TCAF, May 11th and 12th! See you there!

I'm putting the finishing touches on our presentation for the spotlight on our careers at TCAF. Besides that, Bá will be on a panel about adaptations from one media to another, talking more about his experiences with the Umbrella Academy comic becoming a Netflix live action series, but also about the latest books we adapted into Graphic Novels (like Two Brothers and How to Talk to Girls at Parties). This is the panel description, which will happen on Saturday at the Masonic Temple (888 Younge St.):

12:00-1:30 Page to Screen/Screen to Page – Comics is the perfect medium, sure, but there's definitely a thrill in seeing how our favourite stories move across formats. Between movies, television, poetry, and prose, these creators all have oodles of experience in the interplay between the original and the adaptation. Featuring Brian Selznick (Hugo), Gabriel Bá (Umbrella Academy), Renee Nault (Handmaid's Tale), and Jeff Lemire (Secret Path). Moderated by Dylan Magwood.​

Our spotlight panel in on Sunday, at the Forest Hill Ballroom inside the Marriott Bloor Yorkville, (90 Bloor St E.):

11:00 AM – Two Brothers: Fábio Moon & Gabriel Bá Spotlight – Comics superstars Fábio Moon & Gabriel Bá return to Toronto with tons of comics and stories in tow! More Umbrella Academy! More Casanova! More How to Talk to Girls at Parties! Come and join them for this very special presentation about their life and work!

I'll be a special guest of another special panel on Saturday. Try to find me!

Bá will have a special Umbrella Academy signing at the Random House table (they distribute Dark Horse comics in Canada) on Saturday afternoon at 2PM as well.

The rest of the time, we'll probably be at our table (315) on the third floor of the Library. The Beguiling table will have all our books available, and you're more than welcome to take them and bring them to our table for a signature and a quick doodle (we doodle on books, I know, we can't help it).

If you plan on going to TCAF, you should check out the entire programming, as it's full of wonderful gems. A David Rubin spotlight. A Craig Thompson spotlight. A panel with Jamie McKelvie, Kieron Gillen and Stephanie Hans. All the things happening at the Library and around the area. The PARTIES!

We love TCAF and are anxious to be back.

NYCC schedule

I tried to put in here everything we have scheduled at the New York show. If we're not eating or on a meeting (most meetings happen during meals for us, so it's all basically always eating breaks), you'll be able to find us at our tables on Artists' Alley (L1 and L2).

Thursday, October 4th

11 AM-12PM signing at the DC booth
Do you know where the DC booth is? Can you tell us? Will you be there to hold our hands? We'll sign your comic and smile at you.

3:00 PM-3:50 PM: signing at the Dark Horse booth
This is the signing where we'll both be there. Bá will sign again at the Dark Horse booth, but this is your only chance to get me there, along with all the creative team of the Stranger Things comic (I made an convention exclusive cover for it).

Friday, October 5th

We'll be at our tables on Artists Alley most of the day. From 2PM til 6 PM for sure.

7:30 PM–9:30 PM: NETFLIX & CHILLS
(Main Stage 1D)
Meet the cast of the highly anticipated Umbrella Academy Netflix series! Let's see how wonderful these actors are, specially how much bigger than everyone else Tom Hopper (the guy who's playing Spaceboy) is.

8:30 PM: the Harvey Awards
(Shop Studios, 528, West 39th Street, Third Floor)
It's our first time ever attending the Harvey Awards, and we're not even nominated to anything, so NO PRESSURE, JUST FUN! (also, it's the only chance to catch us outside the convention center in case you don't have a badge)

Saturday, October 6th

12:00 PM-12:50 PM: THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY signing at the Dark Horse booth
Gerard Way, Gabriel Bá
WRISTBAND REQUIRED NO POSED PHOTOGRAPHY
LIMIT ONE PRINT, ONE OTHER ITEM PER PERSON
OTHER RESTRICTIONS MAY APPLY—SEE STAFF FOR INFO

This is Bá's second signing at Dark Horse. It's tougher to get in because of the wristband.

1:45 PM–2:45 PM: THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY INVITES YOU TO CHECK IN TO “HOTEL OBLIVION” (Room 1A06)
After ten years, The Umbrella Academy is back in action! With the new comics series, The Umbrella Academy: Hotel Oblivion kicking off and a live action series arriving on Netflix in early 2019, Dark Horse Comics is thrilled to invite fans to a conversation with series creators Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá as we explore the weird, wonderful world of The Umbrella Academy.
(This is a big room. Don't be shy and come talk abou Umbrella with us.)

3 PM-4 PM: Signing at the CBLDF booth
The CBLDF has our various book, and you can get them, help the good cause and get an exclusive drawing on your book while we're all together.

Sunday, October 7th

3 PM-4 PM: Signing at the CBLDF booth
Not content in signing books and helping the CBLDF one day, we're doing it again on Sunday, so come along and let us be merry together!

Imaginary San Diego Comic Con

On Monday, we go to the airport in the middle of the afternoon, as most international flights leave at night. So, it's rush hour traffic for close to an hour to get to the airport.
We get there three hours before the flight. We don't like to take chances. We already lost a flight at LAX back to Brazil (or Houston or Dallas or Panama, I don't remember where the first layover was). We almost lost our flight to Angola, and had to carry our baggage with us inside the plane because check-in was already closed for twenty minutes. We eat some crappy airport food, because it's going to be around midnight by the time the flight attendants bring dinner to the passengers, and by that time we'll be starving even if we did eat at the airport, and the airport food will be as crappy as the one we had close to the gate.
We always bring something to read on the plane, and we might read a little of it, but inevitably we'll choose a movie, preferably a movie both of us have not seen (usually a super hero movie), and watch it while we eat the plane dinner. After the movie, we'll try to get some sleep, but if we struggle to find our way to slumberland, we'll choose another movie. Sometimes we can finish this second movie after we wake up at the crack of dawn when the flight attendants serve breakfast.
And then we land on Houston. Usually Houston, anyway. There are no straight flights from Brazil to San Diego, and we usually get better deals on our tickets going through Houston. We usually meet other brazilians on the same flight, also going to Comic Con. Once we met all of Jeff Smith's Cartoon Books crew coming from Columbus, meeting up with Terry Moore's Abstract Studio's crew on the gate so they could all go to San Diego together (Jeff and Terry weren't there, it was just their entourages).
We arrive in San Diego before lunch, sometimes just after regular breakfast hours in California, and we go to our hotel. We could easily have a second breakfast, but we try to remind ourselves we're not Hobbits.
It's Tuesday on the A.M, and we check in at the hotel.

Now what?
---

Tuesday is our free-pre-con-day, so we can take it easy and recover from the jet lag. With the four hour difference from São Paulo time, it's very easy to get up early in the morning while in San Diego, even with little sleep the night before, but we need this first day to be low key because our trip is long and before 10 pm on Tuesday we're already dead tired. We usually meet some friends for an early dinner (we're not the only international artists that arrive one day early to recover from jet lag, so there's always someone about, and our friends who work at many of the publishers arrive earlier to set up the publisher's booth on Mondays and Tuesdays), have some drinks at the hotel bar and crash at the room early.
Wednesday is when our job begins.
Before Comic Con became this crazy giant thing, we did all sorts of different things on Tuesdays. For some years, staying at the Hostel, we would hang around with foreigners from all over the world who came to San Diego because of the beaches and the weather. We would have to explain to them that we were there for this comic book convention that happened around the corner (the Hostel is right there on Fifth Avenue at the Gaslamp District), and the ones we managed to leave curious would say over the course of that week that one day they decided to try out that Comic Con thing, went there and bought tickets right then and there and got in. They had fun.
We, too, went to the beach some years on Tuesdays. When we started going, Shane (Amaya, who wrote Roland and lived in Santa Barbara at the time and would drive down to San Diego) would drive us to the nice beaches and we would admire giant American biquinis and think about Brazilian biquinis instead. Back then, we would go back to that part of town even at night, after our Comic Con days, to try our luck on Pacific Beach bars, karaoke and pool included. Once, I don't know how, we ended up on a rooftop party of some local indy cartoonists.

All that, and it was only Tuesday.

---

You can read here the announcement of the Hellboy Winter Special 2018. We're back at Mike Mignola's backyard for a little while, writing and drawing a short story revisiting the B.P.R.D Vampire world (don't know B.P.R.D Vampire? It well be reprinted soon). Mignola did a knock-out cover for this issue, and we both did variant covers. With two other stories in this comic (one by the uber-talented Tonci Zonjic), it should be a fun read. Maybe a little scary, but fun.
---

We don't want to wake up too early on Wednesday, but the jet lag is still on full swing so we can't help it. Bá will probably hit the gym, and I'll try to join him (at least this early in the week). We have a quiet breakfast, probably our only meal for the rest of the week which isn't also some sort of meeting. I'm probably finishing a drawing I'm going to hide later as part of my Moon Art Hunt game. I'll consider going to the hotel pool for a swim (I prefer the Hyatt when it comes to a suitable pool for swimming). At lunch, we'll probably have our first meet-up, usually with our brazilians friends. This year, we would go meet Rafael Albuquerque, who's a guest of the convention and has just released a beautiful adaptation of Neil Gaiman's A Study in Emerald (with Rafael Scavone and Dave Stewart). A talented Brazilian artist going to San Diego for the first time this year is Eduardo Medeiros. It will be good for him (and for the comics' world) to widen his horizons and experience a little bit of the craziness of SDCC.
This will be a long lunch, with drinks, that will last as long as it takes for the line of people waiting to get their badges to get smaller (the Brazilian posse won't mind spending an afternoon drinking). Then we'll go get our badges so we can get in for a light, commitment-free preview night. If there's some book I really want and made a mental note to track down during SDCC, I try to find it on Wednesday, because I might forget during the week, and if I don't, by the time I go back there it might have already be sold out . Last year, I stopped at the beginning of the con at the Fantagraphics booth and got some books they had published, and forgot to get the new Jason book. I went back on Sunday, and it was all gone.

Saying hi to Terry Moore and Jeff Smith is usually part of our preview night.

Wednesday is still preview night, so it isn't so crazy to find places to have dinner. We usually choose as we walk around the Gaslamp, depending on who we're meeting for dinner. Still, it's a relaxing dinner with friends. The calm before the storm.

---

From Thursday on, the con game is on. After a breakfast meeting with one of our publishers, we usually have a signing. If we don't, it's my first chance to hide a drawing and start posting pictures online and giving people clues so they can find it.
Lunch is also a meeting, probably with a foreign publisher. Our foreigner publishers from France (Urban Comics) and Italy (Bao) usually go to San Diego. In fact, we met both of them in San Diego years ago, before they were our publishers, and now, besides being our publishers, I think of them as friends.
Signings await in the afternoon, and we also usually stop at the Comic Book Legal Defence Fund (CBLDF) booth to leave the original art we brought for the art auction on Saturday. Their booth is near the DC comics booth, on the way to the Drawn & Quarterly booth. Alex Cox will probably have a lot to say about their relocation to Portland, and if he doesn't, I'll simply ask. I'm curious.

We leave the artwork  personally on the first day because we are not mailing it from Brazil in advance, and because we know they'll display all the artwork they got on Thursday night at the party so people can get a good look of what is available and get excited about the auction.

Thursday night, the rooftop CBLDF Welcome Party at the Westgate Hotel is the party to go. It's traditional, and in this modern day of Entertainment World takeover, it's your better chance to hang out with the cartoonists you know and/or admire. And to meet new ones. It was at a CBLDF party that Bá and I saw Neil Gaiman for the first time, relaxing in a hallway before he had to go back inside to read something for everyone to enjoy. It was at a CBLDF party that we hung out next to Frank Miller in an outside balcony while he smoked a cigarette and talked passionately about comics, standing tall in his red Converse sneakers. This party has always been about the shared love for comics, and about the people who love them: the fans and the creators, interacting together and having a good time.

Maybe we'll have energy to go to a second party, probably with Sierra, and probably at the Bayfront. The Boom Studios crew have good parties at the Bayfront bar. If all goes right, the night might end in pizza in the lobby.

(the Bayfront bar has a brazilian bartender who makes some great caipirinhas)

Friday begins with another breakfast meeting. Maybe with someone from Vertigo/DC to talk about the Absolute edition of Daytripper and decide what sort of extra material would be fun to put in this oversided deluxe edition. Maybe to talk about something else.

(See, the same way I forgot to mention that every morning before breakfast, we'll try to go to the hotel gym, in real life we'll also probably forget to go to the hotel gym before breakfast)

After the Hall-H celebration of Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Reunion (which I'm not going, as I have never been to Hall-H in my life), I would probably stop at the Dark Horse booth at 12pm to get some of the posters they'll give away, because I think they turned out pretty nice (hint: I did the artwork).

During the week, we usually have a signing at the Dark Horse booth, next to a panel or announcement we're involved. After the panel, Dark Horse normally sets up interviews from media outlets.

Lunch meeting, but all day on Friday we're thinking about the Eisner Awards later that night at the Bayfront Ballroom. I hide another drawing across town, and we're thinking about the Eisners. I meet some friends for drinks around six and I try not to think about the Eisners. If these friends happen to be Skottie Young or Jason Latour, their jokes alone will keep me busy laughing and I'll forget everything. I'm still going to the Eisners afterwards.

Mainly because of the Umbrella Academy Netflix show, Bá got an invitation for the Universal party. The Umbrella crew is still shooting in Toronto, so I don't think we'll be able to make it this year.

We arrive at the Bayfront, where they're presenting the Eisners. Every awards ceremony is boring, I know. Still, we like the Eisners. We like to see people get happy about how other people love what they do enough to vote for them. We like the celebratory aspect of it. We miss that the ceremony doesn't have a keynote speech anymore, or a keynote speaker. We heard some earth-shattering-life-changing speeches at previous Eisner awards that motivated us, and still do, to try harder, and do more, and to do it better.

There's some drinking after the awards are all delivered at the Bayfront, and then we'll probably head back to the Hyatt bar and catch up with our gang of idiots. The convention night scene is definitely more spread out nowadays, to all sorts of places and hotels and bars, but there are a bunch of us comics' folk who still hang out the the Hyatt bar.

There's a panel on Saturday I can't help but think we would be in if we were there. We're usually invited to those kind of Dark Horse panels. Here's the description:

3:00-4:00 PM:  Artists Who Write: The Craft and Creation of Comics (Room: 7AB)
Whether it's a superhero adventure, a colorful fantasy world, an ultra-violent crime noir, or a new take on an old classic, creators put a lot of thought into the sequential art that drives stories told in comics. Join an all-star lineup of Dark Horse creators including Frank Miller (Xerxes: The Fall of the House of Darius and the Rise of Alexander, Sin City), Dave Gibbons (The Originals, The Life and Times of Martha Washington in the Twenty-First Century), Joëlle Jones (Lady Killer), Wendy Pini (ElfQuest), and Rafael Albuquerque (EI8HT) as they discuss turning an idea into a full-fledged story and how they continue to keep their writing fresh.
I would be interested to be there just to listen to Frank Miller and Dave Gibbons talk, but Albuquerque and Joëlle are so talented that it's no surprise they've reached the success they have, and I also want to hear they talk about how they got there.

Saturday is the big hollywood day. It's crazy. It's fuller. We usually hide in the green room for lunch.  If I haven't run into Joss Whedon up until this point at a hotel bar (I like that he started going to Comic Con again after two giant Avenger movies), then on Saturday he's easier to bump into, relaxing and having a good time. We stop by Mike Mignola's booth to make sure we say goodbye to him, as he doesn't do Sundays anymore. Close by, we might try to walk around artists' alley for a bit, but nothing sticks out. A lot of crazy talented creators with original art, prints and commission lists. People who sells books usually have booths on the other side of the convention floor, where we used to have our booth, and we have always been book people. We make comics so people can read them.

For the past few years, we have tried to have at least one signing at the CBLDF booth as well, where they have a great selection of our work from all publishers we work with. You'll find there (signed) copies of Daytripper, Casanova, Umbrella Academy, Two Brothers, How to Talk To Girls at Parties (with a special signed bookplate) and much more.

At the end of the day, the CBLDF live art auction will take place at the Bayfront, on the Sapphire AB room, starting at 8 PM, where you'll be able to bid for some amazing original art from your favourite creator. There are some pretty neat Frank Miller, Jeff Smith and Howard Chaikin originals being offered, among many other incredible pieces of art.

The night is full of wonders. We have a much better time at dinner, usually catching up with old friends. For the past few years, this has been editor's dinner for us, so to speak. Bob Schreck, Diana Schutz, Karen Berger, Sierra Hahn, Pornsak Pichetshote, all great editors, dear friends, and during the craziness of Comic Con, we catch up with them, and they catch up with us, and we start our night just right. We met some great cartoonists while on those dinners, which always involved big tables and lots of people. I'm pretty sure I met Scott Morse and Jim Mahfood in one of those dinners with Bob. I met Eduardo Barreto in a dinner with Diana (actually, Eduardo Barreto comes from Uruguay, and was the very first "international" comic book artist I met when he went to São Paulo for a book fair to promote his Batman book, and I was around 13). I met Jeff Lemire in a dinner with Karen. I met John Cassaday in a dinner with Sierra.
Saturday is the night that never ends, no matter if California law says otherwise, and we all meet up at some point after the Hyatt bar closes. The backsteps crew doesn't disappoint. (Will Dennis always has our backs, fellas). One of the recent topics I ask my friends is when are they coming to Brazil, as the Brazilian convention, Comic Con Experience (CCXP), as well as the Brazilian audience, would welcome them with open arms (I'm trying to convince myself the reason I didn't get Skottie Young to come last year was because, on a very energetic Saturday night, I didn't agree to go have matching tattoos made the following Sunday – he got an amazing Alfred Newman).

The spotlight panel on Rafael Albuquerque is at 10 AM (room 24 ABC) on Sunday morning. We'll need breakfast before going to the panel. I'm not sure Albuquerque will wake up in time to get anything to eat, but at least he's a special guest of the convention and there will be people who will go to his hotel room and make sure he attends his own panel. (the convention organisers have a volunteer who speaks Portuguese, who took care of me when I was a guest in 2009. He was taking care of Eduardo Risso last year. I bet he'll take care of Albuquerque).
 
​Our last stop of the Con is the Dead Dog Party, organised by Bob Chapman and the Grapphitti Design crew. Every friend we didn't have a chance to talk to during the convention will stop by, have a few drinks, have a few laughs.

Things start to die out earlier on Sunday, like the magic pixie dust starting to wear off. The Hyatt bar is still open, and some other friends are there. It might close soon, tho, and so we'll cross the street and stop by the Lion's Share.

When will we ever go to sleep?

Probably on the flight back home, the next day, and for the entire following week.
---

Maybe now it's a good time to say Bá and I didn’t go to San Diego this year. We have been going since 1997 every year. We didn't go in 2013 to focus on work (making Two Brothers, specifically), and I went alone in 2014 (Bá was still drawing Two Brothers) to negotiate which publisher would publish the book in the US. Aside from that, we've been there every year. It's our safe port in the american market, where we know our way around, where we see our friends.
This is one of those years where we decided to focus on work. And, like those years, we did miss San Diego greatly throughout the week.

I recommend the experience. I still think it's a special show. You don't have to go 20 times.
But do it at least once.

The first read through

One of the most incredible moments of our time in Toronto was sitting through the table reading of the first episode with the entire cast. Seeing all the actors there, together, and hearing the entire script out loud, was amazing. Right there we started to see how much the actors were going to bring to these characters, and how exciting it was to see this story coming to life beyond the pages of the comics.

The end of the first trip

It was a cold week in this Canadian winter, and yet we all felt warm inside. Watching all the cast and crew work on the show was amazingly inspiring. I think in 2018 we’ll work harder than we ever did before.

Highlights of our trip included, besides being at the shoot and meeting everybody who's onboard in this adventure:
-seeing Chris, Andrew and Peter, talking about the Beguiling, TCAF and comics festivals around the World.
-having lunch with Jeff Lemire to catch up (plus having a look at his amazing collection of original art)
-meeting Francis Manapul and Tonci, catching up with Ramón Peréz and visiting the RAID studio
-watching a VERY exciting basketball game between the Toronto Raptor and the Golden State Warriors, with a very tense and incredible last quarter.

The pilot boys

“The boys” of the pilot. Director, DP and executive producers with their game faces on. It was fascinating to watch all these people work, every day, crafting every scene. These are the people who have to grasp how the entire episode work and have to have this bigger picture in mind while shooting every scene.

On location

Bá and Gerard see the shooting on location. Take after take, hot coffee on hand, every new setup gives us a new perspective of this new world that's being built.

Umbrella Academy shoot sketches

The Umbrella Academy shooting has begun, and the energy on the set is incredible and inspiring. I'll be doing some sketches to try to express my excitement.

Umbrella TV series - It begins

Lights! Camera! ACTION!
This has officially begun!
We're in Toronto for the first week of shooting of the Umbrella Academy Netflix series.

Fun nakedness

Another sketch just for fun, warm up for more important sketches which I'll try to make this coming week.

The Toronto trip

Warm up sketch in the cold Toronto winter. We came to Toronto for an exciting new adventure.

Umbrella Academy TV series at Netflix in 2018

We couldn't be happier with this news.

'Umbrella Academy' Live-Action TV Series Set at Netflix'

The 10-episode drama will launch in 2018 and is based on Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba's beloved comic of the same name.

Start spreading the news...

We're leaving for New York, where we'll release our new book, TWO BROTHERS, and be at NYCC throughout the week.

Here’s our schedule:

WEDNESDAY - October 7
7PM - TWO BROTHERS release, discussion and signing at Barnes and Noble Tribeca
Here it is. The best way to kick off this incredible week. We’ll answer questions, talk about the production of the book and continue to spread our love for comics, and we’ll sign your books.

THURSDAY - October 8
1PM-1:45PM - Casanova signing at the Image booth

FRIDAY - October 9
8PM - Image Comics NYCC Afterparty at Bowlmor Lanes. You can buy tix here.

SATURDAY - October 10
11AM - Spotlight on Fábio Moon and Gabriel Bá - Different is Cool
Room 1A18
Eisner Award winners, Brazilian Wonder Twins Gabriel Bá (Daytripper, Umbrella Academy) and Fábio Moon (Daytripper, Casanova) have returned for a new collaborative original graphic novel with Two Brothers from Dark Horse Comics. Join them as they share their experiences, both inside and outside the US comics market and invite young creators and readers to a discussion about career choices, foreign languages, exotic places and how the best way to make it big might not be by doing what everyone wants, but by doing what only you can do.
1PM-1:50PM - Signing at the Dark Horse booth.

--

We’ll be at the show every day. If we’re not on one of the above events, we’re probably at our table (Y1) at the Artist’s Alley, selling exclusive copies of TWO BROTHERS, prints and original art. 

See you there.

¡DOS HERMANOS EN MÉXICO!

¡Vamos a MÉXICO para La Mole Comic Con!

Vamos a tener dos mesas en el Artist Alley (A1018-A1019), dónde estaremos todos los días.
Y tenemos una charla el sábado, a las 12:15h
- "BAJO LA SOMBRILLA DE LOS GEMELOS FANTÁSTICOS. Desde Brasil, los hermanos Gabriel Bá y Fabio Moon, artistas multipremiados de la industria del cómic, platicarán sobre su trabajo en The Umbrella Academy, Casanova y Daytripper, entre otros proyectos. Moderador: Jorge Tovalín."

Nos vemos pronto!

Aqui una pagina acerca de nosotros.

San Diego was a blast!

I was drinking a Caipirinha at the outside patio of one of the hotel bars, talking with Skottie Young, Chris Roberson and Allison Baker about comics. I was actually enjoying the sun, and my drink was delicious. Topics ranged from the influence of “the Maxx” in our comics to how special it is to work inside the Hellboy universe, with stories about smuggling things from one country to another and who has more original Chris Bachalo pages thrown into the mix.
The girl working at the bar is brazilian, so her Caipirinhas can be trusted.
The guy working at the bar of the Scholastic party was also brazilian. I was impressed when José Villarubia recognised the bartender’s strong accent and said to me “he’s brazilian”. I didn’t get a caipirinha there, but I can’t complain of what I did get: an advance copy of Craig Thompson’s Space Dumplins.
There are no brazilians in space in that book. Not yet, at least. I just read the first few chapters.
Back to San Diego, which is what I can’t stop thinking about. Maybe it is really because I’m from Brazil and I only see these people once a year, maybe twice, but when I can spend five days talking with so many of my friends and they’re all doing such great comics, I can’t complain about where my life has led me.
San Diego was a blast this year.

Bá and I had a wonderful time in San Diego Comic Con this year. I don’t care what people say, it’s still my favourite convention. It’s the only place where you’ll find all the publishers, from the smallest to the big mainstream ones, where independent or alternative artists interact and share their passion in the same space as international super stars of books you grew up reading, and it’s where we can still celebrate the Eisner Awards (where everybody who attends is bound to discover at least one cool book that catches your attention).
It is getting harder and harder to attend SDCC, getting a 4 day pass is hard, getting a hotel room is hard, and there are more and more people going for the entertainment part of the convention rather than the comics part, but still I think SDCC is pretty special and the energy from the authors and the readers was just unbelievable. If you can see past the sea of people, the comics-section  is still the most inspiring place you’ll find on those five days of summer. And, since we didn’t have a table this year, we could also walk around and discover so much more stuff, and see and talk to so much more people, and leave with the even stronger feeling that we’re living in these very special creative moment in Comics, where the audience is really diverse, the production is diverse, and the doors are wide open for Comics to go everywhere.
We even did a presentation about that during the convention.

One of the panels we were part of this year was called “Different is cool”.
We created that panel.
We made that name up.
It was basically me and my brother talking to the audience about how incredible it is to go your own way, find your own style, and how your work stands out when you stop trying to do what everybody else is doing and try to focus on doing what only you can do. Our presentation was a love-letter to the convention and to the Comics’ World, to this place where we can discover such a wide variety of artists and styles and possibilities, and how refreshing that is, and how inspiring, and how many of the authors we admire have had that same moment when that voice in their heads said it was okay to do something you love even if nobody else is doing it.
The room was big, full of readers, of fans and friends, and it was great having that opportunity to talk about our love for comics, and to reflect on how nowadays is a great time to go after your dreams. It was the best way to start the last day of the Con, and it gave us this buzz that we carried to the interviews we made, and to the signing session that followed. We love comics so much and, with the response from the audience at our panel, we felt loved back. It was an incredible feeling.
We first came to SDCC in 1997 dreaming of drawing super-heroes for Marvel and DC, but our journey took us to a completely different path. A more personal path.
We haven’t looked back ever since.

We always come back from San Diego inspired to make more comics. Bá spent a couple of days in L.A to share that enthusiasm with Gerard and talk about the new Umbrella Academy series. It’s going to be great. Knowing there are more Umbrella comics coming is more exciting to me than the news of an Umbrella Academy TV series. Bá and Gerard have so much fun stuff planned.
As I write this, I got my copies of Casanova Acedia #3 in from the printer. It should be in comics stores on July 29th. We’re really making an effort to go back on schedule, since releasing Two Brothers in Brazil and France and touring took us so much always from the drawing board and resulted in this very big (unprofessional) gap between issues 2 and 3. Issue 4 will come out next month.
This year I finally stopped at some point and managed to be interviewed by my friend Jimmy Aquino for his Comic News Insider podcast and I talked about the books I did, the new book coming out (Two Brothers) and about what I love about comics. When he finally asked me the geeky questions, about which characters or books I would like to work on, I think I let him down with my answers, but I forgot to tell him one thing:
Despite focusing on creating new stories and trying to do different things, my brother and I will draw on a mainstream DC book for the first time this year, and it will be published next month.
Back to the drawing board.

Original pages at SDCC 2015

We have a wide range of original pages we brought to San Diego this year, and they’ll be available at the Beguiling booth (1629).

Hellboy cover and pages, American Vampire pages, Umbrella Academy pages, Chrononauts and Killjoys covers, and more. The image shows some of the pages we left with them.

SDCC - Different is Cool!

For the first time in a while, I looked at the whole upcoming SDCC program, and that reminded me how big the show is. There's a lot going on there. Of course there are loads of TV and movies useless bullshit that drag thousands of people every year to gigantic pitiful lines, but you can find many panels with comics creators and publishers with experience and knowledge to share, with lessons about the craft and great advices to the young artists and writers.
There’s a pattern to be recognised on the panels that jump to my eyes while reading the whole program. First, let’s see a list that I find very interesting, and that I might even go to.

On Thursday there’s a panel called "breaking into comics right now" at 12pm on room 28DE and "Breaking into Comics the Marvel way" at 1pm on room 7AB. At 11am, a "Writing Workshop with Kelly Sue DeConnick" on room 2, and at 3pm, "Writing 101: what to think about before you start writing" with Marv Wolfman on room 30CDE. On the same room, it's followed by "Comic Book Art: making a living doing it", talking about how to price and sell your art, exploit and merchandise it and try to squeeze those dollars out of it. 

At 4pm, on room 28DE, there's the "Delcourt panel", with the French publisher's founder Guy Delcourt. Decades of experience and millions of comics sold every year, it'll be good to learn that there's more to comics than American super-heroes. And while you're discovering new cultures, at 5pm, "Making a living in Manga: Japan creators and editors talk" on room 29AB.

Fábio and I will be on two panels on Thursday. At 1pm on room 2, we'll join "DeConnick and Fraction: Milkfed Criminal Masterminds at work" to talk about all the projects this crazy couple is working on, including Casanova. And at 3pm we'll be at room 23ABC on "Dark Horse Originals: The New Mainstream", talking about our new graphic novel, Two Brothers. 

Wow, and that was just Thursday. 

On Friday at 11am, "Publishers Weekly: The French Comics Invasion" on room 29AB. 

If you want to create comics for kids, you should go to two panels. On Friday at 12:30pm, "GRAPHIX: Beginning, Present and Beyond" on room 24ABC, and on Saturday at 3pm, "Kid's Comics" on room 23 ABC, and 

Friday at 3pm, "Breaking into Comics and Staying in" on room 30ABC and on Saturday at 4pm, "IDW: So, You want to be in comics" on room 4. 

On Sunday, if you still have energy for panels and want to learn a little bit more about digital comics, “Comixology Submit: The Future of Self-Publishing” at 3pm on room 29AB. 

And almost every day there's a cool IMAGE COMICS panel with creators and editors talking about how awesome comics are.

You might have caught the pattern on the panels I’ve picked. They’re all about creating Comics, getting into Comics, different approaches and mind sets. Well, that was my way to prepare you to our panel on Sunday, “Different is Cool”, at 11:15am on room 6DE. 

In the last 20 years, we’ve self-published Comics and we’ve worked with small and big publishers, on tiny to gigantic projects, and we have been living exclusively out of comics for the last eight years. We have been to conventions all around the world (we’re open for invitations for show on Japan and Australia, by the way). The first thing we learn on our first trip to San Diego Comic Con in 1997 just proved to be one of the most valuable once we started going to Comics Conventions and Festivals in other countries. Diversity is the most precious quality the Comics global industry has to offer. Yes, Global Industry, because good creators can come from anywhere in the world, and a good story breaks barriers and travels to distant countries and gets translated to the most exotic languages. 

So I invite you to enjoy the whole show, go to all the panels you can, go to the Eisners ceremony, learn all the things you can, talk to all the people you can, and then come meet us on Sunday on room 6DE, at 11:15am, and let’s talk about how the best way to break into comics and build a career may not be by doing what everyone wants, but by doing what only you can do. And let’s find out what that means.

How did we get to India?

Here's a video with our full presentation at Comic Con India, in New Delhi, last February. We talked about all the choices we've made throughout our careers that led us to this point.



Even though we have now a very successful international career (quite unbelievable, really), the core of what we do remains very much the same from where we started almost 20 years ago.

We had a great time at the convention and we learned a lot with everyone we've met there. We can't wait to go back.

Space Boy

Spaceboy sketch Bá made for a fan during our German tour.

SDCC 2012

Our books

This year, more than any other year, we'll have our books at our booth inside SDCC. If you like one of our stories and want to try out another one, we'll be there to supply whatever you want. Some are rare to find, others, like the third CASANOVA album, AVARITIA, will debut at the conven.tion.
We'll be at the booth selling and signing the books, and every book we sell will get a sketch inside.

Our schedule

These are our plans inside the convention center, and around San Diego:
thursday, July 12th
2PM- I'll be at TR!CKSTER for the art demo, where I'll draw and ink on the spot, and answer questions about style and storytelling.
8PM- Bá and I will go to the CBLDF welcome party at the Westgate hotel. Stop by to see all the amazing original art they're auctioning this year, and grab a drink while you're at it.
saturday, July 14th
4PM- Bá and I will be signing at the Dark Horse booth (#2615)
sunday, July 15th
12:15-1:45 CBLDF Rock Art Jam- Bá and I, along with Nate Powell, will draw on site rock related images while we talk about the love and influence of music in our work. The audience we'll be able to bid on the drawings to take them home after the panel, the profits will all go to the CBLDF. Room 5AB


Other than that, we'll probaly be at our booth (#1320) most of the time. Come along, stop by and let's have fun at another crazy Comic Con.

And then, something extra

Aside from all the original pages we'll have at our booth, from Umbrella Academy, Casanova, Serenity and BPRD 2012, I'll be bringing these little paintings I've been doing recently. They're small and delicate, and cheaper than the pages, so a wonderful opportunity for those who want a piece of original art from us but can't afford a page.