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Living with a cat can be an ordeal. Whether dealing with their energetic prowess, or general mystery, cats can be quite the handful. While certainly easier to house than other animals, since cats are pretty much self-sufficient, they can also come with a bag of unexpected problems and adventures. One such owner is Cody Stone Stowe, who got himself an excitable black cat named Coral some years ago, and her antics has lead him to create a series of comics with her as his rising star.
Naturally, this kicked off wonderfully, and he currently boasts a proud 50k followers on his Instagram and regularly gets a lot of attention on all of his posts. Just look at her, she’s clearly planning to burn the entire world down, and Cody is powerless to stop her.
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Cody explained,
“In 2016, living in my own home, I thought it was time to get my first pet. A cat was always ideal since they seemed to be low maintenance (only slightly true). Coral was the first cat we picked up to hold, she climbed on my back, scratched the hell outta me and from then on, she owned me. I never knew that cats had such a sarcastic personality on ’em. They have so many looks that reflect human ones that I get quite the kick out of seeing on a funny cat. Slow glazed blink. Eye rolls. Side eye. There was so much there, and from that, so much to draw from. A coworker at the coop I was working at commented on how I was wasting my drawing talents at work on the whiteboard.”
He further elaborated;
“Originally, I wanted to animate on YouTube, but that idea came right when the YouTube format pretty much moved toward making long format videos the only viable career. Of course, I still wanted to animate but I also wanted it to be a career I can live on, and the financially viable career just wasn’t there for me. So I decided to try comics on Facebook. Started the page WeFlaps and just started posting comics. It was at no cost, no worry of copyright, and didn’t take a long time to illustrate. After the summer, somehow the page had gained fifteen thousand page likes and it had only grown from there. Added a way for fans to support me with a merchandise store and it has become a full-time job for me ever since!”
He continued and explained;
“When I initially started making comics, I had been following The Oatmeal comics by Matthew Inman. The humor was right up my alley and it also revealed to me that comics don’t have to be incredibly detailed or realistic. In fact, making it more simple can often add humor to the piece. My early comics reflect his style but later, I had moved on to more bold lines, a little more detail and color. I was just getting bored with the white blob characters. I had tried many different styles in between but finally found a consistent style my audience and I enjoyed.”
Finally, he said;
“Going forward, I’m hoping to expand the WeFlaps brand to things outside of cat behavior comics. Comics with me as the main character, maybe get into animation, Twitch streaming of sorts, and who knows what. Though I’ll still maintain the comics about Coral because she’s a limitless inspiration. Even though I’ve had her for three years now, there are always new surprises every week from her and I look forward to many more years of surprises.”
What about you? Do Coral’s antics remind you of a cat you know yourself? Tell us about it in the comments, we’d love to know!
