Google Plus Home

May

October

  • retweet
    New Mind Management post: on Finishing Things
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    This is really interesting, not only because it's an interesting product but because when I first saw it I didn't realize that they were "sidestepping" Kickstarter. Very interesting that when you go to their site they show a public total, % of goal and number of backers. 

    "DIY Kickstarter" is not too hard if you have good web-dev skills, you already have a good self-promotional network, and you're reasonably confident that you can move your minimum. What I'm wondering is how they managed to get around the pesky legality issues around paying for preorders, and what they had planned in case their goal wasn't met?

    One of the more interesting ways to use Kickstarter, in my opinion, is for the "let's hit the baseline and then make the product better" model. I think the best examples of that model are the kickstarters for Benign Kingdom, http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/benignkingdom/benign-kingdom-fall-2012, Skin Deep http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/963152868/skin-deep-exchanges-the-secret-lives-of-monster-pe?ref=live, and Bite Me Reprint http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dmeconis/the-dylan-meconis-library-2012?ref=live

    I like that they go beyond the standard pre-order mechanism and use the platform as an opportunity to build an even more amazing product. I'd love to see that done outside KS, but pouring that kind of money into a "random" site requires even more trust than KS. What happens if this project fails? I wonder...

    It's really fascinating watching this whole crowdsourcing thing shake itself out and normalize, exciting times. 
    0 likes0 hits

September

  • retweet
    New post on Mind Management, for those who may be interested in such things :) I said we were going back to basics... This post is about as basic as it gets!
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Hey! Uh, Did you know that I've been maintaining a blog about time management for THREE YEARS NOW ALREADY? H-how is this possible. 

    http://www.angelamay.ca/index.php/index/

    Anyway it's called "Mind Management" and I just finished making a new index so it's easier to find the foundation posts, and I'm gonna start a series that reviews the "foundation" tactics and how they've changed over the last few years so this is a good time for new people to jump on.

    SO IF YOU'VE EVER WONDERED how I could possibly work a full time engineering job and maintain a regularly updating webcomic of modest repute - this is the blog to follow.  I post tactics, time management tricks, mind hacks, and pep talks. Mostly. 

    Wait-What?? Why on EARTH do you have a blog about time managment??
    Because it was the only thing I could do that was nerdier than a webcomic about engineering.

    I kid, I made the blog for a variety of reasons:

    - I was interested in blogging as a thing and I wanted to make a blog to try out some of the techniques I was reading about. I saw some blogs and thought "Hey! I could probably do that, that looks like fun." Incidentally this is not so different from how I got into webcomics :P

    - I get asked fairly frequently how I manage to balance all this nonsense I've gotten into online with a Real Life and such. I never had an easy answer because what I do is pretty complicated, so I started the blog to explain it. So now when I get asked I can go "Here! Look. Read this if you want to know. It's.... it's really long, sorry about that. Good luck!"

    - I used to write these long rambly rants when I was sad (ah, Livejournal) and I've found it more productive to give myself a pep talk instead. I like explaining stuff and I think this might help someone! Maybe. 

    - I'm...... kind of obsessed with time management and lifehacks. 

    - I really like typing. I type fast.

    How have you been doing this for three years and this is the first I've heard of it.

    Yeah, uh, here's the thing: I never know who to tell when I've updated! My twitter is very comic focused and comedic, so the Mind Management posts always seemed out of place. Same with tumblr. I didn't want to mix it up with Wasted Talent, people go there for sillyness. Mind Management isn't very silly. Google plus might work ok, we might be able to try that out.

    Also it took awhile before I found my "voice" over there, I think I have an ok voice to use now. It's more casual than what I started with (I wanted it to be more professional but it really wasn't working out.)

    What else do I need to know?

    I don't have an update schedule right now, but I post regularly. In 3 years I've made 91 posts so that's about a post every other week. Mostly I just post when there's something I want to talk about and I let it go when things get crazy in other areas (work, conventions, books, etc.) But I promise it won't die! Use RSS, RSS is your friend.

    You're crazy.

    #SIGH......... yeah. I know.

    ANYWAY, if that interests you, check it out.

    ... otherwise, carry on
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Photos from yesterday's hike - BCMC up Grouse and Goat Mountain Peak (had to re-upload because the G+ app was being a pill yesterday >:/)
    0 likes0 hits

August

  • retweet
    *New on Zen Habits* Happiness is Uncovering What You Already Have.
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Whoa, guys, remember when NASA put a ROBOT on MARS??
    That was pretty awesome. 
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Ohhh, read comics in public day is tomorrow!
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    This is excellent. It's so easy to find books to read NOW and I'm so excited for it to become even easier in the future. Of course, some books are just narrowly missing the direct-to-ebook trend, and I'm very grateful for these Brooklynites for preserving them! :D

    "In print" should be thought of as the writer's equivalent to the "no generics" timeperiod applied to prescription drugs. They help the creator recoup the cost of producing it, and then it becomes much, much easier to obtain. Huzzah!
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Whoa!
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Fiiinallyyyyyy, just last winter I was wanting to buy one of these for Trevor as a birthday gift. 
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Fantastic article about fear and anxiety
    0 likes0 hits

July

  • retweet
    "Brandalism" - the act of subverting fiercely defended brands. This is really interesting! We went through a similar thing in Vancouver when the Olympics were in town - the use of the rings and anything with "Olympic" in it was fiercely defended. They almost closed down "Olympia Pizza" on Denman st., which had been open for over twenty years (http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/news/story.html?id=657daec0-134e-4edf-90c3-ac57565c478b). You could be arrested for displaying a sign that VANOC didn't want to be viewed in public.

    But this method of using fiercely-copyrighted characters, and modifying existing signage is an interesting form of protest. It reminds me a lot of what KC Green is doing with his off-model Garfs and Shreks, but I'm not sure that's explicitly an act of protest. This also echoes a bit of what happened in the seventies in the alt-comix scene with off-model Mickey Mouses. (drat, I can't find a link for that last bit... I saw it in some documentary).
    1 likes4 hits
  • retweet
    Rule 63 is my favourite rule, I'm not gonna lie
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Rule 63 is my favourite rule, I'm not gonna lie
    1 likes1 hits
  • retweet
    Haha... this is definitely me. I need to know RIGHT NOW and if I can't find the answer it just drives me nuts for the rest of the day 0_o 
    1 likes1 hits
  • retweet
    PART 2 due to crashdom - Join me and the creators of Dresden Codak and Nedroid for a live Q&A! #comfycon
    ComfyCon Vengeance Panel
    1 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Join me and the creators of Dresden Codak and Nedroid for a live Q&A! #comfycon
    Comfycon Vengeance Parade
    1 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Grouse mountain - BCMC trail
    1 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Angela Melick hung out with 1 person. #hangoutsonair
    1 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Angela Melick is hanging out with 1 person right now in a live Hangout On Air! #hangoutsonair
    1 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    ComfyCon Day 3 continues at 3pm ET with myself, Howard Taylor of Schlock Mercenary and Bill Barnes of Unshelved & Not Invented Here: ComfyCon Day 3: Beards Gone Wild
    1 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    We tried a google live event for the first time last night. It's perfect to collect photos... where people get progressively drunker and the photos get progressively more blurry and abstract :p
    1 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Angela Melick hung out with 1 person. #hangoutsonair
    1 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    ComfyCon 2012 is happening!

    So as you might have noticed, everyone in the world is at San Diego Comic Con right now! Well, actually not quite everyone. For various reasons some of us are not at Comic Con but we've decided that we should have some fun, too. So we're doing con-like things for the internet :) Panels! Hangouts! Art sales! All online from our various corners of North America.

    Here’s my tentative schedule:

    Thursday night LATE (9-10 pm PST): I'll be loitering around the internet, possibly stream-bombing (ew that actually sounds kinda gross). 
    Friday night VERY LATE (midnight PST++): POSSIBLE late night hangouts?? I'm having some comicker friends over, but WHO KNOWS what I'll decide to do after or what state I'll be in *_* 
    Saturday evening (after dinner PST): Streaming the next comic. Either Ustream or G+ hangouts, who knows
    Sunday: Maybe I'll do a breakfast panel! I'll probably also do another late night thing. Depends on the weather, there might be some daytime sunmadness involved. 

    Comfycon is supposed to be very chill and spontaneous, so the best thing to do if you want to participate is CHECK TWITTER and follow the #comfycon hastag.

    Psst! Did you know you can use webcomictweets to do this? :) http://webcomictweets.com/hash/comfycon

    Danielle says these things that I just copied due to laziness:
    "Also, there is a strict zero pants rule, and that goes for anyone who, in spirit, is attending ComfyCon. Dress accordingly."

    Here are the others you should follow!

    Aaron Diaz (Dresden Codak) +Aaron Diaz 
    Anthony Clark (Nedroid) +Anthony Clark 
    Danielle Corsetto (Girls With Slingshots) +Danielle Corsetto 
    Bill Barnes (Unshelved, Not Invented Here) +Bill Barnes 
    Howard Taylor (Schlock Mercenary) +Howard Tayler 
    Randy Milholland (Something Positive) +r.k. milholland 

    And note that I'll probably be doing things from my personal G+: +Angela Melick 

    Click here for more linky goodness:
    http://www.wastedtalent.ca/blog/jam/comfycon-2012-happening
    1 likes1 hits
  • retweet
    http://www.adafruit.com/blog/2012/07/10/happy-birthday-nikola-tesla-2/
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    This is an insane roundup of all the Sci Fi shows shot in Vancouver. Crazypants!

    PS ARE YOU GUYS WATCHING CONTINUUM? Let's all watch Continuum, ok! It's the first time Vancouver doesn't have to pretend to be somewhere else :) I just got caught up over the weekend and it's a fun show. http://continuumtheseries.com/
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Yesterday Lucky & I climbed The Chief (a big rock in Squamish). Here are some photos of trees and rocks that I took :)
    0 likes1 hits
  • retweet
    I... I love the internet
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Trevor took some video of me riding (downhill mountain biking) this past weekend! I ride very cautiously because I'm terrified of everything but I am much better than I was a few years ago :D

    If you'd like to watch someone who actually doesn't suck at riding you should watch Trevor's own video :) : Trevor Biking Canada Day Weekend
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Lots of handy stuff in here for my fellow Plusmanauts :)
    0 likes0 hits

June

  • retweet
    "Passageway for Trains and Lovers and also Lovers who get Hit by Trains"
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    This is so cool! But if I had this in my house I would never, ever sleep ever again. I already see faces in things when they aren't there, hiding them in stuff intentionally.... _
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Today instead of going home after work I went to Lynn Canyon. This was a good decision.
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Cell phone nesting dolls.... so cute! 
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    No, I'm not jogging I'm being chased by a psychotic robocopter haaaaaaaaaaaallllppppppppp!
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Sun Yat Sen gardens
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Scrap - pilot facility
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Everyone go enjoy Boumeries, it's so adorable~
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    A photo from our testing facility.
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    Today I shipped the last of the special editions of Welcome to the Real World! And so concludes a project that I'd been focused on for over six months (the real effort to finish book 2 started in about November). I wanted to take a moment again to thank you all for your tremendous support of this book. 

    I seriously, genuinely, could not have printed a professional-quality full-colour book without readers like you who support it. Whether you bought the Extreme edition, or an ebook, or retweeted/one upped/etc. my announcements, or just took the time to say "hey, that's cool - good luck with that!" it all makes a huge difference. I've had a lot of fun sharing my silly true stories with you, and I'm proud of this book and how well it's done.

    I love comics and I love books as an art form but we all know the publishing world is changing. I'd like to think that the success of WTTRW is an example of what the future could be. All I had was an idea and enough people willing to support a truly indie title. It was a LOT of work, but I had to make exactly zero compromises. I made the book I wanted the way I wanted without stressing about a big publisher's deadlines and rules. So THANK YOU for being the people who made it all possible. Publishers are great, but they don't work for every situation and I'm grateful for alternatives. I'm excited for the future. 

    Of course, books are still available :) (https://www.wastedtalent.ca/shop/product/welcome-real-world) and I'm happy to announce that the ebook edition of Welcome to the Real World will soon be avaialable for direct download from my shop. (Gonna set that up tonight). I'm hoping to release the third book in the fall of 2013. 

    Now, while many of my overseas supporters (and myself) anxiously await the arrival of their parcels, I'm going to take a creative break. Not a break from creating, mind you, but I'm going to allow myself to draw stupid robots or bike in the park or whatever I want!!! 
    0 likes2 hits
  • retweet
    This orchid was a stick all winter but I was patient and it bloomed again! Yayyy
    0 likes0 hits

April

March

February

  • retweet
    I made a short little timelapse of making a Wasted Talent comic start-to-finish! This is one of the bonus comics from the new book. Hope you like it! :)
    0 likes0 hits
  • retweet
    So apparently discovery is making an engineering contest-reality show?

    http://pilgrimstudios.com/casting/topengineer/

    This was sent my way earlier, a request for engineers to apply to a show called "*Top Engineer*".

    From the casting site itself:
    We are looking for visual effects experts, accomplished home shop machinists, contractors and engineers with backgrounds in electrical, civil, structural or mechanical engineering. No, you don’t need to have an engineering degree to compete on this show, but you MUST be able to design, build, test and integrate an idea into a final product that WORKS.

    I was curious about this, and the casting director let me pester her for with a few questions:

    Time commitment? A few days in April for casting and about a month for filming (May)

    Structure? The casting director didn't know for sure but she said it would probably be a mixture of games and real-world problems.

    Drama? She said something to the effect of "obviously drama is good for TV, but this is Discovery, not Jersey Shore" (haha, fair enough)

    What is this mysterious prize, how much are we talking here? She wouldn't tell me in detail (aww) but she did say it would be "worth competing for".

    So there you go, engineering reality show in the pipeline. I'm a fan of Discovery's other shows, and while reality TV leaves things to be desired, in my opinion the more people who know about engineering as a possible career-path the better.
    0 likes0 hits

    • 1 2

Array ( [id] => 1 [author] => angelamelick [name] => Angela Melick [webcomic_name] => Wasted Talent [twitter_username] => angelamelick [twitter_id] => 18252740 [website_official] => http://www.wastedtalent.ca [tags] => artist,workplace,webcomic,autobio,canada,bc [approved] => 1 [location] => Vancouver, BC [votes] => 0 [followers] => 5575 [popularity] => 0 [province] => bc [country] => ca [avatar] => http://a0.twimg.com/profile_images/3031829982/838ce2c9b41ed033deb7d0fac5d08856_normal.jpeg [website] => http://www.wastedtalent.ca [gender] => F [email] => [index_tweets] => 1 [created_at] => 1229722357 [sm_score] => 24 [sm_score_report] => 1:1:4:2:0:0:2:1:2:1:4:1:2:1:1:1 [bio] => I'm a mechanical engineer and I draw silly pictures for the internet. (Wasted Talent) [facebook] => http://www.facebook.com/pages/Wasted-Talent/6739902450 [youtube] => spikecomix [flickr] => [tumblr] => angelamelick [formspring] => angelamelick [ustream] => angelamelick [last_update] => 1369409155 [facebook_page_id] => 6739902450 [livejournal] => [facebook_fans] => 3062 [lists] => 0 [influence] => 593 [wikipedia] => Wasted_Talent [wikipedia_preview] =>

Wasted Talent is a journal-style webcomic by "JAM", a Canadian cartoonist from Vancouver.

The comic originally depicted Jam's life in university, and now follows her post-graduate career as an engineer. The jokes are largely gag-based, and do not follow a continuous storyline, except in the most broad sense.

The main characters are Jam and her husband Trevor.

[deviantart] => spikecomix [twitvid] => [webcomic_rss] => http://feeds2.feedburner.com/WastedTalentRss [googleplus_id] => 103401908891303965507 [googleplus_followers] => 1230 [webcomictweets_rank] => 54 )



Angela Melick

Webcomictweets rank: #54

Date Range

  • order:
  • date range: -


Follow on Twitter Follow on Facebook
Processing time: 0.1065 seconds