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Two from Texas: A Look at a Pair of Artists from the Lone Star State

by Sub-Cultured on June 30, 2013
rave_girl_2_by_scottzirkel-d4s7i1y

“Rave Girl” by Scott Zirkel

Texas natives have a reputation of maintaining strong work ethics, and this holds true with the talented comic book artists and writers residing in all corners of the state. Here’s a brief look at two Texas artists who are definitely worth looking out for in the future:

Among the Hills:
Scott Zirkel

Texas Hill Country artist Scott Zirkel has been “making stuff up since 1977” and his sense of stylized humor flows through his work, including his original comic book “He-Guy and the Guys of the Universe” as well as his writing talents to Viper Comics’ graphic novel “A Bit Haywire” and Arcana Comics’ “Wonderdog, Inc.” Zirkel has also contributed to graphic novel compilations by both Viper Comics and Penny Farthing Press.

He has contributed sketch cards to such sets as “Empire Strikes Back 3D,” and “Indiana Jones Masterpieces,” “Zombies vs. Cheerleaders” and “Hack/Slash,” just to name a few.

Zirkel’s work and wit reflect the artists who have influenced him through the years.

“I’ve always been drawn to the more animated styles,” he said. “The artists that have inspired me the most are Chuck Jones, Tex Avery, Bruce Timm, Bil Amend, Gary Larson, and Mike Kunkel.”

He finds himself comfortable working in both the world of pop culture and fantasy, and with commissioned portraits for “real” people. He has different reasons why he enjoys working with each.

“I like the fictional characters because I can show my own versions of those characters, but I enjoy the ‘real’ people because I enjoy the challenge of trying to capture the likeness of the person,” he said. “I don’t know that I’d say I have a favorite, it just depends on what mood I’m in when I put the pencil to the paper.”

"He Guy" by Scott Zirkel

“He Guy” by Scott Zirkel

Zirkel maintains a diverse workload ranging from commercial graphic arts work with The Alara Group of Kerrville to his comics and illustrations. He said he tries to keep his graphic arts as professional and straightforward as possible, separate from his work in comics. As such the audience between the two is fairly diverse. His comics audience in itself makes up a diverse group, particularly as he offers something all ages can appreciate.

“For the comics, I generally produce all-ages materials. I don’t have any books that would be considered PG-13 or R,” Zirkel said. “I do have some art books that are more risqué, but I don’t have those in stores, just at conventions and online.”

He said his book “A Bit Haywire,” (featuring art by Courtney Huddleston) seems to receive the greatest feedback from readers of all ages.

“Kids and adults alike have enjoyed it and it’s been really fun to hear from them over the years,” he said.

See more of Zirkel’s art and writing at scottzirkel.com.

Along the River: Andy Perez

El Paso artist Andy Perez has taken his West Texas hometown’s cultural uniqueness and infused it  into his prints, comics and other works with impressive results.

"Dia de La Page" by Andy Perez

“Dia de La Page”
by Andy Perez

Perez is best known as co-creator and illustrator for the indie comics “Lonely in Black” and “The Afterlife Chronicles of a Zombie,” but he has contributed digital color work and art, sequential art, sidewalk chalk art creations and pin-ups for titles for several projects. His art has even been featured in the San Diego Comic Con Souvenir Book, and he has created sketch cards for “Hack and Slash,” “Lady Death,” and “Painkiller Jane.”

Perez said having picked up a pencil as a kid and “never putting it down to this day,” his list of influential artists is long and still growing.

“My early work was driven by rad comic artists such as Jim Lee and J. Scott Campbell because comics were my first introduction to art,” he said. “Fast forwarding to more recent years, the art beats of Jim Mahfood, the awesomely gritty art of Ben Templesmith, the cheesecake eye candy from Adam Hughes, the beautifully colorful art of Tara McPherson and the storytelling imagery from a James Jean piece all lend something to my work as an artist.”

He said two works in particular have really struck a positive chord with people of all backgrounds: the dreamlike black-and white portrait, “BOOM!” and the Day of the Dead-inspired “Dia de la Page.” He said both pieces have not only been a big success with the comic con goers, but have made the successful crossover into other venues as art showpieces, not an easy feat for any work of art, he admits.

“With ‘BOOM!’ people have noted that they have enjoyed getting lost in the calmness and flow the piece offers along with the colorful idea of having music follow you as balloons,” Perez said. “‘Dia de la Page’ has been a great conversation piece for those that are unfamiliar with the culturally rich Dia de Los Muertos or the pin up queen Betty Page.”

As one of a growing number of El Paso artists working to make his mark outside the region, he hopes his work will help comic readers and collectors, and art lovers in general, see how diverse and trendsetting the Sun City’s artists can be.

“I think the misconception is that it’s all southwest art with landscape paintings, which it really isn’t,” Perez said. “It’s been very exciting for me to see my hometown energetically jam art and creatively raise the bar artistically in so many mediums.”

See more of Perez’s work at artedeandyperez.com.

"BOOM!" by Andy Perez

“BOOM!”
by Andy Perez

Lisa Kay Tate
Staff writer and resident ihogeekmom

I haven’t done one of these in a bit.

I’d like to share what seems to me to be a very tortured artist who perfectly captures the inertia of catapulting oneself through harsh memories mixed with vague nothings that we see from our peripheral vision.  He goes by the name NegativeFeedback on DeviantArt and you can see all of his work by clicking here.

“Icarus. The wounds of flight”

“Homunculi. Love from a distant world”

“On the turning way”

“Evangelion. Cathedral”

“Silva Noctis”

“Tau. Fractured Vision”

AT&T U-Verse messed up our internet and cable for the past few weeks so to repay us they 1) fixed the problem and 2) Gave us free premium channels for three months.  This means I have HBO now, which gives me access to HBO Go, which gives me access to Game of Thrones Season 3, which gives me access to sleepless nights, which gives me access to strange dreams of Tyrion telling me the purpose of life.    Or.. some of those.

I watched episode 1, “Valar Doeharis” last night and while it certainly wasn’t the most exciting episode it did give me some time to reacquaint myself with the characters and it moved the story forward.  Tyrion’s plea before his father was easily the most compelling acting of the episode and it’s good to see Peter Dinklage continue to kill it any time he is on camera.

The best visual pieces of the episode came from Daenarys.  From an assassination attempt by a creepy ass kid to an army of 8,000 heartless bad asses to dragons, dragons, dragons, dragons, omg dragons, dragons…. I forgot my point.  

Episode 2, “Dark Wings, Dark Words“, introduced several new factions including The Brotherhood without Banners and some weird people torturing Theon Greyjoy.

Jaime Lannister provided the action with an ill attempted sword fight against Brienne and Bran is a warg.  Cool.

The subtle bit where Margaery Tyrell takes the information that Sansa tells them about Joffrey being a monster and uses it to her advantage was excellent and also very creepy.  She’s so clever it’s a bit disturbing.

So far this season is playing its cards rather close to the vest, but I already know that crazy shit goes down in episode 9.  Hopefully the episodes until then continue to up the drama and the action while giving the characters some clearer intentions.

It’s been about two years (count em, two years folks) since DC Comics decided to reboot their universe, causing a wave of changes to their superhero families and their status quo. The Batfamily was hit rather strongly with change. Perhaps (not surprisingly) the female members were changed the most and or dispatched of; Barbara Gordon is cured from her lower body paralysis and is Batgirl again, both Stephanie Brown and Cassandra Cain were wiped away from canon along with Charlie, otherwise known as the heroine Misfit as well as Helena Bertinelli who whilst she was a real person, is now dead and was (most likely) never Huntress. Tim Drake’s personal history was rebuilt from the ground up with rather disastrous results. Dick Grayson has returned back to the Nightwing mantle after a stint as a second Batman. Damian kept his mantle as Robin, that is until this past February when Grant Morrison, his creator, seemingly killed the (chronologically in former main canon) young 5th Robin in the pages of Batman Incorporated.

A lot of fans, well…they’re not liking this entire situation and the route DC has taken their favorites characters in the Batfamily. Even nearly two years later.  And the whole “If you don’t like it, why don’t you do it yourself?” reaction from those who don’t mind the new changes and status quo in response to said naysayers? Well, people who are unsatisfied are doing just that and taking some of the closing lines from Stephanie Brown’s Batgirl run; ” It’s only the end if you want it to be” to heart. Whether out of frustration or just pure love for the characters fans are teaming up with their friends and other artists and are taking writing and presenting these characters into their own hands. And it’s not just fanart. Full fancomics and fan series.

I should know, I’m one of those fans doing just that.

I  myself write (when not writing for you readers among other secret writerly things ) an ongoing AU fancomic series Batgirl Incorporated  with artist Yu Lyn Chen. It stands as a stand-alone universe centered around the female members of the Batfamily presented through an actiony Saturday morning cartoon and retro-anime lens with a sci-fi bent that is intended to be more fun and somewhat more adolescent appropriate and kid-friendly as opposed to the new Batman line (barring the digital Li’l Gotham) which is rather dark and grim, in particular the quite somber Batgirl title.

by yu lyn chen, head artist and designer at Batgirl Inc.

By yu lyn chen, head artist and designer at Batgirl Inc. Aw yeah Bat ladies.

My own comic launched officially last December and we are currently wrapping up the last leg of Chapter I, posting about a page or two a week. Our site also features a concept art open submission requests to help foster aspiring artists skills and to help build their portfolios. We also feature guest comic strips, including my own collaboration with Mexican comic artist Vicente Rico, whose work everyone should keep an eye on. Our collaboration,” It’s only the end IF you want it to be”  are our one-shots starring Stephanie Brown Batgirl set in the pre-reboot world. Our second strip in the series, specifically for summer is currently being done.

batgirl series - page 1lettered

boom. pow.

Enough of my own stuff, as there are even more impressive work out there and the thing I wanted to feature the most is JunioR a second Bat-themed comic that centers around a still living Damian Wayne, his friends and family (especially him and animals) that is an absolute must read and my top recommendation for everyone this week even if you are not a fancomic fan you should check this one out; it’s good stuff. Sensitive, well balanced and artful these are little comics worth sharing and easy to catch up on.

tumblr_mktkyf4rwy1s9kbe4o1_500

A comic all about Damian? Really too good to be true. Another plus? Oh god the comic is gorgeous. With art rivaling if not better than what DC has on their own titles, this little comic is a treat to look at each month, which they have impressively delivered a full short comic each month since their launch in March, reaching a lot of attention on tumblr. Speaking of which, the next issue features Stephanie Brown!

tumblr_mp56nvbU5y1s9kbe4o2_1280

Oh my glob. Stephanie was one of the best parts of Damian’s character development, like don’t even deny it.

The comic takes place in a pre-reboot DC canon. Stephanie Brown is still Batgirl. Nightwing is still in blue. But the stories are softer. More kid friendly. Short monthly touching, funny little stories that are really easy to catch up on. From the words of the creators Vivien Gallasch, Pamela Lovas, Wave & Megan Butler ;

[JunioR is] dedicated to the character of Damian Wayne and his numerous family members, friends, and pets. It’s quite a simple concept. Every month we will publish a short comic with focus on Damian and one other character. The current release schedule is the first Saturday of every month.

We do this because we feel like there are many more stories about Damian to tell, and because there should be a place for lighter and gentler stories. We want to tell these stories and want to share them with the fans.

I am noticing a trend; people who are wanting to do their own series and comics seem to want softer or at the least more fun or balanced stories featuring their favorite superheroes. They want things perhaps younger people can read (god forbid a kid can read about the same character that’s on their shoes or bedsheets). This plays into what I’ve been saying about children’s media the past few weeks as well; comics in particular are unsyncronized with their own merchandise and demographics. Don’t you think that’s a bit crazy? Should we be paying more attention to that?

I know of a third Batfamily series also in development, this one featuring their take on a team featuring Jason Todd and Cassandra Cain as Blackbat and I can’t wait to see that develop and launch.

Do you read JunioR or Batgirl Inc? I personally would love to know what you think of people taking the Batfamily into their own hands both as a reporter, and as a writer of one of said series.

https://www.facebook.com/Juniorthecomic

https://www.facebook.com/BatgirlIncorporatedTheSeries

Max Eber
Staff Writer/The Doctor
max@ihogeek.com
Twitter: @maxlikescomics

If you haven’t stumbled upon the corner of the internet that houses the Pokemon Fusion Generator, I’m so glad to be the first to tell you that if you ever wondered what would really happen if Mr. Mime and an Arbok got it on, there is finally a scientifically produced answer:

mr. bok

Horrifying? Adorable? Yes. Yes.

The fusion generator lets you combine any of the 1st generation pokemon, so you can’t see what the abomination of a nosepass/wailord child would look like yet. The best bit is that the artists of cyberspace rallied to the call of adapting these strange misfortunate and pixely creatures in to even more disturbing images.

Enjoy

Warning: anything involving a Cloyster is horrifying.

Kaitlyn D

@deadrabbit92

Staff-writer

It’s the game everyone’s talking about this month; the one that heralded the end of E3 and, amidst shout matches about Playstation 4 vs. Xbox One, managed to capture everyone’s attention. It roared on to the scene amidst a sea of perfect 10 reviews from reputable gaming websites and did so well in its opening weekend, it topped Man of Steel. This is The Last of Us.
I almost wish I hadn’t heard so much buzz about the game before it came out. It’s more difficult to be objective about reviewing a title when you’ve been slapped in the face with the “it’s perfect” stick so many times you’re expecting it to be mind-blowing. I popped the game into my PS3, settled down into the dark, and was crying within half an hour.
The Last of Us, first and foremost, is a game about mankind. Set aside the mechanics, graphics, environments, and sound engineering. The world has gone to hell and these people show all the signs of it.  Adults who remember how it used to be and have had the hope beaten out of them by a world of danger the likes of which have never been seen. Kids who’ve been disillusioned by the harshness of life and had the opportunity of having a childhood stripped from them before they could even miss it. Those brief moments in which the learned hardness of the new humanity slips away with the glance at a watch, telling of an old story, or spotting of a new toy. And the punitive situations that remind you why being tough is the only way to survive. The Last of Us is impeccably immersive. It’s on the level of Bioshock Infinite, if not more so due to better pacing.
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The immersion assault is headed by the characters and their dialogue. Naughty Dog has had a knack for very human interpersonal interaction since Uncharted and that trend continues here. The stoic and intense Joel juxtaposed against the openly emotional Ellie creates believable conversations between a frustrated master and terrified pupil. The questioning of judgment between the two senior survivors Joel and Tess show you right from the get go exactly what is at stake and the state of the world twenty years after a fungal infection decimated the population. And this is all without ever once beating the player over the head with information, rather taking the more subtle approach of having characters talk to one another and allowing the player to read between the lines and imply what they will about these people. The most amazing thing about The Last of Us is not the game, as good as it is; it’s the characters.
Another important factor to not breaking the immersion was the blurred line between cutscene and gameplay. They flowed so well into one another it was sometimes difficult to tell I was supposed to move after transitioning from cutscene to gameplay. This seamlessness works to alleviate the problem of becoming aware that you’re separate from the characters by not giving you firm “play now” or “watch now” times though the use of interactive cutscenes, very few quick time events, and revealing important plot details through not only cutscenes, but actual gameplay as well. If you’ve played Uncharted before, you’ll recognize the combat system quickly. The game revolves around encounters in which you must find a way from point A to point B by either sneaking by or killing a number of enemies. This mechanic is fairly standard by now. Crouch behind a box, sneak up behind the guy nobody is looking at, choke him to death, repeat until objective is met. The interesting thing twist in The Last of Us, however, is resource deprivation and increased vulnerability of the player.
In Uncharted, you feel like Superman. A very unlucky Superman who can’t seem to find a sturdy metal object to save his life, but you feel empowered against enemies. Charge them with guns blazing, hide and shoot from a distance, punch everyone to death — it doesn’t really matter. Generally. Drake can get out of a situation with the guns with tons of ammo or hiding and regenerating health until the next baddie can be punched out. In The Last of Us, Joel is as ill-equipped as he can possibly be, at times relying on the player to find bottles to distract enemies with sounds, or a wooden board with which to melee his opponents. This game takes place twenty years since anyone professionally produced just about anything. It’s safe to say resources are scarce. Bullets are few, enemies are great, and remaining hidden for as long as possible is your best friend.
The player must attack each new encounter with wit first and force later. Common questions are “How many bullets do I have?” “When can I attack that guy?” and “Do I have enough resources to craft a med pack?” And no, health does not regenerate. You must either find food or use med kits. The helplessness evoked by scarce resources and dramatically increased danger with encounters is only compounded by the zombies. Technically they’re not zombies, they’re just infected with some kind of spore that turns you into a mindless person looking only to eat other people.
…But basically, zombies.
These zombies are bad dudes, to put it bluntly. Remember Dead Rising? Dead Island? Hell, even Left 4 Dead? Even the bigger enemies weren’t too big a deal as long as you were fast enough and had enough bullets. In The Last of Us, there are only three types of zombies—runners which run at you and have melee attacks that can stop you for a few seconds, stalkers who are like runners with one hit kill attacks, clickers which have no eyes and require absolute silence otherwise their one hit kill attacks will have you cursing, and Bloaters who will also one hit kill you but also rip off fungus from their body to throw at you. Delicious. Notice how three of those will kill you instantly on contact? Well, the only one who doesn’t can stop you in your tracks for just long enough to allow others to catch up, and if just one of those is an instant kill zombie, game over man. Luckily, the game allows you to restart encounters instead of levels, encouraging you to experiment with your strategies by allowing you to correct your mistakes quickly and without too much of a penalty.
The game does have its problems though. The AI, for one, is horrendous at times. Your companions do their best to follow you, but I often found times in which they were in plain sight of my enemies, and were completely ignored. I think the enemy AI can only recognize the player and not the companions, but that breaks immersion for me and it happens often enough that it’s quite noticeable and definitely annoying. I also found that when pulling up items in my inventory, sometimes the texture for the zoomed in item would not show up for a few seconds, leaving me staring at a really blurry backpack until the game had time to catch up. I’m not sure why that happened, but it seemed noteworthy. Also, any time I chose to save, it always said autosaving was in progress. There was no time in which I chose to save manually that autosave was not in progress, so that’s strange. Seems like a bug to me.
Those small issues aside, this game is incredible. The immersion is hammered home by the beautiful landscapes. I’ve always had disdain for post-apocalyptic cities because they’re also so grey and drab and generally the same color (looking at you, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas).  The Last of Us takes a different approach to this, having plants overgrow structures to make it look like earth is reclaiming what mankind has built. That visual is a kind of allegory for the whole story — mankind returning to its primal roots when nature reminded it of its place and showed man its hubris. Reading-far-too-much-into-landscape aside, I thought the visuals were stunning. In the same way Mayan temples are overgrown now, so too are modern buildings, streets, and cars. It’s a gorgeous sight and Naughty Dog really pulled out all the stops for the details in this game.
The sound engineering is also quite subtle. The music all follows the same sort of theme with alterations depending on the mood and scenario, but it’s rare to hear it. Mostly, the sound is taken care of by the environment and audio indicators to give you hints on what to do. For instance, instead of having a bar on the screen that showed you how visible you are to an enemy, instead a rumbling noise is heard and if it goes on long enough, you’ve been spotted. It’s a great indicator that allows for less screen clutter while still having intuitive information feedback. The weapon effects and encounter noises all sounds as intense as it looks, allowing the visceral action of combat to be that much more believable. Believability seems to be a common theme running through every stage of development of this game.
Verdict: Is The Last of Us perfect? Certainly not. Immersion was broken too often by both the companion and enemy AI for it to be perfect. But was it incredible? Absolutely. The game comes in strong with its true-to-life characters that you can relate to on a deeper level than most games and really root for them to succeed. Pair that with stunning visuals, sound engineering that gets out of your way, but really lets you feel like you’re part of the fray, and a story that’ll be difficult to top this year, and you have Naughty Dog’s latest title. It’s not often that a game can live up to the hype, but The Last of Us sincerely blew me away.
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Protected: Master Debaters – Episode 10 – Which Spider-Man Reigns Supreme?
March 26, 2020
by Sub-Cultured
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