Todd Klein's Blog, page 212

And Then I Read: DOCTOR FATE 3

Image © DC Comics

Under another unusual cover, writer Paul Levitz and artist Sonny Liew continue to please me with an unusual super-hero comic. One unusual thing is the pretty even balance between Khalid and the ordinary folks in his life, friends and family, and Khalid’s struggle to understand and use the powers of Fate to save lives, including his own. I like both parts. The characters are charming and real, and the struggle is completely believable. Khalid does finally turn up a source of information in the astral form of Nabu, a former servant of Thoth, as Khalid is now, but so far Nabu is long on generalities and short on actual information. Khalid is mostly working by trial and error, and the errors are pretty big ones, but he does make some progress. Good stuff, really enjoying the series.

Recommended

And Then I Read: ASTRO CITY 26

Image © Juke Box Productions

This book has lately often focused on aging super-heroes, and in this issue does so again, but in a different way. The issue opens with a replica of the first page of the first ASTRO CITY issue, showing the most powerful hero of the book, Samaritan, dreaming about flying. As the story continues, we follow a day in the life of the character, but one very different from that first story. Here he’s troubled by nightmares, burdened with responsibilities, taking on too many challenges, and not a happy man, despite all his gifts and powers. Writer Kurt Busiek and artist Brent Anderson take us on a thoughtful and interesting journey which has a surprising resolution, and yet a comforting one. I’ve read every issue of ASTRO CITY, and plan to keep reading them as long as they come out and I’m able to do so. If a comic built on homages and tropes of the super-hero genre can last that long, and be great that long, there’s no reason to stop. Cheers to the creative team for keeping it entertaining for twenty years!

Highly recommended.

Pulled From My Files #36: Digital Cover Lettering

Images © DC Comics

I did lots of cover lettering by hand from 1978 on, and when I got my first Apple desktop setup, I began making fonts I could use for that as well, and gradually shifted over to mostly digital cover lettering around 1995. I did plenty of that work until 2005 when DC took it in-house. Here are some examples using my own fonts that I think worked well. This one is from CHRONOS #9.

Not sure what this was for, but the “Featuring” was not a font, it was drawn and traced for this use, inspired by the work of Ira Schnapp.

I’ve always liked covers with one choice word balloon, and here’s one from CREEPER #6.

From DOOM PATROL #2, using one of the fonts seen in the first example above, but with a very different treatment.

From DOOM PATROL #8…I think.

But this one is also marked DOOM PATROL #8, so either one is numbered wrong, or one was a rewrite. This font is inspired by some of the Marvel titles by Artie Simek.

From DETECTIVE COMICS #783, sometimes cover lettering is huge, in this case a one-shot treatment of the logo that I probably got paid extra for…

…and sometimes it can go very small, as in this example from DETECTIVE COMICS #795. This is a tiny random selection from the hundreds in my files, I’ll put up more in the future.

September Sand Sculptures

Photos by Todd Klein except as noted.

My friend Tim, his son Gabe, and Gabe’s girlfriend Bethina were here this Labor Day weekend for their annual shore visit, and we had fun both here at our house and at the beach, though Saturday was very windy, so not so pleasant conditions at the shore. We managed this group effort sculpture on Saturday, though the wind was pushing the waves much higher up on the beach than usual. We began at what is usually the high tide line, and by mid-afternoon had to move our stuff back another 40 feet.

Photos by Calvin Seibert of his work.

Tim had recently discovered the fabulous sand sculptures of Calvin Seibert, and that was our inspiration this weekend. Tim had passed on THIS LINK to lots of Calvin’s incredible work, which is mostly abstract and architectural, and amazingly precise. Needless to say, we didn’t get close what he’s doing, but we had fun trying.

Back to our Saturday sculpture, Tim did the topper, Gabe, above, worked on one side, and I on the other, that’s mine at right. The waves were lapping at our heels.

And then we had to retreat for a while for our lunch break. Some of the sculpture went down, but most of it survived. In the background, we’ve never seen the beach at Stone Harbor that narrow.

After the tide receded, Tim went back to work, adding a large sphere and more to the work.

Here’s the latest picture I got before we left for the day.

Back home we had some good meals, and each evening played one of Tim’s collection of obscure board games. Leo loved the bag the games were in! One night we played “Kill Doctor Lucky,” the other it was “Elfenland.” Both fun.

On Sunday the beach was less windy and more as we like it. I’d pretty much decided the precise shapes and corners, and the smooth surfaces of Calvin Seibert were beyond me, so I made this collection of obelisks, a form we had been discussing.

We were wary of the tide, but it stayed in its usual range today, so our work was not swamped.

The obelisks were fun, and I did pick up the crumbled sand base from Seibert.

Tim had more patience, perseverance and skill than me, and produced this cubist work very much in the Seibert style, though he didn’t have time to do as much as he would have liked with it.

Here’s Tim working with some of his many tools, though he didn’t bring the full tool set this year.

Extending the shape wall with trowel and spackling knife.

New this year were some plastic-coated cards of various sizes to help make those sharp edges.

The cubist structure as far as Tim got with it. Our company had to leave late this afternoon, and we’re sorry to see them go, we had a great time. That wraps up the sand sculptures and beach visitors for this summer! Until next year…

And Then I Read: GREEN LANTERN LOST ARMY 3

Image © DC Comics

John Stewart, Guy Gardner and company still don’t know where they are, but have a better idea of when, and it’s the very distant past, before the beginning of our universe. Like Hal Jordan, they’ve encountered Relic, but this is a much younger Relic still in his own universe before it was destroyed and replaced with ours. This Relic is smaller and less grumpy, interested in learning from the Lanterns about their energy powers. Other forces are not so benign.

I’m enjoying this series so far, but hoping it doesn’t get dragged into a rehash of the Relic material we’ve already read. The art by Saiz is great, and kudos to writer Cullen Bunn for getting the word “amongst” into print in a DC Comic. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to change it to “among” at DC’s request in books I’ve lettered.

Recommended

And Then I Read: B.P.R.D. HELL ON EARTH Vol. 10

Image © Mike Mignola

The “Hell on Earth” story line has gone on quite a long time now, this is the tenth trade paperback. Some of the momentum has gone, but the “everyday life goes on, or tries to, during Hell” approach works well in general. This time we begin back at B.P.R.D. headquarters in Colorado, where an artifact from an archived case brings an old evil to life, and chaos to the staff and agents. But the moral of this one seems to be, sometimes research does pay off.

The second storyline follows Johann and his crew in Japan, where there’s a struggle for control of the city among several gigantic monsters much scarier than Godzilla ever was, and the humans stuck in the midst of it, agents and civilians, are pretty helpless.

Finally, and “everyman” story of people trying to go on with their lives amid the monsters in the American west. Even in the worst of times, a coffee shop has a role to play.

The writing, art, coloring and lettering are all top notch in this series, and even though I find the stories depressing at times, I still enjoy reading them.

Recommended

And Then I Read: WISHING SEASON by Esther M. Friesner

Cover and interior illustrations © Frank Kelly Freas

Khalid is attending Genie school in the mysterious land of the Genies, and is very skilled in magic, but not so much in understanding the humans he will need to deal with when granting wishes. Khalid is admired by his classmate, the lovely Tamar, and envied by another classmate, Gamal, who covets the attention of Tamar, which Khalid doesn’t seem to notice. Khalid is sure he knows everything he needs to know about being a Genie, and their teacher Ishmael decides to give him a trial run in a magic lamp to see how things go. Unfortunately for Khalid, they can’t possibly go worse. When he emerges from the magic lamp in the hands of his new master, Haroun, he forgets to tell him a crucial rule: you can’t use one of your three wishes to get more wishes. When Haroun asks for unlimited wishes, Khalid finds he is bound to grant that wish, essentially making him a permanent slave to Haroun’s every greedy thought and desire.

When Khalid doesn’t return to class as expected, Tamar goes out to help him, but finds that challenging. Meanwhile, Gamar is also on hand to make Khalid’s life as difficult as possible. New allies like a very smart alley cat are some help, but Khalid is so mired in trouble, it seems he’ll never get out. Before long the ruling council of Genies is involved in this mess, and Gamal is upping his evil plans, and things go from bad to worse.

This is a fun book, and the art by Kelly Freas is a delightful bonus. Friesner’s writing is light and humorous, but her characters are appealing and her plot reasonably believable (at least while you’re reading). It is a bit hard to get one’s head into the Arabian Nights world the book takes place in, since the real world now occupying that space is so different, but once you do, the story carries you along on a nice magic carpet ride.

Recommended

Pulled From My Files #35: LOVE STORIES recreation

Images © DC Comics

Some time in 1999 or 2000 someone in DC’s design department asked me to recreate the lettering for this cover from 1971, beautifully crafted by Gaspar Saladino. DC was planning a replica edition but did not have the film negatives of this cover to reprint it from. All they had was a copy of the comic in a bound volume, probably a volume of 100-page Super Spectaculars, of which this was #5. They agreed to my rate, and sent me this color photocopy to work from. I scanned it and painstakingly traced all the lettering in Adobe Illustrator, or in the case of the type at the top, found the right font to match it.

I don’t recall how long it took, but I’m sure it took a long time! The ability to zoom in a ridiculous amount in Illustrator made it possible to match the original very closely. The rate must have made it worth while, though I don’t think I’d attempt this kind of job today. Life is too short. It’s always nice to have a chance to study the fine work of Gaspar Saladino, though. The curve of the lettering where it goes into the gutter took some adjusting, but I think it came out pretty good. The recreation was released in 2000.

And Then I Read: GREEN LANTERN 43

Image © DC Comics

Hal Jordan as a sort of wandering space policeman/detective was working for me, but this issue gets Relic involved, the central bad guy from a recent crossover event. Hal wants information from him, and doesn’t want Relic to know who he really is, as Relic is determined to destroy all Lanterns. Things are working out until one of Hal’s new sidekicks, Virgo, throws a massive spanner in the works. Some help he is…

Still kind of fun, but this issue is less appealing and mildly recommended.

Incoming: FREE COUNTRY

Image © DC Comics, Inc.

This new hardcover reprints the two large issues from the 1993-94 Vertigo crossover with an all-new center third lettered by me (along with other pages in the final section), a total of 75 new pages. As Neil explains in his introduction, the entire idea of a Vertigo crossover was new at the time, as was the imprint, and the original plan didn’t pan out well, so the story was never reprinted. In this new version, the story line has been carried through as originally intended with a center section plotted by Neil, written by Toby Litt and with art by Peter Gross. I think it works much better now.