Tagged: art

Jeph Loeb Talks Ultimates 3.2

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  • January 22, 2008

With the second issue of Ultimates 3 set to hit shelves this week, series writer Jeph Loeb spoke with ComicBookResources about what’s to come for  Marvel’s modern-day Avengers and provided a peek at some of the interior art for the issue.

According to the preview art, the tragic events of the second volume of Ultimates might have taken their toll on the psyche of the superteam’s sharpshooter, much to the frustration of Spider-Man.

“I wouldn’t put anything past Hawkeye at this point,” Loeb remarked. “As a far better writer than I once put it, ‘A man without Hope is a Man without Fear!’”

 

 

Crash Course on Marvel’s Next-Gen Heroes

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  • January 19, 2008

Over at Marvel.com, the second-tier heroes are getting a first-class treatment with "The Future Is Now," a five-week series aimed at reacquainting readers with superteams like The Runaways and The Initiative. The first part of the series, posted Thursday, focused on the Joss Whedon-penned Runaways, and featured some interior art by Michael Ryan.

Although the on-the-run cast of teens usually remains below the radar, series writer/co-creator Brian K. Vaughan dropped a startling reveal in the "True Believers" arc that kicked off the second volume of RUNAWAYS: roughly 20 years into the future, team member Gertrude Yorkes will lead the Avengers!

 

Brian K. Vaughan Discusses Acme Novelty Library Cameo

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  • January 18, 2008

Over at The Beat, Heidi MacDonald points us to a recent entry in Brian K. Vaughan’s blog in which the writer explains his cameo (playing himself) in Chris Ware’s Acme Novelty Library 18. Vaughan explains that the appearance wasn’t the result of any friendly arrangement, but rather a contest that he had entered and won. The Lost scribe goes on to explain that he hopes his appearance won’t bring down the overall quality of the project.

"Thankfully, it’s a small moment, but an unbelievably huge honor for this fanboy. I won’t tell you how and when I show up–not that you should be purchasing this modern classic to play Where’s Waldo? with my slaphead–but I will say that, even though I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting the author, the line of dialogue he gave me perfectly captures the way I haplessly fumble to articulate my feelings about true art, which is exactly how I feel whenever I try to describe my love for Acme Novelty Library."

Comic Strips Tell the Stories of Sex Workers

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  • January 18, 2008

A recent post on BoingBoing regarding comics based on the lives of sex workers has led to an interesting interview with Peter S. Conrad, a writer and artist whose latest project involves turning sex workers’ stories into comic strips. The interview, along with the four-page strip titled "Going Back" can be found at The Reverse Cowgirl.

RC: How did you create the artwork for the stories?

PSC: As much as possible, I don’t want to be in the way of the story. I print out the words typed by the person who told the story and use a pencil to make marks where I think page divisions will go. Sometimes I have to make a lot of cuts, or sometimes I replace a bunch of words with a picture that gets the idea across, so I know I am having an effect on the story, but I use as much as I can verbatim. My goal is to be invisible, because it’s not really my story to tell.

Keep in mind, the art and story are both of the NSFW variety, as they contain adult material.

The Museum Vaults Review

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  • January 17, 2008

The Museum Vaults is the second of four graphic novels created through an unlikely publishing partnership: noted American art-comics publisher NBM and France’s cultural powerhouse museum the Louvre. All four of the stories will be about the Louvre in some way; the first book, Nicholas De Crecy’s Glacial Period, was published early in 2007.

Museum Vaults’ author, Marc-Antoine Mathieu, has been a prolific French cartoonist for the past twenty years, though very little of his work has turned up on this side of the Atlantic. (I’ll admit I didn’t previously know his work myself.)

As Museum Vaults opens, a young expert, Monsieur Volumer, arrives at a museum whose original name has been forgotten. His job is to delve into the subbasements beneath this museum to study, evaluate, and index the collections – to fully understand the museum. (more…)

Paris Review

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  • January 14, 2008

Paris collects a four-issue mini-series set in that city in the early ‘50s, written by Andi Watson and illustrated by Simon Gane. Watson is fairly well-known these days as the writer-artist of such relationship-oriented comics as Slow News Day and Love Fights, but I haven’t heard of Gane before. (From a quick perusal of his blog I think that’s because he’s mostly worked in the UK and for music magazines.) Gane has a very ornate, ornamented, even rococo style, which is a good artistic choice for a historical comic – it clearly distances the action, and keeps it from feeling contemporary.

The story of Paris is pretty straightforward, and focuses on two young women from elsewhere living in that city. Juliet is an American, studying at the Academie de Stael by day and painting society portraits by night to pay her rent. Deborah is an English aristocrat chaperoned by her hideous aunt Miss Chapman. (more…)

Out of Picture, Vol. 1 Review

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  • December 31, 2007

The animators of Blue Sky Studios were finishing up their work on the movie Robots in late 2004 when a group of them decided that was the perfect time to do a collection of more personal stories. (A similar impulse is behind the Flight series of anthologies, to which more miscellaneous animators, illustrators, and cartoonists have contributed.) The first edition of Out of Picture – published in hardcover by a French house – debuted at 2006’s MoCCA show, and was a surprise hit there. Now, Villard has brought out an expanded edition of Out of Picture in paperback, with the promise of a second volume to follow next year.

I do first have to admit that the art is absolutely stunning – the different artists are varied in their approaches, but all are successful in creating their own worlds. On the other hand, Out of Picture is reminiscent of Robots (and other Blue Sky productions, such as Ice Age) – the visuals are amazing, showing deep thought and amazing skill, but the stories those visuals tell are much less original or special.

For example, Nash Dunnigan’s “Night School” uses a dark, chiaroscuro palette and well-chosen camera angles to tell a somewhat clichéd, “If This Goes On” style story about religious domination in the mid-21st century. And David Gordon’s “The Wedding Present” is visually stunning, with a great sense of design and the audacity to make his terrorist characters into brightly-colored funny animals. But the story, again, doesn’t really go anywhere. (more…)

The Art of Bryan Talbot Review

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  • December 27, 2007

There are plenty of comics writers and artists (and combinations thereof) who have never been fashionable, but who do good, interesting work, and even dive in and out of “mainstream” comics as they go. I’m thinking about people like P. Craig Russell, Eddie Campbell, and – most to the point right now – Bryan Talbot. They mostly keep control of their own work, so they never end up as fan favorites for their run on Ultra Punching Dude, but, as consolation, they do get to do their stories their way.

The Art of Bryan Talbot is a 96-page album-sized softcover, with text by Talbot and a short introduction by Neil Gaiman, which traces Talbot’s varied career. After the requisite page of juvenilia, the book moves into Talbot’s first published comics, the “Chester P. Hackenbush” stories in his Brainstorm comic of the mid-‘70s. It all looks very late-underground; interesting but clearly at the far, tired end of a movement.

After that, Talbot’s career goes all over the place, with stints on “Judge Dredd” and “Nemesis the Warlock” for 2000 AD, a pile of art about the singer Adam Ant, some random minor comics projects, and posters/pin-ups on musical and SFnal themes. Talbot refers to himself as a “jobbing illustrator” at one point, and that describes his work in this section. It’s all technically well done, and the pieces are generally excellent for what they are, but they’re extremely various. (Also around this part of the book is a longish section of life drawings Talbot did for a class in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. Pencil life drawings are great for an artist’s development, but can be slightly less compelling in the middle of a book of ink and color comics art. They really don’t seem to mesh with the other pieces of art surrounding them.) (more…)

An Editor’s Night Before Christmas, by Mike Gold

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  • December 24, 2007

 ‘Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house

Deadlines were mounting, so I emailed Herr Claus

The scripts were all posted on the Internet with care

In hopes that the editing elves would soon be there

The artists were nestled, all snug in their beds,

While visions of royalty checks danced in their heads.

(more…)

Harry Potter goes to South Park

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  • December 19, 2007

harry_potter___south_park_by_sam_x_frank-1225224Deviant Art, a website devoted to the “art and skin community” (i.e. tattoos and other cool stuff) has a post today that combines two of 2007’s most popular fictional locations. Posted by Sam, who seems to be something of a Potterphile (including his favorite Wii game), it contains 45 of J. K. Rowling’s finest.

“This is basically a thing I started when I was bored and it developed, and developed…” says Sam, in case you couldn’t tell.

Besides South Park and Potter, Sam’s a fan of My Chemical Romance, which may be the new geek trifecta.

 

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