Category: Art

Collector’s Comics — Full Report

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As I told you in an earlier post, this past weekend John “Johnny Star Warz” Higashi, and I drove down to Fort Pierce with “Big” John Beatty who was making an appearance at Keith and Monica Mallow’s  Collector’s Comics shop. [That’s Keith and Monica pictured below. ]

Beatty and I have known Keith for about 20 years, so we were both looking forward to catching up with him. He’s a pretty funny guy [maybe not as funny as he thinks he is, but he still has a pretty good batting average for humor]. We knew it would be a fun day.

Keith had advertised for weeks that Beatty would be at the shop signing autographs and sketching for fans. You can even see that Keith spared no expense with the sign to welcome John to his store.


A steady stream of fans joined those who had been waiting for Big John‘s arrival. Most wanted to get an autograph or sketch, but a few artists showed up so that John could offer advice on their work. You can see the look of joy on the little guy’s face in the picture above. Of course the pic was snapped right before Keith tried to bogart the kid’s sketch. Luckily the little feller’s dad set Keith straight and he returned the drawing straight away.

Big Beatty sketched throughout the day. Every sketch was a winner from his billionth drawing of the Punisher to his first attempt at Captain Marvel.

 


As the minutes turned into hours, Beatty continued to autograph and sketch for fans. Monica sensed that Big John was starting to fade, so she offered up one of her famous massages. [Personally, I think that Big John was faking it in order to get a backrub!]
Never one to be left out, John Higashi put down the manuscript that he was working on in order to get a massage of his own! As for me, well…

 

When six o’clock rolled around it was time to go. Everyone was having such a blast that Keith offered to take us out to dinner [again] and put us up for another night. Unfortunately, we had planned to get back home [and I really needed to]. Keith attempted to bribe us not only with another meal, another night in the hotel, but even tempted us with a poker game!


Next time, Keith! Next time!

 

If you’re in the area of Fort Pierce, Florida, check out Collector’s Comics. Tell Keith and Monica I sent you. Who knows, you may even luck out and get a massage in addition to some great deals on comics!

 

Collector’s Comics — Update

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It’s about 3:45 and the John Beatty show is still rolling on at Keith Mallow’s Collector’s Comics in Fort Pierce. [How’s that for another plug, Keith?]

Fans have been keeping Big John pretty busy signing autographs and sketching. John‘s done some nice Captain America, Punisher and Batman sketches. He’s currently working on a Captain Marvel [Shazam] sketch.

We’ll be here until about 6pm, so if you’re in the area, swing on it!

Live Blogging from Collector’s Comics

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So here I am “live blogging” from Keith Mallow’s “Collector’s Comics” in Fort Pierce, Florida!

 

Keith invited my good buddy, John Beatty, to come down to his shop to sign and sketch for fans. Beattty asked John Higashi and I to make the trip — and how could we refuse? We’re always up for a trip, and Boy! is Keith Mallow a trip.

Keith is actually a pretty funny guy — and I’m not just talking about his looks. Ok, ok, all kidding aside. Keith has a really nice comic shop that carries action figures, statues, dvds, trade paperbacks and, oh yeah, comics. When I found out that the shop also had a wireless internet connection I decided to give “live blogging” a try. If you’re reading this, I was successful and we’ll have more updates as the day continues.

Sketch Society a Success

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Big John Beatty’s Sketch Society had their first meeting last night and it was lot of fun! John had e-mailed out invites and posted flyers, but wasn’t sure how the turnout would be. He shouldn’t have worried.
Robert Smith [red shirt] drove in from Ocala. Jesse and his crew came down from St. Augustine and arrived at the Daytona Beach Barnes & Noble before John – who was an hour early!

Jeff Whiting and his lady friend dropped in. Although they both had sketch books and Jeff was drawing in his, if you can make out the title of the book she was reading, you can see she seemed to be more interested in drawing to a full house!

Ralph is a local artist who dropped in. It was my first time meeting him. Not only was he having a great time sketching but he also served as the pitch man for Fiji water. He did his job well, and I ended up buying a bottle just to try it out. It was okay, but not as good as the packaging [or Ralph] would suggest.

It was really great catching up with everyone. I’ve known Rob for about 30 years [whew – can we really be that old?] and we ended up talking about novels, movies, comic shows, and so much more. Rob is a great guy and I’m really glad he was able to make it.

It was a blast seeing Jesse “Cadre” Hansen and his crew [Chris and Jason]. Jesse loves comics and his passion is contagious. [Although he appears to be getting a little too friendly in the picture above. Footsies anyone?]

Big John made the rounds making sure to thank everyone for coming. He also snapped up some photos for his blog.

Everyone was having a blast sketching and socializing. At about 10pm Big John started giving off a white light glow. Although it was probably one too many Moca-Carmel-Soy-Lattes with with whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles, we decided to not take achance and instead call it a night. Still, everyone agreed that they would be back the next time John called another informal meeting of the Sketch Society!

Craig Hamilton Gets Carter [2006]

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I can’t tell you how excited I was to get this piece from Craig Hamilton. Craig is a true “artist’s artist.” I had the pleasure of spending most of a Heroes Con two years ago seated next to Craig as he was sketching and interacting with fans. It’s always cool when someone whose art you admire turns out to be as nice as the work they produce.

Craig did this reflective shot of Sly from “Get Carter.” You can see it here. Comments are always appreciated.

You can see more of Craig’s work here.

 

Sketch Society

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My buddy, John Beatty is planning the first [of what he hopes will be a monthly] meeting of folks who like to sketch/draw and socialize. John’s calling the informal gathering Sketch Society and it looks like the first turnout will be pretty good. Of course we’re going to have local artists [and please note you do NOT have to be a professional artist to attend] and even some out of towners as well.

If you’re within driving distance of Daytona Beach, Florida and this sounds like something that you’d be interested in, then click here. The first meeting will be next Saturday at Barnes & Noble.

Brereton’s Nocturnals are Back!

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Dan Brereton has several projects coming out that I know will appeal to many ZONErs. You can bet that I’m going to be on the lookout for them.

This Halloween (and talk about perfect timing) all of Dan‘s Nocturnals stories will be collected in three oversized hardcovers. Each edition will contain a new story and new art in addition to the reprinted stories. The plan is to then continue with new Nocturnal adventures.

[For those of you who came in late, The Nocturnals is a horor/crime/sci-fi series featuring: Doc Horror, a scientist / adventurer; Eve (aka Halloween Girl) has supernatural powers and is Doc’s little daughter; Gunwitch is Eve‘s self-appointed bodyguard (who happens to be a scarecrow… a gunslinging scarecrow); Polychrome is a ghost; Starfish, an amphibian girl; Firelion, a pyrokinetic samurai; and the Raccoon, a infamous gangster).

 

I’m also hoping for a release of The Last Battle, a “gladiator” graphic novel that teamed Dan with Italian writer Tito Faraci. 

Shawn Surface

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Shawn Surface is an independent comic book artist best known for his work at Bill Black’s AC comics and “Bubba the Redneck Werewolf.” I first met Shawn a few years ago at a TampaCon. We talked about comics, movies and art. I left the show thinking that I’d like to get Shawn to do a piece for my Stallone Gallery.Finally at this year’s Heroes Con things worked out. Shawn decided to draw Sly as The Punisher. Click HERE and you can see the result.

Shawn is available for commissions and is reasonably priced. Check out his website and tell him I sent you!

My Gallery is Moving!

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I’ve decided to move my Stallone themed art collection from my site to ComicArtFans.com. You can now see my gallery there. [Well, at least 1/2 of it… the rest is going up later this week.]

If you’ve never checked out the Comic Art Fans site, you should. But my advice is to go when you have some time to spare. There’s so much cool stuff there that you may even forget to check out my collection!

What’s That Saying About Going to the Mountain?

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I just received a booklet advertising Comic-Con International and it had this cool cover by Adam Hughes.

Held annually in San Diego, Comic-Con International is one of the biggest comic conventions in the country [probably the world]!

Although I’ve never attended, I’ve thought about going. Each year the con gets bigger and bigger… I guess if it keeps expanding and I wait long enough, it’ll come to me.

Twenty Years for a Quarter

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It’s hard to believe that the comic company that brought us Black Cross, Sin City, Concrete, Hellboy, Monkeyman and O’Brien, Conan, The Rocketeer, Grendel, Aliens, Predator, Hard Looks, Groo, Tarzan, Star Wars, etc., etc. etc. is twenty years old.But it is.

I can remember buying the first issue of Dark Horse Presents right off the rack. Chris Warner’s Black Cross was on the cover and in the lead story. [For the record, I really think it’s time for a new Chris Warner Black Cross mini-series.] The rest of the book featured Concrete [Paul Chadwick‘s story and art], Mindwalk [Randy Stradley and Randy Emberlin], and Brighter [art and story by Paul Chadwick]. I knew this little comic company had a bright future…

So here we are twenty years later. Dark Horse has decided to publish a celebration comic of sorts. Aptly titled, Dark Horse Twenty Years, will feature art by Art Adams, Sergio Aragonés, Paul Chadwick, Adam Hughes, Frank Miller, Cary Nord, Eric Powell, Matt Wagner, Chris Warner, Joss Whedon, Mike Mignola, and many others!

What will make this even more fun is that every page will feature a different piece, with each showcasing a character from the company’s rich history. As an added bonus, instead of drawing their own creations, the artists have traded titles, so they can provide an unexpected take on the characters that made Dark Horse famous!

The final kicker? As a gift to fans, Dark Horse is pricing this bad boy at just a quarter!

Mike Zeck: Limited, Signed, Rare and Original

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My buddy, Mike Zeck has a few ebay auctions going right now.Here’s what he’s offering:

* One of his limited edition signed and numbered sketchbooks

* Preliminary art that Mike created as possible covers to a Wally Wood tribute book

* A rare [#1 of six] Marvel Punisher portfolio [Mike has autographed all plates and is including an original sketch]

* The first preliminary sketch that Mike worked up for the portfolio

* The second prelim that Mike created for the portfolio

You can’t go wrong if you win any of the auctions. Zeck is the man. [But you already knew that, didn’t you?]

A Short Look at Wolverine

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“X-Men: The Last Stand” opened beyond all expectations earning just over $120 million dollars this weekend. That’s the biggest opening ever for the Memorial Day weekend, the fourth best three-day opening ever as well as the best single Friday in movie history [$45.5 million]. Earning that kind of bank almost insures a sequel. My guess is that before the next X-Men movie comes out we’ll see a film that focuses just on Wolverine.

Wolverine used to be my favorite comic character. That was back in the days when Chris Claremont [writer], John Byrne [penciler] and Terry Austin [inker] were amazing everyone with the classic comics that they were creating. At that time Wolverine was the cool secondary character that would have only a scene or two, but more likely than not, they’d be THE scenes that you’d remember.

Not much was known about Wolverine. What we did know made him an unlikely American comic book hero. He was from Canada. He was a loner. He was just a bit over five feet tall. He had a berserker rage and would actually kill those who threatened him or his friends. No other hero in comics looked or acted like Wolverine.

Of course over the years, because of the popularity of the character, he’s been over-exposed. He’s been a secret agent, a team leader, a father figure, a pirate, etc., etc. etc..

Even his look has changed. Hugh Jackman is tall and lean. Wolverine should be short and stout [no teapot jokes, please]. Robert Blake in his prime would have made a great Wolverine.

The classic Wolverine is still Byrne and Austin‘s version. Frank Miller and Joe Rubinstein‘s take is also a favorite of mine. Not too long ago I talked about some new riffs on Wolverine. Joe Lisner’s Wolverine looks interesting too. All of these guys draw the shorter Wolverine, like he’s supposed to be. The funny thing is, most folks who only know Wolverine from the movies will think that he should be drawn taller.