"Greetings Dear Reader, Fellow Student Of The Arcane Such As You Must Be. You Have Selected This Guide

"Tales from Aeaea" is a 28-page collection of stories about the various citizens of Aeaea, the isle of Circe, goddess of magic. Centuries ago, Aeaea, the isle to which Circe was exiled, was a place imbued with her magic, and docile lions and bears roamed its woods. "Tales from Aeaea" is set in a universe in which Circe was celebrated, rather than scorned, and she embraced her exile, making the isle flourish. Its citizens are students of magic, world-spanning sailors, and many are descendants of the isle's enchanted animals of old.

Here's a sneak peak of a couple pages from Saturn and Egon's story (who you might remember from my previous zine, "Warlow's Guide to Wizards, Sorceri and Familiars Arcane", a sort-of prequel).

"Tales from Aeaea" will premier at the Small Press Expo, September 13 & 14. Come see me there, and stay tuned for more updates!

Hey there, jewel eyes. I made new Loot bags for you...

Printed by the fine fellows at Pizza Party. $15, available at SPX. 

"I'll shove that bat up your ass and turn you into a popsicle."

The Warriors. is. my. favorite. movie. of. all. time.

This is my tshirt design for another Pizza Party Printing movie night at the Ottobar here in Baltimore. On Sunday, April 28th, they'll be presenting the best movie of all time, The Warriors, along with another best movie of all time, The Road Warrior so you'd best soldier over to this one. Admission (and pizza) is free as always, and BASEBALL TEES of my design as well as regular tees of Jimmy Giegerich's utterly rad Road Warrior shirt will be on sale. SO...

Come out to playy-ayyy!

Cthulhu Fhtagn!

For Trevor Henderson's upcoming grim and dreadful H.P. Lovecraft zine "Puffed Shoggoths", which has incredible line up of artists including Trevor himself, Jimmy Giegerich and Jon Vermilyea. You can find out more about the zine here.

With Halloween on it's way, I figure I'll tie this little story into the piece: this illustration is based on an intense fear I experienced on the one and only cruise I'll ever take in my life. I was on the deck one night, in the middle of the Atlantic; it was cloudy and a new moon so no light whatsoever came from the sky. I remember looking out past the railings and seeing the lights from the boat just end only a few feet out at the most charcoal-deep blackness I've ever seen. It was such a profoundly dark and completely unbroken void that it just seemed to swallow everything. As if the ship had sailed into a black hole, there was just nothing in every direction. I remember finding my back to the wall of the ship before I even knew I'd moved and just filling up with the most instinctual fear and dread. There could have been a colossal eye staring at me in the dark and I wouldn't have been any more disturbed than I was in that moment. 

"When you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you," apparently...according to some guy... 

So in true Lovecraftian style, I let the dread take over and this is the result! Stay tuned to Trevor's tumblr for news on the "Puffed Shoggoths" zine.

sk8rs (Taken with instagram)

I got NOBROW 6 in the mail the other day and it is awesome to see it in person. I cannot believe how much talent is packed into this thing! It's really a gorgeous book, and everyone should grab a copy.

Queen Emeraldas.

SPX COMETH!

Check this oouuuuttt...

Here's "Ugs, Fugs and Grossos", 28 pages of ug-ass mugs, fug-ass fugs, and gross-ass grossos; and "Executioner and Friend", dungeons, dragons, and dick jokes, each by Jimmy Giegerich.

"Heroical #1" is an 11" X 14" zine by David Plunkert chock full of weirdo super hero stuff, and playfully off-beat heros.

The very exciting "Fantasy Basketball" by Sam Bosma will be in the mix as well and it's sure to be mind-blowingly good.

Alex Fine is debuting "Il Bruto", a hilarious collection of Charles Bronson pin ups in classic action movie rolls.

"Warlow's Guide to Wizards, Sorceri & Familiars Arcane" by yours truly will be there of course!

Two new comics from Haleigh Buck of Hey Boy Comics will be debuting as well: "Herman the Hot Dog" and "Internet Diarrhea", sure to be goofy-as-hell, wildly inappropriate, and full of schadenfreude.

Last but not least, Kali Ciesemier will be selling some gorgeous prints of her work that are not to be missed!

That's what we got for you guys! Come to tables M5-M8 to get your hands on it all! We'll see you there, pals.

Gouache Process

There have been a lot of very kind responses to my gouache paintings recently, as well as a few requests for tips, and so I've decided to do up a little process post.  I'm very flattered, and a little intimidated!  So, please bear with me as I expose all my clumsy painting techniques.  I should say that though I was taught the basics of gouache painting and dry-brushing, I took those and sorta ran off with my own methods, and they may not be the best way of working!  Like any artist, I'm always adjusting my process.  No doubt my next painting will be created completely differently, but at this point, this is what I do:

So here are my gouache tubes, disposable palettes, and palette knife (and juice!).  I don't know if many people use a palette knife when mixing gouache, but I like to so that I can preserve my brushes just a little more.  I also save all my palettes throughout each piece, and I've found that I can reuse the gouache pretty easily even on these disposable ones so long as you're patient enough to scrape and break up the dried bits with your knife and water.  I've never liked using porcelain or ceramic plates for my palettes, even though they are easier for reusing your dried gouache, only because I run out of space too quickly when I'm mixing and I can't save my colors.

Starting from the beginning!  I always try to preserve as much of the energy of my sketches as I can when I pencil out my piece so I'll usually blow them up and light-table them.  Our light table has become a hugely valuable tool when I paint.  It's homemade!  I hate to pencil directly onto the nice paper I'll be painting on, so I'll usually work over the pencils on the light table, like so:

If you think about it digitally, I typically treat this part like it's all about laying in the flats.  I'm going to have a relatively dark background, so I'll paint that in last so my lighter colors don't pick it up and get all blotchy from the retouching that would have been required in that case.

I can't ever leave that light table on and step away! Doesn't that look scary with that jar of water, and the table a little askew, and my laptop right there..........? 

No harm done!  My cat is dainty, and I'm lucky. 

So I've gotten most of my girl painted in and I've already started dry-brushing on parts.  Usually most of that detail work I'll save till the end, but in some cases it helps to do it before hand.  For instance, layering her dress over the dry-brushing I did on her arm (as you can see in the last photo) helps keep things crisp.

Starting on the background, I'm using this as an opportunity to smooth her shape out a bit and clean up any wayward brushstrokes.

It's almost there!  Now I get to dry brush!  The absolute best part.  Plus! I can abandon the light table now and just go to town adding details and cleaning things up.  This is where I go back to my palettes and reuse a lot of my gouache.  I've made the mistake of mixing too little at the beginning and only realizing it at this step and that is no fun!  Gouache can be finicky with color matching, so I try to avoid remixing a color from scratch at this point because of that.  Also, different colors may dry darker or lighter than when they're wet, which may depend on the brand you're buying.  I use Winsor & Newton and Daler Rowney (cheaper!).  Some colors work better per brand in my experience.  For instance, I hate Daler Rowney's yellow ocher.  It always dries in the tube on me and has a weird semigloss, whereas Winsor & Newton's is great.  Conversely, I've found Winsor & Newton's turquoise blue to be super oily, like, oil with some blue in it.

Anyway, heading towards the finish...

There she is!  All done.  I've added my line work for the little firework sparks, and dry-brushing the light and shadow has carried it home.  I hope this has been neat and informative.  If you want to talk more gouache techniques or what not with me, feel free to ask!  Thanks again for all the encouragement, guys!

Trick or treat! (:

smell my feet!