action action

 I wanted to rant about a case the comic book legal defense fund (CBLDF!) is working to help fund.–
 Recently a guy got his computer searched while crossing the border into Canada ,They found some manga they didn’t like on it and now they’re talking about giving at least a year in prison and having him register as a sex offender.– for having comics.

 
My argument in favor of porn comics has always been that you just have the people who want to make it and the people who wants to read it and nobody who isn’t into it needs to get involved. All consensual ideas conveyed through lines on paper.

The idea of just getting in trouble for having a comic book on you is nuts, with no victim and the crime being an offensive combination of words and lines. It’s like trying to prosecute thoughts you don’t like.
 
 
I have a hard time wrapping my brain around the idea that something you could draw could lead someone else to be locked up just by having it on their person.
and just looking at the list of books  CBLDF has on their site that have had problems at the border (how awkward would it be to have to explain why you are carrying a copy of The bone ranger)
–I’ve read a lot of these,  I have friends and have myself probably drawn worse things than what’s in most of these books.   

There’s more on it here:

http://cbldf.org/about-us/case-files/cbldf-case-files-canada-customs-case/
I think it’s so important to do what we can to knock this type of shit down when it comes up.

———————————————————————————-

Stuff has been good up in my little comic book village.

A talk I did with Sean Witzke went up on his site:

http://supervillain.wordpress.com/2011/07/02/emma-peel-sessions-62-brandon-graham-interview/

———————

I’ve been working on 2 short comics — In the 1st trying to channel all my teenage love of Shirow and Adam Warren and Cyberpunk while in the other short I’m aiming for more arty. My drawing time has been split like the dudes from the Dark crystal — with  arty urRu  and dirty pair porn Skeksis.

Here’s a Skeksis page–the start of  a Dirty parody comic.

Is  Skeksy no?

It was really fun to look at all the different versions of the Dirty pair and try to do my own take. Ther’ve been so many serious dudes to rework the characters.

fujihiko hosono (who also did the Crusher Joe manga) Yoshikazu Yasuhiko( Venus wars Gundam, Arion) –his stuff on the left. and on the right Adam Warren.

This site has a shit ton about DP http://www.elenorecity.com/

and even panels from an early unpublished Warren comic.

http://www.elenorecity.com/comix.html

Here’s some sketchbook stuff I drew watching DP episodes. – There’s a boat and Marian in there too.

and more sketchbook

And a nonsense walrus comic.

Snif..

—————————————————————————–

Colman Engle put up these rad pages of a comic he’s been drawing called WHITE SHELLS NC

I like all the white space on this page.

There’s something that works well about mixing a cartoony style with harsh subject. It evens things out nicely.

Yup. Shitclit.

Coleman’s site:

http://colemandingles.blogspot.com/

———————————————

And here’s some King city drawings. nice nice nice.

Tyler Crookon the left (Of BPRD and upcoming Petrograd) http://www.mrcrook.com/

Justin Greenwood on the right. (resurrection)

http://jkgreenwood.blogspot.com/

——————-

Here’s some stuff by Push.

His site http://www.bluebed.net/

—————–

A Otomo looking comic with some Tezuka characters crossing the street. (to get to the other side)

——

aaand some robotish Robot ish

I like this spaceship

some shirow model stuff.

star wars — I really like the reflection on her helmet. What does QPI sound like?

Elf 17

and a house drawing. ( i like the roof pig)

python 357– I like the rain over the black.

Comic book GIANTS

Hola,

The big news with me this week is that I’m doing a Inkstuds talk tomorrow.(sat 18th)

Me Mr Inkstuds and Michael Deforge discussing Jason’s Isle of 100,000 Graves. Anyone can join in by emailing Robin at inkstudsradio @gmail.com and adding Inkstuds on skype. It’s at noon pacific time. so soon

I’ve been spending all week coloring and writing plans within plans.

I read Joe Decie’s Accidental Salad:

I like how much he’s playing with comics in this. Inside the cover he talks about how this is a work of fiction and how he would never leave his son on the back cover unsupervised.

A lot of it reads like autobiographical comics but he switches it up.  he has a great comic about his process that I’d originally read online assuming it was straight forward and then he hits you with how he pencils with his left hand and inks with his right to save time and how he scatters coriander seeds around his scanner to distract demons.

I like this one.

or this one

It all reads like a more creative way to approach doing comics about yourself, it’s not just him documenting his life but also his ideas in a really cool casual way.

Great stuff. Here’s his site:

http://www.joedecie.com/

————————————————————–

Something I’ve been really excited about is the recent contact I’ve had with some of my comic book heroes returning to comics after years away in animation and games.

Frank Teran whose work I first ran into I think on a Hellblazer issue with Warren Ellis writing. Even with the heavy art edits the goons at DC put on the book it still hit me as one of the rare actually creepy horror comics I’d seen.

And then later seeing his short Aliens and Terminator comics in DHP.

the covers:

And some Aliens pages, Stokoe was just telling me how many times as a kid he’d redrawn that page on the left. the page on the right was done with cut out panels of black paper that he used white paint to draw on.

and some of his Terminator pages that I’d put up here awhile back. It’s just so cool to see the stuff you loved as a kid done well.

Here’s some of his more recent work.

CRYPTO:

and a nicely snarky batman page.

Frank’s site:

http://frankteran.blogspot.com/

———————————————-

And then there’s Fil Barlow, whose 1986 six issue series Zooniverse I saw when I was 10 and it deeply affected how I approach and think about comics.

Just by it being one of the most well made comics I’d read at the time and it wasn’t being talked about or pushed just really took my faith out of popular opinion and I think it gave me this idea that so much of the best work being done you have to dig for.

The ideas are so dense and fun in these– Like the Plastoid race that doesn’t die because they don’t biodegrade. Or how on the lower right he turns the e!xckamation! po!nt into a space station. (and those floating dudes The Diaethon- above a garden fertilized by their poop)

on the right with the first panel seeing through the eyes of Tarmi who is blind to normal light but can see the shadow images of everything.

and then the way we follow this flying zoon into the next scene.

so cool.

Here’s a black and white page from his Aquaarine short that ran in Dark horse Down under in 94

and some of his animation work

Extreme Ghostbusters.

and Starship troopers.

and here’s some of his misses Helen Maier, who works with Fil and even colored Zooniverse long ago.

Fil even drew them together in Zoniverse.– in that 4th panel– the human looking ones.

Fil Barlow’s Deviantart:

http://filbarlow.deviantart.com/

and Helen Maier’s

http://helenmaier.deviantart.com/

and a Zooniverse blog that they’ve put up.

http://zooniversecomic.blogspot.com/

In the past I’d always felt like when our best and brightest leave for higher paying work that we won’t see more comics by them but I’ve got new faith. This is a really exciting time for comics.

————————————————————————–

Here’s some stuff I thought was cool.

Kevin Eastman drawing a TMNT longshot:

and a rad Cyber Weapon Cybercomic cover.

and a cool Gotoh Keisuke cover/

 

Aight I’m off to play loud rap muisc and draw something in a comic book.

 

Word life

Word?

WORD!

Oh hello,

It’s been a good week. I’ve just finished inking the last page of the 3rd issue of my Multiple warheads. One more issue to go (28 pages) and then I’ll know when #1 will be out. Slow as molasses but I think it’ll be sweet.

Here’s a couple of recent sketchbook drawings.

This week has mostly been me watching british from the 80’s and going on walks with Marian. I drew this after one of our walks–trying to get how rain looks in a street light.

Here’s a one page Marian did about the first poetry book she got into.

The 3rd panel has her in the legendary backwards”wize guy” hat that she wore through her tough guy teen years.

And my dear sweet mother just put up a new sci fi short she wrote.

Here:

http://www.365tomorrows.com/06/10/the-last-terran/

and missterr  Stokoe just put a bunch of stuff up. (orc stain preview and more Spider Nam pages)

And a recent(ish) Marley drawing.

shayydayy the technocolor dreamcoat man.– Marley draws good hair huh?

And Some rad aliens by Simon Roy.

http://drwnblog.blogspot.com/

————————————————————————————

I ran into this Moebius drawing of Hugo Pratt’s Corto Maltese with Pratt drawn in there on the middle of the right hand page.

I’ve never dug all that deep into Pratt’s work. He’s a dude who I feel fondness for based on so many of the artists I’m influenced by being fond of him.

Here’s a thing Manara wrote about their friendship:

“When I met him, a friendship was born almost immediately. As he was Venetian, he had no driver’s license, so when he needed to go somewhere it’s always me who took him with my car. Southern Italy in northern France or Spain, we traveled a lot together. A total complicity is born. Whether it’s for the comic or women! (…) We intend to continue, but he died in 1995. We had almost twenty years apart, but it was for me as a father or brother. ”

I like the idea of these guys driving around talking about ladies and ink on paper.

I like how Manara put Pratt into his early Bergman books as the guide.

on a similar kick here’s Paul Pope drawing some pages with Corto Maltese in them.

and a Manara drawing and photo: I like seeing what an artists chose to leave in or take out from reference.

Here’s the trailer for the Corto Maltese movie that I like the look of.

——————————————————————-

 This Albedo photo stuff on the left is on that same kick I’m always aiming at when I think of Photo covers, like hints that can connect the reader with objects of the comic book world. And Matt Howarth Konny and Czu on the Right. 

Here’s a couple pages from a One Piece porn short that the french artists Kevin “TRANTKAT” Hérault has up on his deviantart. I like how much height and distance he shows in these pages. and then there’s that flower in the last panel..man, watch where you step in that place!

http://kiwine.deviantart.com/

Blade runner Spinner cutaway. all this design work lost like such and such in the thing.

and this  –coolest shit ever. Bubble gum crisis and gundam up in the bitch.

 

and some mottoooo slave.

 

and Priss and some Gall force robots.

 

and some covers I thought were cool. Those look like exactly the type of frog and otter I’d want to take on my serious adventures.–I can’t vouch for the other guys.

some Gnomes– Gnome what I’m sayin?

I like that Arzach hat house — alright we need Smurfs.

 

new nose

Hello,

Here’s a quick thing I drew last night after me and my misses we’re joking about the tiny noses Manara draws on women. 

——————————————-

It’s been a good week I’m getting back into my own head, trying to sew up the 3rd issue of Multiple warheads. I’ve been thinking a lot about comics.
In my head I’ve been on my high horse. I’ve been thinking about how important it is that when you figure out how to draw you still push it– fuck around and take chances.

 The reason I regard a lot of mainstream dudes as bullshit is not because they can’t draw but because the extent of that is power girl complaining about having back problems. (also have you seen my new spanking comic?)
It’s scary and hard to go beyond what works and a lot of the guys who I think have done some of the best work I also think later found a comfortable place and didn’t push it as much.  so yeah great power/great responsibility.

————————————————————–

Here’s a long lonng panel doing journalism with comics with D-pi on the far left.

I recommend you put it on when you’re drawing and look up when you hear him talk.

“The human hand connects people in ways that maybe a machine can’t, like a camera would not” Smart dude.

Listening to him seems to subtly make the point that memoir is stronger than journalism because it connects the reader in a way that a newspaper article from the same event wouldn’t. anyway discuss.

pure heart lion

Hello

The above picture is from the TCAF con talk Mr Inkstuds did with me, Paul Pope and  Sam Hiti. you can hear it here: http://www.inkstuds.org/?p=3675

Here’s some Moebius/Otomo fanart I drew tonight to commemorate the Moebius tumbr sparking a new Otomo tumblr. I’m thrilled.

http://theairtightgarage.tumblr.com/

and

http://otomblr.tumblr.com/

and here’s some stuff from my sketchbook.
<

————————————————————–

When I got back from Toronto I had 3 serious dudes from England stay with me on their world tour to see comics and video game people. It was fun, they even bought me a pie thing (tart)

Marcel O’Leary http://marceloleary.blogspot.com/

Andrew Porter http://www.phandy.co.uk/

And Joe Sutton http://www.downplusb.co.uk/

Here’s some robots by Andy on the left and Joe on the right.

And I got them to draw in my sketchbook too.

cool dudes indeed.

—————————-

I’ve been trying to get back into my hermit lifestyle now that I’m done with conventions for awhile.

I reread some Ike Garuda tonight:

Garuda is a book I got in some 50cent bin a million years ago, there were 2 issues but I’ve only ever seen the 1st. It’s good sci fi detective comics. I like that genre, I want more of it.

It’s written by Elane Lee who worked on Starstruck with Kaluta and drawn by James Sherman who did some good  fill in issues of American Flagg and Dreadstar.

This comic has a cool way of traveling from planet to planet in it. They destroy your body and regrow a new you in a womb tank thing at your destination with your memory transported into it. The main characters body dies at least 5 times in the first issue jumping from place to place.

Here’s him comming out of the womb. I like that even though he’s got the wolverine style crotch hiding shadow his dong won’t stay hidden. “in your face bub!”

And I like this scene of getting a lady out of a suitcase:

solid stuff. here’s some more pages.

I was also looking at an old Heavy metal from 91. I like the art in this Juan Gimenez Ca-rt-oon story.  I prefer this style to the newer color Gimenez stuff I’ve read– it feels like the space baby of early Manara and Otomo.

And I like that the main lady in it has a mullet.

That’s where I’m at today, more mullet, more sci fi detectives. please and thank you.

————————————————————————

I managed to dig up a picture of a  preto magix thing I was obcessed with when I was a kid. It’s the ewok village printed on a board game style board that you’d rub tranfer on ewoks whereever you wanted on it. I think this thing is at the heart of my interst in doing wheres waldo style drawings.

 

Here’s Rumiko Takahashi being an OG. I like that she has nerd buttons on her shirt.

some All a-Round Intercept and Escort Lady Ariel .

and a young Optimus prime.

Also if anyone is intersted in buying pages from me, Stokoe, Marley or Marian there’s new one’s up here:

http://www.mcconnellart.com/

young optimus get out of my mind.

PRECAF

I’m about to go to the TCAF con in Toronto. It should be fun.

I’m doing a talk with Sam Hiti and paul Pope at 1 on saturday. I’ve been reading a bunch of their comics and getting hyped about it. I like talks.

Here’s some sketchbook stuff I did this week. Some Dirrttyy pair: Kei with a power to the people harlock tattoo

and a plant horse and Conan:

Here’s the Warheads panel I’m working on tonight.

Lately my favorite shit is to ink while listening to Doctor who audio books. Most of them are like sub par episodes but I’m really enjoying this The doctor trap. about an organization of super space hunters tracking the Doctor on an alien world.

Here’s some comics I read this week.

The Shirow book is just a chunk of the Ghost in the shell: human error processor, but I hadn’t seen that cover before.

CODENAME: DANGER is the best kind of batshit crazy quarter bin book.

So it’s about ex CIA dude, Paul Makor recruiting a team to save a kid from a Nazi war criminal pedophile.

I like this 2 page spread of the guys they’re choosing for the mission.

james bond and woman on fire, good, good, but couldn’t they get a better photo of the guy deactivating a bomb in a scuba suit. Although that would be a banging drivers licence photo.

 Makor picks a team. American Nina and an ex hooker who can learn any skill as long as she keeps her pants on.  on some creepy saint/whore shit.

and a loose cannon psychic clearly named after that producer who works with Talib kweli.

 The ex nazi normally just gets adult lady hookers but he got bored of consensual adult sex YAWWWWWNN and so he hired someone in NYC to kidnap a kid who is the son of a CIA employe from a school in Harlem to ship to Brazil. Fool proof plan.

Here’s the villans spider sense going off after he just had his way with the Osmonds.

And here’s a hooker outfit from the NYC scene.

Anyway the mission goes down and our hero and the mentally unstable dude with mental powers have the villan and the kid trapped in a bedroom. Then our hero throws out this shit.

By the way crazy dude who keeps killing people with his mind, a nazi has been rapeing your kid brother. Makor is a dick.

all goes as expected.

And then Makor takes the olympic gold in being a dick.

———————————

I’ve been so impressed by Theo Ellsworth’s Capacity. Here’s the opening pages.

I really like his take on the reader being in the story is really cool. “if this get’s too weird close the book” and how you’re addressed as ____________ *your name

I’m reading it slow because it’s giving me so many ideas as I go.

I like this scene where you go inside his brain cloud and get offered tea.

and a tea gnome, nice!

———————————————-

Last night my big brother showed up fresh from Argentina with a stack of comics.

I really like the art on this one. Good trees and cars.

Here’s some Marcos Adan panels I like.

Some strip comics. I like that the whole point of the top one is a bird dropping an egg on his head. the end.

And the inner workings of dude.

———————————————————–

For the past while I’ve been talking to Jesse Mead as his thesis advisor for CCS comic book school. I’ve been enjoying the shit out of what he’s been up to.

Here’s a couple pages out of his Lincoln Franklin: Ghost Hunters 2070

You can read the first chapter here:

http://jessemadeablog.wordpress.com/

and my pal Mr Stokoe put up an insanely good movie poster he did.

It’s the thing he’s drawing here:

Here’s the trailer for the movie:

And here’s an 80’s Appleseed video, that might be the only thing of Shirows on film that I love.

and some fucking Elfquest fan movie magic up in this bitch.

Ok. Now I’m going to stay up all night drawing and hopefully fix my schedule in time for the comic show.

stay hungry

Hello,

 My pal Robin who does the inkstuds radio show has set up a site to sell pages by me and Stokoe and Marian and Marley.

The site is here: http://www.mcconnellart.com/

email Robin if you want any King city pages or Marian’s Beast pages:

inkstudsradio at gmail dot com

——————————————–

more importantly SPIRAL ZONE:

On the left is the Spiral zone stuff I was deeply into as a kid and the right is the japanese toys that seem to predate Dirk Courage and his Zone riders.

 I really like the idea of the vehicle that is just a gun mounted on a wheel you sit inside. What the fuck else do you need?

There’s a site: http://www.spiral-zone.com/

————————————–

Here’s some old xmen the Blacksad dude, Juanjo Guarnido drew in the 80’s.

and some Spanish edition Inferno covers he did. I always enjoy how much lounging around there was during Inferno. What a cozy crisis it must’ve been.

and some more recent stuff of him drawing other people’s characters.

Dude draws a mean spiderman.

——————————————

Here’s a Will Kirkby pages I was impressed by.  like just drawing a crazy map or insane city scape would be too easy.

His LJ–http://chamonkee.livejournal.com/

————————————-

One of the comics I picked up at the Stumptown con is this Expansion by Matt Sheean and Malachi Ward. Good cover huh?

It’s great solid SF, like something that would be in Heavy metal in a perfect world.

It’s about these sci fi soldiers that hide out in a black hole space thing that is occupied by a cult that’s hiding out there until the end of time.

they have sites. http://mattsheean.blogspot.com/  and http://malachiward.blogspot.com/

———-

Also when I was in Portland I saw this strip club sign that looks like they we’re looking at this old Dave Stevens, Betty page.

And I just found this on my computer, a year or so ago I thought it was funny to be photoshopping the clothes off the Stevens drawing while doing an interview.

Apparently I got bored when I hit the knees. You’re all class mr Graham.

another big part of Portland was getting to meet Lin Visel whose work I like lots. She drew me a Sexica drawing. soo good.

Her stuff is here if you haven’t read it:

http://thechipperwhale.com/

after the con I did some of her Effort comics characters in my sketchbook.

————————-

Here’s some Yuki Akira Kitamiti cat stuff. I like the idea of printing stuff you can cut out and fold in comics.

and a comic on using an inkpot that I like the look of.

That and lots more good shit here;

http://homepage.mac.com/kitamichi_jp/iblog/index.html

———————-

Here’s an Enki Bilal photo comic with him drawing.

someeee 80’s akira toriyama. I really like the colors on these.

and here’s some Dirty pair art. off the Studio JIPANG site. http://www001.upp.so-net.ne.jp/jipang/kei/

and some 80’s sketchcards– Iczer on on the left 2.

Aight– I’m off to watch a Doctor who. and later pages.

Also I got a twitter

http://twitter.com/#!/royalboiler

I’ve been thinking about how important it is to cultivate excitement about making comics, part of that is this site but also I’ve been trying to sometimes draw later in the day so by the time I get to it I’m hungry for it. 

Stay hungry.

before the roosters yawn

Hellllo,

 I’m staying up all night to jump on a train in the morning. I’m going to the Stumptown con in Portland. I should be fun.

Here’s a Sexica drawing I did today.

I went over to Muggles and Stokoe’s place to make sure they were fed and watered. James is finishing off this massive poster. I ganked this photo off of Marleys twitter ( Claire took it.)

Earlier this week me and James were looking through his pal Jhosephine Tan’s deviant art.  She’s doing some really cool stuff. I really like the way she simplifies stuff –like on this first panel and the “you wonder” panel

And I like how she did the ending here, looking up through the street.

More here: http://jinguj.deviantart.com/

That last panel reminded me of this Tanuma Yuuicirou panel from his porn comic, Participet. I like all the ways you mess with how the reader views a scene.

Here’s some Toshiki Yui pages I like from his impressions of europe.

When I was in middle school I had an ad for this stuck on my binder. As played out as it can get something about flying fish reminds me of all the 80’s Dr Slump, Mario stuff I’m so in to.

Here’s some covers I like. (darrow on the top left and Heinlein’s Puppet masters on the low right)

I ran into a French site with some different takes on Tintin covers.

http://adesso.blogspace.fr/r538/Les-couvertures-perdues-de-Tintin/2/

I like this one with old man Tintin and Hadock.

And here’s some stuff of the anime version of Heinleins Starship troopers;

Also I ran into a 2002 he man that I hadn’t seen before. That showed Skellitor’s face before he was skellitor (and gave him the awkward highschool years name of Keldor– along with an evil errol flynn face). It reminded me of the action figure they made showing Inspector Gadget’s Dr Claw’s always hidden face.

I find this kind of stuff fascinating but also a disappointing– It’s plumbing the depths of all the secrets of childhood. Some of the joy of this shit is that it never gets told and doesn’t always make sense. Plus Dr claw should clearly have a robot cat head.

It’s getting late I gotta run. Here’s this.

And some maps I’ve been looking at to plan my trip.

Here’s a talk I did with the Dancing Robot dudes.

short shit.

Marian drew a My little pony drawing for her BFF.

And here’s some sketchbook stuff I drew yesterday on a walk in between pages.

screws

Hola,

mmm it’s like 7 in the am. I have a new schedule that I’m trying out, I’ve always gotta be tightening and loosening the screws to keep my drawing life puttering along. put put put.

 I’m trying out doing all the work work aspects of my job every other day. Today I did some writing for loot and drew these badges for the Stumptown con:

So tomorrow (or today after sleep) I’m ignoring everything else and only working on Multiple warheads. My theory is that it’ll help me build more excitement about the MW days. and I can rid myself of any guilt for not getting paying work or emails done on those days. They feel like days off.

Today I’ve been listening to an audio book of Robert Heinlein’s letters. There’s something great about hearing WW2 era publishing arguments that I can relate to today. I’ve probably said it on here before but I really like not always agreeing with Heinlein( wicked pro military and all) but still liking him through his work. Makes me feel all enlightened and shit, or maybe he’s just that loveable.

Stokoe’s Orc stain comes out today as well as Nate Simpson’s Non player.

I was reading some of what Sean Witzke has been writing about comics on his Supervillan site.

http://supervillain.wordpress.com/

I like this thing he typed about action—

“The trick that so many action-based comics creators never got (and movies, etc etc), is that action and character are one and the same.  I don’t mean in the acting class sort of mentality way, I mean that even the blankest cipher should be able to walk into a story and shoot someone, and if it is written and drawn correctly it should tell you everything you need to know about that character. The more they do, the more you learn about the characters, the more their actions mean something.”

ok now sleep.