THE CARETAKER - 17 in a Series of 23

INVADER - 16 in a Series of 23

'THULHUISH - 15 in a Series of 23

THE LASHER - 14 in a Series of 23

THE SEEKER - 13 in a Series of 23

FRANK - 12 in a series of 23

GUY FRIDAY - 11 in a series of 23

ULTRA J - 10 in a Series of 23

MORIARITY - 9 in a Series of 23

MASTERMIND - 8 in a Series of 23

SLUGGISH - 7 in a Series of 23

FU HEAD - 6 in a Series of 23

COCOON HEAD - 5 in a Series of 23

KING WORMSER - 4 In a Series of 23

BLURP! - 3 In a Series of 23

YEEKS! - 2 in a Series of 23

COOL-O-DADDY-O - 1 in a Series of 23

Blue pencil for a quick rough, then Staedtler Mars graphic brush pen and microns, with some ebony pencil shading and whiteout pen . . . and Photoshop touches. 1 in a series of 23.

JL's Comic Shop Stop /Hook Hand...

Once again life has gotten in the way and I haven't gotten around to posting anything new. Some of my time has been taken up with a new venture - writing...I've had the first of a weekly series of comics reviews posted over at a new comics and games website - The Comic Collective. You can find my stuff under 'JL'S COMIC SHOP STOP'. It's fun and is a good way to get me to read all the books I buy! Hope you like it and stop in from time to time to check out what books are being talked about; I'm gonna try and keep it diverse. In addition to that, I'm going to have a seperate weekly blog talking about anything and everything genre related that I can think of...it'll talk about toys, movies, comics...all the good stuff! The first of those won't be up, though, for another few weeks, as the site goes under a renovation and gets set to launch 'ver. 2.0'.

As I usually say, I hope to have some more new stuff up soon; for a start, here's a recent sketchbook offering.

Hannya

This is the initial sketch and finished inks and colors for a print I'm working on at the moment...it's a Japanese themed design, incorporating some tattoo style imagery. This drawing is based on a Hannya mask, from the Japanese Noh theater and represents the spirit of a jealous woman.

Monstrous

Finished pencils...inks to follow.

Improvisation No.2 (A Winter Dark)

After too many months of trying to figure out how to store some files online to link to, I thought I had found the answer in Yahoo groups. I created my own Yahoo group and uploaded a file to it, figuring I could just link to it here on the blog. It worked at first, but after a few minutes the links died, hence the 'document not found' message that you got if you tried clicking on the link. I did a google search for 'free online storage' tonight and the first site i found was www.box.net where you can get 1gb of free storage (more if you want to pay). The site is really easy to work with and includes a way to embed your files in your blog, along with this handy dandy little mp3 player. Here's my first offering with it. It's an old...ok, very old (Dec. 1988) piano piece. There was a companion piece to this (Improvisation No.1 - Night Forever After) uploaded to this blog in the early days of it's creation, along with a couple of other music pieces. This, and Improvisation No.1, were both originally recorded as part of a tape of my music from the time entitled 'Nightflight'. The cover art (pre-computer!), created by my friend Bill Akunevicz, Jr., is shown here. The tape was played during a solo art show I had at Brooklyn College that December. Over time I'll be uploading some newer stuff as well.

Improvisation No. 2 (A Winter Dark).mp3

This was another solo piano piece on Nightflight.

Dreamer's World.mp3

A few pages...

A few things from the sketchbook...the bottom is part of page 2 of 'The Hills Are Alive With The Sound of Monsters'...page 1 was on this blog March of last year. The 'Monster' logo is part of the lettering I did for the title. Above that is a page I started working on tonight...sort of an intro page for three new characters, with their names written in my made up Asian influenced type.

it's Time for One Monster, 3 Robots, and One Batman...

I know this site has been seriously lacking in it's Monstrositude™ lately, so hopefully this small little entry will help fill the void. Actually looking at it, there's really only one monster in this post, but you get the idea.

The Collection

I've started a new blog! As if I didn't update this one enough, I'll have another to neglect as well...just kidding..hopefully I'll be able to keep that one somewhat updated with cool posts...if you want to find out more, click here...

Ford City Auto

Done in the style of the Grand Theft Auto video games, this was created for a a series of licensed Ford boxer shorts, where the design is in repeat and on a slant. A keen eye will notice I've reused the silhouetted girl in the fourth panel from an older, unused design.

HEnnnNSHhhIIIIiiiiiiinnnnNNnnn!!

Here's a bit of Tokosatsu history.

These rare photos of a Kamen Rider super-hero show were taken at Korakuen Amusement Park, Tokyo, Japan, by my dad, in the Spring of 1975. I'm sitting just out of camera range.

My family (parents, me and my sister) lived in Japan from July 1974-June 1975 as my father had gotten a Fullbright Grant to do research in Japan for an Encyclopedia of Kabuki that he was writing. The eleven months we lived there had a huge impression on me...as anyone who knows me will readily attest. You can't see it in these shots, but I remember the characters were running along a catwalk under the big foaming head at top. You can see in one shot two Kamen Riders standing side by side on the catwalk.

The photo at the bottom is from earlier in 1975 with me wearing my Inazuman Flash Henshin belt...I'm in position to transform (Henshin in Japanese.) Unfortunately I don't have the belt anymore!

Semi-Recent Sketches

A few things from January...hopefully some new stuff soon.

The Last Guard-inks

The Last Guard

The last page of my sketchbook, another no meaning panel strip...just drawing to draw and having some fun. I'll post the inks soon.

Robot Vs Monster

Just some sketchbook doodling...this started out as the idea last week for a short strip with the title seen here, along with the two head sketches of the 'contestants'..I only came up with the name for the robot...Motaar The Indestructable. I came back to it and added the last two panels, just to give it a comic-book feel. I wasn't intending for the last two panels to be continuity...but it sort of works like that..another reason why the combatants are different in the panels.

Early Sabbath

Sketches done while watching Black Sabbath live in Paris, Dec. 1970.

Dawn On The Pier

Oils, Painter/Photoshop.