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Archive for ‘February 27th, 2009’
3 results.
The Contingent #1, created by Zack Kruse and Cameron Merkler, written by Zack Kruse, art by Zue, published by Mind Storm, (c) 2008
Reviewed by Benita Story http://johnnysaturn.com — www.basicallybenita.com
The story of The Contingent begins in Bolivia with the birth of a baby boy, resulting in the death of his mother. Jump forward 15 years later and this now teenage boy is playing soccer with others in what appears to be a very poverty stricken village. The arrival of two people from America change this boy’s life forever.
The art in this book is more polished that what you see in the majority of indy-comics, the coloring is top-notch, the writing clean and concise. But, unfortunately, the story itself is a rather blatant copy of Marvel/X-Men/Xavier School for the Gifted down to a girl with Cyclops powers, kids who can fly, levitate, make fire, etc. It would have been better for the writer to continue practicing his art in private until he was able to come up with a story line that was original. Taking an already well established idea and writing an already familiar story based on that is not truly creating as much as it is recreating, and the X-Men are far too popular for this story to seem other than what it is.
That being said, I do hope the writer and creators of this book continue to work. When they do come up with an original story idea, I will be happy to read it because there is talent here. Unfortunately, this story line has already been done to death by one of the big comic book companies.
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Hi, Folks:
Item: Today, I watched the movie Ultraviolet with the oh-so-impressive looking Milla Jovovich. From reviews I read, and from previews I’d seen, I expected very little from this film. As it turns out, it’s not great cinema, and some of the special effects were downright jarringly fake. Still, the sets and costumes were pretty damn amazing, and the martial arts were strikingly original. I’ve seen a lot of these films, and this was the most original use of martial arts I’d seen since the first Matrix movie. The tracking shot from pair of glasses to pair of glasses and back (with a bullet) was very impressive, for example. Should you bother to watch it? If you want some eye-candy, sure. If you want a deep plot and nuanced acting, no.
Item: There’s an online, or downloadable flash application called The Grimace Project, and it is a fascinating tool for coming up with facial expressions. There is an almost limitless combination of emotions you can put into play, such as combinations of joy and anger, or disgust and fear, etc. I downloaded this little app, but now I doubt I’ll ever use it. I too have a high tech way of getting exact expressions and emotions worked out, and I keep this tool near my drawing board: It’s called a mirror. I act out the expression I need, and then I apply it my drawings. This works pretty well for me.
Item: I mentioned in an earlier blog that I have been listening to the Crosby, Stills, and Nash boxed set. Nobody harmonizes like these guys. Well, I bring this up, because I’ve never been sure how I feel about Graham Nash’s music. A lot of it seems too light and sticky sweet to me, to be honest. Yet, among the four mega-talented songwriters in this group, Nash can sometimes write some intensely powerful, hard-hitting songs. I guess I should have been far more forgiving of him, because my favorite artists often produce grade B or C songs, but when the grade A ones come along, watch out! I can’t remember most of the songs on Neil Young’s “Stars & Bars” album, but then there’s “Like A Hurricane,” one of the great romantic guitar explorations of all time.
Item: Yeah, I mention music pretty often here. That’s because my heroes have almost always been musicians. In another world, an alternate life perhaps, I could have been a well-known musician myself. That’s not a path I pursued. I love playing music, but I’m not all that gifted at it. I started too late in life, I suspect. I have just enough experience to appreciate greatness in others.
Item: I’ve changed up my inking game lately. I’ve been doing all my line work with Windsor & Newton Series 7 no. 1 brush, and .1 and .05 technical markers. When you live with your lines day by day like I do, then the quality of your inks is a big deal. My answer was to turn to finer tools and get much more exacting with my lines.
Item: Free fonts! They’re so pretty! Plus, they’re free!
Item: I have a gallery on ImagineFX now. Check it out, and then hire me to draw and paint your next cover. Over the years, I’ve done CD covers, tabletop role-playing covers and interiors, novel covers, and lots of other stuff
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