First Ever LazyComix No-Prize

Brandon B. of Sunny California gets the first ever LazyComix No-Prize for pointing out that I was copying the Great Art Adams in this sketchbook pic I did sometime back in High School. (I’m almost 30 now, lest anyone think it was like last year.)

I’ll have to do more of these No-Prize things, that was fun.

New Comic @ PixelStrips.com

Just wanted to remind everyone that you can read a brand new NYComix over at Pixelstrips.com. It's free to read this weeks page, so go check it out here.

Blast From the Past

This past weekend, Ereisa and I went visit my folks in Saugerties, NY. While there my Mom dragged a big box of stuff out of a closet and asked me too look through it.

I dug through it and found a couple of books I thought I lost before getting a chance to read as well as a sketchbook from sometime in High School. I think its like junior year? Most of the stuff is Star Wars sketches, with makes me think it was around the time of the Special Edition release. Anyway, thought it would be fun to post some of them. A LazyComix No-Prize to whoever posts a pic of the original piece I copied that color shot from.

These pics are a few I took on the way home. The N Train into Brooklyn has an amazing view of Downtown Manhattan as it crosses over the Manhattan Bridge. It's just as amazing at night too.

Another New NYComix?! Already?!

After the more subdued NYComix Episode 6, I really wanted to do something more fun. And being that’s its been a while since I did a One-Shot, I decided to make it a Trilogy of NYComix One-Shots.

If you haven’t read any of the One-Shots, they’re basically one-page, one-panel, comics. I love walking down the streets of New York and getting one of those hilarious, out of context snippets of conversation. The newest One-Shot is one of my favorites. Check it out here.

And it looks like the NYCon is a go. More info to come!

--Gent

PixelStrips and other news.

Every Wednesday, I post a new NYComix page over at PixelStrips.com. Pixelstrips is a subscription based web comic site, but that doesn’t mean you have to pay to read the comics. You can read this week’s comic for free, every week. You just can’t read the archives. You have to pay for that.

So feel free to head on over to Pixelstrips, you’ll get a new page of NYComix there every week. Pretty, neat, I think. Plus I have my own message board over there, and nobody posts there at all. (Not just on my board, but the whole forum) So go talk to me. I love message boards. Go over there and start a thread about how you think the Star Wars prequels suck. I might have something to say about that, and it won't be pretty. :)

I went to the comic shop this morning and didn’t pick up as many comics as I thought I would. There was a Goon 25cent issue, so if you go to the shop pick that comic up, if you caught my previous Blog entry about The Goon, you know I think it’s the best comic on the market right now. And it’s 25cents fer cryin’ out loud…. practically free.

I also picked up the latest issue of BPRD. Not because I’m a big Hellboy fan, (I’ve never read an issue of Hellboy, which is comic blasphemy, I think.) but because Guy Davis is just amazing. I love his work. I heard somewhere that he does like 3-4 pages of pencils and inks a day. Which is insane because his work doesn’t look rushed. Plus, the story isn’t too bad, either, so it’s a good read.

I also picked up an issue of Silent Dragon. The writer, Andy Diggle was on Fanboy Radio the other day and they talked about Silent Dragon and it just sounded cool. Haven’t read it yet, but Leinil Yu art doesn’t disappoint.

And the NYCon news is that it’s a go. I just have to make sure I get a table. So if there’s a table available, I’m there. I’ll keep you posted.

Sketches

Last entry I mentioned that I might do some sketches at the upcoming NYCon... I was going to post a few practice pics yesterday, but Blogger was acting weird.

Here's a few to wet yer whistle... head on over to my site for more. They're in the sketchbook section!

Thanks for looking and feedback is welcome.

--Randy

Giving Big Cons Another shot? Maybe.

I'm thinking about going to the New York City Comic Con this February. I’m a little nervous because my trip to Wizard Philly this past summer was a big bummer. Granted, I just sat there with a stack of Mini-Comics on my table, but it was discouraging nonetheless.

This New York City Con is supposed to be gigantic. Like the San Diego Con, but on the East Coast. From what I can tell, its going to be much more diverse than the Big 2 dominated Wizard conventions, so it’s giving me a little hope that NYComix will find some kind of audience. Plus, I realize that for me to really grab the attention of folks, I have to sell myself. Just sitting there and saying hi to people isn’t going to work. I didn’t tell anyone that I was a letterer in Philly, I wanted my work to stand by itself… but, I’m going to at the NYCon. I figure if I put “Marvel” on my nametag the zombies who don’t buy anything without Wolverine in it will take a look. Plus, I’m kicking around the idea of doing sketches. It makes me a bit nervous, but it’s another way to get people to come over to your table. So I figure I can do headshots and attach one of the 2 volumes of NYComix along with it.

2 volumes, you ask?

Yup. By February I’ll have more than enough newmaterial for a second NYComix Mini-Comic. So I’m pretty excited about that. It’ll be bigger too, so hopefully it’ll all work out.

So stay tuned, I’ll let you know if this is really going to happen. I’m 99% sure and I’m hoping I’ll be able to split a table with a friend…we’ll see.

Se7en

Working at home has many advantages. (And disadvantages, for that matter.) One big advantage for me is the ability to watch movies while I work.

Last Christmas, Ereisa bought me a little 13 inch TV with a DVD player built-in. It sits right next to my monitor so I look over from time to time as I work. I have a fairly big DVD collection (not as big as I’d like), but I usually watch movies when I feel like I need an inspirational kick in the pants. Movies like Star Wars, Goodfellas, Mean Streets, anything by Tarantino, and the movie I watched today. Se7en.

Se7en came out in 1995 and it still blows me away every time I watch it. It always did, actually. I didn’t see it in the theaters, but the first time I saw it I was still living at home with my folks and we had the good ol’ Steal-Per-View. (That little black box that unscrambled HBO, Pay Per View, whatever. It suddenly stopped working one day but it was cool when we had it.) Anyway, Se7en was one of the Pay Per View movies and it just got played over and over again all day long for like a month. I remember sitting down and watching it and it was one of those movies that just made you say: “Holy shit.” I watched it darn near every day thereafter for days.

Not only did David Fincher do a beautiful job directing it but the screenwriter: Andrew Kevin Walker really gave me a lesson in screenwriting. One of the things I’ve heard a million times about screenwriting is the idea of taking the viewer and making him/her think they know what is going to happen and then just completely flip that idea around so that they have no idea what is going to happen next.

Tarantino is a master at this. Pulp Fiction is a movie about stories you’ve seen a billion times. The boxer who is supposed to take the fall and doesn’t, the guy who is ordered by his boss to take his wife out on a date while he’s out of town, the hitman who thinks he has an easy job but it ends up becoming a total nightmare. The scenarios go on and on. Kill Bill is plain and simply a revenge movie. But Tarantino is such and amazing writer that he takes these played out story ideas and turns them into something you’ve never seen before.

Walker did the same kind of thing on Se7en. At first glance it’s a buddy cop movie, or another serial killer flick. But everything about that movie is the total opposite of what you think will happen. He even lures you into thinking you know the pattern of the story during the second act, but he blows that out of the water when Jon Doe walks into the police department and turns himself in. The killer turns himself in during the second act! It’s just such a great movie and it’s written so well. It never fails to inspire me and every time I watch it I feel like writing.

New NYComix and other neat stuff.

I posted a new NYComix a few days ago. You can check it out here.

For those of you in the NYC area, there’s an amazing comic shop in Brooklyn called: Rocketship. It’s primarily and Indie Comic shop, but you can get all your “Big Two” comics there as well. Plus, they’re nice enough to carry my first Mini-Comic, so if you’re in the area, head on over and pick up NYComix Volume 1.

One of my favorite comic book websites is Fanboy Radio. I post on their Message Boards from time to time and met a fellow comic artist by the name of Jim Lujan. Jim and a few other guys have a really neat Online Comic Jam called The Bullet Angelica. It’s basically a bunch of guys working on the same comic and nobody knows what the heck is going to happen next. One person draws a panel, it gets posted then the next person in line does the following panel and so on. It’s a lot of fun and it’s worth checking out. It’s just a bunch of folks who love comics getting together and having fun making their own comic. My first panel was posted a few days ago. You can check it out here.

There some other stuff coming up as well, so stay tuned.

Harvey Pekar

“You can do as much with comics as the novel or movies or plays or anything. Comics are words an’ pictures; you can do anything with words an’ pictures!” --Harvey Pekar

For those of you who have read NYComix, the influence of Harvey Pekar on my work is hard to miss. Growing up in a small town, the only comics I had access to were Marvel and a few DC books. It wasn’t until my first year at Pratt that I discovered Pekar’s work. Ereisa bought me an R. Crumb Trade Paperback and in it were a bunch of comics that he did with Pekar. I reread them quite a few times and realized that what might seem like simple “talking heads” comics at first glace, are actually very complex stories that anyone can relate to. Pekar’s comics were like a punch in the stomach. After reading them I realized that I’m missing so many amazing comics by reading only Superhero stuff.

Last Wednesday marked the release of Pekar’s latest work, The Quitter, and, after reading it last night I think it’s his best work. With local Brooklyn artist Dean Haspiel, The Quitter tells the story of Pekar’s childhood and, as with all of his work, it’s brutally honest and real. Pekar has a reputation as a curmudgeon or a cranky old man, but after reading The Quitter, you’ll learn that there’s a reason for his unique personality.

There are many, many autobiographical comics being made today (mine included), but since 1972, Harvey Pekar is and will continue to be the best in the genre.

So, if you’ve never bought an “independent” comic before, go buy The Quitter. (It’s a Vertigo book from DC Comics, if that makes you Corporate comic junkies feel better) After you read it, lend it to a friend who hasn’t read a black and white comic or better yet, lend it to a friend who has never read a comic before. It’s a perfect example of what comics should be and a perfect example of the kind of work that can show the general non-comic reading public that comics aren’t just tights and capes for kids.

Thanks, Brandon...

This post goes out to Brandon from So Cal... who has been a big supporter of my work...

A few months ago at WizardWorld Philly, I spent an entire day watching a guy make bad balloon animals pull in more money in 10 minutes than I did all day with my Mini Comix… its known today at the infamous LazyComix Mini Comic Debacle… (well, not really, that just what I call it) A day or 2 later, I got an email from Brandon asking me if I’d send him a few of the left-over-hundred-or-so Mini Comics… I happily obliged and Brandon became the first person to plunk down his hard earned cash for my work.

A little while later Brandon commissioned me to do a Yoda piece for him… the result you see below… which now resides with Brandon in Southern California…

So a Big Thanks goes out to Brandon… your support is very appreciated.

--Gent