The Official Blog of Craig A. Taillefer: News, Art, Comics, Music, Ramblings, and more!
I’m getting ready to head out to the Museum of Civilization in Gatineau. For the next 4 days I will be a guest of the 9th Rendez-Vous International de la BD de Gatineau.
I’ll be at the Festival doing signings, live drawing presentations, and a few other events. I also have an exhibition in the gallery section. About 30 pieces of original art will be on display, so drop on by. It’s FREE.
The full press kit follows the cut.
It’s a wet and gray first day of October. Which is on par for the rest of the non-summer we have had here in Ottawa. Not that I would have had time to take advantage any nice weather had we had it, mind you. The hammock hung empty, and the garden lay untended for much of the summer.
Since early May I’ve been drawing storyboards for TV cartoons, which has kept me pretty busy. I took a two week road trip/ vacation in July, but I didn’t reduce my workload so I ended up working compressed hours for three weeks before and three weeks after to allow me the time off.
Storyboards is a new-ish venture for me. I did a handful at the beginning of my time in animation, but shifted into key animation and then character design. I honestly didn’t think I had what it took to do them, but I was looking around for work in animation over the winter, and there wasn’t much available I was qualified for, so when the opportunity to do boards came up I took the plunge. It’s not the easiest work I’ve ever done, but I really enjoyed the first show I worked on, and I’m beginning to get the hang of it, slowly but surely.
The end result is that I haven’t had the time for any comic work for the past five months. I’ve spent the odd hour here or there, when I needed a break, working on pencils for Chapter 7 of Wahoo Morris, though the final pages of Chapter 6 still need a few odds and ends before they are finished.
I finish up my current storyboard in two weeks, then, who knows? I have a few leads, and a few potential projects, but nothing definite for a few months. If I can, I will finish up what I can of Wahoo Morris before the next contract starts, whatever and whenever that will be.
A page from the old digital sketchbook. A character design for a short story that’s sitting in the queue of projects waiting for the time to draw them.
The product desription goes something like this: Over 80 of the best creators from every style and genre have contributed over 50 stories to this anthology featuring tales inspired by the songs of multi-platinum recording artist, Tori Amos! Featuring an introduction by Neil Gaiman and an extensive roster of talent, Comic Book Tattoo encapsulates the breadth, depth, and beauty of modern comics in this coffee table format book.
Full list of contributors include: David Mack, Josh Hechinger, Matthew Humphreys, Jonathan Tsuei, Eric Canete, Jason Horn, Dean Trippe, Sara Ryan, Jonathan Case, Rantz A. Hoseley, James Stokoe, Tristan Crane, Atticus Wolrab, Kako, Nikki Cook, Drew Bell, Kevin Mellon, Jeff Carroll, Mike May, Jeremy Haun, Amber Stone, Leif Jones, Elizabeth Genco, Carla Speed Mcneil, Kelly Sue Deconnick, Andy Macdonald, Nick Filardi, Cat Mihos, Andre Szymanowicz, Gabe Bautista, C.B. Cebulksi, Ethan Young, Joey Weltjens & Lee Duhig, Omaha Perez, Irma Page, Mark Buckingham, Rantz A. Hoseley, Ming Doyle, Mike Maihack, John Ney Reiber, Ryan Kelly, Alice Hunt, Trudy Cooper, Jonathan Hickman, Matthew S. Armstrong, Neil Kleid, Christopher Mitten, Kristyn Ferretti, Stephanie Leong, Sonia Leong, Peov, Kelly Sue Deconnick, Laurenn Mccubbin, John Bivens, Hope Larson, Emma Vieceli, Faye Yong, Chris Arrant, Star St.Germain, Mike Dringenberg, Paul Maybury, Jim Bricker, Craig Taillefer, Dame Darcy, G. Willow Wilson, Steve Sampson, Neal Shaffer, Daniel Krall, Adisakdi Tantimedh, Ken Meyer Jr., Mark Sable, Salgood Sam, Tom Williams, James Owen, Seth Peck, Daniel Heard, Ivan Brandon, Callum Alexander Watt, Leah Moore, John Reppion, Pia Guerra, Mark Sweeney, Kristyn Ferretti, Jessica Staley, Shane White, Ted Mckeever, Chris Chuckry, Jimmie Robinson, Lea Hernandez Derek Mcculloch, Colleen Doran and Jason Hanley.
The press this book is getting is pretty impressive, from mainstream news outlets down to all of the usual comic book news sources. If you saw Comic Shop News a few weeks ago, there was a 4 page cover story on CBT with numerous samples of art from the book, including this page from my story.
Now that the book is out I guess I’m allowed to show more artwork in detail. I’ll be uploading the story to my portfolio section some time next week (with the lettering erased) so you’ll be able to see the whole thing, assuming you haven’t bought the book. And why haven’t you bought the book yet? Seriously. Go click on the image up top and you’ll even be sending me some extra cash from Amazon for your troubles!
Back to the art! I spent a few minutes yesterday poring over each page in detail. I was a little worried what the art would like like at the 12 x 12 print size as I was only able to print the page out on typing paper to proof it. There are a few minor things I noticed once blown up and printed on photo quality paper, but over-all the story turned out fairly well. As I’ve mentioned before, the whole story including the style I drew it in to doing a for-print story digitally was all one big experiment for me.
On to the next experiment!
The 2008 Harvey Award Nominees were announced today, and the MIGHTY MOTOR SAPIENS got a nomination in the ‘best syndicated panel or strip category’.
It goes without saying that I’m thrilled. Since my ‘return’ to comics I’ve been involved in 2 self-syndicated on-line strips, and now both of them have received HArvey Award nominations!
I had initially intended to avoid conventions this year, but it looks likely that I will attempt to attend The Baltimore convention after all. I had a good time at the awards ceremony last year, and how often do you get nominated for awards anyway. Okay, yeah, two years in row so far. I’m not counting on a hat-trick next year!
Here’s the Official Announcement cribbed from the Harvey Awards website after the cut: Read the rest of this entry »
Craig A. Taillefer is a two-times Harvey Award Nominated Cartoonist with 25 years of professional experience working in Comic Books and TV animation.He is the writer & artist of Wahoo Morris, has published over 12 comics and books, and was a contributor to the Eisner & Harvey winning anthology Comic Book Tattoo.
Craig is passionate about comic books, hammocks, and lives an alternate night life as a gigging professional rockabilly and blues singer and guitar slinger.
