Ah! Things have been really quiet here the last month or so, but not because I haven’t been busy! A bunch of Americus events have been going on back to back and I haven’t really had a lot of downtime in between. So I’m going to take some time now to catch everyone up and let you know how the events went.
Note: Since I’m catching up on like a month of stuff, the post is pretty long.
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.
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.
[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.
This one came from a conversation I had with a friend from work.
I originally had an extra panel between panels 2 and 3, but I realized after I finished inking it didn’t really work. I kept the square format for ease of reading it online, and having it be three across or three down seemed even weirder.
And FYI: I’m moving next week, so there might not be a gag.
Here’s the second one promised this week:
I know I’m kind of blowing my suicide-gag-wad this week, but these are the ones that came to me, so I just went with it. No one should be worried. [okay, Mom?]
Sorry I didn’t have one up last week. I was in California seeing my family. I’m going to try to get another one done before the week is over to make up for it.
Here’s your weekly dose of yuk-yuk from me:
I’m out of town next week, but I promise I’ll have two the following week!
As a way to keep my drawing muscles warmed up, and to try to keep my creativity on it’s toes, I’m going to take on the drawing challenge of having to draw a gag a week. To make sure I keep my nose to the grindstone and don’t slack, I’ve granted Meg Hunt the power to give me shit and to call me *bitch* or *bitch-ass* as she sees fit. This might not seem like a big deal, but I’d like to point out that even though anyone can call me a bitch, this will be an official, Jonathan sanctioned calling of *bitch* or *bitch-ass* which totally makes all the difference.
Besides all of this *bitch* talk, it will also make sure I’m posting at least once a week.
Here’s for this week:
Later!
So like I mentioned before, I had to do some last minute editing changes for Americus this week. Some of that included drawing new pages. I had to send them pencils to make sure that everything was exactly how they wanted it to save myself some redrawing if it wasn’t. It’s not very often that I document pencils, so I thought I would share them here.
I know, they’re pretty boring and look just like my inks. Ha. I guess there’s a reason I don’t really document them.
[Note: These pages will be added to the end of the climax of Chapter 2. If you want to read the entirety of this scene, you can read it online here.]
In case you were wondering, there was one last change that had to be made, and that’s the portrait in panel 5 on the first page. It needed to be a more natural picture showing the Burns family happy, not a posed family portrait.
Also, if you haven’t gotten the chance, Jason & I played the casting call game with Americus the last two weeks on the Save Apathea blog. We have an both indie and Hollywood versions of the film. He made two really awesome posters for each version. I can’t express how awesome they are. Check them out. They’re good for a laugh.