Ain’t it Cool News has run a preview of “DAD!” which they are following up with a full review next week:

Finally we have an extra special preview from a comic book documentary called DAD! This book from Th3rd World Studios documents the relationship between the book’s writer Scott King and his father who has a terminal illness. This is one of those projects that continues to show the versatility of the comic book medium. It yanks on the heartstrings and will make even the most cold-hearted hold back a tear. This mix of photorealism and actual photographs is a true gem deserving of an audience and I’m proud to be able to showcase it here.

I just got an email letting me know that Sequart has posted the first review of “DAD!”

Despite the book’s problems, this is, intermittently, a compelling read. This feels like an overambitious first project by a young creator, but I admire both King’s ambition and the way he tackled such an intensely personal issue.

It’s a pretty decent review and even the few not-so nice things said about the book are backed-up to the point that I can see where they are comming from. The full review is posted after the break… (Read on …)

Crap! Just learned that the art corrections and coloring on “DAD!” have to be finished by Friday so it can go to the printers. Guess I know what I’m doing all week.

Forgot to mention, “DAD! A Documentary Graphic Novel” is now on Amazon, though for whatever odd reason they have the price wrong. We told them like three weeks ago it needed to be fixed and apparently that will happen any day now.

Since we have our first press coverage today, I thought I should finally make the formal announcement of “DAD! A Documentary Graphic Novel.” The book will be 152 pages and will premiere at SPX and will be officially released on November 8th. The summary of the book is:

“DAD!” is a documentary graphic novel about a family dealing with a father’s illness and adjusting their entire existence to it. At its heart, it is about the story of a bitter son feeling guilty about leaving home, while trying to make peace with his father before he does.

The non-fiction book was “filmed” over the course of two and a half weeks and is complied from 8,349 photos and over 16 hours of transcribed audio.

You can check out it’s page at Th3rd World (which includes a preview) or go ahead and click that big blazing button on the right and pre-order it.

Comics Worth Reading is the first site/publication to mention “DAD! A Documentary Graphic Novel.”

The most distinctive factor, though, is that they describe the creation as having been “filmed”, and a look at the preview shows that … well, I wouldn’t call it a graphic novel at all. It’s photos with word balloons put on. That limits what the author can do, and it doesn’t provide the level of removal I want to be able to approach the material as a story. I got caught up in trying to figure out how they arranged shots, whether they were recreating things as they happened, who took which photos when… all things that got in the way of my “reading” the pages.It feels as though someone’s trying to use the hot publishing tag “graphic novel” without going through the difficult step of drawing (or the as difficult step of finding an artist). I didn’t care for the approach.

What do you think? Am I too stuck on what graphic novels have been to see what they could be? Or is this just a storyboard on paper, not an appropriate use of the “graphic novel” tag?

All in all, her reaction is one we expected to come up at some point, but I was hoping it wouldn’t be brought up the first time the book was mentioned somewhere. She did base her post off the book’s 14 page preview, which is why I think her comments are directed more toward how “DAD!” fits in(or doesn’t) into the medium as opposed to the actual story or storytelling, but I could be wrong. Maybe she’ll be willing to check out an ARC copy of the book…

Spending the week making phone calls, editing, and finally mailing out the ARC copies of “DAD! A Documentary Graphic Novel.” So posting will be down to a minimum.

This is the most recent version of the cover for “DAD! A Documentary Graphic Novel.” It’s definitely not finalized yet, but just thought you guys would like to see an update.

The ARC (advance reading copies) for “DAD! A Documentary Graphic Novel” have finally arrived. The 40+ copies of the book will be sent to major publications across the country for advance reviews. Man this is so exciting.

Above is the wrap-around cover we are using for the Advance Reading Copies of “DAD!” (Click it to Enlarge). The right-side is the front cover and the left side is the back cover.

Look who is listed as exhibiting at SPX… Me!

Guess who will be attending SPX to premier their first graphic novel.

My newest episode of “Eskimo Dave” has been posted online. If you’ve not been reading them while I was on break/vacation now is the perfect time to get caught up!

Episode 44 of “Eskimo Dave” is online. The reference to cheese, specifically brie cheese should make it more than obvious that I wrote it, but putting aside my brilliant skills as a writer, I think now is an excellent time to say just how awesome the art looks this week. Mapping out the long term storyline and overall tone of “Eskimo Dave,” we really wanted it to have a Ducktales/Bone-like feel to it and this week’s art completely accomplishes that (specially when you see the colored version).

For an independent study, I’m doing the rough draft of a YA(young adult) Fantasy novel. The book, who’s working title is “Lotus: Fate’s Pawn,” is loosely based off the first screenplay I wrote when I was 18 (Man I was such a naive and noob writer back then). The above pictures, click to enlarge, are character sketches I had drawn five or six years ago when I was considering turning the screenplay into a comic. Currently I’m on chapter five of probably 50-some chapters and I’ve discovered that writing prose is much more time consuming that I thought it would be. As a result, I probably won’t update the blog till around next Tuesday.

It totally slipped my mind that my next run on “Eskimo Dave” started this week. The next eight episodes are the turning point of ACT I for the first “long term” story arch so they are a tad more plot-heavy compared to normal episodes, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

“DAD!” has been lettered and passed onto proof readers and editors. The game plan now is to get back corrections that need to be made to the art and lettering. Once that happens there will be several more rounds of proof reading before ARC (advance reading copies) will be printed for marketing purposes. So as of now, it looks like we are still on schedule for an October ’08 release!

Getting the rough (keyword is “rough”) lettering done this weekend on “DAD!” so unless there is a big news story, don’t expect updates. But hey, give me some credit, I at least did some posting today when I don’t normally post at all on Fridays.

The above pics (click to enlarge) are the newest promos for “The Dark Knight.”

It’s about freaking time. My first “Eskimo Dave” comic is online. The strip runs weekly and my first arc lasts three episodes. Another writer then steps in for a five issue run and then I’ll have 17 episodes back to back. That’s right… SEVENTEEN! So if you haven’t been reading the webcomic now is the perfect time to jump on board.

I’ve gone into writer’s mode because I need to get the first draft of a screenplay finished in the next few days. Counting today I’m guessing at the most it will take three days. So blog will be quiet until then. Sorry… just when writing fiction it messes up my flow to do blog post.

The pic above is some concept art I had done to help me with the scripting process. Basically the story takes place in “Dreamscape City” the place where dreams are made, literally. Think of it as L.A. only instead of movies the film dreams. The city is set up like a massive back-lot where you’ll have a block that looks like it is from “Blade Runner” right next to a block that looks like its from colonial Virgina. Because of this, I had the map above created so I could keep track of where everything is in the city.

On Thursday I pitched my thesis, which is to do an original graphic novel. The hardest part of the pitch was trying to convince the panel of professors that 1)comics aren’t just for kids and 2)they aren’t just superheroes. It went fairly well and I’m supposed to hear back next week on if I’m approved or not. To go with my verbal pitch I gave out a one sheet of paper that was laid out very pretty with boxes, graphs, and art. Of course if I post a jpeg of it then everything gets scrunched so here is just the info that was on my written pitch: (Read on …)

It took almost a year but I’m done with everything that I can do with “DAD!” The pages are laid out (the equivalent of pencils are done) and the script was finalized today. I’m now sending it on so that the color-er and letter-er can do their part. Considering its 150 some pages… its going to be a while before they finish what they are doing. But it just feels NICE to know that I’m done with my part!

“Supernatural” is adding two female roles to the show who will be series regulars. A lot of fans are upset about this because they feel the girls will obviously be love interests for Sam and Dean. This has caused the shows executive producer to give one of the best quotes I’ve heard all summer:

“We are not turning into One Tree Hill with monsters – I swear. I’d rather put a gun in my mouth.”

Other than that AWSOME quote… the interview here is actually a decent interview. It talks about why they added the women and the general direction of next season. The two women being added to the show will be monster hunters and will be played by Katie Cassidy and Lauren Cohan. I’m not familuar with Cassidy but Cohan was the really hot chick from “Van Wilder 2: The Rise of Taj.”

Conversion to Schrutebucks: 1 stanley nickel = (1 schrutebuck * 1 leprechaun)/ 1 unicorn

Cash Value: ? ? ? 1 stanley nickel = $ (1 leprechaun/1000)/ 1 unicorn