Outer Field Backstory
Outer Field didn’t come together quickly. It took time — a lot of it.
The first character I ever drew was the scarecrow. He didn’t have a name yet. I just knew I wanted something that felt familiar, like a character you might see wandering through Peanuts or Calvin & Hobbes. Simple. Approachable. Timeless.
Most of the early sketches lived in a notebook. I doodled, erased, redrew, and eventually showed them to my wife. She liked him. That was enough encouragement to keep going.
Since then, the process has stayed mostly the same: draw, redraw, tweak, repeat. Characters slowly evolve, sometimes without you even realizing it. If you look at almost any long-running comic, you’ll see that same quiet progression — early strips compared to later ones tell a story of their own. That evolution is part of the fun.
Outer Field Characters
Ace Crow
Mostly clueless
Ace is a scarecrow who takes his job seriously — even if he doesn’t always understand what’s going on around him. He’s committed to protecting the field and constantly searching for better ways to do so, usually by way of ideas that don’t work out as planned.
He was first sketched in a spiral-bound notebook back in 2003. His outfit hasn’t changed much over the years, largely because there aren’t many wardrobe options for a scarecrow. The design has gradually tightened up with practice, but at his core, Ace has always been the same: earnest, optimistic, and just a little lost.
Drake
Sleepy and snarky
Drake is an insomniac bat who quite literally hangs out with Ace. He’s sharp, observant, and rarely impressed. Where Ace sees possibilities, Drake sees flaws — and he’s happy to point them out.
Drake was the third character created for the strip and the only one who had a name from the beginning. He’s loosely inspired by where I spent my high school years in Bowling Green, Kentucky, an area surrounded by caves. During summer evenings, bats would drift through the twilight, and that image stuck with me long after I moved away.
AL
Marooned with morons
Al is an alien who crash-landed in the field and hasn’t found a way home since. His ship needs repairs, replacement parts, and a level of technology Earth hasn’t quite caught up to yet.
While stranded, Al spends his time studying the planet — and teaming up with Drake to comment on Ace’s day-to-day decisions. He was the second character created back in 2003, though he didn’t have a name at first. Early versions leaned more robotic, but over time he became something more familiar.
His headphones are an intentional nod to my own college years spent buried in music, and his antennas are a quiet homage to Boba Fett’s helmet.
Stanley Hemski
Business Analyst of awesomeness
Stanley is a field mouse turned Business Analyst, focused on efficiency, process improvement, and meaningful change — whether anyone asked for it or not. He’s highly capable when it comes to the technical side of his work, but less comfortable navigating the social side of the field.
Stanley came much later than the original cast and was inspired by my own move into business analysis around 2010. He was originally created for a commissioned project with B2T Training and later found a permanent home in Outer Field. His stories tend to orbit workplace humor, meetings, and the quiet absurdities of professional life.
His last name is a playful twist on Kowalski from Due South, altered just enough to feel familiar without borrowing outright.
Mr Fu
Middle manager
Once known as Little Bunny Fu-Fu, Mr. Fu left his more chaotic past behind in favor of middle management. He now oversees the field’s operations, mostly from his office.
Mr. Fu is Stanley’s direct supervisor, though it’s never entirely clear who he answers to — or what his responsibilities are beyond supervising Stanley. He was part of the original character lineup but appears less frequently. Early on, he was meant to be Ace’s boss, but naturally shifted into a managerial role once Stanley entered the picture.
Jay, Edgar, & Poe
Just crows
Jay, Edgar, and Poe are a trio of crows constantly looking for an easy meal — and an opportunity to complicate Ace’s life. Jay leads the group thanks to his intelligence, while Edgar and Poe are usually content to follow along.
They were introduced a few years after the core cast, and while they don’t appear as often, they remain a useful source of chaos. If nothing else, they’ve always had strong names.