Free Comic Book Day 2009

I will also have copies of Fata Obstant & The Hurricane Kids with me, so stop on by.

Samson

click for full size.

This is a new character I created for an upcoming short story. If you follow my stuff then you may be able to pick up what it's for. I had a lot of fun researching his uniform and creating his back-story and I look forward to drawing him in action.

Best laid plans...

Last night I was trying to work up a "Where the Wild Things are" sketch for the always awesome Artjumble blog that I have not been contributing to lately and this is the end result. Nothing spectacular, but a keen insight into how my brain works sometimes.


click for full size.

Mysterious Adventure Magazine

Cover to MA#1 by Scott Godlewski & Matt Kaufenberg

Mysterious Adventure Magazine is a great little project run by a couple great guys, Matt and Scott. It focuses on fun adventure and pulp comics and the first issue came out in January, with a summer issue planned for June. I was lucky enough to be asked to contribute the back cover for it. I should also have a new Fata Obstant story in the fall issue as well as I think it's a story that fits well in quarterly like Mysterious Adventure. Do yourself a favor and pick up the first issue, you won't be sorry. Flying aces, nazis, selkies and a demon detective are just a few of the goodies found within.


click for biggie.

*Bonus! Jump over to the Sketchjam! to see a cool inking experiment I did as well as a Panthro (Thundercats!) sketch.

Review of My Popgun 3 story.

With my work on Villains, all of the reviews were almost universally positive and glowing and much of that had to do with the story. Most who commented on the art sounded a lot like this , serviceable and nice and serves the story. I am happy with my art serving the story, that's my job after all. Here is the first and possibly only review of my Popgun 3 story, which only encompasses 8 pages out of almost 500, so I don't know how many more will be coming.

"King’s Hollow: The Trade"
Review by Corwin Crowl

Writer/Artists: Ryan Cody
Colorist: Anthony Nixon
Letterer: Fonografiks
Page 453

I am going to take a guess that this story is part of a larger story. There is not any kind of explanation of who the characters are or the overarching purpose of their mission. A girl named Nissa is sent out to make a trade with a some kind of giant, however she was never given anything to trade with. Ryan Cody created a simple and quick story with simple yet serviceable pencils and color. His style is also unique and works for the type of story he is telling. There are varying degrees of interesting characters and a lot can be inferred from their conversations. The story takes place in 1943 with a war going on but magic and fairies are also real. While interesting the story does not have any real feel of payoff. It is more like a tease for what is to come next.

Rating: 5 out of 10 (Average)

A couple thoughts as I generally enjoy all reviews and this is neither a great one or a bad one and actually sums up my feelings on the story as well. The story is part of a much larger whole, but I wanted it to be accessible but also encourage people who liked it to seek out future stories with these characters (or the past short story, which is still available thru www.super75comics.com). The characters weren't introduced or explained due to space constraints, although I think it reads fine, of all the stories in Popgun, 99% featured unknown characters or ones that were new to the reader. This story was never made to be an epic in 8 pages, so it's fair to say it is simple, as is the art. I do like that the reviewer gained some knowledge of the characters through their conversation as I was hoping people would be able to form a rough idea of the their dynamics. The fact that it ends as a bit of a tease is what I wanted, again hoping it would garner interest in this world I'm creating. I think that review is actually dead-on for the most part. I wish my foray into Popgun was a bit stronger, but I'm satisfied with it and I hope others are as well. One thing that bugged me though was this, "The story takes place in 1943 with a war going on". The story is set in England in 1943 (via a caption on page 1), and the mention of humans at war is made on page 2, so I thought it would be easily identified as happening during WWII. Setting these fantasy stories in real time and in the real world is one thing I really wanted to accomplish.

And as for those intersting character? Look for Cara de Fantasma (the Ghostface character) to show up again in Popgun 4 or 5 later down the line.

Best Video Ever.

Rachel Maddow is the shit. Please watch this.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Ink Experiment1

If you don't follow the Sketchjam blog and are not on deviantArt following me, then hop over to this post to check out an idea I had late last night. I'm not saying it's a good idea......

Emerald City Report

Emerald city was a fun time, if not a successful money making con, although I really am happy to make any money when I don't really have trades to sell and nobody has heard of me. Most people are saving their money to get sketches from the other amazing artists in attendance, and I can't blame them. I did however get to meet a handful of great fans and supporters and I did a smattering of sketches over the two days, mostly on Saturday. The con itself was great, lots of traffic and nice people. I spent much of my time talking inking with the very selfless and endearing Stefano Gaudiano whom I was seated next to. He and I have very similar ideas about inking and very similar methods of how we work. His inks are bold and loose, yet each line seems to serve a purpose and he inks some of Marvel's biggest books, so I'm not the only one who thinks so.

I'm not going to be dropping names or anything, but the con was very successful for me in that I got to meet and get face time with some publishers and editors, and I have a renewed hope for my creator owned work as well as some future freelance gigs as well. I enjoyed hanging out with my friend D, and his lovely wife who kept me fed pretty well. Thanks to Robbi Rodriguez, Brian Meredith and all the fine folks at Emerald City and I'm already looking forward to next year.

Also today I received my comp of POPGUN Vol.3 from Image Comics. Other than a pin-up or two, this is my first published work at Image and is something I have been looking forward to for a long time. It is also my published debut as a writer (other than self-published books), so I'm happy about that as well. Please pick up a copy if it's within your budget.

More con pics here.