Episode: 4491
Title: HPR4491: Thibaut and Ken Interview David Revoy
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr4491/hpr4491.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-11-22 15:04:38

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This is Hacker Public Radio Episode 4491 for Monday 20 October 2025.
Today's show is entitled Thibaut and can interview David Revoi.
It is the first show by New host Teebo, and is about 100 minutes long.
It carries a clean flag.
The summary is, David Revoi talks about his life journey and of course pepper and carrot.
Hi everybody, my name is Ken Fallon and you are listening to another episode of Hacker
Public Radio.
Well, I am joined tonight by fellow HBR host Teebo, so say hi Teebo.
Hi everyone.
And we are delighted to have the opportunity to interview somebody who I've been trying
to get on, HBR for a considerable amount of time.
And that is David.
David, can you introduce yourself please?
Oh yes.
So my name is David Revoi and I'm a French artist and I'm mainly now a webcomic creator.
So I publish webcomics on internet.
I have a little series that I post weekly right now, but this one is a short one with
four panels.
And in the background I continue to do a series I've been doing for like 10 years and
name it pepper and carrots.
Super.
Now you might think, listening to that humble little thing that he is just, they're drawing
cartoons and scanning them in and putting them on the website.
This person has featured several times in Hackaday and has also shepherding one of the coolest
communities online for everything you do is released under Creative Commons and everything
you create is done freely, open source and under Linux, correct?
Yes, you are totally correct and there is a lot of little peculiarity like this on the
pepper and carrot project because that's what I wanted for it.
So as you mentioned, I use only three Libre and open source software on Linux for doing
all the artwork, but also for the text, for publishing, for everything.
That's because that the only system I have at home since maybe 2009, I'm not one of
the first Linux user, I'm just like a wave of the Windows Vista Linux user.
Okay, so as Windows Vista did it for you, so tell us, let's go back and start off with
you're born in France presumably and how did you get into art?
So I was born in 1981, so in the 80s and I started just a little school path of a young
guy who wants to do comics and at that time, all my teachers told me that I couldn't really
do other job in comics or anything, so I was directed, I don't know if it's the word
oriented by my teacher, on industrial art, so it's a very specific type of school in France
where you do fashion design, but also the design of objects, like the big trend when I was
in my studies was to design mobile phone because that was the new things of the 2000, so that
gives also a little time period about when I did my studies and during these studies,
I met a lot of other young people like me who wanted to do comics and that's probably
where I learned the more of things because we all struggled and a lot of us were trying
and we were just looking at each other and looking how you use this type of ink, how you
use this type of pencil, oh I like how you put this panel in this panel, it works and I
got really lucky to be in a classroom with other students who wanted to also do comics.
The course by themselves were terrible, we were taught how to design, I don't know the
name in English, maybe that's where Tibo you can help me, maybe, pas à l'ange, oh, yeah
pas à l'ange, so that's what you use to hang clothes, you know, for drying, like the clips.
Yeah, there's a little clip in plastic for...
Close pegs.
Close pegs, okay.
For this type of things and we were asked to draw 20 of them on two big sheet of paper,
so that was really problematic for us who wanted to do storytelling, character and everything
to have to do that.
But then after this type of studies, I just decided to continue to live doing drawings,
but that wasn't... that was difficult for me to find something and the only thing I found
was to sell paintings in gallery, so making paintings like all paintings, acrylic paintings
on canvas, so I made like flowers, animals, a beautiful woman or something like this,
and on the summer to do portraits in the streets for the tourists and for everything.
So I learnt a lot also about my technique at this moment and because it was working a little
bit well, I started to buy a computer.
I always had a computer at home when I was a young person.
I'm strad.
Yeah, I started to learn how to script in basic when I was a child to try to make my own
video game, but then the drawing and painting tech took all the place during the teenager
when I grew, and that's only when I... there was this thing in 2000 that the internet was new,
and having a presence on internet for my painting was the biggest motivation I had,
and I learnt how to make a website for this.
I put a computer, I get an internet connection, and I started to post my painting like this on a website.
And I had a lot of luck because I made a lot of commercial paintings.
I would call them the EKR paintings for decoration because I had to live doing that.
But I also did some fantasy type of painting, adventure fantasy, inspired by what I was playing with my friend,
I said don't join in dragons, these type of things.
And I started to put this type of drawing on my very, very ancient web gallery at that time.
And I don't know if the listener can imagine, but at that time, the industry of illustration,
you had to have illustrator that said that that was sending to the publisher the full painted illustration
because the publisher had a special photographic camera just to flash them to be able to print a book cover or something.
And suddenly there was some new type of artist that was arriving with internet.
Artists you can contact and see their portfolio online on a computer screen.
And they could also paint digitally with a stylus and a tablet.
And with the layers and everything, we could make a lot of adjustment, a lot of color things that was not possible before.
So I started to post this type of paintings, digital paintings, because for me it was cheap to get a stylus and a software to start painting.
And it was, it was near no cost compared to my main activities because I didn't have to buy the canvas or buy the paintings.
And I could experiment with painting just what I had in my mind.
That was something reserved for my sketchbook at that time.
But suddenly I could just after work start to paint fantasy scenes and everything.
And at this moment in the cinema, there was the big trend of Lord of the Ring, Harry Potter, and all this new wave of fantasy for the big public.
And suddenly the publisher had a big needs for book covers.
And there was also a lot of board games to illustrate with this thing because it was successfully commercial.
And I was just at the right time on internet with fantasy painting.
And I started to just move from my career of painting and portraits to being just a illustrator.
Just a illustrator of book cover of board game of everything.
So I have this career also before and this career I really like because I could also meet a lot of publisher values publisher.
And with this career, I also started to get to have to pay for my software because at that time, you had to pay the adopt Photoshop license version.
And it wasn't like a subscription, like a monthly subscription like now.
It was like a 800 euro, just the big pack.
But that was the only solution to get the CMYK feature.
So just for the listener, if they don't know, it's a feature that convert the color for printing in a nutshell.
I'm doing a very big shortcut.
It's already up.
But it was crazy just to have to pay for 800 euro just to be able to send to the publisher digital painting.
Of course, you could do it in RGB, but no publisher wanted to take the responsibility of converting the color themselves.
That was something they wanted for the artists to do.
So I did that.
And then I had a big period of teaching even Photoshop on CG school.
I started to really like teaching things.
So that's something that I continue now, but the origin is here.
And I started at this moment, I'm trying to to rememorize everything.
At this moment, there was a little drama for me.
And that slows back to what I say about Windows Vista.
So I had all my professional tools on Windows XP Pro at the time.
But I had more than just Photoshop.
I had also a lot of lessons of software that I boot.
And one day I will go to the supermarket.
Yeah, I was happy with my financial at that time.
And I decided to just buy a computer that I saw in promotion.
You know, it's this type of big pyramid of box.
You have in the answer of the supermarket.
And yeah, something that I never do because I'm the type of person that study 10 time when I buy something, study all the thing.
Yeah, I felt, hey, it's a very cheap promotion.
I take one, I just put it in the in the cart.
And happily.
I eat today my new computer because I saw the spec and the spec were really good.
Good processor, more memory and everything.
But that was a mistake because the motherboard couldn't have a driver for Windows XP.
And at home, I have the box of, I had the box of Windows XP Pro.
I thought I could reinstall it on any computer, but not this one.
The motherboard was like this, the graphic card was like this.
And then all my software at this time, they needed an upgrade pack.
Like Photoshop was needed the upgrade pack CS3.
And to buy the upgrade, it was like 300 or 400 euro more.
And that for each software.
And so my biggest promotion for my good price for the computer was a disaster because I had to to buy all this little pack.
And they all this little pack didn't bring any feature that was interesting for me.
It was just a tax for just doing the update.
It's very for said at that time.
And because I was exploring a lot of alternative, lot of little software, I was already, because I was a freelancer.
And I had no lot of money.
So I already have my mailbox that was Thunderbird.
I already have my brother that was Firefox.
I already use a Librophys.
But that was named OpenOffice at this time.
But I moving to Linux was only the matter of finding, making my tablet compatible on one time, on one hand.
And on the other hand, finding a good digital painting software.
And I started to do experiments with a software that was named MyPaint.
And one other one that is a new image manipulation program that is very well known.
And I started to to make some painting this way.
And also I was using Blender on the side.
So that's when I started to post this type of experimentation under Linux that I was contacted by Ton Rosendal of the Blender Foundation.
And he asked me, oh, I see your fantasy style, your book covers and everything.
I want to make an open movie for Blender, but with your art direction.
So that's how I joined the Sintel Open Movies of the Blender Foundation.
I see the face of TV.
No, that explains that.
That's the guy behind it.
See your fingerprints all over that.
Yeah, visually a lot because the direction was done by Colin Levy.
But the art direction and concept art was by me.
That is a gorgeous movie.
Oh, thank you very much.
That was a unique experience to do that.
And that's probably where I learned how to speak in English.
Because I had to go to Amsterdam and practice a bit better my English.
Because what I didn't say is, I didn't learn English in school.
I learned it more by having some imported video game when I was teenager.
They are the ultimate series in English is perfect for learning.
And then the first forum, of course, on internet.
And then the Blender Foundation project and having to speak to a team and everything.
So I learned a language like this.
So you picked up English by yourself.
You picked up lyrics just by yourself.
How did you learn art?
How did you learn to draw just by copy somebody who can't paint like a stick figure?
I learned drawing by mainly copying when I was a very young kid.
The comics that I like it.
And for me, it was Dragon Ball from Akira Toriyama.
So I was making like my own spin-off of Dragon Ball.
And I was drawing characters fighting for friends.
It was really popular in France this series when I was young.
And that already had this manga style because it's a Japanese show.
And this is something very good also that France very early had Japanese cartoon on TV.
Because for me, when I grew in 2000, when I was a young illustrator and art director,
I already had this influence from Japan.
And that was something pretty new for the English and US market.
But something that was also part of the fashion sometimes.
Because sometimes it's the reverse people are.
Or they like, or they dislike at this time.
It was very contrasted.
But that was a very big advantage in my skill set at that time.
So yeah, I learned how to copy this and after I had a very good art teacher
when I was very early in the school process.
It was very good, I said, because he just invited my parents at one evening.
He showed them my drawings and said, yeah, you can encourage this young guy to make a art career
because he has a little something that is not common from the classroom.
And that's only very late after that my father told me this.
But this teacher wasn't really good for the art advice for his classroom.
But this advice maybe changed my life because after that,
if I wanted a book about drawing to get into a watercolor class or something,
my parents were okay with that.
So I benefited from getting extra school watercolor class, for example.
Just a little bonus here and there that was very precious.
And I think my parents for offering me that.
For example, I remember one time where my father took me when I was 14 years old,
to Paris, to the place where there was the people doing portraits,
the place to be placed.
And it just told me, yeah, you can watch them a full afternoon.
I'd be around just take your time and I was mesmerized by seeing their technique.
And I think in one afternoon, my brain was in recording mode.
And I was just recording every technique comparing them every...
Because when I came back home that day, I couldn't stop doing portraits
for maybe one month or something, training with what I had to reproduce what they were doing.
Yeah, I mainly learn like this.
I'm sort of liking watch people do something.
If I'm really motivated by something, like making a website, CSS, PHP,
I can learn it quickly.
But if I want to learn something and decide this, it's another process.
But there is just things that I'm really motivated and I can learn quickly.
But I guess it's the same for everyone.
Oh, hard to know, hard to know.
I have this thing where I say to my parents, when I left school, I started learning.
But...
Okay, so you are in Amsterdam?
Yes.
Because there's this opportunity to do central now.
So that's another option for this interview, just telling you right there.
Yes, it's 2009, 2010.
And I'm already on Linux.
I'm already doing open movies for the Blender Foundation.
And I will keep with, like this, with the Blender Foundation for three or four movie, open movies.
There is the tiers of steel.
This one I did only the concept art for robots and everything because it's a movie with real actors this time.
Blender was only the super FX.
I don't know the LZF special effects.
Special effects, yes.
Thank you.
And after that, I did also...
Oh, I have to watch the list, sorry.
I spent years on each project, but I can't remember this.
I'm ashamed.
Well, that's fine.
Did you, for while you're doing that, I'll give some people the Wikipedia links for all of this stuff will be in the show notes.
Yes.
The central was if I made a short film, but basically the story of a dragon and a girl and a dragon.
Very, very good.
So, and it was my time.
Oh, it's love that when they were grown up.
And it was made only with Blender, of course, because done by the Blender Foundation.
And at that time, one of the big things I learned was the creative comments, the existence of this license.
Yeah.
Because Ton Rosendal was publishing all the open movies and also the making of and data set and everything as creative comments atribution.
And I remember as a very young art director at this time, I was a bit afraid about Sintel being a creative comments characters.
Because for me, will people will steal my style or will they will make obscene stuff with Sintel?
I had no idea what was going to happen with a real character.
Before that, the Blender Foundation, I had the Big Bug Bunny with cartoony characters and everything.
But with Sintel, it was the first time that there was a female character.
So, I was very, very, very afraid about that.
But I see during the project that only good things were done by the community and amazing things like video games or fan arts showing Sintel with animals.
So, showing Sintel's interacting with all the characters also.
It was just amazing at that time because that was a time where social media started a little bit.
Sorry, you want to say something to people?
Yeah, I just want to interject something else that people did with Sintel as well as use it as a research subject.
Because I actually studied in video compression.
And that was actually a video that we used as a benchmark for video compression because it's like computer generated and all that.
So, that was like a special kind of video when we were trying to also understand techniques or compression techniques for that.
And that was a video that I know a lot just because of this.
So, that's also one thing that came out of that.
That's amazing.
And I work in the TV industry and we use Sintel as all of our testing stuff because you didn't have to worry about the licensing.
And at that time, I think that was one of the first open resources in 4K also.
Because during this project, at the first time I saw a 4K monitor in my life.
And if you went to the IPC around that time, which is like the big broadcasting convention in Amsterdam,
everybody was shown their TVs with Sintel running, it's like awesome.
And if you sign up for the pack, you've got everything, all the source code, all the files, all the art, everything was okay.
Yes, that was a revolutionary approach.
But that was something that I was starting to discover with the project of Tom Rosendal since a long time since Elephant Dream, since even Big Bug Bunny.
I was following this because in the computer graphics community, it was really new and something big.
What was happening around Blender?
And it's still big and a lot of new concepts around them.
So, it's amazing how mainstream Blender has become.
Oh, yes.
Oh, yes.
So, I participated in tears of steel.
And after also in Cosmos Landromat, it's another movie with chips, chips, mutton.
And a tornado.
It was like a trailer for a bigger movie.
So, I participated to the design of that.
And later, there is also in 2019 a spring.
Another movie with a young woman and a little dog.
And spring is one of my favorite because I think the art direction is really...
Really good.
The 3D artists really captured everything I could say in my drawings for this movie.
So, I really love this open movies.
But in parallel.
Did you paint for that work?
Sorry.
Did you get paid for that work?
Yes, yes.
Because the Blender Foundation had this big model where they were doing a big crowdfunding,
promising people to get the DVD at that time that was not streaming and everything.
So, it was the DVD box.
And the DVD had two DVDs, the movies, and also one DVDs for the source and everything.
So, yes.
The internet connection at that time also justified this type of having a CD and everything on it
because downloading them could cost a lot.
So, people would resale this before the movies.
So, we had a budget.
And I say, we were.
I'm just part of the team.
I said that the one who managed at the Blender Foundation probably turned Rosandal at that time had the budget.
And so, we could schedule a number of artists for a number of weeks.
And we had to, of course, get a deadline for making the movies happening.
But there was also some few things that were also additional to the budget.
Like the City of Amsterdam.
I know that the City of Amsterdam was proud to have a studio, a movie studio.
And they were okay to always give a little part of money for helping the studio.
And you're on the side of the couch.
Yes.
And I remember that that's why there is in the open movies a lot of little reference to Amsterdam,
here and there in the buildings.
There is always a little something just to, as a, as a, yes, a nod, yes, to, to their help.
Because, yeah, that, that was also helping just a person.
But it's, it's always a good helping the budget.
And so, with doing this movies, I learned teamwork, collaboration on an open source project.
I also learned all the, the tool like a revision control, not get at that time because it was maybe subversion.
Yeah.
The CVS.
I don't remember exactly what.
But that's the first time I got this type of tool in hand because, of course, all the assets,
all everything we had to commit to get back up to everything.
So I learned a lot of very good things about production at that time.
And also, Tom Rosendard wanted to get some sort of tutorial DVDs for the blender shop.
And, and so I made a DVDs that was named Chaos and Evolution.
And it was a DVDs of how to paint with GIMP, the new image manipulation program.
And so, that was also a good experience about how to, to teach to, because I was teaching Photoshop.
And, suddenly, I could teach on Linux.
And many people were, were sort of impressive that I could paint and do all the concept art and everything on Linux.
Because there was some painting program, but there wasn't some professional using them frequently.
And among them, there was a team, a story for the complexity of the story.
But there was a team that was, there was a team that was the Krita team.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's a, it's a, maybe known now painting digital painting application.
But at that time, it was part of an office suite, like the open office or liberal office.
It was a drawing program of the Caligra office suite.
But I, I think I, it was even named Caligra at that time.
It was K office or maybe they had a name like that.
So, that was the office suite of the KDE desktop in a nutshell.
And there were also curious about how it was possible to do the painting I was doing in Krita.
And I started to give them feedback because my first feedback was, okay, we can't paint on the, on the canvas
because there is a lot of lag.
So you will have to, to build the performance, we need more resolution.
And we started to, to make some adjustment, me at the feedback, not coding.
But they started to receive my feedback.
And at one point, they decided to make a crowdfunding for making Krita ready for my workflow.
So I was really lucky, yes.
So that was the benchmark.
So you could use it for your own work.
Yes, yes, yes.
Yes, yes, yes.
So that was a honor because I could at that time, the crowdfunding was a success.
And they had developers that could code Krita with all my feedback,
all the shortcuts I needed, the feature and everything.
And so I could, that was a dream for me, get a software that was totally different.
I think that's a dream for absolutely everybody.
Just write some software to do what I want.
Will you please?
Yes, get my own painting software.
Yes.
And so I had this.
And after a couple of years, I started to get a very good software for painting on Linux that was Krita.
And that was a good math on their side because also a lot of other users started to use it
and started to find it well.
And so, yes, focusing on one person and say, yeah, we try to make it professional around
and then opening for all the community.
That was a good strategy.
At that time, my workflow was now very good on Linux.
I was really happy.
I was continuing on my new YouTube channel because that was a new thing at that time
to make some tutorial about Krita to cover all the release and things.
And I started to get a sort of little burnout
because I was participating to a lot of projects, very exciting, a lot of things.
But I always wanted when I was a teenager to make comics.
And, yeah, this was still really working in me in background because I was all the open movies.
For example, I was doing the art direction or the concept art.
But I wanted also to make the story.
I wanted also to to story tell to because I had plenty of story in mind.
And at that time, I decided to just release on my blog a comic
because I couldn't or the comic I sent, I have to say, I tried to make comics
and send it to publishers just to the dossier with four pages,
all the storyboards, concept art of characters and everything.
And they were rejected all the time.
So I was sort of a bit hopeless about it.
But, yes.
But after all these open movies and I started to have communities following my blog
and I started to think, oh, I would just make the comic on my blog
and release it because I can continue to do some freelance work,
to feed, to get a roof, to get a home.
And if my dream was just to make a comic, I just make a comic.
I will just work half time.
And I had the very big chance in my life
that at the first comics that I started,
a little witch on our cat, Pepper and Carrot,
the episode went viral.
Just on the internet, very share red.
At that time, that was like what big website, like Reddit,
image, still big, they are still big.
But that wasn't the social media first type of viral effect.
And I started to make a second episode and a third episode on my own time,
like this.
And at one time, people were asking, yeah, you can make them quicker about that.
I told them, I could, if I could do that full time.
And at this, at this time, there was a drama on internet happening
between the YouTube creator.
The YouTube creator started to get less advertisement paid.
They could make a living before that, as far as I understood.
But after that, it was just dramatically lower, just a percent of that.
And one of them decided to build a Patreon, the platform.
And at that time, that was very, very new things because people were saying,
yeah, no, we just watched videos and the advertisements give you money.
And now the creator started to ask, but you can join on this website.
And you can give us monthly or each time we create a new video.
And I saw this and I said, oh, that's a solution for me too.
Even if I'm not really a YouTube creator, I'm making comics.
I can just open a Patreon account and ask the community for crowdfunding
when I release a new episode.
So I had the big luck after that that it worked.
And I could quit my job and start to do pepper and carrot full time.
So behind the little question, why pepper and carrot?
But this is where it fully answered.
Yeah, sorry.
No, it would be long.
It's absolutely, it's great because it makes by job as an interviewer,
a lot easier, just a pack and let you talk.
You did mention the creative commons.
And I also see from your blog, you're into free software.
So was the licensing of the Linux software important to you?
How did that work out?
You came from maybe a user.
I think the next to a creator.
I think it's really the at first, I think in my mind,
the open culture and open software were very two things very,
very, very different.
And open culture for me was almost nonexisting.
So I knew about open software because I started using Linux 2009
or something and pepper and carrot I started in 2014.
But about open culture, I discovered it with the open movies
and the license of the open movies, the creative commons attribution.
And when I saw that's everything that was happening with the source of the movies
and with the character was only good things, just a community.
Even I would say it's added value to the core thing
because suddenly you could get a board game or a video game or something.
There is like a shared lore about this.
And when I made pepper and carrot, I wanted to of course experiment with this.
So for the little story at first, the first episode of pepper and carrot,
I put the non-commercial tag on them because I was a little bit afraid
of getting the things totally away.
And there was a fan that came in the commons of the blog and asked me,
it wasn't on the command of the blog, it was on the,
on something that is extinct now that was named Google Plus.
It was a social mess.
Yes, it told me that, hey, but why the non-commercial?
Why not just going to with attribution?
And I saw the open movies and I said, of course, of course, what am I thinking?
Just you can see the little fear of an artist to open it too big at one time.
Even for me, even if I already had the experience, I had this little reflex
for my new secret project that I was launching on the internet.
But that was something very good to put it in creative commons attributes.
Soon after, a lot of derivation happened around pepper and carrot.
A lot of translation, that was the first thing.
Many translation found on many blogs and I decided to make my PHP skill
and code my website to host all the translation that I could.
And then I decided to make a sort of new thing that allows to translate the comics.
So we have a layer that is in SVG.
We have also the artwork that is a Krita file.
So there is something that is very lightweight and we can make on Git for the translator to translate.
And so we can see also when someone do a correction with the differential things,
what the string changes and everything.
So yeah, learning the version control things were very important for me during the open movies.
And for pepper and carrot, it's like all these little piece that were totally spread apart in my life before.
I say, yeah, my experience was publisher, my experience with open movies and these pre-software.
And suddenly my film was comics, of course.
Everything were coming together and it just works.
That's how the project shape it.
Living the dream.
Oh, yes.
Too much of getting paid for it by the community and everything free.
Yes, yes.
So now I'm 44 years old.
There is a lot of episode of pepper and carrot in my opinion, not enough for the community, of course.
And I'm facing a challenge because I fell into a trap.
It's the production of doing better and greater and bigger each time.
More pages, better design, more characters, bigger background, more ambitious story also each time.
And now the production of episode takes months.
Yeah, yeah.
The last episode I made was two years ago, but yeah, these two years were a bit special for me on a personal level.
So that also full of things that can explain the long pause.
But right now I'm starting to see that the per creation, building model that I had is not working really much with this incremental complexity.
There is a lot of translator.
There is a big website to maintain.
There is a hundred thousand of files with all the translation and everything to maintain.
It's huge.
And I will probably soon switch to a monthly billing model for the subscription monthly for supporting the project.
So that's why recently I decided to make also this new little comic series, the comic strip that is weekly.
The one you can see on my blog right now, because each week I'm releasing a little comic.
There will be one tomorrow.
And here?
Yeah, yeah.
And this has a very good dynamic on the social media.
And I'm really happy about that because with Pepper and Carrot, the problem I had since the COVID, so maybe since four or five years,
while that disappearing for two or three months, making a big episode, and then coming back on the social media just to release one big things, it doesn't work.
The social media are not made for that.
Of course, I have a very good audience reader.
And now also the comics is published shared in many countries in on paper.
So I get invited for time in session and everything.
But I really wanted this presence, this weekly presence on the internet, this interaction, and also getting an experimental territory for trying characters, trying new jokes, trying a lot of things.
And it's edgier. It's very in and out.
You're talking about...
Yes.
Even if I didn't know who you are, obviously I don't know who you are because I didn't know anything that you're a fellow Amsterdamer for a while.
These do get boosted and mastered on you know, the cookie one following you home, the AI one that you've done well.
Nothing down all the forest, but all the books.
The AI one recently was the most viral things I ever posted on Instagram, on Blue Sky, on Amsterdam.
I never saw this type of numbers and I was like, wow.
So this really changed a lot of things for paper and color that's now I can have my series that I build in the background with a big story,
taking the time also to probably make stories that are deeper for me, that propose some not entertaining, not just the little joke because paper and color was a little bone like that also.
Now I can do that with the comic strip, the little joke, the things to be entertaining.
And now I can probably start to talk more about the characters, talk more about deeper story line that I had in my stone.
Right now I found a very good balance between these two and in the next month I will have a new R&K episode.
Yes.
It's right now in proofreading, because before releasing them online, I put them on the sort of forum, it's GitLab.
It's not really a forum.
I open an issue and I post it as an issue, but all the translator can check the panels, can check the text,
and they can also participate into giving feedback about the story, about the English lines, about everything.
So what we try to do at first, and I'm right now in this process, is to get the final English version, so get all the dialogue, final, final, final.
After that I can make a sort of string freeze, like in the software.
So all the other translators can translate the comics from this base, because there is like 69 language.
Probably at the release there will be only 10 or 15 that will try to get the comics done at the release.
But I just want to get the freeze just to get the French version, of course, or so far, for my family.
So the original language is French, of course, right?
No, it's...
I write mostly in English.
Right.
Yes.
I had the... no, what I say is a lie.
There is some variation.
On one side, sometimes I write them in French, and then I post it on this translator, and we get an English version.
But then we modify the English version, and this version become the prime version.
And we will translate back to French.
So there is a sort of ping-pong between the language here, because sometimes if I discover that we're translating from English in French,
that there is a character that doesn't speak, if I wanted, or if there is a problem, I can always backport something to the English to get it right.
Because obviously, there is a lot of things, a lot of nuance that I can't get.
The audience can listen how I speak in English.
Of course, I can't write deep dialogue with that level.
And that's how you wanted to mention Craig Maloney.
That was a very important community member on paper and carrot, because it was maintaining the wiki.
So each time on this type of forum, there were some questions about the lore, about the place in the comics, about how, why a character speak like that.
And I was just writing something about, yes, because in our past, there is this, but I couldn't reveal right now.
It decided to report them into a wiki.
This wiki is on the main website of paper and carrot.
So it was the wiki maintainer for maybe 10 years.
And at one point, it became so good with the world of paper and carrot that when I started to write in English, even if my dialogue were not really good or something,
it had the right tones for this series.
And it could help me to proofread all the dialogue and everything.
Unfortunately, Craig left us, there is one year and a half ago, after a concert, after fighting a concert.
And that's not explained why I was not around since two years, but that was a part.
We did, there's actually brought us together a little bit.
Did episodes, HBO 4134, where I used your blog as a remembrance to Craig, because people will know him on our show from the open metal cast.
And it's funny, and it turns out one of our other hosts knew him from another thing entirely differently.
It was in the Python community, it was also on the Ubuntu community.
Yeah, he had a huge place in many communities.
And Craig also helped me a lot with managing the governance of the community.
Because at one point in the community, we always have this code of conduct things that is happening because some people at first,
of course, I was naive and I started a project and said, yeah, we want to join another thing.
And at one time after a few years, some people started to get a little fight, sometimes in private message, sometimes even when I wasn't seeing anything.
But we had to get a code of conduct and moderators.
So people could get protected when people started to be aggressive or anything that was happening around the project.
Because there is probably like now 100 translator around the project.
Fortunately, they are not all just the same high every morning on the chat or everything.
There is a lot of dormant account just joined when there is a new episode or something like this.
But we have a chat, we have forum, and with always maybe 20 people act more or less.
But even trying to translate the nuance of text, you have the physical, how am I going to translate this is one thing.
But you also have the, sorry, the literal, how am I going to translate this?
But you also have the physical, how do I get it into this text bubble?
If I'm writing in Arabic, how am I going to go the left right or right to left?
Is that going to mess up my fonts?
Yes.
How do I maintain my font style in the very different text?
How do you approach that whole mess?
It's a big mess.
First, I learned a lot about font and how to maintain the font.
Because when I started paper on carrot, there wasn't many open source font for coming, just that.
So I just took one font, but it has only the ASCII char set, so the English and numbers, and that's all.
So I had to tweak it to first we had the accent.
But then when I learned, I learned font forge, and I said, okay, okay, I started.
And then it took some crazy, crazy turn when the Nordic language came in with all the accent.
And I started to learn a Latin extended in font.
And then we have also the Cyrillic, all the Russian and everything.
And then there is also all the Vietnamese with all the accent and everything.
So yeah, the font file gets so many revisions with each time many new accent and everything.
And I started to maintain all of this and to manage the speech bubble with that.
Because the speech bubble are vector, they are in an inkscape file, you can resize the speech bubble without losing definition.
So that's why all my comics have speech bubble without border.
You will see them, they don't have the black outline.
That's just because that was too complex for inkscape at that time.
Every panel is borderless and the speech bubble are just white, borderless.
Because then you can merge them with the panel with the border.
If you need to just extend them, it's easy.
And the tail object is a different or also object.
So if you need more room, you can also put it on the side.
And I also anticipated for the language with a right to left and left to right direction.
And we have a system where we can flip the artwork.
But so far, there is no language that decided this because I discovered that the, for example, for the Japanese version, they prefer to respect the European way to read it.
Convention, yes.
And say, yeah, it's like that also in your country.
Yes, when we import some European stuff, we keep them.
And I say, okay, here at the same for manga, we also respect not at first, not the first years.
But after, we started to respect the reading order.
So not a lot of language decided to experiment with mirroring the artwork.
Fortunately for me, because when you mirror an artwork, it looks always a little bit weird for me.
But I was ready for that.
I think I saw a Hebrew version doing that in a mirrored with Hebrew.
So I know that some version exists like this.
Do in the Inkscape file, is it to each language have its own layer?
Or do they completely clone their own version?
Oh, so it's very simpler than that.
We have one vector file per language, just name it like fr.svg.
EN.svg.it.svg for Italian or something.
And this way, we have many files.
And because it's XML, I can also do a lot of manipulation with Linux tools,
like said, command line things to replace.
And I respected you so much up until then.
You said the XML file.
Why not? It's over or not here.
And I made in bash what I call the render form.
It's a system that just detect if the artwork gets a modification, the critify.
And if the critify gets a modification, you can render the critify from the command line interface
to be a flat PNG, for example.
So the terminal will output just a temporary file that is all the artwork flat without speech bubble.
Then the SVG of Inkscape, it's a bit like a HTML page.
You can put some images in it with a link.
So you can put a relative link to this PNG.
And so if you do that, suddenly your 100 SVG files get the artwork updated
because it's a relative link to this.
And so if you also render after that from the command line each SVG,
you get an update of all the artwork.
So if I change something in the panel, I can get directly the 69 language update.
And of course it's easy to track when a SVG change because it's an XML file.
So this is very easy to do this.
Yeah, but you're doing the wrong one.
What you should be doing is charging 300 euros for that script, you know.
I make it so it only runs on our architecture.
So now I have this.
And it became a bit complex because I have this also for the comics trip.
I have all this also for paper and carrot.
It also manages a update when there is something on the wiki by the community
or when there is something in the font project.
For example, if you touch a font, it will recompute all of them because yeah,
the font has an update.
Yes.
So there is a lot of things and paper and carrot project also became a sort of a very big test project
for the inkscape rendering project because if inkscape change a little bit the font rendering,
I start to have a lot of problems very quickly because I'm hosting thousands of SVG
that are now 15 years old.
So it's really complex to open them with a new version.
And I always need the new version to be able to render the old SVG.
And I can really quickly see when it breaks.
So recently I really want to salute the help of the inkscape developers because they put
it's called it's like a test inside the software.
And there is one to check for all the paper and carrot problem and everything.
So the software can be paper and carrot proof.
So Croatia is designing stuff for you inkscapes, designing stuff for you.
No.
Glanders, designing stuff for you.
Oh, I'm surprised.
A little thing.
Right, Mrs. Smith, the kitchen, they're doing some coding for your tablet.
No, Robert.
I'm in contact with Red Hat employees also for just for tablets because I started to do some
tablet reviews on my channel on my YouTube channel.
And I found it very good opportunity because at one point I had all this tablet brand
who were saying me, hey, do you want to review on your YouTube channel, our tablet?
And for me, it was always tablet that were not compatible with Linux.
And I got in contact with Red Hat employees that in charge of this impute device.
And they told me it can be a good thing that you say yes, take them.
And you give us all the specification.
We make them compatible.
Then you do your review.
And then we have a new device compatible for Linux.
So that's why on my blog I have a tag about hardware.
If you click on it, you'll find a lot of tablets that are compatible with Linux.
And if you didn't inside it, you can find that I reported the specification and everything.
And that's a part that I like.
You were mentioning in the introduction that I also were on Accaday.
You were on Accaday, yes.
And for me.
Yeah, because I like just tweaking a lot of things at home.
I was sort of raspberry is everything.
So I keep doing that.
In fact, HPR wouldn't be published every day if it wasn't for you because you had a recommendation for this yoga laptop from IBM.
Oh, yeah.
And the thing is so reliable that I have it here next to me.
And for like just for two minutes, I put the HPR whole production stuff on it.
And it's been now two years sitting here every day generating the websites for HPR.
Oh, yeah.
Streetways for touchscreen interface.
It's not an advertisement because I don't earn any money on it.
It's a Lenovo Yoga 370s.
And this type of machine were used for commercial to sign paper when they had some rendezvous or something.
Now with the end of Windows 10, there is a lot on the market for very cheap.
I boot one for my mom last month because it's compatible.
I put just Ubuntu for them for her on it because she knows it from since 10 years now.
And that's just a perfect laptop for very cheap.
So I'm really happy that we have.
I can't tell.
I can't say really low tech things, but it's sort of a recycle and repair, repurpose things.
And the market right now is just amazing for that.
There is a lot of very cheap machine that are very capable, especially on Linux.
I like to document that.
Do you have time to continue on?
Yes.
I'm more than happy to.
I have a few things that I would like to ask you.
Just more from a project point of view as you know here.
We are a community podcast.
We have lots of people who contribute randomly from various corners of the internet.
And fortunately we've not had issues with that many issues maybe in our 20 years history.
We've only had maybe four or five instances of trouble.
But I see that you have code of conducts and stuff.
And I found that very useful reading that going through what we were going to do here on HPR with relation to how we do stuff.
Now we've chosen to go a different group.
But how do you how does managing the community?
Does that take a lot of your time?
It did.
It did at one point during the code of conduct era when there was some trouble and when there was some groups that were starting to shape and some problems.
But now there is not a lot of this.
I'm very lucky of the state of the community right now because there are very helpful people.
I receive very very beautiful contribution.
I always think full for all the help I receive.
And maybe it's me who changed it the most through the years.
Maybe in 15 years I learned how to say what type of help I need and what type of territory I prefer to explore myself.
I also learned a lot of little tricks from the Krita project, from the Blender project, from the Inkscape project reading how they manage some time.
I read a house, certain type of developer tell someone else for a contribution and say, hey, I need your feedback because it's your code.
But it's only adding a little sentence like, but if you don't have time, in two days, I'll do this myself.
Just timing things like this are saying, I don't know, do you have a feedback about this?
If you don't, by tomorrow, I will do this and that.
So because I found that maybe the worst thing is being stopped when you need to go fast in a project.
And when there is a people who say, oh, but you need to ask this person because it's their code or this person because it's their expertise.
But at the same time you can't expect because you can't expect them to be like professional like getting an answer the day after because it's open source project.
Sometimes they are not maintaining this type of code since five or six years or they don't care or sometimes they are very protective about this piece of code and they want to touch it by themselves.
It's very hard to predict all of this and I learned how to communicate on this type of project with always this type of words.
That when it sent the comment, I know that if the person has an issue, can quickly react or have the possibility to ignore the message.
They know that I will continue to do my work if they prefer to stay inactive or if they don't have their login and they don't really care now or anything.
It can be a lot of things, but you can also be there busy with life.
Yes, yes, I'm just an old days a week.
That was the week that I went trekking up a mountain or something.
Yes, and this type of management is probably what's really changed in my way to manage the Oracle project and also to probably anticipate when someone starts to also, for example,
there is something with artists that I like to call the microphone effects because I have the blog, I have the social media.
And what I publish is seen by many.
It's not a very big scale like the big artists of internet, but at my humble scale, I think it's a lot of person.
I know that it can attract a lot of people to, because it's also an open source project, to want to influence on that or to nudge my opinion on something, to also impute what they want to say to the microphone.
That's why I called it the microphone because that's like a concert room, there is a single microphone, I'm in charge of speaking.
Of course, in backstage, I'm sharing all these ideas, but I know that it can be tempting for some contributors to also take sort of control of the maintainer, about the vision of the project, about everything.
And that's probably something that happened, the duration of the project, and I had to grow a lot about this.
With simple things, like simply say no, simply say, I don't know this, I will do this way and I will continue to speak about it.
It's not rude, it's still okay in the code of conduct to say this or to say, yeah, I prefer to make it worse, but make it myself to someone criticizing and say,
no, you should do this way because it will be a disaster if you don't do this way or to this technical problem.
There is all of this, it can be toxic for open source manager, and I don't say toxic like intentionally toxic.
Just people motivated to discuss, to get into opinion, to just continuously try to impose their opinion.
And that part, I wasn't ready when I started pepper and carrot ready.
I wasn't even imagining this problem.
I learned in the art way, we had a code of conduct, we had a moderator, I surrounded myself with people I trust and I love, and they act like a shell around me to protect what I do.
Also, yeah, it's a very interesting governance because maybe it's an artistic project.
And if someone's really unhappy about how things are managed around your project, they can just, because it's open source, they can just start their own in the worst case.
It's not like you're just closed to anything they can, they have this freedom in the as well.
Yes, yes, yes, but there is a complexity factor in the pepper and carrot project that protects it a lot from fork.
Because without new artworks, it's really hard to fork it and try to make a spin-off.
Did you have a spin-off?
I really want to have a spin-off.
There were some young artists and I told them, I take these characters, make a series with them.
We share the world, we share the weak, the weak, that would be amazing to do that.
You can do whatever story you want with this character, but we just keep in touch for getting some cool, some consistency.
Keeping the universe.
Yes, for the universe, that would be amazing.
But it did not happen yet.
Yeah, no.
Somebody listening to this hopefully will pick up the groundless.
Oh yeah, that would be cool.
I've been trying to get people to use the Creative Commons license, particularly for our ham radio series.
We have amateur radio.
There's a syllabus and I want people to give lots of ham radio guys.
I've done lots of excellent tutorials, but all of them copyright to this person.
And of course, from my point of view, you're going to the guys.
Please open it up.
And a lot of the people are more than willing to give me is to use it in any way I want, but don't want to let go.
Don't want to get rid of that NC at the end, even if they were doing this.
Unfortunately, we see a lot of software, cool tools in amateur radio.
Just being abandoned because we don't have the source code and that whole thing.
So how do I convince somebody what's in it for the creator to give me their work?
So that I can use it?
I'm not really a person that think that you can really convince anyone of anything.
Really?
What was it in that person who contacted you who I must say I really want their name, who convinced you to drop the NC?
Maybe something with the example, just if they see something that is successful or shiny or something that has this license.
And they see the effect of this license that can be seen as a real advantage.
Maybe it would convince someone deeply.
But I think that in the world of artists and content creators, there is a lot of mefiance in French.
How you would say that people are suspicious.
Yes.
In the world, they are suspicious.
They are suspicious each time they see a low text, like copyright text or something.
And I think with creative commands, many probably don't want to regret or think there is a catch or something.
And because it touches something that is a license text, they prefer to just imitate what others do.
So the copyright things, I don't think they even understand what it means also.
I think they just put it because they saw that the big player in the game also put it.
So I think that if the big player in the game become creative commands, it will change automatically.
Because of the ability of humans to just do that.
But for young creators, I would say that they have all the advantages to put it in creative commands.
If I want to be cynical, getting other people for free, do some derivation of your work.
It's like free advertisement.
It's like they are making some life around your project.
Something that is not interesting for others, become a potential resource for others.
And that can be when you start very low and you don't have a big audience, that can be a little boost.
That is part of many little boosts that you all need to get started.
I don't say that it's a miracle thing.
For example, on Fediverse, Mastodon, there is a trend popular hashtag that is MicroFiction.
I love following this one.
I love them.
Oh, yes.
I don't see the listens each time.
And each time I'm like, oh, this one would make a very good comic strip in 4 panels.
Because it's MicroFiction. It's perfectly adapted.
And each time I have this, I can ask probably to the author.
And because I'm too shy to ask, I don't do it.
But if it was written creative comments, anything, they're rules.
I would respect.
But I could, it would be like a, directly like a playground.
Like I know I can share.
Oh, this one is, and sometimes this label is just inspiring people who knows what this label means.
So it can also push people to action.
For people that are skeptical about knowing if this label will have any effect.
It can.
It can have zero effect.
But if the art is good, and if other people are looking at it and say, yeah,
there is a lot of people like me who are too shy to ask an artist.
They don't want also the rejection.
They are afraid of never handing, never having something.
For myself, if I ask behind the question, there is this little me who say,
I hope, I hope, I hope, because I already see the panel in my head and everything.
And so if I get rejected, I have already like an action that I put that gets rejected.
It's very frustrating.
So creative comments is very free for this.
Because I see something on open game art, for example, an excellent website for resource.
I see the character Sarah, the mascot, and I say, oh, Sarah is only a pixel art characters.
I would like to make a fully illustration.
And I did.
I published at one on my website.
And I just had to write creative comments made by the designer of Sarah.
I don't have a name on the top of my head right now, but I could do it.
And I could share it online.
And all this little, this little permission, it's, it's gold.
So there is a very good ecosystem here for creators, removes barriers.
Oh, yes.
That brings me back to the one thing I don't think I wanted to ask you, but didn't cover before.
Where do you get your stories from?
What's the, what's the creation process like?
So you're great stories.
You see here, my cat.
I know, I now know about that.
And this is going to be a podcast.
You're for the whole.
Yeah.
We're recording this on jitsy.
So I can see the video.
And I'm very tempted to put the video somewhere.
Yeah.
So I now know the inspiration for the cast and pepper.
Yeah.
That's the original model for carrots.
Right now.
Right now is.
Yeah.
What is the cat's name?
No, she's not a printer.
Nootie, because I created carrot.
I created carrot after he was born.
So it's okay.
Yeah.
But yeah, no, it's not printer.
It's like a cushion.
A cushion.
Oh, this is a very good tips for everyone who has a problem of cats sitting on their keyboard.
Just make a little couch for cats near your desk.
And then they prefer going to the little couch than the keyboard or the tablet or everything.
But you were asking where I got my stories.
Yes.
And most of the time, so I know that this is a podcast.
And yeah, visually I can show something.
But I will describe what I show.
I have a sketchbook.
Yeah.
That is a little sketchbook.
Yeah.
There is always like a pen like this on it.
Yeah.
And on this, I'm doing only the ideas of stories.
For example, like I have a little comic strip on this.
It's very rough.
It's in French.
It's a.
It's a.
Those are the good.
The sketchbook for panels with some character faces and some text.
There is also some sequence about pepper and carrot of what I would like to do.
And because for me, the ideas are mainly coming when I do everything else rather than being on
my desk and starting to work on the stories.
Yeah.
And that's something very good because I can do a lot of sure like gardening or everything.
But I have to get this little sketchbook nearby because sometimes I keep processing.
I keep thinking and sometimes there is two and two that do the thing in the brain.
And I have something that makes me smile and I take the notes.
And I know that when I come back to the computer I have this sketchbook that is full of ideas.
And I just do a triage after what goes into the stories, what goes as a mini comic strip and everything.
So I try to maintain this type of ideas.
And for example, this week I got shot of ideas.
I started to get not a lot of this.
And I had to sit full afternoon and start to write a bit the process.
It's never good.
I don't think the story I create this way are the best I do.
But a very good story or something just happens randomly at random moment.
And that's why I need my sort of triage.
Yes.
It's like having a net for the butterfly ideas.
So then is the physical during the artwork a different creative where does the creation come?
Is that the physical sketchbook where you use a pen and paper or is it as creative sitting in front of creator?
Would you ever just sit in front of the creator with a blank screen and just go, OK, I'm going to.
Oh, no, no, this I always have something in mind when I sit in front of creator.
Because the software, the creative software have this very big complexity that with a lot of button with a lot of options.
Also, I'm on my computer like right now this one with two screen in front of me and my tablet.
And there is a lot of distraction here.
I can go read the social networks again.
I just want to see the last videos of the creator I like or the last comics they do.
There is so many distractions.
So I try to get the idea and to be in front of the computer to just do like the execution, the production.
It's probably something that I learned during the open movies project, getting the idea, the scenario first.
And then being on the computer just to make them alive.
And at this moment when I'm in the computer like this, I have more like a art director for the concept, for the characters.
I'm trying to get back to the story and to try to get to the essence of what made me write this little idea.
What is the core idea of this?
And sometimes I keep modifying the artwork on the screen.
I keep modifying the dialogue, everything.
But I rarely get the idea in front of an empty canvas and creator, for example.
And same for a text editor.
The sketchbook is a better option.
But some of comic strips, some scenario, of course, were born also with the notepad cake on my KDE desktop.
For example, I write a lot in Kate.
Of course I try to sketch some time little ideas with Krita.
But when I do that on computer, it's mostly because I'm already in the production of something else.
So it's like a parallel something.
And the computer is just under my hand.
I don't pad.
So this creative process is a bit complex.
And it was really challenging for me to get the writer part in me to be on the same page than the art direction part, the visual part.
Because a lot of time I was starting to write things that were not adapted to my style, my visual style.
Because maybe inside me I was maybe not even identifying what was my style or what my audience was expecting.
So I was writing things for what I wish I could be or something.
And then I had trouble to make it as visually and frustration.
Because the drawing, the visual or the instinct I have about this is something that is always more truthful to what my style is and what I am.
To all the more thinking the parts where I write the story.
So I often need to do some ping pong.
And that's why I like this sketchbook.
As you see, I do some sketch of comics directly with speech bubble and characters and everything.
Because if I start to write it just with a markdown and start to panel one description and the speech bubble,
I can fall into a lot of things that are not working.
It's hard to explain.
But maybe when I compose things visually, I see I can put all the things that works visually and that doesn't need a dialogue, for example.
So I can be more efficient with dialogue because things just work visually or something.
And when I write this on a notepad or just text, I can't predict all of this.
And I make mostly mistakes when I do.
I've seen in Pepper and Carrot that you can go several a lot of panels without any text.
In fact, I think you've had one or two that never any text at all.
Yes, yes.
For a long time, it was a tradition on the project that every five episodes or episode five, episode 10, episode 15 were non-text episode.
It was at first because I just like the efficiency of the format.
And then after, because all the translation process and the text and the dialogue process were too big and a bit too heavy.
And I wanted each five episodes, at least, to get an episode a bit easier on the process, really this process to do.
So this episode was like a little breath.
And also your style is gorgeous.
I happen to like it.
Maybe other people don't, but it's like just slaky.
It's gorgeous.
It took me a lot of time to accept it and to like it.
Because at first, I really wanted to make some high fantasy, very dark fantasy,
and get some big things like Lord of the Ring or the Witcher or this type of series that I really like.
That the stuff I like to read.
And when I started to draw and I started to get all these colors, all these design, all these anime, sort of colorful energy and everything.
And I was really conflicted about this during a period.
And when you see a project like Sintel, you can really see that I'm still in the middle of this.
I'm still the high fantasy and I try to get the serious part.
And there is like the character of Sintel that start to be really like my modern style.
And that's what I define that.
Now I play a lot of the recent episode of Pepper and Carrots.
Play a lot with the dark fantasy things.
And with Pepper that is very contrasted into this world.
With some war, where there is some dragons and everything.
And I know more except this visual style.
And I learned how to write for it.
It's quite family friendly or style.
Yes. Is that a conscious decision or just here?
That's one of the aspects that I dislike.
Because most people that see Pepper and Carrots say, oh, it's for children.
The books or everything.
And for me, I'm not writing this special if children.
Of course, I like that it is compatible with children.
That is easy listening for children.
But for me, I prefer the old audience, the general audiences.
I just don't like to get a lot of blood to get all of this.
I'm not particularly fond of big kissing or sexual things.
It's even up in the dragon and having to explode all over the place.
That is.
You tend to avoid that in your work.
Yes, yes.
I don't have anything interesting to say about this part.
I really like other artists that don't say for work or did that can translate the fear, can translate serious characters.
It's just my art style wasn't made for this.
And I know it.
And the story that I tell are often.
I think the thing that I prefer the most is just to surprise the audience.
Just to offer a twist or just to offer something that feels like thinking out of the box.
Just a bit of this.
That's that's what I prefer.
And to write this under the style of something that is all audience and a colorful thing.
I think it's a good.
Okay.
Do you make a living?
Ah, making a living.
Yes, since maybe after the first year of the project with the Patreon and everything,
I'm lucky to make a living of Pepper and Carrot.
But because of the episode where I've started to longer and longer,
I started to come back to the freelance things between episodes to help me to fund them at the same time.
Yes.
So making a living, I'm not super sure that we can say that.
It's not 100% making a living of this because of this trap on the recent years.
But it's not really a trap because at the same time, I started to make freelance for,
for example, for Framassoft, an association in France that makes a lot of things around free software.
Like peer tube, like the mascot of peer tube.
For example, like all their crowdfunding, like many, many things.
On the website of Pepper and Carrot, there is a gallery for all the Framassoft pictures that I made with them.
So they are only to make their picture into creative comments.
And I have full art direction.
So it's not, it's a dream job.
Yeah.
Sorry.
Yes.
But recently I decided after 10 years with them to say,
I will not continue because I now need to make a, if I want to move to a subscription bill,
like monthly, I can't spend a bit of water.
I can't spend all this time on external projects.
If people are donating for Pepper and Carrot, I have to do some Pepper and Carrot work.
Like the comic strip I'm doing.
So that's why I decided recently to do this weekly comics and to make the Pepper and Carrot episode in background.
And yes, I think by the start of 2026, I will do the change of billing things.
But before that, I want to just release a Pepper and Carrot episode and see if I can sustain the comic a bit more.
Yeah.
Very good.
Do you have any books in print?
Oh, yes.
Yes.
So on the web coming, people can't see them, but I have a lot of Pepper and Carrot behind me.
There is the Bulgarian version, there is a Norway version, there is the English version, the Portuguese version,
the German version also, the French version, of course, and the English version.
And among them, there is only the English version that I manage with a print on demand on the website.
All the other ones are published by Be Showing.
Has anyone taken your work and not released it onto the Christmas commons?
Have you seen this, for example, appear on the back of a van as you were driving down the motorway?
It happened to me last week.
So I think it was in 2015 or 2016 and the project started after two years.
There was a Kickstarter of someone impersonating me with a printed version of Pepper and Carrot.
They released the first one under the radar and got their crowdfunding with all the community thinking they were making the artwork and everything.
But that was a little interesting for me when I learned about this.
It was, of course, too late.
It was on the second crowdfunding.
So all the community could at that time shut down the Kickstarter.
But I think that the only example.
In general, people are very respectful of this, at least giving credit.
Some time on forum, there is a picture that is pasted or something, but this I even don't count.
It's like a usual picture usage of the internet, just this.
But for all industrial things, they respect most of the time.
But maybe there is more on the other radar that I don't know.
On the project, when there is a commercial aspect or when there is money, they always count.
100% of the case.
Just to be sure, it's not a problem.
Even though I know the licensing is what the licensing is, if I am going to reuse it, I do like the Warren Fuzzy or at least telling the person.
And sometimes you get back, oh, God, that's great.
And sometimes that's what the license is for.
Yes.
Oh, yes.
I'm guilty about this, replying to email it and saying, I have a template for this.
Thank you for, yeah.
I don't know. Tibo, do you have any other questions?
Because I think I've covered all my questions.
I don't, not any specific question right now.
A lot has been said, actually, that was really good.
So looking forward to you have a plan for the coming year, change of model.
We're going to see more pepper and carrots.
We're going to see more of those weekly ones, which I'm really kind of a joy.
When I read your blog post, because I'm an evil person, I make them across as a nice person, I don't know.
Why is he not busy doing pepper and carrots?
Yes.
But then now I start to watch them.
They're very good, very like it's stills, you know.
Oh, yeah, maybe one question about that, like, how is that working?
So now you said you're doing the weekly comics as well.
And you still work on pepper and carrots.
And like the context switching of that, like, isn't it hard to, how do you see?
Do you see, okay, oh, no, no, it's Monday.
I need to do like the comic.
And when I have that out of the door, then I can focus.
I don't know if you take two days for that.
Then I can spend the rest of the time doing pepper and carrots.
No, thank you for this question, because that's really hard to switch between the two.
Because sometimes I can have a sort of a block, a art block on a little comic episode.
And it blocks all the machine for the longer episode in background.
But I saw that getting the opportunity to make each week a scenario,
also the drawing, the coloring, and to have all the process,
all the workflow, each week, reproduce, reproduce helps a lot the longer version in background.
Because on the longer version in background, I have, for example, 11 page.
And sometimes I can only draw in black and white one page a day.
And I'm really happy when I do one day, one page.
And then I can spend like 11 work day for more than two weeks on just getting the black and white.
And so it's just making black and white, baking black and white, baking black and white.
And in two weeks, my ability to color start to be weak.
And my ability to make story after two months for the next episode was also a problem.
And with this weekly thing, I start to get now the habit of getting all the workflow in cycle like this.
And I thought it would be a nightmare.
That's why I never come up with this solution before.
Because I think I had the information very early.
I have a making off part on my website where I just log everything about making the comic.
So on each episode I've write my problems.
And I always say, I wish I had a smaller format.
I know that this is what works on social media now.
Paperwork out are just too big.
But I don't want to become just making books with short stories.
I need longer stories.
So I had this conflict in my mind for a long time.
But for me, it was impossible to do the two series at the same time.
Because I wasn't even able to make one series.
That was my math in my head.
And at one moment, I say of the F it.
I'll do it.
And I found it very stimulating to do this.
And suddenly, the fact that I made this workflow in cycle right now,
it's like three months I'm doing it.
And it works really well.
It's really balanced with the long term project in background.
With the short term, I don't feel anymore like in backstage during two months in the dark doing something
and making the big release, the big data at one moment.
But I feel more part of the community of the audience.
And this helps for me to say,
I still have this big thing in back.
And at one time, it will be the big episode.
And I will continue.
So yes, it takes one or two days a week to make the comic, the comic strip thing.
But that lets me like three other day.
And because I'm working a lot on the weekend also.
That lets me a big budget for also the longer.
Which one do you do first?
So you do the comic strip, the weekly one first.
And then you have the rest of the time.
Or do you have a system there?
Because I like to post the little weekly things on Wednesday.
I start to be in the red zone in Monday.
And the ultra red zone on Tuesday.
And on Wednesday morning, if I have...
No, I always have something on the Wednesday morning.
At least.
But the emergency area is like the start of the week.
And then when it's posted, I know that I have the Thursday and Friday for making pepper and carrot full time.
And sometimes I even manage it to make three little comics like this the same week.
Because I was inspired to make a lot of them.
And then I could work for two weeks full time on the version.
But right now it's not too regular.
It's not a Monday I do this, Thursday I do this, it's a bit chaotic.
So I have the idea of for Wednesday to have an episode ready, a weekly comic for Wednesday that would be the...
What you aim for.
Yes, yes, yes.
That's what I aim for.
And for example, for this week, I have nothing ready.
So it's also a lie.
It's false.
I have a lot of things ready in my sketchbook, in my notepad.
I have a lot of four panel ready, but I dislike it the more.
And that's something that sometimes happens.
I don't want to draw that.
None of them.
So I had to draw to compose a new one.
And I spent maybe the Monday full afternoon on this.
That was a bit of waste of time.
Because for just a full panel comics, but sometimes you have to rewrite,
rewrite, rewrite, rewrite until you have just a good one.
I was rewriting three in parallel.
Just to be sure to have one that will succeed and be good.
I always write like this.
So just for the audience right now, we're recording on Tuesday evening.
So it's like super red zone now, right?
It's like even pretty late.
Yes, but we are all the dialogue are done.
The speech bubble are done.
The drawing are in black and white.
And the artwork is color reset for the first panel.
So I have only three panel to colorize tomorrow.
It's I am cool.
We will get our dose tomorrow then.
Yes, it's a bit a last minute one.
Because usually by Sunday, I have everything ready for the next week.
So I can start my week working on paper and carrot and just put the thing on Wednesday.
And then on the weekend, just do a little comics.
But last weekend, I had a wedding of a friend.
And that made some little.
It's tight.
Yes.
Thank you very much again for sharing this.
I wouldn't say discussion because I'm mostly monologue.
Absolutely excellent.
I was I thoroughly enjoyed it.
And thanks very much to you for coming on.
And thanks very much to Tibo for coming on.
Yes, short notice.
That was fantastic.
Thank you.
Yeah, no problem.
My pleasure.
And David, thank you.
Thank you very much.
And I just want to thank also the paper and carrot.
We are doing this proofreading of the longer version right now.
And they are doing an amazing work.
Fantastic.
Well, folks, that was.
That was something that I've been looking forward to.
With trepidation for quite a while, actually.
But I'm really glad to have had the opportunity and hopefully have gone into you in the future.
Links for everything that we spoke about will be in the show notes for this episode.
So take the time and take some serious time to relax and enjoy pepper and carrot.
And I can guarantee you you should buy the book and you'll sit down and have it in your coffee table.
Without further ado, I'll thank you both for joining.
And you can all tune in tomorrow for another exciting episode of Hacker Public.
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