Catbeard of the Caribbean

So, my good buddy Matt Nelson has had this awesome weekly webcomic going for a while now, called Catbeard the Pirate, about the adventures of a pirate cursed to have a living cat as a beard. It’s hilarious, and I highly recommend checking it out. And the current story even has dinosaurs!

I’ve been meaning to do some fan-art for it, so when this idea popped into my head I had to put it down on paper. Only pencils so far – I’ll post an updated version whenever I get a chance to finish it.

Spider-Man 2.0

The Project: Rooftop website is running another re-design costume, this time for everyone’s favorite web-head.

This was actually an idea I had a while back for a more techie Spider-Man that I never did anything with; so I dusted it off, cleaned it up and sent it in as my entry.

I always like the idea of Peter Parker being a science based hero (the guy’s a genius, really), and don’t know why they don’t play that up more. So this is him going the gadget route, incorporating a bit of the mecha-spider-arm idea from the “Iron Spidey” suit and making it his own.

I also figured he have more space for extra webbing refills this way too, so maybe he won’t *keep* running out at the most inopportune times…

Blue Beetle WIP

A work in progress – gift art for a friend.

Free Sketches!

For those locals in the audience, I’ll be at Lightning Comics in Coeur d’Alene on Saturday, drawing free sketches for customers. I’ll be there with my friends in the Spokane Comicsmiths’ Guild, and we should be there from 10 am till about 1:30 or so.

Lightning Comics has sales and events going on for the 4th of July weekend, so swing by on Saturday and check out the deals, and pick up a free sketch as well! Hope to see you there!

…transform this decayed form…

A sketch of Mumm-ra, from a suggestion by my buddy Jesse.

Y’know, I loved Thundercats as a kid, but it’s really a ridiculous premise when you think about it. Something that probably could’ve only come out of the ’80s.

“OK, we’ve got alien cat-people fighting mutants, but we need another bad guy.”
“Oh, I know! A mummy!”
“Perfect!”

Sure. ‘Cause that makes sense.

Thor Sketches

On Free Comic Book Day last month, I was at a local theater for a couple of hours, drawing free Thor sketches for movie patrons who were seeing the new Thor film. This is just some warm-up sketches I did the day before, trying to get a handle on the look of the movie designs, and adapting them to my style.

Spokane Comic-Con Wrap-Up

Just realized it’s been a week since the Spokane ComiCon, and I never actually did a post-convention blog post….

The Con was a lot of fun (per usual) – it had it’s highest turn-out yet, which is definitely an encouraging sign of the size of the geek community around here. We met a lot of great folks, and it was also awesome to see people we recognized from past events, who made a point to find us at the Con and get more sketches from us. And of course, it’s great to be able to meet more artists and creative types, and catch up with friends from out of town.

The one serious snag in the event was the “fire drill” mid-way through the day… The fire alarm went off, and everyone had to leave the building while we waited for the fire department to show up and make sure everything was safe. We were only outside for probably 30 minutes, but I’m sure there were some who didn’t wait around and just left.

And apparently this was a known issue with the alarm system itself, as it had gone off at least twice before that week and hadn’t been fixed. Just bad timing, but thankfully most of the attendees took it in stride and didn’t let it ruin the day.

I only got photos of a couple of the sketches I did during the Con. The top one is the person’s original character, that he was getting different peoples’ versions of. And the other was for a little girl, probably only 5 or 6, who apparently really liked Frankenstein. It was great seeing the thrilled look on her face when she saw it and realized it was for her.

Spokane ComiCon!

I’ll be at the Spokane ComiCon this Saturday (the 21st), in artist alley with my friends in the Comicsmiths’ Guild. We’ll have copies of the Guild Anthology book for sale, along with a whole mess of prints and original art available, as well as taking sketch commissions. Hope to see everyone there!

Also, there will be a Drink and Draw with special guests Dan Panosian and Dave Johnson on Friday Night (7-11 pm) at Cyrus O’Leary’s. To RSVP and get more information, you can check out the Facebook event page here: Drink & Draw Spokane!

Free Comic Book Day Wrap-Up

Free Comic Book Day is always great, as it’s kind of “Geek Christmas”, but this year’s was particularly fun, though a pretty long day…

I was over at Lightning Comics in Coeur d’Alene, ID with my buddies in the Comicsmiths’ Guild, where we were drawing free sketches for customers for a little over four hours. There were people lined up and waiting outside before the doors opened, and we kept busy the whole time, with a steady flow of people.

After we were done there, we headed over to the local theater for another 2+ hours of sketching – this time of only Thor (and related characters) as part of a promotion for the new movie. We were only drawing for people who were going to see Thor, and we were still swamped, and stayed longer than planned.

But we had to eventually had to pack up and leave, as we had a free screening of Thor waiting for us, courtesy of the theater management. I thought the movie was awesome, even with my expectations as high as they were, and being such a fan of the source material.

It was a lot of fun, with a surprising amount of (actually funny) comedic bits and plenty of big super-hero action and fight scenes. Afterwards I was left thinking that the new Superman movie is going to have it’s work cut out for it to compete…

But if you do see it, I wouldn’t waste your money on the 3D version. I thought it really was unnecessary, and the conversion wasn’t the greatest either. Unlike other 3D films I’ve seen, it seemed like they didn’t adjust the brightness or contrast or something, as the glasses actually made things really dim. Which made many of the scenes (like the night-time sequences) a bit hard to see. I’m planning on seeing it again, and going for 2D next time.

And here’s the pics I got of sketches I did during the day. These are all from the Lightning Comics session – I unfortunately didn’t get any of the Thor pics, but it was kinda crazy at the theatre…

Free Comic Book Day!

Tomorrow (Saturday, May 7) is Free Comic Book Day, and I’ll be sketching up a storm at Lightning Comics in Coeur d’Alene with my friends in the Comicsmiths’ Guild. We’ll be there from 10:30 – 2:30, and then head over to the Regal Riverstone theater, where we’ll be drawing free Thor sketches for customers from 4:30 – 6:30.

Members of the Guild will also be over at Merlyns in Spokane from 11-2 doing free sketches for kids. Along with sketches from the Guild, the Imperial 501st should be there from 1 -3 for photo ops and there will be a costume contest with prizes for kids and adults.

If you’re not local, be aware that Free Comic Book Day is an international event, so you can check the FCBD website and find a participating retailer in your area. Otherwise, we hope to see you this weekend!