This is what happens when you work for a Cocksucker...

Friends, what follows is a poor reconstruction, a post-mortem in fact, of an endeavor that became misadventure. The pages below were rendered during the pinnacle of my earlier career in comics which then became an unexpected and abrupt twilight. Working for a string of small, yet robust, publishers I made the acquaintance of a young and promising writer of the Romance Fiction genre looking for his first chance to write for the Action Hero genre. He had an idea of combining the popular costumed hero comic of the North Americans with the perverse, monster, crime and fiend genre many have come to know as Japanese Comics, or Manga. We talked about some of our needs for the story and hero; location and motivation for the series. Then we discussed the title. We agreed on the title. Then we needed to classify the genre, as this was surely a thing never seen before. This young, idealistic and talented pensmith who sat before me then uttered a word that forever changed the world of illustrated hero fiction; we would call the genre "SMASHMOUTH". I fainted, then came to, on fire with the possibilities of the project.
The next hurtle would be getting approval and funding for the idea; the resources and talent that this book would require would could be daunting and might scare the publisher into canning the project before it got to paper. Again, inspiration and pure drive brought us to the perfect solution in dealing with the unpredictable president of the comic juggernaut that was Comico, Andrew Rev,..."Fuck him."
Oh, and that young writer? The man who penned four sinew-ripping, nostril-stabbing, heart-squishing issues of the legendary series known as "RED DRAGON"? None other than Mr. Brian Azzerello, hizzelf! We kicked major ass, if I may say so myself. It was fun and wrong and we totally did it covertly. Andrew Rev was not on board with the project until we showed a preview to a visiting group of reviewers visiting the Comico offices. They took one look at Red Dragon and knew that this was what they wanted to see more of. I got to ink the first issue and Simon Bisley did the cover art. I don't want to get into the demise of the series, four pages shy of completing the fourth issue. Let me, instead share some scans of Xeroxes made on Comicos' shabby-ass copier; this is all that's left, thank you Andrew. A wise, wise man, he.
There a smattering of other pages that I can't seem to make sense of as far as the continuity; I'll post those in a subsequent blog. This book and working with Azz were a complete and utter BLAST!
All I can say about the abbreviated run of Red Dragon is this; "Y'all motherfuckas was robbed!"
h.e.

Cauldron Try-out

Cauldron was a yet-to-be -published series in the early stages of spin-up when I was invited to take a stab at becoming the series penciller. It had all the "stuff" that I love; mecha,techa,chica-gothica, and horra. A coven of hottie witches that had some bumpin' sci-"fly" equipment and the ability to use it sounded cool to me. Well...I didn't get the job. The series was renamed and published as"The Witching".
Here's what I did. Please, please keep in mind that this is the first attempt at drawing from actual scripted story (by Jonathan Vankin, who would be my editor on the "Hellblazer:Papa Midnight" series) in like 9 years; so was a little rusty at the format.

h.e.

Dragsheets

While working I'll use folded sheets of 8.5x11 or comicbook backing board or scrap bristol as a layer of protection betweem my drawing hand and the page just to prevent smudging. I call these papers "dragsheets" for some reason. Anyway, from time to time fun stuff winds up on the scrap( and I don't mean my idea for an evil Simian-Cetaceous(?) Alliance against mankind; yes, armed monkeys riding dolphins).
Well, you couldn't have been any more surprised than I when Batman appeared somehow...He kept making visits over the course of two weeks. Here're just a couple of the scribbles; plus a none related one just cause the girl is boomin'.
Hope you like these,Fred.

Catalyst

Praise the Web. A simple seach turned up some source on the game Dogfight. Not too different from how I recall it! The Albatross(the German aircraft with the broken wing) is being done in by what looks like a Navy Sopwith. You can see the little German pilots head; trust me he looks aghast at his plight. There was a booklet (in the foreground) that came with the game. It was a little brochure on air warfare of WW1. This is what had such great impact on me. I remember the pages had a good amount of text on them, just enough to let an 11 year old believe that he wasn't reading too much. But it was the repros of paintings that really were the greatest. The good people at American Heritage had their branding on both the booklet and the game, which was made by Milton Bradley, so this allowed my little mind to construe that this meant possible approval from the parents because it gave the game the appearance of being edumacational (that's right, I said "edumacational"). The AH endorsement led me to look for other such books in my schools' library, which led my to..'lo and behold; American Heritage "Air Warfare of World War Two"; possibly my first actually read of history (maybe, after Bruce Cattons' "This Hallowed Ground"). Anyway, yeah...I was a little war monger. This started me on the long road of studying the nature of airframes and the nature of aerial combat; I filled pages and pages of school notebooks (formerly reserved for "Civil War guys" with shredded fuselages and secondary explosions ejecting wreckage and flame up from impact craters. I started watching movies like "Bombadier" and "Flying Tigers"; paid closer attention to gun camera footage in "The World At War" when it aired on Sundays...My bedroom ceiling filled with models of airplanes (but my walls stayed dedicated to Bruce Lee).
In fact, to this day, I still have boxes of unassembled models on a shelf where I work; I purchased them not too long ago after having a dream about being locked in a hobby shop after hours amid an aisle upon aisle of model planes. There are no Bruce Lee posters hanging in my studio.
h.e.

Torque, you dorque!

I can't remember when I first became "fixed" on airframes and aircraft or aerodynamics in general. My first recollections are playing a game, a boardgame, by Milton Bradley called "Dogfight". This was back in the Age of Proto-Funk circa 1971-72. It was summer and I was at the board scattering pieces as my sister hated the game and I had no proper friends to partake in such things with me...Anyway, it was the cover art, the box art that I remember most about the game; a German pilot with a look of alarm as the struts to the wings of his crimson Albatross snap; the wing, with it's Maltese cross, crumpling; the victor, I'll assume British, in a Sopwith or an Se-5( I can't recall) streaking off to continue the hunt or die in a subsequent encounter with less a favorable outcome or to simple go home. This may have been the start of the "thing with airplanes".

Planes, reflexively, are the first thing I'll draw 80% of the time if I'm just "meandering" across the page. Sometimes, maybe the view from a plane or the detail of a flight surface or cockpit glazing. Rarely, RARELY are these aircraft jets. I love propellers; real engines. The Golden Age of Aviation.

The image above is from an old sketchbook circa 1996-7. This is a non-conventional configuration that was one of my "pet" silhouettes for a while; many variations on canopy gear and such, but the flight surfaces remained the same. In "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow", the Brits under the lead of a one-eyed (yet still, oddly, hot) Angelina Jolie flew aircraft called Martins that had this same configuration. Not bad.

My futurist eye always keeps martial culture and the sense of "frontier" very handy and evident. The things that the military utilizes whether equipage or people get cycled into general society; or society itself gravitates to a martialist standing on it's own. Above,"VegaEights" is sort of a "my girl has been away for 6 months serving with the Flotilla". It's the sort of thing that really really made me appreciate the early "Love and Rockets" stories by Jaime Hernandez; there were chics and ships!

This is design in earnest here; would/could someone actually handle this plane safely? This is property for a story, but along with thinking of a narrative, having the best toys for your story is half the fun, no? Check out the markings on the tail surface; part of the original squadron flash is altered to signify a hasty realignment of this squadron apart from it's original loyalties and service.

OMG...I'm a geek!
h.e.

Muddy h2o: My Home Is In The Delta Quadrant

Français mal, talked ici

So Elizabeth has returned from Paris. She really enjoyed her trip. Despite my warnings, she risked the wrath of the French by attempting their language on their home soil. She's on the phone presently with her mother, lauding the French , Paris and her sister, Laura whom she travelled with. Wow, she really loved this trip!
Enough of that...here's some art. Bon Appetit.

..Oh, this is some sort of Oceanic thing...Sea Sprites, if you will.
h.e.

OW! My Chops! Which you are busting, like a hitting person, on me...

More mf's gettin' toe up. Including ME; I have to say that I was out of order in an earlier blog by not crediting Raf Nieves for the story/concept for which I drew this art. The pitch, "Tank"...well, tanked; that sci-fi stigma I mentioned earlier. But it's a kick-ass story as only Raf can do! Thanks, for checkin' my shit, brah. Raf and I are presently working on another project that is sure to get high marks. Go to Raf's blog to see if he talks about it because I won't here (yet) because "all I know is Vertigo...". But it's gonna kick-ass, trust me.
h.e.

...Back to our regularly scheduled program:Manchuria,1938

Something else dredged up..no, actually this is pretty near the front right burner; more sample art from a proposal. I need to either clone myself or build a time machine...so much to do.
h.e.

Interlude

If you've checked out the links in my sidebar, you've noticed that I'm a fan of Trish Mulvihills' blog. Go there. It's got great content; a lot of photos Trish has taken in Ireland and Paris and just around her hometown, NYC. Actually, her blog is the document that made me aware of blogger.com. For those of you who don't know, Trish is another creative contributor for Vertigo, a respected and talented industry veteran whose work is seen in many titles, in particular, "100 Bullets". I've only met her once, and she's a sweetheart. Anyway her blog has great samples of art and interesting people and images and events and places and friends having fun...I wish her blog was a television show. Her blog is everything my blog isn't...Which I feel a bit self-conscious about. Seems that in Hilarity Ensues there's nothing but a lot of shit gettin' tore/blown up.
So here's a cute kitten...

h.e.

What's REALLY on my mind?....

So if someone had ever actually asked me,"Have you ever designed a grenade launcher?" I would have to think long and hard about it. Then I would still have not remembered this loverly hand prop. I did it during my game designer foray with Chewy Software. I'd rub out, er...pound out, uh...I'd draw me up some bad-ass sketchies all fast-like...20,40,70% grey marker renderings real loose-like. Then tighten the line-work with black. Simple as Pi. I'd generate a couple dozen of these over the course of a day and hand them right over the monitors of the 3D modellers. I'd give some art direction and boom; one 3D modelled 'nader.

This puppy was modelled by Shane Duncan. It was his idea to give it the Orkish flav.
h.e.

KaBOOOM!!!

Last summer (I'm rifling through old files now that I'm actively blogging, again), anyway, last summer I just happen to be looking out over Old Town, to the west. I catch a flash out of the corner of my eye; see a flaming mushroom cloud shooting up somewhere just east of Halsted Avenue; then hear the explosion (physics rocks). I'm sure it was a roofdeck propane tank that blew. Hopefully no one was hurt. I grabbed my camera and took this shot thinking all the while about Glen A. Larsen. The cloud is about 400 ft high at this point. If you click on this image and look right at the base of the smoke column, you can see the fire started by the blast among the trees. The firestation is in plain sight from the balcony, so I watched and waited for the sirens and the trucks to appear. The firehouse is about two blocks east of the blast, towards the spot where I took this shot and along that street that runs towards the railing of the balcony. But when I saw the emegency vehicles pull out of the station, they headed East (in my direction)! Not West! They eventually got it right. A couple of days later I walked past the station on my way to work. I stopped and asked what had blown up on Tuesday, but the fireman told me that it was a different crew on duty that day...
h.e.

War of the Worlds

Look, there's this thing out there...the Germans have a word for it; Gestaltd. If it gets ahold of your ass you'd better move because it's very, very likely that it has had a few other asses in it's crafty Teutonic clutches. Basically, in terms that relate to this blogger and his profession, gestalt (there's no "d", I just looked it up) means that if you have a kick-ass idea, it's very likely that there's 2 to the power of 10 other people who have the same idea. A few years ago I had the privilege of having Gary Gianni drop by my studio.
He had in tow a photographer named Greg Preston who was taking images of artists, comicbook artists, in their studios for a book he wanted to publish (a bit anthropological, don't you think?). While Gary was a the studio I showed him some of the pages you see here. I confided in him as he had, some while ago, tackled an adaptation of Verne's "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea". What I showed to him were the first stabs at my adaptation of Herbert George Wells' "War of the Worlds".
The closest Perihelion Opposition of Mars on record was going to occur in the next couple of years and I'd thought this a great time for a new adaptation. Well of course the Martian Opposition came and went but I still kept plugging away at the project, glad to have something that kept me busy creatively. Then what happens? I happen to catch an impromptu interview with Tom Cruise where he quickly mentions a project that he and Spielberg are wrapping up (at this point the month is the April prior to the films release). Yes, I get depressed. I shelve the project and don't follow ANY of the buzz on the film (as is my m.o. for films I really want to see). I go see the film the day it opens... Thank GOD it sucked ass! I get on my knees each day and thank Him. I'm not going to get into a detailed post-mortem of the film, but the Warshowski (?) Brothers spoke the truth when saying that "film is a medium of compromises." I think that Spielberg missed the tone and scope of the original story by constricting an already myopic (which works) narrative experience (ow...) by hamstringing the film with 9/11 addled sentiments (the grey ash that people turned into when "vaporized" by the heatray).
I walked out of the theater relieved that the "blockbuster" was so far off the mark. If I remember correctly, Wells wrote the book as a critical work, openly critical of the practice of colonialism; something the British know a little bit about. Plus there's some very telling commentary in the original work about humanities strident advance across the threshold of the 20th century and what we were choosing to carry over into the new century and what we were eager to discard to the past. The glossed over technological "hoodoo" that the film displayed was laughable; that the Martian Fighting Machines had ALWAYS been here, that they were simply buried awaiting the pilots, for eons? Snort,...come on! I suppose every geological survey ever conducted happened to "miss" a large mass of non-terrestrial technology swaddled in an Allegheny ore deposit or nestled against a granite shelf. I laughed out loud.
At any rate, I'm fairly secure in the knowledge that the latest film adaptation and my attempt at an adaption of "The War of the Worlds" will remain two wholly independent and vastly differing efforts in storytelling. Toot-toot! (that's my horn!) .
The art you're seeing here is taken from the "shank" of the story I was (am) planning. That's an old McDonalds that I actually used to spend a lot of time in when I was a teen chasing skirt back on East 87th Street. I was a bit chagrined, when I went back there after lovingly paying homage to the franchise on these pages, to find that that particular shop had been torn down and rebuilt. Damn, Martians.
h.e.

Bursting at the Links

I so want to load art from Jack of Fables; but the book is not out until sometime in the late Spring, early Summer. I'm nearing the end of the first 5 issue story arc, and there are some really, really awesome things that occur; my hat goes off to Bill Willingham and Matt Sturges, the writers of Jack. They keep me on my toes and hopefully they feel confident in my abilities as an artist in bringing "it" to the page. I do have to say that I've discovered my first true pet peeve thanks to these two; chain-link fences. You'll see what I'm talking about when the series starts. Essentially, it's an obstacle (no pun intended). At a long distance, in a drawn scene, the link detail of a fence can be overlooked; maybe a small, deliberately spotted cross-hatch can suffice in communicating the detail of the interwoven mesh. But at a medium to close distance, this mesh becomes an interfering pattern, that MUST be executed pretty exactly in order not to look like caa-caa (that's shit). Plus the incidence/interval of intersecting lines cause horrible "noise" and nearly obliterates any drawing (Lord forbid there's characters emoting on the far side of the fenceline as I have had) that the link pattern has to appear over. As you'll see (eventually) I have no problem drawing the details of the fence when the link are in the extreme foreground; the POV of the "camera" allowing the reader a clear view of the subject, unobscured and nicely framed by the diamond-shaped opening in the fence. So my solution is to simply ignore the goddamned links, except in the extreme close-up. It will be one of those peculiar aspects of my art; like Romita giving every other woman he draws on every tenth page of a Marvel comic three ears. Look at it this ways,yo...what I leave out in fencing, I give so much more in earrage.
Above is a photo of a lad from last years Chicago Convention. I was thrilled to see an attendee dressed as a character from "FABLES". He's Flycatcher, aka the Frog Prince. I sent this along to Shelly at Vertigo and she may use it down the line.
I'm hoping that someone takes a cue from Jack of Fables and dresses as a "Bagman". I can't tell you what that is because it would be hard to kill you from here, just using this blog.
Well, I have to get this day going, f'real-like; comics to draw, y'know.


...evil and madness await. Evil and madness.
h.e.

Here's something fairly recent...

This is a sample from a pitch that has landed in comicbook limbo. For some reason the term "science-fiction" has become a red flag in the business. I can't recall just now what the operative terrm is. I have some more sketches from this same project I'll upload over the next couple of days. These images and any other content here isn't too sensitive, but is considered copyrighted. If you feel the need to swipe anything, just don't make any money from my designs, or at least acknowlege my contribution. Or I will show up on your doorstep and commence to stomping your punk ass.
hilarity ensues

Zapp will save us, won't he?

Here's the man to stand up to the Cylons. Wasn't it DOOP Commander Zapp Brannigan who, when facing death by "Shnu-shnu" at the hands and thighs of sex-starved Amazonians, boldly declared, "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is spongy and bruised...".

Richard Greico? Naw, man.

That's former Vice-President Baltar of the Galactica Colonies (sheesh!). He won the election and ordered the settlement of a crappy little planet by the population of the fleet. Of course the Cylons found the planet...We'll have to wait til next season to find out what happens. Sigh. Best show on television.
Here's another old sketch (I'm working my way up to current stuff, don't worry). But doesn't this put you in the mind of Bungies' "Oni". Well, it was done some years before the game. She's a pilot of some sort that's just walked away from a bad landing. The radial lines behind her were going to be the rotary wings of her helo.
Tony, Juan...thanks for checking out the blog. Spread the word!
h.e.

I knew he'd BONE us!

...and HOW did I know exactly?
Well, for one thing he's Cylon-whipped; secondly...
He did everything EXACTLY the way I would have done it.
Saw the writing on the wall...the writing on the wall.
h.e.

Good dreams!!!

It's a conventional belief that dreams are a window into our state of mind. I've always had and enjoyed my dreamlife; at times more than my waking life. Usually when I dream there's a not a general "theme" or order (though I do have recurring dreams or locations in dreams, there are even people who have recurring "roles"). There is a general "color" or mood to my dreams depending on what's happening in my nondreaming life. The underpinning for most of the experiences while I'm asleep is anxiety. Big whoop. But I process this in stride. What knocks me for a loop are GOOD DREAMS! For instance; I've recently finished a torturous two weeks locked away in a Lincoln Park condo laboring over the last half of JoF#5. I finish the bastard, send it off to Vertigo and that night had the best dream I've had in a while. It involved me going to the bank and depositing a check for 70,000 dollars and dealing with my flaky girlfriend, Milla Jovovich. Not bad. She wouldn't come home; some neurosis about being in a stable, loving relationship! OK, I'm cool, baby...but you told me you'd be here today, yo. Heh. As enjoyable as all this was (and unexpected), there was a cameo made by a very familiar feature from the Tony Akins prop department; the Bridge. When dreams dovetail with waking life in that "freaky" way that they do, you take in stride, no? That's life. But when my dreams, say, dovetail with the vision of some director of a film, it rattles me just a little bit. I feel exposed.
The "bridge", for as long as I can recall, has always been a feature that presents itself as the only means of getting over a water obstacle (duh) in my dreams. But the bridge always, always reveals itself (once on it, halfway across) as a skeletal structure; having no roadway or flooring. So it must be negotiated like a big rusty jungle gym. Hooray!!!
Well, I went to see this great film some years back; Japanese; "Cold Fever"; there was a bridge; it was "my" bridge. Sitting in the theatre I broke into a cold sweat. It was simply strange to see something that I had experienced on such a private level as someone elses device to convey a story. I had never considered the broader symbological (?) uses for a skeletal bridge.
One of my favorite writers, Michael Chabon (I've met him, you know)...wrote something that I find wonderful and reassuring whenever I am "confronted" with those waking "bridge" moments. It's in his book "The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay", the book that brought me back to comics. Chapter 12, Page 256, 1st Paragraph. Read it. Marvel.
h.e.

I Hate You ALL!!! (not really,though)

So what happens? The first decent weather in the city in a few months and people go ape-shit. I've just returned to the airport, dropping Elizabeth off for her flight to Paris. I have to tell you that there were plenty of yahoos out tooling around in their cars and suvs for no reason, apparently, other than it's something to do on a nice Saturday. Plenty of accidents along the way involve fair-weather-addled motorists out for a joy-slam. Plenty of the "wearin'o'da'green" (already?! What the phuck, Ludwig?) Some mother's son almost hit me coming back into the city. I wished for a paint-ball gun filled with pellets gorged with egg yolks. Jack-ass.
Hey! I'm blogging, again; put to shame by Tony M over at LonelyRiceChronicles...AND I'll load images for you.
How's that shit? Here's something old from a sketchbook; scanned by none other than Caitlin Drake McKay of Devil's Due (check out last weeks Chicago Reader to see a photo of Caitlin, who's very cute, and read about the phuckt-up awesomeness that Devil's Due is droppin' on the comics scene). Speaking of comics, sinced I last blogged I've been assigned to a monthly book at Vertigo/DC. It's called "Jack of Fables" (JoF) and features the uber-mook, Jack of the Tales (Jack Horner, the Giant-Slayer, be Nimble, etc.,ect.), in his own (mis)adventures following his exile from Fabletown in the "Fables" storyline. It's written by Bill Willingham and Matthew Struges, who are two very,very talented students over at Roosevelt Franklin Junior High. Andrew Pepoy is on the inks. I'm into issue number 5 already. My editor, the magnificent and well-dressed Shelly Bond, seems pleased...and that's all that really matters, right?
You buy it when it comes out this summer; that's all I'm sayin', yo.
So this old sketch is something I wish I had been driving this afternoon. I would have blasted someone's ass with that...er, pulse-cannon-thingie in the back there, I would've.
Go to fabletown.com and checkout some of the chat. Then come back and tell me about what's happening because I never read it thoroughly enough, myself..I can't keep up with those verbose and talented guys. I try not to do "press"...I'll read it only when I'm feeling a good spike on the self-loathing chart and feel the urge to punish myself. Yes, yes; definately a rise in the incidence of neurosis when drawing a monthly book. I'll fill you all in later. Looking at this old art reminds of when it so important to me that I draw nattily dressed individuals of a martialist persuasion, prepared to do damage and look good while doing it!!! Oh,SNAP. Oh, BLAM! OK, I'll blog at you later.
h.e.
Tony