Post 237

The show last night was pretty great...ELECTRIC SIX WAS AMAZING!!! So, Jake and I got there pretty early, saw the first band, I think they were called Lions. They were entertaining in that they all were quirky. I would have called them "Billy Goat and the Palsy Mummies." The lead singer literally looked like a goat, and spit to a hillarious degree! He spat on his bass guitarist at least twice, once in the face, and once on the shoulder. He wasn't aiming, it just went all over the place. Too loud to hear what they were even saying.

Then came Local H, I was excited about seeing Local H at first, because I loved Bound for the Floor...but we listened, thought maybe we were thinking of another band...nope, right band, they just DIDN'T PLAY THE SONG THEY"RE MOST FAMOUS FOR!!!! Plus, waaaaaaaaaay too loud in a screechy way.

So finally we get to the main event, they hit the stage, and Dick Valentine's wearing capes...capeS...and it's showtime...SHOWTIME!!! They had some talking between songs, awesome dancing, and SOLO!!!!! There was a fake marriage proposal, push-ups, and they went out after 13 songs. Then we waited around, and kept cheering for encore...and they OBLIGED WITH 4 MORE SONGS!!! They mixed in the great hits with ones from the new cd, which I picked up there and it's outstanding!

Either way, had tons of fun, and I need to get some sleep!

Post 236=SHOWTIME...SHOWTIME!!!

So, gonna' go to see Electric Six at the Granada Theater tomorrow with my fellow Electric Six fan Jake! We're going to go and just geek out, I'll tell you, this is the first show I've been to in years, so here's hoping things go well!

Post 235=CRap (Con-Recap)

So, just adding on a few more images here, some more of my commissions, and the Mystique, which I did for the Heroes4Heroes auction. The money went to a great cause, so that makes me feel good. But I was sad to see it go, I was really happy with the color application on this, and it was the last to get taken off of the bidding block wasn't the last to finish, but that's the way things go sometimes...

Got pics of Boulet rockin' the board. I ended up providing boards to 3 people and supplies throughout the convention to a ton of folks. So either I was ultra prepared, or they were super un-prepared...a question that will linger, but I guess it's probably that I just brought way too much crap. I'll have to adjust that by the time of Staple! or DCC (if the Gaijin guys go).

Also, a picture of Nick going crazy with his Superman, I watched him putting the finishing touches on while the bidding was going on. I learn a lot from watching him work, he's just got so much confidence in his lines!

Either way, fantastic convention, and I can't thank everyone who came by the table enough!

Post 234+Weekend=Money?

I'm going to break this re-cap into a couple pieces. First off, awesome convention! WW:TX rocked my socks off! We started off Friday pretty slowly as can be expected, but had a lot of fun. Did a few sketches, the usual format, but had a lot of people telling me they'd be back, and in the past I wouldn't take much from that, but the people REALLY CAME BACK!!!! I was psyched, so by day two, I started painting commissions. Luan started it off, and it really drew in a lot of interested people. We're so used to live arting at this point that we really love painting in front of people.

More than anything, I'm happy that all of the Space Gun Kru had a great time, respect-wise and financially as well. I met a lot of great people that were into my style, and more importantly understood what I was going for. I think that's why I went so crazy with the commissions. When I'm around nice people with interesting conversation, I'm really motivated to go that extra mile.

Day 2 I barely stood up, I was constantly working on commissions and making sales. This is evidenced by the fact that Luan couldn't make it out walking the convention floor except once on Saturday heh heh!

I was extremely excited by seeing friends actually make it out. My best friend from all the way back in middle school made it out to the show, and hopefully I was able to show him a good time. It's been years since he made it to a convention. Some friends (Russell and Laura) I met through my brother made it out as well, not only to the show but the charity auction (to be spoken about in the next post) as well. Also my friend Jamel made it to both shows and even got to do some live art. He's really talented peeps, and he got to do the critique circuit at the show and I hope feels like he got some good advice. I know that's how I started off.

On day one I was sad guys like Kody and Kristian (the esteemed Mr. Donaldson was busy at SCAD...so I can excuse it ;) didn't make it out, but I got to talk for a few hours on Sunday with Nick Derington. I'm not going to even front...I RESPECT AND ADMIRE THIS MAN!!! I've made some friends over the past year that have a mix of a retro style with European sensibilities and a vast understanding of storytelling, and Nick is among the best! I spent a ton of time pouring over his work, out of respect, I won't mention anything, but I will say that the future of comics looks great as long as Nick's working!

I also was super happy that Paul made it out and I saw him on Saturday. We got to talk about things, and really it hit home, because he's been through the things I'm just going through now, and has always been really supportive and helpful to me.

I know it may sound corny, but following the ridiculous pagentry of Zuda you can strip things down to what is most important in your life, and the people that are most important. I talked to so many people that make me feel blessed, because they were so supportive about the whole Zuda process. They were there for me the whole time, and I can't thank them enough! Number one on my list is David Hopkins. He is a fantastic friend and so amazingly giving. He even gave us a great meal of home grilled burgers on the first night, but he was such a great supporter of Hammer Sound. Joe Eisma as well, one of the funniest men I know in Paul Milligan, David Rodriguez and Mike Lagocki from ArtLoveMagic, Josh Boulet, and what I found to be a TON of folks. I have to say thanks again to all of you!!!

Okay, enough for part one, I'll put together part two a little later, with more art and pictures!!! Sorry for all the links, but it helps you understand who I'm talking about, and why I love these folks so much!!!!

Post 233=Conventions and Pinups...

So, tomorrow means I'm at Wizard World TX with the Space Gun Kru!

As you can see from the map above, we're over in artist's alley, in some ways kinda sad we aren't against the wall where we could paint stuff, then again, we're painting Saturday, and I need to pace myself! Either way, I'll have TONS of paintings priced to sell, sketchbooks, sketches, prints, and if you're nice enough I might just show you some of my originals (those aren't for sale right now)! Either way, stop by, say hi, rub some salt in the Zuda wounds, whatev'!

Now, you might have thought I was going to forget about explaining the pinup above...shame on you! Well, my awesome buddy/brother in arts Kristian was nice enough to have me do a pinup in the re-release of his groundbreaking (IMHO) book Supermarket. I can't begin to tell you how much this meant to me, as well as how much fun I had with it!

Anyway, I gotta' get ready for tomorrow, so seriously, stop by if you're in the Arlington area tomorrow and we can chat a bit!

Post 232

So, I'm just getting back into the habit of playing around with things. I'm trying some new brush techniques and line application, working at 11X17 is a very liberating thing.

The painting of Daredevil was for my good friend Gambit (Adam) for his birthday this past weekend. We had a great time partying at Dan's place. Got to hang out with friends, my brother, and Stelfreeze. Got to paint in front of the man himself, and it was amazing! It really helped me get my mind back to a good productive place.

I've got my birthday coming up tomorrow, the big TWO-FIVE! Crazy, I feel older because of work! I have to work tomorrow on my birthday, and it's going to be a long day, not going to get to do any celebrating: A)I no longer eat sweets such as cake B)Lots of work, and meetings, and more work...I'm just going to have to live it up this weekend!

Also, got Wizard World Texas on Friday, I'll have a post of that on Thursday to give specifics and such!

Post 231-We bring you back to your regularly scheduled programming!

Sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo... well, I can say that this month's over with, and more than anything, I'm feeling the first relief that I've felt in over a month!

First off, I want to say THANK YOU to everyone that helped, whether it was a vote, or moral support. I love you for it!

To break any tension, I'll answer some of those questions so we get back to normal business of me posting art, and you guys posting comments: 1) Are you disappointed about losing?Yes, I am disappointed about losing, I'd be a liar if I didn't feel disappointed, but I feel good (I'll explain why a little later in the post). 2)Is Hammer Sound going to continue? I'd like to happily say yes, but I'm being honest here. I honestly can't look at answering this for at least a month away from it. I don't like to make drastic decisions, so I'll let the emotions that this month brought out simmer down a bit and look at it logically. But after putting so much energy into this as I did this month, I'm kind of burned out on the property, and shopping it around only to re-do it in the vision to go with a publisher just don't sound appealing right now. I've been given some opportunities and offers to work on some new properties. I'm just toying around with the idea right now. Following this, I almost feel like it's time to just start working on my creation, my dream project as it were, primarily because of writers. I have been open about my experiences of being pushed to the side when the big name artist is available, Doug didn't do that to me, he gave me the time of day and really was great to me. So going through this process was just so much stress on the 3 of us. I was a wreck by the end of week 2 when we started slipping.

It was far too much stress for me, and I looked deep inside myself and I'm sick of being disappointed by projects that I put so much care into that don't take off. So I think I'm going to start working on a creator owned project because then I can dictate when things get done. I have the full script for this project sitting in front of me. It's been tempting me for about a year now, I used it as motivation to do other projects until it was the right time. I'm starting to think it may be the right time. Unless I get a really good offer to work on something, this may be the right time to start. I've given hints about it since the inception of this blog, but it's my statement piece. It really sums up what I'm about, and I love it dearly. All I'm saying is, obviously the approach I've been taking has been making little headway due to resting hopes on other people, I think it's time to really take it upon myself to see this happen.

Okay, onto some thoughts about the Zuda competition. It was exciting, and stressful, and surprising. It was a rollercoaster. Honestly, I came to the computer thinking I'd have all these things to say about the competition itself, but I really don't. It's in my head, but I can't bring myself to say it. I met great people, reconnected with old friends, and even strengthened some friendships. It taught me a lot about promoting. In the competition all you're given is an opportunity, the rest is all you: you make it, you submit it, you promote it. Promotion was the surprising aspect, purchasing ad space was a foreign idea to me and not in the game plan. So we did it through word of mouth and hitting the internet boards. In that respect we did extremely well, and I'm proud of us!

It was just a tough month, lots of competition, probably 3 comics that would have normally been easy wins in other months. Ultimately, it's the luck of the draw, and we pulled the short straw. It was most unfortunate that we got a month with no conventions, and due to the rules, couldn't promote it in Baltimore. Which really could have helped our cause. But you live and you learn.

Either way, it's great to get back to normal life.

Again, THANKS!

Post 230-The art that never was...

So, I'm not going to go into any details, but I can put this stuff up now since it's not going anywhere. My first 11X17 work in a very long time, I've been working at 8.5X11 for a while now, but having worked large recently with painting, I felt like I needed the room for details. I was THAT excited to do this that I moved up a paper 'weight/size' class just to give it the attention I felt it deserved! I was really excited about the project, but for some very specific reasons I felt like I needed to get away from the assignment. It was really disappointing, but here's what I have...

post 229

So, I've been trying to keep myself busy in the time when I'm not promoting or working at the day job, which isn't much time. But I've decided to start doing larger paintings. This one's about 28X48 inches, still working on the lines a bit. It's on Rives BFK off the roll for ease of shipping. I'm using acrylics for these. This is the larger painting I had promised someone a while ago, but I finally got around to actually doing it. The one I started today is much larger. the nice thing, Rives takes ink REALLY well. Normally Pentel ink bleeds with water, or loses the luster. On BFK neither of these things occur!

I stuck this onto a cork board on the wall and went to town painting it. It's so much fun to work at a large size.

Post 228-Reviews and interview (not plural on the interview)...

I never went through this kind of stuff before, so it's all new to me. I mean, when I worked color flats and stuff on the Hunger there were reviews, but at no point did I feel like I was involved in that aspect. When I did Negative Burn, it happened at a crappy time when Desperado was gearing to leave Image, so it really wasn't promoted and I never saw any reviews. So good or bad, it's kind of cool to see these things now:

Review over at the Webcomic Witchfinder.

Interview at Zudafan (I'm pretty candid, I don't like to hold back on truth bombs, but I kept it fun).

Small interview/review on Comicsmix.

Post 227-Help me regain #1!!!!!

First off, and most importantly, with today's update we lost a step and went to #2, from what I can figure, a lot of people I've talked to have not been hitting "Favorites" on the side panel when you're reading our comic. Let me tell you: Votes, the 'star' ratings, and favorites (underneath the stars it says 'add to favorites'...all these count, and can help us win!!!

Here's a helpful set of instructions for voting created by the awesome Doug Wagner:

HOW TO VOTE:

I need you to sign up (it's free and they keep your info safe) and vote "FAVORITE" for Hammer Sound. The rating isn't as important as getting more "Favorite" votes.

http://www.zudacomics.com/user/register

1. Pick a User Name without any underscores, spaces, or periods. For some reason, their software's not fond of those.
2. Fill out your First Name, Last Name, Email Address, and Birthday.
3. Enter the characters from the box. Remember, they're CASE SENSITIVE.
4. Click the little checkbox to agree to all their rules and such.
5. Click SIGN ME UP!
6. They will send you an email to complete your registration. It's a safety feature, so play along.
7. After completing registration, click on COMPETITION on the top right.
8. Scroll down to HAMMER SOUND.
9. Click on the cute, little picture.
10. On the right, you should be able to RATE our chaotic, little story, VOTE for it, and choose it as your FAVORITE.
11. YOU'VE DONE IT! I greatly appreciate what you've done and it won't soon be forgotten.

Please tell friends, family, anyone you can to vote for us. I know for a fact that I have received a lot of e-mails saying that people would like to see my sequentials on a more regular basis...well this is the chance, and I appreciate any help you can provide!

Okay...now to the paintings. Did these yesterday, 4X13 inch canvases. I decided to paint them, and they're for sale. If I don't get any e-mails then I'm taking them to sell at the beginning of next month at Wizard World. You can inquire at my e-mail evan.kaiser@gmail.com about the price.

Again, thank you for all the help you all have given me so far, and I hate to ask for more help, but it's a very stiff competition this month!

Post 226=New Business Card

Post 225-Spoof!

I joke with my friends from time to time, this time it was Cully because he joked that he was duped, and thought the story was called "HamNer Sound." So I made him a picture to make up for the disappointment!

Post 224

New HAMMER SOUND BLOG!!! I'll have new art, wallpapers, the whole nine yards! Please go check it out, and of course, if you haven't already, go check out the comic HAMMER SOUND at Zuda and vote for me!!!

Post 223- ZUDA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So, I said I'd have big news, and here it is...I got into this month's Zuda competition! It's really something that can help give me some added credibility and hopefully if the story Doug and I created wins, we get to continue it and really ramp up for some high octane action!

It's robots, future stuff, and lots of crazy energy and expressive colors! I went for a really different pallette with lots of contrast and visual texture. It's about Jonah Henry, John Henry's long lost relative!

I'm hoping we do well, so PLEASE, PLEASE sign up (it only takes a minute) and vote "favorite" for our story Hammer Sound! It's really fun, and we had a great time doing it!!!

Here's the LINK.

I'll be talking about it more. But if I've ever needed a favor, I'd like to ask right now to get your votes!

Post 222

The ArtLoveMagic show seemed to go very well last night. I have to say though, I was tired by about 2/3 through. It just happened to be a long week, and our experiment of musical chairs art was exhausting both mentally and physically. We ended up working 2 on 2 paintings. It was interesting how the pieces evolved throughout the evening. Some of them started off well and ended well, others started somewhat lacking vision and we had to pull them back from art death.

By the end of the evening, we had 6 20X30 pieces that consisted of acrylics, india ink, marker, and various other materials. It was a true artistic experience. Performance and fluidity. We (Jake, Matt, Luan, and I) have been working together for nearly a year now at cons, and we have jelled well. It's hard to really pull our styles out of it, but we just...RESPONDED! It was so fast moving that none of us had time to be scared at the precision or dance of it. Our problem was that we worked so fast we finished pretty early.

It's definitely something we had to try once, working together in unison. The venue was just awesome, working in Mokah. Loved the atmosphere, and the music!

I really want to continue live-arting as often as I can. I really work best with music and when I'm forced to not correct myself. It's really changing my art and my approach to art drastically.

P.S. If you can tell what exactly I did in these, MAD PROPS to you! I can tell you if you're right, but it would blow your mind to know what I didn't do!!!!

Post 221

So, tonight I'll be rocking the brush with my brosephs the Space Gun Kru. Jake, Luan, Matt and I will be doing some live art for the folks at ArtLoveMagic this evening in the Deep Ellum at 8 pm. We plan to try some new stuff, like musical boards, where we rotate and work on each others paintings. I really think if you're in the area you should show up and I'm sure you'll have a great time!

In other news, my favorite pen store got some of the pens I really wanted to purchase back in stock, and I nearly fainted from excitement!!! I know, it sounds sad, but some people go crazy over clothes, others love food, people have tons of vices. Mine is pens and to a lesser extent, paper! Speaking of paper, that Canson comic board is actually surprisingly REALLY good from what I've done on it. It takes ink like a champ and gives great line fidelity. It doesn't cause the ink on my brushes to splay out. Instead, much more consistency.

Lastly, KEEP WATCHING THIS BLOG!!!! I SHOULD HAVE NEWS THIS WEEK (HOPEFULLY THE BEGINNING OF THE WEEK), AWESOME, AMAZING, SPECTACULAR NEWS!!!!!

Post 220

Some more experimenting on a large page (over 11X17). Total randomness, but this is what I came up with using some pentel brush, copic, and some acrylic. It's like a weird new world at this size! But I have to say, working on the illustration board sure don't stink!

Post 219

Sometimes it's like I get posessed when I start a piece. It's VERY rare that I take a few days on a piece, let alone more than a few hours. I started this afternoon doing this piece, it's like 12.5X20 inches. I wish I would have taken pictures of the process because this started off as a graytone wash on mat board. I was testing it out, and the mat board was far too cotton based for illustration. But I wanted to make this work, so I broke out the prismacolors and went to town. I finished a bit ago, and it's been a while since I've really gone to this extent with prismacolors, but it's one of those things you just feel like you have to do from time to time. My hands are sore, so I better rest them tomorrow and maybe even Friday so I can be totally prepped for the ArtLoveMagic show this weekend (I'll post details tomorrow).

I really want to put an art show together at some point...

Post 218

The Edward Scissorhands nearly killed me. I was handed the book with the instructions (just look at the reference book, you'll understand the theme). I didn't get to it for a couple minutes, so stupid me, I looked through it. Great page after amazing page...I mean, there was a fully gessoed page with a highly defined painting...what the heck?!!? So I gathered myself back together and did what I felt was my best at the time.

I really had fun with the batman pieces. The batman pieces were for a great collector's sketchbook, a normal/bizarro sketchbook. He had the coolest sketchbook ideas and his girlfriend made the neatest covers for them (painted, collaged, they were all pure class).

Post 217

Usually I do a long-winded con wrap up, but I gots to tell ya, I just don't have it in me right now. I am so tired from all the goings on of the weekend I just have to stumble forward. I met TONS of great people, especially long time heroes of mine, Cory Walker and Nate Bellegarde. A few paintings went, I have to get a few pictures of the commissions I did, but I'll put them up later.