Author Archives: stripfix

Monday August 5, 2019

Lynn's Comments: Here's an interesting note about the animated version of this story: Animation is an extremely expensive way to make a moving picture. The studio often runs out of money, which is when some awful compromises are made. By the time we got to this scene, we were told that there was no more money for animation, the storyboard imagery would have to be cut, and that the fact that Michael was on a busy street corner with people and cars going by would have to be "fixed in post." This means that the editor, camera operator and people in the sound department (post production), would have to make the busy street "happen" without the visual imagery. If you watch the film you will see that every time there is a close-up of Michael and the hot dog stand, there is a flurry of sound. Cars, horns, people walking, dogs barking...all these sounds are inserted and the viewer believes that a load of activity is going on. Then, when there is a long shot, showing the hot dog stand from across the street, for example, there is nothing going on in the background at all! This was a very clever way to eliminate a lot of expensive work. This happened far too often when we did the animated shows and the results weren't always successful. The words, "fix it in post" are a joke in the industry, meaning that a studio will often leave the most impossible "fixes" to the post production crew!

Friday August 2, 2019

Lynn's Comments: When I was a kid, my bed could fly; I was convinced of it! With the covers over my head, my imagination took me everywhere and I sometimes fell asleep dreaming about flying. It's no wonder that many years later, I found myself marrying a pilot and learning how to fly!

Tuesday July 30, 2019

Lynn's Comments: I might have told you this before: my son was the one who had to wear glasses, and he wasn't happy about it. He lost them and they got broken; it was a struggle to get him to wear them at all. Because this was such an issue, I had Elizabeth in the strip be the one who needed glasses. This way, with Aaron and Kate's permission, I was able to show the struggle both kids and parents have when eyesight is a problem. It also provided another visible difference between my real kids and the ones I drew in the strip.

Saturday July 27, 2019

Lynn's Comments: These are all names from my elementary school days. Luccia (I spelled her name incorrectly in the strip), Ruby and Laurel are still good friends today. When we get together, we all see each other as being much the same as we were in grades one and two and all the way through high school. What a joy it is to see them now!

Thursday July 25, 2019

Lynn's Comments: One of the best things about summer camp for me was the bus ride there and back. The laughter, the singing, eating damp sandwiches (flattened in waxed paper bundles), hanging onto best friends who were strangers a week ago—what fun that was. After 65 years, the smell and the sounds of that long bus ride can be conjured up as if it all happened yesterday. Summer camp. It's a wonderful rite of passage.

Sunday July 21, 2019

Lynn's Comments: When this strip first ran, the girls asks the boys if they had change for a dollar because they needed to use a payphone. We updated the dialog not only to remove the payphone reference, but we also thought the girls should confront the boys about their behaviour!

Friday July 19, 2019

Lynn's Comments: This was me. This was how I viewed myself on a beach, and this is how I entered the water: gingerly—when I felt invisible. Now that I’m 72 and have a figure that looks, well…72, I jump right in. Worrying about how you look isn’t as important as enjoying the moment. It took me far too long to figure this out.

Thursday July 18, 2019

Lynn's Comments: This was true. Friends had come by with a sailboard and the owner—a man about our age, showed us how easy it was to master. Wrong. It is not easy, and those of us who tried and tried to get up on the thing suffered from sore arms for a week!

Wednesday July 17, 2019

Lynn's Comments: Any time I've done a cartoon workshop, I tell my students to not try to be perfect; that there’s no such thing as perfect. But, if you do the best you can possibly do, the results are always very, very good. No matter what my job has been, that advice has always worked for me!

Monday July 15, 2019

Lynn's Comments: Here’s another punch line that could never be translated! When strips like this one reached international papers, the dialogue, and therefore the gag, had to be changed entirely. The translators who did this were excellent creative writers who often had an almost impossible job.

Saturday July 13, 2019

Lynn's Comments: Here, Michael is served the one thing he really doesn’t want to eat.

My Aunt Margaret worked at Moir’s Chocolates during the 1950s. Every year, she’d send us a box of chocolates for Christmas. I thought she had the best job in the world. One year, when I was about 10, she came with her family from Ontario to Vancouver to visit us and I told her I would love to work in a chocolate factory. She laughed! She told me she was sick of chocolate! Apparently, the day she was sent to the packaging floor of the factory, she was told that all the employees were invited to eat as much chocolate as they wanted. She dug in! After two days, she had no desire to eat, touch or smell chocolate, and that everyone else felt the same. The Moir’s Company policy paid off. Sadly, Margie’s dislike of chocolate lasted the rest of her life!

Wednesday July 10, 2019

Lynn's Comments: My summer job was always in my parents' jewellery store. My main duty was to dust and wipe fingerprints off the glass counters. I was quite envious of a friend of mine who got a job serving ice cream at one of the malls. She had a cute uniform and was always talking to kids our age. It was a very busy, social place. Later, when I told her how much I wished I'd had her job, she said that after standing all day digging hard ice cream out of the freezer, her back ached, her feet hurt and her arms had never ached so badly in her life! …The grass is always greener on the other side!