Southpawian Fury

Happy Xmas + Holidays + Etc.!

2011-12-30T23:01:00.007-05:00

It's been ages since my last blog post (as usual), so I figured I'd better get one in here before 2012 is upon us! (Plus I'm sick at the moment, and I figure I can't feel any worse sitting here in front of my laptop getting this update done...)

Above is the holiday greeting we used as a voting incentive pinup for Blue Milk Special this year as Vader and TK8008 enjoy themselves with a bit of holiday cheer. Hope everyone had a nice holiday!

Since I haven't posted in a while, here are some updates: Power-Con in Los Angeles back in September was awesome-- I had a great time and met up with so many friends I hadn't seen in years. Definitely one of the highlights of the year for me. My auction piece was bought up by pal Jon Kallis, who I'm sure will put it to good use... if he knows what's good for him. XD

While at Power-Con I was interviewed by MTV Geek. You can watch both clips (if you DARE) in which I talk about my work on He-Man and the Masters of the Universe and Blue Milk Special.

Part One:

Part Two:

Apart from that, Rod and I also had a great time at the Virginia Comicon in Richmond, VA in October. It's always great to meet up with friends and fans, and the VA show was no exception. Extra thanks to Matt, Suzanne and Charlie Wieringo for being such great hosts! Love you guys.

Apart from all that, work continues on BMS, though we had serious doubts as to whether or not things would keep going as they are. At the beginning of this month we had a scare with Rod's health issues (for which he's having surgery in January), and having to read nitpicky comments from readers knocking us for trivial things right in the middle of all this real life drama just didn't mix well. We questioned whether it was worth dealing with keeping BMS going at all. But in the end we had a really great response from readers (we were both totally overwhelmed by the support), that we decided to keep going, at least for now. But in order to do this, give Rod time to heal and have time to work on our own projects, we're cutting back to one strip a week beginning in 2012. But fear not, we'll still be around (I think Biggs might kill us if we weren't).

Other than that, work is progressing on a manga webcomic project that Rod and I have been planning for ages (more on that in a future update when we have more to show), I got a bloody fantastic boxed set of Rammstein's music videos and making ofs that we just finished (I did not think it was possible to love this band more than I did before, yet I was WRONG), we discovered the Japanese Sentai series Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger (which I love and am obsessed with and can't say enough good things about and when it ends I will cry), and we're still continuing with our Doctor Who watching. We've made it up to the end of the 6th Doctor's first season, which has been... interesting (and not in a good way). These last few seasons have been quite the ride. But we're in it for the long haul, behind the scenes drama and all. (I'm going to eat popcorn when we watch the documentary that deals with Colin Baker's firing, though. I'm not kidding.)

So... with that finished, here's to a much better year for everyone. Bring on 2012!

Power-Con!

2011-09-22T22:48:00.009-04:00

In just a few hours I'll be on a plane bound for Los Angeles, CA where I will be a guest at the first ever Power-Con/ThunderCon, a convention devoted solely to Masters of the Universe and ThunderCats.

There is a really large and impressive guest list, and I'm looking forward to seeing a bunch of friends I haven't seen in years.

There will also be a charity auction at the show, with proceeds going towards the Children Affected by AIDS Foundation. For more information on how you can bid on a piece of art (regardless of whether or not you'll be attending the con yourself), go here.

The inked piece I donated for the art auction (pictured above) measures 11" x 17" and features Stratos, Teela, He-Man, Man-At-Arms and Skeletor. I thought someone reading this blog might find it interesting to see my process as I worked, so I figured I'd leave everyone with that before I head out for my long weekend in L.A.

I've started working digitally a lot lately, so I thought it might be fun to do all of my thumbnail and roughs in Manga Studio (my drawing program of choice), so this was basically my first stage-- roughing out ideas:

Once I'd decided on this composition, I set to work fleshing it all out. I actually used several layers to get this rough piece. One was mostly for anatomy, another for adding costumes/armor, and another where I roughly laid in areas I wanted to be shadowed when I inked the final piece.

I then printed out my rough and used my light table to do the final inks by hand.

Then I spent several hours coloring the piece in Photoshop. While the black and white original inks will be auctioned off, I will have this colored version for sale at my table as prints. So if you're interested, swing on by!

And with that, I'm off to finish packing up the last of my things. See you in CA!

Bmore and VA Con Followups

2011-09-21T15:45:00.017-04:00

I've been horribly behind at getting updates to the blog about the shows we've been to lately, so I thought I'd throw up a quick post with some sketches and photos and all that good stuff.

Rod and I attended the Baltimore Comic Con a few weeks back, and it was our first real show of the year. Kind of strange getting back into the swing of things, but we found our footing pretty quickly once we hit the show floor. I always love meeting and talking with people who enjoy the work we do, whether it's Blue Milk Special or some of the comic work we've done for other projects. That's always one of the highlights of the shows for me. And it's also really cool seeing some of those same faces or people we'd only just met at a previous show, but dug our work enough to come back and talk to us again. It always makes it worthwhile.

(Our table also happened to be next to the signing area where Stan Lee was camped out off and on throughout the weekend. He walked past our table a couple times, which was pretty freakin' sweet. It's one thing to read about Stan or watch him in movies and such, but seeing him in person is like tahiepaheioaghepoiahgoebngoeiahgeo29ruaeagr. Just sayin'.)

The other upside to being at these shows is seeing all of our artist/creator friends again. Always awesome catching up and hanging out with our pals! Todd Dezago, Craig Rousseau, Matt and Suzanne Wieringo, Kelly Yates, Rich Woodall, Bryan and Judy Glass, and others I've forgotten (but are no less awesome). And my buddy Jon Kallis was again on hand to help us out at our table-- he is always a huge help!

I sold out of my remaining sketchbooks, we sold a ton of prints and I did a slew of commissions (and finally got my first Harry Potter commish, which was refreshing)! Here are some examples of the commissions for the Baltimore show...

Guy Gardner:

Karl (from Perhapanauts) and Stratos (from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe). Probably my favorite commission of the show:

Han and Luke:

Remus Lupin and Sirius Black:

Vader sketch card:

Endor Rebel Trooper:

Vision:

Vegeta:

Slave Leia:

We didn't have much time to catch our breath before heading to the one-day Virginia Comicon the first weekend of September. This was our first time attending this show, and we had a lot of fun. Definitely a smaller show than Baltimore, but it was nice seeing some of our regular readers and especially hanging with the always awesome Matt and Suzanne Wieringo.

Also, I finally got to meet Charlie! I think we are best buds now. I was reading one of Matt's comic scripts and he kept me company while everyone else was downstairs:

Yep. BFFs.

I did a few commissions at this show, too, including a Cobra Commander and my first ever Star Wars vehicle commission of Slave-1:

I also drew this up, which Rod lovingly colored a few days later. It's our tribute to the new Star Wars Blu-Ray disc set:

And just like that, the VA show was over. We had a complete blast hanging out with Matt and Suzanne and dug the VA show so much that we'll be back for their Halloween show next month! More details on that soon.

Now I'm getting a few last minute things ready for Power-Con this weekend. Whew. But more on that tomorrow!

Baltimore 2011!

2011-08-17T12:39:00.002-04:00

It's that time again...

Time for one of my favorite cons, the Baltimore Comic Con!

Both Rod and myself will be at the Bmore show this weekend, August 20-21. If you can make it to the show, you'll find us in Artist Alley at table A175, located at the end of one of the rows facing the signing area (bottom right hand corner of the convention floor plan). As always, I will be doing commissions sketches and we'll be selling prints of all kinds, as well as giving away Blue Milk Special postcards and milk cartons. And we'll also have a BMS exclusive Baltimore print (if I can manage to finish it in time...).

You can click here to download a larger version of the convention center floor plan.

Baltimore Comic Con is semi-local for us and it’s a pretty large two-day show that keeps growing and getting better every year. It takes place at the The Baltimore Convention Center on Saturday and Sunday, August 20 & 21, 2011. Show hours are: Saturday 10-6, and Sunday 10-5. Stan Lee will be there!

Apart from that, still been chugging away on Blue Milk Special, which has recently gone through a site makeover, and working on putting the last issue of Rob Zombie's Whatever Happened to Baron Von Shock? comic series together. Also, thanks to my sister's rather ingenious birthday present of a sketch journal back in June, I've started doing daily sketches. I post all of them on my twitter account, but some of them also make their way onto Facebook. I'll add more every once in a while. They're all totally random and usually based on what I'm currently watching or reading or whatever. Check them out if you're into that sort of thing.

Oh, and if you haven't seen it yet, do yourself a favor and check out the new trailer for the big screen adaption of The Woman in Black. The British TV movie that came out in the late 1980s is still my favorite ghost movie of all time, and I'm pretty psyched by what I'm seeing so far with the Radcliffe version. F-ing sweet.

That's it from me. Hope to see some of you this weekend!

The Reign of Pertwee

2011-06-02T16:06:00.003-04:00

Jon Pertwee is a badass.

Just wanted to get that out of the way first.

As I mentioned in my last blog post, Rod and I have been going through the entire classic Doctor Who run, and now we're into the Third Doctor's last season. I decided when we started this journey that I was going to completely wipe out my list of favorite Doctors (I'd never seen much of William Hartnell's era, and certainly not enough to base an opinion on, so it wasn't a complete list anyway) and I'd decide as we watched each season how my new list of favorite Doctors would shake out.

I surprised myself by the time I got to the end of the Second Doctor's run by just how underwhelmed I was with him this time around, and pretty much knew that he'd end up slipping a few slots (previously he was my second favorite Doctor). Patrick Troughton seems to be a pretty popular Doctor with people nowadays, and I mean, he was way up there on my initial list, too. He's funny and quirky and likeable. But after going through his entire run (including reconstructions of missing episodes) I came to the conclusion that his popularity is probably due to the fact that a lot of his stories are, in fact, missing, including some pretty horrible ones. So most Who fans only get exposed to his better works, and they don't have to sift through the blandness of stories and companions and recycled storylines over and over.

Anyway, by the time we got into Jon Pertwee's era of Doctor Who, I was psyched. It was a breath of fresh air. One of the reasons the Third Doctor's run saved Doctor Who from cancellation back in the day is because the thing is so damned solid. There are very few stories that I'd call bad or bland, and the Third Doc also has the luxury of having an absolutely brilliant supporting cast in the way of U.N.I.T. (except for Mike Yates, who I have issues with), and some great companions. Oh, and having the the first (and best) incarnation of the Master, played by Roger Delgado, doesn't hurt either.

Also, Pertwee had that knack of kicking ass.

Indeed, this Doctor is a James Bond kind of Doctor. A guy who wears frilly shirts, capes and velvet coats and won't hesitate to kick your ass while doing so. Jon Pertwee brought a physicality and a love of adventure to Doctor Who, and suddenly the Doctor went from being a loveable, funny (and sometimes terrified) kind of Doctor, to someone more stern and authoritative (who could still crack jokes and poke fun with the best of them). His Venusian Akido could cut anyone down, and he could paralyze opponents with but a touch.

Pertwee's run is tons of fun to watch and you can tell the entire cast was having a blast. Great stuff, and I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to watch a really nice, solid run of classic Who.

So now my only dilemma as we near ever closer to the fantastic Tom Baker's era of Doctor Who is.... who comes ahead on my list of favorite Doctors? Hartnell or Pertwee? I really grew to love Hartnell's incarnation of the Doctor, and yet Pertwee is so badass and has such a solid run... Who will come out on top?

Ahh, decisions, decisions...

Anyway, whatever happens, I wanted to draw a Doctor Who piece featuring the Third Doctor ready to beat someone down, frilly shirt, cape and all. So there you have it.

And as a side note, I hope all of my pals heading to Heroes Con this weekend have a great time and a safe trip. Wish Rod and I could be joining in on the fun! But at least the Baltimore Comic Con looms ever closer. More info on what you can expect from us at the show will be forthcoming!

Elisabeth Sladen

2011-04-20T21:59:00.003-04:00

Elisabeth Sladen passed away on Tuesday morning, aged 63. She'd been battling cancer for some time, although as an intensely private person, it doesn't seem that anyone but her immediate family knew she was ill. Lis played the character of Sarah Jane Smith on the long-running sci-fi program Doctor Who (and would later return to the new Who series as well-- her reappearance on the show was so popular that it resulted in her own spin-off series, The Sarah Jane Adventures).

For many of us, Sarah Jane was OUR companion. THE companion. She was someone you instantly liked, wanted to root for and become friends with. As viewers we could relate to her, and we saw things through her eyes. She was one of the reasons I took to the series after my husband (who grew up with the show) introduced me to it after we met. In many ways, I suppose, when I think about our early relationship, the Doctor and Sarah will always be linked in there. I remember when I went to New Zealand to visit him and meet his family for the first time, we watched 'The Ark in Space', a 4th Doctor and Sarah adventure. I will always remember that.

It wasn't long before I was drawn into the Sarah Jane era of the program, which just about everyone considers to be Doctor Who's Golden Age. There is a reason for that. And much of it has to do with Sarah Jane Smith, plucky, independent journalist, who meets the Doctor, falls into joining him on his adventures and quickly becomes his "best friend."

Last year, Rod and I decided that we would rewatch the entire classic Who series, starting with William Hartnell in 1963 and working our way through to Sylvester McCoy and the end of the show in 1989. We just finished 'The Time Warrior' on Sunday night, Sarah Jane's very first story. We have been through 10 years' worth of episodes, three Doctors and 13 companions (many of whom I have enjoyed), and then here comes Sarah Jane, and she is such a huge breath of fresh air. She is a light. A refreshing, plucky light of a person who isn't afraid to tell anyone what she thinks (no matter what time period she may be in). This time round I was immediately struck by how well she played off of Jon Pertwee's 3rd Doctor, and it made me even more excited to get to Tom Baker's era because her chemistry with him is magic. MAGIC.

When the new Doctor Who series started and reinvented itself into something I wasn't taken with, it was still cool to see that Sarah Jane was still Sarah Jane. Elisabeth Sladen still played her as the same person. That same plucky, likeable character you wanted to root for. It was as if she hadn't aged a bit.

And so it was devastating to fans to hear that she had passed away, and so suddenly. I was absolutely gutted and didn't want to believe it, even as more and more sources began confirming it. I had always wanted to meet her one day, but now I will never get that chance. And now there are tribute pages and tribute art, stories from people who knew her, and even a link on the Sarah Jane Adventures website to help parents in comforting their children about Lis Sladen's passing. I love so, SO much that she had this resurgence of popularity late in her career, and that the character of Sarah Jane Smith could be introduced to new fans, and to children. How wonderful.

I cannot imagine how devastating Lis' passing must be to her friends and family. My heart aches for them. She left behind such a wonderful legacy.

There are many pieces of tribute art popping up online. And, after taking some time to process things and deal in my own way, I decided that I didn't want to do something sad. Sarah and the Doctor had a special relationship, and neither wanted to part. Sarah was there with the Doctor through it all because she wanted to be. I loved that when she did leave, it was out of necessity and was forced upon them, rather than having her written out of character and marrying someone she'd just met, or deciding she'd had enough of traveling. Doctor Who companions come and go, but Sarah Jane was special. And so was Lis Sladen.

So, I decided to draw a picture of one of the happier adventures the Doctor and Sarah may have had. Not sad, but looking to the future. Because Sarah Jane Smith will always live on.

Truly Outrageous

2011-03-03T22:07:00.005-05:00

Quick post today. This drawing is actually four years old. FOUR. And I only just colored it today. I have no excuse except that I simply forgot about it. I'm a bad person.

But I drew it sometime after Rod and I went back and re-watched the entire Jem and the Holograms cartoon series from start to finish. I used to watch it when I was younger and remember really liking it, but man, what a fun series. And brilliantly written, too. Great character depth, awesome villains, intelligent writing and great tunes. Can't ask for better than that.

Also, I threw Synergy in there front and center because she doesn't get enough love. So there.

TRON: Legacy

2011-01-29T23:29:00.005-05:00

Rod and I were almost certain we were going to miss seeing TRON: Legacy in theatres. With my hand surgery and the holidays and everything else, the time just sped by to the point that we thought we'd almost missed it. Last Friday Rod noticed that the theatre he passed every day on his way into work was no longer showing it, so we kind of panicked and drove out to one of the theatres around us still playing the thing, lest we miss it entirely.

We'd both been completely blown away by TRON's trailers and Daft Punk's amazing soundtrack, so this film was one of the few we'd really been looking forward to seeing. I am very anti-3D (I see it as nothing more than a pointless passing fad), but we figured if we were going to see a film in 3D it would be this one. And so, we did.

I read some mixed reviews (mostly knocking the story), but honestly, I freakin' LOVED this movie. I loved the soundtrack, the effects, the acting, and yes, the story. It wasn't hugely complex, but it was decent enough. Throw in a weirdly hot computer generated Clu (BONUS), and you have a movie that will entertain Leanne.

As for the 3D experience, I hated it. I thought it was pointless and took me out of the film at times. I'd never do it again. But I can't wait to get this film on DVD so I can watch it in proper 2D.

I did the above sketch while I was killing time today waiting to hear back on some Rob Zombie comic layouts. I loves me some Jeff Bridges. His modern day Kevin Flynn is like an uber cool Obi-Wan with badass powers. Can't go wrong with that!

Sovena and Hand Surgery

2011-01-19T21:08:00.006-05:00

Long time no see.

Part of the reason for that is not just because I've been slacking in updates and/or can't show some of the things I've been working on just yet, but also because last month I had surgery on one of my hands. I'd had severe pain for several years but figured it was nerve damage from an old softball injury and kept putting off having anything done about it. I finally decided enough was enough and went through several tests to figure out what was wrong. I was even at the point of wanting a permanent nerve block done so I would feel nothing in one of my fingers. It would have been better than putting up with constant pain. But all nerve tests came back negative, and the mystery deepened...

But one visit to a hand specialist was all it took to have someone describing my bizarre, painful symptoms back to me, and it was such a relief. Turns out I had a rare tumor in my finger-- something that apparently usually isn't diagnosed properly until someone's gone through around six doctors. So it was a definite shock, but also a relief to finally know that there was indeed something wrong and that it could be fixed.

I had surgery on my hand (the right one, thankfully-- I'm a lefty, remember) last month to remove the tumor, and it's taken me several weeks to recover. During that time I was banned from doing much of anything with the thing, especially typing, and it just was too hard and frustrating to even be in front of a computer knowing that I could only type one-handed (going from typing 85 words per minute to like 20 really, really sucks). So I went kind of AWOL for a bit for my own sanity. Thankfully yesterday my doctor gave me the okay to start using my hand more, so typing this blog post is kind of physical therapy for my hand as much as it is anything else.

So. While I was recovering, I also took a break from drawing much at all, and have only just started easing back into it over the past few days. The drawing of Sovena Red above is a quick sketch that I decided to ink and color. Rod and I have exciting plans for Sovena and her adventures that we hope to unveil very soon. In the meantime, I hope to have some sketches and sneak peeks to post every so often. And you can now own the print version of Once Upon a Superhero-- featuring Sovena-- for only $3.99 HERE. Check it out!

As I get back into sketching, working on Once Upon a Superhero, drawing my last couple backup stories for Rob Zombie's Whatever Happened to Baron Von Shock? and gearing up for the Empire Strikes Back story arc for Blue Milk Special, I'm going to try and post a lot more. Sketches, random things, etc.

Thanks for sticking around. Here's to an exciting 2011!

Once Upon a Superhero

2010-10-21T22:38:00.006-04:00

I still need to create a blog entry to sum up my experiences at the New York Comic Con a couple weekends ago (short version is that we had an absolute blast and really enjoyed seeing so many readers and friends!), but I wanted to devote this blog post to Rod's new comic, Once Upon a Superhero.

He's had this in the works for a while, and had help with art in the awesome drawings of John Amor to make this a reality. This issue features pin-ups by greats like Mike Maihack and Robbi Rodriguez, and a new cover by myself with colors by the ever talented James Offredi.

It tells the story of Russian born superhero Sovena Red, who-- on her eleventh birthday in 1954-- mysteriously gained godlike super powers. Since that day, she has dedicated these amazing abilities to protecting the innocent and defending the world from all manner of super villainy. However, there was one small catch...

This issue is now available for digital download, with a printed version coming in November. Please help support the comic by checking it out and purchasing an issue-- you won't regret it!

BVS Backup

2010-09-15T21:59:00.007-04:00

Like I mentioned last post, here's some info about Rob Zombie's Whatever Happened to Baron Von Shock?, currently hitting comic shops through Image Comics. I've been working as an editor on this book for the past few months and it's been a ton of fun, as always. Rob's done a great job with the series and the characters he's created. I worked with Rob back in the MVCreations days when we were publishing Spookshow International, and I'm still finding myself impressed with the range of stories he comes up with-- anything from comedy to horror to more gritty, serious works. The guy does it all!

Baron Von Shock has turned out to be a very gritty, mature story sprinkled with the kind of comedy only Rob can deliver, and it's been a great pleasure to be a part of. But I was totally stoked when Rob asked if I would be willing to do some backup stories in BVS. I'd shown him some of the work I'd done on Casper and the Spectrals for Ardden Entertainment and he dug the style. So I worked up some quick sketches of the main characters in a more cartoony style and we were in business.

I'm working on my third backup story now, but I thought I'd post the lineart for my first tale here. BVS #3 hit comic stands today (or last week depending on your local comic shop's shipping schedules). Check it out!

Back from Bmore 2010!

2010-09-09T21:20:00.026-04:00

I know this post is horribly late and all I can say is... I guess I'm a bad person. But better late than never, right?

As my previous blog post states, Rod and I headed up to Baltimore a couple weekends back for the Baltimore Comic Con 2010. It's always been one of our favorite shows (the fact that it's local rocks pretty hard, too!) and love the friendly, creator/comics-focused atmosphere. That definitely didn't change this time out! It was a great show, and almost as soon as the doors opened I was flooded with commissions and people interested in Blue Milk Special. It was one of the best show days we've ever had, and it was awesome.

(It was also very cool to see so many people walking around wearing Orioles or Ravens gear-- go Baltimore teams!)

Ahem...

I drew a load of commissions, but what was especially awesome about this was that it's the first time I've ever been asked to do Blue Milk Special commissions! It was tons of fun, and I hope everyone enjoyed them as much as I enjoyed working on them.

Thanks to all of the BMS fans who came out to show support, especially our littlest fans below. Our prints and 'make your own BMS milk cartons' were a great hit, and we'll have more on hand for New York Comic Con in October!

Aside from the commissions, seeing fans and meeting new people, these conventions are great because I get to see my friends that I normally only see once or twice a year. This time out our good friend Jon Kallis was helping us with the table once again, and we had a table next to our friend from forever and ever, colorist extraordinare Val Staples.

We got to see the always awesome Bryan Glass and his lovely wife Judy, but definitely not long enough! We'll make up for this in NY (perhaps with a game of Dracula?). Mice Templar won another Harvey this year, which was completely deserved!

And we got to hang with our great pals Craig Rousseau, Rich Faber and Kelly Yates. Our table was next to (Doctor Who artist) Kelly's, so we got to hear a lot of Doctor Who talk throughout the convention. (Thankfully some of it was Classic Who talk.)

Here's a normal group shot...

But then Kelly had to try and steal the spotlight... again...!

These cons also give Rod and I a chance to hook back up with two of our favorite people, Matt and Suzanne Wieringo. Not enough Hammer talk this year, but we did get into a 'Woman in Black'/ghost stories discussion on the way back from dinner...

My sister Rachael stopped by on Sunday and we took that opportunity to finally walk around the show a bit with her. (We should have gotten that Don Rosa Uncle Scrooge print...)

Another pal we always love hooking up with (and he's still told the funniest story I've ever heard in my life) is Rich Woodall, who joined us for dinner on Saturday and also did a badass Zombie Sovena Red sketch for Rod!

I wasn't able to get a shot of pal Todd Dezago (who cut out like the Flash on Sunday) but it was great seeing him again, especially because I thought I wouldn't see him at all this year! Since we both worked on an issue of Casper and the Spectrals together recently, Todd was nice enough to buy me a big trade full of old Casper stories. Really awesome stuff. Thanks, Todd-- you're the bestest!

Here are some of the other commissions I worked on while at the show...

Best Green Lantern ever, Kyle Rayner:

Tim Drake in his old school Robin threads (that I miss very much):

Tim in his newer Robin costume:

Jubilee:

Spider-Woman:

And lastly, here are a couple of cool costumes. I'm pretty sure this is the same little guy who came to the show last year dressed in an awesome Impulse costume. This year he came as Kid Flash!

And this has to be the cutest Woody from Toy Story I've ever seen:

And that's all I got! If you made it this far, thanks for hanging in there.

Next post coming up soon... Whatever Happened to Baron Von Shock?

Baltimore 2010!

2010-08-26T21:32:00.006-04:00

It's that time again! Rod and I are heading out to our first convention of the year tomorrow, and it's one of my favorites. Baltimore (home of my beloved Orioles baseball) is just up the road from us, and it's always put on a great show. It seems like it's grown in size every year, and-- unlike other comic shows I could mention-- it is focused on comics and creators.

This year we decided to focus on Blue Milk Special, our Star Wars parody webcomic, so our table is BMS-themed. We'll be selling prints and handing out postcards, and I'll be doing commission sketches during the show. I also still have some 2009 sketchbooks left, so I'll be bringing those as well.

Even though I love going to these shows to meet new people and bask in the con atmosphere, I'm really looking forward to seeing my friends again. Rod and I will be set up at table A54 right next to Val Staples at table A53, and we'll be right across the aisle from Matt and Suzanne Wieringo, Todd Dezago and Craig Rousseau at booth 2306. And of course, our good pal Jon Kallis will be on hand helping us out once again. Can't wait!

Here is a floor plan of the convention center where you can find us.

Looking forward to seeing everyone this weekend! Stop by and say hey!

Baron Von Shock

2010-07-19T22:20:00.004-04:00

Been a while. But first, above is a quick digital sketch that I decided to color a few days ago. I've been completely immersed in World War II books, documentaries and memoirs for the past few months, and also had been recently following the World Cup (my teams were the U.S.A., New Zealand and Germany). So this cartoon popped into my head. It was a lot of fun to do and I really dug working in this particular rough style. I'm trying to do more digital sketching these days.

Anyway, seeing as though the subject of this post mentions Whatever Happened to Baron Von Shock?, the new Rob Zombie comic I'm editing, I figured I'd finally say that I'm currently drawing backup stories for this series, starting with issue #3. It's been a ton of fun to do and it's cool working with Rob as an artist and not just an editor for a change!

I'm working in an overly cartoony style for this one, kind of similar to my recent work on Casper and the Spectrals #3. It was fun cartoonizing Rob's characters and going to town on these scripts. And you might be seeing more of this sort of thing from me in the future...

Speaking of Casper, I've been getting a peek at the colors Kieran Oats did on my pencils for issue #3, and they look sweet! I can't wait to see this thing in print!

So, other than all of the above, Rod and I are gearing up for the Baltimore Comic Con next month where we hope to see all of our pals! We'll have a Blue Milk Special table this year, so be sure to check us out!

Moving on...

2010-06-13T01:17:00.004-04:00

Been a while since I last updated this blog, so I figured I'd get a post in to mention a few things before I reveal what I'm working on at the moment (which will be in a follow up post!).

Firstly, I finished up issue #3 of Casper and the Spectrals for Ardden Entertainment, which was a complete blast. I really had fun with it and ended up making it my own by the end of the issue... which I guess could be a good thing or a bad thing depending on how you look at it. But this issue gave me a chance to brush up on storytelling and layouts, and I really had a great time drawing Casper and the gang. Todd Dezago wrote a brilliant and fun script and I hope I managed to do it justice. Thanks for all the encouragement, Todd!

Secondly, Pulverized, the educational comic I finished work on a few months ago, is now available online for sale at Ka-Blam. Check it out!

Thirdly, I was really bummed to miss Heroes Con this year. I heard it was yet another great show, and Rod and I missed hooking up with our pals. Craig, Matt and Suzanne, Rich, Bryan and Judy, etc., etc. You guys know who you are. But, we are happy to say that we will definitely be at Baltimore Comic Con in August and the New York Comic Con in October. Can't wait!

Fourthly, I'm not in my 20s anymore. I celebrated my big 3-0 on Thursday, and it was a little depressing. But Rod made it special and got me a huge, custom-made cake with the Cool Whip-ish icing I love. He's the bestest! Only downside is that I've gorged myself on cake for the past three days. Double-edged sword, that one.

And finally, my cat Ban is awesome. Check him out showing off one of his tricks:

Casper!

2010-03-24T21:11:00.005-04:00

So since I'm allowed to say what I'm currently working on, here we are. I'm penciling issue #3 of Casper and the Spectrals, written by one of my favorite writers ever, Todd Dezago. (And yeah, Todd, I'm going to gush.)

Years ago when I was reading comics and drawing my own shabby ones on pieces of 8.5" x 11" typing paper I'd steal from my mom's printer, my absolute favorite writer/artist team was Todd Dezago and Mike Wieringo. Absolutely fantastic combination of great, fun storytelling and characters, and out-of-this-world art. That's what I wanted to do, I told myself.

I've come a long way since then, and it's thanks to guys like these that I'm where I am today.

So over the past couple years I've gotten to know Todd, and he's an awesome guy (and very, very nice and friendly, and approached me at a con when I was too shy to talk to him-- I will never live that down). I knew he'd been working on Ardden Entertainment's new Casper series, and I was psyched to read it because it looked like a lot of fun.

It's been great working on this project, and Todd's script has been fantastic. It's awesome to be drawing fun comics with great characters and working with a writer I've admired for years and years.

And I'm fortunate that J.M. DeMatteis and Brendan Deneen gave me great encouragement during this whole thing, and it only helps fuel my drive and enthusiasm for this project and comics in general.

Can't wait to see this thing colored and in stores!

Pulverized

2010-03-23T22:04:00.003-04:00

For the past few months I'd been working on an educational comic book for science students. This is something I've always wanted to do-- educate and get kids excited in school subjects though comics. Rod and I even discussed and had done preliminary sketches for an idea of our own a while back.

So when I was approached by science teacher Jim McCarter to create an original comic book for kids, I was psyched. Jim created a great, fun script and let me go to town on it. He gave me a great group of kids (based on some of his own students) to work with, and I ended up having a blast on the project.

This was also the first time I've done everything on a comic, art-wise -- pencils, inks and colors. It was a challenge and great fun.

Jim Calafiore graciously did a cover for us based on my designs (which in itself was a total thrill!), and Rod lettered the issue to finish things off.

Hopefully this will be out there for sale soon either at conventions and/or in schools!

Spoon!

2010-01-26T18:20:00.007-05:00

I guess I might as well post this now.

This is one of the sketches I did for the folks at New England Comics a few months back, along with some sample Tick pages. We met at the Baltimore Comic Con in October and they were interested in my work, and I was pretty stoked when we talked about possibly doing a new Tick story together.

But alas, it doesn't look like this particular story is going to pan out right now. I'm kind of bummed, but I thought I'd post this sketch anyway.

I actually have some other possible things coming up, which I will announce soon-ish...

Buh-Bye, Idol!

2010-01-11T23:14:00.004-05:00

Quick cartoon, because Simon deserves it after today.

Suck it, Idol! Bring on American X Factor! (Even Rod said he'd watch it with me!)

Hope everyone had a nice Christmas and New Years. We spent ours in New Zealand, 18 hours ahead of everyone on the East Coast of the U.S. And it was warm and sunny the entire time-- we went to the beach three times! Of course, as soon as we landed in D.C. the weather made us pay for it with 20-degree temps and crazy strong (and COLD) winds. Ahh, winter.

Here's to a great 2010!

Flash! Ahhhh...

2009-12-14T21:19:00.004-05:00

Just a quick post for today. I drew these two Flash Gordon pieces based on Ardden Entertainment's new comic series. They were looking for a new artist a while back, so I submitted a few things to show them.

I didn't end up getting the gig, but it was still fun. I need to do sketches like these more often.

This may be my last blog post before the holidays-- Rod and I are leaving for New Zealand on Friday to spend Christmas and New Years with his family. I'm really looking forward to it, because I haven't been back since 2003. I'm bringing my iPhone with me (thanks to a handy international data package via AT&T), so I'll be updating my Twitter and taking photos and such.

So if I don't get another chance to say it, Happy Holidays, everyone!

Zombie Weekend

2009-12-07T21:47:00.005-05:00

This past weekend was a really cool one for me-- first because Maryland got its first snowfall of winter, and also because I got to take a break from working on comic pages to go to Rob Zombie's show on Saturday night in Washington, DC.

I worked with Rob years ago back when I was with MVCreations and we were doing his Spookshow International comic series, which was tons of fun. Rob was always totally cool to work with and I was struck by how down to Earth he was. He has a great, wicked sense of humor that I love (and it always made my days pick up, especially when I was going through new scripts he'd turn in). And now I'm working with him again as the editor on his Whatever Happened to Baron Von Shock? comic (which will be coming next year from Image Comics!). Keep an eye out, because this series is proving to be just as hilarious as Spookshow was.

I've talked to Rob on the phone more times than I can count, but I'd never actually met the guy in person before... until Saturday! Rob graciously invited me out to the show at the 9:30 Club, and hooked myself, my husband Rod, my sisters and their friends up with VIP passes. He took great care of us, and it was very cool to be able to see the show from a decent perspective (I wish I saw Rammstein in the VIP section last time I was at the 9:30 Club years ago!).

We met up with Rob for a bit before the show, and he's just as nice in person as he is through email or phone. We talked comics, his El Superbeasto animated film and music, and he kindly obliged and posed for pictures with all of us before heading backstage to get ready for the show.

And speaking of the show, it was the best I'd seen in years. Great visuals and music. The opening bands were fantastic (and I immediately loved Captain Clegg & The Night Creatures for having such a kickass name-- Captain Clegg, or Night Creatures as it's known in the U.S., is my favorite Peter Cushing Hammer film), and it was great to finally see Rob perform live. One of the highlights was when he got a woman-- who was situated in the corner of the room beside the stage doing sign language for the crowd-- to sign a string of expletives for everyone. And she was a good sport and did it all (and Rob told her she had "dirty hands").

So the show was awesome. And to end it all, as we were leaving, there was a guy outside the 9:30 Club handing out Rammstein stickers promoting their latest album Liebe ist für alle da. He gave me two stickers because I was wearing my Rammstein jacket. Aaaand while we were walking back to the metro I spotted a bunch of promotional Rammstein miniposters, one of which I snagged and now have framed and hanging in my living room.

Great night.

(And yeah, I totally snagged Rod's latest blog entry title because I loved it. He has another photo and info from the weekend posted up on his site too. Check it out!)

Lava-Roid

2009-11-21T00:00:00.003-05:00

I'm late posting about this because I'm a horrible person, but Lava-Roid-- the comic I finished a few months ago-- has been getting some really cool reviews.

Lava-Roid was created and written by my pal Kevin Conn and co-written by Stephen "Jesus Hates Zombies" Lindsay. It's a hilarious little book, and I was thrilled to be able to work on it. I had a ton of fun and Kevin gave me full reign with character design and layouts and wackiness.

So... onto the reviews!

The peeps at Ain't It Cool News gave the book a really nice review that you can read HERE (by scrolling down a bit).

Then, Newsarama gave it a shout-out, which you can read HERE (by once again scrolling down a little).

Jennifer Pierce also gave the book a nice review on her blog, which you can read HERE.

And to top that off, G4's Blair Butler mentioned the book on Fresh Ink Online. I am completely humbled and flattered that she mentioned my art. You can check out the review (about 1:32 in) here:

Video Games - E3 2010

Thanks, everyone, for the great reviews! It was a labor of love and I was glad to be involved.

If you want to check out Lava-Roid for yourself, it's available to purchase on Indy Planet. See what it's all about!

Zombie Time

2009-11-04T23:02:00.003-05:00

Wanted to jump in here real quick to pimp something I should have done days ago. In December, Image Comics is publishing a trade recollecting all of the Rob Zombie's Spookshow International comic issues from a few years back. It will be packaged as "The Haunted World of El Superbeasto" to tie in with Rob's recent animated film. Back when I was with MVCreations, I was the editor on this title (and others), and had a blast with it.

Rob is working on a new comic project called "What Ever Happened to Baron Von Shock," so I'm stepping into the editor role once again. Comic Book Resources did an article just recently about the El Superbeasto animated film, the trade publication, and Rob's new Von Shock project. I was quoted a bunch of times (and tried to get a Peter Cushing mention in there-- sadly, it didn't make the cut). Check it out here:

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=23501

Also...

I'm a horrible person for not posting a Baltimore Comic Con recap, I know. I haven't done it yet because I've been busy with projects (more on those soon), but I'm going to try and get a post up Friday or this weekend (I swear!).

But I will say that Rod and I had a fantastic time-- it was great meeting new people and hanging with friends. And I bought a bunch of Green Lantern comics from Shelton over at the Heroes booth. It was nice to be able to walk around and talk to people and really experience a convention again. But more on that in my next post!

Baltimore Comic Con!

2009-10-08T22:19:00.003-04:00

It's that time of year again! Rod and I will be at the Baltimore Comic Con this weekend, October 10th & 11th. We'll have a lot of goodies for sale, including prints, limited quantities of my 2009 sketchbook and a brand new Blue Milk Special convention special booklet.

We'll be at table 116, so stop by and say hello!

I'm also going to be doing commissions again, but I'm going to be limiting the amount I do this time around. At Heroes Con this past June I ended up getting swamped, and I'd like to be able to walk around the con and check it out a little more than I did at Heroes.

Also at my table will be my pal Kevin Conn, who will be selling his Lava-Roid comic, which I just finished working on. It's a really funny read, so be sure to check it out! Stephen Lindsay (of Jesus Hates Zombies fame) helped write it, and I hear there may be talks of a signing at some point this weekend...

I'll keep my Twitter and Facebook accounts updated with info and photos all weekend.

Hope to see some of you there!

(And for those people who think because I'll be out of town this weekend my house will be an easy target, think again! Rod and I live in a neighborhood full of old people who watch everyone's houses like hawks. And the old woman who lives next to us will hiss at you like Dracula if you so much as look at her. Well, not really, but Rod and I joke around that she does... 'Cause it wouldn't surprise me if it happened one day.)

Demon Cat

2009-09-14T19:35:00.003-04:00

Just a quick one for today. And yeah, I couldn't decide on a catchy title for this one.

This was a possible pin-up I'd sketched up for the Mice Templar gang, but it ended up not being quite what they were looking for, so I scrapped it. But I may still finish it one day...

So lately I've been playing Beatles Rock Band... a lot. This game is absolutely fantastic. I just wish it was October so I could download songs/albums in the Rock Band store. Sigh. I'm still hung up on playing Paul's bass (I think you should get extra points for playing it left-handed like Paul-- and not just cause I'm left-handed... just sayin'), and after unlocking a bunch of challenges, I'm now going through the game again to get five stars on every song on hard level. It's tough sometimes, but oh so much fun!

Expert level is going to kill me.

The Order

2009-09-04T21:25:00.005-04:00

The Order of the Phoenix: The Animated Series.

No, but seriously, I've been listening to a few of the Harry Potter audios lately, and right now I'm on Order of the Phoenix. Despite being completely swamped with work on Lava-Roid, this idea of the Order posing for a photo wouldn't leave my head... so I had to draw it.

I know these aren't all of the Order members, but it's a fair few of them. Waaay in the back is Hagrid, and from left to right we have: Bill Weasley, Arthur Weasley, Mad-Eye Moody, Albus Dumbledore, Nymphadora Tonks, Remus Lupin, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Sirius Black, Mundungus Fletcher and Severus Snape.

And if you look closely, you'll see that Mad-Eye's magical eye is fixed squarely on Remus, who is watching Tonks. Mad-Eye is ever vigilant.

I've been working like mad on the Lava-Roid comic, which I hope to finish up this weekend if all goes well. Paul Little is doing colors on this one, and it looks great! We should have this book on hand for the Baltimore Convention next month. Stay tuned...

Aaand The Beatles: Rock Band comes out on 9/9/09, so I'm completely psyched for that (and bought the Beatles instruments despite having a complete set of Rock Band equipment already). I hope I remember to eat and drink after Wednesday. No guarantees.

Deadpool

2009-08-20T20:49:00.005-04:00

I meant to put this up days ago, but Blogger was being a pain in the arse and wouldn't let me upload images. But thankfully it seems to be working for now... (*knocks on wood*).

So this is a commission I finished up for Mike "Heywood" Estelle a little while ago. He asked me for this a couple months ago and I only just managed to finish it. Thanks for waiting, Mike! It's actually the first time I've ever drawn Deadpool. But it was a lot of fun and I really dug adding in the little details.

I'm hard at work right now drawing up the origin issue of Lava-Roid, my pal Kevin Conn's comic. Hopefully this will be all finished and printed up in time for the Baltimore show in October!

That's all from me. More sketches in a couple days!

Mice and Mike

2009-08-12T22:28:00.003-04:00

Mice Templar: Destiny #2 hit the shelves today. I contributed a couple of pin-up pieces in this issue (one of which is above-- sorry for it being so small, but Blogger isn't letting me upload images here for whatever reason), but most importantly, this issue features my husband Rod's debut as the new writer for the 'Myths & Legends' feature in the backs of each Templar issue. Definitely pick it up if you get a chance!

The book itself is a really great read (there's a reason it's been getting so much buzz!), and Bryan, Mike, Victor and Veronica do an incredible job. I was honored to be a part of this series, even in such a small way. Hats off to all of these guys!

Last night as I was drawing and working on stuff, I was half dreading today because it marks the second anniversary of Mike Wieringo's passing. Anyone who knows me knows what I thought of Mike and how much he has inspired me over the years, not only through his beautiful artwork, but as a human being. I don't think you could find a nicer guy in comics, and I wish I'd had the courage to get to know him better.

As I sat there trying not to really think too much, I was struck by the realization that back in June my first published work in years (my back-up story in Perhapanauts #6) was released on Mike's birthday... and my next published work (in Mice Templar) was released today, on the second anniversary of his passing. I don't know what that means, but it struck me that it was an odd coincidence there was another Mike connection there.

Newsarama had a really nice article up on Mike today, and I would like to share it:

http://blog.newsarama.com/2009/08/12/dial-h-for-history-remembering-mike-wieringo

That's all from me.

Blue Milk Love

2009-08-10T17:48:00.002-04:00

Very busy just now, but I wanted to hop on here and thank everyone who's been checking out the crazy Star Wars webcomic Rod and I work on-- Blue Milk Special.

We received a very nice review (a BMS first!) over at The Great Big Nerd. So thank you to Dan Stryker for reminding us that people actually do read our comic and seem to enjoy it. You can check out Dan's review HERE.

Also, thanks once again to pal Todd Dezago for pimping us on his Perhapablog (which everyone should be reading) today. Todd and Craig have been nothing but supportive of us, and we seriously appreciate it. These guys are kool kats.

I'm going to post about this in a couple days, but this Wednesday be on the lookout for Mice Templar: Destiny #2 from Image Comics. Not only is Mice Templar a fantastic read, but this issue features Rod's writing debut of the "Myth & Legends" features in the backs of each issue. And I've contributed a couple of pin-ups to the ish too. So check it out!

Not too much else to add, except that I'm still bummed about the lack of Remus/Tonks from the Half-Blood Prince film. But I've been listening to the audio book and trying to take comfort in that. And the fact that Deathly Hallows is split into two films, so I hope David Yates will take pity on me and give them some decent scenes, damn it!

Since I like to have at least one new piece of art (or a photo or something) to accompany each blog post but Blogger is being a pain and won't let me post it here, here's a link to something I did a couple weeks ago of a scene in the Half-Blood Prince novel (which was, of course, cut entirely out of the film):

http://stratosmacca.deviantart.com/art/A-Million-Times-131006432

Okay, I'm out.

Heroes Con Commissions

2009-08-01T14:48:00.005-04:00

This is insanely late, I know, and it's been over a month since Heroes Con ended which makes it even worse.

But I thought I would share some of the commissions I worked on during Heroes Con (that I remembered to have Scott Weinstein take photos of-- thanks again, Scott!). As I mentioned, I did a bunch of commissions at the show-- so much so that I barely had time to walk around and really enjoy myself as much as I would've liked.

But it was nice talking to everyone who stopped by, and I'm grateful that people liked my stuff enough to even want a sketch from me. So thanks to anyone I met who may be reading this!

And now... On with the commissions!

Alex from A Clockwork Orange:

Robin:

A Star Wars sketch card:

An original character:

Faker, from Masters of the Universe:

Ryu, from Street Fighter:

And last but not least, Cobra Commander:

I have a couple projects I'm getting ready to dive into, but I'll try to keep this blog updated semi-regularly as I work, with sketches and updates and stuff. We'll see how it goes!

Heroes Con '09

2009-07-14T19:36:00.006-04:00

I know this is horribly late, but I wanted to finally post something about my experience this year at Heroes Con. Better late than never, right?

Rod and I drove down to Charlotte on the Thursday before the con, and we actually got there earlier in the night (as opposed to arriving at 2 AM like we did last year). It was actually a really nice drive down, and when we arrived one of the first things we did was pick up our new banners we’d ordered and had shipped to the hotel. As soon as we got into the hotel room we broke those suckers open and set them up in the room-- I couldn’t have been more pleased with them!

Friday morning we made our way to the convention center and realized we were set up next to Comfort Love and Adam Withers, who we’d met at Heroes and later the Baltimore convention last year. They are a husband and wife team like us, and they have a fantastic comic book they write, draw and publish called The Uniques-- it’s a really great read. I picked up the first few issues at Heroes last year and had to keep coming back for more!

We also caught up with Scott Weinstein whose table was right next to ours, and I had my first look at the After-School Agent convention special issue I drew for Scott. It’s still so cool to see my work in print. I just hope I did Scott’s characters justice! Later Chris Zaccone and Gino Patti finally showed and we were one big happy family again!

As the show went on, we caught up with pals Todd Dezago and Craig Rousseau and I finally got to see the Molly back-up story Scott and I worked on for Perhapanauts #6. And they were nice enough to also publish my Justice Brigade pin-up in the same issue, which was very cool. I love those guys! I also finally met up with Rico Renzi, Perhapanauts colorist, who I was beginning to think didn’t actually exist (but he does after all)!

We also said hello to Matt and Suzanne Wieringo and Christian Leaf, and looking back on things I’m an idiot for not asking to see Matt’s portfolio he had with him there at the show. He showed me a couple pages from it (and I told him how jealous I was of his Perhapanauts pages), but I didn’t think to ask him if I could flip through it. Because I’m an idiot. I will try to redeem myself in Baltimore.

I always contribute to the ‘Ringo Scholarship Fund at these shows by slipping money into their collection jar, and this year was no different. I also purchased two more of Mike’s gorgeous pages—one a Spidey splash page, and the other a page from Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man which doesn’t feature any main characters, but I wanted it because it’s just an incredible page. The angles, the shadows, and layouts are just beautiful. It’s the level of work I'm constantly striving for.

The first day of the show was great and we sold some sketchbooks and Blue Milk Special collections. The BMS Milk Droid also made his debut at the show, and he might appear again in Baltimore...

(I stole this pic from Jimmy Aquino because we forgot to take one... Sorry, Jimmy!)

My only problem was that I took on way too many commissions at this show. I ended up filling up my plate so much on Friday that by Saturday I had to start turning people away just so I could finish everything by Sunday. Craig gave me some pointers on that, though, that I’ll be putting into effect in Baltimore. I just didn’t get as much time to walk around as I would’ve liked, so hopefully I’ve learned my lesson.

But before I forget, I have to give a massive shout-out to my friend Jon Kallis. I’ve known Jon for many years (we also do the Idol Fury blog together), and he came to Heroes last year to help support me because it was my first time having my own table at a show. He helped me out last year and again this year, manning our table while we weren’t there, helping restock items and watching over everything. And it was because of him that I was able to walk around the con as much as I did. Thanks, Jon-- you are awesome!

Also great to see Brian Pillow after a few years. Brian worked at Dominion Comics, the comic shop I used to go to when I lived in Lynchburg. And I got to say hello again to Paul Rogers, who owned Dominion. It was such a great shop, and I was really disappointed to hear that it’s closed down now after so many years. Long live Dominion!

Friends Adam and Katy Haile stopped by on Saturday, as well as THE Adam Tyner. I wish things weren’t so hectic at my table so I could’ve spent more time with these guys. But it was great to see them there.

On Saturday after the show, Rod and I went to the art auction, mostly to be there when Matt announced the winner of the first ‘Ringo Scholarship award. Congrats to Katelyn "Rae" Rochelle for the win! I hear it was well deserved and that she will be one to watch. Plus, the girl likes werewolves-- she already sounds awesome to me. When Matt was introduced and came up on stage we all gave him (and Mike) a standing ovation. It was really emotional, and I think Matt did a great job.

Partway through the auction, Rod and I left to go to dinner with friends Bryan and Judy Glass. Bryan is the writer of Mice Templar (amongst other things), a series that has become one of my favorites. We had a great time at dinner and talked for a few hours and heard some of Bryan’s great stories (the Death story still blows my mind). It was a fantastic night. Thanks, Bryan and Judy! Also, on Friday, Bryan had loaned me his Mice Templar sketchbook to draw in. He had loads of other artists draw in his book, and I was honored that he’d asked me to do the same. I told him I hoped I wouldn’t be the one to ruin it (and in the end I’m not sure if that wasn’t the case), but since I wasn’t quite happy with what I’d drawn I told him I’d make it up to him in Baltimore. I’ve got to try and churn out something cool.

(Above photo by Jen Maihack. Thanks, Jen!)

Also on Saturday, Rod and I were interviewed by Jimmy Aquino and Joe Gonzalez of Comic News Insider. I was so nervous and laughed way too much, but I guess it could’ve been worse. Jimmy and Joe are two great guys and were very nice to us. We talked Blue Milk Special and about some of the projects I have coming up. You can find the interview online here. Thanks to my pal Kevin Conn for giving me the inside scoop, I drew quick commissions of Jimmy and Joe’s favorite superheroes. Joe got Captain Marvel, and Jimmy got a picture of Batman lovingly kicking him in the face:

Also on Saturday, I made my way over to the Savannah College of Art and Design’s table where Tom Lyle was drawing and signing. Tom worked with Marvel and DC years ago, drawing Spider-Man amongst other things, and also the very first Tim Drake Robin miniseries. When I was about 13-years-old, I sent Tom a bunch of my hand-drawn comics, and he mailed them back to me with a very nice and encouraging hand-written letter and some of his sample pages. He gave me a lot of pointers and told me not to give up in wanting to be a comic artist. I never forgot that, and I wanted to finally thank him in person. I got a picture taken with him and gave him one of my sketchbooks. I’m not working full time in comics yet, but I’m still trying!

On Sunday I was still scrambling to finish my last few commissions. The con didn’t open until 11 AM, but I got up at 7 AM just to work on commissions. Yeah, I know. But when we did get to the con on Sunday we had a good time. It was sad saying goodbye to everyone, though. That’s the toughest part of going to these things because you wish they could last more than just a few days.

Rod and I packed up at the end of the day and headed out to dinner with Jon, then to the Heroes afterparty where we met up again with Adam and Comfort, Bryan and Judy, Todd and Sharon, Craig, Christian, Suzanne and Matt. We got talking to Matt about Hammer movies (which we all love), but had to call it a night all too soon. We had a long drive ahead of us the following day so it was just as well. We finally did get to talk to Shelton Drum and shake his hand to thank him for putting on such a great show. We’ll definitely be back next year (maybe with bowling shirts...?).

I’ve probably accidentally left some people out or haven’t remembered bits and pieces... My memory (which is horrible enough) on this is already three weeks old. Yeesh.

But it makes me really look forward to seeing all of these wonderful peeps at Baltimore Con in October. Can’t wait!

I’ll post a few of the commissions I did while at the con, as well as a few more photos next entry.

Nova

2009-06-29T20:59:00.004-04:00

I meant to put this in a longer post about my experience at Heroes Con this year, but it's looking like I probably won't have time tonight. So I thought I'd put this up separately.

One of the absolute best things about going to conventions is talking to friends I haven't seen in a while. Since last Heroes Con Rod and I have gotten to know Matt and Suzanne Wieringo, and they are two of my favorite people. Matt is a fellow Hammer Horror fan (I think we might've gotten him into Amicus too!), and we just didn't have enough time to hang out and talk as much as I would've liked. But I ended up taking on more commissions at the show than I should've, and just didn't get time to walk over to their table enough. My fault entirely.

It also happens that Matt and I are both Nova fans, and we agreed to exchange Nova sketches while we were at the convention. Matt had started on one that he showed me in its early stages (which I still think looked great, even if he doesn't think so), but he ended up working on a new piece after he got home. And I definitely can't argue with him on that-- it is definitely easier to work while at home with your own drawing table than being hunched over, drawing at the convention tables.

So last week Matt sent me a gorgeous Nova piece that he posted on his blog last night. And I promptly went nuts over it and sent it to Rod and my sisters to look at because I was so thrilled with it. But it also made me nervous because it'd been years since I'd drawn Nova and I wanted to come up with something nice in exchange-- I couldn't hand Matt a piece of crap after seeing the incredible piece he did for me.

Over the weekend I worked on my Nova piece, and since Matt did such a great job with Rich Rider's original costume, I decided to draw Nova in his threads from the early 1990s when I first really started getting into him. I liked the costume so much because it was only slightly different from the original-- which is my favorite. So this is what I came up with:

Rod is actually the one that convinced me to add gray tones to it, because I was so afraid I'd overdo things (as I have a tendency to do) and mess it up. But I think it turned out okay and Matt liked it in the end, and that's all that matters!

This was a lot of fun. Maybe next time I can convince Matt to exchange Peter Cushing drawings with me!

After-School Agent

2009-06-27T14:28:00.003-04:00

In addition to Perhapanauts #6 being released at Heroes Con, I also contributed art to Scott Weinstein and Chris Zaccone's After-School Agent, which was released as a Convention Special at Heroes.

Rod and I first met Scott at Heroes Con last year, where we had a table next to his. It just so happened that Scott was an incredibly nice guy and had an awesome comic. We became very good friends, and a few months back Scott asked if I would be willing to draw a new story for ASA. I was thrilled, and so... the Convention Special was born.

For those who aren't familiar with Scott and Chris' fantastic book, After-School Agent features a character named Gordon, a 13-year-old boy who was dying of cancer... until his parents made a decision and the Government intervened. The experimental drug they gave him worked, and Gordon lived. But his parents never knew how strong or how fast the drug made Gordon. But the Government knew, and now Gordon works for them, splitting his time between going to school and dealing with mundane family matters, and kicking terrorist arse.

ASA works so well because of the interactions between Gordon and his family, and Gordon and the Government-- even though Gordon has skills and abilities the normal human doesn't, he's still just a 13-year-old kid, and you never lose sight of that. It's full of great adventures, witty dialogue and colorful characters. I highly recommend everyone check it out! It's now up as a webcomic at AfterSchoolAgent.com, with new pages posted every Monday.

I've uploaded the eight pages I drew for ASA into my sequential gallery. Check 'em out!

As for Heroes Con, a detailed report will be coming soon...

Perhapanauts #6!

2009-06-24T23:19:00.003-04:00

I really need to sit down and write up a proper blog post now that I'm back from Heroes Con, but in the meantime I wanted to pimp out a couple of things.

First off, the back-up story I drew for Todd Dezago and Craig Rousseau's Perhapanauts was released today in Perhapanauts #6! It was written by my friend Scott Weinstein and was drawn by me. The issue also features the Justice Brigade pin-up I worked on a while back-- it's a bit of a preview to another story Todd and I will be working on in a future issue.

Also, while I was at Heroes Con this past weekend, Jimmy Aquino and Joe Gonzalez of Comic News Insider were kind enough to interview me for their podcast, which was posted today. Check out episode 205! I was insanely nervous (hence the laughing-- UGH), but I had loads of fun. Thanks to Jimmy and Joe for being awesome!

And last but not least, my favorite artist Mike Wieringo would have been 46-years-old today. Happy birthday, Mike.

Heroes Con!

2009-06-18T09:37:00.004-04:00

Rod and I are heading out to Charlotte, NC for Heroes Con in just a few hours-- and there is still so much left to do! Eek!

But I'm really excited to see everyone-- Todd Dezago, Craig Rousseau, Scott Weinstein, Chris Zaccone, Gino Patti, Matt and Suzanne Wieringo, etc., etc. It's shaping up to be a lot of fun!

And this year I'll have lots of goodies for sale at my table, including my first ever sketchbook (pictured above)! It's 32 pages of sketches I've done over the years, including lots of new sketches and older things I've never put online. I'll also be selling prints, doing sketches, and Rod and I will be promoting our Blue Milk Special Star Wars webcomic (which you should check out if you haven't already!). So come by table SP-233 and say hello!

A couple comic projects I've worked on will also be for sale at the convention-- a back-up story I did last year for Todd and Craig's Perhapanauts #6 will make its debut, and a convention special story I drew for Scott's After-School Agent will also be for sale (Scott's table is right next to ours, so check him out too!).

Okay, I think that's about it. Back to getting things ready! See you guys in Charlotte!

Ship of Fools

2009-06-15T19:53:00.004-04:00

I first met Bryan Glass and Mike Oeming at Heroes Con last year, and they were very nice and gave me some tips and good feedback on my portfolio. They were also the only two people at the con (I think) who looked at my Jenna Stannis digital painting and knew who the hell she was. Turns out they are both big Blake's 7 fans, and I was thrilled.

We talked B7 for a bit and Bryan handed me a series (that he wouldn't let me pay for) called Ship of Fools, something he and Mike worked on over 10 years ago that was first published at Caliber Comics, and later, Image Comics. He told me he thought I would enjoy the series because it was very Blake's 7-inspired. And man, he was right.

I re-read the series recently and was inspired to draw a new piece for my sketchbook that I will have at Heroes Con this weekend. It's a really great read and Mike Oeming's style fits in so well with it-- it's very gritty with a great story and awesome characters. I recommend everyone check it out!

I have my sketchbook cover finalized and I will unveil it probably tomorrow... or Wednesday. I'm just getting the final files compiled so I can send this baby off to the printers. Can't wait for Heroes!

The Walking Dead

2009-06-01T20:20:00.004-04:00

Over the past couple weeks I've been working on sketches to put in a new sketchbook I hope to have ready for Heroes Con in a few weeks. I'm going to throw in some older stuff too that I haven't put online, but I also wanted to have some new pieces to show.

Last year, for various reasons, I took a long break from reading comics (except for certain gems like Todd and Craig's Perhapanauts cause I love that series too too much), and just recently started to get caught up. So I had about a year or more worth of issues sitting waiting for me.

One of the titles I just finished reading is Robert Kirkman's The Walking Dead. It's such a great, gritty series with tons of character development and plot twists and turns to keep things exciting. Oh, and it has zombies too. So one of the first sketches I started working on was something featuring Rick and his son Carl. And I threw in a few zombies for good measure.

I'll probably post a few more sketches here and there as the con approaches. And I'll also post more info on what I'll have available to purchase at the convention itself. Stay tuned!

Idol Season 8, Fin

2009-05-31T22:06:00.003-04:00

American Idol finished up its eighth season last week. I wasn't all that impressed with the performances on Tuesday, but man, the finale kicked all kinds of tail. KISS and Queen? How can you get better than that?? Great performances all around, Kara showed up Bikini Girl, and my Norman Gentle made a comeback appearance. Awesome night.

Congrats to Kris for the win, though I'm sure both he and Adam (and Allison!) will all go on to have promising careers.

I saw this cool Idol video created by Jenastar that pays tribute to the Idol finale and various clips from this past season. She gave me permission to post it here, so I figured I'd end this blog entry with that. Even if this is the last season I watch (if Paula doesn't come back next year), I can say that at least season eight went out on a definite high.

And I really had a blast working on these cartoons. Thank you very much to everyone for all of the kind comments-- it really means a lot.

idol look back from Jensastar on Vimeo.

New post will be coming tomorrow with a new sketch as I get ready for Heroes Con, now less than a month away!

More Idol 'Toons and After-School Agent

2009-05-11T23:30:00.004-04:00

It's been a while since I last posted, and it's mostly because I've been busy. But it's a good kind of busy. I've been pretty productive these past few weeks, and even though I've been stuck at the drawing table for hours every weekend and often have a sore neck and/or back when I finally get up, it feels good. It's a good, creative, satisfying pain.

But firstly, above is a new American Idol cartoon I just finished up. I've done a few since my last posting, but I've been too busy lately to squeeze in more of them (but I do appreciate the nice comments and requests for more). So I finally came up with an idea-- or two, really-- last week and put them both into one cartoon. So I apologize in advance if this is too confusing or busy. Hopefully it translates okay (sometimes it's hard getting an image out of my head and onto paper).

It touches upon a couple of things. First, Danny Gokey's absolutely horrendous performance of Aerosmith's "Dream On" from last week, which he butchered as everyone witnessed the scream heard 'round the world. But, of course, Danny continually coasts through week after week and my girl Allison unfairly got the boot instead. Sooo wrong.

But I also had to give Paula Abdul mad props for performing her new single "I'm Just Here for the Music" on Idol, and gracing us with the Dive of Awesomeness, amongst other things. Rock on, Ms. Abdul.

The main reason I've been insanely busy is because I've been working on a short story for Scott Weinstein and Chris Zaccone's After-School Agent (which is awesome and is being put up online as a webcomic with new pages every Monday!). It's been a lot of fun to work on and very challenging. New York backgrounds are tough, but it's been a nice test and a great way to brush up on drawing objects like cars, buildings, etc. And cat cages are time consuming to draw, and don't let anyone tell you different.

But I love ASA and its hero Gordon, and I've been having a blast working on these pages. If all goes well my story should be out in time for Heroes Con next month! And if all goes really well, my back-up story I drew for Todd and Craig's Perhapanauts (issue #6) should be out by then too!

So anyway, that's all I got. It's going to be really busy from here up 'til Heroes in June. But I can't wait!

--Leanne "I'm Just Here For The Art" Hannah (thanks, Jon!)

American Idol Toons

2009-04-05T20:49:00.003-04:00

Okay, so a few weeks ago I started drawing little American Idol cartoons based on the antics of the Idol judges each week. It started out as just something for fun, and it still is, really, but last week I sent a couple of them to Ryan Seacrest.

Today I discovered that they were posted to Ryan's website here. As a fan of the show, this is pretty freakin' awesome. I hope Ryan saw and enjoyed them.

If anyone wants to see my other Idol cartoons, check out the American Idol section in my gallery by clicking here.

LeanneHannah.com!

2009-03-30T17:02:00.005-04:00

So I guess if you're reading this, you're reading it from my revamped, brand-spankin' new website!

The new LeanneHannah.com went live this morning-- it's something I've been working on over the past couple weeks with Kieran Chapman (thanks, Kieran!). Now everything on the site is much more streamlined and functional, and I'll be able to update on a much more regular basis than before.

Feel free to browse around and check everything out! There is a lot more to come.

Blue Milk Special

2009-02-28T16:01:00.004-05:00

So Rod and I have been working on a Star Wars webcomic off and on for the past month or so. It's been a lot of fun, and yesterday was the day we officially announced it.

If you like Star Wars and people (lovingly) poking fun at it, check us out at BlueMilkSpecial.com!

We update every Monday, Wednesday and Friday with new strips. And we also have a Twitter and Facebook page for those of you who are into that stuff.

It's definitely been a labor of love, and a fun distraction to work on off and on.

There are currently six strips up there now-- check 'em out!

NYCC '09

2009-02-17T11:18:00.015-05:00

Been a while since my last post, but here's why... New York Comic Con! Rod and I made the trip up to NY early Saturday morning and stayed through Sunday evening. We had a really great time!

It was our first time at the NY con, so we just walked around, taking everything in (maybe next year we'll see about getting a table). It was packed on Saturday. It got to be very difficult to move around and it immediately reminded me of the horror/frustration of San Diego last year. Once we got into Artists' Alley it was a little more manageable, though, and we went over and annoyed Todd Dezago and Craig Rousseau for a bit and talked Perhapanauts (which you should be reading if you aren't already!!).

It was also very cool to finally meet up with Chris Zaccone, artist of After-School Agent (which you should all also be reading!), and say hello again to Gino Patti. The After-School Agent guys were our booth buddies at Heroes Con last year. They are cool people.

It took me forever to find the Mattel booth because we were so turned around, but once we found it I bought a few Faker figures for myself and a couple friends and checked out all of the new toys Mattel had on display. My favorite (besides the Stratos figures, of course) was this new Ghostbusters Egon figure-- awesome!

On Saturday I hooked up with my friend Kevin Conn, aka Unemployed Skeletor, and Skelly was good enough to interview me about my art and thoughts on He-Man in general. More on that sometime soon!

Also on Saturday we walked past this incredible Watchmen chalk drawing someone was working on. I never did go back to see it when it was finished, sadly...

As we were walking past one of the Doctor Who booths (the Chicago Tardis guys, I think), we saw Colin Baker-- the 6th Doctor-- sitting there signing autographs and greeting fans. I didn't have the nerve to walk up to the guy, so I admired him from afar.

Saturday night Rod and I went out to dinner with Todd Dezago, Craig Rousseau, Kelly Yates and Rich Woodall. We all had a great time and lots of laughs were had, especially after Rich told an insanely funny story. And then Todd topped it off with another, similar, tale. It was like icing on the cake. I can't remember the last time I laughed so hard. And apparently I was the only person to get a dinner photo in which the television was smiling along with us.

After dinner we headed out to catch a taping of Saturday Night Live courtesy of After-School Agent writer (and all around awesome guy), Scott Weinstein. On the way there Todd and I almost got run over because we were talking and not paying attention to street signage. Good times. But SNL was great and very funny. I was especially thrilled because when we went backstage Darrell Hammond and I stared at each other for a good four or five seconds (Darrell is my fav!). And, of course, I was in the presence of the great James Lipton, though I never saw him up close. Thanks again, Scott!!

After a round of drinks at a nearby bar, Rod and I headed back to the hotel.

And then Sunday was upon us. We spent most of the morning and early afternoon doing some sightseeing, since this was Rod's first time in NY. We checked out Times Square and the massive Toys R Us, then went to Strawberry Fields. As always, I bought and left a rose for John while we were there.

Afterwards we went back to the con and found it was much easier to walk around than it was the previous day. I dropped off some portfolio packets and handed off some business cards, and we walked around and spent some money. We saw a few cool costumes (as there usually are at these things), including Plaid Spidey and a kind of scary looking Iceman.

We hung around the After-School Agent guys and finally got to semi-hang with Scott as things were winding down. I'm currently working on an After-School Agent story for Scott that looks to be a lot of fun, so details on that soon. Chris took this shot of Scott, Rod, me and Todd before Todd and Craig took off for the day.

All too soon the convention was over, so we said our goodbyes and I managed to catch Rich Faber before we headed out to catch our taxi and head to the train station. I always appreciate what Rich has to say about my work and any suggestions he has to offer. Thanks again, Rich!

And that about sums up my NYCC '09 experience. It's always sad leaving these things after getting to hang out with such great people, and it's making me look forward to Heroes Con in June that much more. Bring it on!

Idol Fury!

2009-01-15T20:09:00.004-05:00

One of my guilty pleasures in life is watching American Idol.

Last season, my friend Jon and I would watch the episodes and chat to each other through Gmail with our thoughts on everything from how the contestants sang to how limited Randy's vocabulary was. We had so much fun with it that we decided this season to create Idol Fury-- a site where we could take our chats online, live, as the shows air.

By the end of this season, everyone will have a nickname and we'll critique the hell out of each contestant (and probably make fun of all of them too).

Just FYI, all of the stuff we do and say is in fun-- please don't take offense to any of what we say. It's all in good fun 'cause we dig the show so much!

Good times.

Goodbye, 2008.

2009-01-01T16:14:00.005-05:00

Hope everyone had a happy new year. I spent it at home with Rod drinking a bit of wine and watching the BBC's Quatermass and the Pit (1958) starring André Morell. I was pleasantly surprised to find Michael Ripper in it in a semi-prominent role, then spent most of the rest of the episodes hoping he wouldn't be killed off.

Anyway, yesterday wasn't all that great. I guess every artist goes through periods where they doubt themselves and their abilities and wonder why they bother to draw at all. I guess yesterday was my day. Well, one of my days.

So I drew a Power Rangers piece to try and cheer myself up.

Hope 2009 is a better year than 2008.

Night Creatures

2008-12-30T15:28:00.007-05:00

I'm still messing around with digital painting and wanted to do something with Peter Cushing's character from Night Creatures (or Captain Clegg as it's known in the UK)-- a Hammer film based loosely on the Doctor Syn novels. So above is Dr. Blyss. I thought it might be kind of cool to do something where the character's clothing blends in with the background, and Dr. Blyss was the perfect subject.

The gist of the film is as follows... Captain Collier (Patrick Allen) arrives in an English coastal town with his band of navy men to investigate reports of illegal smuggling and bootlegging, only to find that he must also investigate reports of "Marsh Phantoms"-- said to ride on phantom horses through the marshes spreading terror to any who encounter them. The Captain suspects that the local reverend (Peter Cushing) is hiding something as well...

After spending months watching nothing but Hammer Horror films, I think I've come to the conclusion that my favorite of the lot is Night Creatures. It's not really a "horror" film (though that's what it's billed as), but more of a fun adventure story. It has a real Cobra/Springfield vibe to it (G.I. Joe fans will know what I mean), and Dr. Blyss acts as its Cobra Commander. Blyss is actually a very tragic character, as you find out by the end of the film, and almost immediately I wanted to do some sort of piece featuring the character. Particularly his past (which I can't really reveal without spoiling the film), but I only have rough sketches of that mapped out at the moment. But for now I decided to focus on the character as he appears in the movie.

I think this must be a sort of hidden gem type of film, because it's not really ranked up there with other Hammer classics like Horror of Dracula or The Curse of Frankenstein. It's not talked about much at all, really. But it should be. (Why do I always end up rooting for the underdogs so much?) It's a great story and very well acted-- I was pleasantly surprised by it when I finally watched it. Peter Cushing gives an amazing performance (I'd argue that it may very well be his finest performance), and Michael Ripper is excellent as Mr. Mipps, Blyss' right hand man. It was great seeing Michael Ripper in a more prominent role because he is used a lot in Hammer films, but usually only in bit parts. Here he really gets a chance to shine.

After watching the film a couple times and getting into it, I was very pleasantly surprised to find that Peter Cushing himself really loved it as well. So much so that he had plans to write a screenplay for a sequel (or maybe a prequel?) about Dr. Blyss' adventures. How cool would that have been?

So as you may have guessed, I highly recommend Night Creatures. You can probably find it on Netflix. It's a fun film and probably not what you're expecting.

Anyway, hope everyone had a fun Christmas. Here's to 2009-- let's hope it's better than '08.

Happy Xmas!

2008-12-24T23:30:00.004-05:00

Above is the Christmas drawing I did in '06 of the crew from Blake's 7 (a really awesome British sci-fi series from the late 1970s). It was published on Horizon's website. I really need to get into the habit of doing more holiday drawings.

Hope everyone has a great Christmas, or Chanukah, or whatever you celebrate (or don't celebrate). Enjoy the holidays, and be safe!

And with that, I leave you with this, which my friend sent to me yesterday and made me laugh out loud for like five minutes straight. Thanks, Jon.

Merry... Christmas?

2008-12-23T16:49:00.004-05:00

This is one of Rod's Christmas presents. Yeah, it's a couple days early and not very Christmas-ish, but what can you do? We've been watching Hammer Horror films the past few months. I don't think the mood's left either one of us.

He requested a drawing of Yvonne Romain from Curse of the Werewolf (again) and this is what I came up with.

This was great practice for me-- I'm learning a lot about digital painting the more I work with it. It's been fun.

I have another idea in the works which I hope to finish up over the next couple days. I'm trying to get better.

X-Mas '04

2008-12-21T21:02:00.004-05:00

This was my Christmas drawing from 2004, depicting Sarah Jane Smith, the 4th Doctor and K-9. It was done with inks and Prismacolor markers again.

I can't believe Christmas almost upon us. Time flies!

It's Elementary

2008-12-19T09:00:00.003-05:00

Peter Cushing as Sherlock Holmes. I actually never cared for the Holmes character until I saw Peter Cushing play him. Now I think he's pretty awesome. His Holmes is my Holmes.

I'm still trying to get the hang of this digital painting thing, and I wanted to do this as a sort of warm-up piece before I start painting Rod's Christmas present this weekend. I did this at work when I found a few spare moments, and overall I think it took me around two hours to do. I'm trying to get faster.

Our Hammer Horror marathon has now turned into a Peter Cushing marathon. We've been trying to track down some of his more obscure films, and it's been a lot of fun. Peter Cushing is brilliant, brilliant guy. The more I learn about him the more I love him.

We asked for a bunch of Cushing films for Christmas, so I'm hoping we will get a few of them. One of the films I'm really looking forward to watching is Cash on Demand, a hard-to-find film from 1961. We had to buy a bootleg of it on eBay but it hasn't come in the mail yet. It's gotten rave reviews from what I've read, and it's a real shame that it hasn't come out on DVD yet. I wonder who makes those decisions, anyway. They should put me in charge of them-- I'd sort it out.

Next post will be more Christmas-ish. I'll post my other old Doctor Who Christmas drawing from back in the day. I just need to track it down first.

X-Mas '03

2008-12-11T11:23:00.004-05:00

Since my last entry was kind of morbid, I thought I would post something that was a little more cheery.

A few years ago I got into the habit of doing a new drawing each Christmas. In 2003 and 2004 I was hugely into the classic Doctor Who series, so my drawings then were Who-themed. Back then I was watching a lot of Who and was exposed to several of the different Doctors and companions, but my favorite combination was always the 4th Doctor (played by Tom Baker) and Sarah Jane Smith (played by Elisabeth Sladen). They are an awesome pair to watch.

Above is my drawing for 2003, which I did with Prismacolor markers and inks.

Batman vs. Superman

2008-12-04T16:51:00.002-05:00

This is a commission I've been meaning to finish for a while.

Yeah, I know.

Bats is using a kryptonite blade, though, so I guess it's possible. Poor Superman.

I finally added a journal header thingy to my blog. Since it's getting cold and we might (hopefully?) have some snow this year I thought my 'Hippo walking through the snow' piece was appropriate. It doesn't really have to do with left-handed fury... but I'll have to work on that for next time.

Cushing vs. Tarkin

2008-11-30T23:01:00.003-05:00

Because George Lucas' "young" Tarkin looks nothing like young Peter Cushing.

I threw Christopher Lee in there for good measure because he's as badass as Cushing is.

Just something fun while I was taking a break from Christmas commissions.

The Curse of Dracula

2008-11-21T22:27:00.002-05:00

This was my birthday gift for Rod this year. His birthday was in October, but I'd been working on this piece for the past few weeks to try and finish it up. Finally, after a few adjustments a couple nights ago, it was done.

We've been on a Hammer Horror marathon since last month and I think I have Matt Wieringo to thank for that-- he sent me a few links to some of the really nice Hammer DVD deals Amazon had going on, and that kind of snowballed into a "one Hammer film a night" marathon for Rod and myself. We've been watching them in order and it's been a lot of fun. (Thanks, Matt!)

I didn't grow up with Hammer films-- I was only ever really exposed to the Universal monsters growing up-- but when Rod and I started dating he introduced me to the world of Hammer Horror. It wasn't long before I grew to appreciate folks like Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, and the very classy feel Hammer films have. Going through them again recently has been great, and I've come to appreciate some of the supporting cast who regularly show up in Hammer as well. Being a fan of the classic Doctor Who series, it's also nice to see someone like Patrick Troughton (who went on to play the second incarnation of the Doctor) show up and deliver fantastic performances along with everyone else. I guess I should say I've been enjoying the hell out of these films (pun intended, muahaha).

So, this brings us back to Rod's birthday drawing. He requested something depicting Peter Cushing as Van Helsing from The Brides of Dracula (1960) and Yvonne Romain from Curse of the Werewolf (1961), hence the title of the piece. I'm always a little nervous when dealing with likenesses because let's face it, they can be tricky. I absolutely adore Peter Cushing, and I really wanted to get him looking as closely as possible to... well, himself. I think he and Ms. Romain turned out okay in the end, mostly.

I knew I wanted to give this a painterly feel, and initially I'd imagined myself coloring it in Corel Painter. But for some reason I felt intimidated when I started messing around in it. I guess because there is so much you can do and so many different settings and brushes you can use, it got to be a little overwhelming. So I turned back to a program I was more comfortable with: openCanvas.

I actually hadn't used openCanvas since the Blake's 7 Jenna painting I did back in 2006, but it didn't take me long to get back into the swing of things. OpenCanvas is a very basic Japanese painting program I became aware of a couple years back and only dabbled in (I think I only used it to color the Jenna piece, actually), but when I went back to it I felt comfortable almost instantly. The digital brush reacted the way I wanted it to and it was very easy to get back into a painter-ish mode. I used a watercolor brush setting, but it doesn't exactly give it the feeling of watercolors-- it looks more like oils or acrylics instead. But I'll take it.

I had a lot of fun working on this piece and I experimented with a few things that seem promising (for future works, perhaps?). I'd like to mess around with it again and really get a good handle on the program and just digital painting in general. I don't do enough coloring anymore so this was really refreshing to do. And Rod really liked it, and that was the most important thing to me.

And to follow up from my last post, our websites are back up and running. The transfer process went pretty smoothly. Cheers to that!

Website Woes

2008-11-17T11:46:00.004-05:00

Anyone who's been trying to access my LeanneHannah.com website might've noticed that it's been offline for a while. Basically, the hosting company we were with was bought out by someone else a few months back and we've had nothing but problems since the takeover.

So I'm basically sick of it, as we've been offline for days now, and so we're in the process of transferring to another (more reliable) hosting company. Everything's just about moved over, I'm just waiting for the domain names to transfer now. Then everything should be back up! But all this stuff is another good excuse/reminder to revamp my site, which I've been meaning to do for a long while now. So that's on the horizon in the near future as well.

Also, many thanks to Todd Dezago for giving me a shout-out on his Perhapablog this morning-- I was totally not expecting it. And I think I'll always be shy around those guys. I look up to 'em too much.

Since I don't think I've posted them yet, here are the colors to the Perhapanauts Justice Brigade pin-up I was working on a while back.

Karl Powah!

Hopefully within the next couple days I'll be able to post the piece I've been working on for the past few weeks. I meant to have it finished last week, but ended up getting sick (again) instead. Stay tuned...

Yes We Can.

2008-11-06T10:03:00.005-05:00

Wow. I think the election results are finally starting to really sink in for me. I cannot even begin to put into words how proud I was of my country Tuesday night when the election results came in and we elected Barack Obama as the next president of the United States of America.

I have had to deal with a lot these past few months. The majority of the people I work with are Republicans, and I have been bombarded with anti-Obama e-mails since the Democratic primaries (because apparently the black guy is a scarier prospect to put in the White House than the white woman they were all against). I have had to listen to family members spout anti-Obama rhetoric because their beloved Hillary Clinton didn't get the Democratic nomination, and their support was then turned to McCain (whose policies are vastly different than Hillary's-- I still don't understand that one). I have had to listen to conversations between people I work with who referred to Obama supporters as "morons" (while I quietly sat in the back of my office and tried to ignore them).

I've had to put up with a lot, and for me this election brought out the worst in the people around me. I learned a few things about some of my colleagues and family members that I wish I hadn't. In my experience, the McCain supporters were the loudest and most confrontational of this election, and it got to a point where I just sat back and said nothing because it just wasn't worth getting baited into an argument.

When I came into work yesterday morning, everything was deathly silent. Some of my co-workers didn't even bother coming in, and the loud-mouths who were the most vocal about this election suddenly didn't have a word to say. And I didn't say anything to them. I didn't need to because America had spoken and taken the steps to usher in a new era of change in this country. And it doesn't just feel like a victory for Democrats or for Barack Obama himself-- it feels like a victory for the world.

I couldn't help but cry tears of joy during Obama's acceptance speech Tuesday night because I was witnessing such a historical and beautiful thing. I can't imagine how much this must mean to African-Americans, but I know that for me, it gives me hope. I voted for Obama on Tuesday not because of the color of his skin, but because he was well-spoken, intelligent, his policies were more in tune with what I believed in than McCain's, and because he gave me hope. Simple as that.

Rod said to me yesterday that he was disappointed in New Zealand's current political climate because it appears that after several years, they might be going more conservative in their upcoming election. So he said he thought he might just focus on American politics for a while instead. And I remarked how insane it was that he was able to say something like that. Since I've known him, it's his country's government I've envied. But now it seems that for the first time, the tables have turned. Crazy.

I know Obama has a lot of expectations to live up to and a lot of mess to clean up. But I have hope that he will do just that. It might not be right away, but I think he'll do a good job. I hope he does. How nice will it be to have a president in the White House that is intelligent again? One that I don't feel ashamed and embarrassed of, or one where I'm not completely expecting him to fall all over his words or make a mistake whenever he gives a speech?

I'm feeling very good about the future right now. GOBAMA.

Wonder Woman Day '08

2008-10-12T16:28:00.004-04:00

I lied... I do have something new to show after all. I updated my deviantART site with this, but not here on the blog. So here it is.

This is a piece I drew for Wonder Woman Day III. It will be auctioned off for charity to raise money and awareness for domestic violence shelters and crisis lines. There are a lot of great artists involved with this project and some awesome art will be up for grabs.

I had fun working on this, even if it didn't exactly turn out the way I saw it in my head as I drew. I'm still getting used to inking my own work and felt it was lacking something when I finished, so I decided to add gray tones to it to kind of flesh it out a little more.

I know I'm no Adam Hughes or Jim Lee, but I hope my piece raises a little money for the charity and that whoever gets it will enjoy it.

Ninja Cat!

2008-10-12T13:12:00.002-04:00

No, this isn't my SDCC post... yet. But I'll have it up before the new year, I swear. That's my new goal for myself.

I'm in the middle of coloring a couple things, including the Perhapanauts pin-up I finished before the Baltimore convention. I'll post it once it's finished.

But for now, since I don't have anything else to really say or show, I will leave you with... NINJA CAT! I think I'm the only person on the planet who hadn't seen this until a week or so ago. It's insanely cool.

I want a ninja cat!

Back From Bmore!

2008-10-01T14:19:00.011-04:00

Well, Rod and I made it back from the Baltimore Comic-Con safe and sound. And we both had a really great time!

We were set up at table 3 in the convention center, which was kind of up against one of the back walls next to the concession stand. So we had a decent amount of traffic throughout the con. Half of our table was dedicated to the magazine cereal:geek, which I've done artwork for in the past, and Rod has written articles for. Rod has been helping James Eatock (the creator of the magazine) with promotion, and was using this convention as an opportunity to talk to fans and different comic shop owners.

As with Heroes Con in June, we had some great booth buddies alongside of us. Paige Pumphrey was on our left, and to our right were Melo and Juan Spearman, all excellent artists. Next to Melo and Juan at table 1 was Josh Johnson, a brilliant illustrator who has a children's book out called The Spindletons. It wasn't until the last day of the convention that I realized Rod, myself, Juan, Melo and Josh were all lefties-- we had left-handed power going on in Baltimore!

On Saturday after we settled in, "Heywood" Mike from the Perhapablog stopped by and showed me that my Karl headshot I'd drawn and sent Todd Dezago after Heroes Con, had made it into the newly released Perhapanauts #4. And it wasn't long after that that Rod and I made our way to the 'Haps table, where we said hello to Todd, Craig Rousseau and Matt Wieringo. Now, I have to admit that I was nervous. I always get nervous at these things (Rod said he couldn't tell, but I swear my hands were shaking slightly), and in addition to that I'd brought a new 'Haps pin-up along with me to show the guys. They were all very sweet and made me feel welcome, and it wasn't long before my nervousness went away.

Towards the middle of the day on Saturday, my parents, my sister Rachael and her friend Whitney "Shark" Paulk came to the show. Mind you, my parents have never been interested in comic books. Any attempts I made to get them to actually read a comic (including graphic novels like Watchmen and V for Vendetta) all fell by the wayside. But they wanted to come and see what a comic convention was all about since I was there. And they also wanted to meet Todd and Craig. So while Rod manned our table, I (somewhat reluctantly) walked them over to the 'Haps table and they said hello.

Afterwards, my sister said, "Wait, that was Todd who?" And when I told her she'd just shaken hands with Todd Dezago, her mouth dropped open and I laughed at her starstruck face. "It's just that I've grown up hearing about these guys!" she said. That was pretty cool. See, even if no one else in my family read and appreciated comics like I did, at least I talked about them enough that everyone remembered them. Whether they liked it or not!

Later on Saturday, I asked Craig if he could draw me a sketch of Karl, my favorite 'Hap. Craig agreed, but wanted one from me too, so we agreed to trade Karl sketches. I decided to again draw Karl from his dream sequence in issue #2.

I'd also wanted to find Matt to ask for a sketch from him too, since I really love his work, but was never able to track him down again until Rod and I were walking out of the convention center and ran into him and his wife Suzanne after the show. Maybe next time I'll have better luck.

Rod and I stopped to talk to Nick Cardy for a while too, and I bought a nice print from him. I first met him at Heroes this year (and got a picture of his hand) and he was a super nice guy. This year he was being honored with a lifetime achievement award, and it is well deserved. Rod had wanted to commission Nick for a sketch, but he was completely filled up by the time we got to him. Not really surprising, though. He gave us a preview of the new hardback book about his work coming out soon, and it was beautiful. I'm totally picking one of those up.

When I had some time on Sunday, I walked around and talked to a few artists and Rod and I bought a bunch of stuff. Rich Faber was incredibly nice and we swapped portfolios and had a look at each other's work. He gave me some really great pointers and I appreciated him taking the time to look over my work. His work, btw, is absolutely gorgeous, and needs no pointers. We also talked to Scott Sava for a while and bought some of his Dreamland Chronicles trades he had for sale-- I'm partway through the first one and it's been awesome so far. I stopped by Brian Glass' table too, because I wanted to thank him for the great Ship of Fools comics he gave me at Heroes-- I absolutely loved the series and its nod to Blake's 7, one of my favorite classic British sci-fi series. It was also cool to run into the always inspiring Comfort Love and Adam Withers, creators of The Uniques. I bought issues #1-3 from them at the Heroes show and loved what they'd done. It's something Rod and I have been wanting to do for a while with our own superhero tales. Maybe someday...

On Sunday I ended up selling a lot of prints and doing a few more sketches, and that was a lot of fun. I had great time talking to people and meeting up with some fellow deviantART and He-Man.org guys. I didn't really take many pictures at this con, but I'll end this post with a really cool Robin costume I saw at the show (I'm a huge Robin fan, and this guy had Tim's new suit nailed-- and gave it Tim's original Robin insignia!):

So, all in all I had a lot of fun in Baltimore. I'll definitely be back next year! Aaaand that's all from me. Next post will probably be my photos from SDCC this year. We'll see... ;)

Baltimore Comic-Con!

2008-09-23T13:53:00.007-04:00

So in a few days I'm heading up to the Baltimore Comic-Con. Despite living most of my life in Maryland, last year was the first year I went to the B-more show. But it was very cool and has a nice Heroes Con vibe to it, so I definitely wanted a table this year. The past couple weeks have been spent getting stuff ready, and lucky for me Rod has been able to do a lot for me while I've been busy working on stuff. I don't know what I'd do without him.

Above is the sign that'll be on my table at the con. I put Hippo back on the sign as kind of a nod to what I'd tried to do with my meager Heroes Con sign, which was hand drawn at the last minute. (I think Hippo will be my mascot from now on.) I'll be situated in artists alley at Table 3, and I'll be doing sketches and selling three different prints. Should be fun!

I've been busy these past few months getting things ready for Heroes and the SDCC (I know, I know, I still need to upload my pics from the show!), and I just recently finished up a back-up story for Todd Dezago and Craig Rousseau's awesome Perhapanauts comic series. It's a really fun book, and I was thrilled to be able to work on it.

The story I worked on was penned by the awesomely talented Scott Weinstein, and it's a cool little tale-- I had a lot of fun! It really feels like a proper 'Haps story, and it was a blast to draw. I was laughing out loud before even getting to the end of page one, so I think that says something. Our 'Haps story will be published in the Halloween issue, I think, which should see print next month from Image Comics. I'll post more about it when I know for sure.

It was kind of a challenge for me, because I was trying to make the 'Haps work in my style. Craig's style works so well with them, and it was kinda intimidating at first having to tackle some of these guys. I also inked my own stuff, which was another challenge to get past, because it's been years since I've done it with my own stuff (in a serious capacity, at least). So... looking back on the pages I still see bits here and there that I wish I could redo, but I hope overall they came out okay and that people who enjoy the 'Haps don't feel that I've butchered Todd 'n Craig's characters.

And if I did butcher them, hopefully Rico's coloring will help cover it a little ;)

That's all from me for now. I'll post sketches and pics when I get back from Baltimore!

Ban

2008-08-15T13:59:00.006-04:00

This is my buddy, my cat Banastre ("Ban" for short). I named him after Banastre Tarleton, the notorious British cavalry officer in the American Revolutionary War and my favorite historical figure from that time period.

I think the picture above kind of shows off Ban's personality. I had him when he was a little kitten, and he grew into a big cat, weighing in at around 17 pounds these days. He's such a laid back, goofy, sweet guy and loves to play. I got him in 2004 from a litter of one of the stray cats around my parents' place, and Rod and I took him to Lynchburg with us while I was still working for the MVCreations art studio. When we moved back up to Maryland at the end of 2004, he stayed with us at my parents' house until we found another place to live.

Unfortunately, the apartment complex we moved into wouldn't allow pets, so Ban had to stay with my parents. I've had cats around me all my life and I am a big cat person, and it was strange to suddenly be without one for long periods of time. But at least I could still visit Ban, and he loves to go outside so my parents' house-- surrounded by a large yard and woods-- was perfect for him. Even when Rod and I bought our first house a couple years ago, we all kind of decided that Ban would stay with my parents anyway. My dad and Ban have bonded, and there's no way I could destroy that. And I wouldn't want to take him away from that big yard he loves so much.

And I wouldn't want to deprive my parents of this, which happens while they are both at work and Ban is bored:

So anyway. I'm sitting here, alone in my house at the moment, and I'm missing the little guy. So I figured a blog post would be kinda cool.

But I have pages to draw, so I'm going to get back to work and occupy myself. And I promise that I'll have my San Diego Comic-Con post up at some point. I still haven't forgotten.

Left-handed Powah

2008-08-14T14:57:00.004-04:00

Due to the fact that my blog is called "Southpawian Fury," I think it would make me a bad left-hander if I didn't mention that yesterday was International Left-Hander's day. I didn't really celebrate it other than chuckle with my cousin and another co-worker about it, as she remarked that the three of us (all lefties) being in her office caused a stream of power to burst forth and spread throughout our building.

I've always been proud of being left-handed. It's kind of a weird thing, I guess. I think that it started because of my grandfather, who was always fascinated with the fact that I was the sole lefty in our family (at least on my dad's side). I remember he would often give me left-handed knickknacks or trinkets. One day he gave me a pair of left-handed scissors... And I felt so bad about it because I actually use scissors with my right hand-- it's one of the only things I do right-handed. So I pretended that it was normal for me to cut left-handed and demonstrated it in front of him.

Sometimes it was tough getting used to a right-handed world, particularly at school. Course, I never knew it at the time. Like, using those annoying three-ring binders to write out papers or homework-- the metal clips would always get in the way of writing unless I turned the page and wrote on the back of it and the binders were on my right. Or sitting at desks (where the tabletop portion is attached to the chair)-- there might have been one or two desks for lefties somewhere, but I certainly never found one. But, like all lefties, I just always adapted.

Hard to believe that in the past it was considered a defect of some kind to be left-handed, and parents would often force their children to switch handedness (which can seriously affect a child's development and actually lead to stuttering and other issues). I always find little tidbits like that to be really interesting.

Anyway, I guess I'm proud to be a lefty because there aren't all that many of us out there compared with right-handed folks. So it's kind of neat that a day has been set aside for us "sinister" people.

Crazy.

2008-08-12T22:20:00.000-04:00

I can't believe it's already been a full year since Mike Wieringo passed away. I can't even remember what I was doing a year ago today, but I can sure remember what I was doing a year ago tomorrow, the 13th.

I can't believe it's been a year since I've read one of Mike's blog posts or seen a new sketch from him on dA. Crazy.

Work kept me very busy today, which helped so I didn't dwell. Afterward, coming home, I read some comics, sketched and set up some comic pages for a project I'm working on. Couldn't think of anything more fitting to do on a day like today.

It's been a weird year full of ups and downs. Mostly downs. But I am honored that I was able to work on a few projects this past year dedicated to Mike's memory. It will always mean something very special to me.

The 'Haps

2008-07-31T09:38:00.003-04:00

Just a couple of quick drawings. I was messing around with Todd Dezago and Craig Rousseau's Perhapanauts characters while Rod and I were waiting around in the airport in San Diego. Just some quick inks and gray tones.

We had several hours to wait in the airport, actually, and I was dreading it. But we did run into Eric Treadaway and Eric "Cornboy" Mayse of the Four Horsemen while there (I love those guys!), and also Sam Lotfi and his wife, who we befriended while we were waiting in line for one of the DC Talent Search panels. So that made the wait a little more bearable. Sam's work, btw, is gorgeous-- I've always been partial to cartoony art, and his is fantastic.

Still haven't gotten the pictures I took at SDCC off of my camera, but I'll try to do it this weekend. I've been busy with (art) stuff since I got back from the con, and I hope to be able to show some stuff soon.

SDCC Pages

2008-07-29T16:14:00.008-04:00

Well, I am back from the 2008 San Diego Comic-Con! The show went pretty well (other than having to deal with the MASSIVE crowds). I didn't get the DC portfolio review that I wanted, but I still made a few other contacts that look pretty promising.

This is going to be short for now because I still have to upload the pictures I took around the con. So my next post should be a nice massive one.

But for now, here are the Robin pages I worked on like mad for the three or so weeks leading up to the SDCC show. They weren't good enough to score me a DC review, but I learned a lot during this process and from talking to other artists, so my next attempt will be better!

Hopefully you can at least tell what is going on from page to page.

More to come soon!

The Dark Knight

2008-07-19T15:57:00.003-04:00

I'm copying and pasting this review from the one I posted on the He-Man.org message boards because I am lazy. If you haven't seen TDK yet, best stay away!

Rod and I saw The Dark Knight film this morning and I'm in two minds about it. I think a big part of that is because I felt cheated out of seeing it properly. The speakers in the theatre weren't working properly-- the score and sound effects were very loud, but the dialogue was not. So for the majority of the first part of the film I was straining to hear what everyone was saying and I was so concentrated on that that it took me a long while to really lose myself in the film.

So... having said that, I thought the movie was good. It wasn't great for me, though.

My main gripe is that I thought it was too long. For me, the movie should have ended after the Joker blew up Gotham General Hospital. That way Dent was set up as Two-Face for the next film and had time between movies to really decide to go out there and take revenge for Rachel's death. I was really disappointed that he went full-blown Two-Face and started killing people (and going after Gordon's family, even) because it felt very shoehorned in to me.

But, onto the good stuff. I take back my doubts and all of my uneasiness about Heath Ledger's Joker. He was brilliant. This is my Joker-- the one from the Killing Joke comics-- the gritty, sadistic, crazy psychopath who will kill people for no reason at all. I can see this Joker beating Jason Todd to death with a crowbar. Can't say the same for Jack Nicholson's version of the character. I really thought Ledger was phenomenal. Rod, on the other hand, liked Heath's Joker, but thought he was too dark. He prefers the campier, more family friendly version a la Batman: TAS, which I can understand. But this Joker-- Ledger's Joker-- is the one I was hoping for.

I also thought Harvey Dent was a brilliant character. Having stayed away from reviews and spoilers, I had no idea he was going to be as good as he was. It came out of left field for me. I loved that they killed off Rachel Dawes, and that this was Harvey's motivation for becoming Two-Face. That all worked so well. When Harvey wakes up in the hospital and you can see the rush of memories coming back to him that Rachel is gone, and he just rips the bandages off his face and screams-- that was so awesome. And it ticks me off all the more that he won't be back for the next film. The next film should have been about him.

I really love Gary Oldman's Gordon. I was incredibly annoyed when I thought he'd been killed, and when he showed back up suddenly to save Batman everyone in the theatre cheered. Awesome stuff.

So anyway... I'm going to see the film again in another (better) theatre and I'll make my proper judgment on it, I guess. But I don't think a second viewing is going to change my mind about the end portion of the film. If it had ended sooner and set up Two-Face to be the main villain in the next Batman film, I would have been absolutely raving about this movie.

I'd see TDK again this weekend but I'm just not going to have the time. I have two more pages to finish before San Diego next week, so I'm going to be busy, busy, busy. In fact, I've been so busy lately and such a bundle of nerves this week that I think it's actually been making me sick. My stomach has been in knots for over a week now, and though initially I thought I'd just caught some sort of bug, I'm finally starting to think it's all a result of stress and having little to no sleep this past week. It's a weird experience for me because I don't normally push myself so hard.

Once I finish these last two pages I hope things settle down. At least until the con starts... Fingers crossed. Regardless, though, I shall press on.

Hancock

2008-07-09T16:39:00.003-04:00

It's been a long time since I've seen a movie in theatres. Mainly because I've been too busy drawing or something came up, etc. The last movie I saw was the latest Indiana Jones flick, which I didn't care for. (It'd probably be a good idea not to read any further if you haven't seen it... or Hancock.)

I still think, since they went with the whole "I'm George Lucas and I'll put aliens into whatever I want" thing, they might as well have gone all the way with it. At the end of the movie during the wedding scene when the doors flew open, it should have been caused by a spaceship landing outside. And the crowd, lead by Indy and Marion, walk outside. A hatch on the top of the ship opens and the alien peeks his head out and waves at everyone. Indy and company laugh and wave back. Aaaand scene. Credits roll.

C'mon, it could've worked.

So anyway, Rod and I left work early yesterday and saw Hancock. The critics have been slamming it pretty hard but I wanted to see it anyway. And I have mixed feelings about it.

I thought the first half of the film was great, but then it got weird when they introduced that extra element with Mary. I was partially confused throughout the whole thing and partially annoyed. It's an interesting idea, don't get me wrong, but I think it was executed badly.

One thing that confused me was the bank robber thugs and the guy with the hook-- they knew the truth about Mary and Hancock? Right? That was the impression I got, but I wasn't sure because I was so confused. And did they have superpowers? During the hospital fight scene, I could have sworn when one of them threw Hancock up against a wall it crumbled/cracked from the force of it.

So... if they had powers too, wouldn't that contradict what Mary said about she and Hancock being the only ones left? There are so many things that weren't explained properly in this thing. And I was left wanting more about the "origins" of this group of god-like beings Hancock and Mary belonged to-- who were they? Where did they get the powers from? I wanted more than what we got.

Basically I think Hancock suffers from bad storytelling. There needed to be more explanation in it for me. But I did really enjoy the first half of the film and the special effects were great. I wish I'd just waited to rent this one, sadly. And I wish I'd seen Iron Man instead, but it is no longer playing at my local theatre. I feel a little empty inside now.

Heroes Con

2008-07-02T21:44:00.013-04:00

I promised more on my experience at Heroes Con, and here it is! Though I've read other accounts that are far better... But here we go.

Rod and I left the house late on Thursday for the seven-hour trek to Charlotte. Rod had put in to take Friday off of work a couple of months ago, but things came up and it looked like his boss was going to make him come in on Friday regardless. Which meant that I would be driving down to NC by myself, and Rod would follow Friday afternoon by bus. Then I'd have to pick him up at the bus station in Charlotte at around 2 AM Saturday morning. I was not looking forward to that. But as luck would have it, things worked out and Rod was able to take Friday off after all.

So after Rod got home from work, we headed out the door. The drive was mostly in the dark, and we passed some wicked thunderstorms as we went through Virginia. At one point it was raining and hailing so hard that I thought I might have to pull over. But, being the daredevil I am (not), I decided to stick it out. We arrived at the Hilton in Charlotte at around 2 AM Friday morning and crashed.

Friday morning we made our way into the convention center and found our table and scurried to set everything up. Since this was really my first time having my own table (the last time I was part of a booth was when I was with MVCreations years ago), I wasn't sure what to expect. I had made up some prints of a drawing I'd done of my stuffed animal Hippo walking through the snow, and set those out along with some samples of my work and sequential pages.

Next to me was inker Bill Meiggs, and on the other side sat Scott Weinstein and Gino Patti, who were promoting their book After School Agent (which is a fine read, I must say!). I couldn't have asked for better booth buddies-- they were all great guys and very friendly.

Compared to most tables around me, mine was pretty bare, but hey, I'm chalking this up to a learning experience. Everyone around me made me feel very welcome, and that helped a lot towards getting over my initial nervousness.

On Friday I was basically getting a feel for everything and stayed at the table most of the time (chatting with people and looking at Emiliano Santalucia's secret Masters of the Universe photos/concept art on his laptop with my pal Jon) while Rod walked around. At one point Todd Dezago came up to my table and handed me a copy of the Mike Wieringo tribute sketchbook, thanking me for contributing the piece I'd drawn and sent him.

He wouldn't let me pay for a sketchbook, and I felt bad about that because I had been planning on buying one or two.

I am always shy at these cons to begin with, but get warmed up as I go and get a feel for things. I think Rod had gone up to Todd and told him that I would probably be too shy to talk to him, and that's why Todd came over. And he was probably right, but still... It was a nice thing to do, and afterward I was completely fine with going over to Todd's table and talking to him.

Todd had invited Rod and myself to go to the tribute dinner for Mike at Fuel Pizza on Friday, but we got out of the con so late that day that by the time we got to Fuel the place was packed (I wanted to kick myself for that). So we ended up going to Uno Pizza instead and I don't think we left until after midnight.

Me trying a drink:

Rod, myself and Jon looking over the drink menu:

The next day was very busy. Almost right after the convention opened I got my first commission request from a little girl. I was charging for commissions, but couldn't bring myself to do it in this case. I ended up drawing a Spider-Man that I wasn't really happy with. But the girl seemed to really like it and she said she was going to put it in a scrapbook with a bunch of other commissions she'd gotten-- apparently she's been doing this for years. That sounded really cool, and I told her that I would look forward to seeing the scrapbook at next year's con.

I got another few commissions on Saturday too (including the ones I posted a couple entries ago) and started getting a little better each time. At least I think so. I always find something to pick out that I'd love to change no matter what I draw.

During the con I saw a bunch of pretty cool costumes. My favorites were an awesome Iron Man (with light-up hands and chest!) and a guy who had dressed up as Barbecue from G.I. Joe. As soon as I said, "Look, it's Barbecue!" he turned around really quickly and posed for us.

At one point I finally made my way over to the table Matt Wieringo and his wife Suzanne had set up where they were selling some of Mike's pages and other things-- all proceeds went toward The 'Ringo, the scholarship fund Matt set up in Mike's name.

I was flipping through Mike's beautiful comic pages and recognized so many of them from the comics I read as I was growing up, and I was planning on definitely buying at least one page (probably a Robin) when I came across one of Mike's warm-up sketches towards the back of the book... and I knew I wanted it if it was for sale. To me, it meant more than a comic page. I always loved the sketches Mike would post up on his blog, and would often pour over them when I needed inspiration for something I was working on. Matt was gracious enough to sell it to me, and as soon as I got home I bought a frame for it (and the Flash poster I bought) and hung them both up next to my drawing table at home. The warm-up sketch I hung up next to the framed Stratos drawing Mike had done for me a few years ago, back in the MVCreations days.

Incidentally, whenever I pulled out the warm-up sketch I'd have to give myself a good 5-10 minutes to just stare at it. I love looking at the blue pencil roughs, half-erased lines and finished pencil marks. I can't help it, I love that stuff.

After I bought the sketch from Matt, I also donated again and got a sweet Robin sketch from Randy Green.

Towards the end of the day on Saturday, Val Staples came over to me and said that the Hero Initiative folks were looking for me, and that they didn't realize I was at the convention and wanted me to sign at the What If? panel on Sunday. I was floored-- why would they want me to sign with everyone else? I had done color assists on the issue, but... I somehow didn't think I was important enough to be sitting there with all of these big-name guys.

But Sunday rolled around and I did go to the Hero Initiative booth where tables were set up for the signing. I was introduced to a few of the guys there-- Ethan Van Sciver (who had been signing there before I arrived), Mark Waid, Jeff Parker, Richard Case, etc., and they were all very friendly to me. It made me feel more at ease, but still... I couldn't help but wonder why I was there. I also felt kind of strange because I didn't work on the issue to get recognition-- I only wanted to be involved because it was Mike's last project and was paying tribute to him. But it was still a very neat experience and I forgot about my worries once we started signing. The books started coming down the table and it turned into an assembly line, so it was all I could do to try and keep up.

One cool thing about the signing was that I got this shot of Val completely creeping out Mark Waid:

So, aside from all that, one of the other things I did was walk around and talk to a few artists to get some feedback on the batch of What If? sequential pages I'd done. I had some really nice feedback from Laura Martin, Michael Avon Oeming (who I discovered is a fellow Blake's 7 fan!), Bryan J.L. Glass and Stuart Immonen. It was interesting hearing their comments-- some of them were contradictory depending on which style(s) each artist preferred. Still, it was interesting and opened my eyes to a few things I can improve upon. No one really had anything horrible to say about my portfolio, which surprised me, frankly. I was constantly waiting to hear someone tell me that I had a lot of work to do or things to brush up on. But it didn't happen. I am still stunned about that. Maybe they were just being nice.

So on Sunday towards the end of the con, Rod and I packed everything up and started to head out. We were trying to leave a little bit early because of our long drive home and the fact that we both had to be at work early Monday morning. But as we were walking out we swung by Todd's table to say goodbye to Todd and Craig and got a photo (and a photo of Nick Cardy's hand to boot).

So we started to walk toward the doors to exit when I finally spotted Brian Stelfreeze at his table. I'd been trying to track Brian down most of the con because I was told that he was the guy to go to for a portfolio review. He would give it to me straight and tell me whether or not I was a crap artist, basically. So as I approached him, I was wondering to myself, "Well, I've had a great time at this con... Is this the part where I completely have my art ripped to shreds and Heroes ends on a down note?" But my legs carried me over to Brian and I asked for a portfolio review.

He was very nice and started to look over my stuff. And I swear, it was suddenly as if I was talking to an art master. He started telling me these deep, informative things about storytelling, finding my own style and not letting the writer dictate everything in a story. It was brilliant. I could have sat there and listened to him go on for hours. So finally he starts really looking at my stuff and I brace myself for the worst. But it doesn't come. Instead, he gives me a few pointers and then tells me that he really likes my stuff. And I'm stunned. Even more so by the next comment.

"Who are you working for?" he asks.

"Um... No one," I respond.

"Are you serious?" he asks. And I just nod my head and probably look like an idiot.

He gave me a few more pointers and after I thanked him profusely for taking the time to look at my work, he tells me to keep in touch because he wants to see where I end up. He thinks I'll "go places." Crazy.

So Heroes Con went out on a definite high. But besides that, I really had a fantastic time. I've been to a few conventions over the years, but Heroes has been the best, I think. It was such a relaxed and friendly atmosphere. I met some wonderful people, made a few new friends, caught up with old ones and finally gained some confidence in my art.

But you'll still never hear me say anything I draw is good.

Karl's Plea

2008-06-30T12:06:00.003-04:00

Just a quick post for now...

This is something I sent to Todd after I read issues one and two of The Perhapanauts. I'm so behind on my monthly titles that the last issue I'd read was #0, and when I asked Todd at the con if he had plans for Karl (my favorite 'Hap), I got the "uh oh" look.

So I whipped this up really quick one night while I was doodling. Poor Karl!

Commissions

2008-06-25T19:05:00.007-04:00

I had a table set up at Heroes this year. It was actually my first time having a table of my own and was also my first time at the Heroes convention itself. And I seriously had a lot of fun. It's the best con I've ever been to, actually. So laid back and friendly. But more on that in a bit...

A Punisher commission a nice British guy asked for. I don't think I've actually ever drawn Punisher before, so this one was fun. I was just about to ask the guy for reference when he said, "Oh, it's so nice to ask someone for a commission and not have them ask for reference." So I bit my tongue and pretended that I knew exactly what his costume looked like.

Looking back on it his legs are too small... But what can you do?

I also had someone come up to me from the He-Man.org message boards and ask for a Hordak sketch. This was also a lot of fun, but I was glad Emiliano was with me to provide me with ref. And I was very glad that it was classic Hordak this guy asked for and not the more recent version. The amount of detail would have taken me hours.

I did do a few others but didn't take pictures (because I'm an idiot). But I do still owe my pal Jon a Power Rangers sketch... I haven't forgotten!

New Stuff

2008-06-25T18:26:00.006-04:00

Ugh. I am so bad at updating this thing. Maybe I should aim to try and update at least once a month...

Well, I've done a lot of art since my last post and I guess I'll post some of it soon (hopefully), but for now I'll focus on my newest newest stuff. Then I'll get to the Heroes Con stuff and some pics. So I'll make a few posts instead of one long massive one.

First I'll start with some of the sample pages I put in my portfolio to bring with me to Heroes Con this year.

Since I helped out with color assists on the Marvel What If? Mike Wieringo issue, I had access to the script. As each page came in, it was interesting to me to see the way other artists interpreted the pages/panels, which were oftentimes far different than I envisioned them in my head as I read through the script myself. Art is cool that way.

So I thought I would pick a batch of pages and draw them as I saw them in my own head. Here we go:

Right now I'm getting ready to work on a new batch of pages to bring with me to San Diego in a month. It's been a few years since I was last at the SDCC, and it is expensive getting there, but it's something I've gotta do. I have to at least say I tried to get a portfolio review. Fingers crossed!

Remus and Tonks-- From Start to Finish

2007-12-27T18:58:00.000-05:00

I guess this title is kind of misleading... I'd meant to make this a sort of "Evolution of a Drawing" type of thing, showing how I work from the beginning stages of a piece to the very end. But this particular drawing was different in that I didn't start from a thumbnail sketch-- which I do 99% of the time. But I figured I'd start with this drawing of Remus and Tonks from the Harry Potter series because I've gotten a lot of positive feedback on it.

(Speaking of feedback, I'm so grateful for it. I'm never sure whether or not someone will like what I do-- even if it's just a sketch done for fun-- and when I do get feedback it's awesome! I really do appreciate each and every comment.)

Now then, as I said above, 99% of the time when I begin a piece I start with a thumbnail. Normally I'll do a page worth of thumbnail sketches-- just little scribbles of drawings where I pour my ideas onto a page once I think of the subject matter I want to tackle. In this case, though, I started on a rough sketch right away rather than begin from a thumb. I drew it up on regular ol' 8.5" x 11" typing paper after I'd finished reading the final book in the Harry Potter series and was aggravated as hell that my two favorite characters were basically treated like crap.

I drew a rough sketch in blue pencil, then went straight over my rough sketch with a mechanical pencil. The result (after scanning and some level adjusting in Photoshop) is below:

Next I took it into Photoshop and went to work on the colors. This was actually my very first time coloring in this particular style, so I guess you could say that I used Remus and Tonks as guinea pigs... But the result was decent enough:

So... there you go! Not much of what I'd originally wanted to do with this post, but next time should hopefully prove to be much more interesting... or something. At least the lineart for this piece is finally revealed, haha.

Red and Green

2007-11-10T23:55:00.000-05:00

So it's been a while. Mainly because I've been spending a lot of my free time working on my portfolio. I'm getting back into drawing sequential pages again and kind of brushing up on things, which is fun and challenging at the same time. Right now I'm in the middle of some kind of cold/flu bug thing, so I'm passing the time finally updating this blog amongst other things.

Since I've been doing the sequential thing lately, I've been revisiting a lot of the comic books I grew up reading, and flipping through them is like a breath of fresh air. I remember how wide-eyed I was, pouring over these comics of my favorite characters and just being in awe at the artwork and storylines. These were fun comics. It also makes me realize just how much fun is lacking in comics these days.

Why does everything have to be so dark and moody? I'll admit, at first I welcomed this darker tone for my comics. I'd spent so many years growing up and hearing about how "comics are for kids!" and trying to convince my parents that comics could actually be read by adults and kids alike-- they weren't all bubblegum reads. (For the record, my attempts to get them to read GNs like Watchmen and V for Vendetta all fell by the wayside.) So when things started taking a darker road, I was excited. Then... it just got too overdone and I lost interest pretty quickly.

Take Robin, for example. Tim Drake is still my all time favorite superhero. I used to love reading the Robin title way back when, Chuck Dixon at the helm as a talented crew of artists passed through. Tim was like classic Peter Parker then-- juggling his regular identity with his Robin persona. Back in those days I was the same age as Tim and was going through much of the same things-- school life, homework, trying to fit in, etc. Except that he had the nifty superhero gig. It was a really fun book, and I really looked forward to reading it every month.

Then all of that changed pretty much as soon as Chuck left the series. All of a sudden, Tim's father and girlfriend (Stephanie Brown, aka the Spoiler, who I freakin' loved) were killed off. And I was really worried for the guy. Tim was always a happy kid. I wouldn't call him happy-go-lucky, but he wasn't a brooding character like Batman and he had a good head on his shoulders. I identified with him because he was a bit of a computer geek like me, and on at least a couple of occasions was seen scribbling doodles on his class notes in school (something I did frequently).

But all of a sudden he was orphaned, and lost his only other means of real support when Steph died. I was afraid it would turn him into one of those moody, brooding X-Men type teenagers. And it did in a way. But I still stuck with the guy, despite how horrible his series had become. Then came Tim's recent costume change to the darker red and black scheme-- kind of like the light was being sucked right out of him.

Going through some of these old Robin comics made me realize just how much I miss the red and greens and the fun that this series used to ooze. Fortunately Chuck Dixon will once again be writing the Robin series pretty soon, and I just can't wait. This title has missed him so much, and I hope he can inject it with life and fun again. As a huge Robin/Tim fan, I've really needed it. Especially lately.

Go, go, Chuck!!

What's on YOUR bookshelf?

2007-10-14T01:45:00.000-04:00

There is a thread going on over at the He-Man.org message boards where users are posting images of what they have lining their bookshelves. It's actually pretty cool and gives an insight as to what people are interested in.

So... Here's one of the bookshelves in my bedroom:

(The two stuffed toys pictured above are my favorites from childhood-- Blue Baby and Hippo. Really original names, I know.)

So... What's on YOUR bookshelf?

Sketches and Auctions

2007-09-20T21:34:00.000-04:00

A quick sketch I drew up at work the other day featuring my character Jayden (left) and my pal Danielle's character Nan Quills (right).

I'm finding Jayden really easy to draw, which is cool. I have fun working on sketches of him and I think I have his look down pretty well. Now I just need to move on to the other supporting characters, villains, background characters and such. Sigh. Looong way to go. But at least I'm having fun with it.

Right now I'm working on thumbnails and rough sketches for a couple of pieces that will be in cereal:geek issue #3. Should be pretty cool if I can pull them off! I'm actually pretty glad to have this to work on because it keeps me focused and not dwelling on the same negative, depressing stuff I have been for over a month now. It's weird for me, being so depressed lately, because normally I'm a pretty laid back, positive person.

Anyway. Baby steps, I suppose.

This morning I woke up at 4:30 AM in order to win an auction someone had posted for one of Mike's 2007 sketchbooks. I'd wanted one for a while and was either hoping to get one from him at the Baltimore show or I was planning on just ordering one from him through his website. After his passing that wasn't possible, obviously, so I was pretty determined to get one if I was able to find it. And when I won the auction early this morning I was incredibly excited. After it arrives and I've had a look through it I'm going to have it framed and hang it next to the Stratos drawing Mike did for me. That was a real pick-me-up this morning :)

And on that note... 'Til next time!

Hero and Villain

2007-09-14T23:55:00.001-04:00

Drew up a quick sketch at work today. These are two original characters from a story of mine that I've wanted to do for years. I first came up with the idea back when I was in middle school (some 15 years ago now)-- course, it's kind of expanded since then, and I can draw a wee bit better these days, but I'd put it out of my mind for a while. Just recently, though, I'd been reminded of it and was surprised at just how much of it I remembered.

I'd drawn a little comic book about it years back (it was supposed to be a three-issue miniseries drawn up in pen on 8.5" x 11" typing paper), but the comic has since been lost. The main character, pictured above with the sword, is named Jayden. He lives in a war-torn world where sorcery and dark magic have taken over, and is sent on a quest to take back a source of power and try to restore order to his decaying world. Over the course of the series he meets up with a bunch of quirky characters and gets in a bit of trouble. Fun stuff.

The main villain is unnamed at the moment, and he more than likely won't look the same as in the image above, but I wanted to at least have a starting point as I redesign him. These two will probably go through many changes as I go along.

But for now, this is what I've got.

Immigration, Yeah!

2007-09-12T14:05:00.000-04:00

So I really feel for anyone who has had to deal with the immigration system in the U.S. I truly do. It amuses me that the majority of people out there assume that all one needs to do in order to immigrate to the U.S. is marry a U.S. citizen. Oh, if only it was that easy!

My husband Rod is from New Zealand. We've been going through the immigration process with USCIS for him since early 2004 and we're still not finished. Today we drove out to Alexandria, VA to have him fingerprinted and photographed yet again (I believe this is his fourth time doing this, IIRC) so he can finally get his actual, permanent green card. This is the last step (I think), unless Rod wants to become a full-blown U.S. citizen, in which case we'll go through even more paperwork and even more fees (which, btw, have more than doubled since July 31st). Yay!

Through the years of filing paperwork, filling out forms, paying processing fees and traveling miles upon miles to different immigration stations in or around Maryland (we've been sent to West Virginia, Virginia and Pennsylvania in the past), you learn a lot of things. Like how inept the system is. Or interesting ways of killing time for up to 30 minutes while you're on hold with the immigration 'hotline' (because heaven forbid you should have to ask a question or find out information on something or another).

There are several immigration stations throughout the country. It's interesting to note that none of them know what the other is doing. You'd think that they would all be connected to some vast computer network where they could pull up information on any applicant that comes their way, right? Nah.

For example... Let's say that someone currently going through the immigration system decides to move to a different address. First step is to fill out a specific form. Next is to figure out which immigration station is your immigration station. Then you should probably fill the form out online as well and submit it there. Then, as was told to us by a USCIS representative, we should also probably send the form to the immigration station we sent our original paperwork to when we first started filling out forms (because we live in Maryland, our designated immigration location to send forms to is in Vermont. Why? I have no idea.). "Just in case," she said.

And, for the love of all things holy, MAKE COPIES OF EVERYTHING. The USCIS will not take responsibility for any cock-ups that occur because of the fact that they are inept. If you don't have proof to back up the fact that they messed something up, you're screwed.

So. Hopefully, finally, maybe we'll be able to be done with this immigration crap soon. I'm expecting we'll have to make another trip up to Baltimore to actually pick up the green card, but we'll see.

I think I'll scream with happiness when it's all over and done with.

Me... Kinda Sorta.

2007-09-10T21:17:00.001-04:00

So, I've had this account for a while now and I've never used it. But I figure I should. I'd started using Livejournal, but it was kind of tainted for me for various reasons, and now I really don't have any desire to go back. It's just as well, really, since I deleted the account.

Anyway... My name is Leanne and I'm an illustrator. I used to work for MVCreations as an Editor, Office Manager and Illustrator. I've worked in comics and drawn an issue and a cover or two, and have done freelance stuff for different companies. Hasbro, RE/MAX, things like that. I've illustrated a children's book and have seen my work in print on various things (like wrapping paper, activity books, toy packaging and such). My favorite band is the Beatles. I don't like cocky artists who think they are above anyone else. My favorite color is blue. I'm left-handed. I love comic books. My favorite movie is The Silence of the Lambs. My favorite comic hero is Robin. I find it very hard to take compliments on my art. I am my own worst critic.

All my life I've wanted to draw. It's the only thing I've ever been truly passionate about (apart from the Beatles, but that's another story entirely). But somewhere along the line, since I left MVCreations, I've slipped. The freelance stuff isn't as frequent and I've fallen into the "boring day job" trap that has become my life for nearly three years now.

I have had many favorite artists along the years, people who have inspired me in one way or another to draw and have helped trigger my imagination. My favorite artist, in any medium, has always been Mike Wieringo. His stuff was just flawless, with a life all its own. His characters lived and breathed and moved. I was truly honored when he drew up an 11" x 17" drawing for me of my favorite Masters of the Universe character Stratos. I have it framed and hanging in my office next to my light table, and it has been the single most cherished piece of art I've ever owned. It's beautiful.

And Mike didn't have to draw me that piece. He did it simply because he knew I was such a huge fan. He wouldn't accept payment for it. He didn't even have to draw it on a big piece of actual comic art board, but he did because he wanted me to have something special. That's just the kind of guy he was.

I have many regrets in life. One of the biggest is that I never spoke with Mike more often. I even had the chance to speak to him a couple times on the phone, but chickened out. Mike was always this huge inspiration, this larger than life guy. I always convinced myself that I wasn't good enough to talk to him, or that I'd say something stupid if I ever plucked up the courage to do so. Stupid, I know. Even at the time I knew it was stupid. I apologized to Mike via e-mail and exchanged a few e-mails with him afterward. I told him how awesome he was and how much I looked up to him. He told me I shouldn't be awestruck by any artist-- "it's just art and it's just comics," he said. And he was right. Except I still couldn't shake the 'starstruck' feeling I'd get when I'd look through his work or read his blog or whatever. And let's face it, Mike was this brilliant illustrator and I was just little ol' me. The same girl who shyly shuffled up to his table at a convention in '99 and had him sign some of my Robin and Tellos comics and probably didn't say two words to him other than "thank you" because I was so awestruck. Sigh.

I wish I could go back in time and change things. But I can't. I literally cried so much I made myself sick the day after he passed away. It sucks. And it's not right, and it's not fair. And what sucks even more is that few things in life are right or fair.

So... I stopped drawing for nearly a month, and only last week managed to start up again. But I have this drive now to start doing what I love again. It's small, but it's growing larger by the day. There are projects I want to work on and things I want to accomplish in life, and I need to get to it. I'm going to make a push for this stuff soon and see what happens. And I'll post 'in progress' sketches here along the way.

So we'll see. Should be an interesting ride, anyway.