ComiCon & Dragon Con

Hey what can I say? Comicon and Dragon Con put a big crater in the middle of my year, and when it occurs to me that I should post something, anything, I tend to say: "meh".  Also I've been busy with a lot work I can't share.  My good friend Christos brought it to my attention recently that it's been awhile since I've blogged so...

Comic Con

The Big Damn Display: Last spring I watched the lovely Brittney Lee demonstrate her paper sculpting technique, where she brings a 3-D relief aspect to her already wonderful art.  Everyone was so mesmerized by her demo, that no one noticed the light bulb that went off over my head.
So I took my 'Shiny' print that features the cast of Firefly, and printed the background and each character separately, and very big, roughly 8' wide and 7' high (!) The characters were mounted on foamcore and floated  at different elevations from the background board.  And cause I can't leave well enough alone, I added flexible LED light tape for a subtle glow behind the characters.  It was all very groovy, but the trial and error took weeks, and a huge toll on my wrists and knuckles. But it was worth it every time I heard a genuine 'Ooohhh' as people passed by.  Thank You Ooh-ers!

Dragon Con

People will say some of the nicest things at shows.  It's very gratifying to hear such acknowledgement of the hours, days and weeks of hard work that I put into a given piece of art.  As the show was winding down,  I heard some very kind and rather astute words regarding my work and design choices.  I looked up and the fellow was Michael Whelan.   MICHAEL. WHELAN!  If you don't know, google him now, I'll wait.  ...So, I was seriously flustered, but I managed to get a hold of myself and not pee the carpet like a nervous puppy.  We even got to hang out for a few minutes, he showed me some of his originals including his Way of Kings cover.  Meeting your heroes can sometimes be disappointing, but not Michael - he is a class act, all one could hope for and more.   

Stan Lee

This past weekend I was at the Ace Expo, which made its debut in Albuquerque (that's right, I can spell it.)  The show organizers asked if I could do something special for the show, so I did a portrait of Stan Lee.  They wanted me to present it to him during his panel Sat morning.  I was dubious; this could be great or it could be awkward. But I went, waited in the wings and hoped for the best.  My friend and Albuquerque resident David (Brohawk) Williams called and said, "I'm on my way, I'm bringing my Spiderman costume.  You think I should wear it?" "uh sure" I said.
Moderator  Lloyd Kaufman, with a fellow dressed as the Toxic Avenger in tow, introduced Stan.  Stan commented to Kaufman "you have Toxey here, but I don't have Spidey!" I called Dave back, "get here as fast as you can!" 15 minutes later Dave walks in as Spidey just as Stan is talking about the character.  "Go, go!" I urged Dave, and up he went, to huge applause, hamming it up.  Kaufman then called me up on stage, saying to Stan that I had something for him.  "I was wondering when I was going to get an award or something!" Stan said.  It all went better than I had hoped.  He would have been polite in any case, but seemed to genuinely like it.
We got to talk a little the next day, and I'm astounded with the man's vitality, wit and enthusiasm.  He's like a human exclamation point!  The man will be 90 next year!  Great guy, great experience.

Thank You Lona J. Pidanick for taking these pics.

Back from The Calgary Expo!

The Calgary Expo show was a lot of work this year, but so much fun, and sprinkled with some nutty experiences.

 This year's exclusive was a big success and sold out.  In fact #85 of 85 went to none other than the Mayor  himself, Naheed Nenshi!  He seemed very much in his element at the show, he's kind of a cool geek.  Don't believe me? -check out his yellow All-Stars!  Smart, with a clever sense of humor, and refreshingly unassuming.   I enjoyed meeting him and wish we could have talked longer, but he's the mayor and kinda busy. 

The cast of the Guild came by and we gave them buttons that Yelena made, each button featuring a portrait of one of them. They decided to wear each other's buttons despite Jeff's objection: "I want mine!"

And here's Sandeep and me with Shat- ..okay, a guy who looked like Shatner.

Other cool experiences: Dinner with Neal Adams. A big thank you hug from Summer Glau.  Jealous? 

Less cool experiences: The poor kid who puked in front of my booth for about 10 minutes Sunday morning.  A neighboring exhibitor who played the same 30 second video, with the same cheesy music, over and over and over and...   

Thanks to Kandrix Foong and his crew who put on another great show.

And Big Thanks to all the Calgarians who were so kind to me and Yelena and made us feel so welcome.

Calgary!

The exclusive for this year's Calgary show.  100% Cintiq, baby.  These will be available at this year's show only, at booth #819.

Green Lantern

A year and a half ago I was asked by DC/Warner Bros. to do some artwork of the recently-cast Ryan Reynolds as Green Lantern.  I was to stick to the classic Gil Kane costume.  I would have liked to do more, but I was several steps removed from the real decision makers; I'm not sure what got through.  Well, it was fun to be involved with a project this cool, and I learned a lot.  Below is the key piece I did. I worked out the drawing and initial tonal work on gray paper, then transferred it to Strathmore for the color work.

I hope the movie is good. I like Ryan Reynolds for the part (although I would have preferred Nathan Fillion.) I kinda dig the designs: the suit does indeed look like it's made from alien energy, but the way it extrudes from the skin, then cracks with light coming through is kinda horrible, like a Clive Barker character.  But still, there are lots of things I love about the movie so far;  at the same time, other things - not so much.  We'll see how it holds up through a viewing of the flick.

Sidebar!

Hey, I was interviewed on my favorite podcast, Sidebar.  If you haven't heard it, well you can start here.  It's a great show run by Swain, Dwight and Adrian.  They have a real passion for all sorts of art, and you'll find the interviews insightful -maybe even mine!

Check it out here:

http://www.sidebarnation.com/my_weblog/2011/05/jason-palmer.html 

Drawing on the Cintiq

My basic process is 3 steps: 1-underdrawing, 2 -tonal (transparent color) 3 opaque hi lights.  Over the last few years, I've been using digital tools to accomplish 2 and 3 with greater frequency.  I thought I'd try to do step 1 digitally as well, so I've been drawing my recent work: the exclusive prints for this years Phoenix and Calgary shows.  On hearing this, a few people half-jokingly called me a sell-out. Other's let me know that they knew these weren't real pencil.  Um, okay, I never said it was.  Anyway, I'm having fun with the new medium.  I find that I follow the same process path, I just get there faster.