~ a short account of endeavors ~

Some Dream life pencils.

2010-04-13T01:20:00.000-04:00

Trying to get as much of this done this week as i can, next week is going to be pretty intense getting Sequential to press. Go max go.
Like these two, facing set two count. After the long slow opening and establishing sequence for Charlie, i wanted some nice short bits to follow up with some of the rest of the cast before the next longer scene.

Another new Dream Life page today!

2010-04-10T13:02:00.001-04:00

---

Also some jawboning about lucid dreaming there for you in the blog.

Just two more left for this dream sequence to go.

That's right, i wanted to open the story with a nearly wordless, twenty one page dream sequence! You can see how it might have been a little hard to convince a publisher to go for that without seeing it all done :)

By the end of chapter one though, i hope to have made my case. Colored 20 last night and working on some pencils for 40-46 today.

max

salgoodsam.com

Tablets, Apple, control, and the future of casual pixels.

2010-04-09T22:12:00.016-04:00

On Facebook i just had a interaction typical of many online about, and over the IPad. Funny that i'd have an opinion about an IPad given i don't even use a mac. But I do.

So pardon this wordy ramble.

I'm optimistic. Not converted per say, but i recognize the Ipad's significance. There's no denying it presents a viable way out for big segments of the print media. Not to be what they were maybe, but to be something? As a comic artist looking to improve the way i can get my work out there, i see a lot of potential in these things. And from the list of things not allowed...

...well unless i want to make porn i don't see that affecting me too badly. I don't really care to make porn no.

I can see how it chafes if you do, but we're not talking about the entire digital market here. More like one outlet store chain? And I doubt the device is perfect at all. For a breakdown of the IPads flaws far more informed than i could offer, i like the thoroughness of Cory's at boingboing - and he links to some others worth looking at as well.

Many users are going to love it just the same - but if you're root, a creator or maker, you're going to want more. I do.

Those with the spare $ for a IPad as a casual device will get one anyway - heck the thing can last 10+ hours on a charge and do VIOP, kicks my old N800 all to hell and that was pretty nice. If i have the spare change in the future i'm there. But it's not going to work for everyone all the time. And i don't think that's their idea. That might be what YOU wanted, but not Steve. Xeni Jardin's first blush reaction to it shows how something like this was always a great idea with a waiting and ready market. It's clear this thing is a Win for them, and i think for me too as a comic artist and illustrator. And I think it's going to be a perfect brick for wedging the door open on digital media devices with the same kind of practical form factor.

A market leader, a trend setter, but the long run owner of the game?

Someone finally getting the hardware this right though, is going to make the future brighter for this kind of machine. And that's going to make any free market or speech concerns mute as more and more of these devices come into play. Eventually someone has always matched a mac with an open platform if not in market shares. It's only a mater of time.

If you really want to push the issue of market or speech, then do it in the community and the court, and even use the device to make a statement. But don't expect a device and it's support infrastructure to be the root of liberalizing culture. People do that, not machines. If i draw an X rated comic in print today, i have to deal with the same things app makers are, in brick and mortar retailers all the time. And customs! I don't hear extreme examples in the stories about Apple's shop and if that's all i had to contend with, i think it's quite possible to manage a new booming market for magazines and comics there. Not saying don't critique Steve, he does read Penthouse it seems. But lets keep it in perspective?

I don't want shops to stop being able to have a say about what they sell on their own shelves for the sake of free speech, be they made of mater or pixels. That's just trading intolerances.

Not even a question of capitalism to me. The change that means anything, is that of the cultural standards that inform the consumers who influence retailers.

The best way there is not in their face, but through the back door, via content they will listen to.

So i think the IStore is overblown as a censorship threat - They just reflect the middle moral ground of the american market - There lays the problem, not at apple.

And really I don't expect to see vibrators and blow up dolls at Toys'R'us either. Or less extreme - a larger mens section in a women's clothing store. Not going to happen is it? It's not practical.

Apple may be chasing the largest market there is, but it's not the whole market is it? And so? Just leaves what, 90% of what dominates the internet open to being exploited still? This is bad how? For who? And that i can go somewhere digitally and not have to wade through stuff like this? I like brick in mortar shops like that i have to say. Bit less crass is not always so bad you know. Not my favorite part of the internet exactly. Not the worst, but hey.

Hardware wise, i think the Ipad is a case of low hanging fruit, and they were able to pick it first with the usual apple flair. The touch screen tech and limitations in thinking regarding interface were holding tablets back the last 10 years - geeks loved keyboards, Gates only just flipped on the question - but since before Star Trek sleek slate computers have always been a dream desire. And because of that this has been one of the more thoroughly explored format ideas. We've had our model T and a few more since. The larger hybrid tablet laptops and IPhone have both explored the possibilities here more than tentatively. So while the reality of it may be a little mind blowing, it's not quite something all together new.

The control Apple exerts over it is pretty fragile too. More of an evelitonay influence than a regime. The Iphone OS being the system means not just a built in sweet of apps from the smaller cousins ready to go out of the gates.

It also means the Ipad is all but already hacked 6 ways to Sunday. There are going to be keen geeks who will train their little tablets to dance and say mama just for the bragging rights.

More than a few companies are cracking the technical problems of battery life, leaner OS's, and touch based interfaces with different approaches. Others with less interest in tightly controlling content, or even having a 'store' will be the rest of the market in the long run - Apple itself is bound to come up with a souped up pad running OS X, the HP Slate specs and price point almost guaranties it. Why leave that part of their less casual market completely unexplored?

The IPad looks to me like a fantastic dynamic proof of concept you can own today - sounds like a sales pitch don't it?

But i have to roll my eye's when the drama gets overplayed. Some rather intense arguing going on about it from what I've seen. From the Coming of the Tablet to dark talk of Fascism and Monopoly, like they have already cornered and own the market or something? The market is still just being invented here - I think they are still just one player with fairly modest goals in terms of what they want this device and it's a 1.0 for them.

It's a cheep stripped down version of what's to come, that has a pretty secure income stream built in - and that IS something people have been wanting. It looks like it does what it said it would do really really well. Most people will be able to afford to take one for granted.

But i'd put money on Cory being right. That the real fun is going to be the open format versions of what follows. Where we will really see what tablets can do. Simply because that is where the experimentation is naturally going to be.

That the IPad is such a 'perfect' performing little bastard will make the game all the more fun. Like the left needed Bush, geeks need IBM and Apple's to retaliate and one-up against. Working so well, the first thing hardcore users will see are all the things it might do, once cracked. :)

Apple will likely continue to be good at offering luxury goods to people who don't really care much about or want to know how it operates unless that = simply. I'm not being condescending, many believe in and pursue push button convenience and the freedom to conform. I don't think it's that they are incapable of more. No. Being lazy is a state of mind, not of nature. I've been lazy and so have you. Question is just how lazy and when. And then Apple has you covered in the modernist clean inoffensive style of the minimal. The slickest of cutting edge recycled electronic goods. For now, for that game - they are the Kings of it - all hail apple.

Whatever, I converted to a home built PC in the 90's and never looked back yet. :P
But as a content provider, when it comes to a broadly commercially viable comics market, taking root 'online' POST collector era that will support a salary? In a post pirate bay world? it's a good platform to start with i'm going to bet.

Amazing assemblages by Kris Kuksi

2010-04-07T01:08:00.002-04:00

Found on flickr. Not much there about the artist, but cool sculptures built from "Mechanical parts and bits of toys considered garbage" which he turns into some incredible art.
see the whole set here.

Dream Life and Sequential

2010-03-31T22:18:00.000-04:00

Dream life continues afoot. Or no, it's in the air. well, whatever, :)

There was a rewarding surge in traffic when the latest page dropped. Need to get the last few dream sequence pages uploaded tonight. I posted a clip of script that was cut out along with page 16 today.

Just completed a total renovation and conversion of Sequential to a word press site. Came out well i think. Lot of new functions possible now, Bryan Dave and I have been throwing round a lot of ideas. Need to catch up with TCAF things but so far everything seems to be coming together.

The wing nut's wing nuts are on the wing. But they can't outrun Rachel Maddow!

2010-03-31T21:53:00.004-04:00

So I just want to say, when we depicted the end times in Therefore Repent, i didn't mean to say i belive in it! Nooooo, not even a little. We were taking the piss. But these crazy guys!! Fuck!!! Holy crap, you can't write it this bad. Check out the patch. Man.

But they could not outrun Rachel Maddow. Nice. If there were a god that would mean he watches her.

Good old Michigan. Don't you guys play in our rain dear games. Not unless you got some antlers.

digital painting for Dream Life

2010-03-06T22:59:00.003-05:00

enjoying the coloring i'm doing for Dream Life right now, here's a peek at tonight's work.

More Tainted Love Reviews and Popgun 4

2010-03-06T03:12:00.001-05:00

Couple more reviews in for my last wfh job, not too bad!

Dueling Review: Ghostbusters Tainted Love

By: Robot Overlord | February 21st, 2010 -

Ghostbusters' Winston Zeddemore:

I'm Ready to Believe Him

By Karaoke Fanboy | February 23rd, 2010

Also reviced my copy of Popgun 4 in the mail, nice glossy brick.

Lot of comics to absorb in there, will write about it later when i do, haven't really had the chance yet.

The Launch party notice was listed on Boing Boing, Found an early review of it here, and D.J. has a press round up posted here.

gots' ya' comics right here...

2010-03-03T04:11:00.003-05:00

Psst,

hey buddy...

So I've been wanting to add comics to Sequential.spiltink.org for a while, and was wondering how to go about it.

Then i realized, hey, i draw comics! duh. Been working on a graphic novel called Dream Life for the last while, and it's been begging for a better site.

To be honest I've been reluctant to use Sequential to promote my own work, feel a bit funny about it. But it increasingly seems the best way to continue doing both, and truthfully it was while working out how to get my own work out there that i realized there was a need for something like it in the first place, so of course i should be using it.

Over the last 6 months I've been trying to remind myself of that. I've Just added a new area to the site, a WordPress webcomics page, hosted at sequential.spiltink.org/comics [rss] - for now the main attraction is Dream Life. I had been publishing it on Live Journal but it's needed a new easier to read/follow site for a while.

For the last week there's been a new post each day, after page 9 I'll have new updates every Wednesday.

I want to expand from there, eventually to be a fully online version of RevolveR. I'm still working out how Wordpress works, when i get it sorted I'll be adding an index for other stories of my own....

But if you draw comics, then consider this -

Sequential is looking for creators to publish on site.

If you're interested contact me about publishing your comics on sequential.spiltink.org/comics Directly. Ongoing and short stories are both welcomed submissions. I want to leave the subject open on subject matter for the moment, but looking for good story telling and consistent work and i do plan to be picky. It would be great to have s traditional style strip to post right on the main Sequential blog too! Canadiana is very welcomed. Cheers - max.

drsketchy - the final countdown w Steam!

2010-02-21T04:42:00.002-05:00

Been meaning to go to a Dr, Sketchy session for a long time now.

Keep missing them. Was late to this one, missed the first hour, but finally made it today.

Really need to go do more live drawing in general. Getting stiff. Had a hard time getting into it, but at the end was in the swing.

Trying out some new Pentel brush pens, same tip as my pocket brush but these have refillable reservoirs rather than cartridges, put wash water in one and pure India ink in the other. works OK, need to work on my technique though.

----------------------

SEA OF RED SLIPCASE COLLECTION

2010-02-18T17:19:00.001-05:00

Nice. Only 1000 copies, so get you're orders in now me hearties.

Story RICK REMENDER & KIERON DWYER

Art KIERON DWYER, SALGOOD SAM & PAUL HARMON

Cover PAUL HARMON

MAY 10 - $39.99 - LIMITED TO 1000 COPIES

The year is 1533. Deckhand, Marco Esperanza's shipping vessel is sunk in the dead of night leaving him, the sole survivor, left adrift in the Red Sea. His prayers are answered when a strange ship impossibly cuts through the night fog saving him a watery grave. However, his elation soon turns to horror when he discovers he has been brought aboard the dread pirate ship, The Black Galleon. There is more to Captain Lesser Blackthroat and his evil crew than mere piracy, these men are damned -- these men are vampire.

The year is 2004. Since being turned undead by Blackthroat, Marco has spent the past 400 years tied to the bow of a sunken vessel, clinging to unlife in the dark, briny, deep. His confinement at the bottom of the sea ends when film director Joel Cameron's submarine discovers him while location scouting. Hungry to film a live vampire battle, Cameron agrees to aid Marco in seeking out the eternal monsters responsible his fate that he might have his revenge.

COLLECTS SEA OF RED, VOL. 1-3

RETAILER WARNING: MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR ALL AGES

Previews Interviews and Reviews: GHOSTBUSTERS SPECIAL: TAINTED LOVE

2010-02-17T19:00:00.005-05:00

cool: Newsarama is previewing our book this week, and saying nice things. Always awesome, thanks guys!

Also kind of awesome, we got a good review on Hypergeek, 4 out of 5 stars! Glee!

More kinds of awesome, another Review here by J. Caleb Mozzocco on EVERY DAY IS LIKE WEDNESDAY! AND, he did an interview with Dara on Blog@Newsarama! Nice.

Not as cool: IDW strangely sent out a horrible pdf to use for the preview!
Huh? Rats, they make my hand lettered text look like MUD! Mentioned this to the PR folks at IDW when i saw the pdf myself but....hmmmm...hurrrm...hum.

Well, not to gripe to much or look the gift horse in the tonsils, here's the preview page, but read the one's i posted here below, ok? Images link to lage files on flickr that will open in a new window. Also you can use this full screen slide show, which includes all the other art I've posted from the book so far. These versions of the pages are from before final proof readings so some typo's may be included.

You like?

There was an awful truck accident and problems with customs that's resulting in delays in shipping, but it is on it's way. Ask you're local Brick and Mortar shop about it, or order online.

$3.99 - Diamond Code: DEC09 0906

News on Ghostbusters: Tainted Love

2010-02-15T22:07:00.001-05:00

Crap. We busted our asses to get it done in time but the last people, officials, or weather events in the food chain always have the last say. I was assured it was on time last week, but i just read this from Dara....

Hey guys, Dara here. I just found out the scoop on this book's erratic ship date. Apparently what made it miss the original ship date for the week of Valentine's Day is that it got held up in customs. But here's where the story takes a tragic twist: it is officially hitting stores this week (17th), except for most of the East coast. The truck from Diamond Distributors that had all of IDW's books on it for the East coast stores was involved in a very bad weather-related accident. My understanding is that the driver(s) are in critical condition in the hospital.

So needless to say, it's a very unfortunate event and I hope that everyone involved pulls through and makes a full recovery.

Man, that sucks. Hope the drivers pull through.

Customs on the other hand, I've no love for those guys, give people like little sisters grief all the time. What in the world they held us up for god knows, but nothing new.

Piles of Inking...

2010-02-07T02:01:00.000-05:00

...man, kind of cutting it close for the trip. Getting there though, doing a dragon right now, in a novel pose i think, never seen someone do what we're doing in this scene. Fun.

Can't show you thought, sorry, secret stuff now, save for the big tada.

Took a few moments from some heavy inking work today to play though. Took a stab and composing the cover for one of my two projects for TCAF.

The text i laid-out a while back, didn't know what art i wanted to use though at the time. So been sitting on it for the last two years. After i drew the page, it struck me it would be perfect for the job, need to shade it still for the interior, but might use it like this for the cover.

Want this to be ready for TCAF 2010, thinking probably a small run self published deal for now. Like this, looks handsome and would be easy to get printed well. Going to think on it for a bit but it feels right.

Oh my god, Brendan McCarthy.

2010-02-06T05:53:00.001-05:00

Hit this page - "Brendan McCarthy Talks Spider-Man Fever"

...and had a little geek fit, oh yeah, yes, Brendan McCarthy is drawing two of Steve Ditko's best characters, Spider Man and Dr. Strange in one book.

And i must must must have!

Last years of high school was when i first found out about Brendon's work, it was one of those revelatory encounters. The preview art for this is beautiful. He's perfect for this. So jealous. :)

Tainted Love

2010-02-06T05:00:00.002-05:00

When does Ghostbusters: Tainted Love Come out in comic book shops?

The guys at IDW tell me it should hit the stands on the 10th. That may vary in some Canadian locations but I'm assured it will make it. I'm crossing my fingers and things.

It was made with love, and can be yours just in time to be a gift for that special geek in your life. :) Along with the art here below, you can catch a preview of the book on brokenfrontier.com, and a few words from Dara about his story!

$3.99 - Diamond Code: DEC09 0906

Also pretty cool, is you can get this book as an App for you're IPhone, Touch, or Pad eventually, just $1.99 for that. My first app, didn't have much with formating it, will have to get my girlfriend to get it so i can see how it reads.

I just read something wrong on wiki...

2010-02-05T07:42:00.004-05:00

...to be fair they we're quoting the ROCK and RULE DVD.

"According to the commentary on the DVD release, the effects for the demon in the movie's final sequence were produced by smearing cow brains over one plane of a slit scan multiplane camera."

Well, that's cute, but quite true i think. I'm getting old but this is not how i remember it. They used photos of cow brains alright, thought that was really cool! But i doubt it was smeared on the Multiplane camera directly. :P hah!

I was around as a little kid at the time at Nelvana, 8 or 9 years old. 10 or 11 maybe by the time that part was being shot. Watching that film get worked on was the highlight of several summers - my mother was on the crew and we didn't have daycare. Remember the crew working on that part in particular, it made an impression.

The demon was drawn on black paper with red and white pastel, or something like. Lot of smudging was involved. Crazy hard work for the artist. I recall they were copying from pencil drawings done by the animators who had worked out the mechanics of it traditionally on a light table. Think it might have been the first time i saw someone make tracing paper by rubbing something [chalk in this case i think] on the back of a page and re-tracing the lines of the drawing. Only way they could get the animation onto the black paper.

But it didn't look intense enough when they were done that. I recall the big debate in the paint department about what to do after the first rushes came in. People who worked on it still talk about that part of the production wide eyed about all the work that went into it. So, that's when the guts came into it.

The pastel art was shot on to full size transparencies, the blacks blacked out solid leaving the demon translucent on the films/cells. Making an overlay layer.

The photos of guts n' brains was shot in a bucket as i recall, poked and sloched to make it unduatle. That footage was terned into large stills and were under the cell art, lit from below on the Multiplane. It was footage of moving guts, so they would have to change the photo of the guts for each new frame shot, far more often than the animated demon's cells had to be changed, making it slow going.

Have a clear memory of the camera guy showing me what he was doing at the time and making eyes about all the work involved with perverse pride. Pretty awesome stuff.

But they loved that machine, maybe something happen when i was not around and i never heard about it. But I kind of suspect they could just shot the bucket of stuff with a regular camera, be a heck of a lot easier, and doubt they'd have gotten that gunk on the machine, it was huge and expensive.

One line of common wisdom...

2010-02-04T21:03:00.001-05:00

...I've seen run true in my own lifetime, is that humans are boom and bust creatures, with a well documented tendency to ignore folly and run after the endless return. Not a revelation. Not everyone all the time or anything, but yeah, as a general thing just about all of us some of the time.

There's a real strong, but kind of late push towards electric renewables these days. But sadly we're far from braking point with Gass just yet. Got some more rev to grind out of those hot old hot rods.

There's also a kind of particular level of crazy fascination that we often associate with greed for things like gold, that inevitably heralds the bust of these booms. And that's what i thought when i saw this.

A rare Ferrari 250 GTO comes to market with a supersize price tag of $20 million dollars, more than a thousand times its original value.

It's a lovely machine without a doubt. not sure i say the same for the trend. A sexy growling herald of autopocalypse she is, all nice and red.

page 4 of 8

2010-01-31T04:45:00.003-05:00

More inking tonight. This is going to be a fun project....

IPad, Will it save comics?

2010-01-27T14:22:00.005-05:00

...Don't know, but it looks pretty good to me. And starting at $499 i might even be able to afford it, dang, didn't see that coming.

The IPad seems like a decent entry in the Tablet category, and yeah, i bet my Dream Life art would look good on it, It's even the exact same dimensions! :)

I'm working on a new Zuda project too, if we're lucky and land the deal, this could be a big boost for it.

I've posted more about it here on Sequential, along with some clips. It's pretty exciting to think about what this might do for print and web based media, i for one am optimistic.

More inking.

2010-01-23T23:53:00.000-05:00

Ok, i just like making film clips. I'd like to make a film sometime. For now, making comics. A friend said they wanted to see what was going on better in response to the other inking clip, so this time i did just double speed. Not quite as exciting to watch but informational. Even for me, editing this noticed a lot of little things i should be paying attention to. Should analyze my technique like this more often.

Again music is by Michelle Breslin and co. from the last album recorded buy sadoceanspacebear before braking up as a group. You can hear more here.
sadoceanspacebear
sicklittleslinky
moekellogg

...and penciling.

2010-01-22T22:02:00.000-05:00

Another day at the desk. Someone wanted to see the work being done more clearly than you can in the last proses video i made, so this is only sped up a little bit.

Inking, fast as i can....

2010-01-21T03:06:00.002-05:00

Few days ago i saw a post by Cameron, then a gallery of art by some other friends of mine for a course they are teaching in Toronto. All inking stuff.

If you follow this blog you know i just wrapped up a wfh gig, and i'm trying to get in as much work as i can before a week long vacation in Toronto in February. Seeing that other work helped me get kick started inking some Dream Life stuff. Had a good day yesterday getting this done, and i penciled AND inked this tonight in one sitting! In all this page took about 4 hours. Helped it was a simple one mind you but still, like it when once goes that easy.

The music is by Michelle Breslin and co. from the last album recorded buy sadoceanspacebear before braking up as a group. You can hear more here.
sadoceanspacebear
sicklittleslinky
moekellogg

Keepin' the pot a boilin'

2010-01-19T21:11:00.002-05:00

Put this up on Flickr a few days ago, it's open to the changes different venues and opportunities will provide but I'm kind of hopping i can do it just B&W like this. I really love working in this style, and i think this one would suite it well. Can't say too much yet but this is something I'm collaborating with Mark Sable, my co-hort on Upside Down for Comic Book Tattoo.

More to come soon. Juggling doing some pages for a pitch [as seen here] and inking two Dream Life pages, shooting for 5 in all by the end of the week. So far looking good.

TCAF 2010 has started the big wind up, thanks for the heads up Dave. Exciting, and scarry, got a lot i want to get together for that this year!

Research material for future memories

2010-01-15T20:19:00.003-05:00

Last night i found a facebook group that had been started up by former Rochdale members. Hi Larry and Walter! Going to be great for helping collect first hand accounts of the place and time.

Led me to do some digging and there's a few interesting new bits of material online now about this major component of the Story of my parents meeting and life. Been working with the idea of writing and drawing some kind of story about my father and this will be a big part of it. First off are a few entries in the very cool verbal history project murmur - And some really interesting raw bits of video have been posted on you tube by Charasee Press, 4 in all so far.