY it is done.  The very talented Jamie Noguchi was kind enough to take on the task of coloring this beast and he did a lot of work.  He sent me this file a while back.

Me, being the picky control freak I am, went ahead and did some more work on it.  This file is so huge it literally took 10-15 minutes to save every time I habitually hit CTRL S, so it has been quite a project.  I finally called it good this weekend.  Here it is with all the final touches I added:

You may see only my signature is on that one- Jamie forgot to sign his work so I am having him send it to me. 

We are starting a new line of prints soon in the store.  They will be more spendy then anything we have sold yet, but these will be very high quality art prints that you can frame and hang on good long-lasting paper.  We will be selling a limited run of 150 of these prints numbered.  The first 25 will be signed by both Malachai and I, and will cost extra.  This will be the first time we have sold anything signed by both Malachai and myself, and because of the amount of shipping it around and the fact that Malachai is not going to be real keen on writing his name over and over we are keeping the limit on these low.

These prints will go on sale on Wednesday when I release the new episode, so stay tuned if you are interested in buying them.  They will be for sale in the Axe Cop Art Shop.

Fair warning… I will be taking Friday off this week.  On Friday I will be starting my road trip up to see Malachai and spend a month with him so that we can hang out and write the most epic Axe Cop adventure yet.  There are more details about this project I can't really divulge yet, but it's going to be awesome.  For now, I just need to warn you that I will need to switch the release schdule down to 3 ays a week during my visit so I can make plenty of time to work with Malachai.  I am even have to do less, but we will play it by ear.  I am lookng forward to the opportunities being there will afford, since this is my first visit since Christmas when we actually made Axe Cop.  We will probably do a new video together and maybe do a live ustream broadcast and answer questions.  More on that as it develops, just rest assured Axe Cop fans are in for some great stuff.

So stay tuned for the Wexter print and more.  I will also post a desktop wallpaper of this image later this week as well.  Thanks for reading Axe Cop!!

Ethan

The Baby Man chases reaches new levels today… I want to see this live action so bad.

In other news, a ton of people have been sending me a link to the Daily Show, which aired a clip from Fox News in which it appears Axe Cop was being interviewed.  A guy named Kurt sent me this screen shot:

Ok, so in truth this is John Stossel, but with that cop suit on he is the spitting image of axe cop.  You can check out the clip here, it is at about 13:30.  Ironically, Stossel is known for his libertarian views on economics, and if you watch the first motion comic and turn on the closed caption audio transcription, Axe Cop is called “Tax Cut”.  It seems Axe Cop is a small government man.  He may be a cop, but as far as we know he is freelance and not government employed.  I need to check with Malachai on that one.

Speaking of motion comics… the guy we had working on episode 2 was doing brilliant work, but has sort of stopped replying to emails.  I'm hoping he is OK, but we are starting to think we may have to start completely over on episode 2.  This is a bummer… sorry for the long delay.  We hope to get it out as soon as we can.  Have a great weekend, see you Monday.

Ethan