Busy End Of The Year

I haven't posted much here the past month but that's not because I am not doing anything or lounging around-no sir! The end of 1014 is going out in a blaze of work! I am deep into my two issue Convergence for DC on the  Justice league Blood Moon story arc, but I can't show you all any of that yet, not till DC says its OK for me to do so. I am also still churning on the Judge, and you can see the pencils for the latest Sunday above.

I am also getting ready for our group show with the PPAP next month down at the Newark Arts Alliance.

I still have a few things I want to finish for the show and the card is on its way to the printer. I just finished my last week of teaching for the semester in the After School Program. Good luck to my former student Emily who I have been teaching for four years now as she has been accepted and moved to Pasadena to attend Art Center!

                                                                  Good Luck Emily!

Its a great bunch of young artists i get to teach each week and in just a few months its amazing how far some can develop. And of course I am working on the next issue of DRAW! as well--so no time for eggnog here!

Last Sunday of 2014

Here is the last Judge Parker Sunday of this year, which I finished and delivered to King Features this week. Next year I'll be heading into my 6th year on the strip--where does all the time go? It goes into millions of little lines that equal a huge pile of strips by now!!  I might start selling some as I need to manage my space in my archives, its almost filled to the brim. The gang is still stranded in the trailer park and who knows when they will be able to break free and get back home. It's been 2 days in strip time but at this point its been 26 weeks of storyline, as time works much slower when you have multiple story lines and only three panels daily. I enjoyed drawing the baby squirrel  here the most--though sexy gals are always a joy to draw and a constant pull for the message board trolls to fantasize over. I know a few of the trolls haunt my blog.

I think teenage girls are the hardest to draw as the teens all look much older today that when I was a teen. A 16 year old can look 22 now pretty easy, they are way more affected by fashion trends of celebrities. I teach a lot of young students, a bulk of them young women, art schools are full of way more women than men in my experience,  so I do get to see many trends and ideas from my students. In my Illustration Class I have 99% female students so I see a wide mix of fashion styles, though i realize since they are artists they are probably a bit more eclectic and stylish.

 I still wish we had a full page for the Sunday strips like the great golden age, but I suppose we are lucky to even have the size we get now. I haven't seen a Sunday paper in a long time myself, and the last time the strips were printed so small it was a shame. In a change-up I inked most of this Sunday with an old Esterbrook nib.

Between JP and the DC work it's double duty for a few months in the studio, but being winter I suppose that's OK, I wish I could squeeze out a few more paintings as I have a show with the PPAP in January.

Convergence!

I'll be doing two issues of DC's big Convergence event featuring the Justice league International, written by Ron Mars and coolors bySotocolor

Willingboro Art Alliance

Yesterday I had a great time giving a short talk on my career as a cartoonist and now as a painter as well as doing a demo at the Willingboro Art Alliance.

The WAA was a great group of folks and I enjoyed myself very much.. I had attended the WAA a few years back with my friend from PAFA to see and demo by John Ennis.

A big thanks to RJ Haas for inviting me to do a demo and the talk. Here is a picture of the demo I did in about 45 minutes.

I wish I had more time to continue the demo but we had to be out of the center by 9. If you live close by in New jersey I urge you to join up with the WAA, they are a great group of artists.

Good strip news!

Its good news for Woody, Terry and myself in this article on the Times Dispatch website  It seems Rex Morgan and Judge Parker were the top two strips in a recent poll of what strips to keep and drop  at the Times Dispatch. Its not always good news you hear about continuity strips these days, many papers want to drop all strips in favor of advertisement, etc. Most continuity strips have one-by-one vanished from the papers in the past 20 years. Yet features like comic strips are one of the few things papers can offer readers  these days of 24 hour news cycles and declining circulations. These strips and our work is highly regarded by regular readers. Normal people. I have been told the Comics Kingdom gets over 10,000 hits a day on Judge Parker alone. So we raise a glass to the readers of the Times Dispatch--Thanks!

Inktober 15

Here is another Inktober drawing. I'm way behind on doing 30 drawing in 30 days, though in thirty days I have done a ton of drawings for the strip and more, but I'll keep going till I get 30 done anyway.

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Inktober

 I decided to try the inktober challenge this year, and with a week left I think it will be inkvember before I get 30 done. Its a lot of fun and its also great to see what other artists are doing. here are three of my drawings so far and you can see the rest over on my tumbler.

 I've had a great response to these piece s so far, and many people have wanted to buy them so maybe I'll fins a way to do a book or something down the road. What I enjoy is working fast and free with ink, using pen and ink, but also sponges, tooth brushes, beat up brushes, foam brushes and even a bamboo pen, all kinds of things to make marks with. Ink is certainly the medium I have had the most experience with besides a pencil going all the way back to my early teens when I started trying to do pen and ink drawings.

Judge Parker Process

Here is the latest Sunday I finished for Judge Parker showing the arrival of Godiva at the airport. These types of Sunday strips make me really wish for the old days where the strips were bigger and the originals were as well, especially with the second panel on the second tier.

 

I inked this week all with Pitt pens as I was rushing the deadline. I'll be working on 2015 strips in about 10 days and that will start me on my 6th year on the strip--how time flies, yet its funny I've yet to draw the JP clan in any holiday celebration---though I have drawn a X-mas strip every year featuring our soldiers and those who serve.

In other comic related news I am doing two issues of something for DC( pencils and inks) that I can't announce yet, but it should be fun! I might even have some other comic related news to announce soon.

Judge Parker Process

 Here is another process blog of one of the recent Sunday strips which shows my pencils and then my inks. I do leave certain things for the coloring stage on the Sunday strips since I color those myself. I am still envious of the old timers who had a lot more room to work with on the strips. Even at half a tier, if the paper carries the whole strip its cramped as the lettering in much bigger to read well. Many papers only carry the bottom two rows of the strip, but you can always read it on line at Comics Kingdom. Will there be a rekindling of a old romance between Needy and he old boyfriend?  I'm not telling....

Recent Paintings

 These two paintings are some of the most recent works I've finished in the past few weeks in the studio.  I'm making a big fall push to get a new body of work ready for the gallery and upcoming competitions and contests. Autumn is by far my favorite time of year and I will be back out painting plein air as well in the coming weeks.

The painting above is of a scene on Chestnut Street in West Philly and the painting below is from a recent evening painting session with my friends Will and Alina, we had a mini- the Dirty Palette Club painting session. We still try and get together at least once a month to paint together.

We set up a Fall themed still life in my dining room and spent a fun filled evening painting away.

                                                             Scarecrow 14 x 18 Oil

Judge Parker Process

                                              LETS GET THE SHOW ON THE ROAD


In the current Judge parker storyline Abbey, Sam and Sophie are headed out in the RV for a family road trip as Neddy tries to sell her clothing line to Godiva a big-shot Hollywood star.

This week's Sunday strip looks like the road trip might be hitting a big snag for the Spencer clan. They may or may not be in Kansas---but are certainly in Tornado Alley.  Sequences like this are a lot more fun to draw as I get to do a little scale and drama. Above are my pencils with the boarders inked and below are the finished inks read to be inked, lettered and colored, which I did last night while watching Ray Donovan and Masters of Sex on Showtime. I enjoy both of those shows and look forward to the return of Homeland, though it will be a huge shift after last years dramatic end with Brody. The inks were done with Pitt pens and ink and brush on Strathmore 3 ply bristol.

 I'm still all old school when it comes to working on the strip as I enjoy having the original art which is really piling up! Maybe someday I'll sell some...

The stack of JP strips in my art cabinet where I store most of my original art grows weekly!

Plein Air Burlington 2014

Last week I took part in the 2014 Plein Air Burlington Festival, a week long painting event in Burlington New Jersey. I wasn't able to take part in the painting competition due to the fact I was down at the Baltimore Comicon that weekend, but I did teach a two-day plein air workshop that was a lot of fun.

Thanks to my friend Shaun Stipick who heads the event and the Lyceum in Burlington I was able to teach the workshop and paint at two different locations over the two day.  The first day we set up at the marina, I asked the painters what they would like to paint and that was the first choice. You can see my rig and my demo, which I never finished as I focused my attention on the students work during the afternoon.

 

 My friends William and Alina stopped by after Alina helped judge the show, she was one of the three judges of the PA competition. They both taught a workshop during the week-long event as well.

This is Michele's wonderful piece that I worked with her during the afternoon of the first day.

The next day Michele showed me around the town and a few spots as she lives and works there and knew the area well. We ended up at this great old power plant that was being torn down.

Chuck one of the workmen there was rally nice and very helpful as were all of the workers who passed bay and watched us paint.

I stared my demo and talked about how you handle such a complicated structure with careful observation, triangulation and simplification. Below is the painting where I left it as the sun had changed position too much.

 

Michele painting away and Shaun even got to show up and join us to paint

 

 

Here I am with Michele who was really great to work with and was so nice to bu me lunch both days. Michele did two great paintings and was a lot of fun to paint along with.

Saturday I returned to the Lyceum for the reception for the show and met a lot of the painters who participated. I think I made a few new friends and have been invited to paint along with a group of New Jersey painters. 

                             Alina talks with a few of the painters who had work in the show

                         Here are the winning paintings in order below, from first to fourth

Next year I will take part in the plein air painting competition itself and I think this show will grow in attendance and importance as a strong regional event. My thanks again the Shaun and Michele for a great week of painting!

Baltimore Con Followup

Last weekend I returend to the Baltimore Con for the first time in many years. The last time I attended was my first year back in school at PAFA, so it had been a long time, a long time that I had attended any cons at all. But starting this year I decided to try going back and testing the waters again. Baltimore was always my favorite, Marc Nathan and his crew do a great comic centric show.

It seems that I was missed from the convention circuit as well as I signed stacks of books and card and did a lot of commissions and sold art. I also got to see a few fellow pros in passing as I was swamped in drawing the whole time. Since I had so many commissions and was still on deadline  I skipped the bar hop this year and spent the evening working in my hotel room.

 I was set up at the Kids Love Comics booth along with my buddy Jamar Nicholas and we had a great time.

Cosplay was so much bigger this year than the last time I attended the con and that seems to be the way the future looks for shows.

 I did several of the sketch covers which are difficult to draw on because of the size and the surface get dirty pretty easy. But it also seems Darkhawk is still pretty popular so maybe Marvel should have Danny and I do another series.

It was a good time a a nice break from the studio here and a I look forward to coming back next year.