Out in finer book stores everywhere today, The Sakai Project! I was lucky enough to be a part of this incredible coffee table book, compiling artwork and interpretations of Usagi Yojimbo, all to benefit creator Stan Sakai and his wife Sharon to help them through some recent medical expenses.

This will probably stand as a career high for me. Not only was I absolutely enamoured with the character of Usagi Yojimbo when I first saw him in toy form as part of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles line of toys, but this book is splitting at the seams with a who's who of comic artists. I can't possibly name them all, but there are a lot of childhood heroes here to say the least (you can see the full list of all 262 artists here). I mean honestly, I alone share a page with great artists like Sean Bahr, Jeffrey Brown and Skottie Young. Jerry Ordway is next to us, Richard Corben on the back of that and Bill Sienkiewicz (who I credit for my love of New Mutants, and for teaching me comics artists didn't all have to draw the same) is a page flip away. Never mind the fact that probably my two favourite artists today, Mike Mignola and Guy Davis both are included inside.

Artistic endeavours, and comics especially don't always come with great health benefits. Sometimes artists can barely pay their bills with the money they make, probably why so many hold down day jobs. What's really great to see, and speaks to the comics community is their willingness to step up and help out when they can. This book was published by Dark Horse Comics and produced in association with the Comics Art Professional Society (CAPS). CAPS will also be holding periodic auctions of original artwork from the book, with all proceeds going to the Sakais, so check their website for more information.

Labels: CAPS, comics, Dark Horse Comics, Stan Sakai, The Sakai Project, Usagi Yojimbo

Life certainly has taken a few interesting turns these past few months. As I'm starting a new job (working from home), my wife has started her own business (I worked on the website of course), and as new comic opportunities are beginning, one unfinished chapter has been nagging at me for quite some time...

Around the time Fablewood was just hitting store shelves, and my involvement in Popgun was coming to light, I was approached by a writer whose work I admired, and asked if I'd be interested in drawing a kid's comic for him. Now for anyone starting out, this seems like a golden opportunity. You get your name out there, you get tons of exposure, and your just steps away from quitting your day job. Right?

I have to be up front and say that I was never that naive. I loved the idea of having a whole book that I drew up on my shelf. I enjoyed this writer's work, and it would have been great to be involved with a project he was putting together. I had no allusions that I'd be rich and famous making this book. I know for every Walking Dead, there's hundreds of creator-owned books that only make a few issues before folding, if they even get off the ground in the first place.

A pretty common thing new (and old) artists in comics will see is writers approaching them promising half the rights to a creation if they'll just draw the book and get it out there. When the book isn't making any money, this is 50% of nothing. Now, I'm not necessarily against this out and out. There are different situations, different people involved and different factors in all situations. Were you to write, draw, color, and letter your own creation, and it still didn't make a cent, you'd have 100% of nothing. Sometimes, the collaboration can be a learning experience, sometimes having a team to promote something lends some synergy to the project, sometimes the project just sounds awesome. I believe it's your right 100% to be paid for the work that you do, but I also believe that waiving that right or potentially postponing it is well within reason as well. I will always entertain a pitch if it's with people I admire and respect, even if there's no money up front to do so. It's never black and white, as they say.

The other thing I have to be honest about is the fact that I worked slow. Working a day job, and having a semblance of a life means that you don't have time to sit and draw everyday, all day. Some pages can take me 5 hours, some pages can take me 10 hours. If you only have one or two hours spare time at night, well that's a snail's pace. The one thing I have always been, however, is honest about that. Whenever I enter into a new project, I let people know that I'm still working a full-time day job, and that will effect my output. So this project saw about 25 pages completed over the course of 2 years. I wasn't proud of that fact, and I'll own up to that being disappointing. To be fair, about half way through, I started to get the wind knocked out of my sails which may have slowed me down, but I'll get to that later. Recent stresses at my previous job have also been the reason the site hasn't been updated in quite a while. I think that's a fact that's shaped my style a bit. I could work day and night, trying to be as detailed or amazing as Jim Lee, but the fact is I'll never have the time. So I focus on stylizations that are perhaps easier and more natural for me.

So, as this project progressed, it became clear to me that the writer was very put upon. The whole world has conspired against him; all of the talented artists he's worked with have disappointed him, and he'd be a famous writer by now if he didn't have to deal with all the nonsense around him. There was not a pleasant thing to be said about anyone who he was working with at the time, some of them artists I've admired for years. In fact, he had had (and has had since) some pretty public falling outs with artists he's worked with. Now, I'm a huge fan of music, and I've always said that there are artists whose work I'd buy sight unseen, but I'd probably never want to meet them. The art can sometimes be sullied by the personality. That's what happened to me. The idea of completing this project, with someone who didn't seem like he wanted to be there, who didn't have a single encouraging thing to say (I can only imagine what was said about me), was waning. So I manned up, and bowed out, freeing the writer to find someone else to complete the project. Quite a bit of vitriol, and threats of finding some kid out of college who could complete it in three months, and I was free to move on. So I did.

Some time later, as positive press about the writer's other books was coming out, I dropped him a note, asking how things were and congratulating him on everything that was coming out. Again, I always did enjoy his work. What came next shocked me. I was offered a "work for hire" arrangement to move the project forward (something I had just assumed had happened without me). This took the shape of 5% of the movie rights to the project, or $100 to sign over the concepts and character designs I had come up with. I was stunned. First, I couldn't imagine a new artist wanting to come on board and not take a crack at their own designs: I didn't create Spider-Man... these weren't iconic designs, just some people, locales and creatures I was personally proud of. Next, I was insulted. Doing the math again, 5% of nothing is still nothing, and $100 hardly seemed worth it. So I declined, explained I'd rather just hang on to the designs for the creatures etc., and that a new artist would probably be chomping at the bit to start over. A lot of the concepts I came up with actually influenced and changed key moments in the story. I know a lot of artists would love that opportunity.

The response I got was expected, but disappointing none the less. I really hadn't emailed to drudge up all that nonsense again, just to pass on my congratulations. I recognize that passing those designs on would be a great wrap up point and way to allow the work done not to be wasted. However, I took issue with the fact that that work could be so under valued. I offered to discuss a reasonable value for those designs, as well as the concepts I contributed that helped shape the story, but received no response.

I sat on those concepts for over two years. It wasn't until the writer made headlines this past March with some shady Kickstarter practices around another one of his other projects, and that I saw how he had respected that artist (of whom I'm a huge fan), that I decided to put up my concepts, designs and finished work for everyone to see. I can't see why I should let the work I did go to waste, just because of the sour way things went down. I may re-use some of the creature designs I did in future stories. A lot of the design work was done independent of any story elements laid out. It was done more as a world building exercise than as a direct result of the script (of which there was only 10 or so pages at the beginning). I also ran with some concepts based on the ideas of the book, sort of suggestions for locales or characters met along the way.

You can view everything in the comics section of the website under "Unfinished Comics" (hopefully the only entry going forward), or by clicking here.

As I'm moving forward with life, and enjoying the experience, it is nice to get this weight off my chest and some of this work that I've always been proud of out in the open.

Labels: comics, Escalator, the future

One very taxing project at work and a few busy weekends and I've let my intentions of finishing one piece a week go completely off the rails. However, in this case it's given me some time to think. A friend commented once that they enjoyed the fact that I can self-evaluate and try to learn from it, at least in regards to my art. So that's what I've been doing recently.

I started this blog roughly five years ago after a long lapse from art, mostly through University (full time classes and work will do that). Comics were just a glimmer in the distance. Until expanding my horizons, and discovering things like the Flight anthologies, I thought I had to draw like Jim Lee to even break into comics. For the longest time now, I've been busying myself with what I call "tiny victories"; small, digestible chunks of "success" to trick me into thinking I'm accomplishing something. This has taken the form of an admittedly poorly drawn web comic, submitting finished art to forums, Drawer Geeks, deviantArt; anything at all. I also have a bad habit of taking on busywork, namely agreeing to work with any writer who asked. Not that any of these things are bad per se, but they are distractions from bigger picture items.

From writing lyrics in my high school band, to drawing comics, to all the media I consume in my spare time (movies, tv shows, video games, music), the theme has always been the same: storytelling. I've got characters and ideas running around in my head at all times. They've kept me up at night, distracted me countless times, and never seem to want to calm down. So what have I done about it? Taken every opportunity I could to put off putting pen to paper. Why would I do that?

The same reason I've put off or walked away from all other things I've really cared about doing: being scared to the core of failing.

Even when getting stories published in Fablewood or Popgun, and getting generally positive feedback, it was easy to shrug off as just being a small part of a whole. I've never had to stand on my own with only my work to bolster a project. The irony there of course is I can't think of anything more satisfying: putting yourself out there and having some measure of success doing something you love.

So here's what I'm going to do... I will still try to produce something each week. I may try my hand at single page comics, using Illustration Friday topics as a jumping off point. If not doing that, I will be working away at my own stories, finally getting these characters out of my head and running around for everyone else to see. No current idea how or when these ideas will see the light of day, but I have a few ideas. No more busywork; all my tiny victories will be my own, failure be damned.

Labels: Art, comics, the future

In attempt to get myself back in a groove, I very briefly toyed with the idea of doing an ink sketch a day this month. However, I think this is ultimately counterproductive, and doomed to failure. I can be prolific and feel rushed, or take my time and learn from each drawing; I can't do both.

These three drawing represent three distinct styles I find myself gravitating towards, but I couldn't say offhand which if any I prefer. Each has its merits and weaknesses. The first is a very quick character design trying a completely new style and toying with distorted anatomy. The second was a character design I loved, for a comic story that I enjoyed but never completed, aimed at an anthology I believe will no longer be coming out. However, I think I enjoy the last one the best. This was based on a picture I took at the zoo of a red panda (or Firefox). Believe it or not, he's not falling off the tree branch, but sleeping.

Back to the drawing board...

Labels: comics, crow, firefox, ink, red panda

So I'm a little late to the game on this news (I was on vacation at the time -- California, absolutely gorgeous), but Popgun 3 won the Eisner award for best anthology!



It's great to be a part of such a talented group of people. Some of the stories in the Popgun series have been among my favourite short comic stories. It is very surreal to be included among them. It's also very surreal to learn that Thomas Jane presented the award (something I'm sure my wife will enjoy). We've been enjoying his television series "Hung" quite a bit.

Congratulations to the editors, Mark Andrew Smith and D.J. Kirkbride, and all the creators who helped make Popgun great. If you like, you can even read my short story, "The Last Voyage" online, lettered by Thomas Mauer.

Labels: comics, Eisner Awards, Popgun, The Last Voyage

The new web site design is finally up! I've been plugging away at this one here and there for a while, so it's nice to finally get it going. I'm hoping this is more accessible, with a bit more leeway to make changes in the future. I've added links to my deviantART, and Twitter accounts. For some reason, I've never thought to link to these here before. I've got some more things I want to get up on the site, as well as revamp how I handle mobile traffic, but for now this should do. If you're reading this on the RSS feed, please stop by and poke around.

In other news, it looks like my involvement in "Don't Get Sucked Under the Escalator!" has come to a close. No need to get into the specifics, but it does look like the project will be completed with an entirely new artist. As for what my next project is, I have a few ideas, but I'll post more when I have more to say. In the mean time, I thought I'd post some of the finer moments from my work on Escalator. These are just snippets of pages, character designs and ideas I was rather proud of. Enjoy!

Labels: comics, Escalator, Illustrator, Photoshop, Web Site Design

It's official! Popgun 3, in which my short story "The Last Voyage" appears, is up for an Eisner! Obviously, since my story was only four pages, it's tough to feel too much pride in the nomination, but being a part of such a project was reward in and of itself.

Labels: comics, Eisner Awards, Popgun, The Last Voyage

Here's some more recent ink work I've been doing in the spare moments on my lunch hour. The first is a failed attempt at a design for a longer story I had planned for Popgun a while back. Never came to be, and may end up finishing it someday.

The second one is a small character that fits into a world I had always pictured as a graphic novel, but there's holes in the premise I've yet to be able to adequately fill, so it's always been on the back burner.

The final one is a character who fits into a story that's almost fully fleshed out in my mind. I'd love to tackle it after my current obligations are complete, but we'll see where things are then.

I had planned out a tutorial on preparing line work for coloring in Photoshop (at least the method I use), but I'm afraid I just don't have the time to give it the proper attention at the moment. It's on my "to do" list though.

Labels: comics, graphic novel, ink, Popgun, robots

...does whatever a spider can! Not my usual thing, but a fun departure. Broke out some of the stronger crayons in the color palette as well for this one. Just trying new things all around. This was for Drawer Geeks.

Labels: comics, Drawer Geeks, pen and ink, Photoshop, Spider-Man

Alright, now that I've got some life changes tidied up, I'm back in the game! I've been working away on "Don't Get Sucked Under the Escalator", and I think I just drew the best page I've ever done. Hopefully I'll keep saying that as the pages keep coming. Unfortunately, that's going to be a ways off until anyone can see that book in finished format.

So what can you take a gander at? How about Popgun Volume 3? That's right, I have a short story in Popgun! It's a small one titled "The Last Voyage", and lettered by the always awesome Thomas Mauer.


I don't want to give anything away, but let's just say it plants some seeds. Here's the cover (by Tara McPherson, who I've always enjoyed):
Here's the absolutely staggering in a "How the hell did I end up a part of all this awesome" sort of way, list of creators:



I've set up a new section on the website for comics. You can just click Comics at the top to get to it. I'll be posting to links to the books I've done, where you can get them, and any other information I can scrape together. I may also look into getting some other cool things in this section.

Finally, while we're on the topic of comics, do yourself a favor and check out Mark Andrew Smith (also writing "Don't Get Sucked Under the Escalator") and Matthew Weldon's New Brighton Archeological Society.


It's a kids graphic novel, and it's exquisitely done. The story is full of adventure, and the art is phenomenal. It never once talks down to the audience, which I think is the way to go for kids comics, making them open to all audiences. A great book, and well worth your time.

Alright, I think that should about do it for comics. For now...

Labels: comics, Escalator, New Brighton, Popgun

I've just recently seen proofs for the letters of a short story I wrote and drew, coming out in an anthology from a publisher I totally geeked out to as a teenager. I've also recently finished colors on a two page spread I think is the best work I've done up to this point, for a graphic novel I'm working on, with a writer whose work I admired long before getting the opportunity to work with him.

I love comics.

Labels: comics, Esclator, Illustrator, Photoshop

Here are some of the things I've been working on. Character designs for a short story:





And a very quick color test for that same short story:


The last two Drawer Geeks, "Lone Ranger" and "Dinosaurs":

Labels: character design, colour, comics, Dinosaurs, Drawer Geeks, goat, Illustrator, Lone Ranger, pen and ink, Photoshop

I keep forgetting to mention that you can now order Fablewood online, as well as at your local comic shop. You can get it at Amazon.com (sorry, none at Amazon.ca), although their stock seems to fluxuate a bit. You can also always snag a copy directly from the Ape Entertainment online store. Also, here's another review from Sequential Tart.

Labels: anthology, comics, Fablewood

I've been very busy in my spare time (still got that day job), so I haven't had a chance to post much. I've got a few different things on the go right now, but the biggest one is a book called "Don't Get Sucked Under the Escalator" with Mark Smith (Amazing Joy Buzzards, Aqua Leung). Pretty exciting, and a great story. Here are some promo pieces I put together recently to sort of introduce the story.





Here is my entry for this week over at Drawer Geeks. The topic was "Triplets".

Labels: comics, Escalator, Illustrator, pen and ink, Photoshop, Triplets

Fablewood is available in better comic stores everywhere! I have a copy myself and it looks great. It's still very surreal to see my little story published, let alone along with so many talented artists and writers. Here's hoping it's a sign of great things to come. Thanks so much for everyone who supported the project, and to William Ward for all the hard work he put into making this project a reality. Here are some more reviews:

Wednesday is My Sabbath
Ain't it Cool News
Comics Bulletin

Labels: anthology, comics, Fablewood, fantasy, review

I did a pinup for the book "Aqua Leung", coming out later this year by Mark Andrew Smith and Paul Maybury. The short story in Popgun Vol. 1 was awesome, so I had to take a crack at drawing the character. Inked in Illustrator, coloured in Photoshop. Enjoy!

Labels: Aqua Leung, comics, Illustrator, Photoshop, pinup

The first volume of the Fablewood Anthology, which includes my story "The Spirits & The Woods" is available to pre-order, and appears in this month's Previews. It should be in stores around January 30th, 2008. I cannot express how utterly exciting this is for me. The stable of talent in this anthology is really phenomenal, and it is an honor to be a part of it. Here's the official word:

FABLEWOOD GN VOL 01
NOV07 3306 (Page 208. Page 16 in the order form Catalog.)

Softcover, 144 Page Full-Color
$19.95

FABLEWOOD compiles the talents of up-and-comers like Ryan Ottley (Invincible, Superman/Batman Annual #1), Manny Trembley (Panda Xpress, Sam Noir: Samurai Detective), Joe Infunari (Oni Talent Search, Borrowed Time), J.P. Ahonen and Sarah Mensinga (Flight 4) with talented newcomers like Chris Studabaker (Howard E. Day Prize Nominee), Kevin Crossley (Event Horizon), Axel Machain (Metal Hurlant), Joe Suitor (Popgun Anthology) and more.

Our longest FABLEWOOD story “Under the Midnight Sun” was nominated for the prestigious Howard E. Day Award. Comic legend Dave Sim (Cerebus) stated that "through a balance of pencil and ink on the interior pages and Christopher Studabaker's evocative, austere and expressionistic dialogue and narration, it's a very successful experiment."

http://www.ape-entertainment.com
http://www.fablewoodcomic.com

Labels: anthology, comics, Fablewood, fantasy

So I've been sitting on this news for a while now, but I've been given the go ahead to make an official announcement. The story that I've mentioned working on, now called "The Spirits & The Woods", (here and here) has been officially accepted into the Fablewood Anthology from Ape Entertainment.

This is a tremendous opportunity, as it means my first published work will be included in a fantasy anthology compromising quite a stable of talent. Some of the artists involved include Ryan Ottley, Manny Trembley, JP Ahonen, Chris Studabaker, Sarah Mensinga, Joe Suitor, Kevin Crossley, Joe Infurnari, and a host of others. The book is scheduled for a Winter 2008 release, and I'll keep you posted as I know more.

Labels: anthology, comics, Fablewood, published

Another character sketch. I'm toying with the idea of entering a submission for a fantasy comic anthology, so I'm trying to get my head in that mindset. Comments and criticisms welcome!

Labels: character design, comics, fantasy