Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
::Today's soundtrack: Ben E. King "Stand By Me" ::
Now that the end of the year is once again upon us, it seems it is time for me to also once again get all sentimental and shit. I've been thinking, I believe it is high time for me to thank and give proper recognition to some of my internet idols, without whom William's Bloody Hell would have been completely different.
1. Tatsuya Ishida. There is a great deal I admire about Mr. Ishida. First off, he creates a fantastic webcomic, Sinfest, and that sucker gets updated every day. Never once a "sorry, readers, I'm taking a vacation" or "my personal life has made updating difficult." Every day a new comic strip, period. That sort of dedication means quite a lot to me, and I knew that I wanted to be able to be that dependable as well. If I set my own update schedule, I was going to stick to it, damn it. Also, you'll maybe notice that once in a great while Ishida will post a "Notes from the Resistance" and that these served as my main inspiration for rant writing. Nothing too personal, but still enjoyable and fun to read. Lastly, you'll note that I outright stole his "signature sign off" thing he does on each strip. Yeah, that's all him.
2. Weem. Weem is one fantastically talented artist. She keeps changing homes on the internet, but is always available on DeviantArt. Whenever she has a personally run site, she always features her own art in the layout. When I started up this site I thought that was a great idea. Then she started a series of layouts featuring a cartoon version of herself in them, and I thought that was even better. As a newcomer to site ownership, I was unsure of what was "done" or "normal", but seeing what Weem had done for herself made me realize it wasn't all celebrity blended image headers out there. My site was going to prominently feature my drawings, so basing the layout around that simply made sense. Plus, being called "William's Bloody Hell" made having a cartoon me in the layout make even more sense. Basically, I have Weem to thank for how I chose to design my site, not with "found" images on the internet, but instead with my own doodlings.
3. Chris Sims. This is the guy behind the insanely popular comic book based blog, The Invincible Super Blog (or ISB for short). The way Sims composes his entries about anything from comic book reviews to commenting on silly merchandise, showed me a way of writing that wasn't afraid of throwing in goofy comparisons and sticking to your own brand of humour, no matter how off beat it may be. It was "okay" to make pop culture references, a nod and wink here and there, and toss around "inside" jokes. Sure not everyone will get everything, but you're sure to hit a few marks along the way, and to those who get it, it's all the sweeter.
4. Jennie Breeden. She is the talent behind the online comic strip with a cult following, Devil's Panties (it's not Satanic Porn, honest!). Jennie's strip is semi-autobiographical, which made me realize that a comic about my own life wouldn't be all that weird and honestly, sometimes nothing is funnier than what happens in real life anyway. If it weren't for Jennie, I may never have had the confidence to make my own comic strips, which I greatly enjoy and get loads of positive feedback from readers (much to my surprise).
5. Aaron Alexovich. Mr. A is just The Man. His art makes me nothing but happy all over and he created Serenity Rose, which has inspired numerous fanarts as well as tribute CDs made by me (see Heart Shaped CD, Vicious Whispers and Tesselate on the Prize List). He has subconsciously effected my art style and added to my music tastes. I never would have heard of The Birthday Massacre if it weren't for him.
6. David the Great. A personal friend and overall cool guy to know, Dave is responsible for getting me Microsoft Frontpage, which made me realize that even an HTML ignoramus such as myself could create their own site without a prefab template. But Dave has done oh so much more like helping me install software, flush and reboot my whole system from time to time, give me the occasional tip and pointer about coding, cross browser compatibility, scripting, FTP, and good lord the list goes on and on. When it comes down to it, I would have this site at all if it weren't for Dave. Period.
Honourable mentions go to anyone who has ever written this a site a review because I honestly do take those suggestions to heart and keep them in mind for future renovations. Many reviewers suggestions which have been implemented over the years include, but not limited to: adding my personal comments to each piece of art, including a date with the "new stuff" section, putting up *new!* designations by the new content in the submenus, and changing the indexes to bulleted lists. Wonderful ideas, all. Also, of course, a big hearty handshake to all of my loyal visitors who have been very kind in delivering to me "instant" feedback whenever layout changes have been made and being cool enough to let me know whether or not the new stuff works in their browsers at all. You know who you are *coughemily*coughtiffany*coughpaperclippe*coughjaki* ahem. Pardon me there.
Without all of you fine people William's Blood Hell wouldn't be what is today. I'm all about giving credit when credit is due, and it is loooong overdue. I've been meaning to thank all of you lovely people for a while yet, but something about the impending new year always brings out the sentimentalist in me, bringing this finally forward. So, a heartfelt thanks to you all and I wish you a happy and healthy new year.
William the Bloody (thank ye)
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