2012 Glyph Comics Awards Nominee: Marty's Diner nominated for Best Comic Strip or Webcomic!

Well, this is quite a surprise, given that Marty's Diner has been canceled since last May. But I'll never turn down some comic love from the East Coast Black Age of Comics. The webcomic's up for the same category as last year, however it is one of only THREE nominees. Plus, Keith Knight isn't nominated, so I'm SUPER lucky. Thanks to the jury who voted.

Mindful Metropolis Magazine

First magazine cover I've done. Thanks to editor James Faber. Link to site here.

Prefix Magazine: Velvet Underground's I'm Waiting For The Man

It's been a while (about 9 months!) since I made a new illustration for Prefix.

Coupled with other projects, professional and personal,

this one took unusually long for me to finish.

It started with deciding exactly what to show.

Since the song is very realistic in depicting a secret drug deal,

I approached the illo as a snapshot of that deal.

Now getting the right snapshot was the major hurdle,

which took me a lot of thumbnailing and sketching to get to.

Nothing really clicked until I started thinking less about the deal

and more about the environment in which the song takes places.

"Waiting" finds singer Lou Reed in the middle of Harlem (Lexington and 125th)

looking for the drug dealer who is "dressed in black."

If you're familiar with the VU's music, they make songs about people on the fringes of society:

drug dealers, users, prostitutes, trannies etc.

And absorbing the sonic qualities of the song, I wanted the illo to focus 

on the seediness and claustrophobia of the song's milieu.

The thumbnail below with the star is what I eventually end up with.

All in all, I believe I did alright.

Hopefully, I can illustrate more songs in the future.

Shout out to Prefix founder Dave Park for letting me do this project. =)

Magazine Illustration – Culture: the word on cheese

I got my free copy of the Spring issue in the mail a few days ago.
I did an illustration on a story regarding the FDA's harsh inspections of small-scale cheesemakers.
Also made a spot illo. for the article.

Shout out to art director Hilary Miller for this fun assignment.

Marty's Diner Nominated at Glyph Comics Awards!!!

Big news coming from The East Coast Black Age of Comics Convention!
Their annual Glyph Comics Awards have announced the nominees for 2011
and Marty's Diner scored for Best Comic Strip or Webcomic.

I'm so honored to be included with other great cartoonists like Jay Potts of World of Hurt and Keith Knight of The K Chronicles.

The convention and awards ceremony starts May 20-21 2011
in Philadelphia.

Woo-hoo!!!

The Texas Observer: Deportation Madness

Hey all!

Meant to put this up a while ago.

Been busy working on Sept comics for Marty's Diner at USARiseUp.

Anyway, this was one of the wildest gigs I've gotten.

Texas Observer wanted me to illustrate an article on a recent court ruling that allowed illegal immigrants to stay in the US if they get drug possession charges. The editors wanted to riff on old b-movie posters like that of Reefer Madness. 

At first, the editors liked my original idea of zombies jumping the border fence and smoking weed. And they let me 

go all the way to a finished illustration:

The wonderful art director Kate Iltis loved it and the editors did too. But.....once the editor took a deep look at the finished concept, he had second thoughts. I guess he thought it was a little too over-the-top and maybe a little racially insensitive, losing the subtler nuances in the article. So I ended up making a new version closer to the Reefer Madness idea:

All in all, it was a fun (paid!) assignment, and I got to make a cool poster.

If anybody wants prints of either illustration to hang in their rooms,

Holla at frotoon@gmail.com

Later!

Frotoon #4!

Well, at long last it's finished!
Sorry it took so long.
It's been quite an interesting 2 years since #3.
All kinds of drama–global, personal, and economic–factor into the delay.
That being said, I feel this might be the LAST issue of Frotoon.
I'm not sure, but I know that I have many other projects I'm pursuing at the moment and may not have time like I used to for making minicomics.
We'll see. In the meantime, enjoy the front cover.
If anyone wants to purchase an advanced copy, email me at frotoon@gmail.com