Dave McKean interview

(*image borrowed from the 7-Imp blog interview*)
I was flattered to be asked by Jules of the AMAZING blog "Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast" to give a hand in her interview with one of my all-time favorite artists, Dave McKean. Make no mistake, I contributed at most .0025% of the overall work involved, while Jules and Eisha (also of the aforementioned blog) did the rest along with an assist by Farida Dowler. It's an amazing interview that's both inspiring and laugh-out-loud funny at times and it's PACKED with a TON of Mr. McKean's art. This guy is creative down to the bone.

Thanks...

...Stephanie, for the cool superhero generator link!

After choosing different features and colors from the plethora of choices, it creates the finished version and adds a name to your creation. This is what mine looked like when I was done:

Dreamdark SILKSINGER cover!

We just got the OK to unveil the cover (art by me!) for Laini's upcoming novel DREAMDARK: SILKSINGER. Due out in September. This is, of course, the sequel to her first novel DREAMDARK: BLACKBRINGER, both from G.P. Putnam's Sons/Penguin Publishing.

Both books are unbelievably great!

Painting away and discovering Faunts and White Flight

It's been a while, but I've been busy and I LOVE it! Since I can't show you what I've been working on, I can at least show you (along with some blurred-out-art areas) my work space:

By the way, that drafting table has been THE BEST purchase I've made in a long time. My old table was about 3 feet wide, and while it served me very well over the years, this "new" one has been incredible. I say "new" because I got it off of Craig's List in the early Fall for $100! I'd been keeping an eye out for a while for just this kind of table and after seeing them pop up and then disappear within hours I POUNCED on this one when it showed up online. It's an architecture table with drawers and it's as sturdy as hell! I was tired of my old table squeaking and getting semi-wobbly if I didn't tighten it every couple of days and this new one is solid enough to climb up on and take a nap. And once I got it home and realized that my old chair wasn't high enough, what did I do you might ask? I jumped back on Craig's List and within a couple of days I found a used (nice!) drafting chair for $10 that was missing some screws. One stop off at the mom & pop hardware store on the way home and it was as good as new. Anyhow, enough pitching for Craig's List. It was actually kind of fun at first, working without the chair and drawing standing up (but it got old pretty fast leaning over the table). I've already posted this a while back, but here's one of the pieces once again that I did on my feet & hunched over:


Now on to music. I'm an eMusic monthly subscriber (LOVE. IT.) and I had some credit that was itching to get used this past week. At first I wanted to find a few songs from some obscure bands (to me at least) that were in the "My Bloody Valentine" realm. Someone I'm working with had mentioned his enjoyment of that band and I've been wanting to make a mix for him, but I ended up LOVING a few of the bands myself. For today I'll only mention Faunts and White Flight, and while I'd never seen their videos before, I thought these were pretty good. It's funny because as a child of the '80's, I TOTALLY got into music videos growing up, but since I haven't had cable TV in over 10 years I sometimes forget that there are still videos being made. Anyhow, if you're interested, here're the Faunts with their video to the song M4-Part II. (Crabs at war? Strangely sad) :



And here's White Flight with the song Pastora Divine:



And because this video is just a bit too fun and cool NOT to show, here's another one (it takes a minute for the song to start, but it's a little too much cheesy goodness to look away in the meantime. I think so at least) :

Goodbye 2008!

An olllld sketchy drawing just for fun:


(P.S. - stupid time moves too quickly. That whole "Y2K" malarky seems way too recent to have been 9 years ago! Sheesh.)

Marco Polo and a quick catch up

So this is the full front of the MARCO POLO cover I did for Simon and Schuster a couple of months back. The full image is a wrap-around. They've released the image on their website and on Amazon among others so I think it's safe for me to post it here. It comes out in May '09 and I'm really looking forward to it hitting the shelves! I had a blast working on it and I hope it does really well. Fingers crossed!

I can't post anything from the several projects I've been working on lately, but once things are released by the publishers I'll announce and/or post more work here. Until then, I'll just say that I'm working on some of the most fun projects of my career and I just feel very thankful right now.

I have managed to see a few movies and listen to some good music (the movies on our rare, quick outings, but luckily I can have music on in the studio to provide a soundtrack to my work day). Despite not kicking butt in the box office, Laini and I LOVED the following: RocknRolla, Let the Right One In, and Role Models -- all GREAT and each VERY different from the next. In fact, I'd be hard pressed to list three more varied movies if I tried. As far as music goes, I've been listening to "TOBACCO" a lot. Like a LOT LOT. Also "The Impossible Shapes," old albums and EPs from "Midlake," "Modeselektor," and "Tut Tut" (among many many others, but those stand out to me right now -- check them out!)

Lastly, since it's not going to appear in print anywhere, here's a snippit from a piece I did for...something. But again, it won't see print, so here's part of it. I'll put the whole thing and a lot of other new art on a big website redesign in the Spring once projects are farther along and ARCs (advanced reader copies) are released. Oh, and it's very mixed-media with some digital patterns and touches added at the end:


Happy Holidays everyone! Support your local artists and crafty-folks and small shops if you can. They make the best stuff anyway.

Phew! Thank you voters!

Charles meets Barack Obama

What a GREAT touching video:



Vote!

Tagged by Laurie...

These are 2 images resulting from typing in "Tagged" (one from Corbis and the other from Google). I like that the guy is getting tagged out in the face. Good stuff.

Here we go:

1. What are your nicknames?
Lots from Laini (and several we've sworn to secrecy, so...). Here're some of the ones I can share that have been assigned to me throughout my life for various reasons: Rev, Randy (the name, not the British slang), Monkeyboy, and Smokestack

2. What was the first movie you bought in VHS or DVD?
VHS was "Above the Law" starring Steven Seagal.

3. What is your favorite scent?
Apple pie

4. What one place have you visited that you can't forget and want to go back to?
The Amalfi Coast (or Venice...or Rome)

5. Do you trust easily?
Nope. There're too many ninjas outside in the bushes for me to let my guard down (not to mention that I think my dog's a double-agent for the Commies)

6. Do you generally think before you act, or act before you think?
This question took me 2 hours to ponder, so...

7. Is there anything that has made you unhappy these days?
Politics. Racists.

8. Do you have a good body image?
Sure (but only to a point). Why? Do I look fat in this?

9. What is your favorite fruit?
Mangoes (my wife's converted me. But a freshly picked nectarine is an AWFUL close second).

10. What websites do you visit daily?
The Daily Kos, Salon, Newsarama, Grow Wings, eMusic

11. What have you been seriously addicted to lately?
Politics (but that's not anything new).

12. What kind of person do you think the person who tagged you is?
Incredibly friendly (when she's not kicking asses and taking names. Right Laurie? :)

13. What's the last song that got stuck in your head?
"I Wanna Be a Sheep" by Ezra Furman and the Harpoons

14. What's your favorite item of clothing?
Any one of my Threadless or Gama-Go t-shirts

15. Do you think Rice Krispies are yummy?
Meh. (the "treats" are a whole other story however...)

16. What would you do if you saw $100 lying on the ground?
I'd look around, step on it, kneel down like I'm gonna tie my shoe, pick it up and tuck it away and run like the wind! (Although I've gone so far as to return stamps to the post office counter when I found a bunch of them outside in the parking lot, so who knows...)

17. What items could you not go without during the day?
Wife and dog not withstanding I'd have to say coffee (I should make it clear that "coffee" is a VERY distant 3rd place :)

18. What should you be doing right now?
Drawing. Thanks for the distraction Laurie!

Me vs. a Velociraptor (and the AFL-CIO vs. racism)

I tried to MOSTLY tell the truth, but I may have given myself too much credit on a question or two -- don't think I'll ever know for sure though (thankfully) -- anyhow, this was the result:

I could survive for 1 minute, 44 seconds chained to a bunk bed with a velociraptor

Oh, and MUCH more importantly, this speech is one of the most powerful and encouraging that I've seen on racism in my life. Maybe there's hope for our nation to turn the page on racism after all:

Marco Polo

A couple of months ago I got a great call from the always stylish and always charming Laurent Linn (Art Director at Simon & Schuster). We've chatted several times at various SCBWI functions but haven't ever had the opportunity to work together...until that very welcome phone call/job offer to work on the book cover for a really fun upcoming teen novel about a young Marco Polo! Since I can't go into the plot details of the novel, I'll just say that the "released" info about it can be seen here. Also, I can't show the cover in it's entirety just yet either, but below is a snippet from it just for teaser-sake.

What a great experience working on this project has been! Thanks to Laurent and everyone involved!

My art (okay, and Laini's book too) in Germany!

We received news about this months ago but a little promo package just arrived showcasing Laini's book coming out in Germany! We're VERY excited about this and our fingers are crossed for more foreign rights in the future. Thanks Penguin team for making this happen!

RADIOHEAD (!!!)

OK, so I know I posted this art before, but my AMAZING wife Laini and I just went to see them live last night because she bought tickets for us as an anniversary gift to me a few months ago and ZOWIEEEE! was it was fanTAStic! Here is a video from last night (though not recorded by us -- we didn't bring our camera -- but we were VERY close to the stage in the pit area (HUZZAH!) And it was the calmest "pit" I've ever been in at a concert, but we definitely didn't mind. I suppose we're getting old, eh? :)



They played so many of my favorite songs, and came back for two very extended encores, but I was still hoping for "House of Cards" and "Karma Police" before they wrapped for the night -- sadly I didn't get my wish (guess we'll have to see them again sometime!) While they did play a few older songs, they mostly stuck to tracks from their last two albums (I'll bet SOMEwhere out there somebody who recorded "Bodysnatchers" caught my scratchy-voiced scream of joy when ol' Thom started to strum the opening (geez I love that song!). Anyhow, great to finally see them live as I've been a fan since The Bends.

Thanks to the internet, I found their set list from the show. I think it's accurate if memory serves:

15 Step

Reckoner

Optimistic

There There

All I Need (see video from last night above)

Pyramid Song

Talk Show Host

National Anthem

The Gloaming

Videotape

Lucky

Faust Arp/Tell Me Why (Neil Young cover)

Jigsaw Falling Into Place

Climbing Up The Walls

Dollars and Cents

Nude

Bodysnatchers

FIRST ENCORE

How To Disappear Completely

Arpeggi/Weird Fishes

Idioteque

In Limbo

Street Spirit

ENCORE 2

You And Whose Army

No Surprises

Everything In Its Right Place

Oh, and I recommend that anyone who attends a concert at the White River Amphitheater: just plan on napping in your car for a couple of hours after the show while you wait for the traffic to clear out (which we did) instead of getting stuck in a line of unmoving cars (for 2 hours!). Sheesh, I'm glad we got some sleep instead of trying to leave right away. I should add that the wait in the parking lot didn't even begin to spoil the 2 and a half hours plus performance they put on (did I mention ZOWIEEEE! ??)

We also had a GREAT time hanging out with some dear SCBWI and other creative friends before the concert:

Thanks for coming to lunch guys! We loves ya! :)

And a HUGE thank you to our friend Nina for the tour of the Wizards of the Coast offices! WOW that was cool!

A great day indeed.

And now...back to work for me!

Richard K. Morgan books

So I'm reading the very good sequel (BROKEN ANGELS) to the very good ALTERED CARBON and Laini snagged my newly purchased stand-alone novel by him (titled THIRTEEN) and now she's really digging his big-brained writing too. There's no flying through his writing as it's extremely dense, but thoroughly enjoyable. Check it out!

The above clipping is some preliminary/concept/style-sampling work from a much much larger piece for an upcoming book that I'm working on out in 2009.

Ever have one of those days?

Okay, so it's actually been a great day and a great week, but that title just seemed too good to pass up for this piece that I'm working on for White Wolf :)

Happy weekend all!

Jim

Kidlitosphere 2008 Conference (t-shirt design!)

I did this design for the aforementioned conference. Click here for more info about this second annual conference coming up in September in Portland, Oregon. And click here for an AWESOME design that Laini did!

Ciao!
Jim

Bow-chicka-wow-wowww-Pt. 2 (and a dude with a spear)

Lock & Load

Bow-chicka-wow-wowww!

Hmm, wasn't sure how many "w"s to put in that last warble sound effect. Too many? Not enough? Hmm. Feedback welcome.

Anyhow, here's a snippit in progress (prior to inking and watercolor washes) for a White Wolf 1970's werewolf hunting piece for one of their upcoming RPG books. COOL! Sideburns baby! YEAH!

Gaming cards

A couple of clipped portions from larger pieces I'm doing for some White Wolf gaming cards.