It's Refreshing to Look Better

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Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh... The website overhaul. It's like cleaning your room after two years of gradual, serenity-scrambling disorder.

I owe a little thank you to Dylan Meconis, whose swanky website inspired jealousy, and hence, this refresh. It looked SO good, I couldn't help but take some cues (and her Wordpress theme). While we're at it, go get on Dylan's Kickstarter campaign if you haven't. You can get a high-quality print copy of Outfoxed, my favorite Eisner-nominated web comic of last year, and lots more. I'm serious. I'm not just guilty for stealing her theme. She makes beautiful stuff.

In other news... I'm just about to get started on my last issue of John Arcudi's The Creep. It's been a fun ride, and I'm looking forward to seeing how he finishes everything up (Dark Horse tells me the script is on its way this week). One very fun part of it is that after getting covers from a ton of great artists (Mike Mignola!), I get to finish up the run with my own cover. So be on the lookout for that in a few months!

And now, a man in a hat.

man in a hat

Painting Time

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Just finished this commissioned painting yesterday. 36x24 inches, acrylic on a wooden board. It was a breath of fresh air after an intense stretch of comics pages. I just hope it doesn't look like Thomas Kinkade.

Here's some process photos:

Digital mockup.

Sepia drawing with a layer of ochre acrylic.

Doro assists as I lay down colors.

Detail from finished piece.

Making Friends

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This blog of mine is a sometimes barren wasteland. And let me tell you why. To me, Internet, you're a clubhouse of scary kids. I like the idea of having friends, but I'm afraid you're going to be awful. I'm afraid I won't live up to your expectations, which may be lower than low. I'm sort of afraid that if we hang out, you're going to make me kill a squirrel. That, and the fact that contracts keep me from posting work for the world to see.

But you know what I do like? In all your vast, lonesome expanse, I like this.

It's a start!

The Creep, and a Thank You

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Dark Horse Presents #13 is out today, with the next installment of The Creep, by John Arcudi, art by me. The story gets particularly interesting at this point, as I get to venture from the established 80's Manhattan setting and go even further with the art technique shakeup. This finishes up our run in DHP, with complete issues coming soon (with covers from some comics' favorite creators— pretty fun!). This has been a good project during a hard season of life. Along with gaining a baby and losing a brother earlier in the year, I had to make up for a pretty good chunk of lost time on the schedule. Throw in a few side-projects and mix to equal one maxed-out me. Dark Horse and my comics community have been really supportive through it all, which is appreciated. It reminds me of why I felt drawn to a career in comics: more than the work itself, I appreciate the people behind the work. Some of the kindest people you'll find.

Alright, I'm done with the mush. It's Wednesday, and the sun is out in Portland. Go buy comics.

Monster Picnic Lives

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I love comics fans.

A few years back, I wrote a sonnet for a Monsters and Dames piece (the art was in the Emerald City book, the sonnet accompanied my art print). Since printing up a bunch and selling them all away, I lost the digital file, and the sonnet.

Then this year at Stumptown, a woman named Heather told me she'd purchased that print and had it up on her wall. I told her about my misplacing the file, and a few days later, she emailed me a photo of the piece and a transcript of the sonnet. Thus, it lives, available for purchase once again.

Thanks, Heather!

 

More Creep for You in Dark Horse Presents

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The Creep DHPSilly me. I wasn't even paying attention, and then this month's Dark Horse Presents comps arrived. Here's a panel from my work in there, the second installment of John Arcudi's The Creep. The issue also has a bunch of great stuff from the likes of Carla Speed Mcneil, Steve Rude, and others. Definitely one to pick up.

Northwest Voices

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Tomorrow, I'll be in Longview, Washington, for an event with Northwest Voices, a collaboration between the Longview Public Library and Lower Columbia College bringing in local authors for workshops, discussion, signings, etc. They're having me up to teach an afternoon workshop on comics creation techniques (we'll see what we can do in an hour and a half!), and a presentation on my work at 7PM. Should be a good time! Here's the press release:

Thursday, May 24 Workshop at 3:30 p.m. in Rose Center Room 220 (limited to first 40 who sign up) Reading at the Longview Public Library at 7 p.m. in the Auditorium Come help us welcome graphic novelist Jonathan Case with a pair of events on Thursday, May 24. The first will be a workshop at 3:30 p.m. in Rose Center Room 220. The workshop will be limited to the first 40 people who sign up online through the LCC website (go to the LCC website http://lowercolumbia.edu and click on view entire calendar and then the NW Voices event on the 24th). The second will be a reading at the Longview Public Library at 7 p.m. in the Auditorium on the first floor.

Head over to the Longview Public Library site for more info.

Stumptown 2012

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It's been real, Spring Convention Season. You tried to take me away from my wife and child nearly every weekend for the last two months. You mostly succeeded. I leave you now, more machine than man. Twisted and evil. But in a good way!

Photo credit: Lindsey Ellis

Stumptown capped it all off, and it was a good ending note. Visits from wife and baby, a Dear Creature reading at Comics Underground with Dylan Meconis, meeting Michael Allred and listening to his family band, The Gear...I was even honored to pick up a couple Stumptown awards for Best New Talent (Dear Creature and Green River Killer), and Best Artist (Green River Killer). And they're the cutest awards. Just look!

 

Monsters are always the answer, and I'm glad the Stumptown committee knows that.

I put a ton of stuff out on my table, books-wise, and it hit me that it's all come out pretty much in the last six months. Dear Creature, Green River Killer, House of Night, Dark Horse Presents (The Creep).  It was kind of surprising to see it all in one place— and there's more to come this weekend, for Free Comic Book Day! If I tweeted more, people would know that they should be sick of me by now. As it is, my lack of consistent tweeting is all that keeps me in people's good graces.

Big thanks to everyone involved in this crazy Spring Convention Season. It was great, but I'm all out of words now.

Nite nite.

Dear Creature Reading TONIGHT

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Totally last-minute, because I am like that right now:

I'll be reading from Dear Creature tonight at 8PM, at the Jack London Bar in downtown Portland. In the mix: hi-res projections of my book's art, and an acting partner to help me flesh things out: uber-talented comics creator Dylan Meconis! So, if you need entertainment tonight and want to see Dylan's take on three evil crabs and a large Italian floozy, it's the THING.

Details here.

 

Eisner and Stumptown Award Nominations

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  Well, look at this. Both my books are up for some awards this season, and you can vote (if you're a comics pro for some, if you're anybody for others)! Here's the scoop:

My book with Jeff Jensen, Green River Killer, is up for two Eisner awards: Best Reality-Based Work, and Best Writer (Go Jeff!). Comics pros vote here.

Both Dear Creature and Green River Killer are up for Stumptown Comics Awards: Best Artist, Best Letterer (GRK), and Best New Talent (Me, for GRK and Dear Creature). Everyone and your relatives vote here.

Also note some of my favorite talents getting the recognition they deserve: Chris Samnee, Dylan Meconis, Vera Brosgol, Gene Yang— they all did great work this year, and deserve your votes!

 

 

Emerald City Was GOOD

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Back from Emerald City Comic Con, and what a lovely con it was. Good friends, good fans, good sales. I missed my family (first weekend away from baby), but I had David Hahn with me as surrogate kin, so that took away some of the sting. By the way, if you haven't checked out David's All Nighter yet, you should. It's a terrific return to his one-man-show cartooning; my favorite type of David Hahn comic.

A highlight was getting to meet Tom and Charlaine Jensen, and their son Mike. Such sweet people. Tom is the detective behind Green River Killer: A True Detective Story, my book with his son, Jeff. They gave me homemade cookies and a sweet thank you note for my work on the book. I gave them a look at some ridiculous art I drew for a convention attendee whose copy came with 8 pages blank in the middle of the story. Here's one of the doodles I did in the blank pages.

I also got to do a lot of fun commissions, which you can see over on the Periscope Tumblr. And I got to chat with the amazing Gabriel Hardman, who is, as you know, amazing. I even sold out of Dear Creature books!

Big thanks to everyone who made this such a great con. I'll definitely be back next year, if for no other reason than trying to outdo Ben Dewey's success. Give him a round of applause, everyone. He owned that thing.

 

Library Journal Likes Monster Loving

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This month I turn 30. The 20's were good. 29 particularly so. A new baby girl, two books published, steady freelance work, and a great road trip in our crazy old van. There she is, in all her mismatched bumpered glory. Next time, I'll post art, but for now, you get an 80's van. I think you win. If you want to win big, though, you can meet the new older me at Emerald City Comic Con, where I'll be boothing at #223. Want commissions? I will do commissions for you, sir or madam. I'll also have copies of Dear Creature and Green River Killer, plus art prints. And I'm in Monsters and Dames again, too.

Speaking of Dear Creature, it just got a starred review from Library Journal, which is a good thing. I love librarians. Someday I want to write a musical set in a library. There will be lots of soft shoe and shushing noises.

And now, I'm off to The Creep for Dark Horse. Pencils, pencils, and more pencils. I must fly!

My Gal Wants to Dark Horse All The Time

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I think everything I'm working on for Dark Horse has been announced at last (internet says so), so now I get to talk about it. A little. I'm always skittish about these things, because contract lingo says, "Thou shalt not show any portion of thy work prior to release of yadda yadda"... The great thing is, one of these books is already out in stores, so I shouldn't have to sweat showing you a morsel of my artwork.

I'm on art duties for three new projects with Dark Horse, from layouts through final color. I started them all pretty much simultaneously this October/November, alongside the release and promotion of my two graphic novels, Dear Creature and Green River Killer. Sheer madness.

Two months and almost fifty color pages later, my first baby girl arrived (January 14th), and I promptly took a month off of nearly everything. Most people say the first few weeks with baby are the hardest. Maybe it's just the contrast with this last season, but it's been (new dad smug alert) the best vacation of my life.

Anyway, the smoke has cleared, and I can talk about work again.

The book that's out in stores now is the 4th issue of House of Night, by Kent Dalian, P.C. Cast and Kristen Cast. Joëlle Jones and Ryan Hill provided art and color (respectively) for the main story, while I got to do a juicy back-story about Antony and Cleopatra (as vampires). It's what the kids want, you know.

Here's a bit of my art. It's my first color comics work to come out since 2008's Comic Book Tattoo, and I had a lot of fun with it. Cleopatra has a costume change every page or so, because, you know, she's Cleopatra.

The next project is something I'm doing with John Arcudi. We're bringing back a character he developed for Dark Horse back in the day, The Creep, and starting a new story off with Dark Horse Presents #11. That should be on sale April 18th. It's a fabulous modern noir with a great range of material to draw. From the press release:

In the summer of 1987, a young teenage boy commits suicide. The boy’s mother is unsatisfied with the police’s lack of interest in the motivation behind it, or what connection it might have to the suicide of the boy’s former best friend. She remembers that she heard an old college boyfriend of hers, Oxel, is a private detective. What she doesn’t know is Oxel suffers from a debilitating condition called acromegaly. Will the contact from his old flame be all that Oxel needs to take the case?

Finally, I also did something with Dark Horse for Free Comic Book Day, but I'll save details on that for another time. I'll just say the art style is a whimsical new direction for me, and I very much enjoy whimsy. Yes.

And speaking of Free Comic Book Day, imobethere, signing books at Portland's Things From Another World, May 5th, from 12:00 to 2:00 PM.

And that, my friends, is the Dark Horse Shuffle.

It's Harvey Time

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Baby Dorothy is all about pulling her weight in the family. Thanks, baby.

In case you're wondering— no, I didn't make that onesie. Credit goes to (awesome) Kelly, a friend/fan who sent it to us. I thought this would be the proper use of it.

Comics professionals, please consider not upsetting the baby, and nominating Dear Creature for some of this year's awards. Like the Harveys, for example!

Olympia Timberland Library Visit

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I'm back from the land of Newdad with news of an upcoming event: On February 29th (because how could we NOT do something with the leap?) I'll be at the Olympia Timberland Library at 7:30 PM for discussion, signing, and hello-how-are-yous. Can you tell I'm a little loopy? Baby. Blame baby. I sleep quite a bit, but the baby-hits put my mind in another place. It's like that penultimate scene of 2001: A Space Odyssey all the time.

ANYWAY. Here's a fantastic poster that the library put together.

A bunch of other fun events are on the horizon too. Emerald City Comic Con (Where I will have another piece in their Monsters and Dames book), Stumptown, and the new Rose City Comic Con later in the year. But you already knew that because you saw the side-bar, which is fantastically convenient for keeping up with me.

Now that I'm back from Newdad, there are a ton of great project-related things I need to talk about too, mostly to do with Dark Horse, but for now, I must go work on them, and find time to get Sarah a valentine. LIFE!

More 'Best Of' Lists for Dear Creature and GRK

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Some good news for my books this week: Joining Amazon and The New York Times' 'Best of 2011' lists are USA Today and Horror Talk (which picked both Dear Creature and Green River Killer on their horror comics list!). Very nice.

Eugene Weekly also ran a great review of Dear Creature.

At the heart of Dear Creature is the interplay of base desire and reasoned response. Grue’s entertaining quest to identify the sender of his Bardic bottles somehow makes time to comment on B-movies of the 1950s, Cold War hysteria, prejudice, immigration and the enduring powers of art and romance.

—Aaron Ragan-Fore

You can pick up signed copies of both books at my web store's Holiday Sale!