Sunday, January 31, 2010
Wit
COMING SOON: The Art of Daniel Strickland
Watch for it.
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Sunday, January 31, 2010
From the Comic to the Comical
Today friends we're gonna leave the Big Box
alone and go on-line to pull out some pics of
Super Heroes.
Real Super Heroes
Anyone who can dress like this in public is my hero.
above: http://kllproject.lv
Very good home made uni's. True to the 60's TV Batman and
70's Wonder Woman. How's the view up there Robin.
We know why you're smiling.
Not a bad collection at all.
Martian Man-Hunter and Hawk Girl win this group.
Supergirl looks like she knows something we don't.
Batman doesn't have a clue.
above: http://comicbooks.about.com/
Outstanding Doctor Octopus arms.
It looks like they'll work. With six arms it'll take no time
bringing that room into this century.
That's a black and white TV. Isn't it.
above: http://mydisguises.com/
Now that's a creative kid. He does look cool though.
What kid is this into Hawkman?
Sweet Flash uniform. What adult is this into Flash?
above: http://firestormfan.com/
Really a very tight collection. It's tough to pick a winner.
Great Firestorm, Green Arrow, Hawkgirl.
I pick Captain Action.
Because I can...and I'll never get this chance again.
He's behind Blue Beetle's right shoulder...with the hat on.
I'm telling you...look at his face. He's a dead ringer. Look.
He wins on points.
That's all until next week. I gotta run. I have a five Thirty fitting.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Leroy Brown's ICECUBES
Put on your hats and mittens folks.
Now settle into a comfy pile of snow, chill out
and enjoy:
'ICECUBES' is a newspaper style comic strip about
life inside Alaska's arctic circle for a motley crew including
Nooky the Eskimo, Freeze the penguin, Peckinpaw the polar bear
and EggMan the walrus. The characters are unwittingly engaged
in cultural commentary from their arctic perch atop the world.
Their icy environs only serve to heighten their warmth
and humor of the more intelligent variety.
A comic for those who have read a book or two.
I've been drawing comics since I was about 10 years old.
Eventually I grew up and went to art school in NY
and studied illustration. In art school I was more into the
'underground' scene and did stuff with guys like
Bob Camp (Ren & Stimpy) and Gary Panter (Raw Magazine).
I got published in some NY ‘alt’ papers and even showed my
comics to Art Spiegelman to try and get into RAW magazine.
However, not being big on superhero stuff I never did really
see a way to make a living from comics back then.
I was also very distracted by things like animation and
computer graphics, which eventually became the focus of my career.
A few years ago I made a conscious decision to get back into
drawing comics and I came up with 'ICECUBES'.
Surprisingly it was an idea that formed very quickly
and everything seemed to click- the characters, the format.
After unsuccessfully submitting 'ICECUBES' to the syndicates,
I went straight to the Internet.
Although it's sometimes a struggle to be publisher, web designer,
merchandiser, cartoonist and publicist all at once,
I enjoy the direct contact I have with my readers.
At this point 'ICECUBES' is now also published on the Amazon Kindle
as a collection, and Volume 2 will be available next month.
(Go to Amazon.com and type ICECUBES.) The first 'real' book
should be in print by this spring. Additionally, I get a lot of requests
for tutorials and how to's so I will start a podcast series on how to
draw comics the 'old school' way, with a book to follow as well.
When it comes to drawing 'ICECUBES' I am definitely very old school.
'ICECUBES' is entirely drawn by hand. I only use the
computer to scan, resize and color the comic.
I draw on stiff Bristol with a hard 2H pencil.
I usually practice the drawings on a sketchpad before committing
because I absolutely hate erasing.
When the scenes are blocked out I draw
blue grid lines for the speech. I letter all my comics by hand as well!
Inking is done entirely with metal pen nibs. I am very specific about
the ones I use and it took me a while to find them.
I then make any corrections with titanium white acrylic paint
and finally I draw the panel outlines.
Everything is drawn by hand with real ink- no felt tip pens here!
Every strip is a distilled product of many different ideas.
I feel successful when the strip is simple and to the point and
the drawings are good. I always keep a piece of paper next to the bed
to write down ideas that come during the night. I find myself
constantly thinking about it in the back of my head.
I have this ongoing internal dialog
so I tend to get my ideas from that.
Sometimes I get ideas from a book I read, other times from
a personal situation. At times I get an idea
directly from a drawing too.
Charles Schulz said that he would sit there and draw his characters
in funny poses and that would give him ideas, I do that too.
For inspiration I read books. Books, books, books...
I love history, philosophy, biographies, classic literature...
I wish I could write a book, but to me that is just terrifying.
Leroy Brown, Jan. 2010
Well done Leroy. Thanks for sharing this classic strip.
CCU thinks you have a book or two in there.
Give it a go. Please.
Come back soon and give us an update.
Legion of Super Oh-No
Once again The Android know as "STEVERINO"
reaches into the BIG BOX and pulls one out.
Not so fast. This is no winner.
The Legion of Super-Heroes
DC: No 308, Feb, 1984
"Prophecy of Doom"
Writter/Plotters/Penciller:Paul Levits-Keith Giffen
Inker:Larry Mahlstedt Letterer:John Costanza
Colorist:Carl Gafford
Ouch. This one hurts my android brain. It hurt me to read it.
It hurts me to talk about it. I feel pain just having it in The Big Box.
The pain comes because I'm a LSH fan.
This comic starts off on the right foot with an above average cover.
Then it happened. I dared to read the first page.
"...and the sky itself shall burn!" Ouch. I read on. I swear I did but
I'll make this short and painless. This mag is a two story issue.
LSH did that. That's cool. In fact I like that when I come accross it.
The primary story (the first story) is a thirteen page dud.
Just OK art and Super-Hero cliche's do a number on this book.
I'm Going to throw in an obscure Quote now.
"There were flash backs, flash forwards
and I think there was even a flash sideways."
- Madolyn Smith in the 1988 movie Funny Farm.
These two came on consecutive pages. How's your head?
Let me stop right here and sum this mess up.
A Priest leaves his planet (Trewsk) to lead a spiritual
convocation on Earth. His "sin of pride".
Of course Trewsk is destroyed while he is away.
Priest is given a "power".
Priest is no longer mortal.
Priest arrives on Khund followed be the Legion
Flash, Flash, Flash "Omen approaches".
I can't figure it out. After saying how great and powerful
"HE" is over and over our priest wants them to kill Omen?
"Will the Legionnaires ever be the same?"
A clever goof here is too easy. I'll spare you.
The second story is...well It's a LSH second story.
Colossal Boy (in his first solo) brings his new bride home.
Surprise! She's an alien. Yera from Durla.
Mom seems upset and gives Yera grief because her
home planet doesn't improve life for all on Durla.
Mom is the United Earths president...by the way.
Surprise! She knew about the union and gives Yera
a Life Crystal as a "welcome to the family" gift.
"Oh, Mom."
Yeah. Enjoy those in-laws.
A throw in story that did try to fill some holes and bridge the
storyline with the first tale. Tried. It was not horrible.
Just lame.
Thats a good word to end this weeks review on.
Feel free to miss this one and yes I'm still a
Legion of Super Heroes fan.
Here's something to make LSH fans smile.
Above Convention goers hit the mark with this group shot.
Above The CW's Smallville gets it right too.
Action Figures not dolls.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Alien Irwin Studios
Annnnd Lift-Off. We have lift-off.
For your pleasure CCU has docked Its space ship with:
Alien Irwin Studios
or Google "Spacescape Alien Irwin"
Some years back, when Spacescape was a script and optioned to
a production office in Hollywood, the development director
informed me that I was to have it co-scripted by someone
that the studios would feel comfortable with,
since I alone was an unknown entity. Dan O'Bannon immediately
came to mind, and we arranged a creative meeting
with him to bring him on board to co-script.
I had enjoyed his work on Dark Star and Alien,
and I was really looking forward to his input.
He wasn't much help as it turned out, and the project
of course went into turn-around. To be fair, his health had
been impairing him at the time, and apparently since.
It's too bad we weren't able to work together,
but I was lucky to be able to spend the few hours
we did have kicking around ideas.
Working with no budget I thought I'd try making some
animated shorts on my own,
which you can see on my YouTube channel.
In this way I thought I would bring alive the Spacescape universe,
which was essentially an urban environment of the
"contemporary future",
set in orbit. As I was shopping Hollywood again this new version
of the original script, a copyright lawyer representing
comic artist Doug Tennapel and many other properties
suggested making the story into a graphic novel.
At first I was reluctant to do so, because I wasn't sure
if my skills as a comic artist were up to snuff.
On the other hand, I had done some of my own production designs
so I thought I'd knock out a few pages.
Because of Spacescape's franchise nature this seemed
like a logical sequence or progression. Fortunately,
an upstart cultural publication saw the pages I had done
and we agreed to publish Spacescape on a serial basis.
Maybe the property hadn't become languid after all.
28-plus pages later, Book One is finally out and available
through IndyPlanet. Book two is already well under way.
Once Book two is finished I intend to make the rounds
at the cons, shop the production offices again, etc.
I think the story should register with readers as the reality of
space tourism and travel begins to capture the public's imagination;
outer space developers, real estate speculators, space bangers,
massive orbital junkyards, rocket-powered shopping carts--
it's all there!
Thanks for having us aboard Irwin.
We all loved the "Rotel". What a view.
CCU would like to invite you down to our humble
"station" whenever you're in the neighborhood.
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Fantastic Four + Four
Yes, it is I STEVERINO and yes, I pulled another
Fantastic Four comic from The Big Box.
FANTASTIC FOUR
Marvel: Vol 1, No 388, May, 1994
"Deadly is the Dark Raider"
Plot:Tom Defalco Pictures:Paul Ryan Script:Mike Lackey
Inks:Dan Bulanadi Lettering:Steve Dutro Colors:John Kalisz
Yah, I liked this book.
Upon pulling it I was drawn in by the vintage theme,
costumes and Mighty Avengers.
Look at the golden armor of shell head.
The issue starts off on the right foot
with a well balanced interesting cover.
So I read on.
We turn to page one and we watch.
We watch UATU the Watcher watching
Dark Raider the bad guy watching Franklin Richards the PSI LORD.
He's also future Reed and Sue's son.
They both watch as the future FF cast burst in on
past (Kirby era. Kinda cool) FF. This makes our past heroes unhappy.
They are looking for Franklin but old Ben doesn't care.
With the use of his time sled
Franklin has arrived and is on his way up
to the fun. How they all came to this point in time was not
delt with in this issue. I think I saw an editors note referring
to an earlier issue. Franklin arrives and makes things worse.
Future Ant Man watches as fights break out
and decides to call in the ants in for help.
OK. Oldies Ant-Man Hank Pym catches the call for
the ant army and it's "Avengers Assemble" time.
In a great tribute to the Kirby style we are treated to vintage poses,
costumes and artwork. Well done.
The Avengers do assemble and head toward the distress call.
At this point Franklin shows himself.
He's come to talk with vintage Reed.
"I'm your son!" but before he can go any further...
The Dark Raider. Do you see Franklin's Battle armor. It's a small
panel but well done. So far it's a fun read with great art.
Dark Raider wants to kill vintage Reed
for reasons un-retold in this mag.
The inter-FF/Avengers fight goes on as
Dark Raider moves toward Reed.
More great art. Sue and Reed do fight back as a now de-armored
Franklin pulls a mind meld trick and brings all our heroes together
to help vintage Reed. Sue is there first.
Ooops. It's a two for one shot. The teams are too late.
Read that last panel.
The Dark raider simply leaves. His task completed.
It is now time for the Watcher to act.
What a good book.
A strong story with the best line up you can think of.
Let's not forget the great art. "King" Kirby would be pleased.
Now, this comic was part of a month long tribute to
Jack Kirby who past away in February of 1994
"To Jack, Thanks for the memories."
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