If you're not reading "The Moon Prince"...

You say that now print is dead, and DC is driving the nail in the coffin--you're diving into the whole wild and crazy world of webcomics head first, like some kind of -of--dope fiend!? Some kind of addict who needs a fix so bad you're willing to betray anyone, your best friend--YOUR DOG?
Well-if you're jonezin' for a damn satisfying webcomics buzz-check it out- start reading "The Moon Prince" by my buddy, Kevin Mutch--and do it now!
"The Moon Prince" is pure, classic comics--and in another era it would have been a weekly page in the Sunday Funnies--revered today for its blend of fantasy, sci-fi, and good old fashioned adventure in the manner of "Treasure island", "Kidnapped" "Huck Finn" and "Harry Potter". 
Everything about "Moon Prince" is top notch--from the terrific characters, Molly and Max, Mr. Billy, Cedric Murray and  Kitiko the chesire cat-- to the seemingly effortless way Kevin drives his story forward week after week, leaving you wanting more with every page;  finally to the gorgeous art in the grand tradition of Hal Foster, Howard Pyle, the Fleischer Studios( think "Gulliver's Travels") Maxfield Parish and even Paul Chadwick--steeped in history but a style his own and that is completely contemporary.
"The Moon Prince" is the real deal--a classic for the webcomic era. Do yourself a favor--begin reading it today!

Rugg's Rampage!

OK--if this in-progress photo of Jim Rugg's knock-out double-page centerfold spread for the upcoming pood no.4 doesn't knock your socks off then call a doctor! Get somebody to check your pulse--because, brother you must be gone, GONE from this world! I say-Cold! cold as a stone!
Pood no.4 in July Previews! JUL110903 F POOD #4(MR).)  Featuring Jim Rugg's 2-page centerfold MASTERPIECE--"RAMPAGE"!  CALL YOUR RETAILER! ORDER TODAY--before they're all gone!

Goodbye Xeric

By now it's common knowledge that the Xeric grants for self-publishing comics will be ended soon.( here's the press release).

As a former recipient, I thank the Xeric foundation, its board members, and especially Peter Laird, for their support of my work and the opportunities afforded me as a result. The Xeric grant has been one of the seminal moments in my endeavors in comics, and one of my most gratifying experiences as an artist.
The support the foundation has offered to comics creators is singular, unique--and since its inception it has certainly had an incalculable effect on the medium.  The list of Xeric winners is a compendium of some of the best cartoonists working today, and its influence is clear at SPX, MoCCA and anywhere there are comics. It would be a very different comics environment without the Xeric. The gifts the Xeric brought to comics are an achievement to be celebrated--and maybe at SPX or somewhere, someone should throw a party to do just that.
For better or worse though, I think the arguments for the ending of the Xerics miss one of the salient points of the grant in the first place-i.e. that of getting comics into print. Print, with all of its qualities, capabilities, and restrictions. Print as medium, material, and object.
That the web can serve the same objective as the Xeric--i.e. the dissemination of a creator's work to the public--is certainly true as far as it goes. But it fails to consider that the grants afforded the thinking artist the opportunity to explore  the aesthetics of print, and the nature of the object and the medium, i.e. the comic book. The web offers a platform for creators, no doubt. But creatively speaking, it's a different medium than the comic book(cartooning and comic books are not necessarily synonymous; i.e., comic books need not be cartoons)--and while much of traditional cartooning, i.e. contour line drawing augmented by color or gray tonalities, is well-served on the computer screen--there are ideas and approaches to the medium that are not--such as my own "Look Out!Monsters" or "fandancer"( which I'm assuming, if you're reading this you've read or seen--if not shame on you! Buy them now!)

There isn't a publisher active today who would touch "Look Out!Monsters" (or for that matter, "fandancer") with a ten-foot pole. There are many reasons for that--not necessarily having to do with issues of quality(!)-but having to do with cost, audience and "standards of taste" that define conventional views of the medium. The opportunity to experiment with the comic book as a form; its size and shape, the paper; the exploration of interplay between pages;  the  choices of imagery and the interaction between source image and printing process--those experiments are not something a publisher is likely to try out with an unknown artist. It simply costs too much. But grants like the Xeric are immune to the demands of the marketplace and allow for the "noble experiment". They allow for failure.  (don't confuse "Kickstarter" with a grant program. Its successes will more or less be dependent upon the availability of an existing audience, whereas innovation/experimentation is not necessarily going to have such an audience. ).
The Xerics did more than simply provide funds for printing. They also offered support without asking for anything in return. When I ran into some legal difficulties with "Look Out!Monsters", the Xeric foundation was there with advice and moral support that helped me through a difficult period.
 The web certainly offers the imaginative creator a wide array of choices and possibilities--this is not to argue against webcomics-as they are or as they will become. Not at all. This is simply to say the Xeric afforded a certain kind of opportunity that was distinct, the opportunity to explore form--a singular form--the comic book--one that is unique in our history and experience. 
That the Xerics are now a part of history is another indication that the form is on the precipice of fundamental change. 

But--- I can't end this on that note. No,no, no!--because the Xeric foundation grant was such an unequivocally positive force in my life--and a positive force for change in this world we call comics, I  lift my cup of morning tea, and doff my baseball cap to say " Thank You! Thanks, Mr. Laird! Thanks, Xeric board members! Thanks to everyone at the Xeric foundation! Thanks for all those great comics! You will be missed--but you've left us all so much better off than we were!"

Goddbye, Xeric!

Joe Staton in Pood no.4!

 This morning I absent-mindedly picked up one of the loose comics laying in piles around my studio--some for using in collage, some for reading. Avengers no.134; April, 1974; "the Origin of the Vision", Steve Englehart, author.
The art, early -seventies-era Sal Buscema-- is unmistakable.  But there's something more to Buscema's work on this ish---an energy, a dynamism, there's color in the ink work, variation in the lines, light and dark--chiaroscuro-& more--there's something of the cartoon in there. This is good stuff!
For better or worse, Sal Buscema was probably the only penciller whose work didn't suffer for being inked by Vince Colletta. No matter who inked him, he still looked like Sal Buscema--i.e., Big Brother John in a hurry. But not on Avengers 134.  Not when inked by Joe Staton. In these pages, Sal Buscema looks complete.

If you've read my post over at the "pood" blog announcing JOE STATON as the newest contributor to the upcoming issue no.4, then you know I am indeed well chuffed.
(And if you haven't read the announcement yet--?!?-- check it out here-then come back!)

 I'm sure that for Joe, issue no. 134 of the Avengers is long forgotten-- but almost forty years later, I've still got it, still cherish it,  for no other reason than for those yummy inks.
Both Kevin and I have been big fans of Joe Staton's work since picking up the original Charlton run of E-Man back when we were teenagers. E-Man's blend of traditional super-heroics and light comedy were unique in the early '70's(a time of increasing "realism" in super-hero comics),  reminiscent of the kind of comedy-adventure that had its origins a generation earlier, in Roy Crane's "Wash Tubbs and Captain Easy", E.C. Segar's "Popeye", C.C. Beck's "Captain Marvel", Carl Barks' "Donald Duck", and Will Eisner's "The Spirit".

As a teenager interested in making comics, I discovered that the style of E-Man suited my own burgeoning tastes, a predilection best illustrated in my own 1990's-era Dr.Speck, itself heavily indebted to Joe Staton and Nick Cuti's creation.

It was no small thing to chance comedy in a super-hero book--not in those days. Nor was it commonplace to introduce an overtly cartoon-y style back into superhero comics--not when the demand was more and more for grand illustration--in the style of Neal Adams, or Alfredo Alcala over John Buscema. (Grand stuff indeed!)
But E-Man -and Joe Staton-(along with a few others, most notably Frank Robbins-himself a Sunday Adventure strip vet)-did it, and did it well,  helping to open the door for later artists such as Bruce Timm, and the altogether broader, more pluralistic aesthetic environment that exists in super-hero comics today.

If it seems an odd combination--an upstart, supposedly art-comics-y anthology and a venerable mainstream comics creator, consider this: the overriding impetus behind "pood" was my love of  the Sunday Funnies and a desire to see that format renewed somehow(something I felt was begun with DC's "Wednesday's Comics", but that didn't go far enough). With the addition of Joe Staton in issue no. 4, pood has the chance to bring that wish full-circle, joining with a great mainstream comics creator deeply invested in that tradition--and now working on one of the mediums most iconic vehicles, Chester Gould's Dick Tracy!

Dick Tracy copyright 2011 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

pood no. 4 is in July's "Previews"!
Order Code: JUL110903 F POOD#4(MR).

Find it on page 246 under the BIG IF COMICS imprint!

The July Previews goes on sale June 29th!

The Summer $1. Sale-EXTENDED!

EXTRA EXTRA! The LOOK OUT!MONSTERS SUMMER DOLLAR DAYS SALE IS EXTENDED UNTIL SUNDAY, JUNE 12th! 
Here are the great comics you can buy--for just a buck(+ shipping and handling!)

Pood #1: $1.00
pood #2: $1.00
fandancer: $1.00
lookout!Monsters$1.00

Spend money! Coff up the cash!Do it! Do it Now! This is the once -in-a-lifetime- Sale that can't be beat!
(You can read my previous post for more info!)

Lookie Here!The Look Out! Monsters $1 Summer Blow Out Sale!

Hey there all you comics fans, art fans, art-comics fans--have I got a deal for you!
ONE DOLLAR COMICS!
yep--you heard right--ONE DOLLAR COMICS!!!
and these aren't just any old smelly comics--these are BIG, FRGIGGIN' COMICS!
with LOTSA PAGES!
& LOTSA COLOR!
LOTSA PRETTY STUFF GOIN' ON!
Not to mention, pain, sorrow, loss and love--and--yes, even a few YUCKS tossed in for good measure!

Here's the details--
For 3 days--beginning at 12:01 AM on Monday, June 6th 2011--and ending at midnight, Wednesday, June 8th, 2011--you can purchase the following comics for ONE BUCK-A-ROO each (+ shipping and handling--hey, I'll give the stuff away, but I can't go broke doin' it!):

POOD #1! (Jim Rugg, Sara Edward Corbett, Hans Rickheit, Joe Infurnari, Andres Vera Martinez and many more!)
POOD #2! (Same crazy cast of lunatics!)
FANDANCER by me, GG! 36 pages! Full color! Artsy type stuff-and deep profound thoughts about big breasted super-heroines, plus! a nasty, scary villain,  a few laffs and adventurous derring do!
LOOK OUT! Monsters! -the original, xeric winning big collage comic that got lotsa nice compliments from my friends and family!

How do you purchase these goodies?
Simply go to www.lookoutmonsters.com--
--and click on the appropriate thumbnail to travel to the publication of your choice!

While the purchase prices will read as usual
($10. for fandancer, $5. for Look Out! Monsters!, etc.) --you will only be charged $1. for each of the above comics when you click the paypal button! & of course, via Paypal we(meaning "I") accept all those credit cards and paypal  methods of payment!


This offer lasts for 3 days and 3 days only-first come, first serve, as long as supplies last-so if you've ever wanted to get a hold of POOD--or you're crazy enough to want to check out  fandancer-
-NOWZ the TIME!
I'm dying to get these goodies outta my house and into your hands--soz I can fill up my house with all the NEW COMICS I wanna make!
And--I mean this sincerely-- just cause I lovezya! AHCHACHACHACHA!

Fandancer: sketches and texture

A comment in my post "Comics Not Comics" about texture (Hi Vollsticks!) -and asking to see some examples of some of the pastel work done in my comic "fandancer" offer a good opportunity to compare some sketches--done in markers---and the finals, done in pastel--to illustrate the difference texture brings to tone and mood, certainly in fandancer-and in comics in general. 

Texture was something that was built into my "vision" for FD right from the start--I knew I wanted color, I knew I wanted color built into the image creation rather than layered on top of line drawings--and I knew I wanted to evoke ben day textures(the texture of print) without resorting to photoshop and without arousing the aura of nostalgia that faux-ben day often brings with it. And so--pastel was my medium of choice.  

 I prefer not to blend or smudge--but lay color down one layer at a time, add fixative, add another layer-more fix, another layer, etc.-to build depth into the color, to allow the surface of the paper to work on the image, and to keep process front and center. Process is as important to me as the image is. 

I don't think those qualities are very apparent in these lo-res digital images, but I think they are very clear in the book itself.

 and of course, here's a couple of "nautical" examples from one of my favorite cartoonists-Roy Crane.

The first, in pen and ink, from his classic "Wash Tubbs & Cap'n Easy"-and the second from "Buz Sawyer", highlighting Sawyer's absolute mastery of the now lost art of zip-a-tone.
(& correct me if I'm wrong--I believe Sawyer used "Craftint" paper-wherein the gray tonalities were actually built into the paper and revealed as the artist applied a developer to the area he or she wanted to shade.)

Sawyer's use of gray tones was an ingenious response to the technology of his day, his textures worked in terms of representation--describing space, light and shade, volume, mood, etc--while subtly cluing the audience into process-and the nature of the medium in print-as well.

 

& just in case you weren't aware--there are some wonderful collections of Roy Crane's

work out now--Fantagraphics is reprinting the "Cap'n Easy"Sundays, and as well as Buz Sawyer .