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I'm flying out to cover Image Expo and Emerald City Comic Con in Seattle, but if I was sticking around San Francisco you'd be certain to see me at Sonny Liew's book release tour stop at The Isotope. Sonny Liew's The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye has already been declared "2016's first superalitve graphic novel" by our own Kyle Pinion, great review from NPR's Fresh Air, and it's already part of the discussion for what is 2016's first comics masterpiece. What's happening and where else can you see him?

Millennials are often portrayed by the older generation – my own, to be clear – as a generation of victims. Like most cross-generational proclamations, this is a self-righteous pile of bull built from Gen Xers’ and Boomers’ stumbling reading of Millennial discourse, as well as some resentment for our own repression and the ability of […]

Comics are so expensive– the amount of commitment required to follow a few series cash-wise can abuse the wallet peaking into hundreds of dollars a month easily– which is why those reading a lot of books in print love Discount Comic Book Service, a website that allows comics fans to purchase titles at a steep discount […]

According to a report from TVline, Arrow’s Echo Kellum (You’re the Worst) has been promoted to a series regular as of season five. The actor plays Curtis Holt on the show, a character that fans might identify as Mr. Terrific. Holt first appeared on the second episode of this most recent season as a Palmer Technologies […]

Are Dan Slott (Silver Surfer) and the risk-takers at Marvel bringing a supporting Spider-Character back from the dead in the comics? Will jaded Spider-Man fans contribute enough interest to the resurrection to warrant a teaser and marketing campaign? Let’s face it, watching heroes die is just more interesting than finding a way to bring them back. While Spider-Man: Dead […]

Remember the first time you saw a baby Xenomorph burst from someone’s midsection in Alien? The moment when that monster opened its jaw only to see an even smaller head inch so close to Sigorney Weaver’s face that it made you clutch the armrest of your seat even tighter. For almost 30 years now Alien has been […]

For me a primary and powerful influence, in the past, now and no doubt the future. Carl Barks was both writer and artist and excelled at both.

"The Old Castles Secret", 1948. An all time Favorite!

Carl Barks has had a fundimental influence on my life and art.

I can only acknowlege with gratitute the breadth of this mans impact on my career.

When I was very, very young my mother read to me from the Disney Comics and Stories and duck comics of the time. Mid 60's... Maybe that was unusual. It was definitely influential... My mother read to me when I was very, very young from the Disney Comics and Stories and duck comics of the time. I liked what I was looking at and my mother reading brought the comics to life. That was probably an unusual choice of read aloud material. Disney comic books along with books of all kinds.

Barks has had a huge influence on me from the pleasure of reading and looking at his art - a master of the comic form and character expression that I consciously learned to emulate and unconsciously find myself measuring what looks right by... To the point of having one two page duck story published:

My own adequate effort

Barks was the "Good Artist" for me and my siblings, just like umpteen thousands of fans around the world. We called him the "good artist" before ever hearing the phrase at large and could tell the difference between his art and any other artists. We also knew that Barks wrote a better story than anyone when it came to Disney Duck stories. There were a lot of lazy afternoons spent reading our collections of duck stories. A lot of pleasure got from those comic books.

The intelligence, wit and down to earth-iness that Barks put into his stories resonated with us (me) in a way that no other artist/writer has come close to. Comparing the level of humanity and intelligence in the old Barks duck stories to any comic really casts a harsh light on a large amount of what is published. Particularly material directed to "kids". Barks kept it for kids, assuming that (10 year old) kids were sharp and would know something of what his duck adventures were about. Barks also presented his stories with that old fashioned adventurous spirit and cultural imperialism that was the spirit of the times (til the 70's - 80's when navel gazing, zen = no thought (no statement) and virtual reality became the safe and humane form of adventure and cultural evangelism - that would be a rant for another time...)

What I bring forward from what I learned from Barks.

Staging. 

Barks built his stories like little plays in a box. This in-a-box style of presentation is something I have come to really appreciate in artists that mastered it. The confines of a box are like the confines of a stage (or TV) making an idea work in a strictly confined area. Telling stories in the confines of multiple boxes laid out in uniform rows - is a super skill. The little stage play that goes on in the boxes is all about the characters. The box format restricts the artist to a focus on character and character in setting. The story has to be about (human) drama.

Barks stages his scenes in a way that sets characters into fields of significance.

Character. Ground. Foreground, middle and background.

Characters are often bent right into the boxes and forced to interact with their environment.

Character personality.

Using more or less standard old fashioned Disney expressions, Barks was able to project emotion with his characters. (Interrupting this train of thought - as an artist learns more about someone who inspires him and WANTS to learn more - digging into what inspired the inspiring artist is important. LEARN who your favorite artist learned from. Learn from them AND learn who they learned from. The old Disney style of creating emotional expressions has been around a long time. Sharpened by smart artists working to create a visual vocabulary that reads in motion and from a distance.) Carl Barks used the standard visual vocabulary for emotions to tremendous advantage and enhanced it with tricks of the caricature trade that have been around for even longer. He did not skimp on putting feelings on the faces of his characters. He knew the "anatomy" of his characters and could have them express emotion from any angle.

Solidity.

Its a funny thing to talk about solidity or mass or volume in a medium that is two dimensional. I am drawn to art that has (implied) volume, mass, solidity. Barks' fields of significance is enhanced by each field having a mass and weight that convinces (me) that there is depth and weight in the world he is drawing. Its not just the black cast shadows. Its the way things look like they might have something on the back side. Or the way scenery and land masses seem to have gravity.

Line.

Barks' liquid line has personality itself that adds to the whole. Clean, thick/thin lines that carry significance... That frame the space inside and have flourish. The tight constraint of that line to the service of the art is also clear. No flyaway gesture lines. Just strong contour with personality.

That would be a virtue of Barks' work that makes it outstanding. Barks did not skimp. He put in more - his readers could tell the difference. The formula artists that drew similar characters at the same time often did so with a few (skimpy) poses and expressions, leaving the viewer feeling unsatisfied. Barks shared freely - the richness of his experience and thinking.

It was a fantastic day for artful, intelligent comics when the New York Review of Books added comics to its publishing line. The focus so far is on making obscure graphic novels available again, and the March 22 release of Mark Beyer’s riotous Agony sets an interesting tone for the line. Beyer’s work, which is about the size […]

I’ve enjoyed Tim Daniel’s design work since he started working on books with current Captain America writer Nick Spencer at the Image Comics imprint Shadowline. I was even lucky enough to have him design a logo for a series I wrote once upon a time. Ahead of my upcoming, extensive piece about the state of design in […]

With the massive WonderCon hangover sweeping the internet, Marvel has something a little different to detox from Rebirth — something a bit out of the ordinary. Today’s variants from Marvel include additional costumes first appearing on variants designed by action figure variant cover artist John Tyler Christopher. Newsarama put these pieces together that are interesting because […]

Hanna-Barbera characters like you've never seen them before.

The post DC’s ‘Hanna-Barbera Beyond’ Will Remix and Reimagine Classic Characters appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

For over a decade now, Aspen Comics has been a familiar name on Comic-Con International’s program guides. It’s always one of the loudest panels of any convention even when the house is less than packed. Saturday at Wondercon was no exception. The publisher ran down a few current series while showing a few raw pages from […]

Earlier today at WonderCon, BOOM! Studios announced LUCAS STAND, an original limited series coming in June from Kurt Sutter, the creator of “Sons of Anarchy.” Shown off was the above Lee Bermejo cover for the first issue. Lucas Stand #1 (of 6) Limited Series Publisher: BOOM! Studios Writers: Kurt Sutter & Caitlin Kittredge Artist: Jesús Hervás Cover artists: Main cover: Lee Bermejo […]

Tonight fans at Wondercon got to see the entire pilot episode of Preacher. While we gather our thoughts after talking with Dominic Cooper, Ruth Negga, and producer Sam Catlin from AMC’s new show; here’s a first look at character fans of Garth Ennis story will undoubtedly recognize.

Chalk it up to weird timing or bad planning. Even before DC Comics makes all their big REBIRTH announcements at Wondercon on Saturday, the publisher didn’t mind holding panels. DC All-Access opened their big weekend. Even with such a fantastic line up of creators one has to wonder why you’d ever let the words “ALL ACCESS” […]

It's not that it's a terrible comic book -- I wish it were! Terrible comic books can be fun in their own right. It's just that it's ... fine.

After a road trip to the wildly successful Silicon Valley Comic Con, it is good to have a local con (even if it means putting up with the dreaded downtown LA traffic) this weekend. So WonderCon has moved for this year from Anaheim, which is in the middle of some heavy renovations and expansions, to downtown Los Angeles. Some will say this is good, others will say it is bad; nonetheless we shall be there ready to go on Friday.

Our booth will be set up in artist alley this year at D-16. We will being trying to cram our ever expanding wares upon a single table, which we may expand to two tables for next year. One of the new items will be 13″x 19″ sizes of some of our more popular prints due to growing interest in the larger sizes. These are printed on high quality paper and will sell for $30 apiece or 3 for $70. Due to limited space we will only have a limited amount of prints in that size available.

More to come next week as we will have a small break before we head up to Seattle for Emerald City Comicon.

– Shawn and Diana

The post WonderCon and new sizes of (certain) prints… appeared first on Ghoulish Bunny Studios.

To celebrate First Second Books and the rise of graphic novels, we thought it would be fun to have graphic novelist veteran, Leland Myrick, who has been with First Second from the beginning, and Andy Hirsch, a 2016 debut graphic novelist, interview each other.

Announcements from Diamond, Marvel, Action Lab, and Valiant Comics at the C2E2 Diamond Retailers Breakfast, including Civil War 2: Amazing Spider-Man #1, 300,000 in sales for Black Panther #1, and a major new female character for Valiant.

Check out the just-dropped preview pages from the upcoming series from Titan.

Unlike the eponymous NBC TV show, Marvel’s new Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. comic isn’t bound by budgets, cameos or contracts.  Series writer and Arrow executive producer Marc Guggenheim is using that freedom to tell an expansive, grandiose story that seeks to transform the way you experience the Marvel Universe. Following a recent editorial, Comics Beat reporter […]

Cleaver marketing? Easy way to get out of commissioning covers? Maybe a bit of both. Aspen Comics newest series, Santeria: The Goddess Kiss,  launches this week to make things even more enticing the publisher is coordinating a talent search for aspiring artists looking for a place to showcase their skills. Four of the most eye […]

Robbie Thompson first came to prominence in the nerd sphere as a writer on the long-running Supernatural TV series, but recently he jumped into the comics fold. He’s doing no less than three titles in the Spider-Man corner: Silk, Venom: Space Knight and my favorite, the all-ages Spidey. I spoke to Robbie about the transition […]

For a comic inspired by a typo, Deer Editor has already had a pretty rich history. A successful Kickstarter, especially given that the comics were only offered digitally, was conducted for the first volume. A new campaign for the sequel is currently underway. I spoke to project manager and writer Ryan K. Lindsay about building […]

Hellboy in Hell marked the return of creator Mike Mignola‘s interior art to the Hellboy Universe. The character has been in Hell since 2012, but the mini-series concludes with issue #10 four years later. EW has reported that Mignola doesn’t have an immediate follow-up to the present day version of the character. Mignola previously revealed […]