Tag Archives: Comics

We’re Doing a Magazine

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Hey gang.

We’ve been steadily doing nothing for in these last couple of months of 2013. It’s been irking me tremendously. We’re in a constant rut between lack-of-motivation and time issues and it’s been effecting this project to the point I can no longer evidently hide it and I’m slightly embarrassed.

After talking with Estevan, we decided to take a shot at creating a magazine and releasing it…whenever. Most likely monthly, but promises are hard to keep when you’re lazy.

This magazine will be simply titled “Drawn Words,” and it will feature multiple comic artists and illustrators, as well as indie-comic reviews, interviews, and other tidbits. Possibly more outside of the comic realm come next issue.

We’re really excited to be presenting this magazine that will be debuting this weekend. We’ve worked hard on it these past two weeks.

We are having a call for submissions to comic book artists, illustrators, and writers. We will be taking submissions for doodles (rough sketches, preferably uncolored) for a section in our magazine, reviews (not limited to comics, but limited to things with high artistic merit), short comics (3-panel or 3-pages, it’s all good here), and editorials/features. Anything anyone would like to submit to us, even a simple drawing, can be sent to me at kevin (at) drawnwords (dot) com. This magazine will strive for a long while if we can have more people in on this project.

We’re trying to showcase the greater underground of comics and illustration. We’re releasing our first issue soon. It’ll be small, but there will be more to come in the second edition.

- Kevin

Orlando Comic Expo 2012: Success

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Drawn Words recently attended 2012′s Orlando Comic Expo on September 23. Loads of fun. There’s nothing like going to a small comic book convention the weekend of your payday and spending a third of your check on old smelly comics and mint-in-box toys you’ll never open and fully enjoy. Not that I need enjoyment from toys at 21-years-old by playing with them or anything, but toys are toys. Either way, I purchased a bunch of comics and toys this that have lasted me a while’s worth of entertainment.

This con’s guests included Bob Camp, Christian Slade, Ron Wilson, Ben Templesmith, Tim Townsend, Richard LeParmentier, Richard Livingston, and Nalini Krishan. Honestly, four of these guests I’ve heard of prior, so saying hi and passing out business cards about Drawn Words was an opportunity to network and learn a little bit about these folks.

A huge deal for both Estevan and I (Estevan came out later in the day) was meeting Bob Camp, co-creator, writer, storyboard artist, director, producer, and voice actor of The Ren & Stimpy Show. The Ren & Stimpy Show is the absolutely pinnacle of 90′s animation, also being one of the biggest influences in my life as far as creative endeavors go, and a huge childhood memory of mine. This made fart and pee pee and poo poo jokes okay. This showed Nick that kids loved seeing boogers being flicked at each other. It also proved that adults could have fun watching cartoons too, putting them in a trance of weirdness and mature humor at points. That blend is something several cartoons today are now trying to capture. Hell, Estevan and attempted that feel with our cartoon pitch to Nick earlier this year. So just saying hi to Bob Camp today really made my fucking day. We talked for about 15 minutes and I realized how much of a cool guy he is. Camp is a very passionate man about his projects and characters.

Sitting right next to Camp’s booth was Christian Slade, author of Top Shelf Comix’ Korgi series. This was an odd meeting, as I had no idea that a Top Shelf published author would be attending such a small comic Expo in Orlando. I haven’t met any comic authors I’ve actually thoroughly enjoyed or been heavily following before, but I do follow Top Shelf a LOT, so I immediately recognized Slade’s cover for Korgi when I saw it. I introduced myself, we talked about stuff, and I found out he actually lives less than 15 minutes from me.

Like, what? Really? I’m over here in Orlando complaining that Orlando isn’t into the type of comic culture I’m into and this man sits within a 15 minute drive of my house, producing his buns off on a comic book title I’ve actually heard of and am impressed by. That was surreal!

Both Camp and Slade are incredibly nice folks, and Estevan and I are happy we met them. Their panel really opened my eyes to a lot of things dealing with cartooning and animation in general. Most of all, they took cartooning, comics, animation, and film in a serious way, which is something I enjoy hearing from other people. I love seeing passionate people talk about their art mediums, why they chose it, and why they still with it. Even through the technology advances in the years, they’re still sticking to pen and paper. That’s something special. The roots will never die. Not if there are faithful folks like them still existing to wield those tools.

Estevan met up later in the day and I suggested he enter in the artist throwdown competition. The contest involved all artists drawing around the same theme, which was “Wolverine drinking a beer.” The winner would be announced at 4 PM. Estevan started drawing at 3:35 PM while we were at Arby’s entered in around 3:5something PM, and won second prize! The drawing was kept by staff to post on their official website, but here’s a closer look at it.

I also bought a ton of comics. Some trades of 100 Bullets and Dark Tower, Guardians of the Galaxy, and check this rad old shit out!

Interview: Top Shelf Kid’s Club Author, Jess Smart Smiley

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Hey gang. I’m pretty excited to present to you an interview Estevan and I worked on about Jess Smart Smiley, whose first book, Upside Down: A Vampire Tale, released early this month of October. Also, consider this article an entry for the Halloween month. Estevan had fun creating a comic to accompany the interview I did with Jess, so we both hope you enjoy reading this piece as a whole. Big thanks to Jess Smart Smiley for doing this with us!

DW: Let’s kick this off with an easy and annoying one. What is Upside Down: A Vampire Tale all about?

JSS: It’s about 144 pages. Get it? (Insert rim shot here) Okay, seriously — Upside Down: A Vampire Tale is about a friendly boy vampire named Harold. Harold isn’t the neck-biting kind of vampire, but a chocolate-chomping, syrup-sipping, candy cane-crunching vampire. In fact, he loves candy so much that he ends up losing his teeth and running away in shame. He meets up with Vermillion, the last witch on earth, and she just happens to hate vampires. There are also bats and a mad scientist that keep the book rushing toward the exciting ending!

DW: Your style of illustrating is colorful, simple, and extremely charming, so it naturally fits with the style of the children’s comic you’re readying to publish on Top Shelf Comix this October. Were there any kind of tweaks you had to make in your style or illustrating for readying up for this project, or did you always have a children’s story planned in your head to publish all along?

JSS: Thank you! I’m always looking for new and better ways to draw things and add to my visual vocabulary. When I decided to work on Upside Down I had a three-color palette in mind that I wanted to try out. I asked myself, “What if the entire book was colored in black, white, and halloween green?” It made me look at my drawings a little differently, knowing that placing one green object next to another green object wouldn’t be as striking as placing green next to black, or black next to white would be. Each panel and page was like a little puzzle, figuring out the best way to place colors. It helped me see that comics are as much about design as they are about the drawings.

I also kept the drawings simple and playful because they seemed to fit the overall tone of the story, which is dark, but really playful. If I had drawn everything photo-realistically, it just wouldn’t have the same impact. Imagine Scott Pilgrim drawn in the style of Watchmen, or Batman drawn like Spongebob Squarepants. Bob are valid forms of drawing – but it just wouldn’t be appropriate.

DW: What is the best part about using comic books as your outlet, especially with children in mind?

JSS: Comics are a great way to tell stories, while still leaving room for the imagination to fill in what happens between panels and pages. I love the immediacy of comics – how readily a message can be communicated in a panel, and still leave plenty of room for subplots and foreshadowing.

DW: What was your personal planning process for Upside Down: A Vampire Tale? Did you have the story planned out already or did you work another way around tackling it?

My one goal for the year I made Upside Down: A Vampire Tale was to finish the book completely, as best I could, and to send it out to my dream publisher, Top Shelf Productions. I had never made a comic longer than 20 or 30 pages before, so I knew that I had to break down the book into manageable pieces in order to finish it.

In a nutshell: it all started with a drawing of a vampire in my sketchbook. I wasn’t looking to make a book or do anything with vampires – I just thought it would be funny to draw one that lost his teeth. I started coming up with more ideas and picking the ones I liked best, and connecting them in ways that built a rough story arc. I wrote out all the main action for the book, and used that as a reference for writing and drawing the rough draft for Upside Down: A Vampire Tale. Once I had worked out the action, dialog, story and composition of each panel on each page, I moved on to the final. It was one of the most daunting tasks I’ve ever taken on, but after the drawing the first page in ink with a brush, I got into the flow and drew, drew, drew. I scheduled a few hours each day to draw the book, and I drew every single day, until I had finished drawing the last page. I scanned everything into the computer and spent some time coloring everything in black, white and halloween green, and then looked over the book several times before sending it to Top Shelf, to make sure everything looked right.

DW: It’s noted that this is book one in the series for Upside Down. Do you already have all the future books planned out, or are you still unsure of when to end it all?

JSS: Ah! You noticed that this is book one. Ten points for the Drawn Words crew! Yes – when I was talking with Top Shelf about Upside Down: A Vampire Tale, they asked if I had more stories within the Upside World that I wanted to make. I’m not sure how much I can share about the book, so let’s just say that Upside Down: A Vampire Tale is just the beginning for Harold and his friends. (Suspenseful music!)

DW: The Tattoo Club is such an incredibly cool idea, and I’m very glad people are still keeping the spirit of temporary tattoos alive. I love the idea of different artists contributing to creating new temp tats. How did the idea first come about?

JSS: Right on! I really like Tattoo Club, too. Earlier in the year I was making some temporary tattoos for my Comics Grab Bag (collection of short comics), and illustrator Julia Green made the comment that she had always wanted to make her own temporary tattoos. I thought it was a shame that such a thing didn’t exist, and I immediately started thinking about other incredible illustrators who would undoubtedly make phenomenal drawings that could be used as temporary tattoos. Julia and I launched the project on Kickstarter, in the hopes of getting the needed funds to make it happen, but we didn’t reach our funding goal. I think a lot of people really dig the novelty of the idea, as well as how collectible the tattoos could be. We’ll see if we’re able to revive the project in the months to come.

DW: I’ve seen some talk about you seeing UFOs/aliens via your Twitter and other interviews. What’s with all the sightings?

JSS: At the risk of sounding like a complete weirdo: aliens are real. I’ve had a series of interesting experiences with them and I can verify that they are real, they are green, and they fully intend to take over our planet. Even in my own encounters I had never seen a UFO — until recently, and it was the strangest thing. I was in a parking lot, talking with my friend, and this object came out of the night sky and into the light of a street lamp. It must have been 30 or forty feet above us and it looked like a paragliding chute, but without any lights and without a passenger. It moved just slowly enough that we could see what it looked like, and then it slipped back into the night, straight on course to its unknown destination. Bizarre.

DW: Is there anything for fans to look forward to in the future of Jess Smart Smiley?

JSS: Not really. I’m ready to pursue a career in electrical engineering. Just kidding — I’m working on my first children’s book right now (to be published next year), and am developing a brand-new comics series that I’m just aching to share.

You can check out my blog to get some behind-the-panels looks at the making of Upside Down: A Vampire Tale, as well as my thoughts on other creative processes. There’s also a facebook group for Upside Down, where I’ll be posting downloads and goodies for fans of the book. Thanks!

Comic Review: Ed Piskor’s “Wizzywig”

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Ed Piskor’s graphic novel debut is perhaps one of the most fascinating stories I’ve ever had a chance to read. Oddly enough, its subject matter is something I’d never before imagined to be so intriguing: phone phreaking, computer hacking, and running from the authorities being one of the two. The story explains a simple, precise, yet still slightly fictionalized account of a character named Kevin “Boingthump” Phenicle, and explains the trouble and cult status he gains from being one of the earliest and notable phone phreakers/hackers in the nation.

Ed Piskor, creator of “Wizzywig”

Piskor uses his underground comix charm, initially brought to life in his earlier works with Harvey Pekar in American Splendor and Macedonia, to flawlessly illustrate the life and hardships of Kevin Phenicle. This is Piskor’s first full-fledged writing effort, yet it does not stumble a smidgen as he manages to engulf the reader in a vivid story that captures the very essence of curiosity a hacker feels. From the very first chapter of Wizzywig, you will be surely hooked.

Ed Piskor created Kevin Phenicle to be a combination of several major hackers in real-life, such as Kevin Mitnick, Kevin Poulsen, Emmanuel Goldstein, Joybubbles, and a dozen of other iconic figures in the subculture. Phenicle is used as sort of a representation of the early hacking community. Through “Boingthump,” we can feel how most of those individuals perceive their work, as well as learning their social mannerisms and hacking traits.

 

In Wizzywig, we follow Phenicle at his early stages disassembling several devices to discover out how they tick, and eventually finding loops and hacks that make him curious to find out more. He starts to phone phreak, whistling to make long distance calls into payphones. Then we see him evolve into a computer hacker, creating a virus and hacking into databases through the very earliest stages of the Internet. We even see him rigging telephone contests hosted by radio stations. Eventually, we understand why Phenicle does the things he does, rooting for this anti-hero but also fully comprehending the criminal mischief the character creates.

One thing Piskor did very well with Wizzywig was not glorifying the act of hacking and phreaking that Phenicle did. As much as you may find yourself rooting for the main character, you know from the very start that Kevin is seen as a criminal, and his jail time is apparent in early pages of the graphic novel. To help progress this idea even further, Piskor tied in fictional, yet still slightly true, news reports and other events in between chapters and panels to explain how Phenicle was seen to the public eye, what friends and family thought of the situations Kevin was in, and most important, how Boingthump himself felt about his own doings.

 

The sole constant that remains throughout the entirety of Wizzywig is the feeling of curiosity. Kevin Phenicle is a charming person with an extreme case of curiosity, which fuels his passion for hacking and uncovering more. The reader will definitely experience this emotion while reading Wizzywig, speeding through pages until the end to see how Phenicle handles jail, hacking, and running from the law. This is a very unique graphic novel that should absolutely be read by any person who thirsts for freshness in modern comics.

Written by Kevin Cortez
Illustrated by Estevan Sanchez 

Giveaway: Lauren Barnett’s “Me Likes You Very Much”

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Hey gang.

We recently reviewed Lauren Barnett’s debut full length comic book and best-of collection, “Me Likes You Very Much.” If you’ve read our review on the book you already know how much we enjoyed it. If you haven’t, take four minutes of your time to read over our short review of Barnett’s title.

We’re giving a lucky couple of our readers a signed copy of the comic book for absolutely free, given they do the following:

  1. “Like” our Facebook page.
  2. Retweet this specific tweet about our giveaway.
  3. Comment this post.

That’s. It.

Just do one of the above actions and you’re in. Already “like” us? Reteweet us. Comment our post. Do whatever — more entries means more chances of Estevan and I seeing your entries and choosing you. Or not. We’re really just choosing a random two people from any of these three ways of entering and mailing the signed off books to them.

We have two copies of the book signed by Barnett herself that we’d love to give away for lucky folks to enjoy. This giveaway is simple, but please make sure you have a way of us contacting you. If you comment on this post, don’t use a fake email like poopoo@gmail.com (unless that’s your actual address) unless you want us picking someone else. Other users will be contacted via Facebook and/or Twitter.

Good luck. The giveaway starts immediately and the date we choose winners will be exactly two weeks from now: June 9 at midnight.

Comic Review: Lauren Barnett – “Me Likes You Very Much”

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Existing as an artist or writer on the Internet can sometimes be very irritating. Anyone can become a blogger nowadays, thanks to BlogSpot and WordPress, even if they have absolutely no content with actual substance to contribute to the web. Likewise, this is said the same for artists and hand-drawn comics. Tumblr makes throwing content and original photography/artwork around much easier, and somewhere between the reblogging and “liking,” credit is loss and art is somewhat devalued, as it becomes merely a pretty image to gawk over for a split second of an attention span. This can be especially true with web-comics.
I’m not very fond of web-comics, but I have read plenty to make me laugh. Great web-comics tend to get lost in the slew of clones and cookie-cutter copy art presented, while some creators have issues being consistent with humor and content that can ultimately lose the attention they deserve at times. For the most part though, I’ve seen too many comics on the Internet that aren’t amusing at all and plain out suck total ass.

Thankfully, Lauren Barnett’s web-comics don’t suck total ass and are actually pretty damn funny. Her collection of hand-drawn comics are presented on her blog and her archives date back all the way to 2007. Fortunately, Hic & Hoc Publications released a huge chunk of those comics in a collection titled Me Likes You Very Much, featuring multiple comics by Lauren from 2008 through 2012.

What kind of comics am I talking here? Cute ones. Lauren Barnett draws various fruits and animals throughout her 1-4 panel comics, each with its own little face and an adorable stance. She also throws in a couple of curse words in some panels to turn the cuteness factor up a bit. That doesn’t distract from the actual content though, as Lauren pokes fun in each comic at everyday situations and clumsiness in short, tiny conversations. She also flawlessly showcases these daily awkward affairs in a very simple way, conveying sometimes hard to explain happenings in an effortless fashion.

Through each page’s few panels and talk bubbles, Barnett exploits conversations that most experience every day through witty comments and snappy remarks. These comics include certain “I wish I would’ve said that,” moments and real life frustrations. Hell, as adorable as the comics may seem, Barnett still comes across as a realist, lacing complicated thoughts and emotion behind adorable animals and characters.

It does seem odd and a bit out of place as an idea, but combining cute animals and fruits with real life stories of sarcasm and crudeness really just flow natural with Barnett. Because of this, Me Likes You Very Much is an exceptionally charming collection of comics (or web-comics, whatever you may see them as in book form) presented in a pretty unique way that needs all the praise it can get. This comic will go under the radar for sure, but this comic collection is something you surely do not want to miss. Her 187-page book contains enough laughter to motivate readers to share with friends and re-read over and over again, while the blog will definitely become a new addiction for new fans to hold over until a new effort arises.

Writing by Kevin Cortez
Illustrations by Estevan Sanchez