Zegas #2 made its debut recently… and it’s been reviewed!

This weekend I will be at the Stumptown Comics Fest in Portland! I’m here in the city right now, actually, making the rounds and such. I’ll be joined by Kat Roberts, who will be selling her mini comic as well as prints, and by Chris Sinderson, who will have a variety of handcrafted books and comics for sale.

ITEM! Our pal Jason Thibodeaux will be hosting our stay, which is a good way for me to see how the hell he managed to create things like this video for Japanther’s“Lil Taste” (with the help of Nightshade dynasty, of course… but still, it’s incredible.)

So if you’re gonna attend Stumptown, make sure you drop on by and say hi!

–Fiffe

You’ll recognize the trick, it’s simply one larger image broken down into pieces OR one larger image with characters moving within it . I wanted to take advantage of a double page spread to choreograph Emily Zegas’ body language  through her several moods and locales. The tricky part was making sure the eye was led exactly where it should go. Turns out the heavy lifting is done by the words, the conversations, the thought balloons. The flow goes down the panel , then up the next, then back down, etc.

You can call these my “Marcos Martin” pages. I won’t deny it, he’s been an influence for a while and I’m sure sequences like this were around at the time I was originally cooking my pages up:

Marcos has made a career of leaving his peers in the dust. He doesn’t toy with a layout, he commands it, and no one in contemporary adventure comics comes close to achieving what he achieves on a regular basis. The scene up there is just one big room in one panel, also used in a double page spread. We follow Spider-Man, our eyes being led to the right then back to the left, punctuated by inset panels.

THERE’S A TIME AND A PLACE

Another main influence on this approach is Chris Ware, another storytelling master who occasionally uses the panels to reflect different seasons, eras, or time signatures. This Big Tex page does it all.

It’s no secret that Ware had been influenced by Richard McGuire and his seminal story “Here”, from 1989…

… but the real godfather of the page-as-map is Frank King and his Gasoline Alley strip.

[Matt Seneca wrote a great piece on King over at his recently defunct column Your Wednesday Sequence. Seneca also tackled the same Marcos Martin scene I was talking about.]

GUTTERS

Going over the overblown staging in these pages reminds me of the smaller examples, the panels that are broken into  fragments in order to delay time, build tension, or reveal story details. In We3, Frank Quitely took a Grant Morrison story and took it into visually innovative territory. This modest sequence, however, is nicely paced.

Was it a callback to Harvey Kurtzman, that scene? I’d like to think so. Kurtzman was a true virtuoso of all of these narrative tics and bumps, his war comics being prime vehicles for strong and smart material. These three panels are works of beauty, captions be damned.

This batch, courtesy of Jim Steranko, works well enough but isn’t quite necessary. The image’s story does progress, and the gutter breaks do make the eye start and stop. Steranko was more than capable of managing subtlety,  and this scene certainly  tries to build up a sense of weight, but it still feels like a faint attempt.

Same here (Steranko again). As if mid-air speech wasn’t hard enough to swallow, the gutter breaks seem to be used as mere window dressing. Maybe it was to show that more… panels had been drawn? Steranko, after all, was once nearly denied payment for writing a silent page. Either way, the balance of dialogue and movement can make or break a moment; this one’s a dud.

Just one more dud. Actually, the panel break would’ve been useful if the image actually revealed something, maybe the very thing that’s being explained. I gotta admit, this is a pretty funny out of context scene, but that may have something to do with those tears. Deluxe Format tears.

Here’s a pretty simple but effective Frank Miller shot…

… and here’s another one that justifies the breakdown treatment in a different way. The gutters stagger the eyes one panel at a time while the monologue unravels at its own pace. It’s confident work, and in Miller’s pre-Sin City comics, this type of rhythm is dominant.

Oh, and punchlines. They’re good reasons to break up a panel. Julie Doucet knows the score.

BRING IT HOME

Back to the page as a setting, Gianni De Luca did some incredible, jaw dropping sequences in his time. As far as I can tell, his work was serialized in Il Giornalino. This il Commissario SPADA page is from 1979…

… but his most revered work continues to be his adaptation of Hamlet. Here’s a two page spread from Amleto, from 1976 (the entire story is made up of double page spreads, with a usual change in location per page turn). Click on it and bask in its glory.

I can’t help but think of this John Romita Jr. two pager, perhaps his most imaginative and ambitious sequence yet… and it’s only a walking figure. Such simplicity!

So there you go, a few drops of inspiration on how to stretch and maximize the real estate within an image, a panel, or a page or two. I’m not sure whether the reader should be made aware of such mechanisms, but some of these pages are too bombastic to ignore or be taken passively.

I should shut my yap. Let the work speak for itself and all that, right? Case in point, click away:

Buy Zegas #2 online or directly from me this upcoming weekend, in case you find yourself in Portland’s own comic-fest Stumptown!

–Fiffe

UPDATE: Criminally Left Out

Thanks to Marc Sobel for reminding me of this great scene by Jaime Hernandez. 

I don’t recall Jaime using this method very often but when he does, it is spot on (from Love & Rockets #29, “Flies on the Ceiling“, 1989). Calling him a master storyteller isn’t enough, so let’s just agree that the guy’s a genius. Thanks for the reminder, Marc!

First thing’s first: Zegas Number Two finally came back from the printer this week! It’s kinda difficult to contain my excitement! It looks great, and I’m really happy at how it turned out. Place your order over at our Etsy store. For more online consumption, I also made two prints to go along with the comics, as well as a shirt… A SHIRT.

I got to draw some commissions, too, as a result of the Zegas crowd-funding that ran a couple of months ago. Here’s my version of KOYAMA…

…JUNO for Alison Sampson’s ever growing collection…

…and a Paul Smith-era Storm (couldn’t help but include the rest of the team).

In the spirit of sharing, he’s a pin up I did for Paul Maybury’s D.O.G.S. of Mars (out May 2nd!)

I have to be honest, receiving Zegas #2 was cool and all, as was drawing stuff for people, but sometimes you need something more out of life. Well, I recently conceived that something and it wasn’t exactly a happy accident (I thought to combine two things – a video & a song – in order to amuse myself). I wasn’t prepared, however, to see how truly perfect they were when combined (danke, BG).

Don’t let me cheapen it more by trying to explain it.

” A lot of my life has been reacting against those fucking assholes that say ‘you could do much better.’ … Go fuck yourselves. This is who I am, this is the best I can do and if you don’t like it, drop dead.” –John Zorn

That about sums it up for now. I’ll post some Zegas preview pages soon, as well as different type of “process” post.

–Fiffe

I interviewed writer John Ostrander for a piece on the dark humor anthology comic, Wasteland, over at The Factual Opinion. In the article, Ostrander talks about his involvement in the title, as well as his working relationship with Wasteland co-writer, the late Del Close. It’s  a comic series I always return to, as it features the work of some of my favorite creators, but the most recent — and most important — detail I’ve discovered was how deeply connected Wasteland is to the art of Improv. That would make perfect sense to anyone familiar with the work of Del Close, but Ostrander shed some light on just how defined that writing dynamic was. Read the interview, then find out for yourselves how great these comics really are.

Here are some of the characters from the comic Faunamancer Domination Ascendancy written by Benjamin Marra & drawn by Michael DeForge. I’ve been gearing up to do some commission work and some fan stuff, so what better way to get into it than to do these amazingly designed characters? F.D.A. is a favorite of mine (which recently appeared in #11 here, but catch a page there), and I’d normally hope for more, except it sorta has the ultimate ending. Also, this specific cast is a mere drop in the vast sea of comics these guys put out individually. It’s sick… seriously, it’s crippling to even think how about how they must do it.

It’s finally DONE! After 30 days of biting my nails, the results came in. Y’see, for the month of January, I set up a crowd funding campaign via RocketHub to help make ZEGAS #2 happen. Just a few hours ago it was finalized: we raised enough money to help print up more copies than I projected… and YOU are responsible! I knew we’d pull through. I had faith in us.

Major thanks to every single one of you who donated. You absolutely made this thing happen, and your interest in my stuff is not something I take for granted. Seriously, thank you.

Those of you that went out of your way to mention and support the project deserve a shout out. As do the hosts of comics podcast Hideous Energy (as well as Super Cute co-creators), who went above and beyond in reviewing ZEGAS #1 and promoting the funding of #2. Listen to it here. Hell, try it here, too.

Alec Berry ran a conversation he and I typed one afternoon. I went off on a few rants but Alec was kind enough to nix the worst of it. If it doesn’t involve Jim Aparo, I probably shouldn’t talk about it to begin with. File under Interview over at Spandexless.

RocketHub’s own blog featured a brief interview with me as well.

Other nods: MTV Geek mentioned the project early on. ZEGAS #2 news caught fire and spread over to Death To The Universe & The Comics Reporter & The Comics Beat.

I can’t express my gratitude enough to those that linked, liked, poked, retweeted, mentioned, and basically spread the word. It was a fine line for me to dance across for a month, genuinely reaching out to folks while trying not to oversaturate my presence. But you couldn’t play it too cool for school, boy, because the plea had already been put out there. It was all simple, direct, and based on appreciation from both sides of the tin cup and I’m quite glad I did it.

The comic will be off to the printer in a matter of days and I cannot wait for you to see it.

Oh, and here’s the video I helped make for the fundraiser campaign. Moses T. Krikey put it all together into a slickly edited web commercial while Erik Mallo should be held responsible for the music.

ZEGAS #2!

This Spring!

Look for it!

–MF

Thank you, Deadface.

I M M E D I A T E L Y

I’ll be brief about it, but we’ll see how it goes. The first time I did this, I veered toward a specific corner of comics. It’s pretty random this time around, which speaks more to the place I’m at these days. These are all little anchors floating by on my computer screen. Now they’re floating on yours, too.

Above we have a page from Steven Weissman’s Yikes! #3, vol. 2. I like how how the one-color thing dominated indie comics in the post-Rubber Blanket 90s, and it especially worked for Weissman. His full color stuff is just as beautiful (get those early issues and you’ll see what I mean). This back cover’s a great example of that.

For some eye catching and unintentional crudeness (which perhaps was a product of its budget restraints — what isn’t?), I present: The Skull Killer.

The characters therein are preexisting pulp personas, at least the main ones are. The comic itself is… okay, written by Brendan Faukner (the only comic credit to his name) and drawn by Gary Terry (it reminds me of a Michael T. Gilbert comic inked with a brush). It’s the coloring, credited to Si & Seth Deitch (Kim’s siblings) that attracts me. The creators could probably only afford a few colors while using a press that could only sustain that amount of coloring (that’s how that works, I bet), yet they just had to make this happen. The world needed to see this comic at any cost. It’s a situation made up of the same things that made zine trading possible… y’know, the comic trading circuit from the 60s and 70s. Whether that was the case here or not, it reminds me of a bunch of kids doing it just because they can.

It’s a black and white comic, I should add, the color pages being a couple of rare treats saved for the title pages and the money shot… except this odd example of arbitrary spot coloring (see below). Now THIS I can get behind!

While we’re on the subject of gun toting, I can’t make out the signature on this pin-up…

…but I’m pretty sure it’s John Beatty (uncredited in that 31st issue of Punisher War Journal). Beatty’s doing an inky, quiet version of Michael Golden but, again, it’s the colors that create a very specific world (which may or may not have been Beatty himself). I’m liking the combination of Punisher and pink hues, actually.

Moving forward, I’ve been revisiting “The Bowing Machine”, that awesome collaboration between Alan Moore and Mark Beyer from long ago. Here’s a sampling.

It’s one of my favorite Moore stories and Beyer’s art matches it perfectly. It’s almost like he writes with the artist in mind. Moore tends to do that. It’s his thing. Read it in its entirety here if you haven’t done so already, or hunt down that issue of RAW if you really need to own it.

E L S E W H E R E

A few posts ago I mentioned some Spanish editions of comics that I had as a kid. They usually looked like this.

Nothing like this, however, which is a bit of a shame because I would love to see some Spanish Ditko comic with a red/purple Spider-Man.

There’s more where that came from.

Then this cover happened.

I like Jeff Jones well enough, I’m not a huge fan, but this cover is amazing. Everything about it I was struck by. He’s got some other classic ones, too (including the best Wonder Woman covers ever committed to paper). See them here. Oh, and check out some Kaluta splashes while you’re at it. There’s some great stuff in there.

HOW DARE YOU, NOT COMICS?

This popular blog has been profiling Susan Perl in segments. Count them: one, two, three, four. Her early work for Condé Nast publications is my favorite. It’s a good mix of raw and refined.

I also can’t seem to stop watching portions of this video masterpiece by Robert Ashley.

Speaking of things that defy you to look away…

There. I feel much better now.

–Fiffffffffe

I’ve started a fundraising campaign to get Zegas Number Two printed! The place is RocketHub, and I’m excited to get the ball rolling. I even made a cool video clip/animation for it.

Check out the video and preview art for Zegas Number Two over here at RocketHub!

The funding covers the printing cost, basically. The artwork itself is nearly done, so what you’re paying for is the comic itself (call it a pre-order). I’m also offering some prints, t-shirts, and original art in case you wanna donate a little bit more.

Since I kept the print run to the first Zegas issue really, really small, I mostly promoted it locally while trying to hit up as many comics shops across the country as I could (having it available through Etsy helped a lot, too). I don’t go through a distributor; I package & ship it all myself. Zegas was and IS print only, so no digital distribution for me, either (the comic works better that way). Therefore, its success relies on a grassroots, word-of-mouth approach. I’m trying to make this self publishing thing happen so Zegas could exist. No matter what, it’s still gotta go up against every other book, small press or not, so this is paying for its fighting chance.

Spread the word! Even if you can’t donate at this moment, I’d appreciate the word getting out any way possible!

Z E G A S Number Two… let’s make this happen, friends.

–Fiffe