JaMiE BaKeR: fallout

Benton Jew just turned me onto the fact that on Dave Johnson’s NEWS page there is a nice review of Babes in Space:

Sunday, November 21, 2004
You must buy this!!!

This is one of those books that really blew me away. It’s a collection of Space Girl stories by the likes of: Benton Jew, Anson Jew, Les Toil, Ed Reynolds, Bosco Ng, Brian O’Connell and James Baker. What was that? Never heard of them? Well, put down your Jim Lee comic and try something else. These guy’s rocked my socks with their talent. So give them so of the moola you were going to spend on that Wizard retrospective on foil stamp covers from the late 90’s. For more info go to: www.babesinspace.com

If, as a result of that fine endorsement by one of the best in the biz, you now feel inspired to purchase BABES IN SPACE, then visit my ONLINE STORE, or BUD PLANT where arrangements can be made for a copy to find it’s way into your grubby little hands.


Click on the image for a preview of the SEPHILINA story.

No, that’s not one of my drawings there… I WISH I could make it look so easy… *SIGH*

It’s by one of my all-time favourite cartoonists; the comics artist DENIS BODART. He is having an exhibition in Europe at the moment. But even for those of us who don’t live there, you can get a marvellous sample of what’s on show ONLINE.

I first became aware of his work when I was working at the DISNEY studio in Paris in 1990. I found a book he had drawn called CELESTIN SPECULOOS: Les Affreaux, in one of those fantastic comic-book stores they have in France. Soon after I picked up another book with the same character called MAI 1968. They both feature a spunky reporter/photgrapher gal called MAITE and her boyfriend Celestin Speculoos.

Since I no longer live in Europe it’s a little hard to keep up with what he does these days, but when visiting my sister in France last year, I was able to pick up some more BODART books: a series called GREEN MANOR. As far as I know, thats all he’s had published in book form, though he regularly does strips for magazines, or so I hear.

Anyway, I highly recommend looking at his work. It has a wonderful loose quality to the line, it is very vigorous and fresh, and the looseness is never at the cost of specificity…

Here are some images from one of my pocket sketchbooks that I carry around for doodling on the train…

I’ve uploaded a bunch of these onto my site, but so far have not added to the galleries in my web-folio.

I really need to update some galleries on my site as I have actually uploaded a fair few pix that arent in there yet…

These (and other of my grubby, sweaty little pictures) also appear in Gourmet Gruel#3 the third of my sketch collections that I sell at conventions. (which appears in the latest BUD PLANT catalog.

I’m currently working on my own comics in the few weeks before Christmas. I got tired of working at home, so I’m now sharing a downtown studio space with comics artist John Heebink. It’s a nice location on busy Market street.

I have plotted out a pretty long sequence of Rocket Rabbit stories (about 152 pages), and I’m hoping to get at least a 48 page chunk done by early next year….

The first adventure is a 28 page story where Rocket and the Professor are confronted by the APES of WRATH. the second 22 page story has Rocket and the Professor playing bodyguard/babysitter to the PREZIDENT when he comes to San Fiasco. Hopefully I will have at least those two stories finished in time for Wondercon in February.

I have already arranged tables/booths at Wondercon, Ape, and Comic-con for next year, and I will be sharing with Rhode yet again.

Storyboarding at Pixar is over for now. I may be back in there early next year.

Speaking of Pixar, last night I went to see the INCREDIBLES again, (this time with an audience of people who had not worked on it) at Oakland’s beautiful Grand Lake Theatre. Of course the reaction was very positive, and the East Bay audience definately got a kick out of the East Bay references at the beginning of the film. I have to say that I enjoyed The Incredibles just as much if not more this (third) time. The group of us had to go to a diner afterwards and geek-out on all the Pixar goodness.

The trailer for POLAR EXPRESS was shown before the movie and it struck me how the more cartoony designs of the INCREDIBLES were more believable (for me) as characters.

I remember thinking a lot about this issue back when I was working on the (cancelled) FRANKENSTEIN project at ILM. A lot of times people in CG animation get hung up on the issue of “realism” when I think “believability” is what it is really all about. for example, Bugs Bunny is very believable but he isn’t at all realistic. Conversely, a lot of CG characters are realistic yet not all that believable. Anyway I am looking forward to seeing more CG films with unashamedly stylized human characters.