Daniel Warner

JORDAN CATALANO MUST DIE

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:18:23 GMT

Jordan Catalano Must Die was a fantasy of mine where a shadowy figure goes around killing slacker icons from the the eighties and nineties -- Dante, Randal, Bill,Ted, The Dude, Bender and the Breakfast Club, DIck Ritchie's Roommate, Mikey and Trent -- everybody. It followed a Watchmen-like trajectory in which the idea of being a 'slacker' is rapidly deconstructed and the villain turned out to be one of their own, the consummate slacker -- Ferris Bueller.

Ferris Bueller was the best slacker, because he wasn't really a 'slacker.' He wasn't above planning, or making an effort. He didn't use the existence of hypocrisy as an excuse to live a life he didn't want. He had mastered the art of picking battles, and then winning those battles before they were fought. That's what being a 'slacker' was all about -- not getting hung up, leaving yourself the mental headspace to live deliberately within a larger system.

I feel like that part of the slacker zeitgeist dissolved when 9/11 happened. There was this feeling that we had just found a dead hooker in the trunk of Cameron's dad's Ferrari. Like the disciplinarians had been right the whole time. Like, HOW DARE WE!!!

But now, Gen X and Y have learned to deal with the punishing crucible of their thirties. There is a new crop of smart, creative young people. The post 9/11, total doomsday mentality is thawing out a little bit. I can feel a wave of creativity starting to swell and it will be interesting to see how and when it breaks.

Digital Comics for the Rest of Us

Fri, 09 Dec 2011 20:24:59 GMT

Someday tablet computers will be $99 or less. It's probably at a point just far enough in the future that it coincides with an eruption of digital-native comic book product and mature business models for selling it. Until then, it's just too damn expensive to read digital comics. It really is.

Unless maybe you find a deal:

$99 HP Touchpads

I don't know if HP's web OS app store has a Comixology or Graphicly app, but if they don't you can always try fiddle android onto the thing.

That's my plan, anyway.

Barron Storey Speaks at Massachusetts College of Art

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 18:15:35 GMT

I heard Barron Storey speak. He went off. It was invigorating and life-affirming. I was reminded what it means to be fully committed to making images.

A mixed crowd of art students, artists and teachers gathered in the Tower Auditorium to hear what the master illustrator had come to tell us. The woman sitting next to me had a thin white sketchbook. She had written on the spine in inky black letters -- MY SPIRIT ANIMAL IS A BANANA.

I first learned about Barron Storey when I was a student at Mass Art. He has been cited as an influence by some of my favorite artists -- Dave McKean, Kent Williams and others. He worked with Neil Gaiman on Sandman. He is loved for his illustrated journals.

He now teaches at the California College of Art. It turns out that I had actually seen a lot of his work before I ever knew who he was. He made the classic cover to the Lord of the Flies paperback, did a lot of illustration for Boy's Life magazine, and he made this:

Baron doesn't like this image. He painted over it. But it's the image that flashes in my mind whenever I hear 'Fahrenheit 451.'

I've been reflecting on his talk for the past few days. I've distilled it down to three core ideas. These are small ideas, but have massive implications for a dedicated creator. The quotes are directly from Barron Storey. The explanations are mine.

I. "Don't just DoooOOOooo Genre! USE IT! Use it to say something about life! Use it to say something about what you believe!"

This is easy to say, less easy to do. Using genre requires mastering it. Also, self-expression can derail the narrative structure of genre. If your too obvious about 'using genre,' it's likely you will default on an audience's expectation and alienate them. But, if you can pull it off… well… the results are transcendent:

II. "Decrease the claim and increase the proof."

This is the theatrical version of the business cliche "under promise and over deliver." Use your audience's expectation as a tool for creating effects in your work. It's the reason a magician will intentionally screw up a trick. Reduce the claim of what you are going to present and people will take a step towards you. Their sympathies will be with you.

What does this mean in terms of creating an image? Storey's recommendation is to use the available evidence -- draw what you really see, draw what you really feel.

There are other way's to do this depending on what you are trying to accomplish. Gary Larson was a master of this effect.

III. "Nobody gives a shit about your work. Nobody! The best you can hope to do is to increase their perception of what life is."

If you are an artist, and you have not come to terms with this idea then it is out there waiting for you. It sits around the next corner like a hungry beast with blood and fat dripping from its teeth. There is no way to prepare for it or avoid it. You just have to confront it.

The real challenge is healing enough to carry on after the beast tears you apart. Can you re-establish motivation to create? Can you press on despite the pain? The good news is, if you survive, the competition gets a lot thinner. Almost no one, no matter how talented, or lucky, or young, or experienced survives.

Brian Michael Bendis is the consummate example of how to achieve massive success in the face of overwhelming apathy towards your work. He was able to commit to the hard choice of abandoning the visual aspects of comics and focusing entirely on writing. He molded his projects into a career and a huge, relevant body of work. Compare Jinx to his run on Daredevil -- that kind of transformation doesn't come without sacrifice and pain.

***

After the talk I crowded around the stage with a handful of other die hards. Baron knelt down at the edge of the stage and guided us through some samples of his journals. One of us asked "Why do you call it a journal and not a sketchbook?"

"Because it's a daily act of journalism. It's not about how well I can draw a foot."

Driving in silence on the way home, I thought about what I had seen and heard. What was the real message? was there any subtext? Context? What WAS that? And here is what I came up with:

Unbridled enthusiasm for creating sophisticated images.

EVOLUTIONARY WAR! Marvel Comics At Starbucks

Thu, 20 Oct 2011 18:12:26 GMT

We needed a break last night. Beth left the kids at her mother's house and met me at Starbucks. I made sure to get there early so I could steal a few minutes to do some writing. I waited on buying a drink, found the perfect seat, broke out the laptop, and logged onto Starbuck's free wifi network. Then I saw this:

At first I thought 'Cool! I'll read some comics… for free!' Undoubtedly this is the effect they were going for. Before I found my way to actual content, however, a big question had dug its way out of my subconscious:

What is stopping Marvel or DC from setting up a system like this for comic book retailers?

I can think of two good reasons.

One, there are some technical limitations. A retailer would need to be able to manage their network so that customers could only access the content when inside the store. They would also need some way to update and deliver content. Starbucks has already solved these problems and has dedicated resources to developing and maintaing their networks. Despite the fact that many computer geeks are also comics geeks, you can tell by looking at just about any comic book shop's website, that resource goes completely untapped.

Two, Starbucks presents an opportunity to open a new market. The comics industry has always lusted after 'new' readers. Partly out of a healthy desire to keep the fan base refreshed and partly out of the self-conscious belief that we -- the scruffy, chubby disenfranchised geeks who so love the medium -- couldn't possibly be the only ones interested in comics! So, branching out into a place where you almost never see comics (like Starbucks) and trying to convert civilians into casual readers makes sense. It's admirable, in fact.

Then there are the uglier, harder to accept reasons.

You put digital comics in Starbucks because that's where the tablets are. Let's face it, there is a certain 'type' of person that haunts a Starbucks. This person prefers Jeopardy to Wheel of Fortune, might read the New York Times, and can typically spend $60 a month on coffee and not really notice. It's likely that this person owns a shiny new iPad. Why invest in making digital comics available to customers in a comics shop, half of whom can't afford a tablet computer yet? This will change as the price of tablet computers and digital comics comes down, but by then…

Most brick and mortar stores are doomed. This is a sucky but inevitable reality. Despite the spike in retail sales that accompanied the DC relaunch it's hard not to see it as KY jelly smeared on the long thick shaft of their Digital Content strategy. Why did DC make a huge retail marketing push at the same time they started releasing their comics digitally? Because they realize the need to ease the transition. There is an evolutionary timeline at work here. Tablets are getting cheaper. Wifi networks are becoming ubiquitous. Every day more and more people become less squirrely about reading on a device. A publisher thinking three or four years down the road realizes any long-term investment in the infrastructure of a store that specializes in the selling of printed products is going to be money lost when the stores cease to exist.

Is there is an opportunity here? Maybe an ambitious, forward thinking company like Graphicly could partner with a small group of retail stores, equip them with the proper networking gear, and sell them digital content wholesale. I could imagine a comics shop of the (near) future offering discount digital products alongside high-end print products, but they would have to move fast. And they would have to do it now.

I never ended up reading the digital comics at Starbucks. Beth showed up and we ordered $18 worth of drinks and snacks. Almost 2X what I had spent on new comics earlier that day at the comic book shop. For some reason I try to limit myself to $10 per week on new comics. I have no such notion of limitation at Starbucks… so maybe Marvel knows me better than I know myself.

Crazy Talk

Fri, 05 Nov 2010 16:06:16 GMT

crazy_talk, originally uploaded by cocopiazo.

Jordan

Sat, 30 Oct 2010 16:03:01 GMT

Jordan, originally uploaded by cocopiazo.

Big Worm

Fri, 29 Oct 2010 15:07:17 GMT

Big Worm, originally uploaded by cocopiazo.

Two thoughts that don't seem related, but might be.

1. I don't have any dabble time in my life right now. Everything is planned out. I do, however, have the need to dabble in digital inking. I can't see struggling to learn to work with new materials on a *live* project. Or maybe that's just what I need. I don't see any long stretches of sketchbook time in the near future.

2. There is a crime spree going on in my town. In the last month there have been a rash of house break-ins, car break-ins and the bank in the center of town was robbed. I live right in the center of town. The center of town is a pretty finite space. It occurred to me that I could spend the night in my car and probably catch a glimpse of some crooks. Then it occurred to me that if i saw someone walking through town peeking in windows or trying car door handles I could grab a baseball bat and chase them off (or beat their ass). Pondering this has given me a clearer idea of the inspiration behind the masked vigilantes in comics.

Morlock Pancakes

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 16:11:07 GMT

cough cough 'ahem' tap tap tap 'is this thing on?'

Like a lot of people I disappeared into the facebook/twitter nexus which is in most ways more consuming but less satisfying than livejournal. I suppose livejournal is doomed, but after scanning my friends page for a few moments I can see that, even in it's dying days, it's still so much cooler that what we are working with now.

Everybody is on Facebook, that's the worst and best thing about it. I've reconnected with people, we've hung out, had times. But there are people that have found me, that I really wish I could have left behind.

Prolonged exposure to twitter has me feeling like I'm going to wake up some day in a vat of red gel with my head shaved. The machines will be using my body heat to power the future.

It's a different crowd. A more normal crowd. People yell there. They are super amped up.

For some reason Twitter seems to stimulate a pedagogical urge in people. Complete morons act like they've swallowed a pile of wisdom and can't stop themselves from barfing it all over the internet.

Facebook users tend to believe that their life is a reality show that everyone can't wait for the next episode of. Everybody is Snooki on facebook. I cringe at the number of exclamation points I've used in facebook replies.

So today Robin and I made pancakes. We used a skillet that had happy faces debossed into it. Some of the pancakes came out perfectly round with golden, delicious looking faces. Some of them had too many or unfortunately placed blueberries embedded in them. Some of them ripped or became deformed as we pulled them off the skillet. Several were plagued by air bubbles that caused massive gaps in their features. When the pancakes were stacked in the serving dish the perfect looking ones were placed on top while the ugly ones were shoved to bottom or trashed. I explained to Robin that these were the Morlock Pancakes. Then I had to explain what Morlocks were.

There's no metaphor here. I just couldn't put something like that on Facebook or Twitter. People there don't smirk enough.

Giant Robot Armageddon

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 19:36:50 GMT

Working with the Wacom tablet is totally fucking with the look of my brush lines. I've been casting about for good examples of process. This thread got my attention. I'm trying to decide if this is really a direction I want to go in. It kind of runs counter to my whole, self-imposed SHORTEN THE PRODUCTION CYCLE mandate.

To Do... nah

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 17:32:08 GMT

Books, routers, cables, computers, cell phones -- I have lots of old stuff that still has a modicum of value that I would like to extract. I entertain the fantasy of selling it on ebay but in reality that process is just way too time intensive. I'll keep all the crap until the pain of storing it outweighs the pain of losing whatever slight value it still holds, and then I'll throw it away.

Ready my Special Place in Hell

Thu, 19 Mar 2009 16:22:52 GMT

Today I ordered a double short latte at the Sudbury Starbucks. The woman at the bar made a double tall latte and tried to give it to me. I said 'this is supposed to be a double short.'

'Can you except a tall? It's bigger.'

'No.' I said.

So her helper poured some of it into a short cup and added a shot of espresso.

A double short latte is supposed to have two shots of espresso, not one shot plus whatever happened to be an arbitrary portion of some other drink. So I refused the drink again.

The third attempt was foamless but I let it slide.

Sudbury is on the shortlist of places we are looking to move to but I never thought I would actually end up living there. It's a town of tiny, attractive-but-somehow-sexless women and repressed-but-entitled man-like beings. After my performance in Starbucks today maybe I'd fit in well with that crowd.

A&P

Wed, 28 Jan 2009 03:12:21 GMT

Ten years ago I found out that John Updike had lived in Ipswich, MA —my father's hometown. My dad said "oh yeah, Updike... someone pointed him out to me in the grocery store years ago."

"What store?" I asked.

"I think it was the A&P." He replied.

At the time he didn't know Updike had written a story called 'A&P'. He didn't know 'A&P' was stitched into my brain.

Updike died today. I always thought I would meet him. I would have resisted the wankerish urge to tell him that they didn't actually burn suspected witches in Salem.

Who needs a drink?

A&P

"In walks these three girls in nothing but bathing suits. I'm in the third check-out slot, with my back to the door, so I don't see them until they're over by the bread. The one that caught my eye first was the one in the plaid green two-piece. She was a chunky kid, with a good tan and a sweet broad soft-looking can with those two crescents of white just under it, where the sun never seems to hit, at the top of the backs of her legs. I stood there with my hand on a box of HiHo crackers trying to remember if I rang it up or not. I ring it up again and the customer starts giving me hell. She's one of these cash-register-watchers, a witch about fifty with rouge on her cheekbones and no eyebrows, and I know it made her day to trip me up. She'd been watching cash registers forty years and probably never seen a mistake before."

Galactus

Sun, 18 Jan 2009 20:57:08 GMT

Galactus, originally uploaded by cocopiazo.

Girl Heroes

Wed, 14 Jan 2009 16:12:32 GMT

I got a message from an old friend on facebook today.

She has a daughter who is interested in comics but she (the mother) feels that the range of female superheroes is limited. She's asking me for suggestions.

Where are the dope girl heroes of this moment?

This question has been asked and answered a million times on the web, but the answer clearly hasn't yet penetrated the mainstream culture. Also, there are bound to be answers to this question that exist nowthat didn't just a moment ago.

I'm formulating my reply to her question... any suggestions?

Chubby is the New Hot

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:24:22 GMT

Chubby_is_the_new_hot, originally uploaded by cocopiazo.

Brand Name Sunglasses can Hide Almost Anything

Mon, 12 Jan 2009 17:42:10 GMT

bn_sunglasses, originally uploaded by cocopiazo.

So Alone

Tue, 06 Jan 2009 02:29:16 GMT

I've decided that my MySpace account should die.
For some reason MySpace and I just never got along.
Twitter, however, is magnificient. I love it.
It has restored my faith in the internets.
The mom mafia rules FaceBook in my world so I've avoided it.
But the time has come...

http://www.facebook.com/people/Daniel-Warner/1003811714

Friends?

I Believe in that Poison

Tue, 16 Dec 2008 02:21:16 GMT

By 2004 I had read a little Rimbaud but never fell for it. It felt like something that belonged to the baby boom generation. At best it was what the people whose work I liked to read liked to read. That year a friend of mine gave me a coverless copy of Rimbaud's complete works and letters. His brother had given it to him. Something about that book sparked my appreciation. Maybe it was because the translations were better than the other versions I had read. Maybe it was because the book itself reminded me of my good friend. Maybe the work of a young poet took on new meaning for me as I crossed over into my thirtieth year. I don't know.

MORNING OF DRUNKENNESS

My story of the good and the beautiful! Terrible fanfare of music where I never lose step! Magical rack! Hurrah for the miraculous work and for the marvelous body, for the first time! It all began with the laughter of children and it will end there. This poison will still be in my veins even when the fanfare dies away and I return to the earlier discord. And now that i am so worthy of this torture, let me fervently gather in the superhuman promise made to my created body and soul. This promise, this madness! Elegance, science, violence! They promised me they would bury in the darkness the tree of good and evil, and deport tyrannical codes of honesty so that I may bring forward my very pure love. It all began with feelings of disgust and it ended—since I could not seize its eternity on the spot—it ended with a riot of perfumes.

Laughter of children, discretion of slaves, coldness of virgins, horror of figures and objects from here, be consecrated by the memory o that night. It began in slyness and it came to an end with angels of fire and ice.

Brief night of intoxication, holy night! even if it was only for the mask you bequeathed to us. We assert you, method! I am not forgetting that yesterday you glorified each of our ages. I believe in that poison. I can give all of my existence each day.

Behold the age of Murderers.

The Shared Table

Wed, 26 Nov 2008 19:19:53 GMT

My laptop was dead by the time I made it to 'Cafe on the Common' in Waltham.
I'm now sharing a tiny table and an outlet with a kind stranger.

As Shay and Robin get older Beth and broaden our scope of activities. I've assembled a functional social life over the past few weeks. I've noticed that at this stage in life there seems to be more value in maintaining numerous 'shallow' relationships rather than the select 'deep' high-overhead friendships of my 20s. Maybe the value was always there but I'm just noticing it now. Or, more likely, I have always been aware of it and simply pushed it out of my mind so that I could work on comics in every waking moment of free time.

Last week I heard Robin 'reading' books to herself at 3am.
I'm seeing more and more of myself reflected in her behavior.

"I am of those who like to stay late at the cafe,"
the older waiter said.

"With all those who do not want to go to bed.
With all those who need a light for the night."

An Important Announcement

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 04:42:31 GMT

Picture 4, originally uploaded by cocopiazo.

I think I'm going to grow a beard.

I'm 89% there.

Bathroom Tales II

Thu, 25 Sep 2008 14:05:41 GMT

Same bathroom, same guy, but today he shuffled into the stall carrying a huge, green, plastic watering can with a broken spout.

... and I Have a MF Beard

Wed, 24 Sep 2008 10:45:44 GMT

The new 'I'm a PC' commercial pokes it's finger directly into what has always irritated me about the 'I'm a Mac' commercials.

I am Mac user but I am not that smarmy, doe-eyed man-boy. That guy is an untested, unscarred naif. That guy can only exist against a happy white backdrop where nobody is fighting, starving, building, winning, losing or struggling. Introduce any beauty, pain or reality into that world and the image of the man-boy dissolves. Man-boy exists in an American-born cloud of cognitive dissonance. He's a fashion statement, and computer as fashion statement is wack in the extreme.

The PC commercial is driven by big values--It's not about the machine, but what you do with it. More in the vein of the 'Think' and 'Think Different' messages, it promotes individualism, doing good work, and passion alongside it's products.

This commercial won't get me to move away from working on a Mac but this stuff resonates very deeply with me.

'...I design green buildings' Flower Tower

'...and I challenge the law' Man One

What happens when you email geek dream girl feng@windows.com?

Bathroom Tales

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 09:49:52 GMT

Yesterday I was in a public rest room. An old guy (probably in his late seventies or early eighties) shuffles in. His hands were shaky and he was in complete slow motion. He took a paper towel from the dispenser and CAREFULLY, SLOWLY folded it into a rectangle the size of a match book. Then, stopping to ponder the significance of each pump, covered the thing with slimy pink hand soap. He shuffled into a stall taking his wet little present with him.

I don't know what he was planning to clean with that thing, but getting old doesn't seem like a ton of fun. Will I ever need to take a folded paper towel covered with hand soap into the stall with me?

The Story Continues

Mon, 22 Sep 2008 16:20:57 GMT

I was locked in the cellar making pages all weekend. Drawing a full bike-rack in deep birds-eye view perspective is that kind of thing that really makes you question what you are doing with your life. The assignment calls for really tight diagrammatic drawing. It's a departure from my usual, fast-and-loose designs and I'm getting into it. I'm hoping it the exercise will push me forward in terms of craft.

I did manage to escape to the Comic Shop on Saturday morning. I got the ancient Milligan/McCarthy Rogan Gosh trade, a Cooke/Brubaker Catwoman trade, the first issue of the the Seth Fisher/Zeb Wells Big In Japan mini series and the first Warren Ellis Storm Watch trade. The grand total was under $23 because the trades were used.

Beth took the girls to NY for the weekend. I needed some focus time so that I could dig into the MIT project. Without the non-stop chaos of kids the suburbs can be erie.

Come Work With Me

Mon, 22 Sep 2008 15:40:57 GMT

Does anyone here kill at Flex and/or Ruby?

If so, email me.