Guest at OCC Melbourne

Pretty damn excited to have been invited along by the lovely folks at Oz Comic Con to be a guest at the Melbourne show. It'll also be the Melbourne launch of the trade paperback so I hope a few of you can come along and say hi to Alana and myself! Should be a blast!

Trade Paperback - It's here!

First review hot of the press...

" Sniff, sniff, sniff. Smells promising...can't wait to devour it"- Oreo

( Also a huge thanks to Ryan K Lindsay for writing one seriously kick ass foreword! )

Oreo

Oreo can sure be a hard lil fella to say no to :)

coffee

I'm just gonna leave this here... #coffeejunkie

Trade Paperback coming VERY soon!

I got sent a little sneak peek from the printer today, something that will be heading this way real soon!

From Above Books

With print files out the door for the Trade Paperback, we will be looking at launching the book at Supanova Sydney in a couple of weeks. This means that now we are in the process of doing the ComiXology​ conversion which should mean the digital version should follow in a few months.

Meanwhile in other news we are very near the end of the second edition print run of Issue 1 and will soon be developing a new cover for the 3rd edition version. To say we are surprised to have got to this stage is a massive understatement. So thank you to all who have supported the individual issue installments of the book - you are what keeps this series going.

New Phone cases

Let it be said that I am struggling to adjust to my new phone. After 5 years with the same phone, last week I was forced to upgrade and embrace something new. I figure I'm at that age where I struggle to embrace relearning things. To soften the blow though at least we got the chance to get some new phone cases, and basically didn't miss an opportunity to self promote art all over them. Guess what arrived in the mail today? :)

Comics for a good cause

If there is one thing better than comics, it's comics for a good cause.

Headed up by Neville Howard (Gaining Velocity, Melbourne Comics) and my wife Alana Bruyn (Melbourne Comics, From Above) Tango with the Orangos comprises 2 anthology books showcasing work from over 50 creators from across the globe.

The books (a 32 page and 64 page version) feature short sequential art stories and pin ups collated together with the purpose of raising money for The Orangutan Project.
It's a fantastic cause with some amazing creators lending their time and talents to help put this together.

There's an indiegogo campaign up and running now, essentially operating as an order system for the books so don't miss out on this one (some of those perks are amazing and there's some really well thought out tiers)

Keep in mind as well this content is exclusive to the books. My short story, 'The Investment', will only appear in this anthology, much like the other amazing content.

There's just under 2 weeks remaining on this campaign so don't miss out on this awesome opportunity to be part of something special.

-Craig
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/project-orangutan-tango-with-orangos#/story

Sequential art: scene setting and establishing shots

Recently going back and reworking pages for both the print and Comixology releases of the first trade paperback of From Above, allowed me to check out some of my pages from the series to date.

I’ve always been a fan of scene setting and establishing shots. Whether that be an intimate room scene or an action scene. I like to know where characters are in relation to their environments before the scene starts to play out.

I think that’s why I really like these two pages. One I did for Issue 5 and the other I did for Issue 6. Maybe its the games background in me but I really did the downward ¾ angle shot to really show character in-situ. There are obviously more dynamic camera shots but I prefer to leave these for once things have started heating up.

I remember times when you’d read a book and it’d just be a whole lot of heads floating against blank backdrops or even just cross hatched background pattern. Hey we’ve all been guilty of that sort of thing but in essence it really makes life hard for the reader. In fact I think once I read a 22 page story that had one background in it - not the most immersive visual story telling.

I thinks that’s why as I keep learning in this visual story telling medium (and I have a long way to go), I try to challenge myself with new camera angles and including as much background as possible without over cluttering the panel (even if its just a subtle insinuation in a talking head panel).

I think that’s why I like sequential art so much. You feel like you are constantly learning and pushing yourself. Sure it feels frustrating that I’m not where  want to be yet, but it is invigorating to know that there is a touch of improvement with each new panel and that is all the incentive we need, right?