So whatever your hands find to do you must do with all your heart

If you're following my Twitter feed, you know that I finished issue #8 yesterday! Well, technically it was this morning, I think. And the book itself isn't done completely. I still have to do the trade dress (the bio and recap section, ads, stuff like that) and draw the cover for #9 so that I can advertise it in the back of the book.

Once again, the dialogue is blurred out. Further, for the last page, I'm just showing part of a panel. I appreciate everyone who bops by here to check the progress out, and I don't want to reward you with spoilage.

I like this issue a lot. I think it's up there with #5 and 6 which are personal favorites, I think. Hopefully, every one has gotten better, but occasionally I'll have an issue where I don't quite have the "feel of the ball". To use a metaphor from a sport that's no longer played professionally in Cleveland. Baseball.

Now, I did have a last lyric for the lyric contest. So the one for page 23 is at the top of this post, and the one for the last page, which I find to be exceedingly appropriate:

So you feel like it's the end of the story.

Answers will appear in the next day or so.

You're on Notice

I like TV, probably way more than I should. Then again, I can have the TV on while I'm working, and the Indians are certainly not doing anything worth watching. So, last season, I got hooked on the summer series Burn Notice. USA has some pretty fun series on these days, with Psych, In Plain Sight and new Law and Order: Criminal Intent.

Burn Notice returns tomorrow, and it's got a lot going for it. It's got some bang-up acting. Jeffery Donovan is great as Michael Westin. Bruce Campbell just can't get enough work as far as I'm concerned. I'm catching up on his Brisco County series on DVD and really wishing that had caught on. And the only way Gabrielle Anwar could have been hotter is if she'd perfected that Irish accent she had in the pilot.

The series is nothing but fun, and I recommend it highly.

The Rock of Love

My cousin's been getting a bunch of the Showcase Presents collections from DC and has been passing them on to me. It's been great to read such blocks of comics, a lot of which I've never read. The World's Finest collection was great fun. Brave and the Bold was just goofy 6-'s fun. Now I'm reading Sgt. Rock which I never read, despite going to the school founded by his best known artist.

There's a bit where Rock lectures his soldiers on love. It's my favorite bit so far. Click on the artwork the read the sequence.

Wheelin' and Dealin'

I just signed off on the proofs for Powerful Women #2, so it's time for some pre-San Diego specials!

Until July 20th (the day I leave for California) you can get the second sketchbook for $10.00 plus shipping. That's $5.00 off cover price. And, if you order both of them, you can save $10.00 and get the 2-pack for $20.00 plus shipping.

The newbook features Scarlett from G.I. Joe, Princess Leia, She Hulk, Jade, Halo, Poison Ivy, Princess Aura, and many, many more. Click here to be taken to the commission page, where you can order the sketchbooks. They'll ship out from San Diego after the show.

No mortal man can win this day

Let's break a rule or two tonight. This is actually a fourth panel, which I don't usually post. I thought that the other panels on the page revealed too much. I especially wanted to mention the super villain that appears, but that would give everything away. I will tell you this: I designed him years and years ago as part of a "Design the next Masters of the Universe figure" that I entered as a kid. The character wasn't selected, but a version of him (new name, same powers) will appear in Love and Capes #8.

I've also blurred out the text. The dialogue's not really funny without the set-up, but I choose to play it safe.

Two pages left to go. It may be done this week. I just have some other things competing for my time and efforts this week, too. It's nice to be wanted, though.

Why are there so many songs about rainbows?

Love and Capes is officially hitting obsession stage. I finished page 21 today. There's a good chance I'll have the remaining three done this week. That's a lot.

I don't do a lot of panels with empty backgrounds, but they're nice to spice things up, especially when it calls for it. Here, Major Might and the Crusader are floating in the air. The empty BG just seemed to really get that sense of space.

Bizarre trivia: The second dialogue balloon originally belonged to Crusader. I couldn't think of a reason why Major Might wouldn't say it, though, so I figured I'd give him a little more to do.

Turning and returning to some secret place to hide

The pages are coming even faster now. Okay, I was waiting on a script to letter and had the day free. Plus, by this time in the book, I'm not creating new environments and I can use a lot of the existing ones from my Love and Capes library. Like this one in the Spencer household, reusing the backgrounds I created for the previous issue. The Christmas tree from #7, though, is gone.

Four left to go, plus the bio and recap sections, as well as the cover for #9. That should go pretty well. I've got about two work weeks before San Diego, and in that time I'd like to finish the book, as well as letter a book for another client, and do a cover for a major comics publisher that, for once, is not Maerkle Press.

What's the cover? Who's it for? I'll tell you as soon as I can.

We weren't meant to be, at least not in this lifetime

With page nineteen now done, we're down to the Final Five. What will they be? Who will they be? Why is Sci-Fi Channel making us wait so long to find out? Wait, again, that's Battlestar Galactica.

It's Amazonia and Crusader in the background, and Windstar and Arachnerd in the foreground. Windstar's not actually a member of the Liberty League, but maybe I'll have to change that with as often as he's appearing. I needed seven little superheroes (to reference one of the best episodes of Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends) for this sequence, and Doctor Karma was way too powerful to bring in, and I still haven't designed Mermantis. I needed a couple of filler characters, so Windstar and Major Might pop in.

Windstar is one of my childhood creations, along with Raider. It's fun to pop him into these scenes, just to see him in print.

It's also Independence Day today, so have a happy one.

Cool and Refreshing

As I was working on page eighteen last night, I had myself a little Diet Coke out of my super-nifty DC Superheroes Toon Tumbler. (The first of many.) Doesn't it look pretty?

I'm so tired of being here

I have to say, this page has one of my favorite panels, shown here. Our heroes are thrown onto an alien planet. And, when they appear, Darkblade just has to say "Crusader--?" and Mark already knows what he's asking and, better yet, has anticipated his request.

It's a little thing, but it really gets that Super-Duo friendship thing down. It's the kind of thing Kirk and Spock would do, or Luke and Han, or, once upon a time, Superman and Batman.

Six pages left. It's just gonna fly from here on in.

And by the way, Alpha Tauri, or Aldeberan, really is 65 light-years from Earth. I does my research.