Necon, Reviews, and Other Things

Back from my annual trip to NECON, a writers and readers conference/convention held at Roger Williams University in Rhode Island. It's one of my favorite shows, filled with some of my favorite people in the entire world, including F. Paul Wilson, Tom Monteleone, James A. Moore, Christopher Golden, and more people than I can even begin to name here. As usual, I was joined by my NECON posse, Ellen Williams and Dan Waters, who understand and share my geekery for all things book-like. Thanks as always to them and to all the other attendees, especially fellow former Borderlands Boot Camp attendees like Brian Hatcher, John Buja, Kyle Steele, Shelby Rhodes, and Michael M. Hughes. Horror authors Brian Keene and Joe Hill made surprise appearances this year, and I got a chance to talk to them a bit about comics, which is always fun.

While I was away, we started to see some reviews for the DOCTOR WHO ANNUAL 2010, including some incredibly kind comments from Comic Book Resources about the "Big, Blue Box" story that I wrote and drew. If you haven't picked it up yet, DOCTOR WHO editor Denton Tipton has a preview on his blog, From The Tip. There are a couple of pages from the "Blue Box" story, along with pages from Jonathan L. Davis and Kelly Yates, and Al Davison.

And now that I'm back, I'm starting in on issue 16 of the current series of IDW's DOCTOR WHO, which is the last issue to feature the 10th Doctor, not to mention the last issue of the series before we relaunch with a new #1 and a new Doctor, the familiarly named 11th Doctor, Matt Smith. I'm looking forward to drawing him, but a little sad to see the David Tennant Doctor go. He was a great Doctor, and I really liked drawing that long, brown coat.

On The Shelves: DOCTOR WHO Annual 2010

I'm off to Connecticut this morning to visit with my friend Dan Waters before we both head over to Rhode Island for our annual trip to Necon, but in the meantime, IDW publishing's DOCTOR WHO Annual 2010 comes out today. I drew two short stories for the annual, one that I wrote myself, and one written by my DOCTOR WHO Ongoing Series collaborator, Tony Lee, that ties into the final 10th Doctor story arc we're working on now, "Final Sacrifice", which begins in DOCTOR WHO #13. There are also stories by Jonathan Davis and Kelly Yates (who also drew the cover), and Al Davison. I got a chance to read Al's story a while back, and I have to say, it knocked my socks off.

On the Shelves: DC Digital Comics

The big industry news this week is the announcement that DC has jumped into the digital comic book business with both feet, doing a deal to bring their comics to both the PSP and iPad. I've been lucky to work with the folks at DC's WildStorm imprint off an on for the last few years on a number of different projects, including the MIRROR'S EDGE mini-series with famed game writer Rhianna Pratchett. And now I'm proud to say that the special #0 issue we did is currently free to download through the DC's digital comic app. You can also download issues 1-3 for a small fee. I'm incredibly excited to have a project I worked on in this first wave of digital comics, so a big 'cheers' to the gang at WildStorm and at DC Comics proper.

Sketchbook: Hal Jordan (Updated)

One last color experiment before I launch into the next issue of Doctor Who, this time featuring the Silver Age Green Lantern, Hal Jordan.

UPDATE: As Mike pointed out in the comments, it would seem I got the color of Hal's boots wrong. They're supposed to be green. In my defense, I think they look cool white. If I get a chance I'll fix the color. Like most comic book artists, I'm kind of compulsive about that sort of thing.

Sketchbook: Wolverine

A quick sketch and color test for a Wolverine pinup I wanted to play with. Doesn't work quite the way I thought it would, but that's why it's a sketch and not a final piece. If I ever get around to doing an actual pinup, I'll post it here.

Sketchbook: NEVERMEN

A quick sketch and color experiment featuring one of the Nevermen from Guy Davis and Phil Amara's THE NEVERMEN. I've been an admirer of Guy's work for a long time now, and I constantly refer to projects like THE NEVERMEN and his own THE MARQUIS for story-telling inspiration. No one packs a lot of story-telling into a page better than Guy.

Sketchbook: Evan Fade

Another quick sketch of my character Evan Fade from NEGATIVE BURN. As many of you may already know, I've been working on a novel featuring Evan in-between my comic book art assignments. Switching back and forth between the art side of my brain and the writing side isn't always easy, so when I get stuck, I like to draw something from the story to help me get back into the swing of things. I did this one this afternoon as I sat down to work on the manuscript for a little bit.