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The Zarjaz, Dogbreath & FQP comics thread

Started by Bolt-01, 25 June, 2016, 08:06:16 AM

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Bolt-01

Processed. I'll have the comic in the post to you tomorrow at the latest.

Many thanks.

IAMTHESYSTEM

Will be slavering with delight at forthcoming thrill factor overload!
"You may live to see man-made horrors beyond your comprehension."

http://artriad.deviantart.com/
― Nikola Tesla

blackmocco

Please forgive me. This turned into a bit of a ramble. There is a point, I promise:

So, I contributed a Nemesis/Comic Rock Presents... strip to the latest issue of Zarjaz. Think it's safe to say I was pretty excited. Kev O'Neill's art and Nemesis quite literally fried my ten year old brain courtesy of prog 224 back in 1981 and has continued to do so ever since. No other artist that inspired me as much. When I saw the world that O'Neill had envisioned, it transformed my drawing habits from a cute little hobby, fishing for compliments from my folks and friends, to a manic obsession. When I was sixteen, I got a job at Don Bluth's studio in Dublin working on Land Before Time (fulfilling my other great obsession: drawing dinosaurs) on the back of the 2000AD art I had created (no doubt horrendous, but I still wish I had kept them). It's almost thirty years later now, I'm sitting in Los Angeles working for Family Guy and there's no doubt in my mind that opening prog 224 all those years ago was the springboard for all of it.

With all that in mind, writing and drawing a Nemesis strip was a daunting and simultaneously exhilarating experience. Nemesis had never been tackled before in Zarjaz and that was intimidating enough ("DON'T FUCK THIS UP!") but on top of that, rumours had always abounded that Nemesis was off-limits as Pat and Kev were apparently quite protective of everyone's favorite demon alien agent of chaos and freedom fighter. Maybe that's all second-hand bollocks. I don't know. They both said yes when I asked them. Maybe no-one had asked them before.

Anyway, the strip got done (once I'd gotten over the mental hurdle and realization that I'm NOT Kev O'Neill, I can't draw like Kev O'Neill, neither can anyone else, therefore please stop worrying about it and have some fun instead) and if I do say so myself, I'm very proud of it. It's dangerously compressed storytelling. Two pages in, I realized my story was too large for a mere twelve pages but I ended up embracing that and just went fucking mad with it instead. Comics are too dragged out these days anyway. 22 pages of talking heads. Fuck that. My only big regret was elaborate chase sequences and fight scenes I'd imagined taking pages to flesh out became mere panels instead. So be it. Pat and Kev probably could have hammered out the same story in five pages and done it infinitely better, but hey. We do what we can with what we have at hand.

The story I wrote involved a vacuous celebrity, a Termight-ian Kendall Jenner-type becoming infatuated with Nemesis and I'd always wanted a panel revealing a scrapbook containing imagery she'd collected from various sources so she could have something to secretly ogle. Anyway, along the way I also managed to pull in some collaborators from artist friends, most of whom had never, sadly, even heard of Nemesis. (Needless to say, that's all changed now.) Thought it might be fun to share some of the contributions on here as this became a little bit of a project.

Here's the opening page:



One of American Dad's character designers, Jeff Rebner:



Family Guy assistant director Mark Covell:



Illustrator Peter Donnelly:



Illustrator and comic artist Neil McClements:



Family Guy character designer Sharon Ross:



Family Guy director Joe Vaux:



And finally, Family Guy director Joseph Lee. Bearing in mind these are all busy people and these images were always going to be pretty small in the strip itself, I beseeched everyone not to spend too much time on them. Then Joseph hands me this. Thanks Joseph. Let me just go home hang myself now.

"...and it was here in this blighted place, he learned to live again."

www.BLACKMOCCO.com
www.BLACKMOCCO.blogspot.com

Dark Jimbo

There is sososo much to love about that post.

Mick, you're a marvel!
@jamesfeistdraws

The Legendary Shark

Speechless.

That clatter you heard was me throwing my laptop away. I simply can't compete. Brilliant story, fabulous art.

It truly ain't called Zarjaz for nothin'!
[move]~~~^~~~~~~~[/move]




blackmocco

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 28 July, 2016, 07:30:51 PM
Speechless.

That clatter you heard was me throwing my laptop away. I simply can't compete. Brilliant story, fabulous art.

It truly ain't called Zarjaz for nothin'!

Well, thankee for the kind words, good sir. However, you should pick up your laptop and start plugging back at it. We need you, Shark! (It IS a great issue though!) Big props to The Dave and The Richmond for pulling it all together and for foolishly and easily capitulating to my prissy the-man-from-LA-demands: A4 and color. Dave even sent me a note with mine telling me this was all my fault! Haha!

And if it makes you feel any better, Shark- the strip's art got the royal thumbs-down from Tharg himself who felt the style doesn't suit the prog's requirements. I kinda suspected that was going to be the case (it's a bit goofy, I'll concede) while also simultaneously hoping that same fact might be the thing to catch his Betelgeusian eye. Nonetheless, we battle on.
"...and it was here in this blighted place, he learned to live again."

www.BLACKMOCCO.com
www.BLACKMOCCO.blogspot.com

IAMTHESYSTEM

ASOLUTELY-FUCKINGLY-AWESOMELY-AWESOME! Just amazing work. Blackmocco-forum salutes you!
"You may live to see man-made horrors beyond your comprehension."

http://artriad.deviantart.com/
― Nikola Tesla

Zarjazzer

Can you be U.S. president blackmocco? Absolutely marvelous stuff from yourself and company chums. :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:
The Justice department has a good re-education programme-it's called five to ten in the cubes.

The Legendary Shark

Thanks Blackmocco. Don't take any notice of Tharg, though - he doesn't know everything.

Hold on... what's that bright light coming out of the skyaaaaaargh!!!
[move]~~~^~~~~~~~[/move]




Colin YNWA

That's all a bit special! 

Good work and a little bit more there Blackmocco.

Bolt-01

I see I've missed a few posts overnight!

Blackmocco, so glad you got chance to share those images at a larger size- do you mind if I post 'em on the Q blog later?

As for the strip- it is one of my fave things we've done in Zarjaz over the ten years we've been in charge. The mix of horror and joy you must have felt as a creator s there on every gruddam page.

Seriously- if any of you out there haven't got a copy of the new Zarjaz, you are a grexnix. We won't be doing an issue like this again for a loong time. All the creators went above and beyond for the cause.

Jim_Campbell

My keyboard appears to be malfunctioning. I am unable to type any comments sufficient to capture the awesomeness of blackmocco's post...!
Stupidly Busy Letterer: Samples. | Blog
Less-Awesome-Artist: Scribbles.

Steve Green


Lobo Baggins

Quote from: blackmocco on 28 July, 2016, 05:23:57 PM
Nemesis had never been tackled before in Zarjaz and that was intimidating enough

Well, technically he's inside of a citadel which is inside of a giant tree which is far in the background of a single panel of the last page of Zarjaz's previous venture into Comic Rock in Zarjaz 23  :D

I was absolutely blown away by the quality of the latest Zarjaz, particularly Blackmocco's tale and Paul Williams' art in the Dredd story, although naturally I'm most pleased to see the ABC Warriors, considering I may have short circuited Bolt 01 and Megabus' sanity circuitry to get it.
The wages of sin are death, but the hours are good and the perks are fantastic.

blackmocco

Quote from: Bolt-01 on 29 July, 2016, 08:47:10 AM
I see I've missed a few posts overnight!

Blackmocco, so glad you got chance to share those images at a larger size- do you mind if I post 'em on the Q blog later?

As for the strip- it is one of my fave things we've done in Zarjaz over the ten years we've been in charge. The mix of horror and joy you must have felt as a creator s there on every gruddam page.

Seriously- if any of you out there haven't got a copy of the new Zarjaz, you are a grexnix. We won't be doing an issue like this again for a loong time. All the creators went above and beyond for the cause.

Yep, go for it, Bolt. No problem.

Lobo, sorry. Had no idea. My Zarjaz collection's a bit spotty!

And yeah, I know I'm a bit biased but it's a very strong issue. Bolt's right. Be a shame if people were thinking because it's small press it's not worth the effort. David Broughton's ABC Warriors is worth the cover price alone. Man's a workhorse. His productivity makes me wail and gnash my teeth.
"...and it was here in this blighted place, he learned to live again."

www.BLACKMOCCO.com
www.BLACKMOCCO.blogspot.com