Background: I'm as mystified as anyone that we pitched another plot with Lobo, a character I don't care for. But he would be a decent character to have Supergirl deal with, and I liked the goofy set-up of the story. I think this may have been a pitch for the series that was meant to be pitched to the Superman Adventures comic. I really would have liked to write this one for the comic, it's basically a romp, with a lot of visuals and gags and violence and Easter eggs baked in. There are wo...
2021-06-09 23:02:06 +0000 UTC
View Post
Just about done. Sarah's going to do a quick digital clean-up and it'll go out tomorrow. Between the tight deadline and recent dental issues of her own, Sarah won't be able to color the actual art this time around. I rarely have a cover colored by anyone other than Sarah since she started working on them, it's always a bit weird and "off" to me when I see how someone else approaches coloring my art. It's been so long since the days of Bill & Ted, Fight Man, heck, Wild Knights covers. The ...
2021-06-07 05:55:17 +0000 UTC
View Post
Actually, haven't been stinking on this one, I think it's going pretty well. Only one mistake, you can see I continued inking some of the "mist" lines through the demon's wings. Uh-oh, Spaghettios. I used a G-pen and nib on some of this, been missing using inky ink and it was fun, but, I fell back on brush pens for most work because of the time element. Also, having "live" ink around with the cat has not been wise.
I'm trying to get this done by tomorrow, I'm a pretty slow inker and I h...
2021-06-05 21:41:16 +0000 UTC
View Post
BACKGROUND: This plot was aimed solely at the comic series, and not the animated series, I'm pretty sure. With the plot of the original Funky Flashman/Goody Rickles episode barely commented on, I doubt we would have tried with those characters again. Unless, and this is possible, we tagged the "sequel" to Get Funky onto the original pitch as a bonus idea. Now that I think of it, why would we even try to pitch a Funky/Goody story to DC when there's no way they'd clear Don Rickles, le...
2021-06-04 21:35:27 +0000 UTC
View Post
Two House of Fun-related comics shipped to (some, a few) comic shops this past Wednesday, in case you didn't know.
Huzzah! Comics! We still make them, or at least we did and they're finally seeing print. Which two new funnybook-type things are we talking about? Well, let me tell you.
First up --
BEASTS OF BURDEN: OCCUPIED TERRITORY #3 is out, from Dark Horse Comics. I think this issue is our best yet in the four-issue series. Benjamin Dewey really hit the art out of th...
2021-06-04 20:59:50 +0000 UTC
View Post
Those of you following me on social media are aware that this past week has seen me go to the hospital on Tuesday for a dental emergency. Yesterday Sarah ended up with her own dental emergency (two extractions, more drama to come). The good news is that she was in the process of switching insurance around to better handle my situation and that helped with her finding a dentist that could taker her in immediately. Her work and x-rays were mostly covered by insurance, and presumably I can go th...
2021-06-04 20:42:16 +0000 UTC
View Post
Work has been a mess from everything that's been going on but the antibiotics and painkillers have kicked in and my impacted wisdom tooth isn't hurting as badly as before. I got some drawing done last night, despite the Pirate Girl walking over my drawing board, getting in my lap, biting my pencil, knocking art supplies onto the floor. She's a swell cat but a lousy intern.
Unfortunately, Sarah won't be able to color this for next week because she ended up in a dentist's office wit...
2021-06-04 09:39:33 +0000 UTC
View Post
As I mentioned in a recent post, I find writing book introductions incredibly difficult to deal with, even short quotes are super stressful to come up with. I'm not asked all that often, so, it isn't a huge problem, to be honest. But it pops up here and there. Recently I spent months trying to cobble together a halfway decent foreword for J. Gonzo's collection of La Mano del Destino (a sweet Lucha Libre comic he self-published, the book is out now from Top Cow/Image, the Kickstarter bilin...
2021-06-01 01:36:15 +0000 UTC
View Post
BACKGROUND: I can't say for certain if we pitched this plot to the STAS producers for a potential episode, but I'm pretty sure we did. Since none of our plots were ever considered -- hell, they were barely even acknowledged -- it's hard to remember the details this many years after the fact. I do know from notes that we pitched this to editor Joey Cavalieri (World's Funnest, Bizarro World, Bizarro Comics etc) but it didn't get anywhere past the pitch process. I think thiswould have ...
2021-05-31 01:05:35 +0000 UTC
View Post
When Sarah and I were approached to work on the Superman Animated series, we were asked to pitch an episode plot for -- of all things -- a Funky Flashman/Goody Rickles story (!). Not that I was complaining. As insane as the idea sounded, I was more than into the idea of bringing together these two infamous characters from Jack Kirby's Fourth World run -- the former a hilariously mean-spirited Stan Lee parody (appearing in Mister Miracle), the other an utterly bizarre character bsed on c...
2021-05-29 00:11:04 +0000 UTC
View Post
BACKGROUND: When we worked on the animated Superman series we pitched a number of proposals for episodes, none of which got past the pitch stage. When we started writing for the Superman Adventures comic we pitched most of these plots to the editors. Unfortunately, our schedule never allowed us to work on any of them. We wrote four issues of the comic, but the actual TV plot pitches never got touched.
I've just accessed a very old file with all the plots and will be p...
2021-05-27 21:24:54 +0000 UTC
View Post
I find writing essays and introductions incredibly difficult. Often, I find these things more difficult to put together than an entire script. My intentions on these is to write something that praises the virtues of the book and creators, while providing some interesting background information and maybe even a little personal insight on the subject.
At the same time, there are several things I want to avoid like cancer. These are things I've come to despise from readi...
2021-05-21 01:54:16 +0000 UTC
View Post
Colored despite a cat jumping on my lap and laying there several time.
Episode 15 will be posted tomorrow.
2021-05-16 23:16:33 +0000 UTC
View Post
Some of you might know that we've taken in a stray cat and my weekend has not been going as planned. My new studio mate is being ridiculous, she's super needy and affectionate and it's adorable but I'm getting very little work done because this is the only room we can use to keep our cat Nutmeg out of (old house, with doors that won't stay shut). I plan to bring the Pirate Girl cat to a vet on Monday.
The little stray cat wasn't supposed to come inside, we were making plans to res...
2021-05-16 07:04:36 +0000 UTC
View Post
No idea who this is, but I'm really into the character and hope it ends up in the story.
Hell, I just hope there's a story.
But I figure I'm going to keep this up until I actually have to connect the panels and fill things in.
2021-05-14 06:40:36 +0000 UTC
View Post
Many more to go.
2021-05-13 09:18:57 +0000 UTC
View Post
I just found some more process art from the cover for issue #2, which I don't think I've posted.
Here's an example of what happens when an image just doesn't fall into place and I find myself fighting the drawing. It was the simplest cover design of the four, and turned into the biggest pain in the butt for me.
I wasn't happy with the first take on Death, and re-drew it.
I screwed up the Bill and Ted figures on the second cover drawing, and then had to work the f...
2021-05-12 04:02:17 +0000 UTC
View Post
From a few years back, based on the Jack Kirby original, obviously (inks attributed to Vince Colletta, lettering by Sam Rosen, and Stan Goldberg's is credited but I'm not sure if he contributed inks or --?). I found the finished inks on my computer, if the pencils are repetitive my apologies, I can't tell if there are any substantive differences or not, but it's not hurting anyone to just post all the pencil files I found.
A fun if time-consuming commission, not that the customer asked ...
2021-05-07 23:54:30 +0000 UTC
View Post
The second issue of the current Beasts of Burden series is now available.
Written by me and Sarah Dyer, illustrated by Benjamin Dewey and lettered by Nate Piekos.
The main cover (above) was done by Benjamin, the variant this time around is by series co-creator Jill Thompson (below).
Published by Dark Horse Comics.
2021-05-06 00:48:55 +0000 UTC
View Post
Recent jottings-down on an index card.
Don't ask me why.
But this is pretty much how some one-page M&C comics start off.
2021-05-02 00:33:40 +0000 UTC
View Post
Trying to catch up! Thanks everyone for your patience, I don't want to hack anything out but I am trying to speed up. All I'm working on right now are commissions and index card drawings. And these posts, I guess. And a sandwich. I'm definitely finishing the sandwich tonight. But the soda went flat while I was on the phone with a client for a potential illustration project. I'll finish it, anyway.
2021-05-01 01:39:40 +0000 UTC
View Post
Back in the 90's I wrote a four-issue of The Mask for Dark Horse Comics. It didn't make much of a blip in the scheme of things, and wasn't received all that well by the fans expecting more John Arcudi/Doug Mahnke ultra-violence sprees. Maybe some readers thought it would be a Milk & Cheese romp with a Mask mask on, maybe there was too much plot in there that wasn't engaging, and , of course, maybe it wasn't all that good. I dunno, I liked writing it and enjoyed the father and daughter cha...
2021-04-30 05:18:59 +0000 UTC
View Post
I sold this piece today and scanned the front and back to post here for the heck of it. I always liked this cover, for me it's very stark design and I think my inking was pretty good on it. Always thought the logo looked nifty. Scary to see that it was drawn almost 21 years ago.
Ye gods, where does the time go? Down the drain to return to where life began --?
Anyway, here's to another 21 years of IMPROVING!!!
2021-04-28 08:13:57 +0000 UTC
View Post
Atop this post -- inked commission of Milk & Cheese and characters from Shigeru Mizuki's Kitaro manga, redrawn because the original was stolen on its way to the customer. Still needs coloring. And I still have to redraw a Fun Strip recreation to replace the contents of the package. Gah. The silver lining for me is that I think I did a better job on the second version. Cleaned up some of the clutter without making it seem anything's missing, did a better overall job on the inks, I like...
2021-04-28 04:40:42 +0000 UTC
View Post
I found a 6" by 9" color M&C pin-up that was finished in November, according to the date stamp on the back of it. I checked my commissions list. It doesn't match any requests, and I feel weird sending someone who wanted a non-specific M&C piece something that has been sitting around. Is that weird? I guess so, but I feel like each commission should be intended specifically for a customer, even if they have no specific requests. This feels like re-gifting something to someone. That's a...
2021-04-23 22:43:00 +0000 UTC
View Post
Obviously, when you're a freelancer you get used to not getting jobs, or having projects fall apart. Well, you don't ever really get used to it, but you get used to the idea that it happens. It sucks every time, and for every dodged bullet there are five missed opportunities and at least one great paycheck that you never stop thinking about some days. It's part of the business, and, on the whole, my batting average has been pretty solid -- maybe because I avoided so many situations out of fea...
2021-04-18 00:57:21 +0000 UTC
View Post
Commission done a few months back, based on the Wild Hunt toy figures made by Science Patrol. Fun one to draw, but maybe I added too many figures. Nahh.
https://sciencepatrol.storenvy.com/
Finished inks and lettering.
2021-04-10 20:32:14 +0000 UTC
View Post
BEASTS OF BURDEN: OCCUPIED TERRITORY #1 will be out tomorrow (in comic shops that ordered it).
I'm very pleased with how the new series came together, and I hope folks who have been supporting the series continue to enjoy the work we're doing. The pandemic knocked the project off the schedule when it was nearly finished, so, this has been the first time we were delayed for reasons beyond our control. Which is still a bummer, but perfectly understandable. Artist Benjamin Dewey and ...
2021-04-06 20:00:53 +0000 UTC
View Post
2021-04-05 01:18:40 +0000 UTC
View Post
I didn't draw very many pages in this series, but it's interesting how many of them revolve around snow. I guess the snow got me in a contemplative mood. Or life slowed down enough to sit and draw something while recuperating from the aches and pains. Or perhaps, snow and shoveling and going outside were things that were visual and active, and more interesting to make a comic about. My life in general consists of sitting in a room behind a drawing board or computer keyboard. I don't rea...
2021-04-02 14:30:52 +0000 UTC
View Post
