On A Dark And Snowy Saturday Night...

Once again it snowed and the surrounding areas of Philly were deluged yet again. I'm sick of snow officially now. I'm tired of shoveling and this snow wasn't enough to pull the snow blower out. The weather was so bad that I didn't bother to go out as the roads were slippery and why risk my car to go get something to eat. So I stayed in and did the final artwork for a new Scooby-Doo cover for DC Comics. It was to be due on Tuesday, but now it was done early for a Monday morning digital delivery so I could then go back to the Capstone Scooby art.

I like the eerie lightning that my art lamp gave to the photo. It has a creepy mystery feel to it which works great for Scooby. Actually, there was more actual light but my camera just doesn't pick it up the soft white bulb that well. I have the same problem with my HD Flip video camera. I snapped the pic as I was adding some Pro White during the final touch ups before I went to scan it.

SCOOBY Capstone Books Are Out!

I got my comps from Capstone the other day of the four Scooby "You Choose" books I worked on all last year! They are now out (at least on Amazon.com! I've set up a sidebar on my blog that will lead you right to them!) They are $6.95 each in the stores. Amazon sells them right now for $6.25 each. Not a big discount but these books are NICE! Beautifully printed on heavy glossy paper and they have a great binding to them.

I also got the hardcover versions of them as well, which are the Library Editions that libraries would order so that they would hold up over time from kids borrowing them. These hardcovers are pricey but well worth the price! Beautifully done! The cover art really pops and looks just like they did on my computer screen.

I'm currently working on Books 5 and 6 right now and they should be going to the printer in March.

ALFIE In The Sun

Every morning, if the sun is poking in, Alfie jumps off the bed and lays in the sun patches on the carpet. He'll lay there for about 10-20 minutes and then turn over or move into the shade to cool off for a bit before getting back into the main heated area. These were taken back in early October. These last few weeks he's been under the covers with me and doesn't want to get out as it's been really cold of late! He is spoiled I know.

SCOOBY-DOO Capstone 4-Book Series Covers!

Here's the final cover art as they will appear in spring of 2014!  I don't know how much they'll be in the stores but they are slightly thicker books as they are mostly text. I really like the title designs for each book!

SCOOBY-DOO Original Final Cover Art For Capstone!

On April 1st, I started working on Book 1 of Scooby for Capstone Publishing. This is a series of "Choose Your Own Adventure" Books so I did the cover art and 10 interior illustrations for each book. They came out exceedingly cool as I had complete control of the art and had a great designer from the publisher who designed some great title logos. All in all, I think these will be a hit! Warner Brothers was really thrilled with them and they loved the sample copy that was on exhibit at San Diego Comic Con this past summer. It's nice to see this type of book make a return as I remember reading "Choose Your Own Adventure" books growing up. I still have a mint set of the Indiana Jones ones that were done in the early 80s and I have a Batman and Superman one here as well.

I'm posting the original final full cover art as you'll see the final art as I submitted it since it would wind up being really tight in the final layout and some parts were covered up. They were tough to design as I didn't want any key art to be covered up and so they took a while longer to design than the interior pages. When I colored these I did do some line holds for color and kept the background paints fairly simple as I knew some parts would get covered up. I did do some color overlays on the Book 2 cover as the Gang is out in the woods and for the sake of it being a cover I lightened it up so that it didn't look as dark as it would be. For Book 3 with the Minotaur I created a separate file for a bush pattern that I made. It took me several tries to get it to look like a bush you'd see in an outdoor maze. As I say, I was quite happy with how it all came out and I made the final deadline about two weeks early! Enjoy!

SCOOBY-DOO #39 Comic Cover

Here's the printed cover version for Scooby-Doo #39 which was done in early fall. It had gone through several changes but came out all right in the end. Candace Bell at Heroic Age did the colors. Thanks to Captain Blue Hen Comics for getting me copies of the final printed books as it seems DC Comics stopped giving out comp copies to the talent so we now have to fend for ourselves to see how the work turned out. Ah, comics...

SCOOBY-DOO #38 Comic Cover

 Here is a Scooby-Doo comic cover I fit in this year for issue #38. It's a Elvira parody that had Daphne dressed up as Elvira. I think this was done in late summer. Candace Bell at Heroic Age did the colors. Unfortunately, DC Comics covered up my name on the bottom and then also gave the credit for the cover on the inside to someone else. Ah, comics...

2014 Is Here...

Well, to those who wondered, I'm still here. 2013 turned out to be a year of work and a year of personal growth as I learned some new skills. I was going to post and talk about it all but every time I went to go to this blog and type I felt like the old guy in the Dunkin' Donuts commercials and went "Time to make the donuts" and then said the hell with it.

Since April 1st, it's been a fast year. December was here before I knew it and it was also the month I could sit back and decompress after the last nine months of adventures. It was a summer of money flying out the window on a new furnace, a new roof with some fixed rafters, and a health scare with Alfie that wound up being ok in the end, though he is getting older and he now needs some medicine everyday to keep his liver and gall bladder healthy.

I had completed the Capstone 4-Book Scooby-Doo deal I had and as I was finishing up the last book they offered me two more to do, with another very possible two more after that. I'll be posting the covers soon. I also worked on Phineas and Ferb stuff as well in the gaps but mostly I worked on Scooby to keep my time open for my other adventure which was twice a week and about 10-20 hours more a week of study time. Anyway, here I am and I don't know if I can say renewed because I still feel tired, but we can hope the new year is going to be good! Here's hoping!