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Review: ‘Drawing Words and Writing Pictures’ by Jessica Abel and Matt Madden

drawingwords420-1404654If you pay much attention to news about comic books, you know that the industry is seeing a boost in popularity that’s translated into comics becoming an accepted field of study at venerated institutions like Stanford and elsewhere.

As comics make the transition into classrooms it only makes sense that a formal textbook would soon follow. Fittingly enough, it’s a pair of comics creators and instructors — Jessica Abel and Matt Madden, who are also married — that created the first textbook, Drawing Words and Writing Pictures (First Second, $29.95).

The 280 pages of advice on creating your own comic is largely an introduction to comics newcomers, with explainers on basic concepts and terms. From there it progresses into fundamental skills, from page layouts to creating characters to creating finished quality art.

There’s a world of information the book never gets to, but then it’s essentially a course book for Comics 101. It does have tons of references to more advanced learning materials, though, which comes in handy.

While the book is designed to be used in the classroom, Abel and Madden have crafted it so that anyone getting into comics can gain a lot from it. Just on my own, I had a lot of fun going through their exercises and picked up more than a few new tricks. It’s also very well designed and exceptionally visual-friendly.

I wouldn’t call Drawing Words the Holy Grail of comics, but it’s an excellent place to start, a great primer on a terribly complex medium.

Van Jensen is a former crime reporter turned comic book journalist. Every Wednesday, he braves Atlanta traffic to visit Oxford Comics, where he reads a whole mess of books for his weekly reviews. Van’s blog can be found at graphicfiction.wordpress.com.

Publishers who would like their books to be reviewed at ComicMix should contact ComicMix through the usual channels or email Van Jensen directly at van (dot) jensen (at) gmail (dot) com.

ComicMix Radio: Marvel Trumps With Another King

While the second run of Dark Tower is coming to a close, Marvel has another Stephen King project in the wings — one that will please his fans new and old, plus:

— The Scarecrow moves to Heroes

— Magic: The Gathering gets a big makeover

— Another great week of new comics and DVDs, including Secret Invasion and the debut of DC’s Trinity

M-O-O-N spells “Press the Button!”

 

 

And remember, you can always subscribe to ComicMix Radio podcasts via badgeitunes61x15dark-3500375 or RSS!

 

Happy Birthday: Shrinking Violet

Salu Digby was born in the 30th century—though she was born on Earth, her parents are actually from the planet Imsk.

Like all her people, Salu had the power to shrink herself to microscopic size. As a teenager she heard about the Legion of Super-Heroes and decided to seek them out. She applied for membership and was initially rejected but applied again and was accepted, adopting the name Shrinking Violet.

The name is only partially due to her powers—Salu was one of the quieter, shyer members of the Legion. She is a stalwart heroine, however, and has been one of the Legion’s most steadfast members.

Over the years, she grew in confidence, particularly after begin kidnapped and held captive by Imskian freedom fighters. After that incident, Salu became considerably more aggressive and more outgoing. She also became one of the Legion’s most skilled hand-to-hand combatants.

Tokyopop Forms New Media Spin-Off, Halves Publishing

Leading North American manga publisher Tokyopop announced today that it will be creating a new company, Tokyopop Media LLC, to manage its comics-to-film and digital media projects, while also cutting production in its print department by nearly 50 percent.

According to iCv2:

Publishing production will be reduced by roughly 50% through the rest of the year, reducing output to roughly 200-225 titles per year from a planned total of over 500 titles.  Tokyopop CEO and Chief Creative Officer of the Tokyopop Group, Stuart Levy, explained the reasons for the reduction in output.  “The time is now for us to focus our publishing business to overcome current market challenges.  Few releases will allow for less cannibalization at retail.” 

The company is reducing its workforce by 39 positions in connection with the changes.  "We must adjust our overhead to properly execute this new business plan," Levy said.  "We are doing it with a heavy heart," he continued.  "It involves saying goodbye to 39 of the most talented, creative and compassionate people I’ve ever known."

Regular readers of Publishers Weekly comics blog The Beat were privy to some recent foreshadowing of the move, courtesy of Heidi MacDonald, but the official announcement provides a lot of food for thought regarding the state of the industry.

Tokyopop has also come under a significant amount of fire recently regarding its Pilot Program contracts, which you can also read about at length over at The Beat.

Hard times, indeed.

 

Interview: Scott Allie on Pitching Comics, MySpace and the Digital Medium

  • Uncategorized
  • June 3, 2008

betterdays3cover-1512216Previously on ComicMix, I spoke with Dark Horse Comics’ Editor Scott Allie about a variety of subjects including Buffy: Season Eight, current and future Serenity spin-offs, how he deals with reactions from fans and other tidbits about the Joss Whedon universe. Recently, I got the chance to speak with Allie again.

For this interview, we tackled a bunch of new topics, revisited some old ones, and spoke at-length about Dark Horse’s upcoming online plans, his thoughts on the future of comics and what he looks for in artists and writers.

COMICMIX: Scott, thanks for talking with me again. The last time we spoke was during New York Comic Con. Since we’re in convention season now with more of them looming, can you tell me how a convention like New York Comic Con and some of the others compare to something like San Diego’s Comic-Con International for a publisher like Dark Horse?

SCOTT ALLIE: New York is second only to San Diego. The big difference with the New York show is that it’s more about comics for now. The San Diego show has become so much about anything but comics. Movies, videogames, actresses, whatever. With New York, even when you’re talking about a licensed property, the focus remains on the comic.

Sure, there’s videogames and all that other stuff in New York, but it really feels like a comics convention, and the San Diego Comic-Con just doesn’t. San Diego’s a great place to talk about the biggest things, like Buffy: Season Eight, but smaller stuff just gets lost in the shuffle.

Whereas in New York, you can engage directly with readers about all of what we do. And we do a wide range of material. New York is a good show for that.

CMix: I was surprised that you guys were accepting submissions in New York?

SA: Yeah, we weren’t really doing that.

CMix: It was in the program, though.

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White Viper: It All Begins Today!

Today on ComicMix, the legendary art team of Dick Giordano and Frank McLaughlin begin a new series, White Viper, with scripts by Erin Holroyd.  A mother abandons two bundles in the snow.  A rapacious gang of bandits is following her.  They find one.  What happens to the other?

Credits: Erin Holyrod (Writer), Frank McLaughlin (Inker), Dick Giordano (Penciller), Lovern Kindzierski (Colorist), Mike Gold (Editor)

More: White Viper

 

Was ‘Doctor Who’ Right About Time?

I’m not going to even pretend to understand 80 percent of the Scientific American article I was recently sent with the title "Does Time Run Backward in Other Universes?" The 20 percent I can make sense of, however, seems to fall right in line with the subject line that accompanied it: "Maybe Doctor Who Was Right"

To the best of my summation, the article describes physicists’ investigation of the potential "timey-wimey, wibbly-wobbly" nature of the fourth dimension, and the likelihood that time might not always be a one-way street. Of course, this is all old hat to fans of the relaunched BBC science-fiction series Doctor Who, who were told something similar by The Doctor in last season’s award-winning (and terrifying) episode titled "Blink."

According to SciAm:

If the observable universe were all that existed, it would be nearly impossible to account for the arrow of time in a natural way. But if the universe around us is a tiny piece of a much larger picture, new possibilities present themselves. We can conceive of our bit of universe as just one piece of the puzzle, part of the tendency of the larger system to increase its entropy without limit in the very far past and the very far future. To paraphrase physicist Edward Tryon, the big bang is easier to understand if it is not the beginning of everything but just one of those things that happens from time to time.

While I’m always interested in the ways life (or science, in this case) matches up with my favorite television series, I’m not so keen on the idea of stone statues attacking me whenever I turn my back (the other element of "Blink" worth noting). Even if you’re not a fan of Doctor Who, the SciAm article provides science-fiction fans some food for thought… and who knows, it might be just the impetus you need to brush up on your theoretical physics.

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Battlestar Galactica Interview: Mark Verheiden on Adama’s Motives and Cylon Babies

Welcome to the latest installment of Battlestar Galactica Weekly, our recurring Q&A with Mark Verheiden, co-executive producer of the hit Sci-Fi Channel series Battlestar Galactica. Each week, we’ll interview Verheiden about the events of the week’s episode, what those events might mean for both the season and the series, and hopefully unearth some clues about what to expect as the final season of Battlestar Galactica nears its conclusion.

Along with posing our own questions to Verheiden, we’re also taking questions from fans — so be sure to send your questions to me, your official BSG Weekly interviewer, after each episode airs at chris [at] comicmix dot com. New episodes of Battlestar Galactica can be seen every Friday at 10 PM EST on Sci-Fi Channel. You can read previous interviews via our BSG Weekly Archive or the links at the end of this article.

After a week off, this week Verheiden answers questions about Episode #8 of Season Four, “Sine Qua Non,” which aired May 30, 2008. Note: These answers may contain spoilers, so read at your own risk.

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First, before we get to the questions, here’s a personal message from Mark about the recent fire that destroyed a large part of the Universal Studios backlot.

Readers may have seen the news story about the big fire at NBC/Universal Studios over the weekend.  The fire was actually across the lot from the Galactica offices, and we’re all grateful for that.  But we’re even more grateful to the police and firefighters who did such a heroic job putting down the blaze. So say we all!

And now, on with the questions.

COMIC MIX (from reader Tom): Where did Jake the dog come from? What happened to his previous owners?

MARK VERHEIDEN: Jake was obviously rescued from New Caprica.  As far as his previous owners, truth is we never really discussed Jake’s ownership lineage.  Because I don’t want to believe Lee would steal the pooch from someone (uh oh, I smell a Boxey story!), I assume the dog was being housed somewhere in the fleet sans real owners.

CMix (from reader Trish): Who killed Romo’s cat and why was he carrying around the dead cat for weeks? He never seemed that crazy before. Or was he?

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Indiana Jones and the Godless Commies, by Dennis O’Neil

Now we know. That Indiana Jones still swings a mean whip.

I liked the new Indy flick better than the critics I read, all of whom said something like, well, okay, it was all right but not up to the earlier entries in the series. Which makes me wonder: what would they have thought if this had been the first Indy flick, instead of the fourth. It’s like those clichés in Hamlet – they weren’t clichés to the greasy-chinned groundlings at the first (or fourteenth, or eighty-third) performance of Shakespeare’s story of a screwed-up kid with severe mama issues. Way back in 1981, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, and a platoon of talented collaborators took elements from Saturday afternoon serials, silent comedies and maybe a few other sources and combined them in the right proportions to create entertainment that was not only right for the time, but provided a template for a lot of entertainment that followed.

Was the fourth as good as the first (or second, or third?)? That’s me, scratching my head and muttering, I dunno…And, frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.

Years and years ago, a brilliant science fiction writer told me that Goethe’s criterion for judging art was found in two questions. To wit: What was the artist trying to do and did he succeed in doing it? I’ve never found a good reason to argue with Herr Goethe and by his criteria; Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is a success. We entered the multiplex hoping to be amused, hoping to forget Bush’s ongoing follies and the Democrat’s internecine dogfights and – voila! We were amused and we, temporarily, forgot. Value received. Money well spent.

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Review: ‘The New York Four’ by Brian Wood and Ryan Kelly

ny4-5124195[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the third in a series of reviews of the five books coming out from DC’s Minx imprint this year. Previously, Van Jensen reviewed Rebecca Donner’s Burnout and Cecil Castellucci’s Janes in Love. -RM]

Brian Wood is a very good writer. Ryan Kelly is a very good artist.  That makes the failure of the duo’s new book from Minx, The New York Four ($9.99) all the more disappointing.

Wood, who has shown a masterful understanding of NYC in his series [[[DMZ]]], shifts his focus here to NYU and a quartet of freshmen, each with their quota of baggage. At the center is Riley, who had a sheltered childhood and finally experiences some freedom.

Not a bad premise, but Wood doesn’t really do much with it. The girls sort of bounce off each other in one low-key scene after another, and their problems are never substantial or interesting enough to invest in the plot.

The characters come alive (one triumph of the talented creators), but even they seem underwhelmed by the mundanity of their lives.

There’s also an air of forced hip-ness to the book, which tosses in little elements like character bio-boxes, New York factoids and half-baked Real World-style confessional moments. And the lesson, as always, is that you can’t fake the funk.

Van Jensen is a former crime reporter turned comic book journalist. Every Wednesday, he braves Atlanta traffic to visit Oxford Comics, where he reads a whole mess of books for his weekly reviews. Van’s blog can be found at graphicfiction.wordpress.com.

Publishers who would like their books to be reviewed at ComicMix should contact ComicMix through the usual channels or email Van Jensen directly at van (dot) jensen (at) gmail (dot) com.

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