Dave Dorman on the State of the Comics Industry and Digital Art

Dear Friends,

I thank all of you who came to see me at C2E2. It’s always good to see familiar faces at the show. It was great to reconnect with many of my friends there and some winners of the Writers & Illustrators of the Future Awards as well. One key business dinner meeting resulted in some exciting news about my own action-adventure western series The Wasted Lands and I look forward to sharing that news when I can. Suffice it to say there will be plenty of new Wasted Lands material to see at my Booth #4500 at San Diego Comic-Con this year.

Image of M. d’Cease, the sexy, bad-assed coroner of Mortal City in Dave Dorman’s Wasted Lands.

I was flattered to read today that some of the Star Wars  fans would like to see me do the next movie poster. Here’s their comments: http://bitly.com/137QU69

I did a 2-part interview at Hypno Comics in Ventura, CA a couple of weeks ago with owner George Chase, and a special thanks to Jeffrey Willerth at SliceofSciFi.com for everything he did to create the piece. In this interview, George & I discuss the state of the comics industry and what I, as a traditional artist, really think about digital art, and the deficits I see in a lot of younger artists — deficits that can be fixed if they’re aware of them. Here’s a link to that interview: http://bitly.com/17DN5qj

My next big show is Spectrum Fantasy Art Live in Kansas City May 17th, 18th and 19th, so I look forward to reconnecting with my artist friends and fans there. I will have some original art pieces there that aren’t typical of what you’ve seen from me in the past. Here is a link to information on that show: http://bitly.com/ZHfkTm

Today I deliver my painting to our close family friends, the Haleys, and their lovely daughter Lauren, who patiently posed for this piece I did for the Visions of Oz Gallery Show in Los Angeles, curated by Taylor White:

Dave Dorman’s “Dorothy Daydreams” Painting. Oil and acrylic on canvas. 24″ x 36.”

As always, I thank you for reading. If you have questions, I answer them more readily on Facebook – that link is https://facebook.com/davedormanfanpage. On Twitter I’m @DaveDorman and my wife is @WriteBrainMedia. On LinkedIn, I’m https://linkedin.com/in/thedavedorman. Feel free to connect with me on my social media sites.

Dave.

Which Comics Dave Dorman Bought On Comic Book Wednesday

Dear Friends,

As I write this, the TV is confirming the rumored death of Qaddafi and showing the graphic Al Jazeera footage. I congratulate the Libyan freedom fighters on this new chapter in their lives.

I feel it’s my personal responsibility as a comic book artist to help raise awareness for other amazing talent in the industry. Today I want to make you aware of Leinil Yu if you are not already. I bought  the comic “SUPERIOR” by Mark Millar and Leinil Yu yesterday (see image below) during my weekly trek to Dreamland Comics in Schaumburg, IL:

LEINIL YU ART ON COVER OF SUPERIOR COMIC

In my opinion as an artist and also an art director, I find Leinil Yu  to be one of the best comic book artists working in the industry today. His style is dynamic, he’s a great visual storyteller, and he renders every image with so much style. Other pieces he’s worked on (according to the back cover) include Secret Invasion, New Avengers and Superman: Birthright. I hope you check out his work and it brings you as much joy as it does me.

LEINIL YU COMIC - BACK SIDE

In other news, my good friend Charlie Athanas called me last night and invited me to join him for a really fun electronica concert tomorrow night – Amon Tobin – and I’m really looking forward to it. Here’s a link to Amon Tobin’s concert sampling, to give you a feel for his work: http://bit.ly/roDni4 

Below is an image from last Monday night during the fund-raiser for Chicago’s best horror theater group, WildClaw Theater, which was a lot of fun.

Charlie Athanas (artist), Doug Klauba (artist), Me, John Terendy (videographer)

And here’s a nice mini-review of my book “ROLLING THUNDER: THE ART OF DAVE DORMAN” (IDW Publishing/Desperado Publishing) by Alina Bradford: http://bit.ly/pmUNk6

If any of you reading has a young child, I recommend checking out the movie “Real Steel” with Hugh Jackman. I took my 6 year old this past weekend and we both really enjoyed it. Next up, we’re looking forward to getting the Captain America movie, coming out soon on DVD, to add to our collection because we both loved it in the theater.

Reminder: My Podcast through Michael Mennenga and Babylon 5 actor/producer Jeffrey Willerth’s Farpoint Media is http://itscomicbookday.com (there are a lot more episodes, but I’m waiting for the producer to catch up on edits) – it’s free on iTunes.

On Facebook, I’m Facebook.com/davedormanartist and on LinkedIn I’m an open networker: linkedin.com/in/thedavedorman

On Twitter I’m @DaveDorman

As always, I thank you for reading!

DAVE.

It’s 2010 and I Have New Art on eBay!

Hi Everyone,

Happy New Year! We spent our holidays moving into a new home and studio, so it’s been hectic and I apologize for the delay in posting a new blog. Now we’re living closer to comic book artist Bill Reinhold and his artist wife Linda, which is nice, so we can all get together more regularly.

As you may already know, I am planning to attend MegaCon in Orlando, San Diego Comic-Con, and Star Wars Celebration V this year, so watch for me at these 3 shows for certain. We are conferring with Denise Gideon and Farpoint Media owner Jeffrey Willerth regarding the new podcast for 2010, so I will let you all know when this hits iTunes. We are planning to do it weekly and I hope that’s not too ambitious. We have some really fun guests lined up for the show.

Some of you have asked what I thought of AVATAR. I have to give it to you straight. The story was weak – a retelling of cowboys and Indians, but I did like the 3D work Cameron created. It was definitely worthwhile to see it on the big screen, so be sure to do so if you haven’t already. As our friend Charlie Athanas pointed out, you really have to retrain yourself in how to watch this film – focus on what’s in focus, and not be looking in the out-of-focus screen area for some monster to pop out, as we are all used to doing.

Last but not least, I am posting some new art for sale on eBay–Magic Card art, Highlander art, and a promo piece I did for the Weinsteins’ movie, “Arthur and the Invisibles,” so here are the links for all of you:

Magic Card Art
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270510254295&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

Highlander art
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270510272133&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

Arthur art
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270510274633&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

Thanks for all of your comments. Much appreciated. I hope to revamp my everyday Web site in 2010 to better showcase my art. I recognize that it’s not where it needs to be.

Thanks for reading.

Dave.