Friday, October 29, 2010

Ashella no. 2


The second installment of my weekly strip Ashella.

Monday, October 25, 2010

Miscellanious Mondays #1


Even though today's almost over, I feel it's as good a time as any to launch a new feature: Miscellaneous Mondays. Miscellaneous Mondays will focus on works of art from various aspects of my artistic something-or-other, be they sketches, digital paintings or just about anything else.

Without further ado, here is the very first Miscellaneous Monday image.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Ashella no. 1


Here's the first installment of my webcomic series Ashella. A weekly series about a young girl's struggle for acceptance as she copes with a new set of pyrokenetic powers. But hey! No need to give everything away just yet.

Friday, October 15, 2010


Something that hopefully both sides can enjoy.

Friday, October 8, 2010


This was going to be a page for a minicomic that I was doing; but eventually, I decided that the best thing to do would be to focus on school. Still, as a splash page, I think it's kinda cool, and just basically wanted to share it as a complete illustration on its own.

I was going to just basically hand it out to random people at APE, but I'm not even sure I'm going, and I don't have a booth or anything. I think it would be more valuable to just go to the various workshops they'll be offering. That and the indie mini-comic and a story of a superheroine fighting a giant mechanical ape just don't go together.

Let this serve as all that remains of a really wonky mini.

Friday, August 27, 2010

It's been a while since I uploaded anything. Heck, I didn't even brag about how I met Stan Lee at Comic-Con. Well, in any event, here are some character designs I came up with for a minicomic I'm planning to finish by the middle of October. Nothing major, it's really kind-of like a local band toting around their EP or something. By the way, why the Hell was that all underlined and now I'm suddenly in a different font?



Friday, June 18, 2010

Chip Kidd at Cartoon Art Museum

As many of you know (or as many of you would know if I had a large following), I am a volunteer at the Cartoon Art Museum in San Francisco. Last night, we were fortunate enough to host a presentation by Chip Kidd, author of Mythology: the DC Comics Art of Alex Ross, Batman Collected, and most importantly, Bat-Manga: the Secret History of Batman.

As someone who considers myself fairly knowledgeable about the Caped Crusaider--i.e. not, "he's cool cuz he's dark and doesn't have powers," and Robin-bashers--this was an eye-opener.

In 1966, as the Batman TV series with Adam West hit around the world, the comic book material was very much in-demand. In every other country, this meant repackaging original American DC Comics material. In Japan, however, Manga was already on its way to being considered a "true art form," and a Batman manga was produced in Japan by artist Jiro Kuwata, best known for a series called 8th Man (of whom Robocop is something of a ripoff, according to Kidd).

The series, according to Kidd, didn't seem to take place in either Japan or America, but some amalgam thereof (at-least when it came to the tropes). Batman and Robin were depicted as using guns, at-least in promotional material, and no origin was ever given; and while his designs for Batman and Robin stayed faithful, the villains they battled were largely original. They arguably bear more of a resemblance to villains who might be introduced today. One such villain was Lord Death Man, whose power was to die and resurrect himself at will.

The series died in about a year, and was largely forgotten. So obscure was it that while it was licensed by National Periodical Publications--which is now DC Comics--Kidd's discovery of the Manga was news to Paul Levitz--President of DC Comics as of 2002 and superhero enthusiast--who authorized the book chronicling the Bat-Manga, but wouldn't lend any company assistance with the research.

Kidd's book is available in stores (he did a signing after his speech) and while not complete, should give readers a sense of what the series was like.

Kidd topped his speech off with an announcement that should be of interest to fans of the Bat-Manga. Buuut, I think I'll keep my mouth shut.