Sunday, May 30, 2010

SAYING GOODBYE!!!!


I have had this Blog linked to my website link so whenever I posted something here, it would appear on my site BUT this will be changing as of today. since I adore each and everyone of you I ask that you (you know who you are :) follow me to AMITY INK!!! It has undergone several changes as well as some wonderful improvements. So please stop by and sign up. It literally takes less then a minute to do and will be worth it. If you dont want to sign up thats ok to. just swing by and check it out!

Thank you so much

just click the BLOG or READ STUFF button!

see ya there!
-Jesse

Friday, May 28, 2010

TWITTER? What the hell is that?


Since Anthony and I have been buried under book II: Fight for Amity, we haven’t had much time for much of anything else. So when our buddy Cory told us that we needed a Twitter account it seemed like one more thing for us to pile on our work load. However, Cory shrugged his shoulders and said, “Ill do it.”
It was that moment that I realized Corry was sent to us by God himself to make our lives easier.
So please check it out because he seems to be really into that stuff and will do a good job. Plus we talk quite a bit so he will have the scoop on things as they happen.
Thanks Cory!
-Jesse

Thursday, May 27, 2010

A change is a come'n!

You might have noticed some of the changes to our site. I know, they’re not big changes but changes none the less! My buddy jay was nice enough (as well as smart enough) to set it up so that we can add some changes ourselves without it taking an act of God.
First thing that is better is the NEWS page. We are now trying to keep that up to date as well as post as many events as we can that we think you may like to attend.

Second, we have added new character to the BLOG posts. I don’t know why but this is one of my favorite additions. It’s the little things isn’t it? So now the new posts have a range of about 13 different characters as opposed to 2. Again, this doesn’t change anything but since I am a man that works off of visuals …this totally makes me happy!

Third, we added new banners to the home page that will “randomly” change per visit…or if you just keep hitting refresh. Yeah, so! Who cares if that’s how I do it? I like to see the different banners! We posted several pictures from Berona’s War II: Fight for Amity. This will give you a nice little look into the next book. Plus we couldn’t really keep the add up that we had before because we are, for the most part, not selling the first edition anymore…sorry guys.

Another small improvement is the MEDIA page. We have the Zombie video as well as the original Promo video. Our plan for this page is to have it so once you click on this page it will give you options for videos as well as wallpapers and maybe some avatars. As far as the PROJECTS page goes, we have something special up our sleeve for this one that we will try to get to as soon as we can!

-Jesse

Friday, May 21, 2010

WOO-WHOOO!


Our Preview Book is out!!! And though I'm sure there will be those out there who can’t wait to bash on our story (there always are), we are getting a lot of really good reviews! This is a SMILING point for us! We couldn’t be happier about all of the kind words that people have to say.
http://popculturenetwork.com/article.php?story=20100419123259401

Also, tomorrow Anthony, Cooper and I will be at Heroes and Dreams (Flowood, MS) for the signing of the book. It is the first time that we will all be in the same time at once, so if you’re in the area from 1-5pm swing on by to pick up your signed copy as well!
-Jesse

Sunday, May 9, 2010

Your Epidermis Is Showing!

Back around the beginning of April, Anthony and I were discussing the anatomy (see April 9th post) of our characters. I wanted to be able to get all the dynamic poses out of the Cropones as I possibly could. I didn’t want to change the appearance of my characters but I did want to better understand them. This seems like a “no-brainer” but it did cause me a bit more trouble then I had intended. I know, I know…if I am the one who designed them, than should I not be the one to best understand them??? Well that would seem to be the obvious answer but as it turned out I had been drawing these guys to the point that I could do it with my eyes closed HOWEVER, I never really understood WHAT I was actually drawing. I was very aware of the exterior design but what lied beneath the Cropone fur was a mystery. So after a couple of days of drawing nothing but the frame of the character….I began to see what it was I needed to see while designing them.
-Jesse

Monday, May 3, 2010

Free Comic Book Day!

Well the FCB Day has come and gone! I am happy to say that we had a good time and saw a lot of new faces. We got set up early at Heroes and Dreams Comic shop and started sketching immediately.

As expected, we quickly sold almost all of our “Premature Lunch Box” books. By the end of the day we only had a couple of books left. We were able to walk away from the table each with our own book. We are still deciding if we are going to produce anymore of these books.


It’s said that every time you turn a page, baby Jesus cries.


In Ele-Alta, there was stone. In Croponia, there was wood. This is what makes Amity so valuable. It’s where the green meets the grey! It contained wood, bone and stone. Most soldiers who fought in Amity bare this of badge of honor. Amity was the perfect find.
So we were happy to see that quite a few of the “Amity necklaces” found new homes.
So to everyone who showed up and showed some love…thank you! As always we enjoyed it and look forward to next year. Also, our Berona’s War: Preview Guide comes out on the 12th…so we will be at Heroes again the following Saturday to do signings. It will be Anthony, Cooper and I. The book is only around $3, so be sure to pick one up!


-Jesse

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Slayers and Shaman

Finally! We finished up two more stories blocking our paths of Book II completion. Anthony’s slayer story: Devotion and my shaman story: Denial. The shaman story (both written by Cooper) took me a bit longer than planned because my game plan kinda fell apart and began to take new directions after I started working on it. We wanted both stories to have somewhat the same feel to them and share a “darker” theme. We originally wanted them to have a Mignola feel, so we made sure to have lots of blacks and plenty of negative space. Anthony wanted to use several smaller panels over a larger image while I wanted more of a promotional poster look to mine.

I think we both ended up where we wanted. Devotion is a four page story consisting of larger drawings covered by smaller panels and Denial is a four page story being told through four different “movie style” posters, each representing the words on that particular page. And as always we each worked on our own rough layouts with our own characters and then passed them off for the other to do his character. Anthony draws all of the Ele-Alta and I all of the Cropones. My story wasn’t so bad for Anthony because I only had one page where our characters interact BUT as for Anthony’s story he had quite a few panels where he needed Cropones added. One of which is a HUGE group of zombie Cropones engaged in battle with a slayer…not something that particularly makes me glow with excitement.

I wanted to share a page from each story for your viewing satisfaction…enjoy.

-Jesse


Sunday, April 18, 2010

SUNDAY DRIVE!!!

Destination…Success
“The War” is the final story that is needed to complete the written part of Book II: Fight for Amity. It is turning out to be one of the tougher stories of the book because essentially it is also (in a since) our first comic. Thought Book II is composed of a bunch of short stories, The War is the same length as a comic (25-30 pages) so we are treating it as such…also we have hopes of actually putting out a comic or two (depending on the success of the first two books) so this could be good practice for finding the look we want for those books.
ANYWAY, Cooper is having some of the same problems I have come across when it comes to doing these stories…It can always be BETTER! After Anthony and I gave him our outline to The War, he immediately began to sink his teeth into it but after awhile he knew he could do better. After he made it better, it excited him enough to, once again, make it BETTER! But in doing so, he came across some problems in the story and needed to break through them.
The office with removable T-tops
That’s where THE SUNDAY DRIVE comes in. What better office then the 300zx? I dare to say there is one….no, no there is not! We jumped into the car and hit the road. Before too long we began to work our way through the story as well as work our way to other states…ooops.
We found ourselves entering Louisiana and started looking for somewhere to eat. The GPS was NO HELP AT ALL!!! At one point it actually said, “left in 1.5 miles. Take next right in 5…..where the hell are you?” I kid you not, it told us it had to call a friend and it would get back to us.
What did this thing just say???
We finally found a nice place to eat and later walked to a spot by the Mississippi River, with a good cup-of-joe and worked our way through the rest of the story. It made for a pretty good day.
Apparently everything closes on Sunday in this here Ghost Town. (Cooper)
-Jesse

More Bookmarks...

With free comic book day right around the corner and our preview book “most likely” missing its release date (making me a disgruntled artist) I figured I might as well try to get something new for the event. I started small with the always easy Bookmarks! I gathered some of the art from Book II as well as from other projects (posters, games and such) and laid them out for a presentable little spot saver! Here is just a little look at the start of the project.
-Jesse

Thursday, April 8, 2010

The Little Things

It's the little things that make my day! So Jesse calls me the other day and tells me how he is working on some new drawings of Cropones. He is practicing drawing them in more dynamic poses to make sure they will be able to deliver all the expressions necessary for some upcoming projects...anyways, he mentioned how I was lucky that my characters had noses and more defined legs, cause that makes them easier to draw in all these different angles. So I took it upon myself to draw a little scene that popped into my head of one Cropone solving the problem his way. Needless to say, it made me laugh.

-Anthony-

Family-Alta?

Here is the kind of guys we are….We are tight on deadlines, have a couple of books about to hit the shelves, working on concepts for spin off games and comics and still working on the completion of Book II: Fight For Amity. BUT we always seem to find the time to do stuff to screw with each other. Whether it’s a quick picture sent through the cell (one that may or may not directly blame MY characters for the fall of our book) or just a goofy idea that we want to see unfold before our eyes…we always find the time to make each other laugh!

Having said this, there was NO way I was going to pass up the opportunity to do this little gem of a joke! This is Anthony’s character from “A New Dawn.” When I saw it I couldn’t see anything but the following picture and giggled the whole time while working on it.

I'm not even going to explain it because if I did….you wouldn’t like it anyway.

-Jesse

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Special Thanks!

This is one post that I really looked foreword to! After the San Francisco Wondercon while hanging out in their hotel, Francisco and Humberto were nice enough to show us some love. They gave us a couple of quotes that we will be using on the Back of Berona’s War I: Field Guide. So having said that, I would be remiss not to say that Ramos’ “Art and Out” is also a must have!!! If you are familiar with his work (and you shouldn’t be reading this or any art blog, if you are not….SHAME ON YOU!) you would know all of his work is GREAT!
-Jesse

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Ordinary meets Extraordinary


This is a page from the three part story “Dawn of the Nance” from Berona’s War II: Fight for Amity. What Anthony and I like is the actual story was conceived on our last trip to Chicago. Its basically one FAT inside joke. The actual joke, I'm pretty sure, guarantied us our own personal timeshare in hell. But that’s not even the funniest part…I actually REALLY like the story our joke turned into. At this point the story has little to do with the origination of the joke but we will always know…the truth.
Oh yeah, one more thing. I'm pretty sure that…yes...yes…I'm pretty sure that those are NOT the words that go to the pictures. In fact I'm certain of it. Just having a little fun with my buddy. My buddy who drew his Ele-Alta without even thinking about it, while I spent TWO FREAK’N DAYS on the environment!

-Jesse

Friday, April 2, 2010

Adding Color to Our Day

I just wanted to put down a page from another story from Berona’s War II. This is a story written by Opie and Colored by our buddy Wes. Not only does he take a lot of the stress off of ourselves by coloring these for us but we think he does a pretty good job as well! The R&D stories are going to be pretty funny (we think so anyway) and hopeful we will do several of them as sort of a running joke. So thanks Opie and Wes for sharing some of your talents with us!
-Jesse

A Broken Promise

Here are some of the inked pages to a recently finished story. All that's left for this one is to have the color added, but first I'm going to jump on some other stories. Enjoy the preview.

-Anthony-






Thursday, April 1, 2010

under COVER...

Well here they are! Just to re-explain and to catch you up…Anthony and I made a small number of Berona’s Hundred Year War book to sell at conventions. The book sold surprisingly well and even more so, surprisingly fast. We joined up with Archaia and will be putting out a preview book (end of April). We wanted a new cover for the preview book. So what we did is (and here is where you have to keep up) gave the preview book our original Hundred Year War cover, since we would be changing that one as well. This way for all of you, who did not get a first edition book, it is a way for you to get something with the same cover.
THEN (if things go as planned in June) we will be releasing the second edition of Berona’s War (formally know as the Hundred Year War). We have given it a new cover and updated some of the pages inside…not to mention all the plot holes and endless field of grammatical errors.
The book we are working on, Berona's War: Fight For Amity, will be (God willing) finished by then and will be hitting shelves soon after (Aug).
We were excited about getting our new covers done and wanted to share them. So with no further ado….
-Jesse


Thursday, March 18, 2010

ZOMBIE!

This is a simple little slide show that was created just for fun. There is nothing fancy about it...it just shows some of the zombie characters from the first Book, Book II, convention posters and miscellaneous undead projects. I just wanted to share it and hope you like it as well. The one that I am looking forward to is “La Femme Cropone”...it's gonna be good! We started discussing the layout of that one last night and it's promising. That one will take awhile before its ready to be posted because it's not just a slide show with some music, its going to be way more layered and complex. BUT until then...enjoy Croponia's Zombie Horde!
-Jesse

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Ladies of Croponia!

The Ladies of Croponia is something I started the other day. Basically all it is, is a collection of some of the female Cropone characters. I was originally going to make a convention book out of them of maybe even a mini poster with the collection of females. What I am REALLY hoping I can do is a little after effects project with them…not sure if this will happen but it’s a thought.
Anyway, here are 3 of the 16 ladies I have designed (so far). For the most part all of them are fairly different from each other. They come in several different colors, some with spots and some without, as well as different head pieces. Some of them are from Croponia others from Krite, Condyle and Jackdaw.
The 3 I have here are Krite, Croponia and Condyle.
If I end up NOT doing anything with them, I will post them all later…
-Jesse

Saturday, March 13, 2010

R&D Page

Here is one of the pages I just finished inking for the R&D story. Next, onto the colors.
-Anthony

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Give me some SKIN!

My new best buddy from Cali asked us to undertake to task of doing some iPhone skins. So after a quick debate Anthony and I decided to each do a fan favorite…Slayers and Zombies. It was a tough call because we have quite a number of characters to choose from. I guess no matter who we chose, some one will always want someone else. I figure we might as well do someone WE enjoy. The other two skins were some I did at last minute just playing around. The one of Dawn is one I really enjoyed but Anthony said it was gay of me to do a “chick” skin and then he beat me severely…so I will not be using that one. I'm still not sure the final result for this little project but we think it might result in some skins for sale at the next con!!!
-Jesse

Monday, March 8, 2010

Read the Signs!

As I was working on an iPhone Skin, I started to play around with several different designs. One thing lead to another and I had the idea to do signs. Though I couldn’t come up with too many that I really liked I did get a couple. Zombie Crossing is not an original idea. However, I do think that the bloody Cropone hand does add its own unique touch to it. It was a small challenge to replace the typical human print with that of a four fingered Cropone. I think it came out fun and adventurous and I believe it should be mounted on my wall….somewhere.
The second idea that I had was probably one I enjoyed the most. The basic zombie silhouette could have easily been used as a Zombie Crossing sign as well BUT by adding a little pizzazz (and by pizzazz, I mean a bullet through the head) to it, it gave the whole sign a new feel. After all, who didn’t smack their friends in the forehead when driving past a Stop Ahead sign? This sign was just begging for some alterations. Next we just got to look into getting these babies done!
-Jesse

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Book II: Storylines

Here is a list of some of the stories that will be appearing in Berona’s War Book II Storylines. Some of these are working titles and will have been changed before the book is finalized. And just to be clear…when I say that these are some of the “stories,” what I mean is that these are some of the TITLES is Book II. Some of them cant really be called Stories because they are so short. R&D for example is a 3 page joke as well as several Armor-Krios skits are only one page each. We have some of these titles broke down into something you might see in the Sunday Funnies while others have a “far Side” feel to them and then there are the ones that are written comic book style with panels. Anyway, I just wanted to put some of what we have been working on to give you a look into some of the titles from the next book.
-Jesse

1. The War
2. R and D
3. Bigger game
4. Troop 82
5. Denial
6. Armor Krios Intro
7. What’s in a Name?
8. Ruthless
9. Dawn of the Nance
10. Dune Dog Saints
11. Whatever it Takes
12. Broken promise
13. A New Dawn
14. Flag Bearer
15. Self-Les
16. Slayer
17. Fallido
18. Stronger, Faster, Young
19. How Kurt Almost Died
20. Dawn and the Dead

Monday, March 1, 2010

1st vs 2nd!!!

As you know we’ve been working on getting Book II ready to hit the stores but what you might not know is that we are also revising the first edition as well. Berona’s Hundred Year War (the second edition) will also be hitting shelves across the nation this year.
When Anthony and I were first working on it there were several things that we wanted to change or tighten up before we printed it, but because we were short on time we had to go ahead and send it off to the printers. But now that we are published and are re-releasing it, we have the chance to go back and do the things we wanted. For the most part the book will be identical but there will be subtle changes throughout the book.

There will be a lot of names added to characters without them as well as some character changes every now and then…not to mention ALL the grammar corrections!!!
You can see from the picture above some of the changes that were made. Not all the pages (not even a quarter of them) will be this drastic of a change. But come on…that Cropone looks like a fuzzy potato! SOMETHING HAD TO BE DONE!!!

-Jesse

Sunday, February 28, 2010

Zombies and Blue jeans (things that will never go outta style)

panel from How Kurtrell Almost Died.

“How Kurtrell Almost Died” Is done. The 4 page story is done and for the most part turned out the way I hoped. It’s fun, funny and all about the zombie hoard! What more can you ask for?
Did the 3 Alarm Illustration Gathering yesterday and had a pretty good time. Got to see a couple of guys I enjoy sketching with, so that’s always a good day for me. Another good thing was I had the opportunity to sell several “Knowing Your Zombie!” posters. They sold better than I thought they would.
The next step for me will be to start on the next story…Denial (story of the Shaman)

-Jesse


just goofing off at the table.


Wade and I with our mummy.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Kurtrell Presents: Zombie Knowledge

From the Mouth of Kurtrell comes ZOMBIE KNOWLEDGE! Kurtrell has become my face of the undead. He’s an expert on the subject. I needed one so I went ahead and drew one. Why? Because that’s how my world works! I, like many others, am a fan of the Zombie so I whipped up a little goofy character who can share my geekism of the subject. I present to you Kurtrell. The ultimate Farmer…the Ultimate Foe! These are his words, not mine.
Anyway the character is based after a friend named Kurt, who, believe it or not, loves zombies too! Little Kurtrell is featured in the first book as well as holds a couple of pages in book II, Storylines.
This weekend I will be attending 3 Alarm’s Illustration event and wanted to bring something new to the table so I spent some time designing something I thought might be appreciated by others. It’s an 11X17 mini poster, “Knowing Your Zombies!” It will be a full color poster printed on cardstock and also come in a Toploader protective case. I will be selling them for $10. If they sell ok, Anthony and I will probably design a matching poster, “Know Your Local Slayer!”
-Jesse


Tuesday, February 23, 2010

One Step Close

Thought I am still working on stories that are not quite done and stories that NEED to be done, I am finding myself going back and forth from story to story making sure they are all up to par.

I have recently revisited "Bigger Game" which is done but needed proper word balloons as well as proper text. Once doing those corrections I realized that the cover was not done yet….ooops!

I had Cooper reach into his bag of goodies and pull out some prologue text for the cover page and I finished up the illustration. So what you see now is the (hopefully) final look for the cover to “Bigger Game.” It’s a 12 page short story from Berona’s War Book II Storylines.

I will try to get a list of stories that we are expecting to be in the book as soon as we lock them down…which shouldn’t be long!
-Jesse

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Dawn and the Dead color.

We are still trying to get a lock on exactly what stories as well as their page amounts for Book II. While we are doing that we are also still working on the stories we have written and are ready to go to the next level.
The problem that we came across and never expected to have is we actually have too much for the book. I remember at one point we thought we would never have enough to fill it up…wow, I wish!
We just cut four or five stories from the line up because it went over our page limit. We are not trashing the story altogether but rather putting them on a back burner to be used in a future project; maybe for the Blog or an online comic…we could even put them together to do a spin off comic. Who knows? But as for now we are still pushing forward with the stories we KNOW we will be using. I finished inking Dawn and the Dead quite some time ago but needed to add color to it. I have recently done just that. It was not a fun or even pleasant experience BUT I did it and am happy to say that I don’t think it turned out bad at all. I wanted to share a couple of pages with you and hope you enjoy it.
-Jesse


Wednesday, February 3, 2010

At the CON!


I’ve just returned from a long and fun weekend in Dallas, TX for the Comicon. It wasn’t one of the largest cons we’ve done but I have to put it up there with one of the more fun ones.




We sold some originals, which is ALWAYS HARD FOR ME to do!!!! I know its good money but damn, I hate to see them go!
There were some “interesting” lines this year which led to some great sells. Not only did we sell some originals we sold a good amount of books as well. We saw some old faces from previous cons and also made some new fans….which is what we LOVE to do.
We also met up with one of the guys (Kraig) from our publisher. We had a chance to goof off for a little while in-between selling some books. We always enjoy handing out with him!




And on to OUR FAVORITE part of the con… Sean Patrick Flanery. When things started to slow down we had a chance to talk and get some pictures. We took one in particular that we all seem to love!
-Jesse


DALLAS COMICON!


With the Dallas Con right around the corner, a friend (Brian Thompson) and I tried our best to get a Necklace design locked down before the opening day. Anthony and I had been playing around with a few designs, trying to get one made that resembled the ones from the book.
After about the first two or three hours or drilling, sanding, cutting, crimping and tieing we felt like throwing the drimmel through the wall. We stepped back, took a breather and finally came up with a good design that we all liked. So the plan is to try to get several of these done before Wizard World Chicago. This would normally be an easy task except that we have a serious deadline for getting out our second book, Berona’s War Book II…not to mention making corrections to the second edition of the first book (Berona’s Hundred Year War) before its release. Here's to hoping!
-Jesse