Don Fanucci. Bug Hunter.

Moving to Bay Ridge was a great thing for a lot of reasons… one reason was the back yard…. And our cats absolutely love it… Our youngest cat, Don Fanucci, has become obsessed with catching and eating bugs. Gross, to be sure, but also quite entertaining.

Earlier today, Fanucci got hit paws on a Cicada… a huge bug and quite a score in Fanucci’s mind….. this picture is actually a screen capture of a movie I took as I attempted to pry the bug out of his mouth. It was like Fanucci went feral for a little while, instincts kicked in and he was all business.

Damn Yankees...

I'm a huge Yankee fan.... and a huge baseball fan in general. When I was a kid, Don Mattingly and Dave Winfield were the cats pajamas..... as I got older, my interest in baseball waned a bit, and by the time of the strike in 94'..... I had completely lost interest and it stayed that way until '96, when the Yankees won the series.... their first win that I could remember. After I moved to New York, my love of the Yankees came back in a big way.... being so close to the stadium makes it really easy to go to games via the subway...

The other day I did a portrait of Babe Ruth for an upcoming comic... as I worked on it, I thought about how fun it would be to do a graphic novel about him.... maybe someday.

Updates....

I just updated www.LazyComix.com.... you can go there and read the news..... or you can read it here. Either way, go there and check out the site....

Anyway, a few posts ago I mentioned that my comic NYComix would be appearing at a cool site called www.NorthEastInTune.com.... well, its up. So go on over and check it out... I'm proud to be a part of the site and I'm hoping to debut a new comic there next month, so stay tuned!

I'm busy as all get-out today with lettering stuff... so thats all for now...

--Randy

New Scanner and Star Wars...

As I mentioned earlier.... my old scanner bit the dust. At first I was upset, being the penny-pinching miser that I am and all.... but after a trip to my local Staples… I picked up a great scanner on sale and everything. It’s awesome. Gives me really high resolution and great scans… and best of all, I don’t have to revert to OS9 to use the scanner, as I had to with the old one.

I even scanned the first page of the first PixelStrips comic… (minus one panel, which I’ve yet to work on)

I also posted a few Star Wars sketches that I just scanned with my new fancy pants scanner. Check ‘em out.

Remember Randall?

When I first started LazyComix.com a few years ago, I wanted to use my comic, Randall as the "headliner" for the site. It was right around the time of 9-11 and with all the craziness going on here in New York City, I jumped head-first into this character that I came up with on a subway ride home. I wrote a long-winded script about a regular kid who reads comics and plays video games all day getting super powers out of the blue... I started character designs and decided to take this idea and turn it into my first comic.

The only problem is, when I look at this comic now... I see how indecisive I was... and in a way, still am about that strip. The script is just too much… some of the things are funny, but I take a year to get to the punch-line and my art is just crude…It’s not my natural style. I really have to struggle to draw that way. I inked the early chapters with a brush and pen… then I switched to a rapidograph… nothing matches up. And the coloring just sucks. I don’t like coloring and I can’t imagine how professional colorists do it… its just so time consuming and it gets boring for me real fast. I was first going to color the strip with Doc Martins inks… then I was going to use watercolors… after the disaster of those experiments, I switched to Photoshop. The last chapter was even “inked” in Photoshop…

So as you can see, I had no idea and still have no idea what is going on with Randall. I absolutely love the character and I will get back to it… just not now. I was going to finish the original script and then go from there… but I’ve decided not to. I’ve got some things in mind for li’l Randall… and I’ll get to them, I swear. But the next time we see him… he’ll be a bit different.

In the meantime… NYComix has taken over. And after I finish lettering today, I’m going to start drawing the first page for PixelStrips…

I need to get movin'...

I just realized that today is the 16th.... I've written the first story for Pixelstrips but I have to get going on the art... the only problem. My scanner bit the dust... so I have to get a new scanner and draw this comic... and on top of all this... the lettering is starting to pick up.... sheesh.

Well, could be worse, I guess!

Stay tuned and keep checking LazyComix.com.... there'll be a new Episode there soon....

--Randy

Endless material...

Just when I think I could run out of stories to tell about living in New York.... Ereisa and I take a walk this morning to get coffee and we see some guy in a robe walking around... he damn near let it all hang out..... on our way back from the Coffee joint, I notice that some girl walking in front of us looks like she's only wearing underwear.... thinking that there's no way a girl would walk around in Brooklyn wearing only her underwear, we speed up to check out the situation. Turns out, she was wearing a skirt that tied around her waist... somehow, it came undone without her noticing and was dangling at her side... how she didn't realize this, I have no idea... I wonder how long it was undone and how long it took her to realize it..... she must've been mortified to find out her keishter was hanging out for all of Bay Ridge to see.....

What's in store for LazyComix.....

Every so often I email my website around to various web comic site and magazines that pay attention to the comic book world.... last week, on a whim, I took a trip to craigslist.com to see if anyone was selling a nice bike and wound up taking a look in the job section.... you never know when you might find a neat comic book or illustration job opportunity.... so I found a call for comic book reviewers on a website I've never heard of. So I went to check it out, knowing that I'd never take a job reviewing comics. I'd love to, but I could never be honest with my reviews in fear of upsetting an editor or creator that I may have worked with or may work with in the future.... and if you can’t be honest as a reviewer, you shouldn't even bother.

When I got to the site, I saw that it was a pretty neat site that reviews music, art, movies (there's something I'd love to review) and comics.... so I emailed the editor asking him to take a look at NYComix.... turns out he really dug the work and wanted to run it on the site.... after a few emails we decided to run NYComix Episode 1 in the next issue. Next month, I'm hoping to run a new story that will really be fitting for September.... we'll see how that goes.

Anyway, the site is called www.NorthEastInTune.com... go check it out, it's a cool site and I'm excited about NYComix being a part of it in the near future.

That same day I took a trip over to DigitalWebbing.com... as most comic creators know, it's a place to find other creators looking to start a comic.... if you're a writer looking for a penciler, or a colorist looking for a letterer, anything... it's the place to look. As I clicked around the site I found a call for submissions to a subscription web comic site… being a big fan of web comics, I checked it out and it was a neat looking site with some good looking web comics already on board… so I send the NYComix link on over and got accepted… that’s when the panic set in… I’d have to post a new comic once a week. Wow. I’m pretty much on a once a month schedule now… once a week is a lot of work, especially with all my lettering work. But after talking to my girlfriend, who found the opportunity not as a reason to panic but as a way to force myself to write and draw every day… and to build up my portfolio of NYComix… so now I have to get my first strip rolling by September 1st… I’m hoping to get ahead of schedule so that I can take a week off every once in a while. I felt a little better after I flipped through a copy of Calvin and Hobbes 10th Anniversary Book… Watterson was creating amazing work on a daily basis… made my weekly problem seem a little less daunting.

Anyway, the web comic site is www.PixelStrips.com its still in the early stages now, but I think it’s going to be a great web comic site…

So that’s the big announcement… Now it’s off to letter Runaways and jot down ideas for web comic strips…

New Stuff....

There's going to be a few more places to check out NYComix on the web.... I'm going to make a official announcement within the next few days.

I'm pretty excited about it... as any places I can get my comics seen besides LazyComix.com, is a good thing. So keep you eyes on the site for the big announcement...

I can't believe I have a Blog....

Being that I don't have much time to update my site.... www.LazyComix.com.... I thought this would be a fun and quicker way to keep people up to date on the site and what I'm up to....

I've spent most of the night working.... first on lettering Captain America #9 and then redesigning my site..... which is just a huge undertaking.... but I think the new look is cleaner and easier to navigate... go look and let me know if you like it!

While I was working I was watching the Yankee game.... just when I thought they were going to get swept by the Indians.... A-Rod and Giambi hit home runs and give the Yanks the lead.... this is a win they really, really need.... and how big has Giambi been?

Well, I'm going to watch Mariano strike out the side, giving the Yanks a much needed win.

--Randy