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MEMBER SPOTLIGHT: JJ Harrison

RATE JJ’S PROFILE HERE

Posted by Tim Leong on July 31st, 2006 filed in Story Archive | Comment now »
So, I’m Famous

It seems I’ll be ditching my role at Comic Foundry for the life of a fashion model. Why? Because I’m famous, baby!

If you open up the current issue of Men’s Health, you can find my smiling mug TWICE in the “TELL MEN’S HEALTH” section. And if you open up the current issue of Details Magazine, you can find me modeling some duds I would never wear (not sure what page). No access to Details mag? Well, just roll on over to Jossip.com, where they’re featuring my picture from Details.
Posted by Tim Leong on July 31st, 2006 filed in Magazines, Blog | Comment now »
Lazy Sunday

Random Thoughts:

Just finished reading: Seven Soliers TPB, Vol. 1
Am currently reading: Rocketo, Vol. 1
Next on my reading list: The new book by Yoshihiro Tatsumi (thanks for the sketch and signature, by the way)

Most recent movie I just saw: All the President’s Men. (The best detective story of all time. Period.)

New Comic Foundry Video…is coming on Tuesday when we launch the new issue. Patience.
Posted by Tim Leong on July 30th, 2006 filed in Blog | Comment now »
NYT Comics Page + the Military

NYT ME Gerald Marzorati answers reader mail about the comics page:
For full, please click here

Thinking Up the Funny Pages
Q. First off, let me write a big thanks. I love the magazine, best part of the Sunday paper. Regrettably, I can’t get The Times over here in Iraq and reading the mag online just isn’t the same. The other day I was up in Mosul. An officer I had a meeting with up there had a big stack of The Times with one of the magazines on top behind his desk, which I eyed jealously throughout the meetings. His wife must have mailed them to him.

Anyway, my question: How did you make the decision to add the story/comic book section? I read the explanation why in that edition and I kind of buy it. What I’d like to know is how you came to the decision and how did you pick those particular categories? It seems like such a break with the direction of the magazine. Thanks much and keep up the good work!
– CDR Brendan McLane

A. Dear Commander (have I got that right?) McLane — Your letter has already made my day, not just that you like the magazine, but — speaking as a general-interest-magazine editor, that is, as someone who lives to reach the generally curious reader — that you wrote me from Iraq not to pick apart our coverage of the war but to inquire about comics and stuff!

In one respect, you embody the reason I was interested in scheming up the Funny Pages. In the post-9/11 world, a lot of our pages are being devoted to Iraq and, more generally, to national security and the war on terror. I wanted there to be a place in the magazine that was escapist. I count on attracting readers who want to be informed, of course, but I also count on attracting readers who want to be entertained — hence the crossword puzzle, the Ethicist column, and so on. We reach readers on Sunday morning, when a quiet break from the world, an escape, may be precisely what they have in mind.

The other big thing I had in mind was finding some way to evoke the funny pages of old-timey Sunday papers (though not of the Times, which never had them) in a contemporary way, and here, our popular culture presented a prefect opportunity. To me, the graphic novel — the book-length narrative told in comics-style by artists like Chris Ware and others — is one of the most vibrant young mediums we have. Ditto a new kind of humor writing which is neither jokey nor satirical but memoirish and oddball, a kind of writing that has popped up in recent years at reading nights in clubs and bars in New York, and on the public-radio show “This American Life.” (As it happens, two of the people here involved in the Funny Pages, Paul Tough and John Hodgman, have produced things for “This American Life.” Hodgman also now has the strangest moonlighting gig any writer at the magazine has ever had — he plays the tweedy PC in the new Apple TV commercials.) The third feature of the Funny Pages is serial fiction, and, again, I happen to think we are living in a terrific era for genre fiction — that is crime, detective, and legal-thriller fiction — and since no other magazine was publishing it, why not us?

You are right, it’s a break with the tradition of the magazine — with The Times as a whole, for that matter. But as we seek out new readers across the country and around the globe (via the Web), I suspect we’ll be doing a lot more things that haven’t been done before. Now, as a lot of letter writers have made clear, the Funny Pages are not for everyone, but as a lot of other letter-writers (especially younger ones) have made clear, they love them. Me, I want readers to find something to like in the magazine each week, and then take a bike ride or play with the kids. Hey, it’s Sunday.

You keep safe.
Posted by Tim Leong on July 27th, 2006 filed in Blog | Comment now »
MPA’s new superhero already defeated

Well, this is just ridiculous. The Magazine Publishers Association has just on to the comics bandwagon and was met with disheartening results.

Captain Controversy
Magazine Industry’s New Mascot Doesn’t Fly Well With Many

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — For a superhero, Captain Read sure needs a lot of people to come to his defense.

The red-caped mascot created by the Magazine Publishers of America has upset some of the association’s members-and not because they are worried about the dental health of media buyers to whom the Captain handed candy last week. (He was also handing out fliers detailing research on magazines’ effectiveness and accountability.)

…

Identity problem
Many a superhero has been misunderstood, and the MPA’s boy wonder already has an identity problem. It turns out that, contrary to almost everyone’s impression, the superhero’s name is not pronounced Captain REED, which suggests a literacy advocate, but Captain RED — suggesting that magazines are, in fact, consumed by readers.

Some MPA members’ beef with the accountability crusader goes beyond his name, and has more to do with the fact that they weren’t consulted about his creation. Though an executive at every big publishing house was — or was supposed to be — advised of the approaching Captain Read, many said they heard nothing about the character until they read about the $50,000 campaign in The New York Times.

The Captain, naturally, has his supporters. Ray Warren, president, Carat Media Group USA, sees some merit in the effort: “The idea of creating an icon that can get some attention is a good thing.”

Read full here
Posted by Tim Leong on July 27th, 2006 filed in Blog | Comment now »
’90s X-Men Cartoon Intro, Anime-Style

Posted by Tim Leong on July 26th, 2006 filed in Blog, Videos | 1 Comment »
COMIC-CON VIDEO BLOG 2: ON THE RED CARPET

Our second CF video from Comic-Con is from the Eisner Awards. The Eisners are touted as the “Oscars” of the industry, so we played our part as Joan Rivers to walk the red carpet and find out who is nominated for what, and more importantly, what they’re wearing. Click.
Posted by Tim Leong on July 25th, 2006 filed in Conventions, Blog, Videos | Comment now »
COMIC FOUNDRY VIDEO BLOG!!!

The video age is upon us, my friends, and Comic Foundry plans to be at the front. That’s why we’re launching a brand new video blog function. We, along with the entire world, went to Comic-Con last weekend and shot a metric ton of video that we’ve been sorting through since we got back. Our pal Heidi did a bunch through Divx, but ours are homegrown, very Robert Rodriguez. Shot, scored, cut and written by Comic Foundry. Note that we’ll be doing video blogs on a consistent basis — this was not just a con exclusive.

So, allow me to be the first to welcome you to the new age of Comic Foundry. Up first, the COMIC FOUNDRY TRAVELOGUE. Click.
Posted by Tim Leong on July 25th, 2006 filed in Conventions, Blog, Videos | Comment now »
San Diego

Everyone and their respective mothers are is off to San Diego for the 2006 Comic-Con International. And as of tomorrow morning at 6:20 AM, so is Comic Foundry.

We’ll be representing in full effect. Last year we teamed up with IFC. This year we’ll be doing something…different. It’s going to be exciting….

Enjoy part 2 of last year:

Posted by Tim Leong on July 19th, 2006 filed in Conventions, Blog | Comment now »
Arrested Development, Star Wars

Arrested Development poster in the spirit of Drew Struzan.

Originally found here, where there’s a much bigger version.
Posted by Tim Leong on July 17th, 2006 filed in TV, Blog | Comment now »
Newsflash: The Flash!

WE UPDATED!

It’s not much, but it’s a start. CF presents part 2 of our exclusive conversation with Paul DeMeo and Danny Bilson of The Flash: Fastest Man Alive.

I think I’d prefer less overt explaining through dialogue. But honestly, the big thing was that our first book had less dialogue than they wanted so we did more dialogue. In our original book, which we’ve turned in two of, I think absolutely we do more dialogue than we would’ve before we got coached by our editor.

Check it out here
Posted by Tim Leong on July 17th, 2006 filed in Blog | Comment now »
Kevin Smith on Superman Reborn

Watch this Q+A with Kevin Smith as he speaks about what could’ve happened with Superman Reborn, the scrapped Tim Burton movie 10 years back. Smith talks about how he was hired, the crazy Hollywood requests, etc. And, he’s a fantastic storyteller to boot.
Posted by Tim Leong on July 15th, 2006 filed in Blog, Videos | Comment now »

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Archive for July, 2006

MEMBER SPOTLIGHT: JJ Harrison

So, I’m Famous

Lazy Sunday

NYT Comics Page + the Military

MPA’s new superhero already defeated

’90s X-Men Cartoon Intro, Anime-Style

COMIC-CON VIDEO BLOG 2: ON THE RED CARPET

COMIC FOUNDRY VIDEO BLOG!!!

San Diego

Arrested Development, Star Wars

Newsflash: The Flash!

Kevin Smith on Superman Reborn