Last minute pre-SPX post

Posted on September 8, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

Ah! I’m leaving for DC in like 6 hours, but I wanted to do a real quick post before I left.

Besides Americus, and the Lorian Gendarme Guidebook for Adventuring Standards, I’ll have three other mini-comics. I wanted to share the cover designs that I scrambled to come up with the last two days.

I’m actually pretty happy with them. I found a really nice off-white cardstock to print them on, and it really makes them look really nice [which I’ve tried to replicate in these images]. I would take a picture of them to show you, but I’ve already packed them away.

Anyhow, the first two are basically all of the One of the Johns comics reprinted, and then the last one is all of the comics I did for various anthologies and projects while I was drawing Americus.

Anyhow, just a reminder: If you’re at SPX, stop by and say hi! MK and I will be at table H-15/16.

SPX, here I come!

Posted on September 6, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

Okay, so I’m spending the week wrapping things up for SPX. MK and I will be at table H-16, next to Tugboat Press and Alec Longstreth! Come by and say hello if you’re there!

The secret project that MK and I have been working on for the show is pretty wrapped up, so the rest of the week is getting my old mini-comics ready to be reprinted. As a spoiler, here’s a mockup of the cover for our secret project:

The reading last week at Powell’s went well. Here’s my favorite picture from the event, taken by my friend Courtney. I was illustrating through hand gestures how the more words in a panel you use, the less room the artist has to draw.

Hopefully once I get back, and I can start working on some stuff for myself again. I had a really good work-groove going on the last couple of weeks, and I want it to keep going!

And a new Save Apathea! website will be popping up soon now that we’ve finished serializing the comic. I’ll keep you updated.

Americus at Powell’s

Posted on September 1, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

[Reposted from SaveApathea.com]

Americus is out! Yay! Head to your nearest bookseller and get you one!

I spent most of Tuesday afternoon hanging all 200 pages up at the Basil Hallward Gallery on the 3rd floor of Powell’s.

It was pretty awesome to see the pages up on a wall instead of in a stack in my flat drawers. Also kind of weird to see them all up and think ‘This was three years of my life.’

Here are some pictures:

All of the original pages are for sale, except for this one and this one. Most of them will be priced at a low $100, though ones that have had a significant amount of digital alteration will be cheaper at $65, and some of the cooler Apathea sequences that I’m kind of attached to will be priced at $200. I still need to go through and make the price list, but I will post that stuff here when I do, as well as the contact information for the gallery in case anyone is interested in buying pieces.

If you’re in Portland, don’t forget to swing by tonight for the opening reception and reading. I’ll post some pictures of the event afterwards.

And Kathy Moon reminded me that our guest book review of Teenagers from Mars was featured on Unshelved last Friday. You can check it out here.

Americus News!

Posted on August 25, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

Again, sorry I haven’t been posting here at all this month. MK and I have been really swamped getting our secret SPX project together and then we’ve been doing lots of odds and ends getting ready for Americus‘ release next Tuesday. With everything that’s going on, I’m just going to post some news tidbits:

• First, a recap from last post. Americus was picked for an ABC New Voices and then there was a review in Publisher’s Weekly.

• We were also nominated [along with many other great First Second Books] for the 2012 YALSA Great Graphic Novels for Teens.

• There was also a review in the Kirkus Reviews. It’s the first one that I’ve found from a major publication or review source that has been negative. The summary of the review is basically ‘The heart of the book is in the right place, but the writing and art are lacking’. At least our hearts are in the right place! I’ll take that over a lot of other negative things any day.

• There’s a lot going on at Powell’s next week to celebrate the release of Americus! And it’s all going down on Thursday the 1st. Be there!

All right. I think that’s it for now! Don’t forget to buy Americus next week!

I’m working, I swear!

Posted on August 8, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

So I know that things have been a little quiet lately, but I swear I’m working. It’s just for a secret project that MK and I are getting together for SPX, and I don’t want to spoil any of it. That, and we’ve been filling out a shit-ton of promo stuff for the Americus release.

I did have to do some work this week for the Pacific Northwest Inlander out of Spokane, which I can share. It was for an article about how people can write bad reviews on Yelp anonymously to bring a restaurant’s score down. You can read the article here.

Also some exciting news regarding Americus:

First off, we got news last week that Americus was chosen as one of the 2011 ABC New Voice titles. Here’s the little blurb we got:

“The ABC New Voices titles are chosen by a dedicated committee of independent booksellers around the country (chaired by Cathy Berner in Houston). Only twenty titles are chosen every year – ten middle grade and ten young adult – written by outstanding first time authors.”

And one of the first major reviews for book is out at Publisher’s Weekly. Check it out!

Okay, now back to working on secret stuff…

Knocker’s Up!

Posted on July 19, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

Here’s my piece for next month’s show at the Basil Hallward Gallery in Powell’s. I can’t remember what the name of the show is, but basically they found a bunch of old, bad records and handed them out to a bunch of different artists. It was then the artist’s job to use that record as inspiration or whatever. I decided to cover the record cover [Get it. Ha ha? Eh…Sorry, I couldn’t help myself].

Here’s the original record cover:

And here’s my cover-cover:

How often does the chance to draw a woman’s breasts beating the crap out of some dudes come up and have it displayed in a public place? How could I resist?

I just hope my mom doesn’t see it…

Playin’ Around

Posted on July 18, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

So I spent a day last week playing around in Photoshop doing some digital painting/sketching. Part of me feels like I should’ve just busted out some paints and played around with paint-painting, but there was something nice about the ease as to which I could just play around with something and not have to clean up a big mess or the fact that I could justcommand+n and start a new project.

It was fun and frustrating at the same time. I really liked just doodling and messing around and not worrying about having a finished product, and I think the biggest thing I got out of it was getting a little more used to drawing with the tablet.

Anyhow, here’s two of the more ‘finished’ looking items to come out of the day:

I am actually pretty excited for the learning process – to be using different tools and then to learn how to use those tools to add make the illustrations my own. I have a lot on my place for SPX, but I’m hoping to sit for at least an hour or so everyday and play around to make some progress. I think my goal will be to try to master it and have some finished pieces by the end of the year.

It’s also really good for me because it’s forcing me to confront one of the biggest weaknesses in my my drawing – thinking of form and lighting and not relying on line so much. Even if I slip off the horse and don’t end up following through with that, I think that having to confront those things can only make my other drawing stronger, right?

Favorite

Posted on July 11, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

This is like a week too late, but this was the illustration I was working on to celebrate getting to see Neko Case at the Edgefield last week with Jen, MK, and Greg.

I haven’t really worked on anything finished in a couple of weeks, and I feel really rusty, so I’m not completely stoked for this illustration. I’m a little bummed because I’ve been wanting to do this image for a long time and now that I finally have, it isn’t exactly how I wanted it to turn out.

I’m hoping to get out of the funk this week by being super productive. I think I’m just at a weird crossroads where I don’t know what I want to do with my art life right now. I feel like I need to change things up a bit and rethink how I do things. Hopefully the projects that I have on my plate this summer will help with that.

In non-existential crisis news: I got the light table working! It was as simple as finding the right light bulbs! They are discontinuing the kind of light bulbs it needs next year, so I will eventually have to rewire the whole thing and change the ballasts, but for now it’s good to go. Well, besides that I still need to get the glass and frost it, which is on my agenda for later in the week.

Anyhow, here a picture it all of it’s lit up glory!

New art digs

Posted on July 5, 2011 by Jonathan Hill

All right, just a heads up – this post will basically be repeated at Save Apathea tomorrow. If you follow both sites, I apologize for the reruns. I’ve just been too busy getting settled to sit down and work on anything the last week or so. I’m going to try to get some drawing done tomorrow before it gets too hot, so I will hopefully have a new gag posted then.

Anyhow, just thought I’d share some images of my new studio now that I have things pretty much in place:

So I’ve had this old, massive wooden drafting/light-table forever. In my old place, I basically just used it as a table to keep crap on and do some silkscreening. I decided that I’m going to try to fix it up and use it full-time as my drafting table. I still need to get some new parts – mainly new glass and the lightbulbs – which is why there’s just a big hunk of wood on there right now. It’s also pretty high up, so I think I’m going to give standing and drawing a try. My old studiomate Meg Hunt has been doing it for a couple of months, and it seems to be going well for her. Who knows, I might end up having to get a new stool or chair or something next week.

Here’s a better picture of my the table and my new drawing workspace:

I’ll post some more pictures once I get the light-table working!

Also, if you live in Portland, don’t forget to swing by Floating World Comics on Thursday for the Papercutter art exhibit and issue #16 release party! Come celebrate Greg Means, his comics anthology Papercutter, and his general all-around awesomeness!