MoCCA 2008: Liz Baillie

Shown above is Liz Baillie at MoCCA 2008 — she’s one of our favorites here at fanboy.com: Indie comic book critic Jenny Gonzalez praised her as a breakout cartoonist for her work on My Brain Hurts:

P.S. Have you ever noticed that only cool people wear Black Flag t-shirts?

MoCCA 2008: Kensuke Okabayashi

Shown above is Kensuke Okabayashi at MoCCA 2008, he’s the author and the artist behind the book Manga For Dummies:

MoCCA 2008: Trio Magnus

At MoCCA I came across Trio Magnus, a nice looking publication by Aaron Leighton, Clayton Hanmer, and Steve Wilson. The artwork in the book is a cross between comic art, illustration and fine art:

Below are two of the authors at MoCCA 2008 (Clayton Hanmer is on the right):

Read more…

MoCCA 2008: Clayton Hanmer

Shown above is Clayton Hanmer at MoCCA 2008, below is an example of wonderful whimsical style:

MoCCA 2008: Lance Hansen

Shown above is Lance Hansen at MoCCA 2008. In his hand is a copy of Hayseed no. 1 which is his collection of short and humorous comics:

MoCCA 2008: Damian McKeoun

Shown above is Damian McKeoun at MoCCA 2008, below is an example of work:

MoCCA 2008: Alisa Harris

Shown above is Alisa Harris at MoCCA 2008. In addition to her comic book work she’s also an animator and illustrator — below is a sample of her work:

MoCCA 2008: Jeff Mumm, Steve Seck and Sara Lindo

Shown above are comic artists Jeff Mumm, Steve Seck and Sara Lindo at MoCCA 2008 showing off their books.

MoCCA 2008: Boston Comics Roundtable

Shown above is the crew behind Boston Comics Roundtable at MoCCA 2008, they were showing of their comics anthology Inbound #1:

MoCCA 2008: Alex Kim

Above is Alex Kim at MoCCA 2008 showing off a copy of his comic book Wall City:

MoCCA 2008: Jim Campbell

Above is Jim Campbell at MoCCA 2008. In addition to his comic and illustration work Jim is in two bands: Paper Fleet and The Ottomen Empire. Below is issue #2 of his comic book Krachmacher:

MoCCA 2008: Erik Falk

Shown above is Erik Falk from Jippi Comics at MoCCA 2008. Erik was showing me a few issues of Angst – The Best of Norwegian Comics which just looked amazing. Below is a detail from a cover illustration:

MoCCA 2008: Aapo Rapi

Shown above is Aapo Rapi (who is from Finland) at MoCCA 2008. He’s reading the Spring 2008 issue of Kuti which is an amazing 24 page tabloid color newspaper which is a colorful collection of Swedish and Finnish comics:

MoCCA 2008: Lars Jakobsen

Shown above is Lars Jakobsen at MoCCA 2008. Lars travelled all the way from Denmark to attend the show, below is a sample of his work:

MoCCA 2008: Keith McCleary

Shown above is Keith McCleary at MoCCA 2008. McCleary is the writer and illustrator behind Killing Tree Quarterly shown below:

MoCCA 2008: A Video Review

Above is my video review of the MoCCA Art Festival 2008 which is being held at the Puck Building in New York City this weekend. I only got to spend a few hours running around, but I have to say that this is one of my favorite shows of the year. Firstly the profits go to support The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art, but secondly going to the event is like getting into the best art school in the world — only it’s crammed with nothing but comic book majors! This year I was able to meet people from every place from Norway to less exotic Vermont. The creativity on display would put some museums here in Manhattan to shame, and yet most of the folks in the scene aren’t doing it for money (although they may be trying).

Lolita and Maid Fashion Day

I just got back from Lolita and Maid Fashion Day which is being held at the Kinokuniya book store here in New York City. The event was held today to celebrate International Lolita Day and it was very relaxing and low key. I’m about to run off to cover the MoCCA Art Festival next, but here are some photos to give you a taste:

Read more…

The Girl From U.N.C.L.E. Comic Book

It’s funny I’ve heard of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. but I never heard of The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. until I came across the above comic book cover which was found by digital archivist Frederick Barr. I did some research and it seems the spin off-series lasted for one season from 1966 until 1967 when it was cancelled due to low ratings. The show starred Stefanie Powers who would later find fame as the lead in Hart to Hart in 1979.

Below are some other covers from publisher Gold Key:

Read more…

Joker Comics: Starring your Laff Favorites

Shown above is the cover from Joker Comics #24 which was published in August 1947 by Timely Comics (just a little over sixty years ago!). By the way Timely Comics is still in business today, they would go on to evolve into a company called Atlas Comics which would then go on to become Marvel Comics.

Found via Jello Kitty who is based out of Dallas, Texas, USA! Check out his Flickr page here…

ComicMix Online Reader Upgrade

The crew at ComicMix just did a nice job of upgrading their online comic book reader. As a usability geek I like what they’ve done — it’s a hard task to bring print to the web and the new interface helps to bridge that gap. I also love the range of titles that the site has been adding since they launched, shown below is a sample of The Adventures of Simone & Ajax: The Case of the Maltese Duck:

The Hakone Toy Museum

There’s something wonderful about the sense of both scale and chaos in this photograph of the Hakone Toy Museum in Japan.

Photographed by Louise who lives in London and has two cool blogs: Louise makes stuff and hole punch.

Gay Dalek

I always wondered why the cast of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy never rescued a fanboy living in Mom’s basement? Although this Dr. Who cartoon by Darryl Cunningham shows what the results may have looked like.

Back to the Future: Own a Flux Capacitor

As much as I hate Huey Lewis he must have been on to something as it’s now over 20 years later and I still can’t get the theme song from Back to the Future out of my head. Of course the film was a true classic — in fact I may be wrong but I recall another blogger Twittering how that was his favorite film of all time. And I have to say I count myself as a fanboy of that film, so if you’re like me here is a chance to own your very own Flux Capacitor:

Flux Capacitor Replica

“You’ll have to pump in your own 1.21 gigawatts (pronounced and written in the script as “jigowatts,” which was the accepted pronunciation at the time) to actually travel in time – and that’s up to you. Or you can be content to just pop in 3 AA’s and use the two knobs to adjust the lights. One adjusts the sequential lights behind the temporal firing pins and the other adjusts the flash unit in the middle where the spark of chrono-spacial displacement occurs. Details down to the warning messages from Doc Brown stuck to the front door will awe anyone who sees it.”

Read more…

Jim Henson on the Making of Dark Crystal

I love watching this footage — it’s so sad that Jim Henson passed away so early in 1990. Henson could have gone on making Muppet films forever, but in 1982 he took a real chance and directed Dark Crystal which was so different than anything else at the time. The amount of faith it must have taken to think that puppets could sustain a serious film for over an hour. It’s because of Henson that the way was paved for someone like Tim Burton to make The Nightmare Before Christmas.

Video by Ira Gallen.