One thing I usually do with commissions is send a jpeg of the pencils to the client before I ink. I don’t often get suggestions back but it seems to make folks happy. It also gives me some time to see everything with a fresh eye when I pick up pen and brush.

Been a long time since I drew the MIDNIGHT MINK and CHIPPY! But once I started this commission piece, they danced across the rooftops as naturally as if I were still doing BRAT PACK. Well, the MINK dances. Poor CHIPPY needs to watch where he steps.

If you are interested in a custom commission of your own, give me a heads up.

And, as always, you can check out a whole armada of my previous commissions.

Here is the penciled first page of GHOSTS IN THE MACHINE, a full color short story that originally appeared in EPIC Illustrated back in the early 80′s. I was intent on creating the look of a computer generated environment a decade before personal computers really started to be used in graphic arts and these pencils were a first step in a kind of interesting and convoluted process that ultimately seemed to work pretty well. The story itself and my description of how I did it are included in SHINY BEASTS from King Hell Press. You can get a signed copy at my on-line store.

Found this negative in the back of a drawer. It’s from my high school yearbook photo. I’m 17 and obviously trying out my new super X-Ray powers.

Another panel out of context. This one a tiny panel from SWAMP THING #62. Inks by Alfredo Alacala. Lettering by John Costanza and color by Tatjana Wood. ©DC Comics.

Comic fans sometimes quibble with Roy Lichtenstein’s appropriations of Wally Wood, Irv Novik, Jack Kirby etc. But one thing Lichtenstein accomplished by putting a single panel on a gallery wall was to force us to look at that panel in a whole new way. We know the panel has come from a larger narrative, but we are left to imagine what went before and what will transpire after. On top of that we are asked to see the frozen moment; it’s emotional content, it’s graphic power, it’s strange mix of words and picture; for itself.

The internet has created a new medium to view single comic book panels out of context. “News” sites routinely run panels, rather than whole pages, to illustrate a link to a story on-line. I like lingering over these panels; drinking them in for what they say and what they hint at. Marveling at the craft involved and intuiting what might have been going on in the heart and mind of the artist. Here’s one of mine from MYSTERY INCORPORATED #1.

Self portrait circa 1976. Ball-point pen in sketchbook.

A long-lost blast from my star-crossed past! This page from MOMMA’S BWAH, written by Bill Kelley and illustrated and lettered by me in 1979. It was an undergroundy Mad-like mash-up of BAZOOKA JOE, ED GEIN and ARCHIE that appeared in 50′s FUNNIES; published by Kitchen Sink in 1980. Editor was Larry Shell.