Comic Meet-ups

With us not attending this year's San Diego Comic Con and on top of the lull in our convention schedule, we still wanted to keep up our comic book socializing. It's pretty much assumed that we're an indoor-type of bunch, with our deadlines and all. But we're not all anti-social vampires. We like to get out, occasionally. But at a convention, it's difficult to have a real conversation with creators, cause most of the time you can barely hear them or there's too much foot traffic around their booth. I've been searching for other ways to meet writers and artists in the comic community, so I signed up for a couple of groups on meetup.com. 

Living in a large city you're bound to find more than one comic book pow-wow. The first one I checked out was Comic Makers LA which meets once a month in Downtown. It's mostly artists, some working professionals and others still honing their craft. It's a casual atmosphere where everyone sits around a long table, sketching and chatting. It's kinda like stitch-and-bitch but instead of sewing you're drafting. It takes place on a Sunday so depending on my weekend warrior schedule, I'll try to attend the next one.

The other meetup group is Koffee & Komics. This takes place at a cafe, where it's more of a social setting. From where I was sitting I can see veterans and newbies making the rounds introducing each other. And for the next four hours people were coming and going, talking about podcasts, showing their sketchbooks and sharing industry war stories. At this point, I know somebody, who knows somebody else, who used to be Jim Lee's landlord. The world gets smaller and smaller. I'm definitely looking forward to the next one.

And finally there's Comic Book Sunday where recently we chilled out with lots of creators and fans, post SDCC. This took place during a hot afternoon where it could've easily been mistaken as a BBQ. Alas, there were no grilling meats, but there was a healthy dose of "whatcha' reading these days." Price of admission is hard to beat, a donation of comic books for the swap table. We donated a handful of single issues and picked up a few as well. And since it's on a Sunday, availability may be an issue, but I'll try.

All in all, we met quite a few local creators whom we hope to bump into again soon. Like with most social gatherings, strange faces become familiar faces. And possibly, acquaintances can become friends...or collaborators. You just never know who ya gonna meet.

Clown Fight Review

Dale Wilson over at BuyIndieComics.com was kind enough to review Clown Fight last week. I met Dale at the Long Beach Expo back in May and his enthusiasm for indie comics was so wonderful to see that I immediately had to check out his website when I got home. The site, Buy Indie Comics, is great at spotlighting creator owned books and offering up articles on making indie comics by the creators themselves. Go on over and check out his Clown Fight review!

Freak Scene - LA

Rob and I recently went to Freak Scene LA at Synchronicity. Friday, July 6th was the opening night of the exhibition and it's scheduled to show through the rest of the month. We stopped by to support some of the artists we admire, including our friend Shalo P whom we first met at the Alternative Press Expo in San Francisco last year. Rob picked up a few zines as well, a sketch book by Jim Rugg called Notebook which was designed to resemble a spiral bound notebook, and a wonderful Popeye inspired mini comic by Tom Neely called Doppelganger.

It was a great turnout, lots of people mingling and admiring the gallery pieces. The following day they had live performances by Tom Neely, Josh Bayer, Pat Aulisio, Victor "Bald Eagles" Cayro, Keenan Marshall Keller & Shalo P just to name a few. All in all, it was a cool event that allowed these underground artists to really shine.

Emerald City Comic Con 2013

It's still a long way off (March 1-3, 2013 to be exact), but I'm really excited to say that we're confirmed to exhibit at Emerald City Comic Con in Seattle. For years I've only heard great things about this show and have tried hard to attend, even going so far as to apply for press passes twice before (my day job is in television). The timing of the show hasn't worked out for me in the past, but that's all going to change next year. We'll be set up in Artist Alley, mixed in with what is already looking to be a great line-up of creators. Hopefully we'll also be able to squeeze in some time to explore the city while we're there. We'll post more info as the show nears, but in the meantime we'll be busy making comics for our Emerald City debut!

Pluto Moon Base: Colored Pages

Things are moving along nicely with Pluto Moon Base, though there's still a lot to do before it's completed. Just thought I'd give a quick update with some freshly colored pages by the talented Michael Garland. If you haven't seen it yet, Michael's doing amazing work on the Jonathan Hickman written series "Secret," published by Image Comics. Do yourself a favor and check out that great series.

Next up for Pluto Moon Base, time to find a letterer.

Noir - That's What I'm Reading

I'm currently writing a gritty short comic using a lot of noir conventions and characteristics. I like noir movies (Maltese Falcon, Third Man, Seven, Brick...) but to write something original and modern with these certain details is a challenge for me. So I decided to draw inspiration from NOIR, A Collection of Short Crime Comics. 13 short stories from notables like Brubaker, Grist, & Lemire, just to name a few, all offered a different take on the genre. The stories that stood out for me are: Open the Goddamn Box, The Old Silo, The Albanian, Kane the Card Player and The New Me.

In each of these stories, the characters have a dark past (or future), almost contrary to their everyday facade. Although one of the key elements of noir crime stories is to solve a mystery, its also the introspection of the characters still reeling from their experience. 

Last night I finished another noir comic, Parker: The Hunter from Darwyn Cooke. It was an excellent read with very stylish art. Definitely recommend it.

And in case anyone's wondering, yes I have read Blacksad. And I absolutely loved it. Why? Cause it stays true to form but the only difference is that animals take the place of humans. One of my favorite stories was a political crime narrative, reminiscent of Animal Farm. Originally published in French, followed by Spanish, and lastly English, I'm really looking forward to the next Blacksad hardcover which should be coming out soon. 

Convention Schedule 2012 (Part 2)

The year is almost half over and while wedding planning took up much of our time over the past six months, we're now cranking along on new comics and prepping for the rest of the shows we've scheduled for 2012. We're trying our hardest to have new material (and some surprises!) ready for the upcoming shows so if you can make it out to any of these fun events, it'll definitely be worth the journey.

September 15-16, 2012

Stan Lee's Comikaze Expo

Los Angeles Convention Center

Downtown Los Angeles. CA

twitter: @StanLeeComikaze

October 13-14, 2012

A.P.E (Alternative Press Expo)

Concourse Exhibition Center

San Francisco, CA

twitter: @APExpo

November 3-4, 2012

Long Beach Comic Con

Long Beach Convention Center

Long Beach, CA

twitter: @LongBeach_CC

What I've Been Reading: Rob's List

Gonna try something a little different for this post, from time to time I want to start mentioning some of the great comics I've recently been reading. Not necessarily new, not necessarily collected editions, not necessarily for everyone, just comics I've found to be interesting, fresh, exciting, intense, dramatic, LOL, horrifying, life-altering, or just plain fun. So here we go:

Tiger Lawyer #1
The title of the comic alone captured my attention the first time I saw it. Where as my comic, Clown Fight, is about clowns fighting, Tiger Lawyer is about a tiger.... um, lawyer'ing. And don't even tell me that's not something you're at least slightly interested in checking out, because if you do, you're a filthy liar. You want to read this book, I know you do. This first issue contains two stories: a cartoon style court room comedy, and a grittier, noirish tale, that are both equally entertaining. The wonderful thing about the book is that the basic premise is so deceptively simple that the stories could very easily go in any direction using any genre. That makes me really excited to see what the series has in store. If you're interested (which again I know you are), head over to the Indiegogo campaign to grab the first couple issues.

Thought Bubble #1
A single issue anthology released in December 2011, celebrating the annual comics festival in Leeds, UK. The contributors include Andy Diggle, D’Israeli, Mike Carey, Duncan Fegredo, and Antony Johnston. First off, the issue is presented in a double-sized newsprint style similar to Wednesday Comics, so they had me right there. But it also contained some really nice short stories. With any anthology, the stories are usually hit or miss which can be equal parts frustrating as well as rewarding. You really just never know what you're going to get. In this anthology, I enjoyed pretty much all the stories and I think the large page format was a big part of that. I always get a kick out of shorts that have a well done (and complete) story and with the help of being oversized this issue had a couple stories that managed to do it in only 1 or 2 pages. Really cool. And to be honest, the fact that it's only 22 pages was a plus. It can be discouraging when you start reading an anthology and the first couple stories do nothing for you. Not here, good stories make this one a fun read.

Freedom No.1
The first chapter (of what will hopefully be a nice, long story) is about a young boy in 1779 who heads into a British controlled city of Boston seeking an apprenticeship and the older brother who accompanies him. The comic first caught my eye when I was flipping through the Previews catalogue. After finding and enjoying a preview PDF of the book online, it instantly became a must order for me. One of the my favorite things about the comic is the historical setting. I'm a little biased being a native New Englander, but even that aside, the story has a very authentic feel to it. I'm not the biggest history buff, I just don't have the capacity to retain any of that knowledge, but from reading this book you can easily tell that Seamus Heffernan (writer/artist) has a real love for this time period and sprinkles his knowledge throughout. Everything from the dialogue to the colonial style printing on the title page feels very much of that time. Add to that the wonderful art and an intriguing story it has me excited for future chapters. The book is $7, but with 64 story pages and an over-sized format it's absolutely worth it!

Old City Blues
Amazing art. That's what first attracted me to the book when I picked it up at this year's WonderCon. The story focuses on the police officers of a futuristic metropolis who work cases involving drug dealers, smugglers, political corruption and high tech criminals. The art style of writer/artist Giannis Milonogiannis seems to be influenced by the scifi manga/anime of the '80s, but with plenty of European flavor to make it uniquely his own. The style is very loose and it brings a lot of energy to all the action sequences. I can't really say I've read anything like it before, and that to me is a great thing. The story itself is very tightly paced; we get some nice scenes of character development but it never lingers too long. Just like with some of the other titles I mentioned, I'm excited to see what's in store for future volumes because if this one is any indictation, we're in for a great ride! Pick up the book and enjoy.