Patton Oswalt Poster and WonderCon

A True Comedian of Comedy

This is a show poster I did for Patton Oswalt at his show coming up April 29th.
If you're anywhere near Tucson around this time you should definitely check it out! Details and ticket info can be found in the Events section on his site here.

Prints are available through my Etsy store. Get 'em while they're hot--!

Comics and Comics

So I had the lucky happenstance of meeting the swell funnyman at the Hammer Museum where he was moderator for an event promoting the release of the book "75 years of DC Comics: The Art of Modern Mythmaking." Jumping at the chance to see comics history and geekery elevated to such a classy locale, I joined some friends to see the entertaining discussion. The guests included the author and former president of DC, Paul Levitz, as well as creative giants Jim Lee and Geoff Johns.

During the Q & A, someone in the crowd asked a fairly general question about how to 'make it' in the comics biz, to which even the moderator jumped in. Talking about how one's got to just do your thing (with interwebs n' all)-- not wait to be picked up by some bigger imprint or get 'permission' to do what you love, it was totally heartening to hear words encouraging independent aspirations. I dug.

I think some similar sentiments came though in his "Comedians of Comedy" movie, which follows "alternative comedians," Brian Posehn (another comic book aficionado!), Zach Galifinakis (awesome!), and Maria Bamford (even awesomer!) on tour.
Patton was a fantastic fit for the event and so I made it a point to tell him so after the show... and certainly glad I did~

Pictorial proof :

I strategically placed myself in the front row,

 hoping to absorb some of their talent via spit/osmosis.

Comics pals Ralph and Jeremy were part of the cadre as we squinted our closest resemblence to the Man of Steel of the Golden Age...

Squinty McSquinterson



If you can draw fantastically, be a Publisher of DC, be very well spoken,

 and not have to let go of a good beer all at the same time, your name might just be...

...Jim Lee!

We then proceeded to become zombies...

A Time to Wonder

I'm going to be a bit more timely with this post and make some noise about Wondercon this year. Celebrating it's 25th anniversary, the event will be held April 1-3 at the Moscone Center-- smack dab in the middle of San Francisco. This was one of the first events I ever tabled at and it's been great fun every time. I really enjoy its size, space, and audience. To me it feels like a fine balance between the cozy halls of APE and the rabble crowds of ComicCon. The city is also rad to boot.
Hope to see folks for the show~

Mark your calendars! :

Fri 4/1 Noon - 7pm
Sat 4/2 10am - 7pm
Sun 4/3 11am - 5pm

More info about the event is available on their official site.

I will be in attendance with aforementioned Ralph Miranda and Co. at table #AA-077

I'll have a the newest of my 'Nouvuea Robotica' posters on hand as well as some comics, stickers, and buttons.

One new addition this year will be unveiled in the form of some fashioned machinery--
a vintage vending contraption that'll dispense buttons and other fun goods. 

There will be a limited quantity of capsules with the non-red caps that'll get patrons a free sketch!Bring your quarters! (or at least small bills I can break ;)

Here 'tis, still having it's kinks worked out--

Promised to be ready full of fun trinkets for the show~

[GumballmachineVenturetime is a joint operation

by myself and musician pal digitalcasm--

look for it at his performance too!]

An Arabian Crescent

[ Click HERE to see the cratered details:]

Lunar Landings

I haven't submitted a design to this snazzy site in a while, but I had an idea that I had scribbled on a Post-it a while back that kept nudging me to get drawn. My sketchbook's starting to pile up with a few-- I just need to make time to flesh them out. Thanks to ole pal and shirt designer extraordinaire, 'polynothing'(Josh) for some advice on this design~

Drawing some inspiration from Treasure Planet, and some deeply geeky conversation about planetary orbits with an engineer friend, I wanted to depict an impossibly neat looking gravity situation. The crescent moon is prevalent throughout Middle Eastern design, so I thought some Agrabah-ish architecture would work.

Click on the link above to vote for me! Thank yous :]

.....

And now, a word from our process gif :

Kinda looks like an album...

Enlightened Filament

250 Watts of Wisdom

This is the ninth addition to the Nouveau Robotica series and will be making it's first appearance this weekend at an art show at Sipology Cafe in Long Beach, CA. The show will also feature two other artist friends, Rodney Sellars and Will Koffman under the uniting theme of "Technophilia: Machines and the People Who Love Them." It's a fun and unique space in downtown LB.

For those tech savvy or just plain good at finding details, there is a QR code on the print. When scanned using most smartphone barcode apps, it'll bring you... well, right here!

The illustrative type in there is Tibetan, and translates to (I think...) "Ornament." Seeing as how the written form of the country has such ornate stylings, especially to Western eyes, I thought it fit. The lightbulb icon is pretty literal, but I wanted to play with the interior filament suggesting a face or some sort. The idea of spirituality in an artificial mind was a neat one explored in Battlestar Galactica, so I wanted to give it an Eastern spin. The robot floats above a lotus motif which hides the 'power' symbol with the the animated counterpart below to suggest some sort of 'transcendence' from one medium to another in a digital world.

Click on the Bulb for some ambiance~ :]

[Note: Since the code brings you here. there's likely a blank space above these words for you mobile viewers... Flash not playing well with a lot of smartphones and all--BELOW is an mp4 version!)]

Technophiliacs Anonymous

The show is happening this Saturday (at 7pm), with us artists doing some live painting to the tunes of several DJs including pal Digitalcasm and Calamari Beats. I'll have prints, a few mini-comics and buttons available~

Here's a flyer!

Here's another piece that will be on display. One of a few scenes in a series of digital paintings I've been working on of robots going about their day-to-day when they discover something weird going on. Here, it's playground octopi. Man, I hate when that happens....

"Beneath the Swings"

Pencil, Photoshop

Another Belated Christmas Album and Card

So what would you like to have this Winter's Eve Light Celebration ?

Belated Like Broken Clockwork

It's Christmas time and my pal Digitalcasm Stearns ("Abel") put together another Holiday CD for this year: "Another Belated Christmas*." Featuring the golden voice talent of R.J. Hochmuth, this compilation of holiday tracks crosses all sorts of cultural and awesomeness boundaries!

"Sexy Kwanzaa," "Santa Baby," and the impressively auto-tuned "We're a Couple of Misfits" are some of my favorite tracks.

The ornamented CD face~

Last year's album (which includes a reading of the Polar Express in faux British accent + self-made foley sound FX), is availabile on the Bandcamp site here.

Tuning up the Reindeer (+ the Christmas Spirit)

Also for this time of year is my annual illustration promotional card. The reindeer is a callback from last year's card, but shows all the behind-the-scenes tinkering the Elves do to get a bionic buck airborne. Since I worked in layers in Photoshop, I'm also thinking about giving it some limited animation-- but like the cards themselves in the mail, this might take some time to arrive~

[Leave a comment/message if want to get on the mailing list :]

Merry Christmas and Sweet Soltice everyone!

ck

The Ink Raven

Lightboxes: They make everything more epic~

Don't Graphite, Just Ink About It

This story was my first mini-comic that serves as a intro to a longer 4 part story I'm working on. There is Norse mythology influence in this particular tale and is meant to ask questions about self fullfilling prophecies, the origin of folklore, and the power of belief. Yep, all that in 5 pages~

My first stab at making a mini comic came from much inspiration from the folks at Art & Story.

Much thanks for advice about materials from Mark Rudolph (whose "Echoes from Astroid X" I was using as a quality barometer). I planned to screenprint the band that wraps the mini that lines up with the image, but time constraints forced the monastic discipline of hand painting them in time for the Alternative Press Expo (APE).

[EDIT: for the Long Beach Comic Con, the bands were indeed screen printed!! For a process series, see the link at the bottom of this post]

And now, a story from colder skies:

"Where once there were three

two would remain

bound to the old keeper

of fury and spear.

Flown high from the Tree

to know a dire fate

born to escape

and chase a tale,

a new post--

a ghost. "

-old poem

....

All Part of the Process

In an effort to not overcrowd this blog space (and maybe hide my hodgepodge comics-making process~) I put the "making of" pictures for this minicomic on my Flickr. I thought I'd share this after one person at the Long Beach Con recognized that the band was indeed screened, not just colored paper-- the awesome n' talented Dustin Nguyen! I scored a beautiful sketchbook of his full of amazing watercolors and some of my favorite characters.

The inch strips were actually leftovers from the 11 x 17" single sheet trimmed to make the mini size divide evenly into 8 parts. They wrapped around perfectly, and some part of me wanted to feel like I was honorably using 'every part of the animal' which is paper.

Only some of these minis included a bonus "poster" on the reverse side, a collage of raven sketches I did leading up to writing the story. I think the process pictures can clarify the construction~

Here's a preview for those interested--

If you want more, just jaunt on over HERE!

Back to Triple-two

I will be having another show at this cool little clothing store in Huntington Beach, 222 Clothing. I'm excited to showcase my comic art specifically for this one. I'll have original pages and some new work on display with ole pal Digitalcasm debuting some new songs.

This happens with the monthly Huntington Beach Art Walk. Directions here!

[EDIT: I forgot to note a fun factoid: The 222 Store specializes in Scandinavian and Nordic Indie Brands of clothing-- a perfect perch for a Raven~]

Convention Peeks

" Hey watch where you're goin'! "

Pictures from APE

Before going into the above image, I must say, I had a stellar time at the Alternative Press Expo-- even with the rainy Sunday! I just wish I had more opportunities to browse the other tables and pick up some indie comic gems. It was good to see Javier Hernandez and meet some of the other Cartoonistas there. Also 1/3 of the Art & Story hosting team, Kevin Cross was in attendance. Though far up North, I also met near home local artists like Kevin Woody, who had a small anthology of his work with some diverse stylings I really enjoyed.

I also got a couple of Jim Lujan's Ghettomation DVDs. A great collection, the interview "Conversatio," especially had me in stiches~

Our booth with the fierce and formidable Ralph Miranda ("Man Fighting Street")

Raul Aguirre Jr. ("Man vs. Art") on my right and Kevin Cross ("Art & Story") on my other right.

Kevin Woody sports a fancy 'stache along with similarly themed fun comic ("Between Mars").

[The banner and title totally piqued my interest]

Rule #135: It's not really a Con unless you have last minute projects to finish

Pics from LBCC

Conventions only we apart! Pardon for the backlog but the times have been eventful~

To see more of these pics from Long Beach Comic Con, find my illustration page on Facebook or see some selections on my Flickr.

Each of these events seems to have a different appeal and it's always great to meet diverse crowds at these conventions. The "Soviet Space Simian" screenprints which got no love at APE (ironically~) were very popular at LBCC and are now sold out! I'll likely be trying my hand at more screen printing techniques in new work too. I'll be putting up some pics from my haphazard process in another post.

Our table setup featured the "INFECTED" Anthology,

prints, "Man Fighting Street", and an assortment of mini-comics

McFly! Caught gliding around the convention floor

When pint-size cuteness collides...

Frankie wants a hug!

Goofing around among greats: Dean Yeagle and Amanda Connor

The Sunday of the convention fell on Halloween, so there was an even larger surge of costumed characters-- many creators taking part too.

It was a great pleasure to meet the amazing cover artist for our "Infected" book, Dean Yeagle and one of my favorite comic artists out there, Amanda Connor (in full skunk regalia!).

Fun with Fotoshop

Part of the fun of the Con is getting to see some of the great costumes folks put together. I ran into a detachment from the 501st Stormtrooper Legion while waiting for my morning coffee...

The Imperials occupation of Seattle's Best

I got one of them to humor me this shot:

Which resulted in:

(Bluescreens not included)

...and just because I can:

:]

'(Near-mint'/ 'Fair' condition)

Night of the Life Zombies

Whoop... got your nose!

Staying in the Halloween-ish theme, here are some sketches from last Thursday's Zombie life drawing session at The Catalyst art space. They did a good job with make-up and got some folks to play victims too. I'm usually not much of a gore fan... but it would be an interesting exercise to employ some anatomy memory and draw exposed muscles and such too. eh.

Wish I knew about this impromptu session earlier-- I know a few aficionados of the zombie craze.

Drawing on toned paper's something I haven't done much of but I'm getting to appreciate it a bit more. White-out helps a bunch to make it kick... or bite.

Great expressions from the model and "victim"

Fun with watercolor travel kit and my new parallel pen. Great way to make thin lines and fill in blacks quick.

The guy w/ dapper 'stache dreaming about r2 wasn't there, just needed to fill sketchbook space~