My Summer Song

So every summer there's one song that will capture my imagination force me to fall in love with it. It doesn't have to have come out that particular summer, but if I heard it during the summer and it got into my head in such a way that it crowds out love for other music, then it becomes the summer song. That one up there has the title for my 2009 summer song. It's "Parentheses" by The Blow. About three days into the summer, I knew this simple little pop ditty was it. I love her voice (I have a soft spot in my heart for female vocals, which is my explanation for my obsession with Karen Carpenter, which we shall now never speak of again) and the lyrics make me smile. The video could be better. I'm not too into the animation. None of the fan-made ones were much better, so this is what you get.

Past honorees of the hallowed summer song title have been "Where it's At?" by Beck, "I Want You Back" by the Jackson 5 and Esquivel's "Mucha Muchacha."

Other music that has been getting me through late night drawing sessions:



Architecture in Helsinki: I didn't know I loved this band. I know that now. I also love this simple video.



Fleet Foxes: These guys are really awesome. They harmonize very well and the songs have an earthy quality to them. This video in particular kind of blows my mind.

There's way more, but this post is getting long.

I'm going to go eat.

Super Best Cover Version Supreme

ka-pow.

Hai Karate

When they took his woman, they didn't count on him not rollin' over like a chump.

The Professor in

ENTER THE DJ
Flying Fists of Hip Hop Fury

Sorry, the letterbox thing got me thinking about the cinematic possibilities.

uhhh... ya got any gum?

I just finished penciling 3 pages for Princess Candy and I'm going to bed before 2 a.m. for the first time in quite a while. Yaaaay me!

Here's a little Spidey I drew at work the other day, waiting for a humongous file to save. I scanned it in last night and colored it up when I needed a break from drawing tales of middle school superheroes.

I totally love the Spectacular Spider-Man cartoon. I never saw a full episode until recently when I got a dvd from the library and it's a lot of fun. A very pure incarnation of Spidey's world. It looks great too.

Wrapped up in books

So when my son wakes up in the morning on the weekends, the first thing he usually wants to do is sit down at the dining room table and draw with me. He has two recurring themes, dinosaurs and Super Mario Galaxy. I tend to like the latter better, so I usually choose Mario and we get to work. This past Saturday I managed to sketch this little portrait out between images of Mario squashing Goombas underfoot and the Dino Piranha from the Good Egg Galaxy. It's not anything special, but it was fun drawing with the crayons. We use the Crayola twistables or some such... they're great, because they are regular crayons, but in a plastic body and when you need more wax, you just twist them up, almost like a mechanical pencil. So I can draw with crayons without breaking them in my big doofy adult hands.

In other news, I'm working on a third Princess Candy comic for Stone Arch Books. It's a blast, and I think that there's a real improvement in the pages over the first two books. Of course, I'm in the beginning stages of the pencils so everything seems good. Later on the self-doubt will creep in and I'll be freaking out about every line I put to paper, but hey, such is the creative process.

What Dewey Decimal system?

Feared by librarians everywhere, it's our pal Yeti!

Poor guy was just trying to help out and that's the thanks he gets. Sheesh.

Now in glorious color

For those of you who like that sort of thing.

Galactus, age 7

"Hey everybody, it's me, Li'l Galactus! Jiminy crickets, I sure am hungry!"

and with that there was a great deal of weeping and gnashing of teeth.

No, not really.

Aint That Kind of Street Fight: New Print 4 Sale!

What kind of street fight is it anyway?

I don't know, but it looks like your friend and mine, The Professor, is ready for whatever it may be.

For those who are so inclined, a 16" x 20" print of this sweet image is now available via the internet. just follow this handy link.

Don't Know How to Party

They're all done!

The books I've been working on that I've been so hush-hush about. Actually, I finished them at the end of last week, but I've spent most of this week catching up around the house.

So, what are these books you ask? 2 superhero graphic novels for Stone Arch Books about a character named Princess Candy. I'm not giving up any plot details, I'll leave that up to the publisher. I can say that they are sort of early-reader type books for kids about 8-12 or so and they were wicked fun to work on. The image above is one of my favorite panels from book 2.

Below are the two cover images.




In other news, I'm about to get back into the Yeti 4 Hire dummy and some others that I have planned. I'll post some stuff for that as it progresses.