I have launched the new Band Of One Store where you can grab the Jack Astro comic book. A few A5 Art Card prints and various sketch cards from my morning warmup sketches which I’m posting on Instagram.
The store can be found here: https://bandofone.square.site/
If you are buying anything for Christmas I would order in the next couple of weeks to be sure of delivery before the 25th.
The last few months has been a wild ride, first with the Kickstarter. And then building up to the weekend at Thought Bubble.
It was such a joy to be able to talk to people about my work and show them the Jack Astro Comic Book in person.
A huge thank you to everyone who stopped by the table and either chatted with me or listened patiently to my pitch for the book. The response was really great and I’m still on a bit of a high having such a positive reaction from people both for my artwork and also the general concept.
I made this comic for myself really. Or to be more accurate for my 12 year old self. I would have been a massive fan of this comic if someone else had created it. It was especially exciting seeing youngsters around that age and a bit older looking so thoroughly psyched about the book.
The show was run amazingly well and all the precautions in place for Covid made for a great and safe show. Thought Bubble really cares about the artists and comic creators and there was SO much incredible talent on display. I wish I had more time to hunt around. I know I missed out on meeting and buying stuff from a few of my favourite creators.
Since the weekend ended I’ve been totally fueled with inspiration to get working on my next projects. I’ve got a few exciting things in the works including a spin-off version of Jack Astro for a kids magazine. And a new long form project that will be a bit more in the fantasy genre. A middle-ages setting, knights, dragons and my usual injection of weirdness and silliness.
I will definitely be hoping to attend next year’s show and hopefully one or two others throughout 2022.
My main exposure to his art was indirectly through the Heavy Metal movie. The series of shorts in the film are mostly taken from comic series in the magazine of the same name (Metal Hurlant in French).
Harry Canyon, the story of a New York taxi driver, was based on the Moebius’s comic, The Long Tomorrow. And Taarna was based on Arzach.
That movie had a huge impact on me. There are some cool short stories in it. But mainly the visuals were something totally new to me at the time.
I suspect I heard the name Moebius in the DVD special features. There was a making of documentary, before the days of the Internet this was a source of valuable insights. There was a period of time where I consumed making of’s and audio commentaries hungry for information. Now I guess it is podcasts!
The book is written by Jodorowsky and illustrated by Moebius. It is a Sci-Fi tour de force with so many interesting ideas crammed into its pages. Both philosophical conceptual ideas from Jodo as well as incredible genre defining visual ideas from Moebius.
After reading, I felt like it was one of the greatest graphic novels I had ever read. The last time I felt so overwhelmed by a comic book was probably after reading Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns.
