Tampa Bay Comic Con - August 23, 2013

Today I went to Tampa Bay Comic Con (about 1 hour 15 minutes from Orlando) in their new venue at the Tampa Convention Center.  Huge improvement over the hotel ballrooms where they used to hold the convention.  Though they had about a dozen artists in attendance there was only one new artist that I had not met at a prior convention.

 

Daredevil Artists (28 sketches so far)

 

For my additions to my "collection", I was only able to add one Daredevil artist, Geof Isherwood.  I had a bit of space left on the back cover and he asked if he could fill it all in as he likes to take his time with his sketches and make them as big as possible and of course I said "yes!".

Here is his sketch below (lower left) - excellent!

Spider-man "Foes" Artists (2 sketches so far)

So I decided to start a new "project" - I recently started reading "The Superior Foes of Spider-man" book and as usual bought the white blank variant.  Based on the theme of the book, I thought it might be fun to have Spider-man artists sketch their favorite villain (as long as their favorite is not the same as another artist!).  So to make this cover a little more linear I outlined boxes for the artist to fill in the villain.

 

The first two sketches were done by Mike McKone (Rhino) and Alex Saviuk  (Kraven).  Both artists have contributed to my Spidey head sketch covers and in fact the first artist to sketch a Spidey head for me was McKone so as he was at Tampa today I thought it fitting that he sketch the first villain.  Aren't these cool sketches???  Funny thing is I thought they would draw a head within the white box with space around it but instead their work looks like a true comic panel!

Looks like no more cons for the rest of 2013 but March 2014 seems to be a busy month with another Tampa con, Megacon (in Orlando) and maybe a trip to Seattle for Emerald City Con????  We'll see how that last one fits in budget...

HeroesCon (Charlotte) - June 2013

I recently came back from Charlotte and HeroesCon 2013 - a three day comic con which specializes in comics creators only without any pop culture guests.  This is my second year attending this con and I definitely recommend it for comics fans.

 

Here's a look at how my "Amazing Spider-man" and "Daredevil" collection is coming and a look at a couple other sketches I received.

Amazing Spider-man Artist (33 sketches so far)

I was able to add a Paolo Rivera sketch (top left) from whom I have been wanting to get a sketch for awhile. I had met him before but this was the first time I asked for a sketch.  I even sent him a message a few days before the con to make sure it would work out.  Great guy and I love his style.  At the bottom is a sketch by Rick Leonardi who is credited with co-creating the black costume so I thought it fitting to request a black Spidey sketch.

Daredevil Artists (27 sketches so far)

 

Coincidentally, the only two artists I was able to add to my "Daredevil" collection were Paolo (top right) and Rick (bottom right).  Again, great sketches and still amazed how fast they draw.

Amazing Spider-man Writers (14 in total so far)

Just one signature added to the Writer collection this time - John Layman.

 

Daredevil Writers (10 in total so far)

Similarly, just one signature added to the Writer collection this time - Greg Rucka.

While at the convention, I added one more Hulk sketch to my "Indestructible Hulk" cover - that of the newest Hulk artist - Matteo Scalera (bottom sketch).

 

Lastly, my 9 year-old son asked me why I never have any sketches done of Green Goblin since that is my favorite Marvel villain.  So I took his advice and got my first GG sketch - from one of my favorite artists, Mark Bagley.  Came out perfect...

 

 

Great convention all around - but I do realize that with most of these cons they get similar creators back year after year so unfortunately that means I may not get any new additions.  But still lots of fun!!

Orlando Comic Expo - May 18, 2013

I went to Orlando Comic Expo here in Orlando this weekend.  A relatively new convention that is held in a DoubleTree ballroom...a few vendors and a few comic artists.

 

But even though only a few artists I was able to meet and get sketches from Keith Pollard on Daredevil as seen below (excellent sketch but it took the loonnggeesstt of any artist that I have met so far - I even had to leave to run an errand and come back later - luckily it was only 20 minutes away).

 

 

Additionally, Keith did the top right Spider-man sketch (also excellent) and I also met another artist, Bob Hall who did the top left Spider-man sketch (and that one only took 5 minutes!).

 

 

So to date I have gotten 31 sketches from Amazing Spider-man artists and 25 sketches from Daredevil artist.

More to come at my next stop - HeroesCon in Charlotte in early June.  Can't wait!

Tampa Bay Comic Con - April 6

It's funny that I attended Megacon a few weeks ago and out of the large number of creators in attendance I was only able to get one artist signature for my collection.  However, today I went to Tampa Bay Comic Con and out of eight artists in attendance I added three more sketches to my covers.

 

Tampa Bay Comic Con is a twice-a-year hotel ballroom con that in the past mainly featured comics for sale.  I recently discovered it and within this past year, they now invite comic creators and even a few pop culture celebrities (this one had a couple cast members from "The Walking Dead").  And it is an hour or so from Orlando so not too far for me.

Amazing Spider-man Artists (29 in total so far)

I added one sketch today to "Amazing Spider-man" cover - that of Luke McDonnell - his is the one on the left.

Daredevil Artists (24 in total so far)

In addition to Luke McDonnell doing the Spidey sketch above, he did the bottom left Daredevil sketch.  The other artist I met, Rich Buckler, is known for "Daredevil" mainly for a number of covers he did in the '70's.

 

 

I really like the way the Rich Buckler sketch turned out - it is the one on the top right.

 

The organizers of this con also do a twice year Orlando ComicExpo.  The next one is in May and it looks like I will have a few more sketches to add - more on that in my next blog post....

Megacon 2013 - Orlando

I attended Megacon 2013 here in Orlando a couple weeks ago and was attempting to add some sketches to my "Amazing Spider-man" and "Daredevil" blank variant covers.  I was excited that Mark Waid would be in attendance but unfortunately had to cancel at the last minute.  Overall, there were was only one Artist in attendance that I needed for my "collection".  That was Steve McNiven who unfortunately was only signing his name and not sketching - so no sketch but he did sign (see bottom right hand corner).

 

That now brings my "Amazing Spider-man" Artist signature/sketch collection to 28 Artists.  Hopefully next convention (Charlotte in June) I will be able to add more to the covers.

 

As I came up short on "Daredevil" and "Amazing Spider-man", I decided to start a new collection focusing on "Incredible Hulk" Artists.  I used the blank variant cover from the recently released "Indestructible Hulk" #1 and started with two great sketches - one from Whilce Portacio and the other from Paul Pellitier.  More to come on this one...

 

Lastly, George Perez was in attendance at Megacon and I realized I never had any sketches from him so I asked if he could sketch Ultron on the "Age of Ultron" #1 blank variant cover.  Pretty quick sketch and it turned out nice.