i’m not going to blather on, as i have to finish drawing the book. but i thought i’d share one of the opening sequences in it’s formative stages – as we nail down colour and the look of the book. speaking of colour – i am blessed by the able talents of jordie bellaire in this department. check her stuff out. it rocks.

stay tuned for more…

oh, and here’s a larger ZOOM of the image above.

last month saw me attend C2E2, of which i had a glorious time. this is a convention i look forward to visiting every year.

the last day of the show saw Archaia officially announce my involvement in their project Tale of Sand.  the graphic novel to be released later this year is an adaptation, by me, of an unfilmed jim henson and jerry juhl screenplay from 1974. according to the archives, this is the only full length henson script never to see the light of day. it’s been sitting in a box on a dusty shelf for almost 40 years! it is my honour, with archaia and in conjunction with the henson company, to directly adapt this story into a graphic novel. the story is a dark existential one of a man’s journey through… well that would be giving too much away. for a bit more insight into Tale Of Sand, here is an interview i did with TGTwebcomics regarding the project, as well as archaia’s stephen christy talks with fox chicago. the book is set for a 2011 fall release.

so, needless to say, i am going to be busy.

this brings me to the second thing i wanted to talk about; kukuburi and butternutsquash.

during C2E2 many a fan stopped by my table asking about the return of both kukuburi and the squash. it’s sad for me to say this, and i have posted on it earlier, that the squash is over. at least in it’s current form. there is one more strip which is 99.9% done which i will post shortly to close the online chapter of BNS. it’s been a long haul, but it’s time is done. rob and i feel that we lost our way – and never really regained our footing. we still stand proudly by what is online, but it’s time to be realistic. we do plan a ‘complete’ collection of all that is squash, and we have ideas of a new way to bring the squash back, when the time is right. we will keep you abreast of the collection as things develops.

this now brings me to kukuburi, which i hold near and dear and wish i could be working on every day. but truth of the matter is the book is quite labour intensive. i really don’t think people realize just how much time goes into a page of that book – time which i unfortunately don’t have at the moment. i had hope to be updating again by now, point in fact is that the story is written, the pages roughed out, hell there are 20 pages sitting here drawn in need of inks and colour. but with the tight deadline and amount of work required to complete Tale Of Sand my immediate dream of returning to the book has been shelved.

at C2E2 i asked fans if they would rather see me update one or two pages a month or wait till i have time to return to things proper. they all said the latter.

despite monopolizing my time right now, Tale Of Sand will allow me, once completed, to take a few months off and focus on kukuburi. i know many of you have been waiting almost a year  for more story… of which i am gracious, i just ask you for a few more months.

that said, another discussion that took place at C2E2, with a prominent publisher, was in regards to the collected edition of kukuburi….

more on that as things develop.

enjoy.

and i thought it’d be a perfect way to share a little bit of my process.

archie is americana, and i wanted to push forth that flavour with this piece. to help capture this i based the composition on the classic norman rockwell piece seen to the left. i also wanted to evoke a very clean and classic line of yesteryear, akin to old newspaper strips so i decided to ink this piece with clean and fluid lines using my go to brush; a winsor-newton sable series 7 #2 and 3.

1) initial inks;                 2) a larger version of the above image.

more to come as i have time…