Colorful interview.

For all of you curious about this new project I'm doing on Dark Horse, Umbrella Academy, there is a interview/talk with writer Gerard Way and editor Scott Allie on NEWSARAMA today.

And they have colored the drawing I did. It looks kinda cool and reminds me of the days we did ROLAND and Steve Oliff colored it. It is always very weird seeing someone working over my art.



New times are coming. Colorful times, it seems.

Robots tonight.

We had a blast at this year's Comicon. We met a lot of people, signed a lot of books and did what we set out to do. Since we're now back at the drawing board, there's only working ahead. What we will be working on is the good stuff, the stuff of dreams.

Tonight, I would love for all of the LA residents to go to the 24Seven release party at the MeltDown comic store, which starts at 8pm, and say hello to Becky Cloonan, Vasilis Lolos, Matt Fraction, Kelly Sue and Ivan Brandon for me. The book looks beautiful, and it's filled with the freshest passion for comics.

Here's a panel from my story with my brother, "the FIREMEN".

Rain maker.

One of the greatest things about going to comic book convention is meeting comic book creators, as we all work reclusively in our basements. Here in San Diego, it's like we're one big club and, no matter how movie and games oriented the convention has gotten, it's still the comics club, a place where we all love comics, and a place where we belong.

I have this impression that right now is a great time for comics. A lot of great comics are being published, a lot of creators are doing the kind of comics they love, no matter if they are super heroes or not. Now is a time of great passion for comics, and that just reflects on the comics.

Today, as part of the "announcements of the con", Dark Horse announced a new book my brother Ba is drawing, and he already did a signing alongside with the amazing James Jean, who just won an Eisner and is doing the covers, and with the writer of the series, a guy called Gerard Way.

The new comic book is called Umbrella Academy.


From left to right: Ba (with the hat), James Jean (with glasses) and Gerard Way (with gray hair).

While finishing the forth issue of Casanova last weekend, Ba did his first picture for the book, based on the characters the writer himself (who can draw pretty well and who has a band called My Chemical Romance) did and sent. I'm not sure they did show these image at the convention, so here it is:

Busy Comicon!

We did our Dark Horse signing and it was great. Just the fact they had one of those light banner things of us was completely worth the trip. Aside from that, we did AiT signings, which we will do again today, and Bá is just conquering the world with Casanova.

Okay, conquering the world was pushing it a little.

But that's the way we feel right now.

Back to the last two days.

OFF TO SAN DIEGO!

Here we go again. One more time, San Diego, and all that it entails, awaits us. I wish I could say I'm not nervous, and part of me is in fact very calm, but I have a lot to do there, many people to see, to talk, to meet, and when you're moving as fast as a speeding bullet, you worry you're going to miss the train.

We won't. I know that.

In case there's anyone reading, here's what our schedule will be like:

THURSDAY

3pm - De:TALES signing at the Dark Horse booth.
Come say hi and get your De:TALES copy signed. If you liked the stories we put on the book, you'll like the stories we have to tell on the flesh.

4:30pm - CBLDF signing on the CBLDF booth

We're auctioning the cover of Casanova 3 for the fund, and we'll be doing drawings for those there at the time. Come by and help protect the freedom of the artist.

FRIDAY

1pm - AiT signing
If you liked Ursula or Smoke and Guns, we'll be there talking about comics and signing your books. Larry has a lot of cool books and we'd love to convince you to try them out when you buy ours. I'll have postcard prints of the Smoke and Guns cover for 2 bucks if anyone wants them. They sure look pretty.

3pm - 24Seven signing

Stop by at booth 2729 to see this beautiful book and check out our story on your hands. I'm very proud of our artwork on this story, specially my colors, and no internet preview can really show what I did there. And we'll have nice postcard prints of scenes from the story for 2 bucks each.

SATURDAY

5pm - Ait signing

Second chance. If you liked Ursula or Smoke and Guns, we'll be there talking about comics and signing your books. Larry has a lot of cool books and we'd love to convince you to try them out when you buy ours. I'll have postcard prints of the Smoke and Guns cover for 2 bucks if anyone wants them. They sure look pretty.

---

We'll have a secret signing on Saturday, and we'll be hanging around all these booths at various times, and Ba will be a lot at Booth 2729 side by side with Matt Fraction on the Casanova bandwagon extravaganza.

This is the tenth straight year we go to San Diego. The first one, we were merely comic book fans, we stood in lines for autographs, we got copies of the books we liked from the hands of the artists and writers we liked, we started meeting them and discovering they were real and, most of the times, they were really nice guys (or girls).

We're really nice guys as well. Don't be shy and come talk to us. Get to know our work and ask us why we do comics. We'll tell you all about it. We'll tell you stories.

We'll leave you waiting for more.

Scripting.

So, this script I'm drawing finally arrived. It's nice, tight, and it has some interesting characters. It's six pages long.

I have been reading other people's scripts for some time now, and the more I read them, the less I write my scripts this way. I appreciate all the detail the writers put in the panels, the descriptions and the page rhythm, but when it comes to working on my own scripts, I can't help but work differently.

Artists who also draw often don't write a full script to themselves, mostly because it's boring to do the same thing several times. I already create the story o in my head, then I have to write it, pencil it, ink it and letter it (and maybe color it)? That's too much of the same thing, if you ask me.

At the same time, I also think the story should be thought trough as much as one can, and I don't do anything out of laziness. I'm just directing my energy where it is most needed.

Center stage.

Today I had a dream about theatre. That's all I really remember: the stage, the backstage, actors and lights. And, every time I think about theatre, I think about the role of the artist on a comic book.

How much thought do I put into staging everything I'm going to draw? I think about light sources to play the dramatic effect of the story, I position my "actors" in a way they'll interact with one another, I make sure the dialogue keeps hitting the necessary beats, and I leave room for the reader to fill in the blanks.



There's a very nice review of De:TALES on the Oregonian's Paper Trail blog. A month after it's release, it's good to see our lovely book still catching the attention of people. And, since it took us six years to complete this book, I hope it takes at least the same amount of time for people to keep talking about it. Or maybe a little longer.

Web comics on the way?

Over at The Engine, Warren Ellis created a space for people to post their web comics. No so different than any other place web comics are posted, the main attractive in this new development of that site, for me, is the possibility to make all those people, who already talk about comics all day, see some comics they wouldn't see in the comic store. Maybe they would see it, but they can't find it, 'cause the stores don't carry it. Or maybe because they haven't been published because the artists haven't had their chance yet. Or maybe because they such are very bad comics.

I like the internet as a way to connect people, to some times read what other people write, think and shout out. It's a good "place" to try to say what you want to say, and maybe show some pictures. The potential to web comics is, to me, very limited when compared to real comics, just because you don't hold it in your hands and flip through. But web comics are a great way to speak your mind without any financial obligation. It's just you, your creativity (or the lack of) and everybody who bumps in it in the way.

I'm thinking about a simple web comic to post on The Engine. When it starts, I'll let you know.

So far, so good.

I have four new penciled pages. Ba has three. We have two more weeks of hard work before we go to San Diego. In-between working all the time, we'll release a new indy comic in Brasil, have a release party and sign some autographs, as a way to warm up to what's in store for us at this year's convention.

Not that we decided to do the comic book to warm up, but it works that way as well, which is coincidentally good.

We're also considering doing one mini-comic for San Diego. Maybe two. Maybe some nice colorful prints of the Casanova covers.

And, finally, we've been thinking, which seem to be the easiest part, but is in fact the most difficult. There's all kinds of things you can think of when you're buried deep into work, but sometimes trying to come up with your next fresh idea for your new story isn't one of these things. However, now is the time for new ideas, now is the time for new stories. Maybe some stories will just continue, as we realize we miss some characters too much to just leave them be on their old stories.

Once I was done with Roland, I said "no more horses!" and tried different things.

I guess the horses had different plans for me.

The book is on the table.

Issue 2 arrived today, it's also beautiful. No, it's even better than issue 1. Ba is on top of his game here, only getting better.

Back to the comics still to come.

Getting my hands dirty.

There's nothing better than starting a new story. Well, maybe there is, but it's great all the same to draw that first page and get that feeling that you have started walking down this road, discovering new ground, and that once you're done, you'll be able to show people this new story so they will be able to walk down this road as well.

I'm on page two and I love it already.

Next week, pirates are coming, so I must hurry on what I'm doing now to get more pages done.

June is my favorite month of the year, and it's almost over. I've done some of what I set myself up to do, but there's so much more I could have done.

So much more I will do.

It's my favorite month, all right.

But it's not the only month there is.

. . .

Oh, and I'm really thinking about getting the BONE ONE VOLUME EDITION now that's going back to press.

Yello Jello

Well, our friend Bruno D'Angelo has redesigned his site, YELLO JELLO, with lots of comics he's been doing for years, some unpublished even.

There's a link to his brand new BLOG and even to products he is selling, like T-shirts, mugs and other fun stuff.

He is the artist behinf almost ALL Terra Major comics and he has done one chapter on our ROCK'N'ROLL comic, published by Image last year.

Take a look. You are still gonna hear a lot about him.

Starting tomorrow.

The new story should start tomorrow. Thumbnails are done, and the characters, as much as I would like to have created them beforehand, should be defined once they appear on the page. This story in a bit different from all the others we have done, and I'm anxious to see how it's going to play out.

Bá should start penciling Casanova 4 tomorrow and, judging by the time it took him to finish issue 3, he should have no problems finishing this issue before we travel to San Diego later in July.

Thanks to everyone for the nice words about De:TALES (yes, it's such a lovely book) and for the early support to the just released Casanova. Let's hope they both do well and let's also hope everybody likes what's coming next.

Today is the day!

Today, Casanova hits the stands. It's out and you can finally see it. Nothing will ever be the same again.

That's a good thing.

Tell us what you think of this first issue and, if you haven't seen De:TALES already, now it's your chance to go again to your comic book store and get your copy (and let us know what you think of it too).

Warren Ellis seem to like it.

Backstage.

It's funny to watch something from the backstage. It's not the same as doing it yourself, that would be the center stage. No, I'm just watching from a same distance, yet from very close, as pages and more pages of Casanova are made. Besides Ba, I'm probably the only one who sees all the pencils, all the thumbnails and all the sketches. I see stuff even Matt Fraction doesn't see, and he's the writer of the comic book. I see all the drawings Ba didn't like (even if they were great drawings) and erased.

I see the whole thing.



Today, Bá finished the cover of issue 5.

Today, I'm also doing a cover. It has to be done by the end of the weekend, so I still have a lot of work before me. I'm only doing sketches today.

And now Ba is at the backstage, watching me as I go.

Speak your mind -the work never stops.

Let me start by saying I have no idea what's written in japanese on my drawing. It was written in one of my brushes and I just copied it into the picture. Hopefully, it has some artistic meaning.

I finished a script yesterday for a new story, and now I'm trying to figure out how the characters will look. Because of the way they talk, I want them to have a very different look from my previous characters, a kind of old and polish look, but at the same time I have this very contemporary visions of them in my mind, which means maybe I won't escape the world my characters live once again.

Brian, from Khepri.com, wrote me today to let people know that anyone that can't find De:Tales in their comic book stores can buy it online (and cheaper) ON THIS LINK HERE! Brian is really good at getting stuff to people who wants it, so that's a good opportunity to those yet to discover the wonder twins magic.



The work never stops, does it? Neither should we, then.

Neither should we stop to create, to push ourselves harder into every direction we can, creatively.

I love comics because I really think in comics we can accomplish things in a story that are impossible to accomplish in film or in prose. Because of that, I try to reach the boundaries of the comics medium, I try to learn of it's history, I try to create something that I believe in.

I believe in telling stories. De:TALES has the latest ones we told. What did you think of it?

Tomorrow begins today!

So, did you get your copy of De:TALES already? Have you read it? What did you think?

After spending a week with the book on my hands, I still can't believe how beautiful it turned out. How good it reads, how the order of the stories works.

How everything works.

Don't you agree?

note: this post will be here for two weeks, and I want people to comment on their thoughts about the book.

Thirty.

Yesterday was a great day. We're now thirty. We're now old.

I don't feel old, really. I have more energy than ever, as so many stuff is happening. For starters, we just got this on the mail.



Nice.

But now all.

We also received another package in the mail, the same day, as if they all knew.

Inside detail - Late for coffee

De:TALES comes out on wednesday. Because of that, I'll write something about some of the stories, and why this book exists.

I think that personal contact is important when you're trying to sell your work, your story and your art, but the story is, in the end, the most important point of the equation. No matter how many conventions I go, how many editors I meet, how nice or good looking I am, it's the quality of my story that will get the job done.

And that's exactly what happened.

My brother and I had met Diana Schutz when we finished Roland, as we gave her a copy of the story for her to read - and then for her to give to Frank Miller, who had also just finished 300. That was back in 1999 or 2000 (my brother remember these things better than me, but anyway).

A year later. we had Ursula to show, and she noticed how much better the art had gotten, but since it was only the artwork we were showing, the conversation could go only so far.

Back in Brazil, in 2001, after meeting her and so many other editors, we started working on other stories, and trying to come up with more serious ones. At the time, we were contributing to an brazilian anthology, and we focused our efforts into stories for the anthology. Out of that effort, we did Late for coffee.

I'm very proud of that one. It was probably the only time we completely divided roles, as I wrote everything without Ba's help, and he then drew the entire thing himself. We talked a lot during the process, which is one of the advantages of working side by side at the studio, and we found the best angle for every scene.

After we were done, we translated it and, alongside with the next story we did (Other Words), we sent it by mail to Diana Schutz. Some months later, we received an email from her

She had read it, and, aside from how much the art had improved, she was impressed about how much she liked the story.

The story.

That's the most important point of the equation, in my opinion.

But the art in this story is one of the most beautiful things Ba have ever done.

Makes you want to fall in love and makes you want to cry.

I noticed a detail or two just now.

If you click HERE, you can see the Dark Horse page for our beloved upcoming De:TALES, and I just noticed it contains a four page preview of our first story.

The book is coming out next week, and from there on, nothing will ever be the same.

We have been working with Diana Schutz to get this book out since 2002, so most of the stories we did since then are on the book. Now, with the release of the stories, we have only an open road to travel, in which new stories (yet un-written and un-drawn) will emerge.