Colorist Day

We are proud to present Colorist Day at SCAD-Atlanta on Friday, November 5th. It will take place during the regular Temple meeting. Our guests are:
Matt Wilson (The Anchor; The End League; Thor: The Mighty Avenger; Ultimate Comics Mystery; Wolverine)
and
Laura Martin (Astonishing X-Men; The Ultimates; Thor; Planetary; The Authority; Ruse)

Friday, November 5th, Rm 347
Matt Wilson talk/demo 1-3pm
Laura Martin talk/demo 3:30-5:30pm

Artists Forum 2010

The Artists Forum 2010 fast approaches. Our guests this year are:
Skottie Young
Eric Canete
Stan Sakai

Friday, October 22nd
  Workshop with Eric Canete, Room 347, 1-2:30pm.
  Panel discussion , Room 347, 4:30-6pm.
Saturday and Sunday, October 23rd and 24th
  Workshops and Portfolio Reviews, sign-up at Room 346

HOLY FRAK! SEQA Prof. Captured by Admiral Adama!

SCAD/Atlanta Sequential Prof. June Brigman had a close encounter with Edward James Olmos, the actor who portrayed Admiral Adama on the SCI FI Channel's late great "Battlestar Galactica" tv series. Brigman and her fellow SEQA Prof. (and husband)
Roy Richardson were attending the Dallas Comic Con when this cosmic encounter occurred. Show producer Mark Walters claimed to have had no hand in arranging the meeting, which he nonetheless was prepared to record via iPhone. "He's even better looking in person!" Prof. Brigman was later heard to gush. Prof. Richardson had no comment on the subject.

Scott Pilgrim 6 Release Party

A number of SCAD-Atlanta folk went out last night for the release party of the sixth and final Scott Pilgrim graphic novel at Criminal Records in Little Five Points. Scott Pilgrim is a wonderful comic series published by Oni Press, who has published five of the folks in this picture. Remy is holding an issue of his comic "Wasteland," which recently hit shelves.



Left to right: Jerell "Drill" Drakes, Allen Spetnagel, Erin Gladstone, Chris Schweizer, Chris's daughter Penny, Cara McGee (Dressed as Scott Pilgrim character Envy Adams for the costume contest), Remy Veteto, Hunter Cark, and Rachel Ochoa.

Welcome to the NEW Temple

We've got some new featured and TONS of exciting news with the NEW Temple of Cartoon Mojo. But first...

Why is it important to get involved with the Temple? NETWORKING and EMPLOYMENT! Darnell Johnson landed himself a concept art job when the company saw his work on this blog. He was also recently hired by Marvel Comics to do a special project. All this right before he graduated. Congrats, Darnell! The Temple is a great place to help with networking to land that first job. So if you're a SCAD-Atlanta SEQA student, it's a no-brainer. Get involved with sketch challenges and send us work and news to post. You never know who is going to see it.

Darnell wasn't the only student to recently be hired by Axel Alonso at Marvel Comics. Irene Strychalski and Dominike Stanton were also nabbed for a special project. Congratulations, guys! All of this was due to the three of them taking part in the SCAD-Atlanta SEQA Writers' Forum last May. Getting involved with your department events pays off. Stay tuned for more news on their Marvel project.

Faculty member Nolan Woodard was also hired by Marvel to color the upcoming "Lady Deadpool" #1. This follows professor Shawn Crystal's long run on "Deadpool" books for the past year. Marvel sees what we're doing at SCAD-Atlanta's SEQA Department and is liking it. How many professors practice what they preach? All of SCAD-Atlanta's and the comic industry recognizes it.

Marvel isn't the only company hiring SCAD-Atlanta SEQA students. Oni Press, who publish professor Chris Schweizer's Crogan graphic novels, hired Remington Veteto to pencil and ink a multiple issue run on "Wasteland" starting with #29 and Erin Gladstone, Cara McGee, alum Justin Wagner, Falynn Koch, and Jackie Lewis to pencil and ink stories for "JAM! Tales from the World of Roller Derby" which came out last week. Cara is also currently working on a graphic novel for Oni called "Confessions of a Virgin Sacrifice". Jackie also illustrated a book called "Play Ball". How did this happen? They all got involved in the SCAD-Atlanta SEQA Publishers' Forum last winter. Yet another reason to get involved with events.

As for the NEW features:

The new header is by Irene Strychalski. We had quite a few submissions but she really captivated the concept and humor of our department. Nice job, Irene.

MEMBERS - An updated list of our faculty, students, and alum. In order to become a member you must be a SCAD-Atlanta SEQA student, alumni, faculty, or staff. If you have a blog or website or LJ or Deviant Art account devoted to your artwork, please email templeofcartoonmojo@gmail.com the link so it can be added to this list.

CALENDAR - As of right now it contains just a link to ConventionScene.com where you can see the schedule for all upcoming comic conventions in the world. We'll be adding SCAD-Atlanta events and schedules in the coming month. Fall quarter will see a BIG update in this section.

SHOWCASE - Just like our physical showcase boards outside of room 347 in Building 1600 on SCAD-Atlanta's campus, we now have an online version. This same showcase can be viewed as a slideshow in the sidebar. If you are a SCAD-Atlanta SEQA student, alumni, faculty, or staff and have amazing (student) work you'd like to share, please email your work as a JPG, GIF, or PNG to templeofcartoonmojo@gmail.com so it can be added to the Showcase.

WEBCOMICS - We now feature a collection of links to student run webcomics. If you are a SCAD-Atlanta SEQA student, alumni, faculty, or staff and have a webcomic you'd like to share, please email the link and a banner (200x75 pixels) to templeofcartoonmojo@gmail.com so it can be added to this list.

SKETCH CHALLENGES - This is a HUGE collection of all open sketch challenges and submissions for each one. Now you can easily view challenges you can take and see what's been done in the past. As before, you can vote on next week's challenge in the sidebar where the current theme will also be posted. Sketch challenges are not limited in any way except that they must focus on the theme. When you complete your sketch, email templeofcartoonmojo@gmail.com a 72dpi image (JPG, GIF, or PNG). If you have a suggestion for a theme, send it in an email to the same address to add it to the vote.

SPOTLIGHT - We'll be featuring a new Spotlight each quarter now. There is actually a backlog of deserving students. Our next one is Dominike Stanton who is now alum but still more than worth promoting. Check back tomorrow for his Spotlight Q&A. His work is already featured as a slideshow in the sidebar.

FORUM - The Temple now has a Google Group. It's a place where students can post news, work, tips, tricks, and get critiques from their peers. In order to take part, email templeofcartoonmojo@gmail.com so you can be added as a member. We're also looking for student and alum moderators. Let us know if you're interested.

TEMPLE GOSSIP - At the very bottom of the page is a Chatbox. It's there for anyone and everyone to chat and share ideas. Have fun with it.

It's now summer quarter so we hope everyone is having a great break or enjoying their summer classes. Enjoy the new Temple and have fun with the upcoming sketch challenges!

Laura Martin's Visit

Last Friday the SEQA-Atlanta Department invited two-time Eisner Award winning colorist Laura Martin out to do a demonstration and presentation of her coloring and process. We knew her work was amazing but she blew us away!

The student turn out was fantastic with not just a massive percentage of SEQA students and alum attending but also faculty and students from ILLU, ANIM, and ITGM! Their investment of time was well made. Laura was an extremely giving guest and surprised everyone by bringing in an as-yet-unpublished Punisher page by Leinil Yu to color for her demonstration. She shared work from the past too explaining the thought process behind her color choices and application but also gave a candid insight to being a colorist. Not only was everything she shared interesting and informative but our students had the bonus pleasure of finding her completely and utterly entertaining! Even for the faculty, her process and understanding of color, its application, and storytelling was really inspiring. Laura couldn't have been a more wonderful guest and we sincerely hope to have her back in the future for an encore. Thank you, Laura!

HEROES photos

As promised, photos of our recent HEROES experience!

The SCAD booth! Everyone did a great job manning the table and promoting the school. Honestly, the department makes it an easy sell. We rock.

Some of the SCAD-ATL SEQA crew hanging outside the Westin.

Doug Dabbs enjoying some sketch time at the Temple tables.

Doug Dabbs squash your face!

Grad Student Pat Bollin and his girlfriend Renee with none other than Jeff Smith.

Clay Nash is... incredible?!


This Imperial was looking for some protection money from the Temple tables but the Force is strong with our students.

And he ended up taking photos with undergrad Irene Strychalski...

...and Professor June Brigman...

... but Remington Veteto wasn't buying it. He knew the truth.

That's right, only at SCAD-ATL are all of your faculty members published and working professionals but one is an official Stormtrooper with the 501st: Professor Nolan Woodard.

Can't wait for next year!

HEROES Success!

This past weekend the SEQA-ATL department was at HEROES. In total, we had FOUR TABLES! That's a great representation of our faculty and students and we're proud to say it was a huge success and the students made us all proud.

As Professor Roy Richardson commented, "Attendance at all the SCAD workshops doubled (and even tripled in some cases) compared to last year. Many thanks to everyone from SCAD Atlanta and Savannah for all their hard work, and to Shelton, Dusty, and their entire crew for another great show!" We all agree. Thanks, guys!

In fact, Dusty was so nice he setup all of the ATL tables next to one another. First up was the prolific and fun Professor Chris Schweizer promoting his book "Crogan's Vengeance"! He's posted his own report about the convention here.


Next to him was the ever talented Dean Pat Quinn (seen below: the rare no-suit variant figure) with tons of pages from the comics he's drawn over the years.


And next to him were TWO tables for the Temple of Cartoon Mojo! Pat Bollin, Cara McGee, Allen Spetnagel, and Doug Dabbs shared their fortune with other students and all really made their presence known and showed our students are here to stay and here to succeed!


So all in all, Professor Nolan Woodard would like to give this convention a big...


All students who have additional photos, please email them to Nolan at his SCAD address. He'll collate them all and make a big HEROES photo post with them!

CONGRATULATIONS!

Each spring we look back on the success of the year but this year is special. This year we tip our hats to the first of our "homegrown" graduating class! These are students who studied here all four years and lived to tell the tale. So, as in any good tradition, the Temple of Cartoon Mojo had a little party to celebrate. Congratulations go out to graduating students:
Dominike Stanton
David Bonilla
Joy Taney
Hung Le
and Allen Spetnagel

We also took the opportunity to debut what will be the Temple of Cartoon Mojo table in Artists' Alley at HEROES Con this June 19-21 where Allen Spetnagel, Cara McGee, Pat Bollin, and Doug Dabbs will be pimping their artist selves and getting face time with the industry. If you plan on going, stop by!

Everyone have a great summer and stay productive! We'll see you back here this Fall!

Sergio Aragones Report

Graduate student Allen Spetnagel went down to UGA along with a few other SCAD-ATL folk and came back with a history of Sergio Aragones along with a short comment about the event itself:

Sergio Aragones is a well-traveled man. Born in Spain, his family emigrated to Mexico during the Spanish Civil War. Aragones eventually moved to the United States to pursue a career in cartooning--a career which has taken him all over the world.
Last night, the lecture hall S151 at the Lamar Dodd School of Art, University of Georgia was filled with universal awe and laughter. Sergio was there drawing and lecturing. In the tradition of the great showman cartoonist Winsor McKay, Aragonnes was entertaining an audience with his drawing skill.

"Giraffe!" someone yelled. "A race-car!" shouted another. "Ninjas!" "Shadows!" With each demand, Sergio calmly produced a masterful sixty-second cartoon, every gag more spontaneous and funny than the last. One could not help but be impressed by his speed--a gag that would take your average cartoonist a week to come up with shot instantly from Aragones's pen.

All this was the finale to a lecture from the acclaimed "MAD" Magazine cartoonist and creator of "Groo, the Wanderer." Aragones first made money from cartoooning in the third grade by charging his schoolmates a centavo for cartoons. Since his youngest days, he had been drawing behind the sofa and telling stories on the school bus. It was the moment when he discovered the existence of other cartoonists that opened his eyes to the possibility of cartooning as a profession.

While still in high school in Mexico, he would sell memeographed cartoons to the magazine "Ja-Ja" (pronounced "Ha-Ha") for one Peso each. Local hotels were the only source of foreign magazines where he lived. Aragones began to pick up and emulate material he found in these periodicals from abroad. He found more enjoyment in the pantomime cartoons of the European magazines, simply because he could not understand the puns and punchlines of the American comics. This caused an important realization that it is more universal to tell stories without words. He tried to get his unwilling peers to translate "MAD" for him, and would literally chase down classmates more proficient in English to get them to explain the jokes to him.

Moving to New York City in 1962 with $20 and a portfolio of cartoons drawn on any scrap of paper he could find, Sergio attempted to sell his gags to the syndicates, which he misunderstood to be a type of worker's union. Everywhere he turned, he was told: "This is very weird--you should go to 'MAD Magazine'." Aragones was terrified to present his work to "MAD" because he knew they typically ran satirical storylines, not gags.

When he finally took his work to "MAD," he had a stroke of luck. He encountered Cuban cartoonist Antonio Prohias, then cartoonist on "SPY vs. SPY." He spoke as little English as Sergio himself, and paraded Aragones around the office introducing him as his "brother." Soon, Sergio had $100 and a published 2-page cartoon entitled "A Mad look at the United States Space Effort."

By 1976, Aragones had multiple 2-page features, one cover, and his singular margin cartoons under his belt at "MAD." Bill Gaines took the "MAD" staff on trips around the world--Switzerland, Russia, Tahiti, an African Safari, and a Mexico trip organized by Sergio himself. When Aragones "MAD" family met his real family in Mexico, he knew he had acheived success.

Watching Sergio receive the ceremonial "shoe" at the UGA Jack Davis Lecture last night was almost anti-climactic. The celebrated cartoonist had already been accepted into the "fraternity."

"Once you become a cartoonist you become part of a universal fraternity... no matter where you go, you'll have a very good friend."
--Sergio Aragones

Festival of Trees

Even though this event isn't technically a SEQA event, so many people in our department worked hard on it we wanted to share. While we already had plenty on our plates, President Wallace came to the ATL campus with a project: The Festival of Trees. It's an event hosted by the Children's Healthcare of Atlanta where custom Christmas trees are made for patients in their care. The SEQA department had two kids to make trees for. One wants to grow up to be a marine biologist and the other loves Spider-Man. Hundreds of man-hours went into creating these trees. Check them out below!

Pat Quinn took on the Spider-Man tree with amazing results. We weren't sure how he was going to do it but it turned out great!




Nolan Woodard, Shawn Crystal, and a ton of SEQA-ATL students, who donated their precious time away from finals, created an island with undersea environment for the hopeful marine biologist. Turned out pretty well. Thanks for all the help, guys!




But not to be outdone is Pat Quinn's assistant Nicole Dabbs. She worked with the other Academic Director Assistant Kori Wiltz to create this amazing carousel tree! It's phenomenal and we consider it to be the best out of all of the 30 or so trees created for the event. Nice work, ladies!

Pulishers Forum

A boy and his toys...Pure Bliss.

Axel in da house!

James in da house!

I think i smell a job coming on. Go Cara!

Starros in da house!

The publishers forum kicked off and was a HUGE success. Thanks to Axel, James, and Starros for being so generous with their tie. Thanks to Nolan and Schweizer for being so involved and making sure everything went as smoothly as it did. Lastly, thanks to all the students that participated, you made us look GREAT!

GENERATE 24-Hour

The Generate 24-Hour event was more successful than anyone could have hoped! In total we had over 200 students in attendance and a large portion of that stayed the entire time. SEQA and ILLU worked closely together on many challenges including the traditional 24-Hour Comics challenge, Firebreather pin-up, Children's Book illustrations, and Captain Planet super heroes/villians.

You can view all of the entires for Captain Planet at the Generate Blog here!

You can also view what Rick Lovell in ILLU had go down for Firebreather as well as their own children's book challenge on the Generate Blog here. Those Firebreather pin-ups are going to be sent to Phil Hester shortly to be considered for publication!

Many of the other challenges have also been posted up so check out what other departments had going on at the same blog.

As for the traditional 24-Hour Comics challenge that was the foundation for this entire event, our Grand Prize Winner was Travis Evans! He won a copy of Adobe CS4 Design Premium for completing his comic first. Congratulations, Travis! Here's his entry:


Irene Strychalsky was our runner up winning her own 6x8 Wacom Intuos 3 tablet. Her entry came in right under the gun! Check it out: