Finally got around to reading the published version of the interview with me in the latest Meg (thanks Matt). Christ, I can be a whinny bitch sometimes.
Somebody said that reading stuff like this was enough to put them off becoming a comics artist. I really hope that that isn't the case. The thing to realise is that any interview is one writer's interpretation of fragments of a single conversation between two virtual strangers. Unless you are some kind of manipulative, practiced self-publicist who can trot out platitudes at will (Stan Lee), chances are that you will be in a certain frame of mind and attempt to answer the questions as honestly as you can given your mood and feelings at the time. This is just how human beings work. Well, it's how I work. I agree that this sort of interview rarely lives up to expectations. The fact of the matter is that the least eventful part of any cartoonists life, is the part where he/she sits at the drawing board for hour upon hour. Unfortunately, that's the bit that people want to ask about. Personally, I find creator interviews irrelevant. Who gives a flying fuck about Neal Adam's lunatic Earth-formation theories? Who cares what pen tip Mike Mignola uses? Buy a crate load, you still won't draw like him; and if you do, what have you achieved?
It's probably a recurring theme to hear creators state that they feel they are struggling to improve. And, obviously, the repetition makes for tedious reading. But, in my own experience, artists who do think that they are good, usually have very little of lasting value to offer.
Just to clarify. I didn't say anything bad about the use of the word 'cartoony'. I always describe myself to people I meet as a cartoonist and spend a section of this interview defending my more cartoony work as the work that gave me the most enjoyment and attacking those in comics who look down on work of that type.
Also realised (too late to tell Mike), Miranda is a moon of Uranus, not Saturn. By the way, Mike, if you read this, it was a pleasure talking to you.
All the best.
Richard Elson
Somebody said that reading stuff like this was enough to put them off becoming a comics artist. I really hope that that isn't the case. The thing to realise is that any interview is one writer's interpretation of fragments of a single conversation between two virtual strangers. Unless you are some kind of manipulative, practiced self-publicist who can trot out platitudes at will (Stan Lee), chances are that you will be in a certain frame of mind and attempt to answer the questions as honestly as you can given your mood and feelings at the time. This is just how human beings work. Well, it's how I work. I agree that this sort of interview rarely lives up to expectations. The fact of the matter is that the least eventful part of any cartoonists life, is the part where he/she sits at the drawing board for hour upon hour. Unfortunately, that's the bit that people want to ask about. Personally, I find creator interviews irrelevant. Who gives a flying fuck about Neal Adam's lunatic Earth-formation theories? Who cares what pen tip Mike Mignola uses? Buy a crate load, you still won't draw like him; and if you do, what have you achieved?
It's probably a recurring theme to hear creators state that they feel they are struggling to improve. And, obviously, the repetition makes for tedious reading. But, in my own experience, artists who do think that they are good, usually have very little of lasting value to offer.
Just to clarify. I didn't say anything bad about the use of the word 'cartoony'. I always describe myself to people I meet as a cartoonist and spend a section of this interview defending my more cartoony work as the work that gave me the most enjoyment and attacking those in comics who look down on work of that type.
Also realised (too late to tell Mike), Miranda is a moon of Uranus, not Saturn. By the way, Mike, if you read this, it was a pleasure talking to you.
All the best.
Richard Elson