One Day at a Time!

This week Leon Beyond discusses the past, present, and future of Page-a-Day Calendars.

Leon Beyond in The 66 YEAR STINK!

USS Catastrophe and their pal Leon Beyond have an exhilirating new 7 page comic strip in this week's Riverfront Times. The best way to experience this sensational overload of facts (as well as the best way to meet singles in your area) is to get your fingers inky with an old-fashioned newsprint copy, but you can also read the story online at The RFT's site, or at Leon's Blog. Here are some DVD extras:
Above: Initial story outline and breadown and evidence of a tragic studio glue-spill. Below: thumbnails and wardrobe.
Some reference involved in the making of the comic:
How my pencilled pages looked:Kevin H.'s cover:
And the teaser and open-source tattoo design. Support your local newspaper and content providers!

Put a Lid on It!

This week Leon Beyond discusses the Secret History of Disposable Coffeenalia. The strip is a continuation of my ongoing fascination with the design of plastic coffee cup lids, seen in this appendix to my history comic Redbird (coming soon!?):
I've since figured out that the mysterious code on the Grub 'n Go cup stands for Decaf, Black, Cream, & Sugar.

Tone Wolf Vuitton

I made this for my pal Tony.

Bad Robot!

I drew this shirt that is currently on sale at Shirt.Woot!
The design is a riff on Isaac Asimov's 3 Laws of Robotics, and was suggested as part of a T-shirt contest I was involved with in Las Vegas with my pals at shirt.Woot!

I drew & painted & semi-ruined about 40 custom t-shirts over the course of 2 days, most of which you can see here. Each was based on a concept suggested by a convention-goer. Here are a couple of my favorites. "Inter-Species CES" & "Crap in 3010: Still Crap":"USBacon (suggested by Leslie Townley)" & "My Mom Says I'm Special" (I added the 5.25" floppy disk, even though I couldn't quite remember what one looks like):"Just Brains" & "Lonely Apocalypse / Escort Pamphleteer (suggested by Matthew Shultz)":"The Geek Shall Inherit the Earth" & "Sushi Revenge":"State-of-the-Art Catapult / CES 1010" & the winning design "Overcoming Asimov's Laws (suggested by Jonathan Knell)":Thanks to my Woot! for a good time and everybody who submitted ideas! It was fun, and I still have silver fabric paint under my fingernails.

Vegas Travelogue: Jan. 6-9, 2010

Also: Be sure to check out this week's Amazing Facts & Beyond, also inspired by our trip to Vegas and the Consumer Electronics Show.

Things Leslie Hates!

That kind of sketching just soothes the soul!

Falling on New Year's

Just in time for your explosive New Year's Eve festivities, Leon teaches more valuable lessons involving safety, anvils, pickles and testicles. See the whole strip here!

Local Color: Best of '09

Last year the Riverfront Times printed a bunch of my weird drawings to accompany the Unreal Year-End News Quiz and by Gosh, they did it again this year. Be sure to check out a copy of the paper or look at the online version, but in the meantime, here are my sketches & illustrations (watercolor & ink on typing paper). Click on them for larger views.George Clooney sightings during the filming of Up in the Air swirled.So did genitalia-shaped Mardi Gras beads.This wasn't your Grandma's Easter service.This wasn't her funeral.If you ever throw the first pitch out at a professional baseball game you are guaranteed to get made fun of for something.I'm kinda shocked this guy never got me.One of these guys probably will.

Leon Beyond Crossing the Delaware

This week, Leon debriefs us on the REAL War on Christmas.Washington Crossing the Delaware, by Emanuel Luetze, 1851.

Look at the Fine Print!

Tomorrow I'll be setting up on Cherokee Street, hawking lots of printed goods along with many other great printmakers, as part of the Cherokee Print League. I'll be stationed at Fort Gondo. It goes from 10 am - 7pm. Poster by Firecracker Press:In related news, this week's Amazing Facts & Beyond tells the story of the early advances in printmaking, use of Fine Print, and the first Cherokee Print League:Come see me! Dress warm! I hear there will be cookies somewhere along Cherokee Street, too.

Sweet Meat RFT Cover

I drew the cover to this week's Riverfront Times, and it features beloved local radio mascot, KSHE's Sweet Meat. And if there's anything I love more than cute/weird corporate mascots it's REAL ROCK RADIO. KSHE just published a coffee table book documenting classic St. Louis rock history and this drawing is documenting that. Here was my idea: And a tighter sketch:And the final drawing, after simplifying the scene a bit. That is an autographed picture of Sammy Hagar on the mantle.Here's how I colored the drawing initially, sticking to a muted nostalgic scrabook vibe: I like the more festive final colors better, but I don't like that Sweet Meat's white ear-hairs somehow got lost along the way. SIGH. If anybody was curious about that little drawing inside the scrabook, it's this legendary piece of St. Louis-related Classic Rock Memorabilia:Thanks, Sweet Meat!