It’s a quick tutorial on how I added tones to some of Jonathan’s AMERICUS pages using marker paper overlays.  So click here to read about how the magic happens! Though hopefully, if you’re reading this blog, you’re already reading AMERICUS and know all about this post.  If not, then head on over and start reading Jonathan’s first graphic novel!

And of course, thanks to Jonathan and MK for the opportunity to lend my nutty typings to their website.

AMATEURS, which you may have heard me mention on this blog in the past, is now up and running.  For those of you who haven’t read my past ramblings on the project, it is a comic series by Jeremy Massie and myself, and we’ll be posting new pages to our web site every Tuesday and Thursday.

AMATEURS is the story of a group of teenagers who become disgusted with the world of superheroes that surrounds them, and decide to rebel by starting their own crime-fighting team.  You can read it online at http://www.amateursthecomic.com/.

I have spent most of this week obsessively working on completely overhauling my website. Besides the design changes, I’ve based it all in WordPress, so it has its own blog and should be pretty easy for me to stay on top of updating. I don’t know if that means I’ll be posting less here, or maybe posting specifically bpb group project stuff here, or posting in both places.

Ideally, as Americus wraps up and with me planning to hit up some conventions next year, we’ll be trying to crank out a 2012 BPB calendar, as well as another issue of the brownpaperbag mini-comic.

Anyhow, I’m pretty stoked.

So I’ve spent this last week drawing promo stuff for Americus. We’re doing a big promotional push for Banned Book Week, and even though I have some stuff to work on in regards to actually finishing the book, this stuff had a time stamp on it so I had to bust it out first.

If you haven’t checked out Save Apathea yet or in awhile, I would highly recommend checking it out next week. We’re posting a new page every weekday, having YA authors guest blogging [as well as some other literary folk, I think], and First Second has hooked us up with some swag from Macmillan related to banned books and will be giving them away during the week. Be there!

Anyhow, the animated gif below is a compilation of banners I did for websites, and the image above is a placeholder image until we get the cover done for websites that write articles or what not about Americus.

If you are interested in having copies of the banners for your website & helping promote the book & Banned Book Well, send me an e-mail & I’ll send you the files.

jonathan [at] bpb-art.com

]]> http://www.bpb-art.com/2010/09/24/americus-promo-stuff/feed/ 2 http://www.bpb-art.com/2010/09/01/previews-and-anniversaries/ http://www.bpb-art.com/2010/09/01/previews-and-anniversaries/#comments Wed, 01 Sep 2010 23:44:17 +0000 Jason http://www.bpb-art.com/?p=1927

This week the AMATEURS website went live.  The comic isn’t ready to go up yet (Jeremy and I are still working on creating a buffer of pages), but we made a short teaser for the project, which is what occupies the space at the moment. Part of me has wondered if making a preview for a comic is too much of a vanity project, though I will say it’s given me a chance to get comfortable drawing the characters and experiment with toning pages.  It’s also gave me a chance to butt my head against ComicPress, which will be powering the site.

However, it is exhilarating to be able to show something for this project that Jeremy and I have been working on for a while now.  It’s also a bit terrifying, because we’ve thrown our hats in the ring, and now it’s time to make sure the work gets done.  If all goes well, we should start serializing pages in the next couple months.

Again, that address is http://www.amateursthecomic.com.  Okay, that’s enough of that shill-talk.

Something else I’ve been working on in the last week is a new strip for the Viet Nam Literature Project.  I’ll post the whole thing once it goes up on the VNLP’s website.  This one was a doozy to work on, though I’ll save my commentary for when I post the full strip.

I just want to acknowledge that it’s been ONE FREAKIN’ YEAR since we decided to keep a regular brownpaperbag blog.  I know “regular” is open for debate, but whether we delivered each week or not, that target has always been there in the back of my mind.

On one hand it’s encouraged me to be more productive — to have something to post on Wednesdays — though sometimes that productivity has been channeled specifically to this blog.  Instead of sharing art I was already making, that sharing being an extension of my art, writing for this site feels more and more like a separate creative act. For example, when I’m in the middle of a project, whatever half-finished bit I have at the moment may not make an interesting post by itself.  So instead I may post it and talk about my process, or I might create something else to post instead.

I’m not saying this is good or bad, only noting that what started as one thing seems to have turned into something else that was unexpected.  Hopefully all of this isn’t sounding too pretentious.  In reflecting over the past year of this website, these are the thoughts that come to mind.  Also, I speak only for myself when writing this and not my fellow art-mates.

Just one more thing before I sign off:  This week, Jonathan left for a two-week trip to Vietnam.  It doesn’t look like he has any pre-written posts, so time willing, I’ll try to update these next two Fridays as well.  Time to roll up my sleeves and bang on some keys!

Here’s how it’s going to work: Listed below are 20 pieces of original art ranging from published freelance stuff to fan art that you might’ve seen on the blog. Each piece is numbered and has a minimum bid next to the title. If you are interested in a piece, please just post a comment with the number of the piece you’re bidding on with the amount of your bid [bids have to be equal than or greater to the minimum bid listed]. At the end of the auction, I’ll check all the comments and see what the highest bid for each piece is and contact that person with an invoice to be paid via Paypal.

Shipping & handling for the pieces will be $7.00 each, which will include secure shipping [If you win more than one piece, I will combine the shipping & if you live in Portland, I will just hand deliver the piece].

For an additional $5.00, I will offer to matte the piece to fit the closest convenient frame size [in most cases this will be 14 x 17].

Auction ends the 20th! If the winning bidders want their pieces shipped before I leave for Vietnam, the money needs to be Paypaled to me by the 24th.

Without further adieu, here at the art works to be auctioned off [in no particular order]:

Note: Dimensions listed are for the size of the board, not the actual active area of art.

1.] Wolverine! – 11 x 8 – minimum bid: $10

2.] The Death of Boromir – 11 x 14 – minimum bid: $30

3.] Hobo Town – 11x 17- minimun bid: $20

4.] This Time Tomorrow – 11x 15 – minimum bid: $30

5.] Eowyn defeats the Witch-King – 11 x 11 – minimum bid: $20

6.] Video Game box art [Cube] – 17 x 11 – minimum bid: $20

7.] Video Game box art [Forest] – 17 x 11 – minimum bid: $20

8.] Video Game box art [Players] – 17 x 11 – minimum bid: $20

9.] Video Game box art [Ocean] – 17 x 11 – minimum bid: $20

10.] Video Game box art [Space] – 17 x 11 – minimum bid: $20

11.] Video Game box art [Clouds] – 17 x 11 – minimum bid: $20

12.] Boatful of Hindus- 14 x 17 – minimum bid: $15

13.] Portland Farmer’s Market – 11 x 17 – minimum bid: $30

14.] The Sad Wrestler – 11 x 14 – minimum bid: $10

15.] The Dead Marshes – 11 x 14 – minimum bid: $20

16.] The-Ne’er-Do-Well – 14 x 11 – minimum bid: $20

17.] Apocalypse – 14 x 17 – minimum bid: $20

18.] Portland Transportation – 12 x14 – minimum bid: $30

19.] Strip Tease – 11 x9.5 – minimum bid: $15

20.] The Eye of the Night – 11 x 15 – minimum bid: $30

As an added bonus, I’ll send anyone with a winning bid a postcard from Vietnam!

Thanks for looking! Please help spread the word to anyone that you think might be interested! I’d really appreciate it. If you have any questions, please contact me at jonathan [at] bpb-art.com.

MK and I will be blogging along with the pages and we’ll also have guest bloggers swinging in to post as well. I’ll be in charge of blogging on Wednesdays, so mark your calendars.

I’m  a little nervous about the blogging aspect because I’m afraid I’m going to either a.] be at a loss of things to talk about, and b.] keep talking about the same old thing and bore the hell out if people. If you have ideas of topics or aspects of the process that you might want to hear about, please let me know.

The concept we went with for the website design was that it was created by the main character, Neil. If you check out the website, you’ll see that we have a big splash page that directs you to the main blog, with Neil working on the website, while being surrounded by some of the drawings he’s created for the website.

Similar to how I do major corrections, I just did a normal ink drawing of Neil, and then took some tracing paper and drew ‘his’ drawings over it.

I then scanned in both images, layered them into one, and then went ahead and colored the illustration. Here’s the final piece:

All right, even with the blogging duties starting over at Save Apathea, I’m gonna try to be posting here regularly again.

Some big news – First Second has asked MK and I to serialize Americus online. Details are still being hashed out, but we’re hoping to have the website up and ready to go around the middle of July. I am pretty excited, though I’ll admit it’s kind of funny too. I think the standard approach is to do your webcomic and finish it up with hopes of having a publisher picking it up. We’re doing the reverse – we’ve got the book finished and have a publisher, but are doing the webcomic to help drum up interest and support for the book before it’s release date next fall.

Like I said, I’m pretty excited. I’ll give you more details as they pop up.

- – -

I also did some spot illustrations for an entertainment piece for this week’s Willamette Week. There is a free, all ages music festival happening in the St. John’s neighborhood this weekend. If you get the chance, check it out. I haven’t been to St. Johns in years and years, but it’s a beautiful area and the third annual No. Fest seems pretty awesome.

I’ve finished the next page of A Date in Time and Space, but I’m gonna put it on hold for now while I work on getting saveapathea.com ready to get rolling.

xoxo- jonathan

NOTHING!

Anyhow, here’s the illustrations from the previous years, with the one I did for this year at the end.

I’m actually not very pleased with it. I thought, thought, thought that I would be able to come up with something really great, but as you can see it seems like every other year is kind of a sucky one. I guess that means next year’s will be better. But maybe that’s the thing – maybe there’s no way around summing up the history and heritage of an entire continent’s worth of people without hitting the major icons of those cultures. I’d like to hear anyone’s thoughts on the subject.

- – -

Other bit of news – I finally updated my website! I didn’t really change it around much, mainly the colors and decor image, but I’m really, really happy with it. I feel like it’s simple and professional, but still has some of the goofiness that defines my work. Here’s the main image I did for it.

ONEOFTHEJOHNS.COM – Tell your friends! Tell your family! Just go there NOW!

Here’s a set of two panels from chapter 9:

Also, I did some work for the Willamette Week this week, as well as some pro bono work for the great folks at Hyphen Magazine for their next issue. Check them out.

EDIT: Forgot there’s a NDA with the illustration. The issue should be out the second or third week of April. Will keep you posted and repost the image when I am allowed to.

I’m taking a vacation with the misses next week so don’t expect anything from me.