I tried to put in here everything we have scheduled at the New York show. If we're not eating or on a meeting (most meetings happen during meals for us, so it's all basically always eating breaks), you'll be able to find us at our tables on Artists' Alley (L1 and L2).
Thursday, October 4th
11 AM-12PM signing at the DC booth
Do you know where the DC booth is? Can you tell us? Will you be there to hold our hands? We'll sign your comic and smile at you.
3:00 PM-3:50 PM: signing at the Dark Horse booth
This is the signing where we'll both be there. Bá will sign again at the Dark Horse booth, but this is your only chance to get me there, along with all the creative team of the Stranger Things comic (I made an convention exclusive cover for it).
Friday, October 5th
We'll be at our tables on Artists Alley most of the day. From 2PM til 6 PM for sure.
7:30 PM–9:30 PM: NETFLIX & CHILLS
(Main Stage 1D)
Meet the cast of the highly anticipated Umbrella Academy Netflix series! Let's see how wonderful these actors are, specially how much bigger than everyone else Tom Hopper (the guy who's playing Spaceboy) is.
8:30 PM: the Harvey Awards
(Shop Studios, 528, West 39th Street, Third Floor)
It's our first time ever attending the Harvey Awards, and we're not even nominated to anything, so NO PRESSURE, JUST FUN! (also, it's the only chance to catch us outside the convention center in case you don't have a badge)
Saturday, October 6th
12:00 PM-12:50 PM: THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY signing at the Dark Horse booth
Gerard Way, Gabriel Bá
WRISTBAND REQUIRED NO POSED PHOTOGRAPHY
LIMIT ONE PRINT, ONE OTHER ITEM PER PERSON
OTHER RESTRICTIONS MAY APPLY—SEE STAFF FOR INFO
This is Bá's second signing at Dark Horse. It's tougher to get in because of the wristband.
1:45 PM–2:45 PM: THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY INVITES YOU TO CHECK IN TO “HOTEL OBLIVION” (Room 1A06)
After ten years, The Umbrella Academy is back in action! With the new comics series, The Umbrella Academy: Hotel Oblivion kicking off and a live action series arriving on Netflix in early 2019, Dark Horse Comics is thrilled to invite fans to a conversation with series creators Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá as we explore the weird, wonderful world of The Umbrella Academy.
(This is a big room. Don't be shy and come talk abou Umbrella with us.)
3 PM-4 PM: Signing at the CBLDF booth
The CBLDF has our various book, and you can get them, help the good cause and get an exclusive drawing on your book while we're all together.
Sunday, October 7th
3 PM-4 PM: Signing at the CBLDF booth
Not content in signing books and helping the CBLDF one day, we're doing it again on Sunday, so come along and let us be merry together!
Monday, October 01, 2018
NYCC schedule
Monday, July 23, 2018
Imaginary San Diego Comic Con
On Monday, we go to the airport in the middle of the afternoon, as most international flights leave at night. So, it's rush hour traffic for close to an hour to get to the airport.
We get there three hours before the flight. We don't like to take chances. We already lost a flight at LAX back to Brazil (or Houston or Dallas or Panama, I don't remember where the first layover was). We almost lost our flight to Angola, and had to carry our baggage with us inside the plane because check-in was already closed for twenty minutes. We eat some crappy airport food, because it's going to be around midnight by the time the flight attendants bring dinner to the passengers, and by that time we'll be starving even if we did eat at the airport, and the airport food will be as crappy as the one we had close to the gate.
We always bring something to read on the plane, and we might read a little of it, but inevitably we'll choose a movie, preferably a movie both of us have not seen (usually a super hero movie), and watch it while we eat the plane dinner. After the movie, we'll try to get some sleep, but if we struggle to find our way to slumberland, we'll choose another movie. Sometimes we can finish this second movie after we wake up at the crack of dawn when the flight attendants serve breakfast.
And then we land on Houston. Usually Houston, anyway. There are no straight flights from Brazil to San Diego, and we usually get better deals on our tickets going through Houston. We usually meet other brazilians on the same flight, also going to Comic Con. Once we met all of Jeff Smith's Cartoon Books crew coming from Columbus, meeting up with Terry Moore's Abstract Studio's crew on the gate so they could all go to San Diego together (Jeff and Terry weren't there, it was just their entourages).
We arrive in San Diego before lunch, sometimes just after regular breakfast hours in California, and we go to our hotel. We could easily have a second breakfast, but we try to remind ourselves we're not Hobbits.
It's Tuesday on the A.M, and we check in at the hotel.
Now what?
---
Tuesday is our free-pre-con-day, so we can take it easy and recover from the jet lag. With the four hour difference from São Paulo time, it's very easy to get up early in the morning while in San Diego, even with little sleep the night before, but we need this first day to be low key because our trip is long and before 10 pm on Tuesday we're already dead tired. We usually meet some friends for an early dinner (we're not the only international artists that arrive one day early to recover from jet lag, so there's always someone about, and our friends who work at many of the publishers arrive earlier to set up the publisher's booth on Mondays and Tuesdays), have some drinks at the hotel bar and crash at the room early.
Wednesday is when our job begins.
Before Comic Con became this crazy giant thing, we did all sorts of different things on Tuesdays. For some years, staying at the Hostel, we would hang around with foreigners from all over the world who came to San Diego because of the beaches and the weather. We would have to explain to them that we were there for this comic book convention that happened around the corner (the Hostel is right there on Fifth Avenue at the Gaslamp District), and the ones we managed to leave curious would say over the course of that week that one day they decided to try out that Comic Con thing, went there and bought tickets right then and there and got in. They had fun.
We, too, went to the beach some years on Tuesdays. When we started going, Shane (Amaya, who wrote Roland and lived in Santa Barbara at the time and would drive down to San Diego) would drive us to the nice beaches and we would admire giant American biquinis and think about Brazilian biquinis instead. Back then, we would go back to that part of town even at night, after our Comic Con days, to try our luck on Pacific Beach bars, karaoke and pool included. Once, I don't know how, we ended up on a rooftop party of some local indy cartoonists.
All that, and it was only Tuesday.
---
You can read here the announcement of the Hellboy Winter Special 2018. We're back at Mike Mignola's backyard for a little while, writing and drawing a short story revisiting the B.P.R.D Vampire world (don't know B.P.R.D Vampire? It well be reprinted soon). Mignola did a knock-out cover for this issue, and we both did variant covers. With two other stories in this comic (one by the uber-talented Tonci Zonjic), it should be a fun read. Maybe a little scary, but fun.
---
We don't want to wake up too early on Wednesday, but the jet lag is still on full swing so we can't help it. Bá will probably hit the gym, and I'll try to join him (at least this early in the week). We have a quiet breakfast, probably our only meal for the rest of the week which isn't also some sort of meeting. I'm probably finishing a drawing I'm going to hide later as part of my Moon Art Hunt game. I'll consider going to the hotel pool for a swim (I prefer the Hyatt when it comes to a suitable pool for swimming). At lunch, we'll probably have our first meet-up, usually with our brazilians friends. This year, we would go meet Rafael Albuquerque, who's a guest of the convention and has just released a beautiful adaptation of Neil Gaiman's A Study in Emerald (with Rafael Scavone and Dave Stewart). A talented Brazilian artist going to San Diego for the first time this year is Eduardo Medeiros. It will be good for him (and for the comics' world) to widen his horizons and experience a little bit of the craziness of SDCC.
This will be a long lunch, with drinks, that will last as long as it takes for the line of people waiting to get their badges to get smaller (the Brazilian posse won't mind spending an afternoon drinking). Then we'll go get our badges so we can get in for a light, commitment-free preview night. If there's some book I really want and made a mental note to track down during SDCC, I try to find it on Wednesday, because I might forget during the week, and if I don't, by the time I go back there it might have already be sold out . Last year, I stopped at the beginning of the con at the Fantagraphics booth and got some books they had published, and forgot to get the new Jason book. I went back on Sunday, and it was all gone.
Saying hi to Terry Moore and Jeff Smith is usually part of our preview night.
Wednesday is still preview night, so it isn't so crazy to find places to have dinner. We usually choose as we walk around the Gaslamp, depending on who we're meeting for dinner. Still, it's a relaxing dinner with friends. The calm before the storm.
---
From Thursday on, the con game is on. After a breakfast meeting with one of our publishers, we usually have a signing. If we don't, it's my first chance to hide a drawing and start posting pictures online and giving people clues so they can find it.
Lunch is also a meeting, probably with a foreign publisher. Our foreigner publishers from France (Urban Comics) and Italy (Bao) usually go to San Diego. In fact, we met both of them in San Diego years ago, before they were our publishers, and now, besides being our publishers, I think of them as friends.
Signings await in the afternoon, and we also usually stop at the Comic Book Legal Defence Fund (CBLDF) booth to leave the original art we brought for the art auction on Saturday. Their booth is near the DC comics booth, on the way to the Drawn & Quarterly booth. Alex Cox will probably have a lot to say about their relocation to Portland, and if he doesn't, I'll simply ask. I'm curious.
We leave the artwork personally on the first day because we are not mailing it from Brazil in advance, and because we know they'll display all the artwork they got on Thursday night at the party so people can get a good look of what is available and get excited about the auction.
Thursday night, the rooftop CBLDF Welcome Party at the Westgate Hotel is the party to go. It's traditional, and in this modern day of Entertainment World takeover, it's your better chance to hang out with the cartoonists you know and/or admire. And to meet new ones. It was at a CBLDF party that Bá and I saw Neil Gaiman for the first time, relaxing in a hallway before he had to go back inside to read something for everyone to enjoy. It was at a CBLDF party that we hung out next to Frank Miller in an outside balcony while he smoked a cigarette and talked passionately about comics, standing tall in his red Converse sneakers. This party has always been about the shared love for comics, and about the people who love them: the fans and the creators, interacting together and having a good time.
Maybe we'll have energy to go to a second party, probably with Sierra, and probably at the Bayfront. The Boom Studios crew have good parties at the Bayfront bar. If all goes right, the night might end in pizza in the lobby.
(the Bayfront bar has a brazilian bartender who makes some great caipirinhas)
Friday begins with another breakfast meeting. Maybe with someone from Vertigo/DC to talk about the Absolute edition of Daytripper and decide what sort of extra material would be fun to put in this oversided deluxe edition. Maybe to talk about something else.
(See, the same way I forgot to mention that every morning before breakfast, we'll try to go to the hotel gym, in real life we'll also probably forget to go to the hotel gym before breakfast)
After the Hall-H celebration of Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Reunion (which I'm not going, as I have never been to Hall-H in my life), I would probably stop at the Dark Horse booth at 12pm to get some of the posters they'll give away, because I think they turned out pretty nice (hint: I did the artwork).
During the week, we usually have a signing at the Dark Horse booth, next to a panel or announcement we're involved. After the panel, Dark Horse normally sets up interviews from media outlets.
Lunch meeting, but all day on Friday we're thinking about the Eisner Awards later that night at the Bayfront Ballroom. I hide another drawing across town, and we're thinking about the Eisners. I meet some friends for drinks around six and I try not to think about the Eisners. If these friends happen to be Skottie Young or Jason Latour, their jokes alone will keep me busy laughing and I'll forget everything. I'm still going to the Eisners afterwards.
Mainly because of the Umbrella Academy Netflix show, Bá got an invitation for the Universal party. The Umbrella crew is still shooting in Toronto, so I don't think we'll be able to make it this year.
We arrive at the Bayfront, where they're presenting the Eisners. Every awards ceremony is boring, I know. Still, we like the Eisners. We like to see people get happy about how other people love what they do enough to vote for them. We like the celebratory aspect of it. We miss that the ceremony doesn't have a keynote speech anymore, or a keynote speaker. We heard some earth-shattering-life-changing speeches at previous Eisner awards that motivated us, and still do, to try harder, and do more, and to do it better.
There's some drinking after the awards are all delivered at the Bayfront, and then we'll probably head back to the Hyatt bar and catch up with our gang of idiots. The convention night scene is definitely more spread out nowadays, to all sorts of places and hotels and bars, but there are a bunch of us comics' folk who still hang out the the Hyatt bar.
There's a panel on Saturday I can't help but think we would be in if we were there. We're usually invited to those kind of Dark Horse panels. Here's the description:
3:00-4:00 PM: Artists Who Write: The Craft and Creation of Comics (Room: 7AB)
Whether it's a superhero adventure, a colorful fantasy world, an ultra-violent crime noir, or a new take on an old classic, creators put a lot of thought into the sequential art that drives stories told in comics. Join an all-star lineup of Dark Horse creators including Frank Miller (Xerxes: The Fall of the House of Darius and the Rise of Alexander, Sin City), Dave Gibbons (The Originals, The Life and Times of Martha Washington in the Twenty-First Century), Joëlle Jones (Lady Killer), Wendy Pini (ElfQuest), and Rafael Albuquerque (EI8HT) as they discuss turning an idea into a full-fledged story and how they continue to keep their writing fresh.
I would be interested to be there just to listen to Frank Miller and Dave Gibbons talk, but Albuquerque and Joëlle are so talented that it's no surprise they've reached the success they have, and I also want to hear they talk about how they got there.
Saturday is the big hollywood day. It's crazy. It's fuller. We usually hide in the green room for lunch. If I haven't run into Joss Whedon up until this point at a hotel bar (I like that he started going to Comic Con again after two giant Avenger movies), then on Saturday he's easier to bump into, relaxing and having a good time. We stop by Mike Mignola's booth to make sure we say goodbye to him, as he doesn't do Sundays anymore. Close by, we might try to walk around artists' alley for a bit, but nothing sticks out. A lot of crazy talented creators with original art, prints and commission lists. People who sells books usually have booths on the other side of the convention floor, where we used to have our booth, and we have always been book people. We make comics so people can read them.
For the past few years, we have tried to have at least one signing at the CBLDF booth as well, where they have a great selection of our work from all publishers we work with. You'll find there (signed) copies of Daytripper, Casanova, Umbrella Academy, Two Brothers, How to Talk To Girls at Parties (with a special signed bookplate) and much more.
At the end of the day, the CBLDF live art auction will take place at the Bayfront, on the Sapphire AB room, starting at 8 PM, where you'll be able to bid for some amazing original art from your favourite creator. There are some pretty neat Frank Miller, Jeff Smith and Howard Chaikin originals being offered, among many other incredible pieces of art.
The night is full of wonders. We have a much better time at dinner, usually catching up with old friends. For the past few years, this has been editor's dinner for us, so to speak. Bob Schreck, Diana Schutz, Karen Berger, Sierra Hahn, Pornsak Pichetshote, all great editors, dear friends, and during the craziness of Comic Con, we catch up with them, and they catch up with us, and we start our night just right. We met some great cartoonists while on those dinners, which always involved big tables and lots of people. I'm pretty sure I met Scott Morse and Jim Mahfood in one of those dinners with Bob. I met Eduardo Barreto in a dinner with Diana (actually, Eduardo Barreto comes from Uruguay, and was the very first "international" comic book artist I met when he went to São Paulo for a book fair to promote his Batman book, and I was around 13). I met Jeff Lemire in a dinner with Karen. I met John Cassaday in a dinner with Sierra.
Saturday is the night that never ends, no matter if California law says otherwise, and we all meet up at some point after the Hyatt bar closes. The backsteps crew doesn't disappoint. (Will Dennis always has our backs, fellas). One of the recent topics I ask my friends is when are they coming to Brazil, as the Brazilian convention, Comic Con Experience (CCXP), as well as the Brazilian audience, would welcome them with open arms (I'm trying to convince myself the reason I didn't get Skottie Young to come last year was because, on a very energetic Saturday night, I didn't agree to go have matching tattoos made the following Sunday – he got an amazing Alfred Newman).
The spotlight panel on Rafael Albuquerque is at 10 AM (room 24 ABC) on Sunday morning. We'll need breakfast before going to the panel. I'm not sure Albuquerque will wake up in time to get anything to eat, but at least he's a special guest of the convention and there will be people who will go to his hotel room and make sure he attends his own panel. (the convention organisers have a volunteer who speaks Portuguese, who took care of me when I was a guest in 2009. He was taking care of Eduardo Risso last year. I bet he'll take care of Albuquerque).
Our last stop of the Con is the Dead Dog Party, organised by Bob Chapman and the Grapphitti Design crew. Every friend we didn't have a chance to talk to during the convention will stop by, have a few drinks, have a few laughs.
Things start to die out earlier on Sunday, like the magic pixie dust starting to wear off. The Hyatt bar is still open, and some other friends are there. It might close soon, tho, and so we'll cross the street and stop by the Lion's Share.
When will we ever go to sleep?
Probably on the flight back home, the next day, and for the entire following week.
---
Maybe now it's a good time to say Bá and I didn’t go to San Diego this year. We have been going since 1997 every year. We didn't go in 2013 to focus on work (making Two Brothers, specifically), and I went alone in 2014 (Bá was still drawing Two Brothers) to negotiate which publisher would publish the book in the US. Aside from that, we've been there every year. It's our safe port in the american market, where we know our way around, where we see our friends.
This is one of those years where we decided to focus on work. And, like those years, we did miss San Diego greatly throughout the week.
I recommend the experience. I still think it's a special show. You don't have to go 20 times.
But do it at least once.
Thursday, September 15, 2016
CHINA!
There're no words to describe the thrill of having your book published in China. Or maybe there is, but it's in Chinese.
That's the beauty of telling stories. There's no limit where they can go.
Friday, October 23, 2015
AMA with Fábio Moon and Gabriel Bá
The time has come for you to ask everything you ever wanted to ask, but didn't have the chance.
Next monday, October 26th, 2PM ET, AMA with Fábio Moon and me at reddit.
https://www.reddit.com/r/comicbooks/
#TwoBrothers
Wednesday, October 14, 2015
TWO BROTHERS in New York.
Nothing happens out of the blue and it's easy to loose track of time when you spend so many years working on the same project. You may forget all the other things that happened during those years, what has changed since the last time you were there. Last time we were in New York was in 2010, we had just released the last issue Daytripper. I can say for sure that everything changed for us after that book.
Five years later, we were back in New York with an Eisner and Harvey awarded book that spent four weeks on the top of The New York Times bestsellers list, published in twelve languages, respected and beloved by authors, critics and readers. And we were there to release our new book, TWO BROTHERS.
We began our trip with the right foot, with a discussion and signing session at Barnes & Noble in Tribeca. We arrived half an hour earlier to let our anxiety steam a little down, and when we finally began talking with the audience, we were warmly welcomed by everyone, always paying attention and full of interesting questions. Everyone present left inspired and happy, with their books signed, glad they were there, being part of that special moment. Right there, the book was out on the open, it was free. We could finally relax a little and recharge for the next four days that awaited us.
We love conventions, the interaction with the readers, meeting new creators, the adrenaline of selling your own books and sharing the passion for your work with everyone who stops at your table. We’ve been to four different conventions in the U.S. this year and we could see what they have in common, the differences, the artists that go to every each one of them, the publishers, the T-shirt/Toys/Light Saber stores, the cosplayers. Bigger and smaller events. New York Comic Con has grown a lot in the last five years since we’ve been there, specially the Artist Alley. It was great returning to the crazy frenzy of tabling, specially with a fresh new book that would only come to the stores the following week.
We sold 100 copies of Two Brothers in two days. Dark Horse had more books shipped overnight for the weekend to have it at their booth. We were rarely not busy on our table. With a career of almost 10 years in the U.S., readers had a lot of different stuff for us to sign, but what brought most of them there was Daytripper. The single issues, the trade, the deluxe hardcover edition. But most importantly, what the story meant to each one of them. A book that remains with the readers after they finish reading it, one that is constantly given as a gift for loved ones, one that is the entryway to comics to so many people.
Saturday was our busiest day and we were barely at our table. We had our spotlight panel in the morning, a signing session at the Dark Horse booth, followed by five interviews about the new book. After all that, we waited an extra hour at the booth just so we could give our book personally to Frank Miller. It’s great to have idols that inspired and influence you. On the very few occasions we happen to meet ours, we make sure to show the respect they deserve. We have a successful career, our work, our fans, but it’s always good to remember we have still a long road ahead of us.
Life is made of choices, and we’ve chosen to go to New York to release our new book. It was a group effort to guarantee the books would be there in time, to set up an event on the bookstore, to get us a table at Artist Alley and a spotlight panel on the official program. We bought the tickets, the convention and the publisher got us the hotel rooms. We spent almost a week in New York without doing any sightseeing, no shopping, nothing a tourist is encouraged to do so easily there. We went there to release the new book and we had to return right away, for work awaited us.
I’m not sure when we’ll be back in New York, but I am in no hurry. The new book’s journey has begun and we were glad it happened there. Today, the book arrives on every comics shop around the U. S., and many other places that buy and read comics published on the American market. The book has already been released in Brazil and in France, and in two weeks it will be released in Italy (at Lucca, our next trip), but I feel like from now on, the book will really reach the whole world. It’s just a matter of time.
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
¡DOS HERMANOS EN MÉXICO!
Vamos a tener dos mesas en el Artist Alley (A1018-A1019), dónde estaremos todos los días.
Y tenemos una charla el sábado, a las 12:15h
- "BAJO LA SOMBRILLA DE LOS GEMELOS FANTÁSTICOS. Desde Brasil, los hermanos Gabriel Bá y Fabio Moon, artistas multipremiados de la industria del cómic, platicarán sobre su trabajo en The Umbrella Academy, Casanova y Daytripper, entre otros proyectos. Moderador: Jorge Tovalín."
Monday, July 20, 2015
San Diego was a blast!
I was drinking a Caipirinha at the outside patio of one of the hotel bars, talking with Skottie Young, Chris Roberson and Allison Baker about comics. I was actually enjoying the sun, and my drink was delicious. Topics ranged from the influence of “the Maxx” in our comics to how special it is to work inside the Hellboy universe, with stories about smuggling things from one country to another and who has more original Chris Bachalo pages thrown into the mix.
The girl working at the bar is brazilian, so her Caipirinhas can be trusted.
The guy working at the bar of the Scholastic party was also brazilian. I was impressed when José Villarubia recognised the bartender’s strong accent and said to me “he’s brazilian”. I didn’t get a caipirinha there, but I can’t complain of what I did get: an advance copy of Craig Thompson’s Space Dumplins.
There are no brazilians in space in that book. Not yet, at least. I just read the first few chapters.
Back to San Diego, which is what I can’t stop thinking about. Maybe it is really because I’m from Brazil and I only see these people once a year, maybe twice, but when I can spend five days talking with so many of my friends and they’re all doing such great comics, I can’t complain about where my life has led me.
San Diego was a blast this year.
Bá and I had a wonderful time in San Diego Comic Con this year. I don’t care what people say, it’s still my favourite convention. It’s the only place where you’ll find all the publishers, from the smallest to the big mainstream ones, where independent or alternative artists interact and share their passion in the same space as international super stars of books you grew up reading, and it’s where we can still celebrate the Eisner Awards (where everybody who attends is bound to discover at least one cool book that catches your attention).
It is getting harder and harder to attend SDCC, getting a 4 day pass is hard, getting a hotel room is hard, and there are more and more people going for the entertainment part of the convention rather than the comics part, but still I think SDCC is pretty special and the energy from the authors and the readers was just unbelievable. If you can see past the sea of people, the comics-section is still the most inspiring place you’ll find on those five days of summer. And, since we didn’t have a table this year, we could also walk around and discover so much more stuff, and see and talk to so much more people, and leave with the even stronger feeling that we’re living in these very special creative moment in Comics, where the audience is really diverse, the production is diverse, and the doors are wide open for Comics to go everywhere.
We even did a presentation about that during the convention.
One of the panels we were part of this year was called “Different is cool”.
We created that panel.
We made that name up.
It was basically me and my brother talking to the audience about how incredible it is to go your own way, find your own style, and how your work stands out when you stop trying to do what everybody else is doing and try to focus on doing what only you can do. Our presentation was a love-letter to the convention and to the Comics’ World, to this place where we can discover such a wide variety of artists and styles and possibilities, and how refreshing that is, and how inspiring, and how many of the authors we admire have had that same moment when that voice in their heads said it was okay to do something you love even if nobody else is doing it.
The room was big, full of readers, of fans and friends, and it was great having that opportunity to talk about our love for comics, and to reflect on how nowadays is a great time to go after your dreams. It was the best way to start the last day of the Con, and it gave us this buzz that we carried to the interviews we made, and to the signing session that followed. We love comics so much and, with the response from the audience at our panel, we felt loved back. It was an incredible feeling.
We first came to SDCC in 1997 dreaming of drawing super-heroes for Marvel and DC, but our journey took us to a completely different path. A more personal path.
We haven’t looked back ever since.
We always come back from San Diego inspired to make more comics. Bá spent a couple of days in L.A to share that enthusiasm with Gerard and talk about the new Umbrella Academy series. It’s going to be great. Knowing there are more Umbrella comics coming is more exciting to me than the news of an Umbrella Academy TV series. Bá and Gerard have so much fun stuff planned.
As I write this, I got my copies of Casanova Acedia #3 in from the printer. It should be in comics stores on July 29th. We’re really making an effort to go back on schedule, since releasing Two Brothers in Brazil and France and touring took us so much always from the drawing board and resulted in this very big (unprofessional) gap between issues 2 and 3. Issue 4 will come out next month.
This year I finally stopped at some point and managed to be interviewed by my friend Jimmy Aquino for his Comic News Insider podcast and I talked about the books I did, the new book coming out (Two Brothers) and about what I love about comics. When he finally asked me the geeky questions, about which characters or books I would like to work on, I think I let him down with my answers, but I forgot to tell him one thing:
Despite focusing on creating new stories and trying to do different things, my brother and I will draw on a mainstream DC book for the first time this year, and it will be published next month.
Back to the drawing board.
Wednesday, July 01, 2015
SDCC - Different is Cool!
There’s a pattern to be recognised on the panels that jump to my eyes while reading the whole program. First, let’s see a list that I find very interesting, and that I might even go to.
And almost every day there's a cool IMAGE COMICS panel with creators and editors talking about how awesome comics are.
Wednesday, May 20, 2015
Going places
We've been to San Diego Comic Con International 17 times, once to NYCC, and one time to TCAF (ok, it's in Canada, but it's awesome). Although we've been to conventions all around the world, in the United States we've been to only two. So we're really happy to be going to Denver and Phoenix the next two weekends.
At the Denver Comic Con, we'll have tables G2 and G4 on the Artists' Alley, where we'll be most of the time. We'll sign books, make free sketches. We'll have comics and prints to sell. Stop by.
On Saturday, May 24, from 12:55pm to 1:45pm, we'll be on Room 304 on the panel Festival de Brazil, with our friend Rafael Albuquerque.
Then on the next weekend we'll head to Phoenix Comicon, where we'll set up our stuff on tables 13140 and 13142 on the Artits' Alley. If we still have comics and prints, we'll be selling them. If not, signing, sketching and talking comics.
On Friday, May 29th, we'll be on room North 121 for a Spotlight panel about our work, from 1:30pm to 2:30pm.
And we have two signings at the Dark Horse booth. On Friday at 3pm, and on Saturday at 11am.
We're really excited to go to these two different places and meet new readers and creators.
See you all there.
Thursday, April 17, 2014
DELUXE
At last, the Daytripper Deluxe Edition HC is here! We're very proud of it and we know how much the readers have asked for a premium version of our beloved book.
You can see a step-by-step of the new wraparound cover image here and Comics Alliance has a preview of the Sketchbook section here.
And a little video of the book.
We couldn't be happier. This really push us to keep telling our stories. We love comics.
And a big thank you to all our readers. They made this possible. This book is for all of you.
Wednesday, April 09, 2014
Daytripper in the University
Wednesday, March 05, 2014
How did we get to India?
Here's a video with our full presentation at Comic Con India, in New Delhi, last February. We talked about all the choices we've made throughout our careers that led us to this point.
Even though we have now a very successful international career (quite unbelievable, really), the core of what we do remains very much the same from where we started almost 20 years ago.
We had a great time at the convention and we learned a lot with everyone we've met there. We can't wait to go back.
Monday, December 23, 2013
Daytripper Deluxe Edition HC - the cover
We couldn't be happier with Daytripper. It became everything we believe comics can be and it has been reaching people all over the world. We really enjoyed its run as a mini-series, but the collected edition is the one really going the distance. We love this book.
It took us long nine months to get the first cover of Daytripper right, making a lot of sketches, having to lots of different approaches, but in the end we couldn't have done a better job. The cover for the first issue had to portray a little of the whole series as it could be used as the cover for the trade. Well, it did happen and it has become the "face" of the book all over the world.
Except for the American edition, in every country it has been published, it got a harcover treatment. The same book, nothing different inside. Well, if we would have the american hardcover edition, it should be special, since this is such a special book.
And it will be.
It was very hard coming up with a new cover for the new edition, because I really love the old one. So the new one had to be special, to tell more than the first one, to embody the whole story. Four years have passed since I've done the first cover and this book became something larger, so the cover would have to step up too.
With the release date of April 2014, the Daytripper Deluxe Edition HC will have a dust-jacket wraparound cover, three piece case, better stock matte paper and 16 extra pages sketchbook section. Go to your local comic store and make sure you order it.
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
Thursday, October 03, 2013
Oktoberfest! Taking over Germany!
Essen
Essen
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
Morning walk with the dog
Nothing comic-book-related to report this time, expect the impression this photo of my brother walking my sister's dog around the empty streets of early sunday morning São Paulo could have been a scene of Daytripper.
Also, paying close attention to the picture, I noticed Bá is wearing his DeathFace t-shirt, which is the product of Ivan Brandon and Chuck BB's imagination, and should be coming out as a comic from Offset Comics in a not so distant future.
Sunday, March 03, 2013
Tour de France 2013 - the video
The final chapter of our great adventure in France, now with images, sounds and a lot of traveling around.
Thanks to everyone who came to our signings. Thanks for the stores who opened their doors to us: La Bulle, Expérience, La Parenthèse, Bulles en Tête and Apo(k)Lyps.
And thanks for Urban Comics for everything they did for us. It was amazing.
Friday, March 01, 2013
Angoulême - part 2, or the French tour
There were two halfs of our trip to France. Going to the Festival at Angoulême was just the first one, and the second half was definetely the most different.
Using our lovely Parisian apartment as our home base, the Urban Comics crew sent us in a small signing tour around France: four cities in total, including Paris. Every day, we would wake up early, take a TGV train and cross the country to visit another city, give interviews to the local press and sign at a local bookstore, where we were always met with a mix of readers who had already read Daytripper and those who were discovering the book for the first time but, either out of a recommendation from the bookstore owner or out of their habit of going to signings.
It's incredible how every city in France appears to have a great bookstore specialized in Bande Dessinée and comics. We visited Bulle at Le Mans, which I think was the oldest one in our tour and was located in the oldest part of town, a beautiful medieval village near the remains of the wall built during Roman times. In Lyon, we visited Experience, a great bookstore with a ceiling filled with drawings from their visiting artists, a most distinguished collection from all around the world. We saw Craig Thompson's drawing, and Bannister's (he's from Lyon), Cyril Pedrosa's and so many more. Moebius also left his markings on that cave of wonders, and so did we.
Nancy, the smallest city in our tour, had the biggest bookstore, La Parenthèse, with a lot of space for the readers to discover all kinds of comics, old and new. One room, where we did our drawings and met the public, was filled with great automates, those wonderful handmade dolls which, when you press a button, move by themselves in the most ingenious ways.
In Paris, we visited two bookstores: Bulles en Tète, the newest in our trip, and Apo(K)lyps. Luckly, their were close to each other and we walked the distance from one another, but still that was our longest signing day, signing for three hours on the first and for almost the same time on the second.
We finished the last night of our tour with dinner with Pôl and François from Urban Comics at a great restaurant, eating well, drinking champagne, wine and talking about comics, past, present and future.
We don't know when, but this wasn't our last trip to France. This was the beginning of our french road. And our work has put us on this road and, if we continue to do good work, it's the work which will keep sending us across the globe. The work is the author's voice, the author's face. Our work is our passport.
Wednesday, February 20, 2013
Angoulême 2013 - the video
Monday, February 18, 2013
Angoulême - part 1
Bá and I returned from our first trip to Angoulême and its Festival International de la Bande Dessinée a week ago, in the middle of Carnaval, and after 10 days in the cold french winter, we recovered by the beach for a week, feet sunk in the wet sand seen through the transparent waters of our beautiful sea. We had an incredible time in France, inspiring every day, and more and more we fall in love with the respect and love the french market has for the books and the artists.
Festivals that take place in smaller cities, or in just one determined part of a big one, are great because you can - and should - do everything by foot, and Angoulême is this beautiful little medieval city and the festival takes over the entire town. All around, you see people that love comics, artists, readers, editors and everybody else involved, and you cross them in the streets, in every restaurant, in all bars and museums and in the giant tents (called "bulles" over there) where you'll find the stands and booths of all the publishers. The prize most people are after is a very beautiful original drawing - done on their book or on a sketchbook or on a separate piece of paper - from their favorite artist. The artists take turns in the publishers booths, and a place in the line for one of the signing sessions of three hours (or more) is very disputed.
We were at the Urban Comics booth every day, signing copies of Daytripper or Casanova, and from Umbrella Academy and many of our work in english. The response from the audience was incredible, and it was great to see what the french responded more in Daytripper: Olinda, the exotic girl from the waters of Salvador, and Brás first love, was more successful than Ana, and many people asked for drawings of Dante, the dog.
Another guest Urban Comics brought to the festival was Bill Willinghan, of Fables' fame, who came with his lovely assistant Stephanie. Every night, as we gathered together for dinner, the guests and everybody from the publisher, we had an incredibly funny time with Bill, a human well of jokes, and he told very interesting stories about his time serving in the army in the seventies, which was the last time he had visited France. After two or three Vertigo panels together in San Diego (all of them passed without us getting to properly talk to each other), it was really nice to finally have an opportunity to get to know Bill a little more. Those dinners at Angoulême were always delightful, and everybody at Urban Comics loves what they do, and it was nice to feel that comics (or bande dessinée) are such a passionate world in France.
It's great to feel the good vibe when it's there, spreading, oozing from the artists, from the readers, from yours friends. It was great to see people we already knew so we could share this wonderful feeling that comics are great and there's something magical happening in comics right now. We had great talks with Cyril Pedrosa over late night drinks, and a great conversation with Mark Siegel over wine, and a wonderful lunch with Bannister in the basement of a italian restaurant. There were those we wished we could have seen more, and talked more with, like Frederik Peeters, Annabelle, Joe Keating and many others. On the last night, we had a very interesting and motivating conversation with Jessica Abel and Matt Madden about the differences of comics, of comics markets, of different artists, authors, and how that, instead of limiting, is nowadays actually liberating, even if still hard to accomplish.
Another great thing about this year's festival was the presence of so many brazilians. Call me patriotic, or sentimental (or blind, or crazy, or stupid), but comics are living a great moment in the world theses days, where new stuff by new people is finding its way in the hands of the readers all around, and when something great happens to you, you wish somebody close to you could share all these wonderfull feelings, and it was great to have other brazilian artists around, our friends, and it was a special moment that we shared in those four days of festivities, a moment we can bring back home together, hoping that, by talking about it, we can inspire others the same way the trip inspired us.
