Six of the Best: Comics Festivals

Of course there are loads of comics conventions in the US - San Diego and New York etc - and quite a few in France, but after reading (and especially seeing) so much about it, this year, Angoulême Comics Festival is the one I'd go out of my way to visit.

Now I just have to talk my fiancée into a holiday in the beautiful South-East of France... but how?

Here are some of the tastiest-looking festivals in Ireland, the UK and a little further afield, over the next few months:

• 27-29 March: Phoenix Convention (P-Con), Dublin, Ireland.
  
• 9-10 May: Bristol International Comic Expo, Bristol, England.
• 4-6 June: 2D in Derry, Northern Ireland.
• 18-19 July: London Film and Comic Con, London, England .
  
• 3-4 October: British International Comics Show, Birmingham, England.
• 13-15 November: Dublin City Comic Con, Dublin, Ireland.
• 28-30 January, 2010: Angoulême International Comics Festival, Angoulême, France.
  

Inconveniently, there is a fixtures pile-up next weekend, 28 March, as P-Con and the UK Web and Minicomix Thing coincide with an anime festival, at the Irish Film Institute.

Six of the Best! Wonderful Taschen Books!

"Weasels ripped my flesh!"

Indeed. Be that as it may, wonderful German publisher, Taschen - purveyor of cult kitsch and artsy porn - celebrates its 25th year with some wonderful bargains. Here are six of the best:

1. Robots - Spaceships and other tin toys - whimsical, colourful, beautiful.
   
2. Mens Adventure Magazines - absurd, grotesque, fascinating.
   
3. Japanese Graphics Now - dense, futuristic, bold.
   
4. Illustration Now - weird, intense, amazing.
   
5. Fantasy Worlds - dreamy, preposterous, er... fantastic.
   
6. Chinese Propaganda Posters - comi-tragic, mesmerising, superb.
   

Inspirational.

Six of the best! Comics for beginners

It has become a cliche that most people think of comics as a more or less a sub-genre of Science Fiction (superheroes in spandex), but of course there is a grain of truth to it.

Lots of people have argued, over the last 20 years, for comics as a medium (sequential art etc), so no need to rehash that debate. Suffice it to say that while many comics are genre fiction, the medium now embraces literary fiction and even non-fiction.

Here are six of the best comics for adults or children; they offer great storytelling and art, but are accessible enough not to daunt those exploring the medium for the first time:

1. Asterix - the eponymous hero of a small Gaulish village persistently humiliates the Roman Empire.
2. Tintin - amazing artwork and ripping yarns, full of mysteries and intrigues, investigated by the eponymous boy journalist.
   
3. Bone - harking back to the early days of comics, Bone follows three cousins on an fantastical journey of epic proportions.
4. Calvin and Hobbes - wistful, wise and hilarious adventures of a primary-schooler and his tiger, illustrated with wonderful brushwork.
   
5. The Hobbit - beautifully illustrated adaptation of the Tolkien classic.
6. Marvel Pocket Books - inexpensive pocket editions of classic superhero comics (from a more innocent age), with self-contained stories and art by masters of the medium, such as John Buscema and Jack Kirby. Perfect for a schoolbag (or a briefcase).
   
7. Understanding Comics - a potted primer of visual culture and an eloquent explanation of what comics are and why they work. Not for the very young, but the beauty of McCloud's book is that it takes comic format, so children 10+ should be able get it.
   

Note: This list is a) a personal selection and b) safe for children.

Apropos of nothing, Rafael Rozendaal's Colourflip is the best website ever. [via Curtains for You, Kid]

Six of the Best! The Spirit of Skateboarding clips

As I walked to work today, I came across a skateboard on the street. I was tempted to ride it into work, but instead I just popped a little ollie and went on my way.

As a youth, I loved punk music and skateboarding the cobbled streets of Dublin, smashing my face and limbs at every opportunity. Here are six of the best skateboarding clips I could find:

1. 'The Bones Brigade Video Show' - Skateboarder and film director Stacy Peralta (who directed the excellent Dogtown and Z Boys), is an ambivalent figure. On the one hand, he promoted skateboarding tirelessly, on the other he merchandised and commericialised it relentlessly.
   
   Peralta innovated the skate video to promote his company Powell-Peralta and the Bones Brigade, the team of professional skateboarders it sponosored. It captures the blend of goofy and acidic humour, playful and subversive attitudes, relaxed and aggressive poses that characterised skateboarding in the 1980s.
   
   This is the first of seven parts, the rest of which can be seen here.
   
   
   
2. Thrashin' - Romeo and Juliet on skateboards. This film distills the fizzy pop character out of skateboarding, but doesn't totally neglect its gritty punk flavour. There is a lot of dayglow in this film, a lot of doods, but Red Hot Chili Peppers make an appearance. It's pretty rad.




3. The Search for Animal Chin - The first 'film' proper directed by Stacy Peralta, this was one of the few skateboarding videos to feature any kind of narrative (albeit a loose one). The Bones Brigade search for Animal Chin - a kind of skateboarding will'o'the wisp - skate and have adventures.
   
   Animal Chin captured the spirit of skateboarding, while it was still pretty raw, and some amazing footage of the talented Bones Brigade.




4. Rodney Mullen - Incredibly talented, graceful and intellectual skateboarder, who epitomises the 'wow!' factor of skateboarding.




5. Skateboard Kings, 1978 - An interesting British documentary about Tony Alva and the dogtown skate scene. This is the first of seven parts, the rest of which are available here.




6. Back to the Future - I doubt I was the only kid to fall for skating after the cool intro sequence from back to the future. This chase sequence sealed the deal. After that I was always trying to grab the backs of passing cars and get towed into school.
   
   
   

Six of the Best! Comics News Sites

It's been a couple of weeks, so here are six of the best comics news sites I've come across over the last few weeks:

1. The Beat - Publishers Weekly's news
   
2. The Web Comics Examiner - Erudite and academic features.
3. The Comics Journal - well, exactly. In depth, serious, but accessible features and interviews. It's Journalista blog also comes highly recommended.
   
4. Newsrama - a polished site with a broad range of interests (and no longer limited to comics).
   
5. The Comics Reporter - serious-minded site, which features the world... outside comics!
   
6. The Comics Bin - a diverse site, which features sections on European comics, Race issues in (US) comics and how-tos for would be comickers.
   

I must also mention Comics Worth Reading and Comic World News (which, while no longer active, is full of useful stuff).

Six of the Best! For Drawing Day!

Grab a pencil/ pen/ stylus! It's Drawing Day 2008!

Celebrate by using any of these six free design/illustration/image editing tools online (and off):

1. The Gimp - and for those who can't imagine using anything other than Photoshop, there's GimpShop, which adapts the Photoshop interface and hotkeys for Gimp!
   
2. Inkscape - powerful-looking vector graphics editor, with plenty of support material; I'm just started to use this, since my ancient copy of Illustrator seems to be dying. But Microugly has created a handy Inkscape reference for Illustrator heads.
   
3. Paint.Net - I haven't tried this one yet, but it comes highly recommended.
   
4. Fontforge - The only free font editor I've come across. Looks good, if a little awkward to install, for non-techie types.
   
5. Pencil! - unlimited undos with the use of an eraser!
   
6. Pen! - there truly is nothing that cannot be done with a biro.
   

Six of the best! How to Draw Comics

I would just like everybody to know that this was a painstakingly researched blog entry. I've been combing the Internet obsessively, making notes and lists of pros and cons. Just in time for Drawing Day 2008. Nice.

1. Edgar Tadeo - short, but covers basics of figure drawing.
2. Rat Creature - scans of various how to draw books
3. Learn to Draw - not particularly about comics (though it does have a section about caricatures), this imaginatively titled website has lots of good exercises.
   
4. Drawing Comics - Comic pro Scott McDaniel's really useful guide to perspective.
   
5. A really good article about animation on Scribd. And Rivkah's posts about panelling and ballooning and Wally Wood's 22 panels are really worth checking out.
   
6. The motherload of comics tutorials.

Also, unrelated to drawing day per se, eager beaver types might like to try a 24 hour comic. All the best comics creators do them.

Six of the Best! Video-sharing websites

Nothing illustrates the potential of easy-to-use digital video and video-sharing websites, like this incredible animation by Italian grafitti artist Blu.

Here are six of the best video-sharing sites I've come across:

1. Fab Channel - videographies of concerts from a wide variety of acts.
   
2. Vimeo - young pretender to the video-sharing throne!
   
3. Atom Films - comedy shorts and fan films with high production values.
   
4. Hobnox - edit video online and make acid house!
5. Youtube - the granddaddy of them all and an amazing resource. (If only there was a quality filter!)
6. Flickr - with a 90 sec limit on videos, Flickr will soon host videos of a 'photographic' nature.
   

Six of the best! Web Comics with Nice Artwork

Apropos of nothing, here is a great illustration from Vera Bee.

Here are six of the web comics I've seen with the nicest artwork:

1. Family Man - Well-researched period drama.
   
2. Dice Box - beautifully drawn, epic story.
   
3. Clockwork Game - adventures of the famous Clockwork Turk, which beat everybody at chess in the Eighteenth Century.
   
4. Brat-halla - about obnoxious Norse godlets.
   
5. The Phoenix Requiem - the author of this gothic melodrama takes pains to insist that The Phoenix Requiem is a novel, rather than a comic.
   
6. Badass Muthas! - have no idea what's going on, but artwork is quite nice.