Guest Axe Cop comic!

Hey all*. Sorry it's been a once-a-month update schedule lately. But things are happening in real life!

First off, we just got back from Comic Con late last night (lousy I-5 decided to add an extra hour to our normal commute -- at 10pm on a Sunday). It was a lot of fun and we had a great time seeing friends. Hopefully I'll talk more about it later.

One of the more exciting things for me was that my friend Ethan asked if I'd do a guest comic for Axe Cop while he was down at the convention. So I did one! And it was really fun to make, and people seemed to like it. You can see it up here. I know, I know: "Monkeys aren't funny." It's kinda funny seeing them killed, though, right?



*Mom and Google Bot.

Axe Cop!

So my buddy Ethan posted these comics on TenNapel's forum around Christmas. They were called "Axe Cop," and he'd done them with his five-year-old brother Malachai while home visiting his family. He made them as a lark, but now it's the newest, biggest, and best thing on the internet, so I thought I'd share it with you in case you hadn't stumbled across them yet. The comics feature Ethan's excellent and hilarious drawings, and are written entirely by Malachai's brilliant child's mind. An idea so simple you wish you'd thought of it (and were as funny as the Nicolles).

More bad Western art - Outlaw Territory

I've been meaning to write about this for a while now, but finding these images online (saving me the trouble of scanning them from the book) made it easier.

I bought Outlaw Territory, a Western comics anthology, earlier this year. The cover was pretty cool and I had hopes that there would be at least a few good stories or some sweet art to make the purchase worthwhile (I know anthologies like Flight, Gunned Down, and Marvel Westerns well enough to know that you're guaranteed some stinkers). Unfortunately, there were only 2-3 contributions that I can think of that were any good. Most of them were, at best, boring and uninspired, and at worst, full of terrible art.

The selection below (from First Car in Mexico, by Andy Macdonald and Daniel Heard) is by no means the worst. In fact, it's actually pretty good! Nice lay-out, colors, and drawings. Except for -- say it with me now -- the guns.

****

Those are the weirdest banana guns I've ever seen. And they're so detailed that you'd swear the guy wasn't making them up! He doesn't fudge the design behind weak renderings like Phil Noto. But trust me, he is pulling those out of his butt. There's never been a revolver with a grip like he's got going on there. As you'll recall, I don't mind invented guns if they look somewhat close to reality (i.e. the artist knows what the appropriate guns look like and bases his invention on logical principles). But those handles . . . ! The weird thing is, he apparently knew enough to draw a loading lever underneath the barrel in the top panel, which would be appropriate for a black powder revolver. Maybe he only had half a picture for reference? From mid-cylinder on? Because everything from that point back is wacky. And then in the second-to-last panel he doesn't keep his gun anatomy consistent at all. He's confident in his invention, hoping that they look like real guns to his audience. But I'll bet you he'd laugh out loud and smack his forehead if you showed him a real revolver (from any point in history, really).

Here's a different example (Gut Shot by David Miller and Philip Fuller). The rendering isn't bad in this one. Bland, but fine. But the coloring kills it. It looks like the colorist discovered the bloom effect and decided every single panel should have it. Honestly, look at it! Every panel. Someone hide the lens flare from these kids before things get worse.

****

This next one (Griswold's Song by Ming Doyle) is an odd duck in that the gun was obviously referenced. It has a weird added-on panel where the barrel meets the cylinder (should be one piece), but the rest of the anatomy is fine. But the way everything is rendered is so squirrelly and ugly as to ruin it. Also, check out his hand in the bottom panel. Aside from being ugly, it's position relative to the gun makes it appear as though the grip is, once again, extending straight down underneath the hammer. Bad, dude! How could you do that if you had reference of the real thing for the rest of it?

****

This page isn't the worst of this entry (The Bounty Killers by John Cboins and Shannon Eric Denton) , but it does at least show the illustrator's failed attempt at a Kent Williams-ish style. There are some really wonky faces in some of the other pages. It also tries to convince me that you only need to draw backgrounds in the establishing-shot panel. Sorry, pal, you can get away with that a bit when you're doing dialogue, but when it's an action scene, and you have a lot of negative space in the second panel, it's obvious and amateurish. Filling it with color doesn't fix it.

****

I constructed this post using only the examples from the blog. Eventually I'll scan some of the really bad stuff to show you. The worst one of all will astonish you with its badness. Like, bad for the internet, let alone a published book.

Comic Con 2009

Amy and I had a great time at Comic Con this year. Here's the run-down:

Friday - (nerd-shirt worn: Catscratch by Doug TenNapel)
- drove down, intended to make copyright panel, but hit traffic, so we stopped at my parents' house and hung out for a bit.
- met up with Biola friends Tawney and Elizabeth for dinner in North Park (San Diego). Good Mexican food place. There were rainbow banners everywhere because it had just been Pride Week, I think. Honestly, every single storefront on that street had one. Pity the poor business that didn't order theirs in time.
- Elizabeth then drove us to Eisners (comic book award - like the Academy Award for comics). Eisners were next door to the Convention Center at the Hilton. Got there in plenty of time. Sat with forum friends Ethan (nominated for Best Humor Publication for his book Chumble Spuzz 2, the one I have a pin-up in!), Ethan's brother and co-writer Isaiah, Ruiz and his girlfriend Brenda, and some others. Doug and Sean McGowan found us.


Eisners were boring, slowly paced, but Patton Oswalt and Reno 911 guys (presenters) were funny. One award was accepted on the winner's behalf by a guy dressed in a silver cape and t-shirt that said, "Yes, I am a Gay Robot." He gave a really long and incredibly unfunny acceptance speech. Doug had us rolling with his comments about winners and presenters throughout the ceremony. Ruiz was laughing hysterically at bad presenters and long-winded acceptance speeches. This old Mad Magazine writer was given a lifetime achievement award and went on for 20 minutes. Ethan didn't win (bummer!). We all left after that.
- Eric Peterson, Isaiah Nicolle and I were going to go surfing Saturday morning (like last year), but I forgot my cell phone and wasn't able to arrange boards or coordinate a meeting time, so we decided to do it on Sunday instead.

Saturday - (nerd-shirt worn: Ninjas Everywhere by Scott C)
- wanted to go to Chuck panel, but got there at 9:45 and line was already closed off. Didn't know floor opened at 9, either. So, Amy and I started walking the floor, aisle by aisle. Saw John Kricfalusi and Kali in booth. Said hi to Kali and told her I admired her skill. She was flattered I recognized her. She was very nice.
- bought a shirt from Giant Robot booth (another Deth P. Sun shirt - the blue one)


- met Scott C, who saw my shirt, exclaimed. Asked him for a cowboy monkey sketch. He did a great one.


Amy bought one of his prints.

Very nice guy. We talked about Bodie.
- met up with Hethe for lunch. It was good catching up.
- went by Doug's booth. Doug wasn't there, said hi to Eric Branscum, a friend from the forum and Sockbaby 4. Browsed Doug's original art pages.


- found this awesome prop of a fictional gun from a comic called 13 Chambers.

- came across some cowboy dudes.

- went to Behemoth booth, got picture with Orange Princess (what a nice gal!), got Barbarian sketch from Dan Paladin.

- went to annual Hodown with TenNapel and forum buddies. Doug bought us all chimichangas. Met Dave Nielson, who happens to live in Carlsbad and happens to know Hethe! Nice guy, we gave him a ride home. Josh Kenfield attended his first ever, and we hung out with Frankie for a bit, too. Also chatted with Eric Brown. And several other good friends from the forum.

Sunday - (nerd-shirt worn: Gear by Doug)
- got up at 5:30am to meet up with Eric, Isaiah, and Eric's wife Shayla for surfing. Only got a hold of one extra longboard, so gave those to Eric and Shayla, while Isaiah and I took shortboards. The waves were huge that weekend, but we went to Teramar, which doesn't face the south, so the waves were medium to small. Didn't stay out for that long, but had a good time. Water was really warm. Isaiah and I took the longboards when Eric and Shayla were done and caught a few fun rides.
- got down to the Con early to help Doug work booth. Amy dropped me off and went to find parking. Got on the floor by 8:30am with Exhibitor badge and walked floor with Doug for a bit, admiring artwork. Went back to the booth at 9 when floor opened to everyone else.
- watched Doug interact with some atheist/agnostic fans. Very graciously done. Planted a good seed.
- Doug's wife Angie came by and we talked about her days of airplane piloting (!).

- met a guy who made an escrima movie because he was inspired by Sockbaby. Nice dude.
- met a girl who is a producer for Xbox in WA. Another friendly person. Amy was there and we all had a good time chatting. She and Amy shared a "Mid-West Girls" bond.
- sold a lot of Doug's limited Earthworm Jim prints. Sold out of Jim, still had a couple Evil the Cat at the end.

- at the end of the day, we helped Doug pack up and took off for home! Had a great carnitas meal with the folks and bros.

There are many more pictures from our Con experience on Amy's Facebook, too.

Poor cover art for "Western" from Accent UK

By gum, it's been a while since my last complaint.

And man have there been a lot of Western comics lately. Two new anthologies just popped on my radar (this one and Outlaw Territory), and I just saw that they're making a The Good, Bad, and the Ugly comic (the preview doesn't grab me, and I may write a post about the ridiculous break-top 1851 Navy seen in one of the panels).

The subject of today's post is the cover to Western, drawn by Kirk Manley.

My problems are only with the guns. First off, you have the shell ejectors (the tubes along the undersides of the barrels), which, on an actual SAA (the gun I'm assuming Manley is trying to depict), are actually located along the south-western side of the barrel (from this view). The picture below reveals this beautifully.

On later double-action revolvers, where the cylinders swung out, the ejector rod was moved to the position Manley depicted. But on SAAs, you can't push a shell out through the center of the cylinder, so the ejection takes place right there through the open loading gate (as show above). A lot of artists are guilty of substituting double-action revolver characteristics on their cowboy guns (as I've pointed out in the past). While the ejector housing location isn't a huge sin, it still demonstrates a lack of research and reference.

Other minor sins include the fact that the ejector rod looks hollow, like another barrel. The back of the trigger-guard also appears to connect with the grip, which is incorrect for any revolver. It looks like a revolver top welded to a 1911 grip (the pistol on the right is a clearer example). The pattern on the grip, too, was not common on revolvers back then.

But the biggest sin of Manley's should be obvious to the layman. Did you find it yet? Take a look at the grips. Look at where they enter the top of the fist and where they exit out the bottom. See it? It looks like this cowboy is squeezing those grips so hard they're coming out the bottom of his fists like a gooey piece of taffy. It's really obvious on the right side. Doesn't that look horrible? The grips are way too long. Even if they were structured correctly, you wouldn't see that much grip coming out of the bottom of his hand. The length combined with the way they bend forward towards the viewer makes for a really poorly referenced drawing that is glaringly bad once you're aware of it. Not only is the gun anatomically incorrect, but Manley didn't use reference of a hand holding a gun.

I also wonder if Matt will have something to say about the font used for the title. Isn't it that same over-used font that we saw in the Man with No Name comic?

Pook stuff

Frankie complained last weekend that I don't post my own stuff very often, and he's right. I usually only post finished stuff, which I don't do all that often, though I sketch all the time. So here are some sketches concerning my Pook comic.

First up is Miner Tom. I don't know if he'll be in the final book or not, but I liked the little doodle (mostly because it had a background that looked ok and I don't do those very often). As you can see, I did it almost a year ago.
Next is one of the pooks. I like the proportions on this guy, and for some reason I don't always get them looking right when I'm actually putting them down in the comic. They're very simple, but there are certain aspects that have to be right for them to have the right appeal I'm going for. The size and shape of the body, the eye level, and the legs are the major ones (what else is there, actually?). This one also has a nice invented background. Very simple, but at least it looks like he's in an environment.

Last weekend in San Diego I tried to come up with some possible covers. I wanted something with a conceptual hook and decent composition.

This first one is ok, though with the title at the top I think it might function a bit better. Also, you can't see that the fuse is lit.
This next one is the same concept, but a different composition. It highlights the concept a lot better. Then I went for the "crowd scene." This image points directly to the nature of the pooks in the book, and I like the composition. For a final, I'd more clearly delineate the movement from dark to light coming from the end of the tunnel.
This last one isn't a very good cover or composition, but I included it just because there's are decent bar/hotel bits in the background.

I'll try and post more sketches soon.

TenNapel's Ghostopolis to star Hugh Jackman!

Doug Tweeted this over the weekend:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/film/news/e3i06056b3e43453484607160b8e9c6c0f8

Pretty big news for him.

Dead Irons - new Western comic

I didn't read much of the article, but the covers captured my attention.

This first one is by Jason Shawn Alexander, and it's pretty great (wish that Dynamite logo would disappear, though). Nice composition and colors; overall good design.

This next one by Jae Lee is even better:

Great idea, great colors, great drawing. This cover would suck me in if I saw it on the rack. I'll probably check out the series, though Alexander's interior work didn't do a whole lot for me. I'd buy these two images as posters, though.

More Man with No Name art

No sooner had I finished the last post than I discovered preview art from issue 2 of the MwNN. And guess what? I have complaints! Hooray!

That's a weird pose to take, isn't it? He looks like he's sort of prancing. And his sarape looks way too long and flow-y. Its size and the way it's been rendered obfuscates any strong pose the underlying body might have.


Here I find two problems. The first is panel 3. Clint's hat looks perched on his head. Look how far away it is from his ears. Just look at his whole head in relationship to the hat. It looks silly.

The second problem is the guns. Most of their anatomy is handled well, but they frequently break down in the grip. It's most obvious in panel 4. Here's a picture of a Colt SAA:

Note how far the grip extends away from the body of the gun compared with the depiction in panel 4 above. Check out panel 3 as well: the grip appears to line up perfectly with the tip of the hammer.

Kudos to the artist (Wellington Dias?) for getting the rest of the gun right, but take a look at your reference for that grip.

Western Comic Art - Man with No Name vs. Jonah Hex

Remember a while back when I posted about the Man with No Name comic, and said that on paper it should have been an easy sell, but when I actually saw the comic (ironically also on paper), it didn't grab me?

See if you can spot the difference between these two bits of art.

From The Man with No Name: The Good, The Bad and the Uglier #4

From an upcoming issue of Jonah Hex:

Which piece grabs you more? The art from the first isn't bad, it's just kinda boring. Really boring compared to the Jonah Hex piece. Some of the art from the Jonah Hex series has been boring as well (or just plain bad), but man, they get some good artists from time to time.

It's too bad, because the MwNN comics get some good covers:

Productive weekend, comic-wise

This weekend I inked two complete pages of my comic. It's the most productive I've been in a while. I also penciled and inked a potential cover, but it didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped. It's not bad, it's just not the best-designed composition. I'll probably post the cover up here when I get the chance. I'm still debating whether or not to post some of the pages. Over the last 2 years I've been working on this thing, I've wanted to keep the pages to myself until I was done, but now I wonder if releasing a page per week would be kind of fun, in addition to an incentive to keep working. We'll see.

While inking I watched a bunch of movies: The Rocketeer*, The Fog of War, Thirteen Days, Master and Commander, Gorillaz videos, and Ocean's Eleven. I also took breaks to play Castle Crashers, and I unlocked the Ninja.


*The Rocketeer really needs a good Blu-Ray release. The DVD release isn't even anamorphic (meaning I had to jimmy with my TV's settings to get it to fill up the screen, and it was still stretched), the tranfer is very soft, and there are no special features to speak of. Come on! This is a popular movie that launched Jennifer Connelly, featured one of the coolest costumes ever designed, and is just a lot of fun. Side-note to the side-note: Amy and I identified Melora Hardin ("Jan" from The Office) as the singer in the South Seas Club! Further side-note: Josh, the other boss from The Office, played the pilot who gets shot down in Thirteen Days!

Original comic art

Here are my two prized original comic art pages:


The first one is a page from Scud: The Disposable Assassin by Rob Schrab. He pencils his pages on graph paper, then traces and inks them on vellum. Very unique. I was so jazzed to be able to buy a page this summer.

The second is a page from Sam and Max: Freelance Police by Steve Purcell. I bought that one two years ago from Steve at Comic Con. I still don't have it framed.

Also, be sure to check my Comic Con post below! I updated it with pictures.

Comic Con 2008

We had a great time. Amy and I got in with my Professional badge, and while it didn't create an instant parting of the crowd like I'd hoped, it did cause a few artists we spoke with to ask what we did.

We were only able to go for part of Friday, and all of Saturday and Sunday. Friday we drove down after work and got there about 4:30. We cruised the floor for a bit, said hey to Doug TenNapel and Sean McGowan, and ran into a few other forum friends (Erik "Lars" Brown and his wife, and I think Eric Branscume). Stopped by Eef's booth at Slave Labor, but he wasn't there. We ran into him on the way over to Bad Karma's booth, though. Said hi to Eric Peterson and Val at Bad Karma. (Yes, three Erics in one night.) We met up with Frankie and his friend Melissa, too. Some of us wanted to go to an MST3K panel they had, but when we got up there an hour and a half early, the line was all the way down to the street level, so we said forget it. We wanted to go get dinner with everyone (including the Mulhollands), but it didn't work out, so we had a group of six (Eef and his brother Isaiah, Eric Brown and his wife, and Amy and I). We went to Rockin' Baja Lobster, if I remember right. Had some good carnitas tacos. We went up to my folks' house for the night, and Ian came down and met us.

Saturday was more cruising the floor. Picked up some books and talked to some artists. Got to meet the artist who created Korgi. He was a nice dude, and he had some of his original pages for us to look at. I went to Rob Schrab's booth to say hi, and it seemed like he remembered us from last year and Doug's house, so that was cool. I bought an original Scud page from him! It's gorgeous. I'll post a picture when I get the chance. Dan and Doug Heder stopped by while we were there (and Dan remembered us too!), so we said hey.

We went by Doug T's booth again and Angie was there, and we got a big hug from her. We chatted for a bit about the bewildering experience that is the Comic Con.

Amy and I ran into Scott Adsit on the floor, and got a picture with him. I put my hand on the small of his back without thinking for the picture and felt awkward about it for the rest of my life.

While searching for Ian (whose iPhone had died) I ran into Robert Smigel doing a new Triumph the Insult Comic segment (horrible pictures to come). Amy and I also saw Matthew Fox walking to a signing booth, which was cool. We met up with Josh Kenfield for a bit as he waited in line to get some MST3K guys to sign a poster.

Elizabeth Starks also came Saturday and joined us for a good part of the day. That night was the TenNapel Forum Hodown, and Tawney Smith and bf Tony came, which was great. We had a good time seeing the Westhavenbrook guys and other forum friends (Ruiz and gf, to name a pair), and eating more good Mexican food. Frankie bailed because there was a magical cat giving out free wands somewhere.

On Sunday Eric Peterson and Isaiah and I went surfing in Carlsbad. It was Eric's first time. Isaiah took off to the main lineup, having had a lot of experience up in Oregon of all places, while Eric and I stayed on the inside. Eric was fine at catching waves, but standing up presented more of a challenge. He made it to one foot up by the end of the morning, and I'm sure he'll get it if he goes again. We made it down to the Con in time to get into the room to wait for Sockbaby 4 to premiere. (It's available to download on Sockbaby.com now!) It was great! Doug even gave a shout-out to all the frogmen in the audience, so Eric, both Adams, and I all got to take a bow. The panel afterwards was pretty funny. Jon and Dan Heder were there, as well as Rob Schrab, his girlfriend Kate Freund, John Soares, Justin and Cody Spurlock, and even Isaac Singleton!

It was a fun year!

New Digital Bits shirt (Comic Con themed)

The Digital Bits just put up the new shirt they're selling at this year's Comic Con. Sarah, Todd and I developed the idea and I drew it. The original version actually depicted Batman and Wonder Woman towing R2-D2, but their "legal department" nixed that one, so Todd and I came up with this final design based on some typical Comic Con attendees.
If you've ever driven from San Diego to LA up the 5, you should get the reference. Having lived here all my life, I don't know how much of a universal symbol this sign is. Will attendees from a non-border state get it?

Also, in case you can't identify the types: furry, anime cosplayer chick, and kid with Naruto headband and homemade cardboard box costume.

Michael Turner passed away

I was shocked to discover this morning that comic book artist Michael Turner passed away a few days ago. I didn't even know he had cancer. He was diagnosed back in 2000.

When I heard the news, I immediately thought of my post from back in 2006 titled "Michael Turner sucks at women." Criticism (even jerky criticism) is fun until tragedy befalls the person being criticized. If something terrible happened to Uwe Boll or Rob Liefeld tomorrow, I'd feel bad about making fun of their stuff, too. I've heard Turner was a nice guy, as well (same as I've heard about Liefeld), so I feel like even more of a jerk, even though I was only criticizing his drawings.

I noticed that I received a few more comments on that post from some angry person (and some Greek guy, I guess?). I always wonder how people find my blog posts several years later. It's funny how they go off without me knowing about it (like the Juggalo post).

The Man with No Name comic

I forgot to mention: when I was at the comic store picking up the last issues of Scud, I flipped through that Man with No Name comic. Eh. The art was fine, but nothing special, and the story didn't jump out at me. I passed. Oh well.

Visit to the comic store

I went to pick up the last two issues of Scud: The Disposable Assassin from Cornerstore Comics last night. Cornerstore is a very nice little shop that's just a bit too far away to warrant weekly visits, so I had them pulling Scud for me and waited until the last issue was out.


Rob did a really great job ending the series. It ties up everything very well, and it's really interesting to see the direction it took after 10 years. Rob has matured and worked through a lot, and it shows. The art is fantastic, too; it's just as good as it was when he left. (Click here for some preview pages from #23.) There's also a really good interview in the back of #24 with Rob, conducted by Doug TenNapel (who also drew the cover). He asks great questions, and Rob's answers are very insightful. The final issues of the series featured God being imprisoned by some evil angels, and Rob gets into his thoughts on God and religion a bit. (That's God on the cover, by the way.) There's a great 2-page spread in the final issue featuring God rampaging through Heaven eating rebellious angels. Rob describes God as a bear-like force in the interview.

I can't wait for the Scud Omnibus. Rob has hinted at a hardcover edition as well, which is even more exciting.

While at Cornerstore, I also spied the new Neca Ninja Turtles figures. They look so awesome. It's funny, because the packages have art from the original comics on them, but it doesn't do much for me. The figures look better than the art they are based on. I bought Leonardo.