Le Fantome

Several years ago when I worked at Sun Sportswear (where we had a Looney Tunes license) I did a comp for a Halloween shirt that featured Pepe le Pew as the Phantom of the Opera, holding a rose towards the poor cat he's been chasing for 40 years. They didn't use it, but I've always liked the idea of Pepe as the Phantom, so to celebrate Halloween I did a new sketch of Pepe in costume and looking ready to go on in place of Michael Crawford! (I used the play version of the Phantom costume. I like the play.)

Happy Harpy and Freaky Halloween!!!!

Tremble before the power of...

Something silly I did at ZomBcon over the weekend. I was there with fellow CLAW member Mark Monlux as sort of his booth-lackey, and I inked this quick sketch. I added the green tint and the glowing red eyes later in Photoshop, of course.

BUILD YOUR OWN!

Now YOU can build your very OWN "Halloweenie Alien Belly-Buster"paper sculpture!! Just print this sheet, cut it out, insert flaps into matching slots and VOILA! Your very own HALLOWEENIE! Attach it to your shirt to amaze and terrify your friends!

Brought to you by BRILLCO!

^0^

Happy HALLOWEENIES!

Yes, it IS an Alien Weenie.

At last night's C.L.A.W. Open Swim meeting we had another of our fun art competitions, the theme of which was: Halloweenies! I decided to take the opportunity to try doing a paper sculpture, because I wanted to see if I could do one in a short time period, under pressure. Also, the idea I had seemed like it would lend itself well to the medium and I hoped to make a big splash by doing something unusual that no one else in the CLAW outfit does. (OK, it was a shameless bid to win through shear novelty!)

The success of the venture turned out to be relative. I DID actually win, edging out fellow CLAW-member James Stowe (who's Classic Monster's Penises watercolor set was shear genius) by a single vote, but overall I was mostly unhappy with the final piece...of art. For one thing, I ended up having to buy a pack of really cheap and extraordinarily crappy construction paper from Walgreens because I couldn't find my pad of good art paper when I got home from work. Also, there really wasn't enough time to do it properly. I had to cut several corners and compromise on details in order to finish in time.

But the idea of an Alien "Belly-busting" Halloweenie seemed to go over pretty well. Also, as you can see from the pic, it was meant to function as a costume element! I thought that gave it added value.

The Madman From Planet Zatar!

So, Saturday, Oct. 1st was 24 Hour Comic Day! I went into it with the absolute determination that I was going to finish this year! But, I didn't. However, I did beat my total from last year AND I still intend to finish it and get it published.

This particular story has a very sentimental meaning to me. The title may seem a bit cheesy, but that's mostly because my friend Todd and I came up with it when we were 12! The story is based on a 4 minute, spontaneously invented, action-adventure Super 8 movie we made at a Special Effects workshop at Arizona State University!

It's the 35 anniversary of the year we made our miniature epic and I wanted to celebrate it by doing the long dreamed of (at least by me) remake of our movie--which as far as I know, no longer exists ANYWHERE but in my head. Todd and I had discussed remaking it once, back in 1979 when I was in Arizona spending the summer with my mom, but it was never to be.

We lost touch shortly after I went back to Texas and I eventually learned, unfortunately years after the fact, that my friend Todd had died of a rare illness. So I wanted to remake "Madman", not just for me, but for him too!

I used a youthful, cartoony style for my graphic novelization for two reasons: one, because I figured it's be faster. And two, I wanted to pay homage to the two 12 year olds who starred in the original film. ^0^

Several things that will be in the comic reflect aspects of the original film--one was the use of a fish-eye lens for a "feverish" POV shot, to show how insane the 'madman' himself had become. (This was based on the paradigm established by the original Star Trek series.)

Another feature of our play-acting was elaborate stunt fighting. We fancied ourselves as amateur stunt-men and were constantly flipping each other around the playground during 6th grade recesses. We got pretty good at it--although it may account for some of my back problems now.

So this is a portion of my graphic novelization of "The Madman From Planet Zatar"!

Dedicated to my friend, Todd Johnson 1965-2005.

I've posted the first few pages, but the remainder will ultimately be used as part of The CLAW's anthology comic book.