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ICECUBES in Japanese!
Posted on October 6, 2025 by Leroy Brown
Dear friends, I recently went on a surprise trip to Japan. It has to be said that Japan is the land of comics and cartoons, except they call them manga and anime. Did you know that manga and anime are one of Japan's biggest exports? It's amazing to see all the billboards, signs, TV shows and even subways full of cartoons and cartoon characters. To celebrate our great visit to Japan, I made an ICECUBES strip in Japanese! Accordingly, it is read from right to left and from top to bottom.

    Mini contest!

The first person to translate this strip in the comments below will get a free download of ICECUBES vol. 2 in pdf format. Leave the comment right here:

7 thoughts on “ICECUBES in Japanese!”

  1. Owen wooff

    Peckinpaw: “It’s difficult!”
    Freeze: “please draw it!”

    1. Leroy Brown

      Leroy Brown

      Congrats, you did it! Although it reads right to left, so Freeze first says: “Draw please!” and then Peckinpaw says “It’s difficult!”. Freeze is trying to get Peckinpaw out of his slump and wants him to draw another comic strip. We’ll see if he does… In the meantime you just won a free digital download of ICECUBES Vol. 2!

    2. Leroy Brown

      The link was sent to the email you provided when commenting. Thank you for being an ICECUBES reader!

      1. Owen wooff

        The link didn’t work

        1. Leroy Brown

          Hi Owen, I sent you a new link.

  2. J.P. Keslensky

    Very glad you had a wonderful trip to Japan. Very exciting. Love to hear more about your visit.

    1. Leroy Brown

      Thank you so much! I’ll make a post about it. It was quite the adventure.

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Layouts.

Posted on June 19, 2009 by Leroy Brown
ICECUBES Charles Schulz always hand lettered all of his comics. He never used assistants the way some others did, ie. Garfield and Doonesbury. He said that he needed to letter his own strips because he didn’t know what the copy would be until the last minute. Changes always happen while you’re drawing a strip, like in this case when I decided to change the panel layout. The text I had wouldn’t read well in the layout I had so I joined the two middle panels and adjusted the drawing instead. You can still see the construction lines for the old layout (orange arrow). Here’s the final strip. ICECUBES

ICECUBISM

Posted on June 12, 2009 by Leroy Brown
Peckinpaw descending a staircase -cubism
Peckinpaw Descending a Staircase by Leroy Brown
“Peckinpaw Descending A Staircase” by Leroy Brown. Acrylic Painting of Peckinpaw Descending a Staircase. Painted in honor of Marcel Duchamp for the Mocca Fest 2009 in New York City held at the famous Armory, where Duchamp first showed his ‘Nude Descending a Staircase’ in 1913! Duchamp’s painting changed modern art forever! You can buy a print of this at the ICECUBES store!

Practice before committing.

Posted on May 1, 2009 by Leroy Brown
ICECUBES When I’m planning out a drawing, sometimes I need to make some real quick sketches to work out simple things like a hand position. In this case I wanted to try out some different hand positions so that the pen he is holding didn’t cut across his face and disrupt the drawing. So I moved it around. You can see the published comic strip here.
ICECUBES
ICECUBES
ICECUBES Here I was trying to figure out how to get Peckinpaw to cross his legs and look natural… not as easy as you would think! Tip: the shin and knee are foreshortened!

Casper and Harvey’s Friendly Comics.

Posted on April 25, 2009 by Leroy Brown
ICECUBES Everyone knows Casper the Friendly Ghost and everyone remembers reading Harvey Comics when they were kids. Casper, Richie Rich, Little Dot, Little Audrey, Spooky and Hot Stuff are all characters that are truly part of America’s collective memory. We love those characters because they are all so friendly and funny. Harvey Comics is part of everyone’s childhood and lucky for me part of that childhood came back to life when I visited the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art in New York City. The Art of Harvey Comics was a really neat exhibit that featured original art from Harvey comic books by stalwarts such as Ernie Colon, Sid Couchey, Warren Kremer and Howard Post. It was just great to see the original art and even greater to meet founder Alfred Harvey’s son Russel Harvey. Russel is a multitalented artist in his own right and wears many hats including TV producer, photographer, writer and comic artist. ICECUBESRussel Harvey (right) and MoCCA director Karl Erickson (left), NYC, April 2009 Russel regaled us with stories of what is was like to grow up in a world of comic art giants. Apparently Charles Schulz really used to say ‘good grief’ and Joe Simon (Captain America) could draw in virtually any style. I had a great time and just want to thank MoCCA’s director Karl Erickson for being so welcoming and Russel Harvey for being -true to the Harvey name- so very friendly! 🙂 Leroy Brown

Positions.

Posted on April 4, 2009 by Leroy Brown
ICECUBES When I’m planning out my strips I try to draw the characters in different poses to see which ones work best. It’s a good idea to try things out before drawing the strip and to experiment. Often times I come up with unusual results and that goes into the strip. The funnier the better! 🙂 Be sure to take the poll! This coming week will be the last week. If you want a third comic on Fridays remember to support ‘ICECUBES’ by clicking on our sponsors!

Pencils.

Posted on March 28, 2009 by Leroy Brown
ICECUBES I like how these pencils look. Sometimes the pencils look better than the finished ink job. I hate when that happens! Oh well, you decide. Notice how I always extend the drawing beyond the panel in order to get a balanced feeling. You can click on the image to get a better look. The finished comic strip is here.ICECUBES