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Post by Deleted on Mar 24, 2022 21:31:14 GMT -5
3 Rivers Comicon, which is June 4 & 5, just announced that Howard Chaykin will be a guest. Was already planning on going with my two girls, so this is a pretty nice little bonus. Have to dig out some of the old Star Wars books to see if he'll sign. Howard was very pleasant and very busy sketching when I met him at Gem City several years back. He signs things very quickly and it looks like swirls not letters when he does, but he is generally amendable to signing stuff (or was). He was surprised at some of the things I asked him to sign (Monark Starstalker, Solomon Kane in Marvel Premiere; Conan; Ironwolf), and was glad I asked for something different than what he was always asked to sketch (Hawkgirl). He seemed to like interacting with fan and such, and didn't mind signing or sketching (free signatures, modest prices for sketches back then), he just seemed to get bored signing or sketching the same old things over and over again as the day wore on. Now, that was 2014 and a lot could have changed since then, but I enjoyed the experience of meeting him. -M
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Mar 25, 2022 0:55:59 GMT -5
Apparently David Anthony Kraft was the literary agent for the estate of Otis Adelbert Kline. He also apparently was writing our has written a biography of Kline. I’d actually love to read that.
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Post by EdoBosnar on Mar 25, 2022 5:53:30 GMT -5
3 Rivers Comicon, which is June 4 & 5, just announced that Howard Chaykin will be a guest. Was already planning on going with my two girls, so this is a pretty nice little bonus. Have to dig out some of the old Star Wars books to see if he'll sign. Howard was very pleasant and very busy sketching when I met him at Gem City several years back. He signs things very quickly and it looks like swirls not letters when he does, but he is generally amendable to signing stuff (or was). He was surprised at some of the things I asked him to sign ( Monark Starstalker, Solomon Kane in Marvel Premiere; Conan; Ironwolf), and was glad I asked for something different than what he was always asked to sketch (Hawkgirl). He seemed to like interacting with fan and such, and didn't mind signing or sketching (free signatures, modest prices for sketches back then), he just seemed to get bored signing or sketching the same old things over and over again as the day wore on. Now, that was 2014 and a lot could have changed since then, but I enjoyed the experience of meeting him. -M I met Chaykin back in 2010 when he was a special guest of the comics show in Zagreb. One of his scheduled activities was doing sketches for fans in the French Institute's library and reading room one afternoon. Not many people showed up so I ended up sitting there and shooting the breeze with him for a good 20 minutes while he drew me a sketch of Monark Starstalker...
...and signed three comic books I brought with me: Marvel Premiere #s 32 and 56 and the Iron Wolf reprint from the early 1980s. And yes, he was pleased that I asked him to draw something different (everyone else there just wanted him to draw some generic character, usually a woman) and tickled at my selection of comics. I actually had to pass those around, because nobody else had ever even heard of, say, Monark Starstalker or Iron Wolf, much less seen the actual comics. They were only familiar with Chaykin's work from the '80s onward - typical pretentious Europeans ... (although I was a bit surprised that even Darko Macan, who was also there, hadn't ever seen any of that stuff, as he's otherwise quite knowledgeable about American comics). It also gave him something else to talk about, as he noted how much praise he got for the art in the Monark Starstalker story in particular.
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Post by foxley on Mar 25, 2022 6:50:29 GMT -5
I think a lot of artists are happy when you ask them to draw something a bit more obscure, especially if it shows you are a fan. (If I ever get the chance to get a Chaykin sketch, I'll probably go for Dominic Fortune.)
I remember when I commissioned a sketch form Mike Grell, and said that I was trying to decide between Dawnstar and Sigil (from Bar Sinister). Mike had been looking down at his sketch pad, but when I said that, his face suddenly lit up and he looked up at me and said "Did you say Sigil?" in a delighted tone of voice, which decided me there and then that I was getting a Sigil piece. Mike then said that he had probably done about 500 Dawnstar sketches to every Sigil, and I think his delight in getting a chance to do a seldom requested character from one of his creator-owned books really shows in the finished piece. And when I met him again a couple of years later, he remembered me as the guy who'd commissioned the Sigil piece.
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Post by EdoBosnar on Mar 25, 2022 7:52:35 GMT -5
I think a lot of artists are happy when you ask them to draw something a bit more obscure (...) Oh, yeah, definitely. Had a similar experience in that regard a few years later with R.M. Guera. All of the people in line before me were having him draw generic Native Americans - not specific characters from Scalped, but 'traditional' ones wearing the feather headdress or whatnot. So when I came up and asked him to draw the horse from Scalped, Festus, his face lit up and he even said, 'Oh, bravo!' Also had a pleasant chat with him while he drew it - which took him less than 10 minutes. A friggin' masterpiece in such a short time. It's framed now, of course.
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Post by The Captain on Mar 25, 2022 8:23:31 GMT -5
I think a lot of artists are happy when you ask them to draw something a bit more obscure, especially if it shows you are a fan. (If I ever get the chance to get a Chaykin sketch, I'll probably go for Dominic Fortune.) I was thinking about asking Chaykin to draw a certain green rabbit, because who would ask for that, and who else on earth would have that? I’ve also found that creators like to sign different things than usual. Herb Trimpe was blown away by the books I brought him to sign (Hulk 124 & 142, Marvel Spotlight 12) instead of the recent variant cover he’d done. Ron Frenz asked why I brought him ASM 260, instead of 252, and Thor 411 instead of 412 (first New Warriors); in both cases, I told him because the ones I had him sign were favorites of mine. Bill Sienkiewicz was thrilled I brought the Thor cover he did with Dracula and Lady Sif on it (331, IIRC) instead of the same things he always saw. They appreciate fans who are interested in their entire catalog, not just the “money books” that are likely to wind up on eBay that evening.
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Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 9,627
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Post by Confessor on Mar 25, 2022 9:13:46 GMT -5
I think a lot of artists are happy when you ask them to draw something a bit more obscure, especially if it shows you are a fan. (If I ever get the chance to get a Chaykin sketch, I'll probably go for Dominic Fortune.) I was thinking about asking Chaykin to draw a certain green rabbit, because who would ask for that, and who else on earth would have that? You are clearly a man of excellent taste. Get him to draw two and give the other one to Icctrombone for his birthday!
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Post by Deleted on Mar 25, 2022 9:49:29 GMT -5
Ironically, I was going to ask Chaykin to do Fafhrd and the Mouser thinking no one else would ask him, but when got to the table, he was working on a sketch of the duo, which I noted and he kind of grumbled that was his fifth time drawing them that day, so I switched course to Hawkgirl.
-M
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Mar 25, 2022 10:47:29 GMT -5
I would be physically unable to have Chaykin do a sketch and have it not be Dominic Fortune.
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Post by MWGallaher on Mar 27, 2022 13:12:27 GMT -5
Browsing through a digital copy of TwoMorrows' Jack Kirby Collector #76 I noticed this side-by-side of Jack Kirby's cover for DEFENDERS #44 and Al Milgrom's inked version. I was amused to see that after inking, but before publication, the reaching hands and swinging sword were deleted from the foreground but their associated speed lines weren't!
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Post by codystarbuck on Mar 27, 2022 20:26:19 GMT -5
I haven't met many artists; but, of the few I have, when I got sketches, I tried to pick something I liked that would fit the artist, not necessarily a signature character of theirs. The first one I ever got was from Tom Lyle, who I met at a little show, in Augusta, GA, while I was stationed in Charleston, SC (about 3 1/2 hours away). He was doing Starman, at the time, which was still relatively new. By that point, I had picked up Strike! and a good portion of Eclipse's Airboy and wanted him to do the character Sgt Strike, from the Strike! series. I liked the idea of it, which was a Captain America type, who wasn't that nice of a guy, who was tied into the darker side of the war, almost from the start. He had to grab one of the cover art xeroxes he was selling, to recall all of the specific costume details. We chatted about the book and the fake comic book company that Chuck Dixon created, to make it seem like he was reviving Golden Age characters.
I next met Joe Staton and got him to sign E-Man #1 and saw he was sketching. I tried to think of what character I always wanted to see him do and asked for Captain Marvel. His first response was, "You mean the Shazam one/" To which I replied, "Yeah, the real one." He did a fantastic job , as I figured his cartoony style would be perfect for a lighthearted character (like his own E-Man). We both stopped what we were doing when Marina Sirtis, of ST Next Gen walked past, in a black mini-dress and heels, looking way sexier than the show ever dressed her.
I met Gil Kane at Heroes Con and had just picked up an issue of THUNDER Agents, from my list and then noticed his table. As luck would have it, this was an issue where he did the cover. I asked him to sign it and he remarked that he hadn't seen "one of these" in years. He flipped through the book to see if he had done an interior story; but this was just the cover. I wish I had known he was going to be there, as I had the issue with his Raven story and one of Menthor. I met Dave Dorman at that same con and had him sign the Aliens hardcover he had done and we talked a bit about the Kubert School, where I had recently applied (got in, couldn't swing the tuition). He added a little sketch to his signature and pointed out a couple of other younger artists who were grads.
I met Doug Rice in Springfield, IL, twice. The first year, I asked for a sketch of the Mark Shaw Manhunter character, in his costume redesign. we spent the time talking Japanese tokusatsu shows, as I had asked about the design elements and he told me about borrowing from Kamen Rider, which led to talking about the costuming in the various shows (Kamen Rider, Kikaider, Super Sentai, Space Sheriff, Metal Hero). That actually turned me on to those shows and I got a couple of tapes, at that convention (and more, later). he came back he following year and remembered me and I asked for the feline character he had in his Dynamo Joe series, at, First Comics (Pvt Pomru). We talked for quite a while that day, about various things and he ended up giving me the sketch, for free, when I pulled out the cash to pay for it. He also signed a promotional flyer he had for a new pulp aviation series, which ended up never being published. Looked cool as hell, which is a shame. he had already had a potential series at Image dropped, when they cut off the non-core creators, in the wake of their fight with Diamond, over late books. Rice and Tom Artis had a promotional ad for something called Tiger, a series they were going to do, before that. I met Artis at that show and got a sketch of the Black Terror, which he did for a self-published comic, a couple of years before, but never produced a second issue (and the first wasn't fully inked, as was apparent when you compared the early pages to the later ones). I also bought a few sketchbook pages from him, which included a couple of characters that, I think, were meant for that series.
At that same show, I got to talk to Clarke Hawbaker, about his love of Mike Grell's work and the retouching job he did for Acclaim, on their reprint of Grell's Starslayer. the reproduction looked odd and he commented that he was provided scans and hired to touch them up to more closely match the original printing. he had already homaged the Warlord, in his Nomad series. He also had a fantasy art portfolio for sale, which he signed for me, while we also talked about how things worked at Continuity and why their release schedule was all over the place (everything had to go through Neal, but waited until he was done with commercial art jobs)
Got to meet Steve Leiber and talked with him about the Kubert School. he gave me a Hawkman poster he had and signed it. Loved his work on the character, though I didn't read the book, as he had the spirit of his teacher, while maintaining his own style. super nice guy.
Got to meet Grell in the early 00s and had him sign a few things; but, when it came to a sketch, I wanted him to do a character he did for an illustrated book, rather than a comic book: Robin Hood. he had done sketches and art plates for an edition of Howard Pyle's The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, published by Donning/Starblaze (the people who did the early Elfquest and A Distant Soil Collections). I had Grell sign my copy; but, asked for a sketch of Robin Hood, in a more historically accurate look. We talked for quite a while, along with Mike Gold and John Ostrander, as they had a mini-First Comics reunion.
Got to meet Kurt Busiek, at that convention and had him sign my Astro City trades. He personalized them and added little touches, on an inside page.
I went to college with a guy, who was from Chicago and had been to the Chicago Con multiple times. he always had artists do humorous sketches of their characters. He had Mike Grell do Jon Sable, on crutches, with an Uzi, with the title Jon Dis-Sabled. Another had Grimjack chowing down on hamburgers, with the caption, HungryJack. They had fun trying to top one another. He also showed me his original Watchman button, that he had made, with a home button maker, which he wore at a con. the DC booth went gaga over it and asked him to put together a presentation of similar buttons that could be produced. He provided samples and he had the reply from them, on official DC Comics stationery, as well as the complimentary set of buttons they gave him, when they released them to stores. so, he ended up being part of what honked off Alan Moore, about how DC handled that project, as he was not happy about the merchandising. I used to have the Comedian button; but, don't know what happened to it. I think it might have been stolen off my jacket.
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Post by badwolf on Mar 29, 2022 12:11:03 GMT -5
If I ever met Dave Dorman I'd have to get him to sign Alien Encounters #5..
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Mar 29, 2022 20:35:04 GMT -5
In 1944 Otto Binder made $17,500 writing comics for Fawcett. Adjusted for inflation that translates into $282,000 in 2022 dollars. That’s pretty damn good money.
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Post by tonebone on Mar 30, 2022 9:25:04 GMT -5
3 Rivers Comicon, which is June 4 & 5, just announced that Howard Chaykin will be a guest. Was already planning on going with my two girls, so this is a pretty nice little bonus. Have to dig out some of the old Star Wars books to see if he'll sign. Howard was very pleasant and very busy sketching when I met him at Gem City several years back. He signs things very quickly and it looks like swirls not letters when he does, but he is generally amendable to signing stuff (or was). He was surprised at some of the things I asked him to sign (Monark Starstalker, Solomon Kane in Marvel Premiere; Conan; Ironwolf), and was glad I asked for something different than what he was always asked to sketch (Hawkgirl). He seemed to like interacting with fan and such, and didn't mind signing or sketching (free signatures, modest prices for sketches back then), he just seemed to get bored signing or sketching the same old things over and over again as the day wore on. Now, that was 2014 and a lot could have changed since then, but I enjoyed the experience of meeting him. -M I met Chaykin at a local con a couple of years ago.. I came armed with a bunch of the Evanier/Spiegel Blackhawks with his covers. I was really nervous because he can be pretty brusque in interviews. He has also been outspoken about not wanting to sign "old stuff" (Like Star Wars). He was the nicest guy in the world, and seemed overjoyed at seeing the Blackhawk comics. He talked about one cover for 10 minutes, saying it has always been one of his favorite images. He really looked them over and seemed to admire his handiwork as he signed each one. The most positive con interaction I've ever had. This was the cover he really gushed over... I think it's the issue that contains a story he drew, as well.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Mar 30, 2022 17:35:16 GMT -5
Dynamite #8 (July 1954, Comic Media) has the cover tagline "Exciting Adult Reading." The CMAA, which promulgated the CCA, was founded in September of '54. So this is just barely pre-code. Dynamite's cover feature, was Johnny Dynamite, which was a somewhat serviceable Mike Hammer knock-off. I don't recall another time that a comic explicitly seemed to be aiming at an adult audience on the front cover (during this time period), though I have clearly not l looked at every pre-code cover.
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