FACES

Each day, John Stephens, a sophomore at MU, devotes time to drawing. He has produced a comic strip, “The 12,” for about a year, and he tries to come out with a new one each week.

Stephens posts them on his door in McDavid Residence Hall, and he distributes them to about 30 of his friends, relatives and co-workers through e-mail.

He learned how to draw cartoon characters in the eighth grade by looking at pictures of the Japanese cartoon “Dragonball Z,” so his characters look Japanese.

Stephens, who is from Liberty, said friends and companionship are the most important things to him because that is where the best humor comes from. He said inside jokes are always the funniest.

“Often, people get the wrong impression of me — when I have been drawing weird sketches in my notebook in class,” Stephens said. “They think, ‘This kid is a nerd.’ But there are a lot of people that are into Japanese cartoons.”

Stephens is majoring in psychology, which he said he likes because he can see it played out from day to day.

Watching movies, reading, playing video games and rock climbing are a few of Stephens’ hobbies. He often spends his nights playing Halo, a video game, with his friends in McDavid.

He also enjoys camping in Estes Park, Colo., and hopes to live there one day. His dream: to become successful from drawing his comics.