Seasons

A New Year's comic about living life at your own pace

This was originally pitched for the Wordle Review as an end-of-year comic, but I think it still works as a New Year’s comic as well. I hope it can be a reminder for myself and anyone else that needs to hear it that it’s ok to live life at your own pace, regardless of how society might make us feel.

✦ Ideation + Sketches ✦

In the original pitch, this comic was formatted to include five Wordle squares and the script was very loosely written. After deciding to develop this concept for myself, I reworked the composition to fit in the square format I usually use for my short comics and balanced out the sequence by adding a cover page.

Reworked sketches

Character study

While researching the process of caring for a bonsai tree to use as a visual metaphor for self-care, I quickly learned how much work it takes to maintain a perfectly manicured tree. A fun fact I learned is that some junipers, the trees I referenced for this comic, turn a shade of purple-green during their dormant period in winter. I really wanted to use this color, especially because it worked well in contrast to the bright juniper berries in the final page. So I let that guide what eventually became the overall palette, with some help from Poline, a fascinating color palette generator.

Black and white flats

Final color and type

Ironically, while working on this comic as a personal project over the holiday break, I caught a cold so I really did have to force myself to slow down while working on a comic about letting yourself rest. Thankfully, I’m starting to feel a bit better and working on this comic was a nice way to set the tone for 2025.

I hope with the pressures that tend to surface at this time of year, everyone is treating themselves kindly 💚