The pencil lightly touches the paper, and with a deft stroke of the hand, the sketch begins to take shape. With maddening concentration, the artist focuses on completing the smallest details which define his piece.
Without warning, the racket of a door opened and the screech of the journalism instructor broke his single-mindedness.
?Is it done yet?? adviser Greg Stobbe asks the artist.
?Almost finished,? junior Daniel Hopper replies, returning to his drawing.
With a grunt of impatience, Stobbe exits the room as clamorously as he entered.
The risks Hopper, an illustrator for The Feather, endures to publish his drawings exceed the ?evil glare? from Stobbe. Confidence, skill and ample time are a few properties a commited artist needs.
?Stobbe spotted a drawing on my binder cover in freshman English class, and he asked me if I wanted to do a drawing for the online newspaper,? Hopper said. ?At first, I didn’t want to do it because I was lazy and I had lots of homework, but Stobbe handed me an article to draw for anyway.?
However, compliments from peers and his own self-assurance granted Hopper the confidence to publish online his comic strip, “The Teen Age.”
At the age of six, Hopper discovered his talent for drawing. Starting with stick figures, his self-taught style slowly morphed into its present form of precise cartooning. Hopper studied drawings and real-life models, and he further developed his skill by taking an art class in junior high.
?I have actually wanted to be a comic artist for quite some time,” Hopper said. “I?ve been able to see myself drawing comics since I started reading The Fresno Bee funnies and comic books like ‘Calvin and Hobbes.'”
Over the summer, Hopper wrote up character sketches, basing their personalities off of himself, his friends and his family. The sketches and everyday experiences help him form new comics.
?I like reading his comics because they’re about school life and I can relate to them,? junior Ellie Park, another illustrator for The Feather, said. “His artworks are really amazing because of the coloring and the way he draws his characters. If someone looks at the comic, they can get what it is about.”
Hopper’s comic aims to showcase the lives of high school students and poke fun at the different aspects of the teenage life.
He describes the main character Jake?s personality as ?slightly awkward and dim, but loveable.? The hero?s family includes a drama-queen sister named Angie, a stressed-out mom and a serious businessman father. Jake?s friend Bradley is portrayed as outgoing, very animated and rebellious at times.
Each drawing includes several steps, requiring a two-hour process of forming the idea, sketching, coloring and inking. Hopper keeps going through the process because he enjoys the release of stress from creating the comic and he knows a lot of people will enjoy them, he said.
“I am going to look at the comic strips if I ever feel bored or have free time,” Brett Henderson, writer, ’12, said. “They seem really cool, and are probably very humorous. I think it is a very good addition for our online paper, and it will hopefully boost the ratings.”
While the feature adds dimension to The Feather Online, comics also provide light-hearted humor for readers.
“They’re really awesome because they express teen issues in a light-hearted, funny way,” Ricky Lopez, ’11, said. “Daniel Hopper does a good job drawing the comics; he has a unique style.”
The first six editions of Hopper’s comic strip, available from a link above the poll on the right menu bar, appeared online on Oct. 29.
