This post is the product of me searching for something in an old filing cabinet and finding these unrelated items to share:

Screw-On Head: With this week being the release of the Amazing Screw-On Head and other curious objects Hardcover collection , I found it odd that I stumbled upon the original painting I did back in my watercolor/ink-outline days. I had scans of the painting, but thought the original was long gone (though I have plans for it now that I have found it) As readers of the blog know I'm a big Mignola fan and Screw-On head is one of those gems that got better with every reading and showed that you how other creators were still interested in doing something fresh and unique in comics. I'm very excited to sit down and read the collection which also includes the Eisner Award winning story 'The Magician and the Snake' that Mike co-wrote with his daughter Katie (7 at the time). And an excuse to share a painting I did of a character and creator that renewed my faith in something new & different lasting.

College Comic Strip: Though I never drew a single strip of it, I had an idea for my college newspaper. The premise was two college roommates (Nick & Dave) who need a third roommate to split the rent. Nick goes out to find a new tenant and instead brings home a monkey. He rationalizes that the monkey can take care of the apartment, cook, clean, perhaps even do some of their homework, which will allow the two to pick up more hours at work (which they never do). Another character Mike was a friend who didn't live with the pair (and now a monkey) but might as well have been considering how much time he spent there. Mike was going through an identity crisis and chose to wear masks until he discovered his 'true self' and was ready to face the world (this is why he's wearing a pumpkin in this lineup, but the disguise would change every strip or so). Over the course of the run I planned on the monkey robbing a bank to help with the rent, going to classes for them, and taking pleasure in terrorizing Mike.

D & D Character portraits: When roleplaying, I always enjoyed flawed characters (something the GURPS system taught me was beneficial to fun adventures). While I was trying to break in to doing illustration in 2001 or so, I did these character portraits for a fantasy roleplaying game. The focus I was working on were imperfect characters, not handsome or tidy, but folks missing teeth, with receding hairlines, covered in muck, scarred and homely. They are all rendered in pencil on white copy paper. Like much of the portfolio I took around at that time for work, lack a setting or background. It was fun rediscovering these as well as the above entries...never found what I was originally searching for, but the content for this post made it worthwhile anyhow.

Fan Art: This week the fan art comes from Aaron Hawbaker who did a pencil drawing of the scene from Fall 1152 where Celanawe has reclaimed his axe and Midnight is at a disadvantage.
Thanks Aaron!
If you would like your fan art posted here, email your work to ericebon (at) hotmail (dot) com

Upcoming Appearances:
West Hollywood Book Fair: Sept. 26
New York Comic Con (Archaia booth): Oct 8-10
Mid-Ohio Con: Nov. 6-7

From the Vault: Art History Comic

German Expressionism project:
From the vault, I dug out a 20th Century Art History project. The professor, being a huge comic fan, allowed me to do my project in comic form. At the time, this may be the longest series of sequential pages I had ever done in a row. Parts I am still proud of conceptually (having the die brucka group being knights with a castle on a bridge) and parts that completely fell apart (I didn't do much explanation to the blue rider group, or tie in the western idea to the subject matter.) Here are the 7 pages:

Click for more info on :Die Brucka, The Blue Rider Group, Ernst Kirchner, Erich Heckel, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Emil Nolde, Max Pechsein, Wassily Kandinsky, & Franz Marc

Walt Simonson:

This past weekend at the Comic Geek Speak Supershow, I was able to get a nice chat in with Walt Simonson. We talked about strategy games, inking implements, wars, 60's sci fi, puppets, and idyllic places to live. Walt seems to be one of those people who no matter what subject matter a conversation turns to, he will have something meaningful to contribute. I look forward to chatting with him again in Baltimore.

Katie Cook Mini Paintings:
Are you a fan of Katie Cook? Own a collection of her mini paintings? have as much trouble as I did figuring out how to display/store them? Here is my solution! Because the paper size can vary, I needed a flexible method, not a stock card holder or mat size. I bought a small, blank photo album (the kind with plain black pages) I use photo corners to fix them to the page. The adhesive just needs to be moistened and it sticks to the page. This method allows you to remove the mini paintings for any reason (like needing to scan them). You can find photo corners and blank books like these at craft stores everywhere.

Fan Art:
Krystyl Cullins did this piece for her boyfriend Ryan (who shared it with me). Krystyl has a lot of work on her website, and it is some really nice stuff! Thanks Ryan and Krysyl!!!

Upcoming Appearances:*
C2E2 (Archaia Booth): April 16-18
Graham Crackers Comics Chicago, IL May 1st (FCBD)
Motor City Con: May 14-16
San Diego (Artist Alley): July 22-25
Baltimore Comic Con: August 28-29

*more 2010 dates may be added

From the Vault: The Space Between Us

**I am away this week in Alaska. So this post was pre-typed and auto-posted for me **
The Space Between Us:
Many years ago, my friend Mike Davis was living out of state when he and I talked about making comics. Mike felt that he struggled with comics, especially when it came to drawing panels. He was confident with sketches or single illustrations, but not comics. So I proposed to him that he fill several pages of a sketchbook with doodles of the same characters, to also include locations, scribbles, anything from his sketchbook he liked. He would then mail me that book. I scanned all the various sketches and pages. In photoshop I cut and pasted and layered them into a digital collage until I worked up what I thought was a working story. Here for you are the results of that interesting collaboration.

Fan Art:Matthew Netzley sent me this artwork of his Mouse Guard Role Playing Character. Matthew also sent me the link to his gallery

Upcoming Appearances:*
----2010----
CGS Supershow: March 27-28
C2E2 (Archaia Booth): April 16-18

Graham Crackers Comics Chicago, IL May 1st (FCBD)
Motor City Con: May 14-16
San Diego (Artist Alley): July 22-25
Baltimore Comic Con: August 28-29
*more 2010 dates may be added

From the Vault: Maddie & the Monster

Maddy and the Monster:
Years ago, after seeing some of the mini books Jon Morris was doing, I started hand making books for family members as gifts (I still owe one to my youngest niece and don't know when I'll find the time to make it for her). This book was for Julia's cousin's daughter Maddy. With a smile on her face she would call me 'monster' when I came to gatherings with the sole expectation that I'd chase her.

Ink & Stein:
This month's Ink & Stein (Saturday the 27th) is at a new location!
Based on the huge success of the gatherings (we have been getting 15-20+ people per month) we felt the need to move the event. The Corner Brewery, our former home, seemed like the ideal location. But they refused to accommodate us. They wouldn't reserve us space without a charge, they treated us like we were in the way, and ultimately were rude to our group. "Sorry we brought a group in monthly willing to buy food and drink Corner Brewery, we will annoy someone else with our spending."

After Katie Cook scoured the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti area for a new location she found the MARRIOTT at Eagle Crest! The space is full of tables and chairs that are spread out in a well lit area. This may make it easier for Ink & Stein-ers to socialize and not be locked into one seat as they were at the Brewery. The only drawback is the Bar closes at 11pm. However, it looks like we can hang out after that, but just not order any more.

So if you are an artist (or writer) in the Southeastern MI area, come join other like-minded folks the last Saturday of every month at the Ypsilanti Marriott at Eagle Crest from 7-11pm

Fan Art:
Jason Bradley sent this to me. His inspiration for the two panel strip was Steinbeck (obviously) and the Bugs Bunny Cartoons with Gossamer. Thanks Jason!


Upcoming Appearances:*
----2010----
Alaska Library Conference: March 4-7
CGS Supershow: March 27-28
C2E2 (Archaia Booth): April 16-18
Motor City Con: May 14-16
San Diego (Artist Alley): July 22-25
Baltimore Comic Con: August 28-29
*more 2010 dates may be added

Free Comic Book Day 2010:
Archaia will be releasing a Free Comic Book day 'flip' book that features a new Mouse Guard story from me and a Fraggle Rock story and cover on the other side. Here is my cover for the Mouse Guard side of the issue. The white box is for comic retailers to stamp or label their logo/address in hopes to attract new readership to comics to their store. The story I'm doing will be 10 pages and will take place in Spring 1153 (as an homage to everyone who asks when 'Spring' is coming in the book series)

Watercolor paintings c.2004:While I love watercolor as a medium, I always struggled with feeling like my watercolors were good enough to stand alone without ink line to help. So around 2002/2003 I started playing with the idea of painting loose and then going back over with pen to isolate shapes that were variations of color or stroke or form.

It got me going on a kick of painting superheroes & comic book characters. I was using paper that I had purchased and cut for our wedding invitations that was left over. In fact, some of these (all of them have sold or be given away long ago) may have the hand stamped image of leaves intertwining from our wedding on the back of them. The trick, I found, was to have a painting that was loose enough to need the linework, but strong enough that the forms were still all there without line.
(R-L: Rorschach, Spider-Man, & Dr. Doom)

The balance between the watercolor and line wasn't always what I wanted. Sometimes I felt I would overuse the line, while other times I felt I had overpainted the painting. I found that using negative space and strong lighting composition helped to not make the paintings turn into 'stained glass mud'. I would tend to work on multiple pieces at one time so that as one was drying I could be working actively on the next, and then back to the dry one, etc. This was at a time before I had started working on Mouse Guard as a comic series. I thought that these types of paintings would be good examples of my work that may generate commissions as well as be saleable items.
(T-B: The Flash, Han & Chewie, & Grifter)

These paintings received a positive reception by other artists who were posting on the hellboy.com forum. And being a Hellboy fan, I couldn't help but paint Mignola's characters this way. The forum artists also organized a holiday gift exchange of Hellboy themed pieces of art. I did several more of these style pieces in a larger format for the exchange. There was also a fan-posted anthology comic where Maija Graham wrote and I Illustrated a Screw-On-Head story in this method
(Top Row L-R: Liz, Johann, Hellboy, Abe, & the Baba Yaga)
(Bottom Row L-R: the Fairy folk, Roger, Rasputin, Lobster Johnson, & Screw-On-Head)

As Mouse Guard started coming out, I thought it would be foolish to drop the paintings from my convention display. So every con, I was painting a series of characters that all went together. The first of which was the Arkham Asylum lineup. I sold limited prints in little manila envelopes (printed with stencil lettering "Arkham Files" and printed coffee-ring stains) to help my table sales for those unfamiliar or uninterested in Mouse Guard.
(L-R: Mr. Freeze, Poison Ivy, the Penguin, Two-Face, the Joker, the Riddler, Catwoman, & the Scarecrow)
The last set of these I did was a grouping of Jedi. Mouse guard was strong enough on it's own and not having a relationship with the companies and publishers who owned copyright on the characters I felt I was pushing my luck. I picked 6 species (Twi'leck, Mon Calamari, Human, Rodian, Ithorian, & Wookiee) set them on different locations (Coruscant, Naboo, Kamino, Tatooine, Hoth, & Kashyyyk) and gave them all lightsabers.
This set I was happier with the original watercolors than usual, so I scanned the un-inked versions in case I preferred them. Here you can see the whole set in original and final states.

Fan Art:Bo Harris gave this color pencil and ink drawing to me at the Windy City Con last Sept. I like how alone and unfettered to civilization this mouse is. He looks pretty self-sufficient. Thanks Bo!
And if you have Mouse Guard fan art you want to share, email me through the mouseguard.net contact info to send me your work.

Upcoming Appearances:*
Live reading: Holiday Walk at Flint Public Library: Dec. 8 (6:30 & 7:30pm)
----2010----
Alaska Library Confrence: March 4-7
CGS Supershow: March 27-28
C2E2 (Archaia Booth): April 16-18
Motor City Con: May 14-16
San Diego (Artist Alley): July 22-25
Baltimore Comic Con: August 28-29
*more 2010 dates may be added

From the Vault: TOWER!

Tower: The Board Game
(WARNING: COPIOUS AMOUNT OF GEEKY CONTENT TO FOLLOW)
I'm opening the Petersen vault (as I did with Jesters) on a game project. It started while playing the old TSR board game Dungeon. My pal Seyth and I were complaining about the flaws in it and how we would fix the flaws. It ended with a year long (not full time, we were both still in college) development of our game: Tower. Having played it on assorted game nights I can attest that it's not that much better than Dungeon, but because we made it, it has a soft spot in our hearts.

One of the first changes we made was to have more diverse characters. Dungeon had 4 (?) types of characters but multiple copies of those types. We decided that if there are two magic using characters, they should have differences. We made 15 characters and based a lot of them on our own D&D characters (My elven thief and Seyth's Dwarven Berzerker were first on the list). Here's another post where I go into more info & art about the characters

Tower uses three different kinds of cards. Treasure cards can be either worth gold or have a use in gameplay. They are separated into 6 levels (one for each floor of the tower) with level 1 being least valuable and 6 being the most. Spell cards help magic users keep track of what spells they know and which they have used. And after years of playing we decided to help balance some of the characters who weren't as well off with hand-drawn item cards. Each character gets 1 item specific to them at the start of the game. Unfortunately, this didn't completely balance anything, but made for other quarrels about how fair/unfair someones personal item is.

The game is played on three separate boards each showing 2 floors of the Tower. I layed out the boards in Pagemaker and have since lost the files (and my copy of page maker...good riddance). I originally wanted to have the boards stack and pivot out of the way to access the lower sections, but the design proved too tippy or heavy. This photo also shows the 'Monster manual" that is indexed as to which monsters appear on which levels. I id most of the artwork for the manual, but Jesse Glenn (Kenzie) provided several of the creature art pieces. Some of his are the most loved/memorable in the game (like the Owlbear).

In addition to making the characters all unique in the game, they all needed artwork and miniatures for gameplay. I customized Lego figures, drew portraits of each character, and fabricated character cards that could stand up to drunken use. I added sculpy to the legos and baked them in the oven at a low temp, so as not to distort the lego plastic too much.

To randomize which monsters appear in which room, I made lettered tokens 'A'-'E' & 'X'. I rolled out sculpy, stamped them with a rubber monogram stamp and then cut them into chips with a piece of thin walled brass tube. It was when I was fabricating these pieces that Julia and I were dating and getting serious. She still says this game fabrication was a bit scary for her and she wondered if I was stable enough to be a good boyfriend.

So there it is. A huge amount of work went into the game when I should have been studying harder or paying more attention to my girlfriend (especially when you consider how flawed it still is). But on New Years eve, it's the game that everyone wants to drag out and play.


Other Work:
I have turned in my dummy copy of Snowy Valentine's Day to Harper Collins. I have a while to breathe and tweak the sketches before doing the final work, but I am very happy with the results. Obviously, I can't share too much of the book, but here is one of the pieces/scenes I am most proud of. Jasper Bunny, looking for the perfect Valentine's gift for his honey bunny, visits the porcupine children who are knitting scarfs for their mother. Jasper learns he can't knit and that porcupine tots find that funny.

I also got an opportunity to do some work that will be featured on products for comic book artists (not sure if I can reveal who/what yet). I was asked to do a few sample panels in my style, but without being something already under copyright etc. The Ladybug with the top hat and moustache still cracks me up a bit.

From the Vault: Jesters

Old Friends:
A few weeks ago, I got together with two of my closest friends Mike Davis and Jesse Glenn. I have known Jesse since I was 11, and Mike since I was 13. They stood in my wedding, they are like brothers to me. It had been far too long since we were all sitting around a table, so we planned a game day. We played Risk, Settlers of Cattan, and Crononauts. I bring this up because I know how instrumental they were in getting Mouse Guard's ball rolling.

All three of us are artists and we spent all our spare time together playing role playing games and drawing and making up comics. Through the years we created things together and we created things alone that we only asked for critiques on. Mouse Guard I did alone, but added my dear friends as characters and asked for their opinions on my mousey world right from it's creation. Some of the ideas we never got around to really developing are ones that I still like to dust off and take a look back on. This is a long way of saying that I want to regularly some of those projects from ----

The Vault: Jesters
This time around, I took a look though the folder marked 'Jesters'. Jesters spawned from Halloween costumes Jesse made for he and I. We were invited to a party and needed quick costumes, we also knew we could get in 'free' if we dressed as some sort of clown and offered to serve drinks and tend the front door. After that party I thought we had the start of some fun characters. I named them Donovan and Jakeus (D for David/J for Jesse). The concept was to have two medieval adventurers/spies who were entrusted to know all the kings dealings and could easily get into other kingdoms under the disguise of being fools or jesters. My concepts were taken right from the costumes and our own likenesses.

Later Jesse started writing a very funny/witty script where the Jesters discover a plot against the king but are thrown in jail for arguing in public in a bar before they can do anything about it. My artwork was being heavily influenced by my admiration for Mike Mignola's work and Jesse never finished the script. I still think the concept has potential, but for now will remain in the vault.





Tutorial:
A friend asked me to look at a scan that was sent to him to figure out why it looked odd. Turns out the person who scanned the artwork scanned it as a bitmap. Now I know a lot of tutorials and pros will tell you to only scan your linework for comics as a bitmap. For Mouse Guard I scan as greyscale and here's why. On a bitmap setting when a scanner is 'looking' at the artwork and it finds a 'grey area' it has to interpret it as either black or white. There are several methods it can use (usually settings you can adjust or set before you scan). I put together an example of a greyscale gradation and how the various settings effect it.


-Threshold: maps out large areas as either black or white. once the tone gets to light it's just pure white

-Pattern Dither: will try and stipple out a black and white uniform pattern in the pixels to simulate the gradation.

-Diffusion Dither: same as pattern dither, but in a random distribution rather than uniform

-Halftone Screen: uses a patterned shape that increases or decreases in size depending on the value of the tone it interprets.

while each of these have their uses [Threshold will simulate how an old copier would have made an image, Diffusion dither works well for sending photographs by fax if you have to, halfone screen can be used stylistically (look a McDonald's drink cup)] I prefer to scan in greyscale and the on a case-by-case basis adjust the levels (either with the levels tool or by dodging and burning in specific areas) myself.


Fan Art:
I was directed to this one by a friend. It's from an artist on Deviantart.com who goes by PlainYellowFox. I really like the attitude on both mice as well as the colors in the background!Nice Job PYF.

From the Vault: The Big One

From the Vault: The Big One:
Back in the late 90's A friend of mine wanted to do a comic. The premise was an alternate WWII with metahumans (Elves, Dwarves, Drow, Dark Dwarves, Goblins, etc.) as the various nations warring. I offered to help with some design work and plotting. This triptych watercolor was one of those preliminary pieces to be used as a jumping-off point. Unfortunately not much became of the idea, but along with this painting I did a few other fun WWII inspired pieces.

How to Make A Wife Unhappy:
a week or so ago, I was frustrated and in a split second impulse decided to trim my beard into "friendly muttonchops". Before I did it I had the idea in my head that it would be funny. It was, but only for about three minutes. When Julia first saw it she didn't notice and then asked me to "stop making that face" before gasping at what I had done. I have trimmed the rest down so that my beard is even, just very trim.

Carving:
I majored in Printmaking in college, and while I was there I used a technique that combined traditional intaglio techniques with traditional relief printing techniques. I was only able to do it a short while (here is an example of one) After I left school, I was unable to continue with the technique because it requires a press. As a replacement I found a way to use the technique where the goal was a printed image, but a carved block of wood. The one photographed here was a gift for Julia. I plan on starting another one soon and I'll try and document the process.


Molded Glass:
This is a collaboration piece I did with glass artist Gary Bolt. He was experimenting with a technique in casting glass using a woodcut technique to create the initial image. Knowing I was a print major, he asked if I'd be willing to do a piece to test the limits of the idea. I carved the image out of a speedycut block (a soft rubber to replace linoleum or wood for a faster cut relief print).

The block was mailed off to Victoria B.C. where Gary made a sand mold and poured molten glass into it (here it is shown cooling). The final piece is buffed on the surface to remove the sand texture from the high points. Today the piece sits in my north studio window.













Wizard World Chicago:
This weekend I'll be in artist's alley signing, sketching, and chatting. I'll also have free Mouse Guard
temporary tattoos!!! See ya there!!