CITIZENS OF APE CITY, YOU HAVE BEEN DECEIVED

Good people of ape city, It has fallen to me, Dr. Zaius , to explain to you the treacherous web of deception perpetrated by the human known as: "Mitchell". Some time ago, it was reported among you that this human had been ransomed away by the evil General Aldo, and taken to the forbidden zone. I assure you now that such reports have been greatly exaggerated. While it is true that this human has journeyed to the land forbidden to us by the great lawgiver, I have recently uncovered artifacts that prove not only, that he was not kidnapped, but moreover that he went there willingly to seek refuge from his masters.

Upon further examination of his cage I found rudimentary writting and drawing utensils, on loan to him from Dr. Zira, to be missing. Furthermore, it has been known to his fellow humans that for sometime now he has been busy fufilling requests for drawings and illustrations of all manner since the creation of this blog. These facts, coupled with the evidence that he is slipping in his release date of zombie boy, lead me to the conclusion that he has concocted this entire story of being held prisoner merely as a ruse to concentrate more fully on his artistic commitments.

In an attempt to remedy this situation I instructed the signal corps to send a mirrored message to Mitch on yesterday morning. The message implored him to return to Ape City at once, or failing that to send more ape related artwork until his mission is completed. I urge you all to return now to your tree houses and prepare for Tuesday's free day of pizza.

FEAR NOT HUMAN FRIENDS!

"Do not be afraid humans, Cornelius and I have spoken to Dr. Zaius and even now negotiations for the release of the one among you known as Mitch, are underway."

"Thank you Zira, In fact I want all of you to know that all indications are that Mitch is utilizing his current isolation from this blog to create more art for all of us to enjoy."

"Yes but, Cornelius dear, In the meantime all we are getting to look at are these ancient drawings from Mitch's , "ape period" he went through in the late 90's."

"Now Zira really, we cannot expect much from one held captive by such a fearsome gorilla as Aldo."

"Oh...I suppose you are correct, but I still hope Dr. Zaius finds an answer to this terrible situation quickly. I know these poor human pet's of ours are all scratching their heads."

A MESSAGE FROM GENERAL ALDO

Hah! you fool's thought you could keep me locked away in the forbidden zone forever? Well I have escaped, (and just in time to ruin Free pizza Tuesday) I inform all of you to be on gaurd. I am hunting human's to use as my slave's.

Already I have captured the misserable wretch known as "Mitch". He is cowering in a cave scribbling silly drawings. Bah, soon he will be racing through the target practice fields ha-ha.

I cannot be stopped this time. I have found a device from our future, (I don't know how it work's yet ) I am sure it will give me great power. Be on gaurd all of you.

General Aldo has spoken!

WILL THE REAL TOR JOHNSON...PLEASE STAND UP?

Well I've been at it again all night. Here is the final of three versions of Tor Johnson, the B-movie horror actor most noteble for his role in: "Plan-9 From outerspace ". I was invited recently to contribute a piece to the small-press zine "Monster-a-go-go" by publisher Tim Goebel. He suggested I do a pic of Tor, as he was their magazines un-official mascot.
This is the first time I have ever been invited to do a magazine so I wanted to create an image that was lasting, iconographic, and well suited as a logo. My approach was to first do a pencil sketch, going easy on the cross-hatching, really just trying to create a map of his face. Next I made several copies of the pencil sketch. I did a color version using your basic department store brand of crayola crayons, with a magic marker back splash, and finally tonight the black and white inked piece, which employed brush work, black ink, white opaque, tech-pens (fibermicrons) and muted wash. Tim said the work was quote "Awsome...more than I could have dreamed of." It was a real fun and gratyfing piece.

HERE IS TOR JOHNSON WITH THE LATEST NEWS

If anybody is curious what I am doing today, (other than recovering from last nights show ) I am busy spending time with my wife and kid's, getting ready for an up-coming comicbook show in NH, and working up some more horror art. I'll be at the drawing board, and checking e-mails, listening to disco...all night long. If anybody has a notion drop me a line. I'd love to hear from you. Finally, ....the next Tor Johnson head you see will be pen and ink.

RENY GET'S IT RIGHT!

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY to all you hard working dad's out there. Sorry I'm late getting to tonight's post. Believe it or not I had to work today...the good news is that I peeled off this coffee break page in less than an hour! I'm getting faster guy's.

There may be some of you who have not had a chance to read all the MONSTER DISCO post's yet, ( I suggest you do if you seem lost in this thread topic ) suffice it to say for now that these pages are not about creating perfect art, they are about creating PERIOD.

Increaseing one's speed is just one of the many benefit's of this exercise. Sure I would like to slow down and take my time with each page, but that's not what this is about.

Among the challenges to this piece was the unbearable heat and humidity at work today...Wow! It was like drawing on wet toilet paper, and I'm only exagerating slightly.

I look forward to everybody's comments KEEP POSTING!

PAGE FOURTEEN " I WRITE THE SONG'S "

In today's Monster Disco page, ( that's page fourteen, for all you score keepers out there ) we get to see vlad's reaction to Renny's all night song writting marathon.

I was originaly thinking of doing this as a four panel lay-out, but then as I began to work out several dialouge ideas, I began to see the advantage to breaking up the middle with a three panel change of emotion scene, with connected balloons. This is a great effect for taking the reader into the moment, and when it's done correctly the reader can easily imagine it as if it were an animated sequence. NOTE: relying on quick, familiar dialouge also seem's to help this trick.

My heart lies with the 1970's comic, I am trying on purpose to employ several of the devices used by main-stream comics of that era. I had less time than usual today. I would like to have punched-up, and defined my spot blacks. Oh well.

THE RETURN OF MONSTER DISCO!

Surprise! You thought that Monster Disco was going to remain a 12pg rough-cut mini, didn't you? BBgggnnammph, WRONG!
Here is proof that Frank, Blaze, Vlad, and poor ol' Renny will be making their comic debut in a full size 24 pager.

I did stop production during my vacation at 12 pages so I could get some other work done, but now I am back to the coffee break idea and luving every minute of it baby!

As always time was a constant hound at my heels, ( less than one hour for this one folks! ) however that is the true point of this exersice. I am trying to teach myself that any down time available can be used creatively. The results are sometimes mixed, but the therepudic value is incalcuable.

I used think I needed to be a proffesional comicbook artist to feel this happy about my work, now I know I just needed to be able to find a little time each day to make comics...and that's just what I'm going to do.

A NAUGHTY LITTLE POST

Hey gang! It's me again...Good news! I have been invited to contribute to Tim Goebel's Monster Magazine called: "MONSTER-A-GO-GO".

The theme of the issue is Bride of the Monster, however Tim tell's me they already have more than enough Frankenstein illo's, so I'll probably be doing a few pin-up's on other horror related topics.

Nevertheless, I could not resist the temptation to skratch out this little number once the idea came to mind. I know it's a little disgusting, but at the time it seemed funny.

I'm sure somebody will find a use for it someday, and the balloons can always be re-done to say something a little more acceptable.

What can I say, sometimes I can be a bit ribald in my humor. Hope this don't offend anyone.

NOT BACK TO WORK SO SOON MASTER!

Yes it's hard to believe but my vacation is over after tomorrow. I must say I had a really great time drawing, and blogging with all you good people out there. I plan on working on zombie boy all day tomorrow, as long as I don't get side-tracked with another horror piece.

It's all Matt Dembicki's fault. He turned me on to a great monster site http://www.gdarkness.com/monstermags/
which led me to: http://www.filmlandclassics.com Which led me to pulling out all my old horror mag's and pouring...no, DROOLING, over all the gorgeous black and white photography. A few years back I would not have been secure enough in my inking skills to tackle some of this material, but now I figure...what the hell.

Here is a portrait I did this afternoon of actor Dwight Frye who portrayed Renfield in the 1931 classic "DRACULA"

FAIR WEATHER...GLOOMY OUTLOOK

Howdy folk's! Perhaps if I start of with a cheery greeting like "howdy" it won't betray the gloomy spirit I'm in. Why so gloomy? I was afraid you would ask. It's not real bad it's just that after day's of rain we finally got some nice weather, which means....you guessed it YARDWORK!
And brother do I got a ton of it to do. I should've worked on Zombie boy more while I was off instead of having a blast on blogger, and I whittled away what little drawing time I had this morning on doing this silly horror piece, which was fun, but has no venue. ArrrGHH=gghhUmp!

Oh yeah and one other thing this is the third time now FREE pizza day has been ruined. I asked that they deliver the pizza to this blog at 4pm right? What did they do? They brought it all to my house at 4am! Of course untill we got up at six the skunks, and strays in the neighborhood had ruined it all. Sorry folks. Hey you guy's over at Cyber pizzaria really SUCK!

Anyway I got to get out there and mow the back forty, you can almost lose a kid in the grass it's so high, I say almost because the little smarty's keep finding their way back somehow.
Sorry for my grumpy mood. No comics from me today kiddies, maybe tomorrow I'll surprise ya.
Later gators! NOW GO MAKE ME SOME COMICS!!!

DID YOU MISS THE TOUR?

If you haven't been here in a few day's you missed a real wild time. I took everybody on a virtual tour of the Retro-Wonderland studios, and all the amazing exhibits held tightly within it's wall's. It is all just a memory now, but fear not, I hereby decree that every Sunday night will be a secret show and tell night. On this sacred night of the week all the goodies will be paraded for everyone to feast their eye's upon. My usual witty commentary will accompany of course, so fun is sure to be had by all. Now a question. How many of you kept a copy of your ticket? Well if you read the instructions carefully you would've read they were re-deemable for a FREE gift.
All of you who did keep a copy, affix them to an e-mail as an attatchment, along with your mailing address, and I will send you a Monster Disco comic FREE of charge. While we're on the subject of freebies I should remind everyone that tomorrow night is FREE pizza Tuesday, so bring your appetite. Sorry no new art today, I was tuckered after this weekends doings

AND NOW.....ISSUE #2, PAGE ONE

Hey gang, look...it's page one of ZOMBIE BOY #2!!!
Just to show you that I do create some rather detailed and serious comicbook art now and again, I figured I would take a break from my Monster Disco comic today and get some much needed inking done on issue #2 of Zombie Boy.

This is the opening splash page which picks up less than an hour from where issue #1 leaves off. Our heroine, Jasmine is in her bedroom with her Mom and Judge Warner, ( who brought her home ) trying desperately to explain to them that she saw her boyfriend Ronnie alive, (sort of...) at the graveyard.

Trouble is our boy Ronnie's been dead almost a year gone by now. The Judge, (who knows she's telling the truth ) on the page following suggests to Jasmine's mom that the poor girl might be cracking up.

To complicate matter's, unbeknownst to Jasmine, creepy judge Warner is really her Father, ( the result of a high school fling ) and use's his considerable influence
with Jasmine's Mom to suggest the little dear take some much needed away time...in a state Mental Hospital. Look's like a job for Zombie Boy!

If you bought issue#1, then you know that this series is Gothic Horror/ Romance set to a page turning retro-art style like you've never seen before. If you have'nt seen this series yet you've come to the right place. Issue #1 still available. If you order through this site you can get a standard comic sized copy, bagged and boarded, personaly autographed, and including a FREE
Zombie Boy decal for your home or locker for only $3.50 (postage included in price)

RENNY WRITE'S A SONG, ...and eats bug's

Here it is folk's Page 12. If you remember from yesterday, our poor put upon Renfield has been threatened into producing a Disco hit for his Malicious Master...Vlad. This guy Vlad...AKA
Count Dracula, satisfied Renny has finally got down to business,
decides to leave him alone, and step out for a ...shall we say,
liquid lunch? In a rare act of kindness he offers to bring back a snack for the hard working Renfield. The little fellow however decides not to take advantage of his masters gracious offer and settles instead for a delicious snack from his bug jar.

What on Earth is this? You may be asking yourself, if you've never visited before. Simply scroll down comics fan's and you will see it is all about a fun little daily exercise called Coffee Break Comics.

Please excuse my brevity in tonight's posting, however Blogger has been down most of the day. Add to that the fact we are having a wicked lightning storm outside. Given the situation I have decided like our fiend Renfield not to push my luck.
(I still refuse to eat bug's though....okay maybe just one...CRUNCH!

COFFEE BREAK CONTINUES DESPITE PIZZA CRISIS

Here is todays coffee break post. We've arrived at page 11 folks, by tomorrow we'll be half-way to a 24 page standard comic. For the dozzens of first time visitors who don't know what this is I will say please scroll down about 20 posts or so and work your way up. For now just know it's alot of fun.

I must say this exercise is funner at work. When I'm at home
there is a terrible temptation to run to the studio and get better tools, better lighting, or to spend a couple of good hours cleaning it up. At work I know none of that is available to me so I just make due.

I really wanted to flesh this out some more, but when my hour and ten minutes was up I came down to the scanner like a good little boy and slapped this sucker out there for everyone to laugh at.

The good news is it is really keeping me loose and warmed up for ZOMBIE BOY (which I hope you newbies scroll down to see)
and it gives me a break from that kind of detail oriented work.

This page has some sarcastic dialouge to it which is always fun.
Stay tuned the next couple of days while I put all the other posts
up in the attic and re-design the main page. It may not be untill
the weekend, but it does have to be done. Things is gettin all
cluttery like up in here.

NOTE: Due to a mix-up with the delivery people all the truckloads of pizza
for FREE PIZZA Tuesday were delivered to an orphanage in Hackensac, NJ.
Sorry.....We'll try again next week.

THE WORLD ENDS AT MID-NITE SO ENJOY THIS POST

Here is page 10 in our coffee-break series, a dark and moody piece to fit the rain. In case your wondering, yes I am on vacation, and yes I'm still doing coffee-break comics anyway. "Hey this here is sur-posed to be ahn at wirk pro-ject taint it feller?"

Why yes it is festus...however I thought long and hard about this and decided I could still ethically do it at home provided I keep myself limited to the same amount of time available on the job, and that I use the same materials available at work.

Besides It's my game and I make up the rules. Seriously, lot's of folks work at home today...you wouldn't want to exclude them from our coffee-break challenge would you? Of course not.

And you know I didn't cheat. Does this page look like I spent much more than an hour on it, hmmmmm? In fact I think this page isn't even as good as some of the pages I did at work.

So needless to say there will be much more of this schlock comming your way. I actually couldn't stop now even if I wanted to. There are several of you,(you know who you are) who have decided to spread the coffee-break comix gospel. Most recently Ron Fortier, himself a comicbook writer and frequent visitor here, had a nice mention on his web site: http://airship27.com/ Thanks Ron! Matt Dembicki also made mention on his shared blog D.C. conspiricy, and Small Press Syndicate Chairman, Jack Bertram helped in bringing visitors from several comic related chat groups.

Thanks to everyone who visited last month and made the debut of this blog such a rousing success! June is going to be even better with new features, upgrade tool's, and several secret projects....err...that is if the world hasn't ended by then.

AND NOW.......BACK TO OUR STORY

Here is today's COFFEE BREAK page. It represents a return to the central element of our story line, the love triangle between Blaze, the Frankenstien Monster and Dracula. Today's piece,(page 9) picks up where we left off nearly three pages ago with Blaze phoning Frank from channel four studios. The continuity has been perserved rather nicely I think, which was my biggest fear starting in on this one. (compare to page 5 several posts back)


I also had a lot of fun with the interplay of mood, expresion, ect. between Blaze and Maureen. Just two office gal's sharing the experience of a budding romance.

All this changes, however in the last panel, when the joy of being asked for a date by Funky Frank is overshadowed by the ominous phone call from Vlad of the super group "Transylvania Connection".

It was in this last panel that I wanted a terrific shocked look on Blaze's face contrasted by Maureens discretion in whispering the bad news. I'm fairly happy with the results.

I wanted to include as many design traits as I could to beef up what would otherwise be a boring conversation.
A cursory glance will reveal several of these. Panel one, elongated downshot with heart's, hand gestures, and expression. Panel two extreme close-up of notation only. Panels three, and four contrasting points of view,
(with silouette and sound effects) . Finally Panel five which we already discussed.

Total time in this page was less than an hour, however I admit thinking about how to overcome the conversational lags for quite some time before I actually sat down to create. If your new to this site please avail yourselves of previous coffee break posts to catch up on what's happening.