How To Write Comics The Fingeroth Way!
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Marvel Comics
Hey, while you’re sitting on your butt Wednesday nights playing on the computer, you could be learning how to write comic books.
My good friend, Danny Fingeroth, is opening up his brain again and letting all the how-to out with his 5-part online course called Writing Comics And Graphic Novels. As a former Marvel editor - and one I hold in high regard - and comic book writer - ditto - it doesn’t get much better than this in the learning department. He's now the Sr. VP of Education at the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art in New York.
Click to continue reading How To Write Comics The Fingeroth Way!
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Gahan Wilson Teaches Cartooning
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials
One of my favorite cartoonists is Charles Addams. From the time I first saw his cartoons, I loved them. And then I saw Gahan Wilson.
He had such a unique style and a bizarre Addams-like sense of humor, but he went off into different areas - childhood, zombies, science fiction. He was a little grosser, a little weirder, and his style of drawing was not slickly mainstream.
He was a breath of fresh air.
Wilson has lived the charmed life of a cartoonist that you don’t hear about much anymore. He had a regular strip, Nuts (a kind of anti-Peanuts) in National Lampoon (the earlier, funny Lampoon), nearly 50 years’ worth of cartoons in The New Yorker and Playboy, wrote novels, had a syndicated newspaper strip called Gahan Wilson’s Sunday Funnies, book collections and a whole lot more.
Click to continue reading Gahan Wilson Teaches Cartooning
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Simonson & Simonson
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Marvel Comics
Nope, that’s not the title of a great lost 1980s private eye TV series.
It’s part of a new thing that my pal Danny Fingeroth has organized with the Society of Illustrators called Comics Out Loud.
Here’s the skinny straight from Danny: “Top comic book creators - one from each discipline of the medium - demonstrating and discussing their work processes as attendees circulate around the room and watch the process of ‘sequential art’ (as the great Will Eisner dubbed it) being made.”
So what does that really mean? It means you get to watch (and interact) as Louise Simonson writes, Walt Simonson pencils, Bob Wiacek inks, Chris Sotomayor colors and John Workman letters, each working on a current assignment.
Click to continue reading Simonson & Simonson
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Danny Fingeroth in Seattle
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Marvel Comics
Writer and editor Danny Fingeroth will be appearing at Comics Dungeon in Seattle, WA on January 5th.
Here are the Facts on Fingeroth: "Danny is well known for his extensive editorial runs at Marvel Comics, overseeing titles such as Spider-Man, Marvel Team-Up, and more.
"His writing credits include Darkhawk, Dazzler, The Deadly Foes of Spider-Man, and numerous issues of The Avengers, Iron Man, Daredevil, and more!
"Fingeroth is also the creator of Write Now! Magazine for TwoMorrows Publishing and is also well known for his books Superman On The Couch: What Superheroes Really Tell Us About Ourselves and Society as well as Disguised As Clark Kent: Jews, Comics, and the Creation of the Superhero."
Click to continue reading Danny Fingeroth in Seattle
Happy Birthday, Stan Lee!
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Marvel Comics
It’s Stan Lee’s birthday this week. He turns 89 and he seems busier now than he was at 49 1/2.
My only Stan Lee story is from the one time that I met him. It was social. It was political. It was dinner.
That’s right. This wasn’t some convention fly-by “how are you?” We actually had dinner together. Though he would certainly not remember it as I was but one of many dining companions that evening.
Back in 1994, Marvel Comics had just purchased Malibu Comics out from under a stunned DC Comics and a quick “executive back-slapping” dinner was organized at Chinois in Santa Monica.
Chinois is one of those places that you don’t really go to unless you’re on a really terrific date or someone else is picking up the tab. In this case, someone else was picking up the tab.
All the Marvel higher-ups of the day, like Terry Stewart, were there and so was the Malibu gang – Scott Rosenberg, Dave Olbrich, me and Chris Ulm. As we were ushered to our table, I found myself standing next to a very jovial Stan.
Click to continue reading Happy Birthday, Stan Lee!
Weekend Reading: Dwayne McDuffie, Bill Crouch and Wulf The Barbarian
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Interviews, Movies, Reviews, IDW Publishing
So, so sorry to hear that Dwayne McDuffie passed away earlier this week. I hate it when a good guy and a terrific writer goes too soon - from his work at Milestone Media, to his animation writing on Ben 10 and other series, it felt like he had a lot more to say that I wanted to read and see.
Rich Johnston at Bleeding Cool had a nice reminiscence of his interactions with Dwayne.
And Heidi MacDonald at Comics Beat also weighed in with some very nice thoughts.
Tom Spurgeon at The Comics Reporter has a round-up of various links to posts about Dwayne. Condolences to his family and his many, many friends on their loss.
Also sad to hear that comics historian Bill Crouch has passed away.
CG: Animation historian Michael Barrier does not like computer animation a technique “creating mechanical, manipulative series of films that don't capture the magic of the yesteryear.”
Click to continue reading Weekend Reading: Dwayne McDuffie, Bill Crouch and Wulf The Barbarian
Comic Book Jobs: Checking Out Craigslist
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials
Teachers, interns, extras don’t sound like comic book jobs, and yet here they are. Let’s take a look at some Los Angeles-based opportunities.
Think Now Education is looking for part-time teachers for “after school programs” in the Inglewood Unified School District in Los Angeles. One of the classes you could be teaching? Reading Graphic Novels. Another one? Making Comic Books.
A Los Angeles-based comic book publisher “in the mid-Wilshire district” is looking for an unpaid intern for their design department. Got to love comics, designs that pop and creating excellent book jackets. No pay, except the usual college credit.
A movie based on an “Action Comic Book” needs extras of all types, ages and ethnicities for an L.A.-based shoot for scenes in a baseball stadium, airport, and subway. There is pay, they say!
Good luck, Craigslist job seekers!
[Artwork: The Rough Guide to Graphic Novels by Danny Fingeroth)
Irwin Hasen: A New York Story
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Interviews, DC Comics
Artist Irwin Hasen was the co-creator (with writer Gus Edson) of the long-running comic strip Dondi, the poor little orphan boy who never aged in his 30+ year run (1955-1986).
But Hasen’s career goes back to 1940 when he started in comic books, drawing for Harry "A" Chesler’s shop. His later work includes Green Lantern, Justice Society and Johnny Thunder for DC and he’s credited with creating one of my favorite old-school DC characters, Wildcat.
Now he’s the subject of a new documentary: Irwin: A New York Story that’s debuting as part of FilmColumbia in up in Columbia County (about two hours north of NYC) this weekend, October 24 at 1 pm at the Morris Memorial Theater.
Click to continue reading Irwin Hasen: A New York Story
MoCCA: Paul Levitz, Stephen DeStefano, Robert Sikoryak
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Television, DC Comics, Marvel Comics
Is The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art the smartest kid in class? Their fall education programs make me want to hit Hotwire for a cheap flight to NYC and spend a few months with a laptop and some pencils.
My old friend Danny Fingeroth, the Senior VP of Education for MoCCA, gets a tip of my cap for putting together an excellent slate of programs.
Here’s a peek at the list:
Robert Sikoryak and Kriota Willberg are teaching “Anatomy For Cartoonists Workshop” (4 sessions). “This course will teach students how to create real or imaginary characters — in any style — that are consistent and believable.” Bonus: “nude models will be employed.” Nude models should never be unemployed, even in a recession.
Sikoryak is the author of the recently released Masterpiece Comics and his work appears frequently on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Kriota Willberg teaches anatomy for cartoonists and illustrators at The Center For Cartoon Studies.
Click to continue reading MoCCA: Paul Levitz, Stephen DeStefano, Robert Sikoryak
Al Jaffee’s MAD Life
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Interviews
“Is this a follow-up post about Al Jaffee?”
“No, it’s my grocery list. The internet will publish anything.”
In an earlier post about MAD Magazine‘s Al Jaffee, I reprinted a biographical piece he’d written in the early 1960s.
Jaffee wrote that he spent 6 years in Lithuania as a child with his Mom. His Dad stayed in the US but dutifully mailed Al’s beloved comic strips to him overseas. The story sounded like a fascinating morsel and I wanted to know more. And there is more. A lot more and it reads like a page-turning thriller.
Danny Fingeroth, the Senior VP of Education at MoCCA, the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art in New York, sent me a note about the post and told me about Al’s upcoming biography, Al Jaffee’s MAD Life. The book, written by Mary Lou Weisman, “covers the story of his chilling six years in Lithuania with his mother (as well as the rest of his life and career, of course),” says Fingeroth. And what a life that was (and still is, fortunately).
Click to continue reading Al Jaffee’s MAD Life
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