#INKtober 2015 No.17: Peanuts Confidential

This INKtober image is yet again inspired by my thoughts as a young kid. It always bothered me that the adults in the Peanuts cartoons were never seen. I was freaked out whenever the teachers spoke on the cartoon shows. Sure it was funny . . . but also quite eerie, especially when as a child one would try to envision what those teachers + parents looked like whenever they spoke.

INKtober image #17: Using a SB brush pen on Canson marker paper and digitally toned in Photoshop.

So this was my conclusion . . . a very rare skin disease that occurs during puberty. I would imagine the entire Peanuts' community was under quarantine and under the watch + care of the U.S. military. If fact, I'd imagine it was the US military that gave these sick people the cruel and heartless code-name: "PEANUTS".

The inked version sans all the type

With this theory, it all made sense. It explained why the adults were never seen on the cartoon shows and why all of the adults spoke so strangely due to their enclosed and hardened mouths. Makes total sense to me . . .

The original pencil sketch

Quick Daily Sketch: Gramps Attacks!

I can't tell you how strange it is to find old work that I did . . . and have no memory of drawing it. That's what happened today. As I mentioned in prior posts, I've been trying to organize my work and sketch books. I have too many sketch books that I start then I jump into another, then another . . .

After awhile, I lose track of where my sketches are stored.

In this case, it was a smaller sketch book, trapped between two larger books on my top office shelf. I quickly flipped through, not expecting to find anything . . . but there were quite a few sketches, including this one:

Gramps flagpole leaping into action with probably one of the most dangerous guns ever created.
At least he's not pointing it at someone . . . 

Of all the characters I have created in my lifetime, Gramps is my favorite.  Gramps is from my comic strip, "Home of the Brave". He was a super spy, who caused many well known events in history to occur (good and bad.)  He, along with some of the greatest inventions and weapons ever created, have spent the past several decades hiding in the family attic. Though the family thinks he is insane, and he is . . . the things Gramps knows could topple governments, change history and alter reality (which might be why he's insane.) So it was a pleasant surprise to find this sketch, since I don't remember ever creating it.

I even put a version of Gramps into my first kid's books: Bobby's Biggest Bubble.

Every once in a while, I think of possibly going back to the strip. In the last 80's, there was no world wide web access, only dial-up services and bulletin boards. The strip was available via a monthly downloadable fanzine format, which could be accessed through Qlink's dial-up service. And though we had a very limited audience, I was really inspired by the fans' comments and emails about the strip. (The strips were later reprinted and then continued with new monthly strips in a local tri-state tabloid called Spa Times.)

Another sketch of Gramps, though this time he's a bit more younger and this image I remember drawing.
This is how Gramps looked just before he hid away in the family attic.

There is so much material on the strip, yet I've never taken much care of my artwork in the past. Drawings were often just piled up and thrown into random boxes. Hopefully, one day I can find which box I put them in . . . then maybe reboot this strip into the 21 century.

Home of the Brave: Knock Knock

Back in the early 90's, a good friend of our family started a health newspaper which was circulated all over the state at health spas and gyms. She approached me looking for a comic strip to fill their entertainment section. I mentioned I had already had a comic strip printed in a nationwide fanzine for over two years . . . she could reprint those strips at no cost. She was very interested, but questioned if it was related to health or sports in anyway. It wasn't . . . 

An example of Home of the Brave as it appeared in "The Spa Times"

So I revamped the comic strip; changed the story so that Ollie wanted to be a Super Health Officer instead of a Super Crime Fighter. But I still used many of the old images, sketches and jokes, adjusting them to work better with a general health theme. The strip became more polished looking and I got away from using too much black in every panel. 

To see other posts about this comic strip, click the keyword "Comic Strip" below in the labels sections.

Home of the Brave: Vigilance strip found

This weekend, my office is getting a much needed cleaning. Since we have outgrown our home, it is nearly impossible to organize where to place items. So I have my work, sketches and documents everywhere. It's time to purge! But that's not easy since I don't want to throw out anything "valuable" without checking first. 

The strip shown below is a good example that I need to check everything before I throw stuff away.I was ready to toss out a box filled with of old work paycheck stubs, documents and other various paperwork, but decided to go through it -- just in case. Good thing too, for this was one of my earliest comic strips from "Home of the Brave."

Some very old artwork of my comic strip "Home of the Brave" that was lost . . . but now found.

Not sure what number strip this was in the series; the pencil markings of the strip # and date on the back are completely worn off. But based on my memory of the story, this should be somewhere around the 10th, 11th or 12th strip made for the "Home of the Brave" series.

You can see more about this comic strip at this link here.

Interesting side-note:
At the time of this strip, the late 80's, the word "Super Hero" was legally owned by DC and Marvel comics. Here's a quote from Wiki:
"While the word "superhero" itself dates to at least 1917, the term "Super Heroes" is a typography-independent 'descriptive' USA trademark which is co-owned by DC Comics and Marvel Characters, Inc."
I believe this is still true and active today. I also find it troubling that both companies can do this, claiming ownership to a popular phrase that neither companies created.
Yet, because they made the most popular super heroes, they are given TM ownership of the term "Super Heroes".

Because of this, I had to change my family of dysfunctional "super heroes" into "crime fighting heroes". The words crime-fighting and crime-fighter were frequently used in my strip . . . reluctantly. 

Bobby's Biggest Bubble: Now and Then

I mentioned in my previous post how I been enjoying bringing back old characters into my children's book. There are about 6 characters now throughout the book that were a part of different projects from my past. This post focuses on two favorites: Gramps and Mrs. Sugarpants.

These were supporting characters from my comic strip: Home of the Brave. Gramps was an ex-super soldier/spy who had been living in the attic for well over 3 decades. Everyone thinks he's senile, except his grandson, who knows that all the wild stories Gramps speaks of in the past are actually true.

In Bobby's Biggest Bubble, I use Gramps as the local park curmudgeon, Mr Krumple. I was tempted to name him Mr. Seaman, an actual grumpy neighbor who yelled at us back when my friends and I were teenagers. (But, that last name just wouldn't be appropriate for a kid's book.)

In Home of the Brave, Mrs. Sugarpants ran the local store.  She had terrible hearing and the worst eyesight in town. She also had visions of grandeur, believing her store was so popular that it was always filled with celebrities.

In Bobby's Biggest Bubble, I gave her the same job - the local store owner - but with one important change: her name. It had to be changed for the children's book . . . so I toned it down from Sugarpants to Applebottom. It's a safer name and I think kids will enjoy the newer name.

Home of the Brave: Comic Strip

Long ago, in a age without stylus tablets or Photoshop, I had a comic strip which was printed monthly in a fanzine. I belonged to a online service called Q-link, which I was able to dial-up on my Commodore 128 for $.06/minute. (That's right, I had a 128k computer and spent about $60-$75 a month for an extremely slow 300 baud service. If any of this is not making sense to you - look it up on Google!!)

A strip from The Home of the Brave circa 1985

On Q-Link, I joined a forum of comic book people. The forum had collectively made their own comic book stories and images, which were gathered by the forum leader. He would then make photo copies, staple the pages together and mail them out to all members. This was the only way to share our works with each other ( and far more cheaper then downloading our works for $.06/minute.)

My contribution was doing 5 comic strips a month, based on my dysfunctional superhero family called, "The Home of the Brave". The star was Ollie, a teen who wins multi-millions in a lottery (by mistake) and decides to become a superhero. He is trained by his "Gramps", who lives in their attic and is thought to be insane ( but the truth is, he was the WW2 super-spy he claims to be.) The rest of the cast is rounded out: a sweet oblivious mother, a doubting curmudgeonly father, an insane candy store lady, a master disguise sidekick dog name Roger and reluctant frightened sidekick cat named Mew.

Very rare colored version of my comic strip (This one was my favorite of the bunch)

The fanzine lasted over 2 years (and later several pages of the strip were reprinted and revamped for a local paper called The Spa Times.) I tried to submit my work to various newspaper syndicates, all which said my work was good but the topic was too specific for the market . . . that people in general wouldn't have an interest in a superhero family. (Well over a decade later, Pixar's The Incredibles would prove those syndicate people to be very wrong.)

A sample of the 5-strip monthly format which lasted over 2 years in Comix Fanzine
These were the very first 5 strips of the series

Oh, and for those who don't know who Johnny Carson was . . .
LOOK IT UP ON GOOGLE!