One of the jobs I currently have in the studio to ink is an Elvira story penciled by my long time buddy and awesome artist John heebink. John is one of the best and most underated artists in comics today and such a joy for me to ink. Many artists get overlooked because they do non-mainstream or humor books, and that is such a crime in the case of John.
Why is it people assume it's easier to draw "funny"? because they are just plain stupid that's why!
Luckily the Doll and Creature book we did together (written by the new Stan lee of comics, Rick Remender)a few years back is currently being reprinted in color from image. I think it's one of the best inking jobs I ever did and certainly a showcase of John's talent. Elvira isn't as popular these days it seems, the far more morbid and groetesque fare seems to be the order of the day in Hollywood, so the comics might be her mainstay today.
In the recent months the publisher of Elvira, Claypool Comics has been rumored to be in trouble with Diamond the main comics distributor due to it's recent change in policy reguarding minimum orders. In short, if a book doesn't recive a certain basic number of orders it won't then generate a basic $$ number and Diamond will cancel the orders, effectively shutting out the publisher from getting books in comic shops. Claypool has been putting out good solid fun comics for a long time and like many small publishers is struggeling to reach an audience. This is a sorry situation to say the least and Claypool isn't the only publisher in such a predicament. The low numbers on the orders are not a reflection of the quality of the books, nope, more a direct reflection of the shitty state of the retail business, the Babymen shops, the majority which don't order anything outside of the top 50 comics.
Elvira always reminds me of the great humor DC books from the early 70's like Angle and the Ape, Binky,Jerry Lewis etc, all which had fantastic art by guys like Bob Oksner. With talents like my buddy Binky and Ricardo Villagran working for Claypool two name only two, these books desrve a widder audience, so ask your retailer to stock a few copies of Claypools books.
I agree with you, John Heebink is an Awsome artist and a joy to work with! A real pro!
ReplyDeleteWhat a lovely lady of darkness AND humor.
ReplyDeleteDo people really think funny is easier to draw than the darker stuff? Damn, humor in general is harder to do than dark as it doesn't come as easily to us humans. And to have to render it in a visual medium which is already tougher than verbalizing or writing it--let's just say, you have to be very good at it to effectively pull it off. Even kindergarten art gets dark sometimes. Just more readily accessible emotions/experiences for us to draw from (pun intended).