I’ll be a GUEST at GallifreyOne 2014

I had a great time at Gallifrey One this past February, so I couldn’t be more delighted to announce that I’ll be returning in 2014 as a Guest of the convention! 2013 may be the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who, but 2014 is the 25th Anniversary of the world’s largest and longest-running annual Doctor Who convention.

Gallifrey One: 25 Glorious Years will be held February 14-16 2014 at the Los Angeles Airport Mariott Hotel. I’m excited to be joining the already-impressive slate of guests they’ve announced for 2014, including Colin Baker (The Sixth Doctor), Katy manning (Jo Grant), John Levine (Sgt. Benton), Richard Franklin (Sgt. Mike Yates), Frazer Hines (Jamie McCrimmon), Paul Cornell (Writer, “Human Nature”), Gary Russell (Novelist/Script Editor) and MORE!

I’ll be announcing what panels and signings I’ll be doing with the convention gets closer, but in the mean time I’ll have to see how many new Doctor Who prints I can get done by then!

You can always read up on all my planned convention appearances for the coming year on my Appearances Page!

Title Pages: The Batman Strikes #19

It’s time for another installment of Title Pages, featuring another title page from my run on The Batman Strikes! which was a tie-in comic for The Batman animated TV series. A Title Page is the page which features the story title and credits for the issue, and is often (but not always) a Splash Page, which is a full-page image, rather than a page broken up into multiple panels.

A classic comic book Grundy

Grundy as seen in The Batman

The De Niro Frankenstein monster

I wish the effect of Batman caught in the beam of the flashlight hadn’t been colored with such a sharply-defined cone of light coming from the flashlight. It’s not a realistic effect and it detracts from the effect of the area caught in the beam popping out from a background that’s otherwise in silhouette.

And while it has nothing whatsoever to do with the Title Page, I can’t blog about this issue without including my favorite page from the issue, and one of my favorite from the entire series.

Origin Story: Kid Flash from Young Justice #5

I posted this on Tumblr a few days ago and at got a good response there, so I thought I’d do a slightly expanded version here.

This is Kid Flash’s origin as told by the Kid himself (aka Wally West) in Young Justice #5. Furthermore, it’s a comparison of my pencil art with the digital inks and the final print version.

Script by Art Baltazar and Franco Aureliani
Pencils by Christopher Jones
Inks by Dan Davis
Colors by Zac Atkinson
Letters by Carlos M. Mangual

This comic was scripted by Art and Franco, but the versions of the origin stories presented in it were based on Young Justice continuity as developed for the TV show by Greg Weisman and the other writers. This was my first issue drawing Young Justice, and I was still trying to master the nuances of the character designs. Complicating matters was trying to draw the characters a year or two younger in flashbacks! Let’s dive in!

This issue featured members of the newly-formed team going on a camping trip together and getting to know more about each-other as they tell (origin) stories around the campfire. Aqualad’s story about becoming the protege to Aquaman was just wrapping up as we get to Kid Flash. Wally’s story starts with the origin of the original Flash Jay Garrick, so I got to draw Central City in the 1940s. The “Lampert” Building seen in that panel is a reference to Harry Lampert, artist and co-creator of The Flash with writer Gardner Fox. I love throwing in references like that!

Here we see a young Barry Allen meeting Jay Garrick and getting his autograph on a copy of the Golden Age Flash #1 before becoming the second incarnation of The Flash. I drew a simplified version of the Flash #1 cover art and composited it into the artwork in Photoshop so I could get greater detail than I could have done in the raw pencils.

This page is a good example of leaving room in the artwork for the lettering that is to be placed later. Panel 4 is the simple version – the shot is tight enough on Barry Allen that it didn’t need a background, so I just left enough space to the side of him that the lettering would fit without covering Barry up. But check out Panel 2 right above it.  There’s a whole bunch of background that gets covered up by the fairly large amount of text in that panel. But none of it was important. You just needed to see enough to know you were in a bedroom next to an open closet. All the important stuff (Wally, the open case with Barry’s notebooks) is at the bottom of the panel, with lots of vertical lines in perspective leading your eye down to it.

I remember enjoying drawing the makeshift laboratory in Wally’s parents’ garage. I tried to make it feel kind of ramshackle, with equipment that like it would have been more at home in a high-school chemistry class than a high-tech lab.

Those are Wally’s parents on the left in Panel 2, who appeared in the TV show, but who I didn’t yet have reference for when I drew this. On the right is Iris and Barry Allen. Barry’s hair is getting a little orange here, rather than his usual blonde buzz-cut. Maybe he’s been hanging out with Wally too much…

And finally we see Wally somewhat reluctantly accepted as Barry’s sidekick, Kid Flash.

If you’d like to see more sequences broken down this way, let me know!

Gallifrey One 2013 – Part 3 of 4 (The Young Justice Meetup)

Continuing my report on my trip to the Gallifrey One convention, and what an adventure it was…

SATURDAY (Part 2)

In case you’re just joining us, I had traveled to Los Angeles to attend the Gallifrey One Sci-Fi convention that was celebrating the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who, and catching up with various Los Angeles area friends. I’d had plans to have a rare in-person meet-up with my Young Justice collaborator Greg Weisman on Friday for lunch, but a longer-than-hoped-for set-up at the Gallifrey One art show meant I didn’t have time to get across town to Greg’s office and the meeting didn’t happen.

With the help of Hal (aka ChristopherJonesWebMinion on tumblr), I had been organizing a meet-up for Young Justice fans at Gallifrey One for Saturday evening in the lobby of the convention hotel. When I told Greg about it, Greg said he was in, but he wanted his presence to be a secret surprise. So now it looked like I was going to see Greg after all, but instead of a quiet lunch it would be along with an undetermined number of unsuspecting Young Justice fans. All during the convention I’d been plugging the meet-up at panels and when talking to anyone who expressed any interest in the show or my comics work. Now I was pushing it even harder, but I couldn’t mention it’s biggest selling point. A lot of language along the lines of “you don’t want to miss it” and “we’ll have surprises” was used.

During the afternoon, Hal had disappeared to retreat to the hotel room and change into her Novice Hame cat nurse costume from Doctor Who. Given the make-up involved, this takes a while, although not as long as you might think, given that it’s basically a process of attaching and blending a 1-piece mask. She and I met up in the lobby in time to start gathering the troops for the meet-up.

Hal as Novice Hame
Photo by Teh Curmudgeon

The lobby was crowded with Gallifrey One attendees chatting and milling about, so when I spotted a chair in the corner that was opening up I pounced on it, figuring I could plant myself there and hold court as a hopefully respectably-sized gathering of Young Justice fans gathered. I had fashioned a makeshift “Young Justice Meet-up” sign earlier in the hotel room, and as the first YJ fans gathered Hal took to holding it so it could be better seen – so we had Novice Hame from Doctor Who promoting our Young Justice gathering!

And gather they did. The fans seemed as happy to gather with other Young Justice fans as to talk me, I think, which was fine. I think a couple may have stopped by and left, but our group had grown to about a dozen when I spotted Greg standing at the back of the group. I introduced Greg to the assembled group and just stepped forward, made his way into the corner behind me and the two of us (mostly Greg) held court for the next hour. It was all very low-key and rather informal, which I think was part of its charm. I had a great time and I think the meet-up proved to be a weekend highlight for a lot of the Young Justice fans who managed to make it there. More fans attended than stuck around for the picture below, but 0negirlarmy was good enough to supply a some of the photos she took of the event, as her camera was doing better under the lighting conditions than mine. 0negirlarmy, by the way, wasn’t even attending Gallifrey One. She was local to the area and when she saw the event mentioned on Tumblr, drove across town to be there! Hopefully she found it worth the effort!

Greg and me in the corner Photo by 0negirlarmy

The Young Justice Meet-up – Gallifrey One 2013. That’s me holding the sign and Greg in the blue shirt taking a knee.

Greg and I with Greg’s gift.

Afterwards, Greg, Hal and I were joined by my friends Mike and Alicia for dinner in one of the hotel restaurants. It was a great opportunity to for Greg and I to talk shop, reflect on the last year and a half on the Young Justice comic, and share stories. All this was while Hal was still in full Novice Hame garb, which posed a problem when she wanted to order a beer and got carded. When we were leaving the restaurant, some of the staff stopped Hal to get photos. Even with all the crazy costumes at the convention, it’s not every day a cat nurse dines in your establishment!

Eventually Greg had to run and the rest of us soon called it a night. The Young Justice meet-up had been a grand success, and soon it would be time for the final day of Gallifrey One 2013!

NEXT: SUNDAY

You can find all the installments of my Gallifrey One 2013 trip by clicking the link.

Gallifrey One 2013 – Part 2 of 4

Continuing my report on my trip to the Gallifrey One convention, and what an adventure it was…

SATURDAY (Part 1)

Before even leaving the hotel room on Saturday morning I managed to get in touch with Greg Weisman (my Young Justice comic collaborator, co-producer and writer for the Young Justice TV show), principally to apologize for not having been able to exit the hotel in time to make it to our planned lunch meet-up the day before. I told him about the Young Justice fan meet-up I was organizing in the lobby of the Gallifrey One hotel that evening with the help of Hal (aka ChristopherJonesWebMinion on tumblr), and to my surprise, Greg seemed interested in turning up for it! He needed to check on his schedule, but made it clear that if he was going to attend, he’d want his presence to be a secret surprise. I wouldn’t have had it any other way!

Inspector Spacetime Panel – Photo by Alex Halcyon

First up, I attended the (Not) Inspector Spacetime Panel, which was a lot of fun. Character was dropped much more than last year’s panel, and there was tons of behind-the-scenes news about the production of Untitled Web Series About A Space Traveler Who Can Also Travel Through Time Season 1, and the upcoming Season 2. You can read lots more about that panel here. I arrived at the panel first while Hal finished changing into her Greendale Human Being cosplay, which seemed appropriate for the panel, given the Inspector and the Human Being’s shared origins on NBC’s Community. Later in the day we got a photo of the Hal’s Human Being emerging from the TARDIS, looking very much like a Hartnell-era monster.

Hal as the Greendale Human Being in the TARDIS

Immediately after the Inspector Spacetime panel was my second panel of the convention, Superheroes as Popular Culture. Lots of good discussion from a panel of heavy hitters I was lucky enough to join! After the panel, Marv Wolfman and I grabbed a quick lunch at the hotel. I’ve known Marv since he was a guest at CONvergence 2005, and it was great to catch up and talk shop 1-on-1.

Superheroes as Pop Culture (L to R: Len Wein, Christopher Jones, Sterling Gates, Marv Wolfman, Joshua Fialkov)

There was a little bit of time to sightsee after that. There are always lots of fun people and great costumes on display at Gallifrey One. I tried to get into the Sylverster McCoy interview panel, but it was standing room only. I managed to get into the room and was standing along the wall near the door when the irripressable McCoy hopped down off the stage to take the microphone into the audience to talk to people one-on-one. A camera followed, so it was possible to see McCoy on the screens at the front of the auditorium, but at this point it wasn’t too different from watching McCoy on video. It was about this time that I got a text message from Brittney Powell who I’d met on Thursday while at dinner with Wally Wingert. She was at the convention and was wondering if I was around. I ducked out of the room to respond to her and let her know where I could be found, which led to one of the best chains of impromptu people spotting and networking I had the entire weekend!

A Dalek taking in the view photo by Jason Musgreave

Weeping Angel cosplay photo by Amanda Winter

Robot cosplay photo by Drew Simchik

While standing outside the Programming Room, in the span of about a half-hour I managed to talk to:

Shaun Lyon, Programming Director for Gallifrey One (Who I’d been trying and failing to find and connect with all weekend)
Brittney Powell, Lovely lady and actress (She turned up after a few minutes, and she kept running into people SHE knew while we stood in the hall)
Sterling Gates, Comic book writer (I’d been on a panel with Sterling earlier in the day, but we’d not had a chance to chat)
Bridget Landry, JPL Rocket Scientist and Master-Level Costumer (dressed as Doctor Who‘s Harriet Jones – yes, I knew who she was!)
And many more!

Bridget Landry as Harriet Jones
Photo by Susan Fox

Soon it was almost time for the planned Young Justice meet-up in the lobby.

Would our gathering have a decent turn-out? Would Greg Weisman appear?  Would our Young Justice Meet-up signage be held by a cosplay Cat Nurse?

These questions and more will be answered in our next installment!

NEXT: SATURDAY PART DEUX

You can find all the installments of my Gallifrey One 2013 trip by clicking the link.