life on paper

FANART FRIDAY: SAILOR TWAIN or "The Mermaid in the Hudson"

2012-01-14T03:50:00.000-08:00

I could not possibly communicate to you how much I love this comic.

But I will try anyway.

My little sister told me to read Mark Siegel's SAILOR TWAIN. So I did. It was THE BEST decision I made that week. Sailor Twain is a careful, deliberate, brilliantly handled story of love, loss, mystery, and mermaids. The restraint and delicacy with which the story is revealed over the hundreds of pages that currently make up Sailor Twain is astounding. There are few people working in any medium that can tell a story like Siegel.

It's really good comics, people. And, amazingly, it is currently FREE online.

So... read it.

You may start

HERE

I like Sailor Twain so much I drew a picture about it.

And here's some detail, 'cause we all love that.

Seriously though.

Read this comic.

If you don't, you will feel foolish about it one day.

FANART FRIGGIN FRIDAY: CHRONO TRIGGER

2012-01-06T09:43:00.000-08:00

So Sam Bosma's been posting all manner of wunnerful video game fanart, which made me feel the itch. Here's a quick pass at Crono.

Trying to subdue Akira Toriyama's INCOMPREHENSIBLYWILDDESIGNS into something I can actually draw was really fun.

SPERA AND FORTHCOMING GOODNESS

2012-01-02T10:56:00.000-08:00

CITIZENS OF EARTH:

HAPPY

NEW

YEAR

It is going to be a good one. At least on this blog. So far I am knee deep in great projects for 2012. For example. Here's a pin-up I did for the second volume of SPERA.

I believe the first volume is now on sale. If I were you, I would check it out. It was made by talented people, and I'm beyond pleased that I got to toss some art onto it.

Here's a detail of those pretty pretty princesses.

Enjoy your freshly minted new year.

More to come.

-Jake

FANART FRIDAY: SILLY KINGDOM

2011-10-15T17:13:00.000-07:00

I was flipping through my copy of Katie and Shaggy Shanahan's Silly Kingdom today, and in the back I saw these BEAUTIFUL sketches that Katie had done of Milsley the Desert Witch as a younger woman. Katie draws with this easy feminine grace that I've never been able to muster.

May have something to do with me being a man and all.

Anyway, I had to draw me some Milsley. Mostly 'cause of her HAIR.

I think the hair is even bigger and more full of neat stuff in Katie's version.

THE REMAINS OF THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR

2011-10-05T17:58:00.000-07:00

Hey people.

Trying some new things. I'm not sure how I feel about this one. But I needed to stop tinkering with it. It's a small part of a mini-comic I've been working on in my spare time.

Thanks to everyone who came out to see us at APE!!! We sold out of stock pretty quickly, which was kind of nice, but kind of a bummer for the folks who didn't get their hands on a copy. Again, my apologies.

The word on Hawaiian Dick is that it's getting released for summer convention season... we don't have a firm date yet, but folks have been asking, so I figured I'd share what I know.

Keep it real, people!

-Jake

ARE YOU GONNA BE AT APE?

2011-09-28T12:40:00.000-07:00

Because I am.

The Alternative Press Expo

October 1st and 2nd

at the Concourse Exhibition Center in

San Francisco, CA

I will be at table 521A with my bay-area partner in crime Thi Bui, providing copies of The Anthology Project Vol. 2 as well as the second installment of Thi's ongoing immigration epic to the eager citizens of San Francisco.

GET SOME.

A PANEL FROM 'THESEUS,' MY STORY IN THE ANTHOLOGY

Those that purchase a copy of The Anthology Project will be able to get it signed by the singularly hilarious Katie Shanahan as well as the irrepressibly morose Roman Muradov, who will also be exhibiting. I'll sign it too, if you ask nice.

So come and stop by table 521A for a good book and a good time.

X-MANIC MONDAY: YOU'RE A GOOD MAN, CHARLIE XAVIER (PART 2)

2011-09-19T18:36:00.000-07:00

This is probably in poor taste...

X-MANIC MONDAY MASHUP: YOU'RE A GOOD MAN, CHARLIE XAVIER!!

2011-09-12T17:09:00.000-07:00

That's Dr. Moira McTaggert in the booth, for those of you who like to know these things.

X-MANIC MONDAY: LABOR DAY EDITION

2011-09-05T08:16:00.000-07:00

Happy Labor Day, peoples of Earth! I did not draw any X-Men today. Because I have decided, with the rest of America, to let some other person I don't know do my job while I go barbecue all day.

THIS MAN IS THAT PERSON.

CLICK.

And be amazed.

X-MANIC MONDAY: SPORTS EDITION

2011-08-29T12:04:00.000-07:00

Colossus and Cannonball playing old-timey football. 'Cause in my mind, fancy private schools like the Xavier Institute still use old-timey uniforms.

As a kid, certain X-titles had a lot of appeal to me, 'cause they were about otherwise normal kids living at a cool boarding school with powers and drama and whatnot. That Harry Potter appeal. The books have lost that over the years.

OH, and a few of people were asking about process. See below. All of these images should enlarge to actual size when you click 'em.

STEP 1: THE IDEA

Once I've thought of what it is I want to draw, even before doing a sketch, I browse around online and in my library for scrap. In this case, I looked through a bunch of old (pre 1930) football photos for ideas about uniforms, shoes, poses, etc. And because they're pretty much awesome.

Once I feel informed (or get tired of looking), I start sketching. I quickly doodle out a dozen or so little possibilities and then pick the one I like. I liked this one above. The actual sketch is around two inches tall.

STEP 2: THE DRAWING

I make a drawing based on the sketch. Sometimes I enlarge the sketch and draw over that, sometimes I don't. In this instance I enlarged the sketch, drew over it with blue pencil and then did the final drawing in 4b mechanical pencil on top of that. I isolate my pencils in photoshop using the channels functions.

STEP 3: COLOR

I color under the lines in photoshop. Nothing fancy. For client work I'd have already picked my colors and done a study, but for this kind of stuff I just wing it. I keep my colors flat and simple. Sometimes I color my lines, too, by locking the transparency of my pencils layer and going over them with the desired color, like I did on Colossus's sweater.

STEP 3: TEXTURE

Here I've thrown down a layer of scanned watercolor texture I made with india ink wash. It's an overlay layer under the lines and over the color, set as a clipping mask.

I duplicate my color layer and throw the color halftone filter on it. That's right. I use a FILTER. And I'm not ashamed. Then I isolate the dots with the channels and drop the opacity.

STEP 5: FINISHING TOUCHES

And another overlay layer. Gradient. Pink. I cut out of it to make sure Colossus's eyes are blue, and check over everything one more time.

Hope you folks enjoyed the drawin' and the shop talk. I'm always hesitant to do anything at all on process because what I do is SOOO SIMPLE. I do not think I could be more basic if I tried.

'Till next time.

X-MANIC MONDAY: KITTY PRYDE

2011-08-22T12:00:00.000-07:00

More prep-school mutants.

A lot of the folks that read this blog did not grow up reading 80's cape comics, and therefore do not know that Kitty Pryde has a pet space-dragon named Lockheed.

But she do.

And we all need to accept it.

I'ma keep trying to do one of these a week. I need something fun and simple to do between jobs.

X-MANIC MONDAY: JUBILATION LEE

2011-08-15T11:15:00.000-07:00

This is what Jubilee might look like if Xavier actually ran a School for Gifted Youngsters instead of a Front for his Morally Questionable Secret Paramilitary Strike Force.

Seriously, why are those kids never in class? And why don't they have AWESOME prep-school uniforms?

Between 1991 and 1998 most of my free time was spent trying to draw the X-Men like Jim Lee and waiting for my latent mutant powers to manifest themselves.

It was a disappointing childhood.

DRAWINGS FROM THE ROAD

2011-08-11T13:26:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I go on vacation, but I don't want to stop working.

So I don't.

This was drawn at my in-laws' place outside of LA.

I like the protagonist from issue 3, 'cause he's just a little bit sleazy. Just a little. Enough to make him interesting, but not repellent.

ANIMATION BLOCK PARTY

2011-07-30T14:11:00.000-07:00

Hey peoples. METRO is screening over at the Animation Block Party this weekend. Somewhere in Brooklyn, I'm told.

We're showing with the rest of Program Four this Sunday, July 31st (tomorrow) at 4pm. If you're there, you should go. If you're not, you should check out last years films. Because they are wonderful. Especially Old Fangs, in it's own frightening way.

Here's a quick li'l 30 second trailer for METRO.

I can't remember which festival needed a trailer, but I ended up having to make it in fifteen minutes or something to submit in time.

Seriously, though. You should watch Old Fangs. I'm kind of in love with it.

THIS TIME WITH A CAR

2011-06-29T10:36:00.000-07:00

Hello, my peoples.

Here is some more Hawaiian Dick.

This time with an ominous vehicle of great mystery and portent. I wish I could show you the page after this. It is undoubtedly the best page in the comic so far, and probably the best picture I have ever made.

But I can't, y'all. Spoilers and such.

So this will have to do.

In other news, it was brought to my attention that the image in THIS POST was somehow broken. That error has been corrected.

Have a great summer. Never change.

-Jake

I AM BACK

2011-06-13T15:41:00.000-07:00

Here's a drawing I did of a town called Cillas.

And here's some color on it.

Thanks for looking at my pictures, folks!

More as I scan stuff.

2011-05-29T01:35:00.000-07:00

Hello, Friends.

I'm still on the road, but here's some more pictures.

When I get back I'll dump a whole lot of sketchbook on you.

-Jake

THE DISTANT FUTURE. THE YEAR: 2011

2011-05-20T15:16:00.000-07:00

The blogger robots have failed, and I left my laptop at home... so you get an iPod post.

Isn't it wild that even without a computer I can access, download, edit, and post my work from a train station? Long live the future.

VIAJERO

2011-05-15T16:29:00.000-07:00

Another spread from Hawaiian Dick.

You'll have to click on this one to see it at a decent size.

I'm done with the 70's for now, as well as these kinds of chatty scenes. The third issue has a little less conversation, a little more action, and I'm excited about that.

I won't get started on it for a while, though-- I'm heading for Spain tomorrow and won't be back at the studio until June 10th. I've instructed Blogger to have its robots continue to post drawings in my absence. We'll see if they choose to obey or to rise up against me.

JUST SO YOU KNOW...

2011-05-06T01:18:00.000-07:00

... I'm still drawing comics.

Can't stop won't stop.

In other news, I have a new fantasy in which I live in the 70's and I draw romance comics full time. And wear plaid leisure suits. And meet Lynyrd Skynyrd. And Alex Toth is rude to me about how his comics are so much better than mine.

...It's a very specific fantasy.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

2011-04-25T11:43:00.000-07:00

Thanks to all the people who had kind things to say about the little story I've been posting. Working on getting more of that out.

In the meantime, I'ma answer some questions that I've been getting a lot of lately.

WHEN IS HAWAIIAN DICK COMING OUT?

I dunno. I'm gonna be done with the interiors by February of 2012. Unless the Mayan Apocalypse befalls us before then. It's a race! I don't know how or when Image plans to release the book, but I'll keep y'all posted.

WILL YOU POST ON YOUR PENCILING/COLORING PROCESS?

Yes. Soon-ish, even. It's embarrassingly simple, but I will do it. Probably next week.

WHY DON'T YOU DRAW IN INK? YOU KNOW THAT COMICS ARE DRAWN IN INK, RIGHT?

As the last survivor of a distant alien race, I have a near-lethal ink allergy. When I fell to your earth, scientists claimed that I would never be able to draw comics. But the light of your yellow sun lends me the power to draw with graphite and black prismacolor pencil.

Thanks for your questions, earth-men.

Here's some more people smoking!

THREE

2011-04-20T01:15:00.000-07:00

TWO

2011-04-18T15:27:00.000-07:00

ONE

2011-04-17T00:34:00.000-07:00

MORE SMOKING

2011-04-15T18:26:00.000-07:00

Do you know why there's so much smoking in film noir? Because there's so much talking in film noir.

When your story calls for some extended conversation with little or no action, those characters need something to DO. In some cases they need to act to support the dialog. But a lot of gesturing about isn't appropriate for some scenes or characters. Say, cool detectives and hardened feds exchanging info on a possible perp. So what can these characters DO while engaging in vital, story-developing dialog and maintaining a collected, cool demeanor?

They can smoke. It's a convenient device that's become a staple of detective fiction.

Also, it's period. Don't mess with it.

The conversational bits are always tricky. This is why there is almost no dialog in the stuff I do for myself. Writing dialog stresses me out, and I tend to fall back on pictures. Clay, however, writes excellent dialog, and so I am forced to grapple with these storytelling issues.

I recently read Stuart and Kathryn Immonen's Moving Pictures, which I highly recommend, and Stuart does a FANTASTIC job of handling the chattier pieces of story. I need to spend some more time with it and make some notes.

METRO screening in New York, Provo

2011-04-08T01:19:00.000-07:00

Hey, Folks. METRO, a movie I made, will be screening this weekend (this Friday, also known as Today) at the Epiphany Children's Film Festival in NYC and the Final Cut Film Festival in Provo, UT. So if you'd like to see it, you should go.

I'll tell y'all about future screenings before the day of.

If I tell you. Which, honestly, is pretty improbable.

People living in Not New York or Provo or wherever else will be able to see the film after this summer when it screens on The Internet. Probably sooner than later. I'm the crown prince of missing submission deadlines. I'd be the king, but I keep missing the coronation.

BE ADVISED:

2011-03-31T11:15:00.000-07:00

FANART FRIDAY HAS BEEN CANCELLED DUE TO LOCALIZED BLACKOUTS

2011-03-25T16:16:00.000-07:00

I was almost finished coloring the Spider Man I promised you all when the power went out on me and destroyed the file. Which is not so great a tragedy-- I didn't much like it, anyway.

So you get real work instead.

An establishing shot, even. With a tree!

CLICK THIS TO MAKE IT BIGGER

There will not be a Fanart Friday next week, because I will be attending WonderCon in San Francisco with my friends, Thi and Jared.

And there may not be a lot of Fanart Friday for a while.

I've kept the game up for some time now, but it's getting a little stale for me (I didn't even want to post this week's mediocre offering) and I want to use my free time to turn out a few short comics I've got bouncing around in my head...

Also, I'm BURIED under work right now.

I'll definitely post one now and again, but I can't maintain it as a weekly occurrence anymore. Can we all be cool with that?

Yes. Yes we can. Less fanart, more comics. Change you can believe in.

ALSO: IF YOU CAN NAME THE WEIRD, OUTSIDER ARTIST I'M CHANNELING IN THIS PANEL, I WILL GIVE YOU THE DRAWING.

Because contests are FUN!

THE ANTHOLOGY PROJECT VOL 2 IS ON SALE

2011-03-23T12:32:00.000-07:00

Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls, you can buy the second volume of The Anthology Project

HERE.

The book will ship in late April, and be available for purchase at several conventions and festivals this summer.

Here's a printed spread from my story, THESEUS. And someone else's hand. I think it's Joy's.

If you'd like to see more, you can see spreads from all the other artists over

HERE.

The book is FULL of talented creators telling their own stories on their own terms. It is a choice cut of meaty comics goodness, an unparalleled party tray of assorted sequential snacks. I am proud to have my own little confection displayed on such a platter.

Enjoy.

FANART FRIDAY MASH-UP: CONAN THE HYRULIAN

2011-03-18T07:05:00.000-07:00

I've been reading me some Conan and playing me some Zelda.

And those two things have, apparently, been merging into one, deeply confused concept in my sleep-deprived brain.

Conan is ridiculously fun to read. It's written in this incredibly hyperbolic, sexually charged fortissimo. Robert E. Howard turns out descriptions of busty sword maidens fit to make a man blush, then turns around and details Conan's physique with the same level of eroticism. It mirrors the kind of egalitarian exploitation you find in a Frazetta painting: everyone is equally naked, sexy, and violent.

Which is how it SHOULD be.

The Zelda games are a great foil to all that, because they are steeped in that whole sword-and-sorcery thing Howard invented while remaining COMPLETELY sexless and militantly wholesome. The two things are at opposite ends of the S&S spectrum, and I had a lot of fun cramming them together.

Maybe later I'll do Link the Barbarian.

Next week is Spiderman week, folks. There will be a trivia competition to win the drawing.

And Joey Majdali is disqualified for being an insomniac, so someone with normal sleeping habits may ACTUALLY WIN this time, dear readers.

Until next time, may Crom grant us all that is needful for man.

PS-- I KNOW that the correct term is Hylian, y'all. But 'Hyrulian' is a better stand in for 'barbarian,' or 'Cimmerian.' Artistic license, I say.

2011-03-16T12:50:00.000-07:00

It was like, NINE DEGREES outside when I drew this. Fahrenheit. I was trying to beat back the cold with color, and as a result it looks like a MarioKart version of Hawaii. Complete with Wild Wing.

Maybe it's Shigeru Miyamoto's vacation home. Adorable carnivorous flora lurk just out of sight, bouncing in rhythm to the pleasant, tropical beat...

Or maybe it's the lovely home of an alcoholic detective. Who knows?

CHARITY PRINTS--HELP HEAL JAPAN

2011-03-12T00:12:00.000-08:00

Hey, y'all. I've made several prints of my work inspired by Japanese artists available through deviantArt.

Until further notice, all of the profit from these prints (20% of the total cost) will be donated to the relief efforts of The American Red Cross in Japan and other areas affected by the pacific tsunami.

You can purchase a print

HERE.

OR, if you'd like to skip the print, you can donate directly to the relief effort

HERE.

Or both.

These are the prints currently available:

I am extremely grateful for all of the help that my family and community received from kind and giving strangers in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. I cannot imagine what would have happened without it.

Nature is beautiful, wild, and powerful, but it can't be anything but amoral and indiscriminately destructive. So it's nice that there are people around to be good.

FANART FRIDAY MASH-UP: 20th CENTURY BOYS and CAVE STORY

2011-03-11T02:20:00.000-08:00

FIRST: Naoki Urasawa's 20th Century Boys is better than I could possibly communicate to you.

It's a stunningly rendered, painstakingly told story about despair, ambition, and the ways we both fall short of and transcend the hopes of our childhood selves. It's first rate comics, and an incredible story.

If you're ever going to read Manga, read 20th Century Boys. Below is Kenji, the series protagonist, facing off against his nemesis. But as a child. With a guitar. Just read the comic, it's incredible.

SECOND. I recently played through Studio Pixel's Cave Story, (which is wickedly fun) and had to do something pixel-y. It took me a while to figure out how I wanted to do it, as I have a friend who's doing some truly unbelievable things with a lo-res look at the moment, and I didn't want to infringe on his territory. But I feel like I found something adequately removed. Anyway, that's why everything's all pixel-fied.

Have a good weekend, y'all!

themachinestops

2011-03-06T13:12:00.000-08:00

Drew this in my tiny little pocket moleskine while I was waiting for my little sister to finish getting her hair cut.

Which took a L O N G time.

I think it's going to be my next short story.

FANART FRIDAY: GIRLS ON TANKS (AGAIN)

2011-03-04T10:19:00.000-08:00

Tank Girl spurns your 'color.'

Trying to see of graphite-stick scribbles can stand in for screen-tone. I feel like normal zip-tone looks a little out of place on my b&w pencil work, but I like the simple, pared-down look of manga, and I'm trying to find an acceptable substitute.

What do y'all think? Is it working for ya?

FANART FRIDAY: GIRLS ON TANKS

2011-03-04T00:49:00.000-08:00

I loved Ashley Wood's covers on Tank Girl: The Gifting. They seeped into this drawing without my conscious effort or consent.

The schoolgirl is from a weird, mostly upsetting seinen manga by a gentleman named Matsumoto. NOT TAIYO. A different Matsumoto. Anyway, she lives in a tank. In a park.

My wife's up there, too. You can't tell it's her, 'cause it's super-tiny I haven't colored it, but she's there. With guns. She was actually the wardrobe consultant for this particular doodle. She does NOT live in a tank.

A bigger, color version is pending-- I wanted to make sure I had something up for Friday morning, and my wardrobe consultant is making me go to bed.

HOW TO DRAW COMICS..

2011-02-28T14:22:00.000-08:00

...THE ~~MARVEL~~ NARRATIVELY EFFICIENT WAY

I like drawing comics, y'all. Under any circumstances. Drawing comics under the constraints of a script and a prescribed page-length has been a really interesting experience. Left to my own devices, I tend to tell very simple stories

v e r y s l o w l y ,

drawing only a few panels per page and spreading the narrative burden so that no one panel is too overworked.

While a lot of fun for me, this method is really indulgent, inefficient, and not practical for most stories. Hawaiian Dick is a more complex narrative with a lot of characters, a LOT of dialogue, and a lot of environments with a limited page count. So it needs to be told in the most efficient way.

There are a lot more panels per page, and every panel I draw ends up bearing a good deal of narrative burden. This means that the panels need to work harder than they do in, say, THESEUS. Which means that I have to work a lot harder than I did with THESEUS. There's more spatial information to communicate, more characters, more environmental detail, more emotional nuance that has to be present from panel to panel.

Clay writes great dialogue, and keeping the reading order of the balloons clear and attractive while satisfying narrative requirements and compositional concerns is a new trick, as well.

Maybe the most important thing I've learned drawing Dick, though, is that 'good comics' isn't about good drawing, good composition, good color, or any such nonsense. It's all about the telling. It's about narrative clarity, mood, emotion, and pacing. Not that a little eye-candy ever hurt anyone. But it's not that important.

Anyway, it's been fun so far, and it only looks to get better. The story keeps expanding and improving, and I think we're gonna have some pretty good comics on our hands if I don't screw it up.

*DISCLAIMER*

I do not mean to imply in any way that comics produced and published by Marvel Comics or it's parent company Disney are in any way narratively inefficient. Just making a li'l joke.

FANART FRIDAY: FINAL FANTASY VII

2011-02-25T01:23:00.000-08:00

It was a formative experience.

You should check out this vastly superior Final Fantasy fanart

HERE.

Hip-hop artists rap over doctored beats from FFVII.

Album's called Black Materia.

Review

HERE.

I did a million sketches of different compositions until I settled on this. I usually prefer to do something figurative if I can, but the sword was the only thing that felt adequately... respectful... of the strange space that this game occupies in my life.

BLUE COLLAR DRAWINGS

2011-02-24T13:46:00.000-08:00

As I type this, the second volume of The Anthology Project is being printed and bound somewhere in China. I am so peeing my pants to see it.

So here's a page of my story you can look at.

My friend Sam Bradley just informed me that you can see the process for this page from thumbnail to finished art

HERE.

If you're into that sort of thing. I just looked at it, and I'd forgotten how much this changed from the sketch.

NOTAMOVIE

2011-02-20T19:56:00.000-08:00

Here's a wee little snippet from my film (which is called METRO, by the way).

It's a gif. Because I can't show any clips from the movie. And this, you will note, is not a movie in any way. It's a gif. Note the hideous compression.

Also, people, I just finished pencilling my first issue of Hawaiian Dick! I was asked to come on and draw the rest of this arc, which I'm very excited to do. I'll show you more of that as soon as I get it colored.

-Jake

FANART FRIDAY: HUGO PRATT

2011-02-18T02:17:00.000-08:00

Hugo Pratt is a master of his art form. And Corto Maltese is his masterpiece.

The eponymous Corto is a seafaring gentleman of fortune who is so hardcore he straight carved his own lifeline into his palm. And it only gets better from there. Pope described him as a turn of the century Han Solo, which is pretty apt.

This drawing was a LOT of fun. I knocked out two pages today, so I was pretty done with tight, controlled drawing, and cutting lose in value with a chunky graphite stick was just the thing I needed.

Both Corto Maltese and Hugo Pratt are Venetian, so I decided to put our hero in Venice. I stole this composition from one of my favorite artists. As always...

THE FIRST PERSON TO NAME THE ARTIST I VICTIMIZED GETS THE SKETCH.

HAPPINESS IS A PINK CETACEAN

2011-02-14T13:54:00.000-08:00

May the Pink Narwhal of Love and Contentment visit all of us during the traditional Nap of St. Valentine this year, and teach us the true meaning of Valentine's Day.

FANART FRIDAY: THE HUNGER GAMES

2011-02-11T05:17:00.000-08:00

Rue is mourned by the Girl on Fire.

And some variations on a theme of Mockingjay.

Katniss is such a fantastic heroine.

Too often we are subjected to one of two extremes in entertainment. We are either served a mindless cocktail of sensory stimulation masquerading as narrative by people who think they know what we want, or are subjected to a tediously meaningful, often punishing experience by people who think they know what's good for us. Two different flavors of condescending.

Suzanne Collins, author of The Hunger Games, does not roll that way. She is not here to dance for your amusement, nor has she come to grace you with her wisdom. She has come with a worthwhile story, and she is here to tell the hell out of it.

There is no condescension. There is no indulgence.

There only is a story like a sledgehammer and a writer with a killer hook.

DRINKING...

2011-02-08T20:07:00.000-08:00

... it's what detectives DO.

Thought I'd throw up another naked drawing between fanarts.

I'm kind of ready to drop color on these-- I've got plans for this bar sequence. Just a few more pages to go...

FANART FRIDAY: SKY DOLL

2011-02-05T04:37:00.000-08:00

The thing about Sky Doll is...

... there are ONLY perfect drawings in Sky Doll. EVER. Alessandro Barbucci and Barbara Canepa control the quality of the book OBSESSIVELY, and it shows in

EVERY

SINGLE

PANEL.

It used to be nearly impossible to find a copy in english, but Marvel put out a translated version a few years ago that should be easy to get ahold of, for those interested. Be warned: don't read it unless you are DOWN with sexy. Because it is a sexy book full of sexy drawings of a sexy robot.

Also, this is pretty much a day late. Even though it's Friday night for me, the clocks say it's Saturday morning. But I make no apologies, dear readers, because I am a year older every February 4th, and I had me some partying to do before getting around to the fanarts.

Have a good weekend, people.

PRETTY SOLIDERS

2011-02-02T03:18:00.000-08:00

Remember Toonami? Remember how they aired those WICKED cool promos that made Sailor Moon look like Demon City Shinjuku?

Yeah. Me, too.

Katie asked me to do this a while ago, but I've been trying to turn out a page of comics every day (so far, so good!), and had trouble finding the time. Tonight I just bit the bullet and did the thing.

This is Sailor Venus, my favorite Scout. Sailor V stands for Victory.

also...

CONTEST!!!

THE FIRST READER TO NAME THE ARTIST I STOLE THIS POSE FROM GETS THE SKETCH!

WHY WE NEED MURDER MYSTERIES

2011-02-01T03:10:00.000-08:00

Because if the popularity of the genre is any indicator, we need them badly.

To read about a murder is to confront one's own mortality. We are all going to die, and we know it. The murder mystery begins by acknowledging this central fact of the human condition in concrete and explicit terms. Death comes to sit at our table. And we remember that when we leave, it will be with him.

But the mystery doesn't end with Death. It begins there. As the detective exposes the truths of the victim's life and death to the audience, a promise is made. The story promises that we will be remembered after we are gone. We are promised that someone, someone clever and wise and good, will care. Will notice. That our death (and therefore our life) MATTERS. That our loved ones will be looked after when we are gone, that justice will be served, and that our story will be told. We are promised that death is not the end. In the murder mystery, death is always a beginning.

It's a funeral service on behalf of all humanity that we feel compelled to attend. Because Death waits for us all. But when the service is over, the case is closed, and justice has been served, we can live with Death. Because we have explained him, and expiated our fears.

And now we know that even after Death takes us quietly (or violently) away from life's table, life will go on, and carry our story with it.

We need the murder mystery to tell us that death is a beginning.

Because we are all going to die.

UNDRESSED

2011-01-29T03:09:00.000-08:00

They look so naked without color.

FANART FRIDAY: DUNE

2011-01-28T02:18:00.000-08:00

a boy fremen...

and a girl fremen...

I don't even know, you guys. I was in the mood for something different.

FANART FRIDAY: HENRY DARGER

2011-01-21T15:45:00.000-08:00

Henry Darger is the creator of a dense, laboriously illustrated, 15,000 page epic detailing The Story of the Vivian Girls in What is Known as the Realms of the Unreal. He created the work over the course of sixty years.

He never showed it to anyone.

Ever.

Darger's paintings are singularly beautiful. They have something of the elegance of a Japanese wood-block, the scale and ambition of a Ruebens epic, and a naiveté that makes them at once charming and deeply upsetting.

He was a hermit, a recluse, with no social involvements to speak of. He lived with his art, gave it all of the time and money he could manage between his job as a hospital janitor, and his devoted practice of Catholicism.

I don't know why Darger made what he did, why he kept it to himself, why he chose to burrow into his imagination rather than seek the association of people. I don't know that he could have made other choices had he wanted to. But it lends a kind of purity to his work. It is a strange form of worship, some kind of saint-like religious ecstasy that flows from the pages of scribbled prose and thickly patterned illustrations. It's also the voice of a trapped and lonely man, desperate for companionship he would never know.

It's a beautiful voice. Sad, and defiant, and beautiful.

FANART FRIDAY: HERGE'S TINTIN

2011-01-15T02:24:00.000-08:00

All of my ideas about color in comics come from studying Herge's work.

Tintin is perfectly clear and clean. The line claire style that Herge popularized,

coupled with his low-contrast color made every panel easy to read and every page attractive.

Herge keeps it flat, keeps temperature and value contrast low in his color, and keeps his storytelling as simple as possible. It's a brilliant formula for elegant, supremely readable comics.

And we could use more of those.

INTERESTING THINGS HAPPEN IN BACK ALLEYS

2011-01-13T02:01:00.000-08:00

That's what they tell me, anyway.

I've only ever been to front alleys.

I drew another alley before this, and it was not as good. Then I drew this one so you wouldn't have to look at it. You're welcome.

By the way, I made some moving pictures with my brother and some friends. Four and a half minutes of moving pictures. It was fun.

I'll show y'all sometime.

But not today.

My talented friend Tyler and his devoted army of talented associates made a movie, too.

You should check it out.

THE CONSEQUENCE OF SOUND

2011-01-06T02:00:00.000-08:00

Sound in a purely visual medium is problematic.

I generally avoid it. Type and emanata are the only tools available, and both of them tend to compete with the visual story rather than compliment it.

The roundness of a word balloon, for instance, is hard to manage inside of a square panel. The contrast between straight and curve is fierce, and (unless artfully placed) distracts from the image and feels like clutter. All emanata is inherently foreign to the drawing. And the more representational the drawing, the more out of place the emanata or type. Symbol fights representation.

This is how I deal:

I cheat.

I treat elements within the panel in much the same way I approach the panels within a page: I subdivide. A round balloon is a foreign object, but a squared balloon is a subdivision. It's clean. If I quarantine my emanata with a square balloon, I can keep it from fighting with my image. I like a clean read, and with so much happening on any given page of comics, I have to cheat any way I can to get it.

If I were more talented, I wouldn't have to resort to this nonsense. I'm constantly impressed with the elegant solutions I see from other artists and letterers.

Also, not everyone wants a clean read or a harmonious page. This is how I like to MAKE comics, but I personally enjoy reading intentionally frantic, carefully cluttered work when it's done well. I picked up MITCHUM by Blutch last week while I was in LA, and he doesn't even bother with panel borders for most of the book. I wouldn't even know how to approach that at this point.

Maybe one day... but not today.

FANART FRIDAY: ALEX TOTH

2010-12-31T01:56:00.000-08:00

You need to know two things about Alex Thoth:

Alex Toth is one of the most influential, prolific, and under-acknowledged artists in history.

Alex Thoth died, as he lived, at his drawing table.

Here are some other things you can also know:

Most comics artists are remembered for their masterwork. Kirby has the New Gods, Thor, the Fantastic Four, and Cap. Ditko and the Romitas have Spiderman. Eisner has the Spirit and A Contract with God. Toth never stayed on one project long enough to really own it. He just did a better job than everyone else.

Jordi Bernet is famous for Torpedo, but Toth took him to school when he drew the book. Same goes for Neil Adams' Batman, the Black Canary, or any book Toth ever touched. His work was just graphically and narratively more advanced than anyone else of his time. It was superficially simple but elegantly complex in its effect. It was, and still IS, ladies and gentlemen, some next-level-hocus-pocus.

In spite of this, Toth is often forgotten because he is a master without an obvious masterwork. One exception might be the Zorro comics he drew for Disney, but those are so tragically over-written that much Toth's genius is hidden by cumbersome speech bubbles and unnecessary narration. Another might be Toth's more 'branded' creations for animation: The Superfriends, Jonny Quest, Space Ghost, etc. The dude single-handedly designed and boarded Hannah-Barbara's entire action lineup. Entire networks have been built on rebroadcasting, dubbing and otherwise recycling Toth's Saturday-morning ouvre in much the same way that whole careers have been founded on imitating his style. Dude was not only excellent, but PROLIFIC.

Somehow, despite all of those memorable, pervasive, still-relevant creations, he is largely anonymous.

And I wouldn't really care, except that Alex Toth DESERVES to be remembered. Because he cared. He really did give his life to the craft, to making great pictures and telling thrilling stories with real flair, and we should remember him for giving us what he did. Because without Toth, there is no Superfreinds, no Jonny Quest, no Birdman, no Herculoids. No Bruce Timm, no Mazzucchelli, no Mignola, no Azaceta. No Venture Brothers, no Space Ghost Coast to Coast, no SeaLab, no Adult Swim. And I don't know about you, but without those things, I just wouldn't be me anymore.

So remember Alex Toth. 'Cause he helped make us what we are.

Also, whoever can name the characters drawn above from memory gets the sketch.

REVISIONS

2010-12-29T01:10:00.000-08:00

I revised this panel. This is that revision. I'm trying to post panels that don't give away too much story. So they're all this sort of general, anticipatory posing or reaction shots. I promise there's more to it than this. You'll just have to pick up the Anthology Project to see it.

I've finally worked out a revision process that is efficient, effective, and fun to do. I feel like if work is not that way, then somebody (usually me) is doing something kind of wrong.

Also, how strange is that kid's butt? So strange. It's like G I Joe action figure butt. I kinda like it, but also kinda feel like I am embarrassed for him.

FANART FRIDAY: HOLIDAY EDITION

2010-12-24T05:35:00.000-08:00

Because without C. S. Lewis, I would live in a world that is always winter and never Christmas.

This is blog post number 200, and it goes out to the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Merry Christmas.

Whatever the 25th means to you, I hope you have a happy one.

FANART FRIDAY: YOSHITAKA AMANO

2010-12-17T13:40:00.000-08:00

Yoshitaka Amano is the mad, inscrutable god of his own surreal universe.

He destroys and commands both space and time through pattern, texture, and a phalanx androgynous, heavy-lidded demigods.

I don't think I need to say anything else about that.

Here are some details from the piece.

Theseus (which is done, by the way) was really environmentally sparse, and that left me itching do do something in a more visually complete world. Therefore... Amano.

GROSS.

2010-12-15T14:35:00.000-08:00

right?

FANART FRIDAY DOUBLE FEATURE: FLORENCE AND VENICE

2010-12-10T14:02:00.000-08:00

When we boarded the plane for Rome, I was in a bad place. I hated the way that I drew, hated the projects working on, and had come to dislike the very act of drawing.

So I was fleeing the country.

In Florence, I learned to draw for pleasure again. Just for fun. Just to relax, to take it all in, without worrying about making a 'good' drawing. After our month there, I couldn't look down a street without wanting to draw it for the naked joy of making marks. That's the most important thing I brought back from Italy.

In Venice I decided to draw comics for a living. I got up early every morning to draw and paint with Natalie. During this drawing, I realized that if I wanted to draw comics every day. Forever.

And I decided to do it.

These are a few of the artists that helped me through recovery.

TO THE PAIN

2010-12-10T03:29:00.000-08:00

I'm coming down off of this incredible, euphoric, insomniac fugue-state, and can't sleep, despite the fact that I haven't done so in almost 48 hours, now. This happened to me Saturday night, too. So I thought I'd post some of my favorite passages from THESEUS.

This particular panel features a big ol' eye.

And this page (SURPRISE!) is full of yellow-ellow-ellow-ellow.

Because of the difference in scale between combatants, I wanted the fight to take place on what is essentially an infinite plane. Every once in a while some background will show up for orientation or the sake of a composition, but I tried to keep the figures fighting in space. It was fun to do, but now I really want to do something environmentally heavy... so expect some of that soon.

WHO WATCHES ANIME??

2010-12-09T04:31:00.000-08:00

I WATCHES ANIME.

Does it show?

HRRNFFF!!!

2010-12-08T01:11:00.000-08:00

I'm pretty sure that's the sound my minotaur makes when he snorts.

HRRNFFF!!!

I drew FIFTEEN PAGES of comics in two days this weekend.

We'll see how that works out.

Oh, and again, the complete version of this story will be published in The Anthology Project vol. 2.

Thanks to all of you who ordered your copy on our kickstarter page and helped us meet our goal!

Sketchbook Stuff

2010-12-08T01:02:00.000-08:00

Been thinking a lot about Amano lately.

I s'pose that accounts for this:

I drew this during church or something. I can't remember-- this weekend is blurry. The sketchbook this was drawn in was recently found by a two-year-old of my acquaintance after I left it at her father's house. She brought it to her dad, pointed at it, and said 'Jake.'

It is the first time she has ever said my name.

To that child, my identity is expressed by a black notebook with an elastic strap.

I guess I can live with that.

FANART FRIDAY: PAUL POPE

2010-12-03T22:44:00.000-08:00

This is why I love Paul Pope:

When I was a kid, digging through garbage bags of my uncles monthlies and sneaking into my aunt's room to read her trades, I didn't read comics because I believed in the potential of the medium, or because Chris Claremont was doing really interesting things with story, or because Elfquest was shedding light on the human condition. I did it because those comics were cool. They were cool as all holy hell. They FELT cool.

I grew up, and now I read lots of comics for lots of reasons. But very few comics make me feel like I'm seven years old again, trying to parse the meaning of a page of ElfQuest or Vigilante. By and large, they don't make me FEEL the cool coursing through my veins like they used to.

Paul Pope's comics DO. They are cool. They are cool as all holy hell. Reading a Pope comic feels like hearing REAL rock and roll for the first time again. It's Bowie-esque science fiction, full of guarded, rock-star drifters and tough girls with short fuses, lips like pillows and nothing to lose.

This week's fanart features two characters from Pope's Heavy Liquid. Neither of them have real names. She's the Boss of the Fork Tungs, an all-girl Brooklyn sado-street game, and he's just plain unlucky. Because even the minor, nameless characters in a Paul Pope comic are dripping with design, story, intrigue, and above all, cool.

So read 'em.

Oh, and Paul himself-- in addition to being a gracious, intelligent, generally swell guy-- is just as effortlessly cool as his comics.

FANART FRIDAY: TAIYO MATUSMOTO

2010-11-26T21:04:00.000-08:00

THIS IS WHY YOU SHOULD READ MANGA BY TAIYO MATSUMOTO:

He is an absolutely singular artist and storyteller. It's hard to make art that's completely uncompromised. Matsumoto seems to do it about every time he picks up a pencil. His work is brave, ambitious, and completely fresh.

Oh, and it's a total BLAST to read. Like what dealers want you to think drugs are like. It's soooooo good. You guys... it's wicked awesome you guys. Read it, you guys.

Or at least rent Tekkonkinkreet.

Theseus in The Anthology Project Vol. 2

2010-11-24T02:15:00.000-08:00

NEWS! My talented friend Sam Bradley, who has super watercolor powers, invited me to be a part of the second volume of The Anthology Project. My piece for the book will be Theseus, the first five pages of which I posted here a while back.

I'm extra thrilled to be a part of the project, 'cause it's stacked with absurdly talented artists from all manner of industries.

You can pre-order a copy and support the project over at KICKSTARTER.

...

Or you can incur the wrath of Theseus.

FANART FRIDAY: CRAIG THOMPSON'S HABIBI

2010-11-19T12:34:00.000-08:00

I was recently privileged to study comicsology under the tutelage of Craig Thompson for several weeks at the Atlantic Center for the Arts. Which was incredible. Craig has a lot to teach and a unique method of instruction that led me to a lot of important conclusions about making comics, how art should be approached, how to live my life generally, and how to gracefully lose an arm-wrestling match.

One of the unexpected perks of hanging out with Craig was access to an edited copy of Habibi, complete with on-page spelling corrections. Habibi won't be out for another year, but I'm gonna go ahead and tell you why you should read it anyway:

Habibi is LUSH. It is opulent. It is narratively, thematically, and visually rich to a frightening degree. An absurd degree. It is almost offensive. If Habibi were a meal... it is not a meal. It is several banquets served one after another, each more indulgent than the last. And when you have finished the marathon meal, dear readers, you are sated, comfortably full, and unexpectedly refreshed.

Habibi is an artistically generous, utterly compelling, intimately meaningful, and gorgeously crafted comic. No unrealistic expectations about it's quality could possibly exceed it's reality.

READ IT.

Craig is okay, too.

FANART FRIDAY DOUBLE FEATURE: Amanda Connor and Provo, Utah

2010-11-12T14:14:00.000-08:00

FIRST FEATURE:

This week our group giving props to Amanda Connor, who came down and worked with us a bit at the Atlantic Center for the Arts. Amanda has done incredible work on Powegirl, The Pro, Vampirella, and other such titles.

You can dig on that at the Fanart Friday tumblr HERE. It's booby-licous.

SECOND FEATURE

I live in Provo, UT. And I am a fan.

Provo is a place of run-down manors and thriving downtown businesses. The stately ruins dominating every city block south of the university represent the soul of Provo- a fading tradition of homogenous wholesomeness affectionately occupied and haphazardly maintained by a diverse, young, ever-changing population. We appreciate the antiquated beauty of what has been, do our best to protect it, and add to it our own energy and ideas. Old things are preserved, renovated, resurrected, and made new again and again by a stream of freshly arrived domestic students, immigrant families, foreign faces with academic visas, and the great-great grandchildren of mormon pioneers.

These houses are everything I love about this town. And I get to live in one.

Process Preview

2010-11-11T11:50:00.000-08:00

This is a panel for an upcoming Hawaiian Dick story, written by the talented and patient B. Clay Moore. Dick is kind of a dream project-- private detectives, lovely secretaries, and supernatural murder mystery in 1950's Hawaii. Drawn in 2b pencil, processed in photoshop.

You can see the whole spread here, with a lot more prattling on about color.

Because of the location and the traditions established by Steven Griffin, color is a major part of the book. I did my linework with color in mind. The pencils don't read very well on their own, but they aren't meant to-- they're just another visual ingredient to be processed into the finished confection. The linework serves to give a little texture, interest, and specificity to the painting underneath it. The naked colors are actually a lot clearer and easier to read than the pencils, and are doing most of the storytelling work in the final panel. Color tends to ride backseat in comics, almost as an afterthought, so it's fun to let it drive for a bit.

Holy smokes, y'all.

I love making comics.

FANART FRIDAY: Sam Hiti's DEATH DAY

2010-11-05T11:31:00.000-07:00

DEATH DAY is the science fiction of the future. Sam Hiti's comic, published first online and now in print, is a grand, bizarre, frequently jarring trip into a bleak and familiar future. Unlike so much of today's science fiction, DEATH DAY doesn't pander. The reader is dropped into the middle of the action like so much cannon-fodder, and left to deduce, engage, and survive the text. There is no preface outlining the events between now and the speculative 'then', no glossary of terms, no mouthpiece characters clumsily over-explaining the unfamiliar. The events simply confront the reader as they unfold, and context is gradually revealed along the way.

DEATH DAY is uncompromising and unapologetic. Do yourself a favor and read it.

Buy it in print here.

Read it online here.

Willard is lost.

2010-09-25T13:53:00.000-07:00

On The Road.

2010-09-07T13:58:00.001-07:00

Again.

First L.A., now New Orleans, next Mississippi.

I had to leave before I could finish THESEUS. Which was lame of me. I thought about bringing it, but I was already taking work with me, so...

Sorry, Dudes. I'll finish that in a few weeks when I get back home to my stuff and my studio and my life and all.

In the meantime, here are some sketches from the Quarter.

For whatever reason, my favorite thing to do when I travel is to make sloppy, lazy, indulgent line drawings of my surroundings. Usually of a place's more representative architecture. It's tremendously satisfying and relaxing. It lets me feel like I'm on vacation, like I have the time to be sitting in a park or cafe, sipping something cold, and drawing interesting buildings just to kill the time. This is almost never true, but it's nice to feel that way.

THESEUS

2010-08-17T12:06:00.000-07:00

a short preview...

STAR CROSS'D

2010-08-16T11:02:00.001-07:00

I saw a production of Romeo and Juliet this weekend.

Juliet died like this:

NOTICIAS

2010-08-05T01:32:00.000-07:00

DEAR PEOPLE WHO READ THIS BLOG:

We gots news. A few people have been asking me about what's going on with the Jean-David pages I posted a while back. I'm currently finishing the first draft of the story for which those images were a style test (it's several hundred pages) and will be taking the draft to a thing this fall to work on it further. I'm not allowed to talk about the thing unless I get permission from the people who run it, and I haven't, so I won't. But I'll get to work on my comics alongside and with some of my favorite creators.

I'm taking an extended trip back to the motherland to work on the book, starting September 1st. I'm gonna try to post every day while I'm down there. We'll see. Like the book, the trip starts in New Orleans and heads north.

Also, I've been making a movie. That'll be done in November. Ish. You can see some of that work here. I don't want to post any of it on this blog, since I'm trying to focus on comics... Even though I spend most of my time working on illustrations or that film. The movie has been, so far, the longest, most stressful, most difficult artistic commitment I have ever made. I have never spent so much time on any one thing... I often wonder if it's actually worth it. When it's finished, y'all can let me know.

Until then, here's a picture I did for my brother. He's a linguistics student, and is compiling a dictionary of terms exclusive to New Orleans for school which features the illustration below. We are a family obsessed with it's own heritage.

Try, Try Again

2010-06-13T22:12:00.000-07:00

Here are some sketches for a project I'm working on. It's not my story, nor am I the first artist to work on it, so I'm having to do quite a bit of experimentation to find a look that feels right to me while remaining faithful to what has been done and designed. What look do you like best?

I penciled and colored the page with the car chase, and the superlatively talented Jared Greenleaf was kind enough to drop some inks on it for me. Also worth mentioning: my wife gathered most of the research on those cars, excepting the Corvette. She's a big help pretty much all of the time.

The premise for this thing is really cool, and I'm pretty excited to be attached to it. More on this project as it unfolds.

P.S.-- Some of y'all asked about when the rest of that Jean-David story will be available. The truth is that I don't know. I'm waiting to hear back on a few different fronts, and I'll let y'all know what's what as soon as I can. Thanks for expressing your interest!

-Jake

2010-05-30T09:55:00.000-07:00

I've had these pages sitting around for a while. I drew them all in the first week of January, but then a bunch of work came along, and I had to put it aside. I colored these pages last week, and the talented and generous Anthony Holden lettered them for me in a pinch. This short goes for about 20 more pages, and it's part of a larger story that goes on for hundreds. In a few weeks I'll know whether to just finish the short and put it out or to start planning the longer project.

I love drawing comics.

Portland, ho!

2010-05-26T23:56:00.000-07:00

So it's been over a month. It's not even that I haven't made anything to show-- it's that I've been up to my neck in work without really a moment to post. So here's a panel from a personal project I've got in production. I'ma try to post a new image around every other day for the next little while from my ever-expanding pile of crap I never show anyone.

P.S. If any of y'all are Portland area locals, I'm headed up that way this week. From tomorrow night 'till next Wednesday (June 2) I'll bouncing around Portland and Salem with some friends for no good reason at all. What should I do or see while in the area? Any ideas, denizens of the internet?

Belated News

2010-04-19T22:18:00.000-07:00

Friends! Acquaintances! Strangers!

I was recognized for being okay at stuff a little while a go by the Society of Illustrators, who chose to include my piece in their 2010 student show. It'll be printed in a li'l catalogue this fall with all the other pieces in show. It was also up in the gallery for a while... I think. It still may be. I'm hazy on the details. All I know is that I had to frame it, and it's in a better place now... Manhattan. Way cooler than my hard drive. Way to escape and make it big, little .PSD. Live the dream.

Also, a bunch of my friends also got stuff in the show. Find out who! Click here.

MORE COMICS

2010-04-10T12:51:00.000-07:00

Pencils. The first half of a little story.

Inks. These two pages are unrelated. When I showed my stuff around last week, a few people asked to see some inked pages, and so... here are some inked pages.
The bottom page (featuring man with knife and suit) is part of an earlier iteration of the Robin sample I did. I had the whole thing drawn out, but decided that a billion thugs in clown masks would be much cooler. It was darker than the version I ended up going with, and I think less creative.

Also, some friends of mine have recently done some comics here and here. And I still love this one, even though it's old. Check them out. You'll be glad you did.

Real Men Draw in the Rain

2010-04-07T13:09:00.000-07:00

Sketches from last weekend's trip to San Francisco. Drawn while standing on the street in the rain on Easter morning. Having a little wallet-sized sketchbook is so useful for taking notes on the fly.

Abominations.

2010-03-28T22:56:00.000-07:00

This is a panel from a comic that I made last weekend. It felt so alive in the sketch phase and then it just DIED on me when I tried to carry it to the finish. This panel is one of the only survivors. I'll give it another go in a few weeks. I kind of liked the story. It just didn't play quite the way I wanted it to.

About a week ago my boy Jeremy told me that I'm too prone to toss out finished work, and it gets in the way, slows me down, holds me back.

Probably.

But I'm coming to accept that some things, whether are not I like them, are just me, and I'm all I've got to work with.

At least I have a human head.

TIGHTS AND VIOLENCE: A LOVE STORY

2010-03-18T20:33:00.000-07:00

This is a tale of Teen-Aged Heroism told in six pages, drawn in the traditional Comic Book Manner for your visual enjoyment.

A lot of the panel-to-panel storytelling is clunky. I was trying to be 'economic' and ended up with a lot of choppy transitions that disrupt the narrative flow. I have a lot to learn. But this is kind of the best I can do right now.

The next one will be better.

And more.

2010-03-11T14:01:00.000-08:00

While I draw in ink fairly often, I haven't tried to 'ink' anything comic-book style in maybe two years, which is kind of a different game. I need to figure out what I want to do with it, 'cause this is kind of confused. Whatever.

HOLY HALFTONE, BATMAN!!!

2010-03-08T21:48:00.000-08:00

This is part of what I did today. It's maybe the LEAST exciting part of it, but it's the only part that fits on my scanner. I'll toss the rest of it up tomorrow--same bat-time, same bat-url.

Inky goodness.

2010-03-05T11:25:00.000-08:00

Been a month, blah, blah, apologies. I've been busy. REALLY busy.

Once upon a time, when I wasn't busy at all, I bought a tiny little moleskine book at the Museo d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto. These are some drawings I did in that book.

I'm never sure if this last one reads. I drew this sitting in the sun on the curb of a truck stop somewhere between Rovereto and Milan. The ink in my brush got all hot and thin and came out so fast I could only draw in wet, black blobs. It was fun.

THIS IS HOW YOU SAY JEAN-DAVID:

2010-02-10T16:15:00.000-08:00

Picture.

2010-01-26T10:03:00.000-08:00

I miss a violently blue sky peeking out at me between rooftops at dusk in Florence. It looks kind of like this, but better. Actually, it looks a LOT better. But we do what we can.

Distopian Epiphany

2010-01-12T21:33:00.000-08:00

I realize that, despite the repeated warnings of Mr. Bradbury, I have spent all day in the company of screens.

What kind of life is that for a human?

Demonitos

2010-01-06T18:44:00.001-08:00

I need two swamp-demon creatures for a project I'm working on. I've been doodling them during class. Here are a few. More to come.

ballpoint on newsprint. Around 3"x3"

All together now!

2009-12-19T18:03:00.000-08:00

My lettering is kind of a sloppy afterthought, and that needs to change. Here's the first two pages! I don't think I'll post the third-- I can't really get it to look good.

Belgian adventure comics from the late 1930's are WHERE IT'S AT!!!

2009-12-09T17:40:00.001-08:00

I have a friend who, whenever she sees something spectacular, says, "That's what I stand for in art." It's a funny, almost hyperbolically dramatic way of endorsing something, and I like it.

Me, I think I stand for comics. And ripping of Herge's colors. I stand for that, too.

What do YOU stand for? Tell us!

Feelin' like a Leopard.

2009-12-03T18:10:00.000-08:00

This again. Can't get over it.

More to follow.

Paintin'

2009-11-14T20:12:00.001-08:00

Sometimes, on weekends, I bust out the paints with my girl Natalie. This painting is the result of one such excursion. Any of you Provo dwellers wanna guess at the location?

This weekend, however, it snowed. So we just watched Project Runway instead.

And let me tell you something: I friggin' HATE Irena.

So.

Much.

And again.

2009-11-03T10:30:00.000-08:00

This might turn into a thing...

La femme fatale

2009-11-02T09:34:00.000-08:00

Trying to find a look for my leading lady, here. Considering the fro. Can the fro look high fashion?

Freedom

2009-09-20T15:11:00.000-07:00

This is one of the few paintings I did over in Italy that I actually like. Sort of. It's part of a monastery up in Fiesole. Maybe an hour and a half. Because I only paint for fun, and I only enjoy the first few steps of a painting, I rarely finish anything beyond a sketch.

And I LIKE it that way.

I likes me my freedom. It's maybe my favorite thing about freelancing.

My last gig is all tied up and done, by the way, so I'll be posting with a li'l more frequency during the foreseeable future. Unless I get offered another ludicrously large job, I should be able to post more of this Italy stuff. I've still got two more sketchbooks and a few more paintings to go through.

Games

2009-08-12T19:50:00.000-07:00

I play games in my sketchbook. The fun thing about games is that you never know if you're going to win or lose. My games usually end in a draw. Heh. I didn't even mean to do that.

Florence, May 25th, 2009

2009-07-28T09:58:00.000-07:00

The great thing about Florence, for me, was the incidental splendor caused by a thousand years of urban sprawl and clutter. Beauty of almost any variety can be manufactured and duplicated. From makeup to fashion to fine art, almost all of our culture's 'beauty' really contrived. I know people who have learned the formula for a pleasing landscape or portrait, who can tell you, from memory, which color combinations inspire which feelings in the beholder. We artists trade in manufactured beauty, and there isn't a lot in the man-made world that can't be picked apart and seen for the illusion that it is.

It was refreshing, after spending days and days in museums full of deliberate compositions and carefully orchestrated experiences, to get out and see the haphazardly real, organic, accidental beauty of cluttered urban development over the centuries, the growth of a city organism, dirty and ancient and functional.

It is, to me, just as much a natural wonder as any landform or vegetation- it is an un-planned, un-designed form created by erosion and eruption over time.

And then I went and turned it into another mannered contrivance.

You will be a tiger, I will be a manatee

2009-07-09T11:03:00.000-07:00

If you have means, you should check out "Super Animal Brothers III" by EAR PWR. It is a song (and an album), and they are a band, and their song sounds like this.

It sounds like video games felt when I was six.