New Pin-Up

quick portrait style pin-up for my buddy Ben Hall's forthcoming masterpiece, Knucklejelly.

Updates

Here is a random selection of panels from my chapter in the upcoming Expendable One Vol.2 that is coming out this summer from Viper Comics. Now that I have wrapped this project, I am moving onto a HUGE project for me, a monthly book that should be hitting sometime the end of this year, but I'll let you know when the time comes as I plan on becoming a promotional machine about it. I'm also doing a small side gig with Brent and I've finally set plans in motion to actually get the SKETCHjam Sketchbook Vol.1 out in the next coming weeks. It should be an exciting rest of the year, career-wise at least.

06.18.07

Here are some pics from last night's work (3 pages pencilled + inked), luckily I got to use alot of blacks and not alot of backgrounds on those pages.

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A project I illustrated a pitch for a few months back is up for discussion at Comics Should be Good. There are a couple comments there that I enjoyed reading and a couple that even like my artwork so check it out and feel free to post.

shitAY!

I did a pretty shitty thing tonight, but I'm watching Sarah Silverman on cable, so it's a toss up for how this night has gone.

ugh.

I haven't uttered a word out loud in 3 hours. Normally that is not so alarming, but it is becoming an unwelcome trend.

Random

Here are a bunch of random panels from a project I just started, it's essentially a fill-in for an upcoming Graphic Novel for Viper comics, can't post too much, it has a tight deadline but I never turn down work, hopefully it comes out looking fairly nice. So I have been working fairly hard, just not alot of stuff I can show right now. I hope to have much bigger news to announce later this summer.

The greatest thing on earth.....

A little departure for me today, I normally do not post very personal thoughts on here, I believe that every little piece of my soul is a chink in my armor of baddassery, so every little bit I give away is potentially arming my enemies against me. Today I'm willing to take a chance to tell you about something that is very dear to me.



UCC Apple Tea. The nectar of the gods and the well of life I drink from. During my time in Okinawa I drank as much of this as possible, and thanks to a very generous allowance from my fine parents, I drank a lot. Since my departure, it has been sparse and my longing for it continues to go unfulfilled. I think I have found it online, packaged differently, but tasting very similiar at Ito En. However, besides being very expensive for a case, my longtime confidant, and world renown Okinawan Tea expert, John Feller, has informed me that they are not indeed the same, and UCC is only available in Okinawa.

So in my quest to quench this raging beast inside my taste buds, I have searched long and far for a substitute (although it is an insult to UCC Apple Tea to do so). I have tried and failed to brew my own, but the recent surge in flavored bottled teas has brought some satisfaction. Lipton makes a citrus flavored tea that is decent, but sweetened with High Fructose Corn Syrup. My current selection is Snapple White Tea, Green Tea flavor. It is very good, not UCC good by any stretch, but it does the job.



So until I find a source for importing the UCC at a reasonable price, I will continue to search for a reliable substitute, and long for the times, few and far between, when I am able to smell the aroma of the Gods, and taste perfection in a bottle again.

thoughts...

so, I really like X-Men: The Last Stand, and I don't care who knows it. It's the closest to a comic book I've seen on the big screen. Also, some serious shit has been dropping on the SketchJam blog lately by Charlie Clark, damn that kid is good, if he doesn't get in his own way. Go. Look. Comment. Be Happy. Make me happy.

New Stuff - May 2007

Here is some new stuff I have worked up over the last couple weeks for a potential project, these pages were made to show the publisher, the first batch wasn't what he was looking for, so per his request I went back and slightly altered some stuff and my style, so hopefully the second group will pay off.



and the newest batch, done this week -

a productive night -

working on the sketchjam anthology and sweating my nuts off. It is hot. No doubt about that.

random 05.09.07

Ever hear of the "piss rule". (My apologies for the language) It goes something like this; You never have to take a leak until you have finished your 3rd beer, but then you have to go after every sequential beer. It's math. It's a fact, and it doesn't matter the volume, 3 bottles or 3 pints, it makes no difference. It's fact. Like physics, it has never ceased to be 100% accurate, in my case anyway.

Today was no better (see last post)

Randomness

Scrubs is a really, really good show.

All of today sucked except the 30 minutes I played with the boys and a 6 minute phone call. 36 out of 1440, that's .025% of a good day, maybe tomorrow will be better.

That's all for now.

Weekend Round Up - Free Comic Book Day 2007

This past weekend was Free Comic Book Day 2007 and I loved (almost) every minute of it. Once again this year Mike Malve of Atomic Comics, comic fan, retailer and all around PIMP, took wonderful care of everyone and while I wasn't able last year to enjoy all the festivities, this year I soaked them all in. Friday night I arrived at the Hilton's hospitality suite just in time to hop a ride to a courtesy viewing of the latest (and hopefully last) Spider-Man movie. This one was terrible and while I loved the the generosity of Mike, this was the low point of the weekend for me. Best part was the trailers for Order of the Phoenix and The Bourne Ultimatum. After the movie we all piled back in the cars and headed south to a fantastic Drink and Draw that was set-up for us at a wonderful local place called Pita Jungle. I love Pita Jungle, I love drinking and I love drawing, so it was perfect. The best part was getting to meet some of the other artists and we all sketched on a giant bed sheet that Mike is giving to the Phoenix Children's Hospital, hopefully the kids like it. I shared a crazy cab ride back to the hotel with Francisco Herrera, I was so busy talking his ear off I apparently missed the 3 cop cars the driver almost hit and the red light he ran.

The next day was the signing and sketching at The Atomic Comics Mesa location with myself, Marat Mychaels, Shannon Denton, Scottie Young, Rick Remender and Jim Hanna. Our store was cool because everyone there was an artist and could do sketches so we all kept pretty busy. Scottie is a pimp and overall we all had a blast and the line was pretty busy all day long. Spider-Man was there and his line was about 3 times the size of ours, kids love the guys in spandex (yeah, kinda creepy).

After the signing we all hung out by the pool and shot the shit, we had a lovely dinner afterwards and then I called it a night. Overall the weekend was great and I'm glad I got to meet and hang out with alot of cool people, so thanks to Scottie Young and Casey, Josh Blaylock and Courtney, Shannon, Francisco, Marat, John Layman, Patrick Sherberger, all the other creators that I really didn't get to talk to much, the Atomic Comics staff and especially Mike Malve for for making it an awesome weekend.


Me, Scottie Young and Rick Remender


Francisco Herrera sketching Spidey, next to Scottie's Joker




cross posted to myspace + sketchjam

Recent sketches

Indie Spinner Rack

I did an interview for this podcast months ago, it's finally available, I haven't heard it yet so I hope I don't sound too retarded. Checkcheckcheckcheckcheckitout!

Musings and Mayhem

So while blog-surfing today I came across Becky Cloonan's blog, where she linked to Corey Lewis' blog where they were both discussing the problems with the comic book industry in respect to the independent comic creator. I thought I would chip in my 2 cents as well. In most indy comics (and many mainstream comics), monthly single issues do not sell well enough for the publisher to recoup costs, and are in essence, loss leaders that lead up to an eventual release of the books in trade format. Like my book VILLAINS, issues #1-4 were released, and then a few months later, the collected trade was released (still available too, clicky on the links to the right and grab a copy!). Now I was very lucky, I knew from day 1 that my book was going to lose my publisher money, to this day I am still eternally grateful they agreed to publish it. The loss leader mentality can only go so far. The percentage of profit on a collected trade is much more than a single issue, so many publishers have started following the Asian market and began producing OGN (Original Graphic Novels) to try and stay alive, while still producing titles.

They problem with OGN's are the massive amount of work that must go into completing them in one giant, singular effort. When doing a series of individual issues, Issue #1 can be released while the creator is working on Issue #3, they can get an instant sense of satisfaction to help keep their creative energies flowing, and the book can begin to get reviewed, gain momentum, and build an audience. When doing an OGN, the creator might labor for months on end, half a year, more than that maybe, on a single volume. During this time, there is little to no momentum being gained, no audience being built, nothing. The creator can easily get dis-heartened, with no book out there with his/her name on it to promote or discuss, it's easy to feel let down and have your creativity sapped. This is part of the reason I am so frustrated with not having anything on the schedule or set up anywhere. I have plenty of projects I am working on, but with no deadline, or schedule, it is easy to become stagnant. The biggest problem seems to be money. It shouldn't come as a surprise to many, but 90% of comic creators make very little to NO money for doing what they love. We work at night after our "real" job, we work on the weekends, we do it all for the love of storytelling. But putting 6 months or a year into a 150 page book, to never see the light at the end of the tunnel is a hard thing to do.

Personally, my idea is to meet in the middle. Instead of releasing a 150 page OGN, break it up into three 60 page installments, sell them affordably and they can be released every 3 months or so. I have two current projects in development, Coral City Aeronauts and The Ronin of The Ryukyu series that I think would be perfect for this format and that is really the only way I am interested in publishing them. My dream for RoR is for it to be 6x9, 60 pages, b/w and priced at only $5.95. I have 3 volumes in mind, for a total of 180 pages or so. Now I just need to convince a publisher of this....

Be there or be square...

Mike Malve yet again hooked me up with a great store to sign and sketch at for May 5th's Free Comic Book Day. Mark it down on your calendar kiddos.

The Ronin of The Ryukyus

The Ronin character I have is something that has been brewing in the back of my mind for years. I have 2 story lines already mapped out for him, one is written, the sequel is in my head. I love drawing him and I can set him in any environment I wish. He actually pops up in the last page of my short story for the Legendary anthology as well. For the sketchJAM sketchbook I decided to do a short idea I had for him that I wanted to do last year. The Ronin & The Island of Beralku will run about 7 pages and will be a fun introduction to the character. This story actually takes place between the 2 others, which are The Ronin & The Shisa, and it's sequel, The Ronin's Revenge. Someday I will do these books, maybe in 2008. Anyway, here is a pic of my blueline paper after I blew up and printed out the thumbnails....



and here is a small version of the final page. This type of project is very spontaneous and fun, I thumbed and inked the first 3 pages in a total of maybe 5 hours.

News and Notes

Just got an email today from Mike Malve at Atomic Comics & The HERO Initiative saying that my sketch cover for Ultimate Spider-Man #100 sold for $300, which is a lot better than I thought it would, but also tied for the lowest, so maybe they had a minimum bid or something, either way, I was in great company and I'm glad I could help even a little.



also today, I was playing around on http://www.deathclock.com/ and according to that site, if I am slightly overweight (which I am) and pessimistic (which I currently am), I will die in 20 years. BUT, if I keep my current weight and be happy (optimistic), I will live until 2073 and be 97 years old. So that gives me another reason to try and get happy. Oddly enough, if I lost weight I would live 2 years less. huh.....................