Lucca Italy Comic Festival

In September I went to the Lucca Comic Fesitval in Italy and had a great time -- Super Spy was just published over the summer in Italian. One thing I've always done is try to come up with a different sketch every time I sign a book. But truthfully I end up cycling through 15 or 20 different sketches that I've come up with. But for this show I thought it would be fun to come up with a different sketch for every single book I signed. Well, it ended up being about 300 sketches over 3 days. Tons of fun. What I didn't realize until the second day was that my wife was taking pictures of the sketches as I was doing them. Didn't get photos of all of them but here's a sampling....

I'm really curious as to what other artists do at cons. To me, there's a strange kind of fun to work with ink in a book without penciling anything first and having that kind of "danger" of screwing up every time and still coming up with a drawing you haven't drawn before. It's as close to any kind of performance "improv" I'll ever get and I really enjoy it.

If you look closely, there are a few where I started doing 3 panel stories in the front of the book -- each different and written on the fly. I think I only did 3 or 4 of those -- the writing and drawing just took too long for people waiting to get their books so I went back to straight sketches.

SPX Next Weekend!

I'm getting ready for SPX 2009 this weekend. Should be a good show. I sold out of 3 Story last weekend at Windy City Con but should have a Twhole new stack of books for SPX so come by and check it out! I'll be doing commissions all weekend as well. And again, here are a few new commissions I did this week as well as a sketchbook commission from this weekend (The Flash).

3 Story is out, Revolver is in the can and being lettered by the awesome lettering dept. at Vertigo as I type this for a release this spring/summer. In addition, I'm currently plugging away on a fun 70s style Marvel comic with Cullen Bunn called "The Tooth" and laying out pages for the Super Spy sequel "Super Natural".

Thanks again to everyone that came by and talked to me in Chicago this weekend. What a great show!

Commission Time!

My new book 3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man is out this week! Check it out please! Also if you want to get a signed copy you can order it directly from me at my newly redesigned website. Take a look! And thanks to everyone that ordered books and art from me -- it is much appreciated!

Got caught up on a TON of commissions this week. I put the finishing touches on my Vertigo book "Revolver"which including actually writing footer "scroll" text for the bottom of every page of the book that was specific to the action of that page and...also contained the page number in the same text. Hard at first but by page 100 I figure it out. There's actually a whole other book if you just read the text at the bottom. Really fun to work on. Here are all the commissions I finished this week! Going to Chicago this weekend for the Windy City Con -- come say 'hi' to me there!

Aquaman

This is a commission I did a few weeks ago -- maybe my daughter's favorite one I've done so far. Still plugging away on a few new projects and waiting for 3 Story to hit the store shelves on October 2. I'm also doing balloon layouts for Revolver right now which is a first. I've lettered all of my books until now so I'm excited to see how this one turns out. I think lettering is one of my weak points generally, so we'll see. Should be good! But I still snuck in a few hand lettered sound effects.

Super Spy Revisited

Here are some character sketches for a new Super Spy project that I'm working on. I'm also starting pencils on a new book called "The Tooth" that I'm doing with Cullen Bunn and Shawn Lee. I'll be posting more on that as I go along. It is going to start as a free on-line comic.

I have about three more commissions to get done this week and then I'm also going to start on the Super Spy sequel "Super Natural". It's written, I just need to start penciling that as well. As I type this I realize it's sounding more like my to-do list. Well, I guess it is. More art and info next week!

Giant Man Short Story

Here is the first of two Giant Man short stories I've done for Dark Horse Presents. They'll be collected later this year but for now you can read them free online HERE! And don't worry about spoilers for the graphic novel. These stories were designed to stand alone and they don't appear in the graphic novel at all so this is the only place to see 'em.

Vertigo Book Announced

The book I've been working on the last couple of months has finally been announce. "Revolver" is a new Vertigo original graphic novel -- 192 pages. It won't be out until spring but you can see a little preview and read a little about it from my editor here.

Also -- my next release 3 Story is going to be out on October 7th. And if you're in the St. Louis area make sure to come by the official book release party at Subterranean Books in U. City from 7-9pm. I'm going to have every page of the original art on display as well as sketchbooks and scripts and other fun stuff that ties into the book.

In the meantime, here are three recent commissions that I did at Heroes Con and San Diego...

San Diego Comic Con Schedule

Just finished the second 8-page Giant Man short story for Dark Horse today. Here's the first panel/half-page. This should be appearing on their site in August. 

Only a week until San Diego Comic Con 2009! I'm going to be there every day and I can't wait. I'll be taking commissions from now up until Saturday at noon so if you have a request let me know via email or talk to me at the show. Look forward to seeing a bunch of familiar faces!

Here's my schedule:

Wednesday: Top Shelf Booth

Thursday: Top Shelf Booth

Friday: 1:30-2:30 After the First 1,000 Pages - Panel discussion with Gene Colan, Becky Cloonan, Zander Cannon, Roger Langridge and myself. 

After that I'll be at the Top Shelf booth again.

Saturday: Dark Horse Booth 3-4pm signing a preview comic with excerpts from 3 Story in it as well as limited edition Giant Man prints.

After that I'll be at the Top Shelf booth again.

Stay tuned for more updates -- I'm also on a Vertigo panel but I'm not sure what time/place that will be yet...

Strange Tales

I finished my next book this week (the book AFTER 3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man) which I still can't talk about -- but it will be announced at San Diego Comic Con so after that I'll be blabbing non-stop about it. In the meantime, here's a panel from an 8-page Black Widow story I just finished for Marvel. That series comes out in September. Here's a link to more info about it. I'm going to be in issue #2 -- keep an eye out for it!

Giant Man. Short Story.

Dark Horse is really getting behind my new book and as a result for July and August they are premiering two new short stories that tie in to my new book 3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man. The best part is they are free on-line. You can read the first one here.

Also, I was lucky enough to be picked for the St. Louis Magazine A-List 2009. Click on the photo here to read it...! If you look closely at the photo you'll be able to pick out a few 3 Story spoiler images...

I'm also 15 page from finishing my next graphic novel which I just found out will be announced at San Diego Comic Con in a few weeks. Can't wait to start talking about it since I've been working on it for the last 4 months.

Heroes Con this weekend!

I'm going to be at Heroes Con this weekend and I'm really looking forward to it. There's a really nice crowd and a lot of creators that I'm a fan of will be there so it's doubly good. Also I'll be doing a LOT of commissions, so the time is going to fly by. If you are at the show, make sure you go to my panel on sunday at 1:30 for a discussion of Historical Comics and comics with a little history stuck in 'em. Jason Lutes and several others will also be talking. I can't wait.

Here is a scan of one of my commissions I'm doing in advance for Heroes Con. Classic Aquaman. I'm going to watercolor this today and I'll post the color version when it's done. Aquaman was one of my favorite costumes and probably the best set of under-oos I had as a kid because the green shorts and orange shirt actually felt like his costume. Spider-Man and some of the others didn't quite pull off the same effect but Aquaman was designed like a real costume.

Distinguished Competition

I've been inking a TON of pages the last couple of weeks -- breaking any kind of record I ever had before by inking 30 pages this week for a new book that will be out sometime in 2010. I can't announce the title or publisher or anything about it until they tell me I can. But it can't hurt to show one crazy page out of context for a story I'm not describing!

Also -- 3 Story: The Secret History of Giant Man is available now for pre-order HERE.

In addition to the full length graphic novel I'm doing two short stories that will appear in July and August on Dark Horse's myspace comics page. I've already written them both and inked the first one and started to paint it. Here are a few panels from the first story...this is what my original art looks like before I letter it and clean it up or add the background old-papery effects that I used on Super Spy and parts of 3 Story.

And finally...I did a short comic strip for a friend of mine that does a weekly strip called SubCulture. You can read my contribution here.

TCAF and Jeff Lemire

Just got back from TCAF (Toronto) on Tuesday and had a great time. Met a lot of people. Thanks to everyone that came up and talked to me at the show! Also a BIG thanks to my good friend Jeff Lemire and his wife for letting me stay at their house. I was up against some big deadlines on monday so Jeff and I hit the Beguiling to get some comics and then spent the rest of the day inking pages and filling in blacks. We also did a couple fun experiments -- with me penciling and him inking and me inking his pencils. The images here are my pencils with Jeff's inks. The color images are Jeff's inks and my watercolor. For more of our crazy comics jam definitely check out his blog HERE to see his pencils that I inked...always a fun experiment -- not quite him or me but a crazy mash-up of both of our styles.

TCAF and the Spirit

I'm really excited about going to Toronto this week -- my good buddy Jeff Lemire is going to be there and show me the sites and then I've heard nothing but great stuff about TCAF. If you're up that way, stop by the Top Shelf booth and say 'hey'!

Another busy couple of weeks but I've been throwing things in a folder to add to the ol' blog. I just finished all of the last of the production on 3 Story, finished the back cover art and all of that. Also finished the inks and tones on the first 15 pages of my new-new book that I still can't announce yet so that's been taking up most of my time.

Also -- did an illustration for a French magazine that is doing a tribute to Will Eisner's Spirit (the picture above). First time I've drawn the Spirit -- and still feel like I haven't drawn him. Oh well -- it was fun drawing P'Gell anyway! Oh yeah -- see if you can spot the hidden 'Spirit' in the drawing...

Emerald City Wrap-Up

I had a lot of fun in Emerald City -- toured the Dark Horse offices and Oni Press and talked to a lot of people. Also sang 'Goldfinger' at the Dark Horse party. I was also interviewd by iFanboy at the con which you can watch here.

I also did several commissions at the con -- one was for a boy and a red umbrella, a Batman, and a Punisher...

3 Story is done and I'm already two new books -- one is the 'to-be-announced' project I'm waiting for permission to announce and the other is for The Tooth -- a book that I'm working on with my buddy Cullen Bunn which is starting out as an on-line comic in July and will be collected early next year. I'll post some art next time...

3D Postcards in Seattle

I finished a set of 5 postcards that I'm taking to Seattle to help promote my new '3 Story' book. I know it's early -- the book doesn't come out until September but I wanted to have something new for the show. Thanks to my dad for helping me convert these images into glorious 3D. If you have the red-blue standard 3D glasses they'll work on screen.

I'll be in Seattle -- Emerald City Con!

I'm going to be at the Emerald City Con in Seattle this weekend -- April 4 and 5. For more info about the convention go here! I'm trying as hard as I can to finish a 32 page giant-man mini-comic for Seattle as well as new sets of 3D Giant Man cards -- but we'll see. It's going to be a hectic week.

Also if you haven't picked up this month's Comic Foundry magazine -- you should! It's the last issue but also has a 3 page feature on 3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man with new art, etc.

GQ Super Spy

This is probably the only way I'll ever get into GQ Magazine -- but if you pick up this month's issue they have a list of the 20 Graphic Novels to read after Watchmen and they stuck Super Spy on the list. Here's a link to the article.

Also -- I've set my calendar with convention appearances and here is where I'll be:

Emerald City Con - March 3-5
FX Con (Florida) - April 17-19
TCAF (Toronto) - May 9-10
MoCCA (New York) - June 5-7
Heroes Con - June - 19-21
San Diego Comic Con - July 23-26
Wizard World Chicago - August 7-9
Windy City Comic Con (Chicago) - September 19
SPX - September 25-27 (3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man Debut)

For the FX show I did a piece that will appear on playing cards -- all for charity with an auction of the original art, etc. Here's what the art for my card looks like -- final size is super small -- 2.75" x 1.5".

SCAD

I'm off to SCAD (Savannah College of Art and Design) to talk about comics and walk through my creative process -- so if you're in the area and can hurry up and enroll in the school (if you haven't already), stop on by and say 'hi'!

Part of the process I'll be talking about his design -- so for this week the images here are the steps of creating the Super Spy cover. The two concepts I came up with, and then the original water color cover and then finally the solid colors-cover that I brightened up on the suggestion of Brett Warnock (the publisher) which I totally agreed with after I saw it finished. And then the hardcover 'variant' cover for the limited edition version.

Giant Video

Well, I started penciling my next book this week -- 176 pages graphic novel that I can't officially announce yet but should be able to talk about soon. In the meantime, here is a video of one of the last pages I painted for the Giant Man book. It took me a month to paint 190 pages which is quicker than I thought but now I'm sick of water colors. That usually happens though -- I get sick of inking too but by the time I'm done with all the design and production I've forgotten how much work the rest of it is and I go into the next book just as excited. Short memory is a good thing sometimes.

Giant Advertisement

Well, I'm about 2 full work days from finishing "3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man". I'm doing the production on the book now along with color correction and a few last minute designs for the interior pages. I'd designed 4 or 5 pages to act as ads that the main character appears in to endorse products. Here's one of the ads. I'm almost there! Click on the thumbnail to read the text...

Next week the book will go to my editor and then I'll be able to cut my hair -- I vowed not to cut my hair until this book was done and I am looking pretty shaggy.

Giant Man Preview Pages

Haven't had time to post anything lately because I've been spending the last month painting my Giant Man book. I'm nearly done. I've been painting an average of 4 to 5 pages a day so I can finish by the end of the month. It's been fun -- I've been watching/listening to a lot of television this month while I work which keeps it interesting. I should be able to post the cover next week so stay tuned! The colors turned out kind of dark compared to what the final print version will be -- part of what happens when I change them to jpegs.

Also there will be some exclusive preview pages in the new issue of Comic Foundry magazine which hits the stands sometime in February/March and I should have the cover posted here next week. Stay tuned!