At your doorstep

Tr!ckster Cocktail Hour

Bá and I will participate this year again in the awesomeness that is TR!CKSTER. During Comicon in San Diego, while amazing stuff happens inside the convention center, there's just too much going on, and more and more it's easy to lose focus of what you want, what you love and what you're looking for. For these reasons, some amazing folks created a place outside the convention center where you can focus on creators who do their own comics, and where you can learn and discuss how to become a creator yourself talking with some great talented bunch of authors you admire or soon will discover.
This year, TR!CKSTER is promoting an activity called Cocktail Hour, in which one accomplished creator, or a team of creators, will spend one hour with one person who subscribe, to help develop this person's project. As it's put on the website, "YOU will bring a project you're working on and brainstorm, design, chat, troubleshoot, and create alongside one of your favorite working storytellers. Bring a script, an outline, character designs, comic pages, storyboards, screenplay pages, whatever you need, and experience one of the most focused working sessions of your life as you drink and create, together. Time and day to be mutually determined"

Bá will do one cocktail hour, and I will do another.

What does that mean? What can we do with your project? How can we help you?

- Let's say you're an artist with no script. We can look at your artwork and help you with your technique, with your inking or coloring, with your style. We can tell you what publisher your work fits better, and maybe we can even know who to talk to at the publisher. We can give you advice on how to start writing your own stories, and how that can be different than working with other writers. We can give you tips and advice on self-publishing.
- Let's say you're an artist with a script or project. We can look at your script, your story, your project, and help develop it further, see where it can be improved, talk about schedule, talk about craft and how the art and the words work together to tell your story. We can look at your character designs and help out create the look of your story, help you make your art your own.
- Let's say you're a writer with no artist. We can give you advice and tips on how to find artists, we can look at your script and tell which artist or style to look for, maybe we even know somebody who really fits your project. We can help sketch the characters, think about covers, design, how to package your story to propose your project to a publisher, and what publisher does the kind of books you want to make. We can go over your script and polish it, maybe tell you what artists like to see in a script and what doesn't help the artist to understand what that scene/panel is about, we can help you break down a scene in panels and pages.


If I got yourself interested in learning while helping out TR!CKSTER, go to the TR!CKSTER indiegogo page and subscribe to one one hour of intensive learning. It will be tons of fun, guaranteed. There are other amazing artists offering the same Cocktail Hour workshop, so maybe you can also have an amazing time with Jill Thompson and her storytelling and watercolor skills, or you can get expressive, cartoony and funny with Scott C (just to name two), it's your call. While you're checking the link, see all the other ways you can get fun stuff and help maintaining this amazing creator friendly space, buying prints and books.
Let's all meet up at TR!CKSTER and celebrate the art and love of making comics.

36

(sketchbook doodles. Click on the images for bigger versions)

2012 Around the world - part 2

We make comics, and we like to tell stories, because we love the medium and we really believe comics are a wonderful and unique special way to tell all sorts of stories. In recent years, more diverse comics have been made, seen, read and celebrated, and one of the greatest ways to discover what comics have to offer is by getting out of your hole and being open to the different.
The different is awesome, and it's all around.
That's certainly one of the best advantages, for us, to travel to conventions and comics festivals. Around Brazil, in the US, all over the world, nowadays you'll certainly discover one aspect of the comics world you just didn't know before every time you go to a comics festival. There's always that book, that artist, that panel, that event or simply that vibe that will inspire you and make you want to create that same awesome feeling in your work.
That's how we felt after going to TCAF, the Toronto Comic Arts Festival.

Very different from the Napoli Comicon, which in its own way were more similar to bigger more diverse shows like SDCC in San Diego, TCAF was a festival to celebrate creators and their comics. "Do your own stuff, make your own comics, have an individual voice", these seem like the mantra not only of the festival, but of all the exhibitors who travel from all over to show their new books in Toronto. And what wonderful work is being produced these days.
We were talking to Jeff Smith during the festival (he was another guest of honor, and we shared the opening event on Friday night, as you can see on video on a previous post) and it was just amazing the amount of new cartoonists, some much younger, and the raw energy they paraded around, as if screaming "my work is awesome and I just won't be ignored". If someday we hoped people believed comics were cool, and were the most wonderful job in the world, those cartoonist at TCAF believe it with all their hearts, and they'll fight for their comics, even if it's a Scott Pilgrim's kind of fight. Last year, at San Diego, I had the same great impression and vibe with Tr!ckster and both the creators and the audience who circulated on that wine bar for those days and nights: They were there brought together by their love for good comics, creating a serious place to discuss how to make the work better. But, if Tr!ckster were a store/bar/party place, TCAF was an entire festival with more than 350 exhibitors, half of them women cartoonists, and they were all loving to be there selling their comics. You felt the love, all around, and you were intoxicated with that urge to create something new, something fresh, something your own, and to share it with everybody around you.

And then there were the night parties.

(me, Cecil Castellucci, Jeff Smith, Bá and Kazu Kibuishi at the TCAFÊTE at Pauper's Pub)


Another important part of the whole festival experience, parties, dinners and night time activities are great so you can talk a little more with you friends from distant places, or you can make new friends and get to know new people who, in their own way, love the same things you love. Toronto didn't disappoint in this category, and the festival organizers threw very nice parties all three nights. Popping in and out of various places portrayed in Scott Pilgrim (both in the comic and in the movie) only made it feel like the never ending night life of Toronto (maybe I'm stretching it a bit) was tailored maybe for cartoonists and comics fans.
Just like in Italy, we left filled with joy, eager to tell new stories and completely inspired by the places we visited and the people we talked to, and I'm sure someday people will recognize a little bit of our canadian experiences in one of our stories. And, just like in Italy, we put together a small video to try to explain, or at least show, how TCAF is a festival every independent creator should go. It's that awesome (don't mind the subtitles, they're for our brazilian fans).

Thanks to Peter and Chris, for inviting us, and for Krystle and Miles and the entire Beguiling staff, for being really nice and helpful and awesome, and thanks for all the cartoonists we hung around during TCAF (Becky, Andy, Jeff, Kazu, José, Jason, Mark, Cameron, Bryan, Vera, Matt, Dustin, Emily, Nathalie, Clark and I'm sure many more I'm forgetting right now): if we keep doing the comics we love the best way we can, nobody can stop us.

2012 Around the world - part 1

The convention season has started for us, and it keeps reminding us how many people love to read and to do comics in all its forms and shapes. And the more different these conventions are, they show us how much the comics world can grow in all these different directions.

One page short of finishing the artwork on Casanova: Avaritia #4, our first convention was Quantacon, a small convention here in São Paulo which, in its fist installment, burst out with creative energy and all around happiness. Fun and interesting panels, great range of authors and their individual little booths, and a great amount of fresh new material. It's a great time to be a comic book author in São Paulo and the convention did show how much the city needs an event to put everybody together more often.

After that, Bá finished the last page of Casanova and we left for two international conventions.

First stop was Toronto, only for two VERY cold days. We were guests of honor for TCAF, so it was great to come to the city one week before the festival to get an idea of the city and where everything would take place. Since we were there, we went to visit the CN tower and we made a video calling people for the festival, which you can check out clicking here.

Then we left for Italy.

We went to Naples for Napoli ComiCon and had an incredible time. Everybody we met there were awesome people, from the cute frenetic loud-talker-guest-relations-organizer Viola, to mexican Artist Tony Sandoval, Swiss artist Frederik Peeters, canadian artist David Finch, almost all our italian editors, german artist Line Hoven and so many more. Claudio Curcio created a great festival that puts together everybody who loves comics, games, cosplay and pop culture and, on top of that, made it in Naples, which is an incredibly beautiful city in a very chaotic way. For me, big cities are fascinating, I love when a city has this kind of energy that oozes from the people, the rhythm and the chaos of any place where you can find any type of person, and you look around and you see history in every wall, every building, every hill with a dormant volcano. And all those scooters! The stuff we saw during our short stay in Naples will surely influence future stories, future characters and future situations.
Thanks to all the girls responsible for the the guests who took care of us and make sure we survived the incredible experience: Viola, Chiara, Alexandra e Giovanna.
Thank to our french editor, François Hercouet, who travelled to Naples just for one day to meet us and gives us copies of the just released beatiful french edition of Daytripper. Merci, François.
Thanks to Claudio for inviting us.
And thanks to Italy, for preserving its history in ways many (if not all) cities in Brazil don't even bother to try. We had an incredible time in Naples, and then visitng Pompei, and finally visiting Caserta and the royal Palace, the old medieval town and the incredible Caserta comicbook store, Comix Factory. Thanks to Steffano Perullo for the Caserta portion of the trip.
You can see some pictures of our trip clicking here.
Bá put together a video with images we made during our incredible italian trip. That's just the first offspring of our short italian love affair.



After Italy, we left back to Toronto and for TCAF, thinking there wasn't much Toronto could do to impress us more than Naples.

We should have known better.
(to be continued...)

TCAF 2012 May 4th kick-off event

For all of you who couldn't be there, here are four videos that cover almost all of the TCAF 2012 kick-off panel with Jeff Smith, Fábio and me, mediated by Mark Askwith. It was a great weekend and we'll write all about it soon.

CONVENTION SEASON!!

Two weekends of fun, sketching and lots of flying around await us!


 NAPOLI COMICON!


We're very excited to be going to ITALY as guests at NAPOLI COMICON this weekend and, for our delight, Italy is the country with the largest variety of our books (after Brazil and the U.S., of course).
- DETTAGLI (Comma 22)
- Daytripper (Planeta DeAgostini)
- CASANOVA (Panini)
- Umbrella Academy (Magic Press Comics)
- Sugarshock! (Bao Publishing)
- URSULA (Lain)

Our schedule is:

Sunday April, 29th 

10:30 Mostra d’Oltremare- SALA INCONTRI

Come si lavora in USA

With Lorenzo Ruggiero, Pasquale Qualano, Fabio Moon

11:30       Mostra d’Oltremare- SALA INCONTRI

 Incontro con Magic Press Edizioni 

with Pasquale Ruggiero and Gabriel Bá

15:00-18:00 Mostra d’Oltremare-Area autografi
Signing Session

Monday April, 30th

15:00-18:00 Mostra d’Oltremare-AREA AUTOGRAFI
Signing Session

16:00 Mostra d’Oltremare-STAND MAGIC PRESS
Signing Session

Tuesday may, 1st

11:00-13:00 Mostra d’Oltremare-AREA AUTOGRAFI
Signing Session

15:00 Mostra d’Oltremare-STAND MAGIC PRESS
Signing Session

15:00-18:00 Mostra d’Oltremare-AREA AUTOGRAFI
Signing Session

So we will have two panels and signings with many publishers. For all of you who are attending the convention, look for the schedules of these publishers and you might find us.


TCAF

After that, we're going to the cold lands of Toronto, Canada, as guest of TCAF (Toronto Comic Arts Festival). We have two commitments so far:

- TCAF 2012 KICK-OFF EVENT! Jeff Smith, Gabriel Ba, and Fabio Moon in conversation!
Noir and the Fantastic in Comics and Graphic Novels
Friday, May 4th, @ 7:00pm
@ Toronto Reference Library, 789 Yonge St.
in The Bram and Bluma Appel Salon
Free to attend, registration required.
And
- We have a spotlight on our work sometime on sunday, May 6th, and we'll talk about how you can't turn back once you discover all the different possibilities of comics as a language.


We'll have some signings, I guess, and a table where we can hang out, but we want to walk the floor a lot and discover new stuff and authors.


We expect to have lots of fun on both conventions and meet lots of people.
See you guys around!

Casanova Avaritia trade is coming

It's coming in July. You should go to your comic book store and make sure your store person orders the book for you. You'll probably need to order two books, to read the story twice, and then you'll understand it. And it will be awesome.

here's the solicitation:

CASANOVA: AVARITA TPB
Written by MATT FRACTION
Art and Cover by GABRIEL BÁ
From the writer of Marvel's smash hit FEAR ITSELF and the artist of the best-selling book Umbrella Academy comes one of the most critically acclaimed series of the year! On the run from ten thousand parallel worlds that want him dead, Casanova Quinn, the world's sexiest and savviest superspy, fights tyrant and hero alike. Now Cass and Sasa Lisi, his girlfriend from beyond tomorrow, must flee from space-time itself, aim one batch of enemies at the other, kill everybody, and save everything, simultaneously. Don't be afraid: you are an apocalypse dreaming of butterflies + the first part of reincarnation is dying. You have never read a book like CASANOVA.
152 PGS./Mature ...$14.99

For now

Best Friends Forever Kickstarter

My friend Brea Grant (who I met throught comics, but she's also an actress) is making her directorial debut writing and directing a post-apocalyptic road movie called Best Friends Forever and she has this great Kickstarter campaign to help raise the money they need to finish the film. You can contribute with various amounts, and there are super cool prizes for those who help out.
Watch the video and learn more about the project:


Brea asked me if I could help out, and I did a cool poster image that wil become a limited print awarded to anyone who contribute with more than $100. Check out the sketch I sent Brea and the finished poster below:


So, the project has only 10 more days to raise the money, and they can use your help. This is a cool project, Brea is a serious and talented professional and we can help.

Olé!

Daytripper - Au jour le jour

The French edition of our beloved Daytripper is ready, a beautiful hardcover, and it will be out on April 27th, published by Urban Comics, a division of the Dargaud group. We will be in Napoli for NAPOLI COMICON at the time and I hope I can get my hands in one copy (aside from the Italian and Spanish editions as well. Yes, I think the European market is all connected and works as one big thing. I know it's not that simple).
There's a nice new introduction by Cyril Pedrosa (and it keeps the beautiful illustrated piece by Craig Thompson). You can get all the information about the book here.



Thanks everyone who made it possible, specially François, who took such good care of our book at Urban Comics.

Meet at the door

Sketch on my notebook.
Pencil, ballpen and watercolor.

Mask

Personal drawing.
Ballpen and brushpen on the notebook.

Winter Girl

CASANOVA: AVARITIA final issue!!

I'm working on this issue as we speak (read, whatever) and it's AWESOME! It will blow your mind!
By the way, don't forget to pick up issue #3 on early April.

CASANOVA: AVARITIA #4 (of 4)
One of the most critically acclaimed series of the year comes to its catastrophic conclusion. CASANOVA: AVARITIA #4 answers every question (almost), solves every riddle (kind of), and explains absolutely everything you ever wanted to know about the world of CASANOVA (in a way). Casanova Quinn, hated on all sides by tyrant and hero alike, must flee from time and space, aim one batch of enemies at the other, kill everybody and save everything simultaneously. Don’t be afraid: you are an apocalypse dreaming of butterflies + the first part of reincarnation is dying…
By the Eisner-laden team of MATT FRACTION (AvX, INVINCIBLE IRON MAN, THE MIGHTY THOR, FEAR ITSELF) and GABRIEL BÁ (UMBRELLA ACADEMY, DAYTRIPPER).

40 PGS./Mature …$4.99

Merci, Moebius

The courage to dream with open eyes and imagine the world.
Le courage de rêver avec les yeux ouverts et d'imaginer le monde.

Tree study

Moebius

Jean Giraud, also known as Moebius
1938-2012

Pencil

Pencil drawng for something cool I did last week.

Les Femmes

For the international womens' day, I made this sketch on my notebook.
And because women are a infinite source of inspiration and mystery.

Batman and Robin

Brazilian coffee

Drink it black.
Starting out a new sketchbook.

CASANOVA: AVARITIA #3 GO'DAMMIT!

God, damn! I'm finally done with Casanova: AVARITIA #3! If any of you hadn't seen the cover last year, here it goes again.

First of all, I'd like to apologize for all this delay. I used to hate those indy books done by superstar authors that would come out late because, well, they are superstars and really busy and all. Well, that should teach me to respect the big league and what it brings to the table.
Lot has happened last year, both Matt and I didn't expect it to be so crazy and we all hoped we would be able to work normally on Casanova through any sort of storm. We were wrong, but what ended up happening is what always ends up happening. THE BOOK IS AWESOME!!! I can honestly say it has the best pages I've ever done and some of the craziest scenes Matt's ever written. In the end, that's what really matters.

So, the solicitation number for it is 5960607229-00311 and it shall come out in March, finally! If you haven't already ordered it, WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING???

And I'm hands deep into issue #4 already! Good times! 

Straight to inking

I guess Bá and I weren't the only ones impressed by the link to a 26 page story done in ONE day by this incredible french artist called Boulet. You can check out the story clicking here. It's a funny and nice story on its own, but to think it was done in 26 hours is insane. It's one page per hour.
Poking around the web, I found some videos of the guy drawing, and discovered that he doesn't pencil his pages, going straight to inking. Check it out.
Bá and I got all kinds of excited about this and, during some coffee breaks, we tried out hand at drawing straight with pens. Bá's version in the one with blue pen, mine is the other one, in black.

"Drawing straight with a pen is EASY" is what Bá is saying to me on his drawing.
I don't know if it's easy.
But it sure is fun.

TCAF in May

We've been invited as special guests to TCAF, Toronto Comic Arts Festival, that will take place on May 5th and 6th, at the Toronto Reference Library. Other guests include Jeff Smith (Bone), Alison Bechdel (Fun Home), Kazu Kibuishi (Amulet) and Bryan Lee O'Malley (Scott Pilgrim), among many others (full guest list here).
And they've asked us to do the art fot this year's poster, so we were extremely happy and honored. I hope you've liked it and also hope to see a bunch of people there and have lots of fun.
And let's hope it's not too cold in May.

Inspired by fashion

Fashion week just happened here in São Paulo and I did a sketch inspired by some of the outfits.

Super models.

Cool clothles.

I like it.
Don't you?

Daytripper gets a 5th printing!

Thanks, everyone, for all the love we've been getting for Daytripper. It's beyond our highest dreams.
And all the international editions (Spain, Italy and Brazil already; France, Poland and Denmark on the way) keep adding more excitement to this wonderful party. Once again, thank you!

We're working hard on all our other projects to keep making amazing, challenging comics.

ffff

Self Portrait

The new year is here.
Let's look ahead, and be adventurous.

FCBD Serenity story

That story I did I just wrote about on the last post? It's a Serenity story, written by Zack Whedon, and it will be one of Dark Horse Free Comic Book Day's offerings. Yes, FREE!
The interview I did about it? It here on this link so you can check it out. If you want, you can also check it out what the writer has to say about the story on this other link, and than you'll discover my book will actually be a flipbook, and the flip story is a Star Wars story with Han Solo and Chewbacca! How cool is that?
the month of May can't arrive soon enough.

1. You can see how my thumbnail sketch looks like when I'm showing it to the editors and writers. This is how I get pages aproved.
2. The final panel.

Almost time

My drawing board can almost rest for a few days at this year's end. Bá and I are working on a poster, and then all I have to do is to start planning for 2012.
I just finished a new short story. I already answered an interview about it.
Bá is kicking ass on new Casanova issues, and after that I'll take over once more for the forth arc.
We've been having new ideas, but we know ideas might take a long time till they're stories, so we preffer to wait until we have a book to talk about the book. Ideas are like a girl who smiles at you: you feel warm inside, you feel special, but then it takes a lot of work to win that girl over. Lets first do the work before we introduce anybody to our new "girl".

Still, I think 2012 will be awesome.

Life drawings

Some of the drawings Bá did this year at the live drawing class. Not one took more than 10 minutes, but these range from 1 minute to 5 minutes each.

Matt Fraction in Brazil

It was great to have Matt and Kelly Sue in Brazil, even if only for a little while, and even if we didn't see each other all that much with us having to handle our booth and Matt and Kelly Sue writing and reading and walking around the cool parts of the city.



Back to drawing comics now. These puppies don't get made all by themselves (or, how I would have said to Kelly Sue, "and that's why we have Mario").

Look for this on November 23.

I'll have a new story on the sixth issue on the Dark Horse Presents anthology, out this month. Also, I did the cover, which looks like this:

The two new stories I did this year were for traditional anthologies. One for DHP. The other story, a three pager, I did for a traditional Argentinean anthology which now has a brazilian incarnation.

X-Men in Rio

We've been busy here in Brazil, Daytripper has just been released here and we're having a blast with the "national" response, but I decided to stop by and put these two images up. We're heading for Rio de Janeiro later this week for the Rio Comicon and, since one of the internaitonal guests is long-time-all-star-X-Men-writer Chris Claremont, I took some time to pay tribute to a part of the history of the X-Men, and of comics, which deeply influenced both Bá and I, and I colored these two pieces we made in July as part of the CBLDF that took place in SDCC this year.

We'll meet up with our friends Bob Schreck and Paul Pope while there, as they're also guests of the show (the festival in Rio is amazing), and we'll try to show them a good time, brazilian style.

Floating world of original art.

Last month, the comic book store Floating World hosted, in Portland, an art exhibit of original Casanova art (which you can check out on this link of Matt's release of Casanova: Avaritia #1 on the store), and now it's time to celebrate the release of Habibi, Craig Thompson's new book, and again Floating World will have a great art exhibit of Habibi-inspired pieces of artwork from several artists, and Craig invited both Bá and I to contribute.
We felt honored and pumped up with the challenge and, if you find yourself in Portland this month, don't miss the chance to check out the results. And buy Habibi while you're at it, it's a wonderful book. Casanova: AVARITIA #2 is also out in stores today, so lucky you, Casanovonaut who is craving to know what happens next.

Lots of different stuff and a São Paulo pinup

We've been busy with new projects, lots of drawings and conventions here in Brazil. I'm working on the new CASANOVA: AVARITIA issues, we're adapting a Brazilian novel into a Graphic Novel, we're working on a illustration book and we're also trying to put new ideas together. All that while we tour around the world to spread the love for comics.
Well, this is one of the illustrations I just did for a poster of a concert, a simphony about São Paulo.

Initial sketch was made on a notebook, 3 inches tall.



I don't usually do this, but this time I have printed the sketch bigger and used it as the skeleton for the pencils, just because I liked the composition so much and it would be very hard to get it right on the bigger size artwork. I'm working on a A4 size here, not that big in fact.



Inked version, using Micron and Staedtler pens.



Since I have scanned the pencil, I noticed how nice the paper texture turned out to be and how it would dialogue well with the city. I decided to incorporate that into the final artwork.
The pattern on the sky is a tile pattern typical of São Paulo, with a very clever use of tiles forming the shape of the state.



It's kind of my homage to Katsuhiro Otomo as well. I always loved how his cities are more than just backgrounds and are treated as characters, his light and shadows and the use of zipatone and patterns in the black and white art.

Well... Back to work.