Picture Alec Baldwin and Kevin Bacon
Page thirty! Whew, another milestone.
Seriously, if I could, I'd just punch through the rest of the issue. I think I've got one more page left in this burst of Speed Force, and after that I have to think about what happens on page 32 and 33. 34-35 should be a cakewalk though.
The Ref(erence)
I'm almost ready to hit another odometer-turning milestone on Love and Capes. This is page twenty-nine, so my next page will have a three in it. Yay!
Lots of referencing here, too. Amazonia is wearing an outfit based on a Rachel Pally design. (Yeah, that's right, I have to pay attention to those kinds of places while I'm working on this book.) It's way too daring for a 
wedding, of course, but that's the kind of thing Amazonia would pick thinking it was more appropriate. There's even a big reason why she picked that particular blue, but I'll leave that for the story itself, if I get to it. If it doesn't come up in the text, I'll reveal the reasoning later.
The Church pictured is very clearly based on my home parish of Immaculate Conception. It's a great classic-looking Church, so it was a no-brainer of a choice for the scene.
Lots of plot to get to in these next pages, too. Wish me luck.
You Can't Take the Sky From Me
Saw this over at Llama Butchers and thought it was kinda funny.
At Least It's Not a Tycho IV Cloud Creature
Regular readers of the blog know that I'm pretty close to obsessed with The Process, both mine and other people's. From work flow to idea capture, I can't get enough of it. It's one of the things I think that attracts me to so much Aaron Sorkin stuff. SportsNight, The West Wing, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip were all behind-the-scenes stuff.
So, I'm curious to know how this issue of Love and Capes will go. Usually around page 20 or so I get so obsessed with the ending and the book being done, I start pumping out pages to the exclusion of all else. It really does become an Ahab-like obsession. And I can tell I'm at that point on Love and Capes now. I can usually tell when I can bust out a page in a day or less, rather than spread it over two.
The thing is, there's at least 14 pages or so left. If I'm at maximum now, what's going to happen next? Will I get faster? More obsessed? Will I burn up like the doomed singers in Once More Again With Feeling? I dunno.
It'll be kind of fun to find out, though, won't it?
Quick Like a Bunny
Wowzers! Here's another page of Love and Capes #12. Usually after traveling I lose a step and it takes some effort to get back into the swing of things. It almost seems like the back-to-back cons energized me. I've had three full workdays since I got home, and I've done almost as many pages. Heck, if I could do a page a day from here on out, I'd be done early.
However, I can assure you that such a thing will not be happening. I can already a twinge in my hand and the smell of burning wires coming from my brain indicating that I need to take a breath pretty soon.
Baltimore Randomness Continued
Got to talk to Scott Asdit a few times. He's on 30 Rock, and he's big with the funny. He was very nice to my Mom, and I think I may be able to get him to write a blurb for the next Love and Capes trade. Here's hoping.
As I teased, why I'm jealous of Lora Innes: she got a cosplayer, Sarah Gillig. Someone was a fan of her book and dressed up as the lead. But does anyone ever come dressed as the Crusader, Doc Karma or better yet Amazonia? No.
I got to do some fun commissions, including this one of Poison Ivy growing flowers. It's probably the best freehand drawn hand I've ever done.
An iPhone and an auxilary jack are great things to have. When Mom and I were driving back from Baltimore, I used the phone and the iHeartRadio app to tune into Lanigan and Malone from 300 miles away. Kind of cool.
Two For the Price of One
Despite my travel schedule, I managed to get two more pages of Love and Capes #12 done. I didn't post page 25 sooner because it tied directly with page 26. You really need to have the two of them together. Now, I haven't bothered to post enough for you to know why I think that, it was more of a "my own brainspace" kind of thing.
One of the panels I can't post is a big half-page dramatic scene. You'll know it when you read the finished issue, and I'm a little proud of it. It's rare that the finished piece matches the vision in your head, and this one certainly did. I can even hear the soundtrack playing everytime I see that panel.
It's Lifehouse, by the way. First Time
New Products in the Love and Capes store!
You've been waiting for it, I know, and now it's here: New Love and Capes merchandise. What have we got? Both the Baltimore Comicon and Mid-Ohio-Con exclusives, new lanyards, the new "sketch" shirt design on blue and white ringers, black shirts, spaghetti strap tops, ribbed tank tops, and black hoodies. All sorts of coolness. And, as always, the full Love and Capes Store is available here.
But, let me throw a little more into the mix. All orders placed before October 31, 2009, will receive a free copy the convention exclusive. (In the case of convention exclusive orders, the other version will be supplied. So, if you want the Baltimore version, you'll get a copy of the MOC version free!)
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NEW! Love and Capes #11 1/2 12 pages. Full color cover and interior. $2.00 plus 50¢ shipping and tax where applicable. Available NOW! |
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NEW! Love and Capes #11 1/2 12 pages. Full color cover and interior. $2.00 plus 50¢ shipping and tax where applicable. Available NOW! |
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Love and Capes Lanyard Magenta lanyard with Love and Capes logo and clip! $6.00 (includes shipping). Available NOW! |
My Harvey Awards Night
Baltimore Comicon was its usual greatness. Marc Nathan runs a darn fine show, and has a ninja-like awesome staff. And I'll write more about that soon, but I had a long day of driving and unpacking, and I'm a little beat. I'll post fun stuff and stories and pictures soon, including why I'm jealous or Lora Innes. But for now, I know what you want to really read about…
The Harvey Awards.
Yeah, I didn't win. And I'm disappointed, but man, it was an awesome experience. Let me warn you now, this is gonna be a long one…
I was nominated in two categories: Best Letterer and Best Cartoonist. When you're in comics, everyone knows what the awards and the categories are. When you're talking to people outside the industry, its a harder explanation. It's kind of like being nominated MVP in soccer. People understand it's a good thing, but come on, it's soccer, does anyone in the real world care? So it's hard to find people outside the comics circle who get it. But I'll do my best to explain it.
The Harvey Awards are kind of like the SAG Awards. Voted on by comics professionals. There are the "technical" categories, like Best Letterer and Best Colorist, and the more prestigious categories, like Best Artist and Best Cartoonist. They're all important, though.
The awards are held in the Mariott Ballroom. It's a pretty swanky affair, actually. Hors d'overs, drinks, fancy dinner. I and my Mom headed over about seven.
Yeah, my Mom. When she found out I was up for a Harvey, she decided to come. She was planning on Amtrakking up and surprising me, but was stymied by the ticket-getting process. So she asked in that "I'll just show up anyway" way for me to bring her along.
As the awards approached, the gravitas of the whole thing began to weigh on me. It's a pretty cool thing to be nominated for a Harvey, and the thought of receiving one started to twist in my brain. It was nice to have Mom there to act as a safety valve to keep me from spending too much time in my own head.
I sat with a bunch of my fellow nominated friends and their families, and we had a great time. And the Scott Kurtz started the awards.
I already hated Scott Kurtz. He got to be on MacBreakWeekly, and I love that show all to pieces. Jealousy's a horrible thing. Then, on top of it, he turns out to be a great host. Funny as can be. There was a Glengarry Glen Ross parody cartoon that was pretty funny, and his first quip of the night was "We'd like to thank you all for attending, but our attendance isn't up to Diamond's minimums, so the whole night is cancelled."
It's funny because it's true.
Scott also gets it, in a pretty awesome way. After the whole Kanye West thing, I expected there to be some "You've got a great book, Taylor Swift, but…" thing along the way. I even joked that we needed to have an over/under pool on the first joke. I would have lost, because there never was one.
I mentioned this to Scott after the ceremony, and he said that they thought about it, but any joke like that would have taken away from someone's big moment. That's pretty cool, to be that aware of the moment for the individual to not go for the big joke.
The first award given was the Best Letterer. Honestly, I didn't think that I'd win. I was up against some great letterers, and ones who still practice hand lettering. I started that way, and can still bust it out when I need to, but I'm mostly font-based these days. So, when I lost to John Workman, I was pretty centered with it.
What followed was two hours of the most fun awards I've ever been part of. I'm not a big fan of awards shows. I've always said that unless I'm up for one, or have money riding on it, I don't watch them. I was up for this one, though. Scott was very funny, and so were most of his presenters. It was a great time.
And it almost distracted me from worrying about the big award.
I had all that time to think about winning or losing the Best Cartoonist Award. It was a little nerve-wracking. But a weird thing happened along the way.
I realized the honor that it was to be nominated.
The whole ceremony has a very real spirit of collegiality to it. There's a "we're all in this together" vibe. As it went on, you really get a sense of the heft of the award and the recognition. There have been 22 Harvey ceremonies. If each one has five nominees, and none of them overlapped (which is an oversimplification) that means 110 people have ever been nominated for Best Cartoonist. I'm one of them.
Wow. That's just… wow.
So, by the time that my award category rolled around, I wasn't worried about winning. I was just humbled to be in that company.
Oh, yeah, and I was up against Al Jaffee, of Mad Magazine fame. If I'd won, I might have Kanye Wested myself. It's Al Jaffee, I'm not in his weight class. So, when he was, it was no surprise.
That's all right, though. If you've got to lose to someone, he's a pretty good person to lose to. I can't complain at all.
It was a great time, and I'm glad I got to share it with my friends and family. Congratulations to all the nominees and to those who did win, especially Bryan Glass who was just so thrilled that it was heartwarming. He did a somersault onto the stage, in fact. Heck, I almost didn't want to win just to not have to follow that.
So what's next?
There's an episode of "The West Wing" where the President and his staff are getting upset about the lack of progress they've made and the problems they've failed to find solutions for. In it, Sam Seyborn has this exchange:
Sam: I was thinking about what you asked me before about have I been able to think of anything, and I said, "No." And you said, "Neither have I and neither has the President."
Leo: What about it?
Sam: I wouldn't speak for anybody else, but you know I'm not done yet, right?
I'm not done yet, either.
If I Lived Here, I'd Be Home Already
Sometimes, the little things are the things I enjoy most. For instance, I think this is a really well drawn dumpster. It's the right blend of real and cartooning, and is colored just right. I also like the image of the female character in silhouette, while her coat is in color. I think it works well.
For a short work week, I got two pages done, and I think I may even start the next one tonight, so I'm okay on schedule. There was some roughness on the page, dialogue-wise. Didn't really enjoy that hour of staring at the computer to write three balloons. And while everything I planned to happen in the book is happening, it's all happening differently than I thought. I hope it holds together.
By the way, this is page 24. In a regular book, I'd be done. But, since this one is double-sized, I think I've got about 20 pages left. I'm committed to a max of 48. I have it planned for 40-42 plus some cool back matter. I'll even sell an ad or two if anyone's interested. Hint hint.
Oh, yeah, and I'm heading to Baltimore Comicon tomorrow in the big SUV of Justice! A little more info will appear on the blog tomorrow. That's right, sparky, it's a tease.