Comics! Games! Anthropology! » comics

Mid-Missouri Comics Anthology Deleted Scene

admin — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 16:00:55 +0000

If you haven’t gotten a copy of the Mid Missouri Comics Anthology 2009 at Rock Bottom Comics, you should definitely get it soon! Here I present a page that was left out, which would’ve been the introductory page to my chapter of comics. I drew it over around two hours at one of the Midmococo meetings. It’s done in pencil, except for the 2nd panel, which is partially photoshopped.

The one page introduction pairs two characters from different stories: Karie from Collegetown and The Epic of Karie, and Keeley from her own story. I thought it would be fun for them to introduce my section in character (those who have followed my blogs from 1999 may remember a similar format for my first website!).

I wanted to lower the bar by intentionally making the art bad so the reader would be blown away by the following pages. The editor of the book thought the page was too rough and asked me to at least ink it. By that time I had moved on to working on something else but I had no problem leaving the page out since it would make a fun blog post. And here it is! Click the thumbnail below for the larger version.

Fun fact: the photograph of me in panel two was taken from one of the reference images I took using Photobooth as I modeled a pose for Ray of Sunshine, featured in the Anthology!

Mandatory Break Time

admin — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 18:55:00 +0000

Can’t… stop… working on paper. Must… force myself… to do… something else, like enjoy these Family Circus parodies.

I Present: The Epic of Karie

admin — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 04:52:00 +0000

This is my 2009 24 Hour Comic, The Epic of Karie. Unlike previous years I went with a previously-created story, one from my earliest comic-making days (around 1998-2000). Go ahead and start with the introduction, which is a blog post in itself!

Voxy Lady

admin — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 13:00:00 +0000

I’m the cover story of this week’s Vox Magazine. Wow! I don’t even know what to say about that. Except, go over there and have a read!

Note: If I knew I was getting the cover I would’ve drawn a special something for them!

Cool Things from Comic-Con 2009

admin — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 21:47:00 +0000

My Comic-Con day this year is tomorrow, but cool news is already on the internet.

Batgirl: Year One the motion comic! Batgirl: Year One is one of my favorite trades. The art is wonderfully simple yet exudes character. The retelling of Batgirl’s origin is also a cool superhero adventure story with appearances by Black Canary and really crazy and menacing Firefly. While had an inkling of an idea for my own superhero comic before, it was when I read this that really inspired me. (Then the hard part was not ripping off its awesomeness!) I was hoping this would be an DCU Animated project (link warning: sound), but a motion comic is fine too. The coolest part? The whole thing is already on iTunes!

Source… er… nadshot.com

Certainly more to come.

Mr. July

admin — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 23:10:00 +0000

Before I’m last month’s news, I want to tell you that I was the July featured creator at the Midmococo website. Check out the enlightening interview here!

Who Views the Viewmen?

admin — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 02:50:00 +0000

I finally found time to see Watchmen at a matinee this evening. That’s the major minus of having a normal work schedule: I can’t have my way around town while everyone is at work, ’cause I’m at work. Instead of going home for my sleep 1 (I’ll have to explain my weird yet consistent sleep schedule sometime), I saw the 4:30 showing. There were around five other people in the theater and we were all well-behaved. The sound did drop out during a scene but since I’ve read the book so many times, *shrug*.

In short, it’s a good movie. A lot of comic book-to-film adaptations strike an odd nerve in the details. Comics Batman wouldn’t have let Ras al Ghul die in a fiery train wreck. Lois Lane does not look or act like Kate Bosworth‘s portrayal. But, man does Watchmen hit all the right notes. Well, 99.9% of them. Sure there are changes in shot selection, dialog, and a few plot elements, but in the majority of cases they mesh well with the source material. The movie is covered in references to minutiae from the book. Characters in the secondary and tertiary roles in the book are liberally given cameos as reaction shots and scenery. Some characters like Silhouette are embellished with great effect. The movie, with it’s hindsight on the 80′s, also loads the sets with impersonators of real celebrities. Look for a David Bowie (no, not the actor who played Ozymandias, who could totally star in a Bowie biopic)!

The ending is not one of these changes I enjoyed. Like V for Vendetta, the ending seems shoehorned in to a faithful adaptation. I wonder what the reason for the change was: the sheer absurdity of the book ending in the face of the mostly “realistic” portrayal of a modern world with superheroes is what makes it so powerful so I hope it’s not because the book ending is so out-there. Maybe it’s because the book ending took time to set up that the movie could not spare. I will admit that the threads leading to the movie ending could be woven more seamlessly into the rest of the plot.

Still I am very glad a Watchmen movie got made and it doesn’t suck. Being a huge fan of the book, seeing some of the scenes play out in motion was really a great experience. The large tub of popcorn I consumed… not so much.

Final Note: Upon reflection on the movie I realized that references to smoking were missing. One bit in the book has Laurie looking for a cigarette lighter on the Owlship when she hits the flamethrower button by accident. In the movie, she just hits the button because it’s shiny or something. In a flashback, a boy is smoking a cigarette, also missing in the movie. Do the powers that be really think that erasing smoking from media is part of the solution? How does that mesh with alcohol use and movies centered around cocaine?

It’s A-Me… Keithio!

admin — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 19:05:00 +0000

From 24 Hour Comics day. See Josh’s Youtube page for more!

I also show up here:

24 Hour Comics is Here Again!

admin — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 14:00:00 +0000

This weekend I’ll once again be at Midmococo’s 24 Hour Comics event. Like last year, the challenge is to produce twenty four pages in twenty four hours, from noon Saturday to noon Sunday. Last year was when I first became involved with Midmococo. Hard to believe that only one year has passed! I’ve met a lot of cool people there.

This year’s event is going to be even cooler. We’ll be at the Columbia Art League in downtown, so we’ll be getting a lot of attention. Which reminds me, I should get my hair cut before then. It’s getting long…

I wouldn’t count on internet access but I can post to Twitter from my phone. Keep an eye out for my updates. I’m sure the ones past hour twenty will be keepers.

Tales from Comic-Con, Day 4 (Sunday): I Just Want a Goddamn Cardboard Tube

admin — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 20:13:00 +0000

I didn’t go to Comic-Con on Sunday in 2006 because I was tired of it by the fourth day. My family convinced me to go since I did have Comic-Con and trolley passes. A deal ‘s a deal! Getting there was no problem. Once inside, though it was chaos. Sunday was kids’ day. Now, most kids were fine, but what was not fine were the con newbies: parents with strollers. Pedestrian traffic was crazy because of the strollers everywhere. The parents would stop in the middle of the aisles and gawk and whatever booth, blocking the people behind them from moving. Babies in strollers would drop stuff or grab things from passersby. And crowd control was a lot worse than in 2006. Booths just couldn’t handle long lines of people so lines wrapped around and around with no indication of where the line ended or what the line was for. In 2006 I specifically saw such lines broken up to help the flow of traffic, but this year it was the norm. I tried three times to talk to staff members what was going on in the line they guarded and two times I was completely ignored. The third time I was ejected from a line I accidentally stood in. That line was important, too:

Omar Dogan, artist at Udon comics, was doing commission sketches. I think his work is fantastic so I went to his booth. Luckily, he wasn’t so busy so I could get my request in: Karin from Street Fighter Alpha 3. Mr. Dogan was very nice and he told me to pick it up around closing time. As I walked away it occured to me that I had no way of safely transporting a 11″ x 17″ art piece. But, I saw many convention-goers all weekend with poster tubes from the Fox booth so off I went. When I got there they were out of posters with a sign promising more later. I walked around some more and returned. Now there was a giant throng of people demanding poster tubes. I walked around the booth but couldn’t find where the line ended. I saw one likely spot, a corner with a staff member and what looked like the end. I asked the man if it was the end, and he said no. It turns out, the line continued directly behind me, from where I had come from. So… that meant I was in the line right? No, said both the guard and the woman behind me (whom is a jerk btw). At this point I was on the verge of a freakout so I left ending my quest for a poster tube.

I calmed myself down by first watching Spore being played at their booth, played some Rock Band in the game room. Walking through the exhibit hall made me have an attack again so I sat in a secluded area playing Phase on my iPod. Once I was refreshed I went back to see Omar Dogan. Surprisingly my piece was done (it had been around three hours). It’s fantastic: inked and shaded which is beyond what he needed to do for a con sketch. I had him keep the rough lines. I wrapped the drawing in some thick posters, forming a protective tube I had to hold closed. Having gotten that, there was nothing I needed to do so I left Comic-Con as fast as possible.

{Things I got at Comic-Con. Click to see annotated version at Flickr.}

I’m not sure if I want to do it again. At least I’ll skip a year like before. Maybe two years. I did have lots of fun and got many unique souvenirs, and talked to some great people, but the aggravating times were insanity-inducing, literally. I’m pretty sure it’s all worth it, though. Maybe. Let me look at that drawing again…