December 01, 2009
(Most Of) 2009 in Review
01. What did you do in 2009 that you'd never done before?
Had a solo gallery show
Visited the house of a former NWA president
Read 14 books to research a project
Lived in downtown KC
Attended an MMA event, seeing Fedor Emelianenko
Attended a Lucha Libre event
Toured the backstage of Memorial Hall
Visited Georgia and South Carolina
02. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more?
My only resolution was to stay the course on my life's direction, and maintained doing just that.
03. Did anyone close to you give birth?
I'm sure this'll get me in trouble, but I can't think of anyone.
04. Did anyone close to you die?
My Grandma Schamberger, and I'm still taking it hard, and reckon I will be for awhile.
Katy's grandma Rose Ryan. I only met her once, but she helped bring that special lady into my life.
Greg Young, the brother of friend Andy and brother-in-law of Katy's best friend Jamie.
05. What countries did you visit?
The US of A.
06. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?
More artwork completed.
A wife.
The Promotion written and mostly (if not completely) drawn.
07. What date from 2009 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
Saturday October 15, my Grandma's funeral. Probably the worst and best day of the year. Funerals are such a rollercoaster emotionally, from saying goodbye to all of the laughter and remembrances. The night ended with me and almost all of my first cousins in Grandma's basement, playing Five Crowns and drinking way too much beer and wine. My little brother AJ said it the best the next day, "It was really cool. It was like a bunch of best friends hanging out."
08. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
The first script for The Promotion
09. What was your biggest failure?
Even with all of the setbacks suffered this year, I can't think of anything I'd classify as a failure.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing to speak of. Katy had enough of that for both of us.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
A journal that has the cover of the original edition of Raymond Chandler's 'The Big Sleep' on it. Almost all of the notes for The Promotion have gone inside it.
12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
My cat Monkey. She's become a real sweetheart.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
I don't know for a fact who it was, but someone at work started unfounded rumors about me that almost got me fired. Fuck 'em.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent.
Car.
Groceries.
Gas.
Insurance.
Comics.
Electric bill.
Phone bill.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Researching The Promotion. All kinds of neat things have happened from doing the legwork on this book.
16. What song will always remind you of 2009?
Paid in Full by Eric B and Rakim:
Thinkin of a master plan
Cuz ain’t nuthin but sweat inside my hand
So I dig into my pocket, all my money is spent
So I dig deeper but still comin up with lint
So I start my mission- leave my residence
Thinkin how could I get some dead presidents
I need money, I used to be a stick-up kid
So I think of all the devious things I did
I used to roll up, this is a hold up, ain’t nuthin funny
Stop smiling, be still, don’t nuthin move but the money
But now I learned to earn cos I’m righteous
I feel great! so maybe I might just
Search for a 9 to 5, if I strive
Then maybe I’ll stay alive
So I walk up the street whistlin this
Feelin out of place cos, man, do I miss
A pen and a paper, a stereo, a tape of
Me and eric b, and a nice big plate of
Fish, which is my favorite dish
But without no money it’s still a wish
Cos I don’t like to dream about gettin paid
So I dig into the books of the rhymes that I made
To now test to see if I got pull
Hit the studio, cos I’m paid in full
Of course, being a vegetarian, my favorite dish isn't fish. It's paneer masala, but that doesn't rhyme as well.
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder?
Much happier. My future is really exciting right now.
ii. thinner or fatter?
Same.
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Exercising. Drawing. Writing.
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Attending funerals.
20. How will you be spending Christmas?
Katy and I will be hosting our first, so it'll be very swank and hip and urban and all of those other buzz words.
22. Did you fall in love in 2009?
Nope, stayed in love, though.
23. How many one-night stands?
None.
24. What was your favorite TV program?
Monday Night Raw
Runner-ups: Mad Men and Flash Forward
25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
I don't hate. That's a weak emotion.
26. What was the best book you read?
Novel? "A Lion's Tale: Around the World in Spandex" by Chris Jericho
Comic? "Incognito" by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips
27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Nothing. Wow.
28. What did you want and get?
Want: To be more financially stable
Get: More financially stable
29. What was your favourite film of this year?
Where the Wild Things Are
30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
29. Had dinner with Katy, Mom and Roger at Don Chilito's. Also started my first day in my new position at the day job.
31. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Talking to Grandma one more time.
32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2009?
Dayjob - Dress Casual
Personal - Comfortable
33. What kept you sane?
Katy.
The cats.
Drawing.
Comics.
34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Bob Geigel
35. What political issue stirred you the most?
The new boss, same as the old boss.
36. Who did you miss?
Grandma Schamberger.
37. Who was the best new person you met?
No one in particular.
38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2009.
Never wait to make a change in your life, because that chance can and will go away in no time at all. I'll never have the chance to have a normal relationship with my Grandma Schamberger, but I had the opportunity to do just that for 29+ years before she passed away. I'm still grateful to have had her in my life, but that stronger bond that I always figured would happen 'some day' never came from me passively waiting for it. "Brazil is the country of the future - and always will be." Don't wait for the future to change things for you: Do it now.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:50 PM
November 30, 2009
State of the Rob 11302009
* The radio silence has been due to a combination of me working on the scripts for The Promotion, putting in extra hours at the day job, and all-around being busy. You're all still very dear to my heart, though.
* I'm planning to write out all of The Promotion, do any rewrites, then layouts and finally start working on the book. I've got the look I'm going for, so right now I just need to get my ass in gear and finish writing the sucker.
* LINKS! (AKA me going through my Bloglines and pointing out what I think looks cool)
* Aren't You Glad You're Not a Mormon?
* I love the colors on this.
* Jim Starlin + Howard Chaykin + Nick Fury = Awesome
* I'm overall not in love with the work that's been contributed to the Covered blog, but every so often someone gets it right.
* Eric Skillman's design process for the covers for Criterion's releases of Downhill Racer and White Dog are awesome to contrast the different approaches a designer takes with different visuals.
* I love the contrast between the hand-painted watercolors and the digitally-created billboard in this cover by Dustin Nguyen.
* Classic exploitation posters from the golden age of Hollywood.
* Jim Steranko's Shadow paperback covers.
* I would buy a lot more syrup if it still came in bottles that look like these.
* This needs to get distributed in North America STAT!
* Swoon.
* (S)he will be there by Matthieu Forichon.
* How awesome is Pablo Auladell's work? Answer: Very awesome.
* Dig the energy in this piece.
* Tomer Hanuka's cover to The Kiss Murder.
* Vintage posters from Casablanca, Frankenstein, and King Kong!
I'm really enjoying Tin Salamunic's contributions to Urban Sketchers.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:39 AM
October 30, 2009
Happy Halloween From Monkey and Korma
Posted by Schamberger at 04:00 PM
October 28, 2009
State of the Rob 10282009
* Busy busy busy!
* I'm about to start scripting the rasslin' book. I've got one research book to finish up and then I'll feel confident to begin work on it in earnest.
* I know I've talked about it here before, but I've never done this level of research before on a project. I've read over a dozen books, talked to people, gone to various locations, it's been an amazing experience.
* A couple of weeks ago, I went to a Lucha Libre event at Memorial Hall, both to get reference shots of a wrestling event at the hall but also to see El Santo, and another match on the card involving a mixed tag match with women and midgets. Win win win! Here's a few shots from that:
The crowd was super hot for the whole event, and the intimacy of the hall made for a very rich environment.
* Last week I got to go to Memorial Hall to take backstage photos and get a tour of the whole facility from the new company operating the hall, Titan Entertainment. They've done an amazing job in restoring the venue and are genuinely interested in restoring it to its former and rightful pedigree.
Here's some shots I took from the tour:
Here it is from behind the stands:
My guide didn't know for sure where all of the writing from backstage came from on the wall, and I let her know that some of it was actually wrestler code. Back in the time before cell phones and email, wrestlers would write on the walls of the venues to their buddies who would tour through later, and that was how they would stay in touch!
Here's the green room/VIP locker room. Madonna, Patsy Cline, Coldplay, Fedor, and all of the main-event wrestlers would prepare in this area.
Here's the bathroom they used. Come on, that's kind of cool to see.
* One floor down, here's the kitchen where food for the concession stands is prepared, and also where KCK city workers will take their breaks.
* Here's one of the stained-glass skylights overlooking the ballroom above the arena. Yeah, there's a ballroom up there!
Here are a few more shots of the ballroom. Absolutely gorgeous!
Here we are looking down at the auditorium. Every seat feels like the front row!
Here's looking down on the lobby from the balcony. The lobby is so gorgeous.
When Titan first took over the hall, they went around scrubbing all of the walls down, as there was tobacco residue over everything from over a half-century's worth of smoking. Up on the balcony, they started scrubbing the wall and found that instead of a wall, there was a glass case containing this 48 star flag! How cool!
Posted by Schamberger at 11:03 AM
September 15, 2009
State of the Rob 09152009
* Have I ever told you my deep belief that Country music post-Eagles is utter bullshit? This is a belief I hold as firm as the Pope believes in God. Over-produced crap by a bunch of posers who grew up in the suburbs, is what it is. It's also responsible, I posit, for the genocide of the Western genre.
Westerns used to be a big deal in American culture. Our big icons like John Wayne, Gene Autrey, Lee Van Cleef, Roy Rogers, and later Clint Eastwood, all made their names in Western pictures. Shows like Gunsmoke, The Lone Ranger, Bonanza, and The Wild Wild West were all uber-popular and regular staples. Now there are no Westerns on television, a rare movie, and a couple shelves of books (mostly reprints of Lonesome Dove and their ilk). It's a damned shame.
There's something about that lawless frontier that excites the hell out of me. A man with his friends, his family, and his two guns fighting to bring order to his world - how can you not fall head over heels in love with that? That man that's not conforming to the status quo, instead making the status quo conform to him. I don't think that story has fallen out of favor with the public's id, but it got lost in the transmission.
The Western got confused with the Cowboy, and the Cowboy got consumed by the Country Redneck Good-Ole-Boy culture that grew up around the whole Urban Cowboy/Smokey and the Bandit/Glenn Campbell movement in the 1970's. The Good-Ole-Boy was popular through the mid-80's and began to lose favor, most notably with Jeff Foxworthy's 'You Might Be a Redneck' routine, becoming a sort of outsider culture regarded as dimwit cousin-fuckers, because, well, not every person that listens to Rhinestone Cowboy is going to go out and screw their own blood, but to all of the motherhumpers out there, it's better mood music than putting in 'Kind of Blue'. At least, that's the perception the public took.
But the Western is not the same as Country or Cowboy. Westerns are frontier stories of man versus nature, man versus man, man versus society and man versus himself. It's the story of the things America did to grow up, pains and all. Country tales are people going white water rafting and sporting the Confederate flag and wishing for a simpler yet utterly whitewashed Eurocentric time. Good ol' boys reminiscing on the good ol' days that they never lived in and that never actually existed. Cowboy stories are similar to Westerns, and can even overlap, such as in Rawhide, but they're stories of cattle farmers farming, most famously seen in Giant with Rock Hudson, Liz Taylor and James Dean.
But you take one of those asshole country 'stars' of today who sing about what strong cowboys they are, and take them back a hundred years and put them in Deadwood? It'll be just like when Marty McFly shows up in the past in Back to the Future 3. They'll make fun of his ridiculous clothes and beat his ass out of principle.
* Whew. I needed to get that off my chest.
* Okay, one more thing: Most farmers don't listen to modern country music. Posers from suburbs listen to country music. Well, some farmers' wives might listen to country.
* I've read a ton of wrestling books in the past few months.
* Now I'm working on reading books on the 70's decade and how it impacted our society. The general drift seems to be that this is where our society started to dumb down and mass media really started to take control. That's a fascinating time to set a story in.
* LINKS!
* Check out this great post-Manhunter story by Archie Goodwin and Walt Simonson!
* I've found my dream house.
* Gorgeous.
* I really want this Marshall Rodgers Batman portfolio.
* Wow.
* That Sean Phillips feller shore kin draw purty.
* Can I be Francis Marshall when I grow up?
Posted by Schamberger at 03:40 PM
September 08, 2009
State of the Rob 09082009
* I'm seriously considering playing around with home brewing my own beer. Of course, I've been seriously considering this for a long time now. But I still am.
* Last weekend was the annual Schamberger Open, our family's get-together where we do something that closely resembles playing golf. The Schambergers are notorious practical jokers, and this year was no different. My uncle's step-son was the target of everyone this year and he was a great sport about it. The highlight was the night before the tournament, I had him convinced that every team had to wear a jersey, and that the last team to show up had to dress like cheerleaders. The next day, I had him going to all of the uncles asking if they had the box of jerseys, for about an hour! Finally his step-father clued him in on the joke, but it became a running gag after that.
* I'm having fun with these early Hollywood starlet pictures. I'm thinking about doing more here in the coming days.
Posted by Schamberger at 10:34 AM
September 02, 2009
State of the Rob 09022009
* A lot going on lately, kids.
* First, the loss of my grandmother hit me harder than I was thinking it would. She was the last of my grandparents, and there were a lot of other things tied up with her emotionally that really came up after her passing. I know, you just want to see me draw pictures of 1930's starlets, but it's where my head's been at.
* Immediately after that, we had a pretty major health scare with Katy. She's fine, and she's on the recovering end of things, but it involved several specialists and a brief stay at the hospital on Monday.
* Research for the next book has been very consuming, as well. I've read about eight books on the wrasslin' business so far, with a few more before I'm confident enough to flesh out the characters and their world. After that I'll be spending time at the library's Kansas City research room to get everything down for the time period as well. I want this book to be right, and to feel right.
* Last Friday we went to Memorial Hall for the M-1 mixed martial arts event, including a rather kayfabe Fedor exhibition match. Still, attending an event like that at the Hall was really cool and I took plenty of reference shots for the book.
* I'll have art to show again on the site here, too! I've been really busy with a couple of murals that I'll share some progress shots of as well.
* Until then, here are some shots of my paintings hanging at The Rhythm Lounge at 3535 Broadway in Kansas City. They're exhibited there for the next few weeks, so stop on in on a Friday or Saturday night and check 'em out! It's a really great venue run by a great bunch of people. And if you're interested in buying a painting, you better hurry, they're already moving!
Posted by Schamberger at 10:33 AM
August 17, 2009
State of the Rob 08172009
* First up, a very happy birthday to my special lady Katy. She's finally 18 today, so I don't have to feel like such a dirty old man anymore.
* Second, I'd like to publicly thank everyone who sent their thoughts my way after the passing of my Grandma. Losing someone can sometimes show you how many people you have who care in your life, and I've definitely felt that over the last couple of weeks.
* Friday my work will be displayed at The Rhythm Lounge at 3535 Broadway as a part of their VIP pre-opening. This is the same work I had on display for my last show. It should be on display for a couple of months give or take as a part of their grand opening. So if you're looking for a new place to eat downtown, give this a try.
* Tomorrow night we're headed to the Smackdown/ECW taping and I'm stoked. The product has been lacking a little of late, but it's still always fun to go to one of the WWE's live events. It does make me wish the old territory days were still going strong, though. It would be totally cool to go to Memorial Hall every Thursday night for some rasslin'.
* Mad Men's back and the world is right again. The cast and creative team didn't miss a beat, and I'm really interested to watch everything progress.
* LINKS!
* The Stars My Degradation: Early Alan Moore comix.
* Howard Chaykin's Cody Starbuck - fully painted gorgeousness!
* To quote Robin, "Huh?"
* Here's a collection of amazing Leyndecker pieces.
* And a nice collection of New York illustrations by Jules Guerin.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:52 AM
August 10, 2009
State of the Rob 08102009
* Last Monday, I got an email from my Dad that my Grandma was in pretty bad shape. Around midnight on Tuesday night she passed away. Lorene Schamberger was a class act all around that deeply touched so many lives. We were very fortunate to have had her in our lives. Over the four days I was in Western Kansas for the Wake and the Funeral, all of the family got together (and this is a German Catholic family, so that's a few hundred when it's all said and done) to celebrate her life and share our favorite memories of her. At the Wake, I got up to tell a couple of my favorite memories of her, and I'd like to share them here with y'all as well.
* My favorite memory was from a couple of trips back. See, since the time I started driving out there I would always bring my own towel with me, because somehow I'd come to believe she didn't have extras. Now, why I didn't realize that her house was Hotel Schamberger with eight or so beds in it and three bathrooms would equate to extra towels, I don't know. But anyway, I forgot a towel, and in the morning I went upstairs to the kitchen to have coffee with her, and bashfully asked if I could borrow a towel because I had forgotten to bring one with me.
"There's a whole pile of towels under the sink!" She told the story to everyone the rest of the time I was out there.
* The last time I actually talked to her was when I called her to tell her Katy and I were engaged. I tell her, and there's this long pause, and finally she says in her incomparably unique voice, "So you got her drunk first?"
* The last communication I got from her was a Christmas card. She would draft up a letter with how she was and then write something personal at the bottom. Mine simply said, "Stay happy" on it. I will, Grandma.
Posted by Schamberger at 11:54 AM
August 02, 2009
State of the Rob 08032009
* What I did on my Summer Vacation, or What Rob's Been Doing Since He Finished His Book
* Katy and I had a nice trip to Omaha a couple of weekends back. We'd never been there before and really enjoyed the Old Market area of town. The beer cheese sauce at The Old Spaghetti Works was awesome, by the way.
* I read Dennis Lehane's latest novel, 'The Given Day' and totally swooned the whole way through. I really don't believe Lehane can do wrong. I've read everything he's done to date and he continues to exceed all of my expectations. His deft characterizations are a marvel. The fact that the book includes Babe Ruth and the Boston Molasses Disaster are just icing on the cake.
* I'm reading 'Brody: The Triumph and Tragedy of Wrestling's Rebel' now, after finishing up 'Slap Happy'. Both are giving me a lot of things to work with for my next comic book work.
* Speaking of, besides reading books I've started doing interviews with a lot of the boys who were there during the late 70's/early 80's wrestling scene, as well as other historians and experts on the time period. The research I'm doing on this is really going to pay off, I think, but it's a fascinating experience of its own. Kansas City has such a rich history that I think I'll be able to show through the lens of pro wrestling and how it fit into our society at that time, and what it says about us.
* We finally finished up watching The Wire. Wow, what a satisfying experience. Of course, there was a total 'Rob Moment' while we were watching the final season, when I accidentally skipped an episode. Katy's still pretty peeved about that one.
* My new position at the day job is keeping me really busy, but in a satisfying way I haven't had for several years now. I'm finally in a spot where I can show what I'm capable of, and it seems to be getting me the right kind of attention. If one can't be working in their chosen career full-time, they need to at least enjoy the work they are doing, or "If you can't be with the one you love, honey, love the one you're with." That's where I'm at right now.
* Hopefully the rasslin' book will slowly start to move me to an even more positive place, though.
* Further evidence that we are living in the wrong future: I found out this morning by reading my brother's Facebook status that he's married. By the way, Congratulations Jim and Cassie!
* LINKS!
* Matthieu Forichon's work is absolutely GORGEOUS.
* I know I can't be Al Parker when I grow up, but at least now I can learn how he worked in gouache.
* By the way, Leif Peng's Today's Inspiration blog is still my favorite thing on the internet.
* Two weeks until Mad Men returns! Check out the new gallery to whet your appetite!
* I may have not been familiar with Rolf Armstrong's name, but I definitely am now! Gush!
* Mike Kaluta's illustrations for 'My Name is Paris' will make anyone swoon.
* Rafael Grampa makes me want to throw a brick through my drawing table.
Posted by Schamberger at 04:09 PM
July 13, 2009
State of the Rob 07/13/2009
* On Saturday I drew (and painted) the last page of Too Soon. I feel so...liberated. I started work on this book last year when I was going through a lot of complications in my personal life, and now combined with the move to the new home and the promotion at work I feel I'm really getting past a rather dark period in my life.
* Of my three graphic novels, each stands as a milestone marker for where I was at in my life. Flipping through The Black Chamber and Too Late, I get taken right back to where my mind was at when I was crouched over that drawing board.
* The final installment goes up tomorrow, by the way, unless you're my pal on Facebook, where you can read it all right now.
* I'm taking a breather until I start up the next project. The wrestling book is calling for a lot of research to make it the book I want it to be, and I'm not going to cut corners on it. In the meantime, I think I'll work up the conclusion to the whole Unbroken Circle story and put it up as one installment. No idea on how long that will take or the length of the installment. It'll be nice to put a cap on this story I've been percolating for the last decade and change.
* I'm happy with how this last scene came together for Too Soon and I'm seriously pondering hand-painting the wrestling book. We'll see.
* So folks, what do you think of Too Soon? I'd really love to hear anyone and everyone's thoughts on it.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:55 AM
June 30, 2009
State of the Rob 06302009
* Busy, busy, busy.
* I've only got about ten pages of Too Soon left to draw. I'm hoping to rock those out over the next couple of weeks.
* The last scene is going to be fully painted, because I'm obviously a masochist.
* We've nearly got the loft all settled in. I hung art all day yesterday after going through a bazillion hoops to get my drivers license renewed.
* I took the worst picture yet for a license, by the way. I looked like Baron Harkonnen, even though I'm in about the best shape of my life. Being a foot taller than the average man gets me every time.
* I turn 29 tomorrow. I got engaged when I was 28. I'm getting married when I'm 30. I'm getting old right now.
* LINKS!
* Lee Bermejo's work has always captivated me.
* A gorgeous Alex Nino portfolio. GORGEOUS.
* Can I draw like JH Williams III when I grow up? No? Oh, alright.
* Swoon.
* Can I be Fred Ludekens when I grow up, then? Still no? Shucks.
Posted by Schamberger at 11:45 AM
June 22, 2009
State of the Rob 06222009
* I've got under twenty pages left to draw on Too Soon. Ooowee, that feels good to type.
* I'm really happy with how this current scene has come together. I'm getting closer to having my final piece look like what I see in my mind.
* Over the weekend I read Greg Rucka's latest novel 'Walking Dead' and loved the hell out of it. I've loved the hell out of all of his novels, actually. It was a real struggle Saturday to not put my pencil and brush down and just read the book cover to cover. I did end up doing that Sunday, though.
* Sunday night we watched Wall-E after having my folks over for Minsky's pizza, making for a great all-around day.
* That's about it for this week, y'all. Expect the regular sketchbook stuff along with some process work for Too Soon.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:04 AM
June 15, 2009
State of the Rob 06152009
* After this current scene, I've only got three more and 'Too Soon' is done. I feel like I'm finally hitting my stride with it and getting the visuals to match what I have in my head.
* I'm proud of the story I've got here. I think it's the best-written of the three. I think 'Too Late' had the best art of them, but the story here works better.
* I'm going to do a shorter chapter to end the story of 'The Unbroken Circle' and then take a little time off to get the next book together and fully planned out.
* Got good news at the day job that will be making my life a lot easier in the near future.
* Beer floats are awesome.
* LINKS!
* Here's a nice write-up on my last show at artkc365.com by Steve Brisendine. Unfortunately the show's down at that location now, but expect some news shortly on where you can see them next. Hopefully.
* Evidence that we may be living in the RIGHT future.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:55 PM
June 08, 2009
State of the Rob 06082009
* Back online!
* Thanks to everyone who was able to make it out to my opening last Friday. It really means a lot to have so many friends and family around showing their support. Also, thank you to the wonderful love of my life Katy Ryan for bringing the show together and supporting me through the nine months of work leading up to it, to Drew Hertel for organizing everything and putting the whole dang show together, and UMB Bank for sponsoring the show! All of you are awesome people!
* As seems to be a tradition with my openings I got several surprises, including:
* Congratulations to Brandon and Robin Moore on their impending baby! Brandon is my oldest friend, and it's so great on so many levels to see his family growing. These are good people.
* Two of my former English teachers, Karla Thompson and Marc Russell, showed up. Mrs Thompson remembered me as the guy sitting in class drawing the whole time - yeah, that was totally me to many teachers' chagrin.
* One of the UMB staff on hand was a former coworker of mine. She was the only one that wasn't introduced to me at the beginning of the show, so when I went up to talk to her, I asked her what she thought of the show. "Oh, I really like it."
"Thanks!"
"This, uh, this is your show? Oh, thank God I said I liked it!"
* Again, thanks to everyone who could make it out.
* The move to the new loft went splendidly and we're settling in. I'll put some pictures up soon once we get it to a point we're happy with sharing it!
* Yes, it really took this long to get my internet back online.
* Last but not least, congratulations to "Sasquach" Andy and Lindsay Denzer on introducing their second offspring to the world, Juliette. Hopefully she's not as hairy as her father.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:50 AM
May 29, 2009
Friday June 5th!
Next Friday, June 5th, is the opening of my show 'In the Mood' at Room 222, located at 222 W 20th Street, Kansas City, MO 64108, from 6 to 9:30. There will be musical entertainment from BAC Horn Doctor Trio, as well. I hope to see you there!
Posted by Schamberger at 03:53 PM
May 20, 2009
State of the Rob 05202009
* Just a quick note that the reason for the infrequent activity and more of the same for a little while is due to my preparing for a move on Friday to our new loft. I'm sorry, yo. Unbroken Circle should continue at Webcomics Nation with little to no interference until I have everything set back up.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:38 AM
May 04, 2009
State of the Rob 05042009
* First, an important public safety announcement: The opening for my show at Room 222 is now going to be on June 5th. The gallery operator, Drew Hertel and I agreed that this would be best promotional-wise due to our sponsorship from UMB Bank. So update your calendars, folks.
* I have all fifteen paintings done for the show now and am in process of framing them. I won't show the final two here on the site until after the opening, as a little extra incentive to make it down to the show.
* I'm slowly updating the website. The front page has a fancy new skin and the Painting section is open showcasing works from the upcoming show. I plan to update the Comix section this coming week as well, since it's way out of date.
* I finished reading the first collection of Howard Chaykin's American Flagg this past weekend, and you know what? It really is as good as everyone says. Worth picking up if you're the other guy in the world besides me who never read it.
* Last Friday we went to Jennifer Janesko's First Friday opening at Room 222 and had a great time. She's a very sweet lady and made time to talk with us, mostly due to my friend David working at Happy Gillis, a sandwich shop she frequents. Her work was phenomenally good and I don't think Drew could have found a harder act for me to follow.
* Katy and I are looking forward to the move to our new loft in the River Market. Well, not so much the moving part, as that kind of sucks, but to the new space and having the farmer's market outside our front door.
* I totally forgot I was going to be published in this anthology, Slam Bang. It features a story I did with the uber-talented Charlene Chua that was going to be in FREE COMIX! before it went tits up. Worth checking out. Hell, I'd like to see a copy, too.
* SHOUT OUTS!
* Instead of my normal links this week, I thought it'd be nice to give props to my friends.
* First up is my lady friend Katy Ryan's infrequently updated blog. Besides running LV Mag and The Dot and freelancing for just about everyone in town, she has this little blog. She has some good gems on there on occasion, and maybe some day I'll comment on one of her posts.
* Kevin Mellon's been posting a lot of art lately and talking about the creative process in regards to living the artist's life.
* Dennis Hopeless doesn't post as much, but he's been sharing art from upcoming projects that looks beautiful.
* Dana Hill gives a lot of insight into design and the designer's process on her new-ish blog.
* Congratulations to Andy 'Sasquach' Denzer on completing law school. Hopefully the Bar doesn't find out about your white slavery ring or the pictures on your hard drive.
* Lee Leslie's been posting a lot more art on his blog lately and I really love seeing his diversity in style while still having it remain within his core style. He's got the chops.
* For some reason Jason Arnett's Livejournal feed doesn't always pick up on my Bloglines reader, but I try to check in on his blog as he always has some great insights and a very warm and friendly writing style. Probably because he's a genuinely warm and friendly guy, I guess.
* My man Jason Preu's blog has the great Way Back Wednesday feature as well as other things he and his family are getting up to.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:05 AM
April 27, 2009
State of the Rob 04272009
* First, I'd like to apologize for the long delay between posts. My hosting service was acquired by another company and during the switchover some of my permissions changed, preventing me from updating the blog. Everything's fixed now and my abnormal posting schedule resumes today!
* Catch-up time!
* My meeting with Bob Geigel was an amazing thing that I'll treaure for the rest of my life. Now, a lot of people say that and forget about the event after a few months, but I truly mean it. Bob and his wive Vera were fascinating people to talk to and Bob's stories will be fueling my comics for years, if not decades, to come. I was very honored to be invited into their home and to have Bob talk about all of his memorabilia and share stories from such a fascinating time in not just wrestling's history, but Kansas City's as well. Harley Race calls Bob Geigel the best friend he's ever had, and I can definitely see that.
* As we were leaving, Bob invited Katy and I to attend the premiere screening of KC on the Mat, a documentary about the history of Central States Wrestling, as his guests. Very cool!
* The screening was last Thursday at Memorial Hall, and if you're familiar with pro wrestling in KC, you know the significance of that. When Bob ran Central States with Harley Race and Pat O'Connor, they used to fill Memorial Hall to the rafters every Thursday night. I invited my mom and stepfather, Roger, as Roger used to go every week himself back in the 1960's. The majority of the wrestlers still living in the area made it out including Handsome Harley himself. When Bill Kersten got on the mic and said his patented "HELLLLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO wrestling fans!" there wasn't a dry eye in the crowd.
* I did this painting for Bob Geigel:
and this one for Harley Race:
I was carrying both of the framed painings around before the show and folks kept stopping me to look at them and I could see the memories of watching these two giants performing going on behind their eyes. It meant a lot to me to share in that with them.
I went up to give Harley his first as Bob was being swarmed by fans and Harley was out front smoking. We had this classic exchange:
ME: Hi, Harley, I did this painting for you and I thought I'd go ahead and show it to you now, but I'll give it to you after the show so you don't have to lug it around.
HARLEY: Tell you what, go ahead and give it to my guy here to run down to the truck. I'm probably going to cut out early to go hit up the boats.
He also said it was beautiful, but that part is what I'll remember.
Bob said "That's something special, buddy," when I gave him his on his way out.
* I'm finishing up my last painting for the gallery show now. I worked on it most of the weekend, but it's proving to be more work-intensive than I'd originally thought. I'm excited for the show and look forward to sharing all of these paintings with y'all in person.
*LINKS!
* A gallery of Kansas City wrestlers, including pictures from the show last Thursday.
* Check out this gorgeous brush work on the inks from 'Dredger'.
* Jesus didn't teach them how to count.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:32 AM
April 07, 2009
State of the Rob 04072009
* Busy, busy, busy. Last weekend I stayed in and worked on comic pages the whole time. I'm about ten weeks out from having this book all done and I'm ready for it!
* Monday I spent the morning taking care of car tax stuff and the rest of the day working on another painting for my show. It's coming along pretty well and should be done shortly, I hope.
* I only got one of my WRESTLEMANIA predictions right, as is normally the case. At our viewing party, Katy won with four picks. All of us guys were pretty shamed by that, to be honest.
* As expected, Undertaker and Shawn Michaels tore down the house with their match, going down as one of the best in history.
* Thursday I'm meeting up with Texas Bob Geigel to do deep research for the next book I'm doing. I'm really interested to talk with him as he was the NWA president during the time period I'm setting the book in.
* You only get one link this week, but it's the only one you need: The Sham Wow guy's mug shots!
Posted by Schamberger at 10:50 AM
April 01, 2009
Why I Love Katy
April 1st, 2009
FROM: Rob
TO: Katy
I checked my email when I got in this morning and I got a query from Dreamworks about an option for The Unbroken Circle! OMG! Do you know any good entertainment lawyers I should talk with, or would Kirra be good for this kind of thing?
FROM: Katy
TO: Rob
BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh my God!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I first read this e-mail in my car, so sorry for the delay in my response. And when I saw it, I screamed! How amazing! I've got a message into Kirra right now and I'll let you know what she says ASAP. I can't wait to hear more about this during our date!!
I'M SO FREAKING PROUD OF YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
FROM: Rob
TO: Katy
Yeah, it's so cool. They said they see it as a vehicle for Jim Caviezel. Jesus is going to be my lead!
FROM: Katy
TO: Rob
SERIOUSLY? WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
FROM: Rob
TO: Katy
APRIL FOOLS!!!!!
FROM: Katy
TO: Rob
YOU ARE THE BIGGEST JERK IN THE WORLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I HOPE YOU ARE READY TO BUY YOUR OWN DINNER TONIGHT. YOU BETTER GET READY TO WASH DISHES.
I hate April Fool's Day.
FROM: Rob
TO: Katy
I love you so much, sweetheart! I just couldn't keep it going all day.
FROM: Katy
TO: Rob
I'm going to punch you in the face. I'm sure you and all your co-workers are laughing at me. HAR, HAR, HAR.
KATY-BOT SMASH! DOES NOT COMPUTE APRIL FOOL'S DAY!
Posted by Schamberger at 11:56 AM
March 30, 2009
State of the Rob 03302009
* Man, I've been working so hard this year. Y'all are tired of hearing about it, I'm sure. Still I've been really keeping my nose to the grindstone and producing as much work as possible.
* Last weekend I spent all day Saturday producing the page you're seeing from Too Soon up top right now. I think it's the best I've done to date and am really happy with it. Sunday I penciled out the next three pages and got some inking in on them.
* I hope everyone had fun at Planet Comicon. I didn't have anything to sell and webcomics aren't usually big enough draws to get me invited to the show, plus the blizzard on Saturday definitely kept me away, even though the show is located in close proximity to Korma Sutra. I hope y'all sold lots and didn't get stalked by folks dressed up like Klingons.
* LINKS!
* Check out this absolutely gorgeous Black Widow comic by Paul Gulacy. Oh, swoon!
* Justine Lai is doing a series of paintings of herself having sex with each United States President. You'll never think of Abe Lincoln the same way again.
* FLASH! AhhhAHHH! Save every one of us! Unfortunately, it's not "Look out Flesh! It's dykes!"
* Harry Borgman in Puerto Vallarta.
* Josh Middleton detailing how he puts together a cover for Supergirl.
* Take a moment and check out this gorgeous sketch of Tarbes and the Pyrenees by Rene Fijten. Wow. That really sets a mood, doesn't it?
Posted by Schamberger at 08:06 AM
March 23, 2009
State of the Rob 03232009
* My show opening has been moved up to Friday May 29th. Update your calendars, folks.
* A couple of weeks back I found out that the show will now be fully sponsored for the First Friday openings (I'll have the Artist's Reception on the 29th of May, then two First Friday openings) by a big local company with a history of supporting the arts. Very cool. They'll be handling the catering and promotions. If they hire Sterling Cooper, I'm demanding Peggy Olson be my copy writer.
* I'll be doing three more paintings for the show due to the heightened visibility. I finished up the first of those last weekend (you'll see it on Wednesday's update).
* Last week was consumed by a sinus sickness killing a lot of my momentum, but last weekend was really productive and things are progressing along nicely.
* Two weekends back Katy and I went to my longtime friend Brandon's house for a Rock Band party and had a blast. I killed it to the Beastie Boys, stealing the show of course.
* LINKS!!!
* Saks Fifth Avenue's Want It! promotional video totally rawks.
* How gorgeous is this selection of work by Willy Pogany? 'Really gorgeous' is the answer you're looking for, Junior.
* Josh Cochran's Fortune cover is striking.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:10 PM
March 10, 2009
State of the Rob 03102009
* Work, work, work.
* I've been busting my ass on Unbroken Circle pages to get my lead back. I'm a week ahead now, and should be two weeks ahead by the end of the week.
* Then I'll be able to get some Batesville in the can. I really am sorry, everyone. That just got away from me.
* I'm only human, damn it!
* Or, as revealed on Battlestar Galactica, all humans on Earth are Cylons, so maybe I'm not.
* I'm pretty sure I'm human though, because I'm not near as sexy as Boomer or Caprica Six.
* This morning I did an interview with a local magazine giving dating advice, of all things.
* Word is there may be soul food at my gallery opening on May 30th. And wine. And a jazz band. Oh, and my twelve paintings too.
* So, there was a comic book movie that came out last week. You might have heard of it, actually: Watchmen. It was a solid enough movie for what it was. The only things I would have done differently would be to reduce the gore and to show Ozymandias' backstory. Now, Sam Peckinpah is one of my favorite directors, but so is Alfred Hitchcock. I don't think the gore worked with such a psychological story, and it took away from whenever there was implied violence. Also, the omission of Ozymandias' backstory totally derailed the reveal, making it a 'So what?' instead of a 'Holy shit!' Otherwise, the changes made were acceptable or at worst forgiveable, and I found it to be enjoyable enough.
I kinda wish I'd gone to the 11AM Friday screening instead of the Midnight screening, though! Yikes! I normally wake up at 4:30AM, and we didn't get home until after 3!
* Here's the current schedule for upcoming comics: Finish this chapter of The Unbroken Circle, 'Too Soon', then put the story on hiatus for a little while (I've been working on it for a decade now and would like to take a breather for a little while). I'm shelving 'The Outerman' for a little while as the story's just not gelling yet and I don't think my art's there for the story I want. Instead, I'm developing 'The Promotion', basically Mad Men meets 1970's Professional Wrestling. More on that soon.
* Links!
* I dig the work of Derek Van Gieson. His brush work is very fluid and subconscious.
* A beautiful gallery of Alphonse Mucha's work. Yum.
* The Famous Artists' Cartoon Course offered for free online! Holy cow!
Posted by Schamberger at 08:43 AM
March 02, 2009
State of the Rob 03022009
* Wow, it's March already? Fuck a duck!
* So, uh, I didn't really accomplish anything I set out to do last week, did I? I'm sorry, gang, I really am. Last week became incredibly busy during the days so I didn't have as much free time as I normally do. I wanted to get caught up over the weekend, but...
* Sunday we had about an inch of water on our kitchen floor and standing water on the carpet outside of it. These plumbing problems are happening more and more often and I finally got it out of the plumber and maintenance that not only was the plumbing put in incorrectly, but the building has since settled so that it's not level anymore, causing everything to back up into our unit. We're so ready to move out, and I'm going to have a nice chat with management when I get home tonight.
* So I'm even further behind now. Unbroken Circle will be, uhm, unbroken, but Batesville's way behind, as are a lot of my side projects. I'm going to get Batesville back on track and we'll have a solid week of installments coming up soon.
* I've got my midnight screening tickets for Watchmen. Stoked!
* I'm reading Ric Flair's autobiography right now and am absolutely loving it. Here's a couple of choice quotes:
David Crockett talking about Flair: "When Ric was a bad guy, the women loved to hate him. But when the show was over, they loved to be with him. He had a bad habit of taking his clothes off. He'd often come out of the bathroom, walk up to a female sitting on the couch, and tap her on the head. Only he wasn't tapping her with his finger."
The other, from Ric talking about a midget wrestler he was friends with:
"Cowboy Lang was a midget wrestler. He'd walk around the dressing room in his cowboy hat and boots, with his dick hanging practically below his knees. He was a good guy, and loved to party after the shows. But he always expected me to get him laid.
"'You know, Cowboy,' I'd explain, 'it's hart to get a midget like you laid. Not all girls are attracted to midgets.' But I had a friend in Charlotte, Sarge was her nickname-because of her National Guard obligation. She always hosted the best parties and, if pressured, would always find a girl for Lang. As the night went on, I'd find myself asking a lady, 'Hey, what do you think of my friend Cowboy Lang over there?'
"'Oh, no,' they'd usually say, 'I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna screw a midget. I won't blow one. I won't do anything.'
"'Okay,' I'd answer, 'But you don't know what you're missing.'
"At some point, I could manipulate things so that Cowboy Lang could take the girl to the side and show her his dick. Afterward I'd see them walking out of the bar, hand in hand, with his big cowboy hat coming up to just above her elbow."
Excellent. There's another great story in there about Flair and Roddy Piper starting a riot in Trinidad that ended with Flair getting paid $5000 and piper getting $500 and a spittoon full of cocaine. They both end up at a nightclub and Flair watched Piper spooning the coke up his nose and saying, "This is what I get when I travel with you. You get all the money and I get this."
Posted by Schamberger at 08:17 AM
February 23, 2009
State of the Rob 02232009
* I've started working out again, trying to get myself into great shape for the wedding. I've been at it for the last month, and I'm really starting to see and feel the results. I do it six days a week, twice a day for four of those. I've dropped about five pounds and put on a ton of muscle mass. My energy throughout the day is way up, as is my stamina and my overall mood.
* I still have a few Watchmen drawings to put up later this week. Night Owl, Rorshach, and I'd like to do the first Silk Spectre Vargas-style and a Hooded Justice.
* Batesville should resume tomorrow. Sorry for the brief hiatus there, but I had to rework some things to make for a hopefully better story.
* I've started framing up the pieces for my next show and they look really nice. I'm optimistic and I think it will be a good display.
* I think I've got what I'm going to do for my next series of paintings. More on that in the next month or so, after I finish up a submission I'm doing for the poster for Columbia's arts community.
* Links!
* My buddy Matt 'Mad' Hawkins has a book of his paper toys coming out soon. It looks great!
* Both versions of 'Came the Dawn', one by Wally Wood, the other by Frank Frazetta!
* Check out the use of color on this album cover.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:27 AM
February 09, 2009
State of the Rob 02092009
* This past week's really just been about work, work, and also working. The day job's been busy and I've been churning out pages at night.
* Lots of art to put up this week! Keep your eyes peeled! We'll see if I actually scan it in and post it, huh?
* Katy got me the 2009 Illustration Now daily calendar from Taschen and I love it! There's all sorts of fantastic inspiration in there.
* MIA's outfit on the Grammy's? Win.
* TV on the Radio on SNL rocked the house down.
* A good friend of mine got let go from her job last week, which was bad enough, but then some blogger made a really obscene post about it, as her job was fairly high profile. I really weep for humanity whenever I come across troll-ish things like that. She's a very capable person, though, and is already landing on her feet, and the blogger mocking her situation still lives in his mom's basement, so the universe has its own way of working things out.
* Links!
* Inking interviews with several of my favorite cartoonists at one of my favorite blogs, Comic Tools!
* Inking tips by the incomparable Michael Cho!
* A ton of cover paintings from The Shadow!
* Lettering legend Todd Klein examining the logo and cover design for Watchmen and also talking about working with Dave Gibbons!
Posted by Schamberger at 07:58 AM
February 03, 2009
State of the Rob 02032009
* Big announcement time! My twelve album cover recreation paintings will be shown at the Room 222 Gallery May 28 through July 6, with a grand opening on May 30th! It's in the Performance Furniture Gallery building located at 222 W 20th Street, Kansas City, MO 64108, cat-a-corner from Manny's restaurant. More details as they become available!
* Katy and I went there this past Saturday for the gallery's grand opening, and this is going to be one hell of a show, folks. The organizer, Drew, has huge plans in store. Definitely keep the 30th of May open on your calendars!
* Sorry for this being a day late, and for Batesville not going up until tonight, but I've been having a bugger of a time lately.
* One of my tires wore down wrong, fucking up the others. Saturday morning I went and got them replaced, only to discover that the vibrations from the tires also blew one of my struts. It was nice of the gents at Tires Plus to not tell me that until AFTER putting the new tires on, wasn't it? Asshats.
* After crunching numbers, I came to find that it was cheaper to get a new car than to fix the one I have, so I've been running all over town getting that deal put together. I should finally have it tonight.
* Sunday night, when I was planning to finish up the pages I was drawing and to get the next Batesville written, my bathroom became submerged by water. Well, part of it. Some areas stayed dry as the water had gotten underneath the linoleum, buckling it up to the point it resembled a gel insole. Then our tubs filled with raw sewage. There's absolutely no better way to end a weekend than seeing your neighbors' TP floating in your tub.
* So, yeah, I'm a little behind schedule on where I want to be with UC and the 'Ville is running a little behind, too. Whaddayagonnado?
* I know! Share cool links!
* Eric Skillman, one of the designers for Criterion, has started making comics! And they rock!
* Vintage storyboards and comps!
* Man, I wish I spoke Spanish. But this webcomic looks gorgeous!
* And on a more somber note, it turns out Saturday night Katy and I ate at The River Market Brewery for the last time, as they shuttered up the next day. Bummer. I have a lot of really great memories associated with that place, including:
* Meeting up with a friend before going to see George Carlin in concert.
* An impromptu birthday party thrown by good friends Jason and Sarah Preu shortly after a painful break-up, which led to some painfully bad karaoke on my part!
* Lots and lots of great food.
* A nice business lunch.
* Getting together with best bud Andy Denzer when he was in town, having some great beer, and listening to some live jazz.
* Another birthday party with lots of great friends thrown by the lovely Katy.
* I'll miss you, River Market Brewery, and your fantastic stout.
Posted by Schamberger at 02:19 PM
January 28, 2009
State of the Rob 01282009
* Hey, you're seeing brand new Unbroken Circle pages now, you lucky, lovely folks! How exciting!
* I'm meeting up with the gallery operator this Saturday for my show. Expect official announcements and details for everything next week. Word is that it will run from May to July, though! How exciting!
* The Unbroken Circle continues to defy all logic by doubling page views each month. The daily updates are key, I think, as well as constant and wide promotion. My income from it continues to increase as well, and I try to put half of that back into promotion for the story. I've had over one and a half million views of my ads since I started running them a couple months back! How exciting!
* Unfortunately, my workhorse Mustek A3 scanner gave up the ghost this past weekend. I did manage to scan in two and a half graphic novels with it and hundreds of sketches, but it sucks having a two hundred dollar paperweight. In the meantime I'm using my old small scanner and piecemealing my pages together. Bummer! My income from The Unbroken Circle should get me a new one in a month or so, though. How exciting!
* Links! How exciting!
* Jordi Bernet draws Sherlock Holmes!
* Google Earth: The Prado Layer!
* Life Magazine's photos of artists at work!
* Can I be Robert Fawcett when I grow up?
* How exciting! (Come on, I'm well known in many, many circles for beating lame jokes to death!)
Posted by Schamberger at 10:17 AM
January 19, 2009
State of the Rob 01192009
* Now that the paintings are done, I'm back into full-on comix making mode, and I'm loving it. I was afraid I would have some pencil rust to shake off, but I think this new batch of pages are coming out even better than what I'd done before.
* Next week the syndicated Unbroken Circle catches up to what you had seen here on the blog before I started hosting it over at WCN. I'm pretty damned happy with those pages coming up and I think you'll like them as well.
* I'm starting to plan out the ending of The Unbroken Circle as well, tying up all of the loose ends and bringing out the ending I've been working towards all along. It does all connect and it is all leading somewhere, by the way.
* Over the weekend Katy and I took a break and just stayed in. I got caught up on some stuff I'd recorded and continued to enjoy new series:
* Battlestar Galactica is excellent and gave a great payoff to the hell of a cliffhanger the mid-season finale left us with. My theories for the show? This isn't a remake of the original, but a sequel, and the Final Cylon 'revealed' is a swerve and the actual Final Cylon is Richard Hatch's character.
* The Brave and the Bold continues to impress and has really gone beyond all of my expectations going into the show. This week's Kamandi vignette was cathartic to my inner geek.
* The Clone Wars series is single-handedly making me enjoy Star Wars again after the abysmal Phantom Menace just about ruined the franchise, dampening the power of fun contained in the second and third installments. It's a fun show and yet tragic at the same time as the viewer knows how bad things will get for these characters.
* Somebody Up There Likes Me was a fine performance by a young Paul Newman and reminded me what a tragic loss his death was. It'd be fun one day to watch this with Raging Bull and the first Rocky.
* Somehow I was completely unaware of Kubrick's second movie, Killer's Kiss, but I thought it was a compelling noir tale with some beautiful shots only made more extraordinary by the fact the movie was done on a $15,000 budget. This was done as a double feature with the next movie on TCM, which was a treat.
* I don't know how I made it this far in life without seeing Double Indemnity, but that was a classic. Working in insurance now it's fascinating to see how the writers (including Raymond Chandler!) were able to take such a soul-grindingly boring field and make it provocative, sexy, dangerous, and most importantly, entertaining.
* We also watched the first season of Entourage. It took a few episodes to get into it, but we did get into it and will be looking to pick up more seasons down the line. Johnny Drama's my boy!
* I picked up the first Northlanders collection and was totally enthralled by the world Brian Wood and company portray through this gritty yet humanistic telling of the Viking people. Highly recommended.
* Reading Doctor No, one thing begins to stick out: Ian Fleming is peerless at the power to incorporate birdwatching into a spy thriller. Also, James Bond isn't overly fond of giant centipedes.
* And now, back to working on drawing pages!
Posted by Schamberger at 09:24 AM
January 12, 2009
State of the Rob 01122009
* Last night I finished up the last of my album cover recreations (You'll get to see it here first on Wednesday). I'm happy to be done with the series, although I loved doing every one of them.
* Stay tuned for the announcement on the show.
* Hey, there I am on Warren Ellis' blog!
* Links!
* Donnachada Daly's 3D illustrations are some of my favorite things online.
* Jim Mahfood is webcomicking now.
* I'm working on finding a link to the story, but most of the outlets are blocked here at the dayjob. Anyway, Seth Petruzelli, the guy who knocked out Kimbo Slice, is apparently a crossdresser. My gay friends assure me that crossdressers are vicious bitches, but that's still hilarious.
EDIT: Thanks to my lovely assistant, here's Seth as Kimbo for Halloween, and here's the drag pictures.
* The first cover to The Shadow rules.
* Speaking of The Shadow, Francesco Francavilla's Pulp Sunday blog is a real treat.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:58 PM
January 11, 2009
Gran Torino
Katy and I went to see Eastwood's latest today, and I'm man enough to admit I got misty-eyed at the end. But first, a little back story:
My first car was a 1972 Ford Gran Torino, pictured above. It was left to me by my Grandpa after he passed, and I absolutely loved that beast. It had the 351 Cleveland under the hood and loved to use it. The car's always had a double dose of sentimentality for me, because first and foremost it was my Grandpa's car for as long as I can remember, maybe even the whole time I'd been alive, and second because it was my first ride. Beyond the sentimentality, the car spent more time at the shop than it did under my ass or in front of the house, but for the time I had it, it led me on all sorts of adventures and defining events like a first kiss (and first boob-grab!), careening off the road to avoid a falling tree, accidentally visiting my first crackhouse (a story for another time), and many other things that would populate my future memoirs. I had to pass the car on eventually to someone who could handle all of the maintenance, but I see it driving around town still, and that's pretty awesome.
Anyway, the movie was as awesome as I had expected. Eastwood's been at the top of his game for a long, long time now (fifty years nearly), and this movie just furthers his legend. Can I say a public thank you to Clint for writing all of these love letters to me? Of course I can: Thanks, Clint! First, Mystic River was adapted from one of my favorite novels, then The Changeling was written by one of my favorite writers, and now he names his latest after my first car and it was produced by the former publisher of DC Comics. Oh, and Katy and I's third date was Flags of Our Fathers (probably not the best date movie, but I loved it).
Highest Recommendation
Posted by Schamberger at 04:20 PM
January 05, 2009
State of the Rob 01052009
* Wow! The end of 2008 was super busy! Normal posting resumes today, so don't worry, all of you who worry.
* The holidays were slow-paced but very nice.
* For New Year's, Katy and I first went to O'Dowd's on the Plaza and toasted the Irish New Year. I don't have any Irish ancestry that I'm immediately aware of, but it led to us eating some great deep dish at Uno's. Then we went to a lame party at Union Station, left there at ten, and ended the year with friends at a house party.
* After what we called a 'nap', we caught an early flight to spend the beginning of the New Year with Katy's family at their vacation house in South Carolina. We flew into Savannah GA, had lunch there, then tooled around South Carolina for the next few days. The vacation was something out of 'Eat, Pray, Love' in that we mostly ate, drank, and slept, but man-o-man did I need that relaxation.
* Tomorrow Batesville resumes, then for the rest of the week I'll post some of the pictures I did for Holiday presents to friends and family.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:50 AM
December 22, 2008
State of the Rob 12222008
* I had a great weekend, what with my good buddy Andy "Sasquatch" Denzer being in town. We did the Boulevard Brewery tour Saturday and then bullshitted the rest of the day in the way only we do.
* On Sunday Katy and I mostly stayed in away from the bitter cold. I got a bunch of Batesville written and did some other miscellaneous work in regards to the webcomic, as well as doing a little development for a side project I'd like to get up and going.
* Because a full-time job, fiancee, daily webcomic, gallery shows, and a novel aren't enough, I really need to do another project!
* Batesville installment posts will resume on January 6th. I'm proud of how this second part is coming together and I'm eager to share it with y'all.
* I'm reading George Pelecanos' 'The Night Gardener' right now and am utterly blown away. This is how you do it, folks, right here. The real deal Holyfield.
* Links!
* The 1992 Jim Lee X-Men cards. Man, Lee was on top of the world when these came out, and they still rule. Some of the computer coloring effects are a little humorous now, but to 13-year-old-Rob, these were the shit. The Domino card is still awesome, and it's also fun to see what the hologram cards look like scanned in. (It'd be fun to try to duplicate that hologram look for a shorter project, wouldn't it?)
* Vintage Pop-Up books! I'm always a sucker for pop-up books and I'd love to have the time some day to put one together. There seems to be a bit of a renaissance of pop-up books lately, and I'm totally cool with that.
* And now a request: I'm putting together a mix-tape of songs about flooding and I hope y'all can give me some suggestions. Already on the list:
(Of course) Stevie Ray Vaughn - Texas Flood
The Clash - London Calling
David Banner - Seein Thangs
DJ Shadow - Broken Levee Blues
Chris James - You Made It
(Of course) Led Zepplin - When the Levee Breaks
Kenny Wayne Shepherd - Every Time it Rains
Morphine - Swim
Stevie Wonder - Higher Ground (although I'd probably use the Ellen Mcllwaine cover)
Any noticeable oversights here?
EDIT: There I am on Lying in the Gutters, talking about how Unbroken Circle gets updated on Christmas. That'd be a great day for y'all to read the archive again, wouldn't it?
Posted by Schamberger at 01:22 PM
December 15, 2008
State of the Rob 12152008
* Over a hundred thousand hits for Unbroken Circle today at WCN! It just keeps growing and growing.
* Katy and I had a really nice weekend, especially Saturday. We started the day off with a wonderful buffet at Korma Sutra, picked up a couple Taschen books at Half Price Books, stopped in at KC Costume downtown, then spent the remainder of the day at the Nelson Atkins museum. I hadn't been there since the expansion and it's absolutely lovely. Then we went to a 'red carpet' party for a friend's birthday that was a lot of fun. Sunday we mostly hung around the house and watched The Wire.
* Can I take a moment to talk about why 'The Crow' is a bad movie? Here's your high concept: Martial-arts-revenge-seeking-zombie. How do you make a movie, then? Why, you have him cry a lot and play emo music on an accoustic guitar, of course! And then fight The Highlander! Seriously, watching that movie as an adult had the same experience as watching The A-Team or Knight Rider as an adult: Not as good as I remembered it being when I was a kid.
* Sorry, totally non-sequitur, but it's been on my mind for awhile now.
* Otherwise things are starting to slow down around the holiday season production-wise. I'm finishing up another painting and about to start the last one in the album-cover series, getting ready to start writing the next batch of Batesville, and still putting out Too Soon pages while developing The Outerman.
Posted by Schamberger at 10:08 AM
December 10, 2008
State of the Rob 12102008
* Not a lot of note going on besides being busy busy busy.
* The Unbroken Circle's popularity keeps rising and rising. I'm at a point that I'm just watching the hits with amazement. I'm getting numbers that most small-press people would be ecstatic to receive. If this growth trend continues...
* I don't know why I didn't know Richard Matheson wrote episodes of The Twilight Zone. 'Death Ship' is amazing.
* Uhmmm...yeah, not really a lot to report about.
Posted by Schamberger at 02:09 PM
December 02, 2008
State of the Rob 12022008
* Is it December? Really? Where the F did 2008 go? Oh yeah, it got ate up by incredibly hard work. That's where it went.
* December's about all booked up already, too. Gosh. Between work meetings, parties, get-togethers and general holiday stuff we're busy through the beginning of next year. Yowza.
* We're going to be in Hilton Head, SC for New Year's. It's my first time there.
* Yesterday I drew my first version of The Outerman. Still got some tweaking to do but I'm getting there.
* I'm not planning on beginning production until late 2010 at the earliest due to all of the research I'm putting into the book.
* How much research, you may ask? I've decided to set the book in the 1960's for a variety of reasons, so I'm amassing all sorts of reference on the time period. Also, this book won't be just in Kansas City like past books, so we're planning trips to New York and various European countries. No shit.
* Also, Unbroken Circle's finale will put me through that time period, so no fear folks. You'll be getting plenty of Rob Comix in the years to come.
* It's strange that I'm planning this hard for a book that's two years off, but comforting at the same time.
* And yeah, revenue off of the comic is making this something to plan around. It's already paying for itself and I'd say at the rate of growth the book has been experiencing that I'm about a month away from profiting off the little booger. If I get to about twenty times the hits I'm getting now it'll be a full-time gig.
* My copy of the Jim Thompson bio 'Savage Art' signed by Chip Kidd:
* The Kidd lecture was fantastic, by the way. It was mostly about the Batmanga book but he also covered his other design work including a funny story about how to incorporate the Oprah's Book Club sticker into the design for Cormac McCarthy's 'The Road'. I also ran into a lot of old friends there, and that's always great.
* LINKAMANIA!
* Penguin's hardback 007 covers!
Good lord, those are gorgeous.
* Kilink! (The rest of the posts on that blog are oh so not safe for work, but if you're into vintage cheesecake it's totally awesome)
* Can I be W David Shaw when I grow up?
* Poladroid. Once the PC version is available, I've got several ideas for this fun little app.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:37 PM
November 25, 2008
(Most of) 2008 in Review
01. What did you do in 2008 that you'd never done before?
Headlined a gallery show
Went to WRESTLEMANIA
Got engaged to Katy
02. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more?
My only resolution last year was to get myself happier and more financially stable, and I accomplished that. And yeah, more resolutions to come. We can always improve ourselves.
03. Did anyone close to you give birth?
My best friend since Kindergarten Brandon and his wife Robin welcomed their son Tristen to our world.
My good friends Jason and Sarah Preu welcomed Beatrix Ninja Maxine Preu into our coil.
04. Did anyone close to you die?
So far no. I had enough of that in 2007.
05. What countries did you visit?
The US of A.
06. What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008?
More artwork completed.
A solo art show.
07. What date from 2008 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
October 3rd, the day I proposed to Katy. Pretty awesome.
08. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
The marriage proposal trumped any other notable achievements.
09. What was your biggest failure?
Even with all of the setbacks suffered this year, I can't think of anything I'd classify as a failure.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing to speak of. I did puke out of nose, though. That rocked. Not.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
Man, I really didn't purchase anything of note this year, due to personal financial situations it was more about saving than spending. I'd have to say a pile of uncut matboard I picked up on clearance was the best buy since I've turned them into my recent crop of paintings.
12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
My cat Monkey. She's become a real sweetheart.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
My own.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent.
Car.
Gas.
Insurance.
Electric bill.
Phone bill.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Planning the perfect marriage proposal for Katy. I put a good six months of planning into it and she tells me I did a fair job.
16. What song will always remind you of 2008?
Two songs from the only CD I bought this year (see, I told you I didn't buy shit this year. I used to buy a new CD every couple of weeks!) by The Dandy Warhols:
'Godless', an Ennio Morricone-inspired piece with haunting instrumentals that was playing in the background for several events this year. The lyrics don't have any emotional reverberation for me, though.
I love it at about 3 and a half minutes in and the guitar kicks in, then the horn at about 3:50. Magical.
'Bohemian Like You', a Rolling Stones-influenced jam that gets me in the mood to rock every time I hear it. The lyrics take me back to a time in my life when I was first setting out on my own and trying to define who Adult Rob would be rather than who Kid Rob was.
Video not safe for work, by the way:
You've got a great car
Yeah, what's wrong with it today
I used to have one too
Maybe I'll come and have a look
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder?
Much happier. My future is really exciting right now.
ii. thinner or fatter?
Slightly thinner.
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Exercising. Drawing. Writing.
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Family feuding.
20. How will you be spending Christmas?
With people who care as much about me as I do them. Take that for what it's worth.
22. Did you fall in love in 2008?
Nope, stayed in love, though.
23. How many one-night stands?
None.
24. What was your favourite TV program?
Monday Night Raw
Runner-ups: Mad Men and Terminator
25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
I don't hate. That's a weak emotion.
26. What was the best book you read?
Novel? "Homicide" by David Simon
Comic? "The Dead and the Dying" by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips
27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Nothing. Wow.
28. What did you want and get?
Want: To be more financially stable
Get: More financially stable
29. What was your favourite film of this year?
The Dark Knight. I'm sure that's going to be an unoriginal answer on a lot of lists this year.
31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
28. Had dinner with Katy, Mom and Roger at Kokopelli, followed by a real shit day at the job.
32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Less financial struggles. This year was the first time in twenty years, since I started reading them, that I haven't bought a new comic or comics each week. I know that sounds trivial, but it's the changing of a pattern I've had for two decades.
33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008?
Dayjob - Dress Casual
Personal - Comfortable
34. What kept you sane?
Katy.
The cats.
Drawing.
35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Greta Garbo
36. What political issue stirred you the most?
The total wrong-headed thinking that got Sarah Palin nominated to a Vice Presidential candidate. I'm not a huge Obama backer, but I'm a gigantic Palin opposer.
37. Who did you miss?
No one in particular.
38. Who was the best new person you met?
No one in particular.
39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008.
The act of attaining your goals is never easy and creates its own adversity. Nothing worth having comes easy, and when you want something badly enough, the amount of work necessary to obtain it can put off those around you. I became almost hermit-like in my near, no, actual obsession to become a full-time comicker on my own terms. I'm nearly totally cut off from the world because I really am working that hard, and it's created some incredible strains on relationships in my life. But it's going to be worth it.
Posted by Schamberger at 01:02 PM
November 18, 2008
State of the Rob 11182008
* Feeling much better this week. If I were to make a list of favorite things, being sick wouldn't be on it.
* Man, 2008's almost over. Where'd it go?
* I'm going to reformat the pages on Unbroken Circle to read a little easier on-screen and to reduce the page-load time. It'll also increase my page-count, which in turn increases my income. I'm greedy, yes, but I really want to swim around in my money bin like Uncle Scrooge.
* Because right now it's just filled with bills, and that's not nearly as satisfying.
* Quantum of Solace is worth seeing. Katy and I caught it Sunday and I was thoroughly entertained. We've decided we really want M's office.
* Yesterday I finished reading Cornell Woolrich's 'Fright' and really enjoyed it. The style of the prose was really unique and the plot kept me interested throughout. What more can you want from a book?
* I'm starting up on the Quantum of Solace collection of Fleming's short 007 stories.
* The word 'ginseng' is from the Cantonese jan-shen, which means "man root". Huh.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:51 AM
November 11, 2008
Ugh
* Been sick since Saturday. Nothing much to report on.
* That's why there was nothing posted yesterday.
* That's also why you're getting this today instead of a Batesville installment.
* You'll get that tomorrow.
* It will wrap up the first chapter with a mighty big revelation and begin to shed a lot of light on the whole Unbroken Circle story.
* So, go ahead and read everything again from the beginning today instead.
* Katy's going to see the New Kids on the Block tonight. Pray for her.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:34 AM
November 07, 2008
State of the Rob 11072008
* Have I mentioned that I'm amazed by the traffic I'm getting on Webcomics Nation yet? My growth there has been staggering. I've tripled in traffic since the beginning of October. Tripled. There's still a long ways to go before this becomes profitable, but it's entirely do-able now, with a little patience and determination.
* Still, I'm getting over a thousand pageviews each day. That's pretty damned cool.
* The time change seems to be taking its effect on me. I've had about zero motivation this week. I'm not falling behind on anything, but I still don't care much for that.
* I opened a Twitter account this morning. I'm still not real sure how I'll utilize it, but I went ahead and got it going to figure that out. The fact that I don't have a mobile device makes it strange to have a Twitter account, but it's not blocked at the day-job, which is a bonus.
* Way to go, America.
* Check out this gallery of early 1950's paperback covers. Gorgeous!
* A Paul Pope movie = Excellente!
* Pope is one of those guys like James Jean who I get excited to see do well. Excellence should be rewarded.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:42 AM
November 03, 2008
State of the Rob 11032008
* I encountered this last Friday at lunch:
The Scene: Me waiting in line at Taco Bell's drive-thru. A couple in their 30's and their son in a red t-shirt are about to enter the restaurant, and then looks of horror take over their faces and they turn around without entering. I notice the little boy's shirt says in bold black print, 'Jesus Christ'.
Mother: We can't go in there. There's people dressed like witches.
* Johnson County has the same initials as Jesus Christ, by the way.
* Friday night we headed down to the Waldo area for Jamie and Andy's rehearsal dinner. That was fun, and then I headed on back home as Katy stayed with Jamie to help prepare for the wedding.
* The ceremony was beautiful and the reception was a lot of fun. No fistfights, which is always a bonus. Katy and I stayed at the Westin Hyatt around the corner that had an AMAZING view. I'm kicking myself for not taking pictures of it.
* Yesterday we pretty much lazed around the house and had amazing Indian buffet. I also started officially working on The Outerman. Well, developmental stuff.
* It's going to be such a cool book.
* I also met up with the gallery operator for my next show. It's getting pushed back to around February to allow them time to finish up construction. I'm really excited for this show.
* Vote tomorrow.
* It's exciting to think we're just a short period of time away from our eight year national nightmare coming to an end.
* Urban Sketchers is one of my favorite new blogs. It's a group of artists across the world who regularly sketch the cities they live in. What a great idea!
Posted by Schamberger at 08:02 AM
October 26, 2008
State of the Rob 10262008
* As you can see at the top, I've decided to concentrate my daily webcomics energies towards my WCN presence, mostly to monetize my archives. There'll be a little gap for those installment to catch up to what was here, but I don't think this very small inconvenience will impact anyone in any sort of major way.
* I'm using their syndication feature to still run it here, though, for y'all's convenience. The only difference you'll run into is that you'll be viewing the archive there instead of on this site. The difference for me is not having to rebuild my website at 5:30AM anymore.
* This coming week is going to be Halloweek here at Rob Schamberger Makes Comix, with a few illustrations I did in honor of some of my favorite movies.
* The Hammer Frankenstein movie? Absolutely beautiful use of color and set design, and the acting was engaging topped off by a wonderfully grotesque Christopher Lee as the creature, but jumpin' jehosephat did it take forever to get to the point.
* The Hammer movies mostly all had that really lush color, didn't they? I've got a copy of Taste the Blood of Dracula on my shelf and that's the thing that really stuck with me - the color. Well, that and the fact that Christopher Lee rules.
* Last week it hit me that Frankenstein is the OG Terminator. How awesome would it be to cross those two properties over? I can answer that for you: completely awesome. There's already the history of having Frank (we're good enough friends that's what I've taken to calling the old bean. He just calls me "Uuuuh" to which I reply "Na NAH na NAH!" It makes us both giggle) meet up with other properties. Think about it, the monster from the past who can't die with the monster from the future who is not alive. I need to make this pitch happen.
* I'm in the process of re-reading the ABC line of books. It's too bad that these didn't really catch on, you know? In the 80's Alan Moore became known as the deconstructionist, but the ABC books were all about putting those pieces back together. We're seeing some of that resonating with the books Ed Brubaker is putting out, but not really anywhere else. Most other superhero books are still caught up in all of that deconstructionist jazz, and I think that's too bad. I like looking forward more than looking back, and deconstructing something makes you look back. We've examined what makes Batman tick, so let's put that watch back together and let it guide our way into the future.
Posted by Schamberger at 03:43 PM
October 22, 2008
State of the Rob 10222008
* Normally I only do one of these a week, but there's a lot going on with stuff so here's another update, this time comix-only.
* The Webcomics Nation stuff is getting more and more readers at a scary pace.
* Most of my readers seem to read it after about 4PM CST and into the evening, so I don't show up on the rankings until then. Probably folks like me that have it blocked at the day job.
* There's also a high percentage of folks in Europe reading it, which heartens me as the European style graphic albums were a big influence on my approach to this series.
* I've got about three more installments for this chapter of Batesville, and then I'll more than likely take a breather until the beginning of next year to start the next chapter. I lost all of my notes for the book past the first chapter after a computer mishap, so I'll be working that all back up during Katy and I's annual creative retreat at the end of the year.
* I need to get Too Soon banked back up and to finish up my paintings for the upcoming show, and something has to give. Batesville looks like what's giving for now, because I don't want to sacrifice the quality level.
* Ha ha, I think I have a quality level.
* I'm also busily developing The Outerman. I don't want to say too much about it since I'm still about a year from debuting it. I'm close to having the final story worked out. Most of my development so far has been on world-building and researching the science behind what I'm setting out to do. I've got the over-plot worked out, and now I'm just finding the best way to tell it, which is slowly coming to me.
* It's also going to be different looking from The Unbroken Circle, but not terribly different. I mean, it's still me drawing it. But UC has mostly been me throwing everything I have at the wall, and I'm hoping Outerman will be what stuck to the wall, or at least what's still sticking to the wall.
* Okay, so this isn't going to be all about comix. I'm a writer, and that means I'm a professional liar.
* I absolutely love the Terminator television series. It's so well thought out and executed. They're really taking the high concept and exploring it beautifully. I've heard that it's not going to tie into the next movie and I think that's a mistake on the two production teams' parts, but the time paradox nature works well enough with that. Like, Robocop vs Terminator isn't canon, but it's still a great comic book.
* I mean, Robocop as the consciousness running Skynet? The ED-209 fighting killer cyborgs from the future? That's gold.
* Here's a shout-out to my buddy Jason Arnett for reminding me about the Hard Case Crime series. I picked up 'Fright' by Cornell Woolrich during lunch yesterday.
* I really love Indian food. In case I've never mentioned that before.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:56 PM
October 20, 2008
State of the Rob 10202008
* Yesterday I made it into the top 25 most popular comics on Webcomics Nation, number 19 to be specific. It's a great accomplishment, but the #1 spot had 40,000 more pageviews than mine, so, you know, still a ways to go. I am getting about 14 times as many pageviews as when I first started.
* Jesus, last night's Mad Men was fantastic. I'm really curious as to how they're going to wrap the season up next week, though. I have full faith in the writing team to pull it off.
* Speaking of AMC, starting this Friday they're going to run horror and classic monster movies through Halloween. I've already got my DVR set to get me all of the Universal classics, especially the ones that team up the classic monsters. I'd have liked to see more of the Hammer Dracula movies, but we can't get everything we want, now can we?
* Speaking more about AMC, I watched Terminator 2 again for the first time in about a decade, and I still hold that it's about as perfect of an action movie as you're going to get. A friend of mine joked that the budget for the first one would just about cover the catering budget for the second.
* I've decided Outerman will have lots of action in it.
* The Colin Powell thing is a Big Deal.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:03 AM
October 15, 2008
State of the Rob 10152008
* Batesville will get updated later this week or will just continue next Tuesday with this week skipped. Sorry, but with my crazy schedule something had to give somewhere.
* I mean a day job, girlfriend (now fiance), a daily webcomic, and a series of twelve 32 X 32 acrylic paintings wasn't enough for me. I needed to write a novel as well.
* I'm having fun with these sketches I'm doing at work. I'll have more to post, so that hopefully I'll be back to nearly daily posts again. This time with art!
* I'm continuing to gain more and more readers over at Webcomics Nation, which is pretty cool. I'm a long way from where I'd like to be in readership, but I'm getting more readers per day than I was getting in a whole week at AIV, so there's that. Still, the most popular series on the site gets about 40 times as many readers. Room for growth!
* I've got three more paintings to do in this series. I'm eager to finish 'em up.
* Here's some neat stuff to check out:
Classic British war comic cover paintings
JH Williams III's Jonah Hex pages
And everything the ASIFA Animation Archive has up, especially the recent Animation Salon post
Posted by Schamberger at 07:58 AM
October 09, 2008
State of the Rob 10092008
* First of all, a very public thank you to everyone who has sent their congratulations along about the pending nuptials between Katy and I. The last week has been dizzying in both its magnitude of importance as well as in the number of great people we've surrounded ourselves with.
* We're looking at October 2010 for the actual ceremony. It seems a long way off, but with the planning we're doing it looks like it'll go really quickly.
* I've only got four paintings left to finish for this series. I'm overall really happy with how they've been turning out.
* However, I've been overall unhappy with how Too Soon has been turning out. It was a noble experiment with style, but ultimately a failed one. I'm still going to finish it off and stick with my schedule, but I'm looking forward to being done with this bastard.
* I'm doing a lot of planning for the follow-up series, tentatively titled 'The Outerman'. I'm so excited for this book. So much so that I might put The Unbroken Circle on hiatus after Too Soon is done to focus on that for a while.
* I've been working in the UC 'world' since about 1998 in one fashion or another. Five years is enough for a while, yeah?
* The number of people reading UC on Webcomics Nation has really heartened me, though. It's a good-sized and growing audience.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:23 AM
October 03, 2008
Katy Says This is the Best Thing I've Ever Drawn
A direct quote from Katy: "This is the best thing that's ever happened to me. And I've been front row at The Backstreet Boys!"
Posted by Schamberger at 07:52 AM
September 26, 2008
What I'm Doing This Weekend
Posted by Schamberger at 09:02 PM
September 22, 2008
State of the Rob 009222008
* I've been thinking about the future a lot lately, like on every aspect of my life. I'm thinking about how I'm going to tie up The Unbroken Circle. I'm thinking about what I'm going to do after that. I'm thinking about what series of paintings I'm going to do once I'm done with these album cover recreations. I'm thinking about where we're going to move once our lease is up. I'm thinking about where comics as an industry are going. I'm thinking about where the US financial market is going. I'm thinking a lot right now.
* The book after Too Soon will be the last one for The Unbroken Circle. There's a lot of moving pieces to put together to tie everything up, but there's a definite ending and everything's been leading to it.
* I've got a lot of story ideas I'm connecting now for what I'll be doing post-UC. It will be about the future, about identity, about destiny, and about pushing myself to do things I've never done before as a creator. It's a couple of years off, though, so I've got time to get it done.
* I want to paint Kansas City cityscapes for my next series. Something hyper-detailed to really take me out of my comfort zone. That's a few months off, though.
* We're looking at getting a loft in the river market. I've been in the Northland since 2003 or so. I reckon it's time for a change.
* There's no denying that the long-term future of comics is not in print. The long-term future of media is not in print (which is a point of contention between myself and my magazine editor girlfriend). We're looking at digital distribution of one kind or another. I think the folks who will really take hold of these changes and profit from them are the same ones who can successfully predict where these distribution models will emerge and sustain. Right now, I'm not that guy, so don't expect a lot of eye-opening revelations coming from me.
But I do know a few things: Unless you're at Marvel or DC, you're most likely not going to be able to get a liveable wage from doing print comics (not impossible, but unlikely), we're one killer app away from a mass exodus from print (Kindle going color, I'd say, or a next-gen mobile device somewhere between the size of an I-Phone and a laptop with broadband connection speed, which is pretty much a color Kindle), and that kids coming up are into comics, but more into graphic novels. I think the comic print industry will be something akin to print poetry collections: something people are interested in and passionate about, but not enough so that the periodical format can survive long-term.
I'd still love to take a crack at Legion of Super-Heroes some day, though.
* The prospect of the US Government bailing out the mortgage industry has me really nervous. I think it's a case of going from the pan to the fire. Ideally, it works out, but we're really one bad event away from it going catastrophically wrong. Remember folks, Bush isn't out of office yet.
* Other things are on my mind as well, of course:
* Phrases that should be porn maneuvers, if they aren't already: First Notice of Loss, How Now Brown Cow, Devil Dog, Flood Insurance, Power and Light, Power and White, In-Depth Coverage, and Mister Gyro. I'm sure some of my friends are already thinking on what each maneuver would describe.
* There's a Super Friends marathon on Boomerang this coming Saturday. The early seasons are brutally bad, but the last couple of seasons are fun in a nostalgia sort of way. Plus, you can't go wrong with those Alex Toth designs.
* Speaking of Toth, check out this gallery of various Toth pieces. Sweet!
* Last night we made this Sloppy Joe recipe Todd Klein had on his blog. Super yummy! Katy also made apple brownies that were delish.
* I'm disappointed The Wire wasn't up for more Emmy's.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:38 AM
September 18, 2008
Portraits of the Flood
At the day job I take phone calls regarding flood insurance. If you've been following the news lately, you might know I've been really crazy busy of late. Here's a few actual quotes from calls I've received:
"There's dead cows everywhere. Everywhere you look, dead cows."
"There's extra walls in my garage now. Probably my neighbors'. I don't think I'll give them back to them, though."
"The debris just wiped my house away. It's gone."
"I saw on the news that my house is gone. My whole neighborhood's gone."
"A friend of mine looked at my house from his helicopter. He was able to see the roof. And water."
"On the news I saw a house on the beach. And nothing else. Everything else is destroyed. Doesn't look like a beach I'd like to go to."
"Describe the damage? A twenty foot high wave hit the house. Does that describe it?"
"I'm completely devastated."
Posted by Schamberger at 12:28 PM
September 03, 2008
50 Things I Love About My Life Right Now
Rather than talk about how the Worst Weekend Ever morphed into the Worst Week Ever, I thought I'd focus on some positive things. So, here goes:
Home Life
1. Katy - She's really easy to live with, and has been a real rock for me of late.
2. Monkey - My cat since 1999. Every day when I get home she rolls over on her back for me to rub her buddha belly, and every morning when I'm getting ready she rubs her head on my leg, purring and mewing. Every day since 1999.
3. Korma - The latest feline addition to the family. He's a fuzzy ball of energy and keeps things fun and interesting whenever we're home. I also love Katy's daily Reports of Korma Cuteness.
4. Having My Work Area in the Living Room - This has worked out tremendously. I'm more productive and get to spend more time with Katy. Plus, the DVR is in the living room, so I've been able to work while watching episodes of The Twilight Zone and movies from AMC and TCM.
5. The Love Cave - That's what we've rechristened the apartment. I know, extremely sappy, but it's really nice to be extremely sappy sometimes.
Painting
1. Doing this series of album recreations has been a total blast.
2. I also love how each piece gets successively easier and harder at the same time.
3. Every time I go to mix my colors (I do everything mixing from primaries and black and white) I hear three voices in my head: Bob Klausing, Manning Williams, and Bob Ross. Messrs. Klausing and Williams were my art teachers in high school, and if you don't know who Bob Ross is, you've got problems. Jump on YouTube and find him. Mainly, "Don't use so much paint," "A little red goes a long way," and "a little blue goes a long way."
4. Having the problem that I'm producing so many painting that I'm running out of of ideas on how to store them. That's a good problem to have.
5. Having paint under my fingernails and picking it out while I'm at the day job. It's a physical reminder that I'm only at the day job to pay for being an artist.
Inspiration:
The Day Job - I know, I know, I bitch about it all the time, but there are shining moments.
1. I had an hour long conversation with a paralyzed elderly woman in Florida. The actual business part of the call was over in five minutes, and the rest of the call was her telling me blonde jokes and her life story. A totally fascinating woman who, if I'm lucky, I'll always remember.
2. Being told several times a week that I have a voice for radio. Little do they know I also have a face for it!
3. Using the same jokes all the time on my phone calls. When someone tells me to have a good day, I say "Have a better one." When they ask for my last initial, I say "S", to which they reply, "S Like Sam," and I come back with, "Nope. S like Superman."
4. Spotting regional isms. Like, people from from Massachusetts call it, "Mass", or people from Pennsylvania say "P A" rather than say the state's name. I also found out "You bet" is mostly a Kansas City reply.
5. Sitting in my car at lunch time with my feet hanging out the window and reading a book. I park at the back of the lot that borders a little patch of woods and let the wind blow through. It's a nice way to unwind.
Reading Whole Runs of Classic Comics - I've mostly been doing this because of finances not letting me buy new comics, but lemons and lemonade, yeah? Some highlights from the last few weeks:
1. Ed Brubaker's Catwoman
2. Gotham Central
3. Starman
4. Akira
5. Sandman - currently reading that now. Got-damn, it's easy to forget how fucking good this book was.
Comic Books in General
1. Making them. I've always loved this and I don't want to imagine a day that I won't.
2. Webcomics. I used to lament the disappearance of the entry-level publishers like Caliber and their ilk. But the web has easily replaced them and has created some great revenue streams for creators. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I've made more money off the web than I did at Image.
3. The current diversity coming out from the publishers. Books like DMZ and Fables sitting next to The New York Four and The Plain Janes and Ender's Game and The Stand and Criminal and Sky Angel and Buffy and, well, Final Crisis and Secret Invasion.
4. Bernie Krigstein.
5. Heavy Metal. I might be the only person reading this anymore, but they're really killing it right now. Sure, there's a dud issue here and there, but do you know how hard it is to put together a regularly published anthology and keep the quality level up? The recent issue with Nathan Fox's Fluorescent Black fucking rules.
Television
1. Rasslin'. Between RAW, ECW, and Smackdown!, WWE has been putting out maybe their best product in years. Watching it with Katy is a treat as well, as any of you who have the pleasure of doing so can attest to.
2. Mad Men - With The Wire concluded, this is now officially the best show on TV. The second season had a slow build, but it's starting to become clear that there's going to be an amazing payoff coming.
3. Burn Notice - Not nearly as good as the first season, but it's still entertaining at its best. I am fence-sitting to see if this falls into the USA Network Campiness Trap or not, though.
4. Battlestar Galactica - OMG, I can't wait until this comes back on. The midseason finale had a FANTASTIC cliffhanger.
5. The Twilight Zone - I've been working my way through recording all of a two-day marathon the Sci-Fi Network had on back on the 4th of July. In case you weren't aware, this is the best TV show ever made, no argument.
More Inspiration:
Rasslin'
1. Entrance Music - I really think every single person should have their intro music play when they enter a building, with video display and pyro and the people in the building holding up signs about them. Like, mine would go like this: The building goes black, and then White Zombie's 'More Human Than Human' hits. I enter the room, throw up my rock fist, pyros shoot up, and light bulbs spelling out my name strobe R-O-B-R-O-B-ROB-ROB-ROB and all kinds of women hold up signs that say something along the lines of 'Hot Rob' and 'My Heart Throbs 4 Rob' and 'The Rob Says'. Yeah, that's how it would go.
2. The fact that Katy calls JBL 'Thunder Thighs' and 'JBLLO'.
3. Todd Grisham and Matt Striker on commentary. Who the hell would have thought this would be the best announce team on WWE right now?
4. The Undertaker - It's amazing that after over a decade he's still the most entertaining performer they've got, and still puts on the match of the night.
5. All of the new talent coming up. Evan Bourne, Ricky Ortiz, CM Punk, Ted DiBiase, Cody Rhodes, MVP, Mike Knox, Colt Cabana, Natalya Neidhart, Beth Phoenix - It's really cool seeing them all coming up and making a name for themselves.
Music Lyrics
1. I'm blowin' up the west coast like I'm Luther Vandross.
2. I don't want the world, I just want your half.
3. I wanna be Jackie Onassis. I wanna wear dark sunglasses.
4. I shot a man in Brooklyn, just to watch him die.
5. I heard the phone ring, should I answer, is this gettin' serious, this terminal cancer.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:33 PM
August 25, 2008
Worst. Weekend. Ever.
This was what was supposed to happen this past weekend:
* Friday night, get together with my brothers Jim and Jesse to have a few drinks and see Jim before he ships off for the Navy on Tuesday.
* Saturday day, go over to Brandon's to see the baby.
* Saturday night, have fun at Katy's birthday party.
* Relax with Katy on Sunday and get some painting and comix done.
Instead, all of the following and more happened:
Friday:
* Nearly got into several physical altercations
* Had a very strange sort of family reunion
* Had a very strange sort of high school reunion
* Heard the following line, "Yeah, last night I did a bunch of coke and had an orgy!"
* Found myself in a scene from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, but not in any sort of enjoyable way
* Chased off by a rent-a-cop
* Saw something that can never be unseen
* Didn't get home until 5AM
Saturday:
* Slept all day
* Almost came to blows after verbally assaulting a prick security guard at Voodoo Lounge
* Comforting a crying Katy in the smoke-filled hallways of Harrahs because half our group wasn't allowed into her birthday party
* Switching location to Westport, which led to:
Sunday:
* Spent the day at the hospital with one of Katy's friends following a very serious and heinous event.
We're both just totally fucking shellshocked from everything that happened, especially the events that led to our Sunday. I seriously feel like I did after the bank robberies. Not good at all, folks.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:30 AM
August 20, 2008
State of the Rob 08202008
* Man, I've been so busy lately. Good busy, but busy all the same.
* Friday night I took Katy out for her birthday dinner. We went to the River Market Brewery and then went with friends to Westport to sit on a deck and enjoy the great weather.
* Saturday morning we had breakfast with my parents at Corner Cafe and then Katy and I headed out to Columbia to participate in the party unveiling the poster for Columbia's Festival of the Arts. We finished up there and then had late dinner at Murry's.
* Sunday we had birthday breakfast with Katy's family at a place whose name I forget but they had a giant Chester Gould original Dick Tracy drawing hanging up on the wall that totally ruled. We headed back to town, took a nap, and then watched Summerslam with friends.
* Monday I was so drained by my schedule and the hectic weekend that I stayed home from work and mostly slept.
* Which brings us to the most exciting news of the week:
I've known Brandon Moore since 1985 and we've been best friends since 1989. In the Summer between third and fourth grade Brandon discovered he had tumors in his right arm and along his spine. The doctors told him that if he lived past age twelve he'd be paralyzed. Heady stuff for a nine year old kid to hear, but he took it in stride. I even remember in fourth grade for Show and Tell he walked from desk to desk letting kids feel the tumors in his arm.
So 1992 came, we were in sixth grade, and Brandon was twelve and not dead or paralyzed and in overall good health. Well, except for the time he projectile vomited on the girl sitting across from him in class. But at that age his doctors told him that at age sixteen he'd be either dead or paralyzed.
So at age sixteen Brandon comes to pick me up in his dad's truck and we go to Hobby Lobby to pick up some supplies. Other than the fact that he left it in neutral and the truck coasted down the parking lot here he was, still not dead, still not paralyzed. His doctors told him he'd never have a kid, and would be dead or paralyzed by twenty one.
Let me digress for a moment here and tell you about Nazareth. Every time Brandon calls me and 'Love Hurts' is playing in the background, I know what's up. See, every time he's been dumped by a girl, he gets home, turns on the radio, and without fail that song is playing. Absolute truth.
Flash forward, Brandon's twenty-first birthday has come and gone, still not dead, still not paralyzed, and the doctors have told him "Enjoy life." I got to stand up with him at his wedding to the really great Robin, who brought with her Ashley, the cutest little step-daughter a guy could ever have. I did make sure to have 'Love Hurts' playing on the juke box for the rehearsal dinner, though.
Which brings us to a call I got yesterday morning, with Brandon sounding exasperated and tired and excited and glowing, leaving me a message that Tristan Moore slid on home in the wee hours of Tuesday morning. Sometimes it's really great when doctors are wrong, isn't it?
Welcome to the world, little buddy. Your dad's a goober, but he's fun to have around and I think you'll do just fine.
EDIT: Here's the video of the little guy's entry to Earth:
Posted by Schamberger at 07:51 AM
August 07, 2008
State of the Rob 08072008
* I'm sad Jack Kamen has passed away. Pretty much any time you picture an EC comic like Tales From the Crypt you picture one of his macabre drawings. Another one of our culture's icons has passed away.
* I'm reading through the whole run of Starman right now and I've got something outrageous to say: I like Snejbjerg's storytelling art better than Tony Harris'. I like Harris' illustrations better, but I think Snjebjerg's storytelling is so much stronger. Either way, this was a great book, wasn't it? I haven't sat down to enjoy the run in one big dose and I'm picking up on a lot of little gems that I didn't notice while reading the 80+ issues as they came out.
* I get wore out just by thinking about how much I have on my plate right now. At first I was overwhelmed by the idea that I'm working three careers until it hit me I'm actually doing four: the horrific day job, the graphic novels, the upcoming new day job (more on that in a moment), and my gallery paintings.
* I'm going to start cleaning up dog crap for a living. Seriously. I've been doing the research into it and you can make a serious living at it for about twice what I'm making now and have no boss and no coworkers. Seriously.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:09 AM
July 30, 2008
State of the Rob 07302008
* The new season of Mad Men has a very different feel to it from the first season. The film stock was different, having less of a high-def appearance, making it almost feel more authentic. The characters outside of Don had a different feel to them as well, most notably Don's wife Betty. There was an air of confidence in her that wasn't really evident in the first season, but thinking more on it, it seems really organic from her last scene in the finale. It's definitely off to a great start.
* Katy and I had a nice low-key weekend following the super-hectic prior two weekends which was just fine by us. We mostly watched the first season of Mad Men, did some reading, had some good meals, Katy did some writing and I finished up the painting and finished pencilling a scene of Too Soon that'd been killing me.
* That scene coupled with the hectic schedule we'd had ate up a lot of my lead too. I'm only a couple weeks ahead right now, but I should be back to a month ahead by the end of this week.
* I got my updated Wowio contract in and I'm cautiously optimistic. I'm still in 'Wait and See' mode. But, if everything proceeds rosily along, the changes they're making should be really nice for both me and my readers.
* Wowio is back up tomorrow, by the way. I'm cautiously optimistic about it.
* Katy came across this awesome quote while researching a feature story she did (more on that in the near future): "The body of Charles Krapp was recovered two or three miles below the city."
That's from the Leavenworth Chronicle published in 1884. I'm pretty sure that sentence is going to be the basis for my next graphic novel.
When she told me this Monday night, in my sleep-deprived state I made what seemed like a hilarious joke, "That's deep Krapp." In retrospect, I must have been really tired.
* I've got a big meeting tonight. Hopefully I'll have something exciting to announce from it!
* Overheard at work yesterday:
Coworker 1: I'm thinking about writing a book.
Coworker 2: Yeah?
Coworker 1: Yeah, but I don't know what it'll be about. Maybe horror.
Coworker 2: I haven't read a book since high school.
Coworker 1: I read one while I was pregnant. I've tried reading others but I normally don't get past the first couple of pages.
Coworker 2: I'm the same way, except I don't even start reading them.
Coworker 1: I'll let you read it when I'm done with it.
Coworker 2: I'd love to!
Coworker 1: When I know what I'm going to write about.
Posted by Schamberger at 11:39 AM
July 21, 2008
The Weekend That Was - State of the Rob 07212008
I think I need a weekend to rest up from this past weekend.
Thursday night we left KC for Columbia for dinner and then for a midnight screening of The Dark Knight. The movie is, uhm, good. You might have heard about it. The bit with the pencil's probably my favorite of the whole flick.
The rest of the weekend was ate up with wedding stuff. Katy's brother got hitched and it was a really nice time with a really nice service. We came back Sunday afternoon and just lazed around the house until we passed out early in the evening following a great dinner at Abuelo's.
We have SO much TV to catch up on! Ugh! There have been just too many good marathons this summer. I'm on the fence about the new season of Burn Notice. It's starting to get that 'goofy' feel that eats up most of USA's programming. Hopefully it's just me though because the first season was pure ace. We've got about sixty episodes of The Twilight Zone sitting in the DVR along with the first season of Mad Men, several episodes of Jeremiah that I've recorded and haven't watched a single ep of yet and also our normal stuff like the rasslin' and cooking shows. There needs to be more hours in the day.
But for now I'm just decompressing from the past two weeks and looking forward to going back to my semi-normal life. I think I'll start on a painting tonight to unwind some. I'll post the progress as it comes along.
Posted by Schamberger at 11:22 AM
July 16, 2008
State of the Rob 07162008
* I'm going to take another step in monetizing the site more than I am now starting tomorrow.
* That will be lead off with weekly graphic novel reviews that will have the option to purchase the books from Amazon. I'm sure I won't get rich off of that, but I'm putting it out there. The first will be the last two Jonah Hex collections with the beautiful Jordi Bernet art.
* The next thing will be an effort to up my hit counts on my stuff here. I've got a pretty ambitious plan in place that will start to be unfurled over the coming weeks but the gist of it is that I'll be paying people to link to my site. Cash money, playas.
* I'll also be updating my comix section to monetize that a little better as well. I need to talk with my tech guy to get that worked out.
* Are y'all enjoying 'Too Soon' so far? It's a slow build but you'll start seeing the pieces coming together in the next month. There's a big payoff coming, don't worry.
* Last weekend Katy and I were in Columbia for family stuff and we went to this amazing brewery called Flatbranch that had maybe the most interesting beer I've ever had. It was a green chili brew and I shit you not, it tasted just like green chilis, even with a little spice to it, and damn it was good. They also had a fantastic stout second only to Guiness, and I'm kind of a stout expert. They had a sampler of six of their brews, probably ten ounces each, for under six bucks too. I got nice and tight for less than one beer at a bar in the Power and White district. Deal!
* Have I mentioned lately that I love Indian food? Because I do. I love Indian food.
* Burn Notice is back on the air!
* Mad Men comes back July 27th!
* I'm going to be out of town Thursday night through Sunday. I'll be able to update the comic every day, but the archive won't get updated until Sunday after tomorrow. Don't lose any sleep over that, alright?
Posted by Schamberger at 11:04 AM
July 10, 2008
Background Information
The Beastie Boys song 'Jimmy James' was originally supposed to use samples from Jimi Hendrix' cover of 'Happy Birthday' but they couldn't secure the rights in time for the release of Check Your Head. It was later released as a single and if you pick up the Sounds of Science compilation the Hendrix version is on there. Anyway, the B-Boys had to instead put out the album version using what they called 'Hendrix-like sounds', and that idea for sampling's been stuck in the back of my head since, doing something 'like' the original and then sampling from that.
In Dennis Hopeless' dining room he has these wall-length murals that I thought were incredibly cool and I thought doing something like that would really jazz up this talking heads scene, and then I got to thinking about what I wanted to use. I ended up doing a 'cover' of some Jean 'Moebius' Giraud Blueberry panels for the murals and then played around with them in Photoshop to make sure they had the right perspective for each panel. I really dug how they turned out.
There's also something going on with the colors in this scene in relation to last two scenes, but I can't really elaborate on that until later in the book.
Speaking of Moebius, this morning I remembered something from when I was taking German in Junior High. In our textbook 'Neue Freunde' there was a section with college-aged kids talking about comic books and one of the quotes was "Ich liebe Moebius. Ehr ist toll," which translates to "I love Moebius. He is cool." We had to pronounce his name as if a cow were saying it though which bugged the fuck out of me. Murrrrbius. There were also some douchebags saying comics are lame, but we know in fact that people who say such things are asshats.
Also, the 'rich bitch' bit is a nod to Dave Chapelle of course, but I couldn't find a clip with just that on YouTube or Daily Motion. If you come across one feel free to help a brother out.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:15 AM
July 09, 2008
State of the Rob 07092008
* Don't forget there's a second opening for my show at Kaw Valley Arts and Humanities this Friday. Unfortunately I'm going to be out of town for a wedding obligation, but how jet-setting of me is it that I've got an opening I'm not even at?
* Speaking of gallery shows, keep your fingers crossed for more announcements soon!
* I'm really tired of having to go to a day job. Anyone want to sponsor me as a full-time artist? Anyone? Hello? Is this on?
* Last night Katy got me a really nice glass-top desk for my birthday. I love this thing.
* The holiday weekend was really nice overall. Friday we went to a friend's house for a BBQ where my vegetarian ass ended up doing a lot of the barbequing. For those of you who are concerned, I fixed myself a nice portebello mushroom burger.
* Saturday was my birthday party at the River Market Brewery where some friends made it out, including old friends Buddy and Marie who I hadn't seen in a decade or so. That was really great.
* Then the funniest shit happened. We were notified that DJ Shadow was playing at a bar on the Plaza so we went down there and as soon as we walked in I noticed two things: One, it wasn't THE DJ Shadow and Two, I had walked into the final circle of Yuppie Hell. I spent Too-Much-Fifty on a couple of beers and left after Katy almost got in a fight with some skinny broad.
* Speaking of vapid white people ruining things for the city, we were the only table that night at the River Market Brewery. I blame the Power and Light District, or as I've come to call it and-I-really-hope-this-nickname-catches-on Power and White for killing off classic watering holes in the KC area. Tanner's is already a victim, as well as Paddy O'Quigly's, and more that I'm not thinking of off the top of my head. I think to gain something KC is losing something even richer, and what they're gaining is an openly racist group of establishments that are run by an out of state corporation.
* I am so stoked that CM Punk is the Heavyweight Champion now. That moment last week was one of the most exciting that's been on RAW in a good long while.
* Anyone? Anyone want to give me money so's I can give an FU to the day job? Hello?
Posted by Schamberger at 09:24 PM
July 02, 2008
State of the Rob 07022008
* The announcement that it's Platinum acquiring Wowio leaves me...well, you know. I don't think anyone would be excited to find out that one of their good sources of income, passive or not, has been taken over by a company known for not paying. I'll mark this as 'Wait and See' until the new contract shows up in the mail. My fingers were crossed for Google or Amazon, y'know?
* Think about Google running a product like Wowio for a second. Yeah, that's a better world.
* Due to popular demand, my show at Kaw Valley Arts and Humanities has been extended for another month. Unfortunately I won't be able to be there for the July opening, but for those of you who missed the June opening, be sure to make it out for this on Friday the eleventh.
* Thanks to Mom, Roger and Katy for a perfectly lovely birthday dinner.
* The day itself, though, was utterly rotten. I really need to continue to focus on getting out of the need for a day job and move more into doing something I actually want to be doing.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:06 PM
June 29, 2008
State of the Rob 06292008
* I don't know if I've ever been more unexcited for a birthday. I guess it's just from getting old. There's not a lot about being 28 to be excited about.
* Other than making it through 27.
* This past year was very hard-earned. I really went through the wringer and came through stronger for it. Hopefully 28 will be less rocky than 27 has been.
* Wowio is down right now while they're going through the process of being able to distribute globally, which is fine for me. I'd like to have my work available for the majority of the world's population. And to get paid for them to read it for free. More on this when the information is available.
* Otherwise things are progressing apace. I'm about a month ahead on Too Soon, and I think the quality of the art increases quite a bit from here forward. I've been trying out some different approaches and some have frankly fallen flat. But that's art, man. Even the failures are wonderful in their own ways.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:51 AM
June 20, 2008
State of the Rob 02202008
A Normal Workday
* Alarm goes off at 5:30AM
* Stumble down the hall to my office, turn on the computer
* Pee while the computer boots. Hopefully in the toilet
* Check email
* Process daily Wowio numbers in Spreadsheet
* Update daily Too Soon installment
* Update Too Soon archive
* Post new blog entry (Secret: I write all of these on Sundays and then just post them)
* Take shower at 5:45 to 6:00AM
* Put on clothes (hopefully)
* Kiss Katy on the cheek and tell her I love her
* Make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch
* Let the cats know they're in charge and to hold down the fort
* Depart the apartment at 6:10AM
* Arrive at the day job at 6:50AM
* Get tea and water
* Clock in at 7AM
* On top of the normal job, I also run reports, correct appropriate policies, and work on writing up new initiatives for senior management to review
* Lunch at 11AM to 12PM, pencilling Too Soon pages
* Except on Friday I read
* Depart work at 4PM
* Arrive home at 4:45PM - yes, it takes five minutes longer to get home
* Pet the cats and give them treats
* Pet Katy and give her treats
* Cook dinner - normally shells and cheese with salsa
* Although I'm getting tired of that and have been trying out different things of late
* Do my best zombie impersonation for an hour or so
* 6ish PM I go to the office and work on Too Soon pages
* Between 9PM and 10PM I turn in for the night
* Except on Mondays I go to watch RAW at 8PM
* Or Friday nights, those are for the girlfriend
* Wash
* Lather
* Rinse
* Repeat
* Katy's thinking about doing an article for The Comics Journal called 'I'm a Comic Book Widow'. There might be something to that.
Posted by Schamberger at 02:42 PM
June 14, 2008
What a Show!
Thank you SO MUCH to everyone who made it out last night for my opening. It was a genuinely amazing experience and I was so glad to be able to share my work with so many people.
Of particular note, I want to thank Katy Ryan, my lovely girlfriend for helping put this together, Carol Kariotis for taking a chance on me and for having such a beautiful gallery space, Dee and Roger Clark for helping me get everything framed, and to all of the Schambergers who could make it out. Also thanks to Rebecca Miller for sharing the show with me.
Here's some pictures that Katy took of the show. She was pretty busy acting as my wingman though so I'll put some more pictures up once I'm able to get them.
This is my best friend of 23 (!) years Brandon, his wife Robin and Robin's daughter Ashley. Yeah, Robin's got a bun in the oven. I'm so excited for them. They're going to be such awesome parents. Katy and I think it's funny that it's the Moore family in front of my More painting. Ba-dum-bump!
Here I am with the Schamberger family. From left to right: My brothers Jim, Jesse (who I hadn't seen in ten years. This was a monster surprise to see him), AJ, me, Dad, and my uncle Ken. Goofy lookin' sonsabitches!
And here's the infamous Preu family. Jason and Sarah are really great friends and it was fantastic they could make it to the show.
More pictures coming soon!
Posted by Schamberger at 10:22 AM
June 13, 2008
Tonight!
From five to eight tonight you can come to the opening reception for my first gallery show at:
Kaw Valley Arts and Humanities Gallery
756 Armstrong
Kansas City KS 66101
913-371-0024
You'll be able to see original pages from my last graphic novel 'Too Late' featuring Kansas City's River Market and the Mutual Musicians Foundation, many of my larger acrylic paintings, and illustrations focusing on jazz, silent films, and noir.
Here's a sampling of what you'll see tonight:
Posted by Schamberger at 03:18 PM
June 08, 2008
Tomorrow Night!
But today, check out the latest installment of 'Too Soon'!
Posted by Schamberger at 03:15 PM
State of the Rob 06082008
* I gave the site a bit of a new look. Nothing drastic, but you'll notice that new picture at the top of the blog here. That's going to change every day. You know why it's going to change every day?
* My new graphic novel, 'Too Soon', is launching today. It'll run at the top of the blog every day. Sorry, your feed reader won't pick it up, so you'll have to come back each day, or every few days, to keep up on it. I'll be doing more frequent blog posts to remind you, though, so don't worry 'bout that.
* Some posts will expand upon the book, some will annotate certain references, and some will be my normal ramblings and art. Every Tuesday will still be new installments of 'Batesville' as well.
* 'Batesville' and 'Too Soon' are related, by the way. More than you'll realize at first.
* I'll be serializing both 'Batesville' and 'Too Soon' on Wowio as one book, launching my new ongoing series there entitled 'The Unbroken Circle'. You'll get to read both in bigger chunks than when they're serialized here.
* Last night Katy and I went to Dennis Hopeless' birthday party. He's pretty excited now that he's sixteen and old enough to drive. Pretty soon you'll be able to get into an R-Rated movie too, kiddo!
* Kidding aside, we had a great time and Dennis' wife Jessie did a fantastic job decorating their house. It's really awesome. It was also great catching up with the KC comics gang who made it out. I'm sure the folks there who didn't know me too well got tired of hearing me talking about the gallery show, but damn it, I'm super excited about it.
* Speaking of, I spent all day yesterday framing all of the art for the show. I'll have around thirty pieces there, including pages from 'Too Late', some illustrations, and a few of my larger acrylics.
* Five to Eight in the PM on Friday the 13th! Be there!
* I'm getting postcards distributed over the course of this week as well. They look really nice.
* Item! My first piece of press for the show, from Compass Magazine:
* I've heard it's also going to be in the next issue of Ink and will be mentioned on Ink's radio update on Jack FM this Wednesday. More as I come across it.
* My cat Monkey has abandoned me:
* More soon!
Posted by Schamberger at 02:13 PM
May 15, 2008
Ducks!
Our apartment complex has a pond in the middle of it that is the home to some ducks, geese, and the occasional other water fowl. Earlier this year these two ducks caught Katy and I's attention as they're from different breeds but they're always together, and normally always separate from the rest of the flock. They're duck buddies. We should probably name them, shouldn't we Katy?
Last night I pencilled and inked my first page of Too Soon. I'm really excited to be working on the book!
Posted by Schamberger at 05:41 AM
May 14, 2008
State of the Rob 05142008
* A week late, but there's the first installment of Batesville. It'll be updated every Tuesday from here on out.
* If you don't want to wait, feel free to download the first 17-odd pages from Wowio. The second installment of that should be going up soon.
* The folks at Wowio wanted me to reformat a little, and I'm still tinkering with how I want to do that. I think it came to me in the shower this morning.
* I should install a dry-erase board in the shower for ideas like this.
* Like, I came up with an amazingly great approach to Legion of Superheroes in the shower a couple of months back. I really want to write that book some day. It's really the only superhero/corporate book I have an active desire to write.
* I've been rereading the Five Years Later/Terra Mosaic/New Earth issues of Legion lately, and they still hold up in my estimation as one of the very best superhero comics ever done. Keith Giffen, Jason Pearson, Chris Sprouse, Colleen Doran, Brandon Peterson and Stuart Immonen? Awe.
* I'm nearly done with all of the thumbnails for Too Soon. I know, I know, this thing seems to be moving glacially, but I'm busting my ass on it every day. I've learned A LOT from doing Black Chamber and Too Late and I think all of this pre-production will be paying off in the long run.
* Ideally I'll be launching Too Soon on June 9th to coincide with my gallery show.
* Speaking of the show, I got most of my frames picked up yesterday thanks to an early birthday present from my mom. Thanks lady! Half-off sales at Hobby Lobby are a blessing.
* American Idol is awful. Just thought I'd throw that out there for you.
* I talked with a customer this morning who lives on the same block as the house from The Amityville Horror. That was kinda cool. Those movies freaked my shit out as a youngster.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:26 AM
May 07, 2008
Big Stuff Goin' On
Save this date: Friday, June 13
Why? It's my first solo gallery exhibition! I just had a meeting this afternoon with the gallery operator, and she's really excited about the show. It will contain pages from 'Too Late', several of my jazz and silent film-era pieces, and a few of my large-scale paintings.
Postcards are in the works, and the operator is talking about trying to find a sax player or a jazz band to play outside the gallery. I'll have more details as they become available!
It will be at the Kaw Valley Arts & Humanities space located at 756 Armstrong in Kansas City KS.
I hope to see as many of you there as can make it out!
Posted by Schamberger at 08:39 PM
May 04, 2008
Normal Posting to Resume Shortly
Sorry for the lack of updates. April was...not a very good month. Most all of the bad stuff is over now though, and I'll be getting more good stuff up here shortly, starting with the serialization of my novel Batesville.
Work on Too Soon is coming right along. Nothing I want to show yet as it's mostly all pre-production stuff, but main production will be starting as early as this week.
Posted by Schamberger at 04:31 PM
April 01, 2008
Most Excellent Weekend
The trip to Florida was totally awesome and there's going to be so many events from it that I just know are going to make their way into future graphic novels.
We got in Sunday morning, got picked up by my buddy Andy, and headed on over to his place to pick up his brothers Charlie and TJ. We had a quick toast to the Wrestling Gods and then headed from beautiful Tampa to beautiful Orlando. Our hotel room was great, having two bedrooms, a full kitchen and full-sized fridge (which we most definitely needed for the amount of beer we were set to consume), and the most-used area, a screened in porch. We chilled there a little too long as we didn't anticipate the amount of traffic going into WRESTLEMANIA.
We got there a little late, missing two and a half matches, getting there in time for the ladder match. We had to walk maybe a mile to get to the arena, which I'm going to go on record saying that it has the worst parking set-up I've ever seen. But, we still get to the show and had a BLAST. We were all in agreement that this was the best live event for any sort of performance we'd ever been to.
The highlight for all of us was being there for Ric Flair's last match, where he 'passed the torch' to Shawn Michaels. It was really an honor to be there for that.
You may have heard about the fireworks malfunction which happened at the end of the night. We were on the opposite side of the arena, but we could see it happen. We did have some embers fall on us, but I don't think anything adverse came from that.
After the show, we made our trek through a rather unsavory part of town back to our car, then headed back to our condo for drinks into the early morning hours. We thought our check-out time was at 11, but a nice housekeeping lady came to inform us at 10:30 that we didn't have to go home, but we had to get the fuck out of there. So we stuck around for another half hour or so killing a few more beers and got on the road back to sunny Tampa.
Once back in Tampa we head to the beach to a great bar called something I can't remember (the sign of a great bar), where we sat on the beach with our drinks and lazed away the remainder of the day. Our flight back to town was uneventful and we made it back just fine to our apartment and two kitties in time to call it a day and hit the hay.
A great trip all around. Thanks again to Andy for putting up with us! I hope to update this post before too long with pictures from the trip once we've got those all processed up.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:09 AM
March 28, 2008
State of the Rob 03282008
* Katy and I are off to sunny Orlando Sunday morning to attend WRESTLEMANIA (which must be referred to in all-caps). This is my first time going in person, which I am over-the-top-rope excited about, and I'm also excited to see my good buddy Andy 'Harvey Birdman Attorney At Law' Denzer and his kin, who we're going with.
* As I do every year, here's my predictions for the match outcomes. As it normally goes, I'll probably be wrong about all of them except for The Undertaker winning:
Raw/SmackDown/ECW 24-Man Battle Royal
- Winner gets a ECW Championship shot the night against Chavo Guerrero.
I'm going with the Big Red Machine, Kane on this one
Triple-Threat WWE Championship Match
- Randy Orton (c) vs. John Cena vs. Triple H
I'm going with Orton retaining the belt after a Cena heel-turn
WWE World Heavyweight Championship Match
- Edge (c) vs. The Undertaker
It's WRESTLEMANIA, of course The Undertaker's winning.
ECW Championship Match
- Chavo Guerrero (c) vs. Raw/SmackDown/ECW Battle Royal Winner
Chavo will retain his championship.
Money In The Bank Ladder Match
- Ken Kennedy vs. Chris Jericho vs. Shelton Benjamin vs. Carlito vs. MVP vs. CM Punk vs. John Morrison
If it weren't for the next match listed, I'd say this will be match of the night. I'm predicting MVP for the win.
Career Threatening Match
- Ric Flair vs. Shawn Michaels
Match of the night, if not the greatest match ever. The Heart Break Kid Shawn Michaels for the win.
(as a bonus, here's Katy's current MySpace picture)
Raw vs. SmackDown Match
- Umaga vs. Batista
God, who cares? I mean, Umaga for the win via DQ.
BunnyMania Lumberjack Match
- Ashley & Maria vs. Beth Phoenix & Melina
God, who cares? Ashley and Maria, and hopefully it won't go long. Too bad, as Melina and Beth Phoenix are both phenomenal wrestlers.
Belfast Brawl
- Finlay vs. John "Bradshaw" Layfield
I want Finlay to win, but I see JBLLO pulling a fast one for the win.
Big Show vs. Floyd Mayweather
Another one which hopefully won't go long. Mayweather, as the celeb always wins.
* I'm a fan of the saying 'Never say never', but I'm probably done with ACT-I-VATE. It got to the point where I felt like Jimi Hendrix playing with the Beatles (we'll see who gets where I got that reference from), plus some behind-the-scenes stuff which doesn't need to be aired publicly. I'm thankful for having the stage while I had it, and I'm in the works of developing more outlets for my works in the future.
* My thirteen-year-old brother AJ and I are making a comic together. He came up with a pretty cool story and I'm having fun making it come to life. It'll be a series of about four six page stories. Here's the first page:
It's fun working with him being the writer on this. Once it's all done I'll have it up on Wowio.
* Man, Countdown's not really good, is it? If you've got 1122 pages and you can't make me care about the characters or the situations they're in, you're doing a bad job. I don't get where it went wrong either, with the strength of the writers involved. The art is okay at best, awfully dreadful at its worst, but the story's the biggest disappointment. 52 was great, and Trinity looks to be strong. Hopefully this book will go down as just being forgettable.
* I just finished reading 'Casino Royale' today. The movie did what I think a good adaptation should, and that's carry over the things that make the source material strong and change it up to fit the medium you're adapting to. The book was fairly sparse in the number of things which actually happened. Bond shows up in Royale, checks out the hotel and the casino, avoids a bomb attack, has the game with Le Chiffre, gets kidnapped, gets tortured, recovers, and says 'The bitch is dead.' That's not enough for a two hour movie where the audience is expecting action/adventure, so the moviemakers brought those elements over and added more in.
* My next book is 'The Corner' by David Simon and Ed Burns, of 'The Wire' fame. It's starting out strong already.
* Over the last couple of months I've read the first five years of Milt Caniff's Terry and the Pirates. I think this is what's making me so disappointed in Countdown. God, a TON of shit goes down in this, and I grow to care about all of the characters as they become more and more three dimensional and fleshed out. A total master's course in how to make a comic. Plus? Caniff can motherfucking DRAW.
* The writing on 'Too Soon' and 'Batesville' are continuing right along. I'm hoping to start drawing 'Too Soon' in the next month or so.
* Personal life stuff is finally calming down after the last year of tumult. Thankfully. Now that the dust is starting to settle down, I'm hoping to get another marble plan going starting April 1st. I'm juggling a lot right now and I want to make sure I'm continuing to move forward.
* And finally, a look around the internet. My good friends Jason and Sarah have brought their second child into this here world. Hello, Beatrix Ninja Maxine Preu! My other good buddy Jason Arnett has been hard at work on an audio project called 'The Well', which is really great. Give it a listen! Check out Golden Age Comic Book Stories. Good god, is there some awesome art on there. Also awesome to look at is LP Cover Lover. I've found so much inspiration on this site. Last but not least, take a peek at Talented Bastard, especially for the latest work from Chris Grine.
Posted by Schamberger at 02:53 PM
February 26, 2008
Status Update
* I'm now well into writing the novel. It took a little while at first to get used to writing prose instead of a script, but I think it will help out my comix writing considerably. I'll start serializing the book here on the site before too long. Working title originally was 'Midwestern' but now I'm going with 'Batesville'.
I've set myself the task of writing on it every day until it's done, which seems to be working out. I like setting regimes for myself, if you couldn't tell by now.
* I've started heavily plotting the next GN, 'Too Soon'. I'm hoping to start drawing on that next month.
* The official announcement goes out late tonight or early tomorrow, but I'm going to bridge the two books with a series of vignettes which will be drawn by other artists. I'm putting out the call to artists to submit their samples to me. The working title for this is 'One Cent Dharma'.
* I've been painting a lot, too, which I always enjoy. I'm doing 32 x 40 'recreations' of the opening scene from 'Too Late', dots and everything. I really love working so large, getting my whole body into the process.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:57 AM
February 11, 2008
The Biff is Fucking Someone's Mom Theory
Let me explain this theory I have to you. Remember in the second Back to the Future when Michael J Fox comes into the wrong future and Biff is banging his mom? I think that somewhere, right now, Biff is doing the dirty with someone's mom.
I'm in ur mom fuqing up ur future
Just stop and think about it. Sure, the most obvious sign is that we don't have hover boards, but we are in the future, and I think we're in the wrong one.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:08 AM
January 31, 2008
State of the Rob 01312008
* 2008 is starting out better than 2007 ended in most all regards. Sure, I'd prefer to be at home drawing all day like I did for the last half of 07, but I'd also like to not be evicted from said home.
* The day job looks to be an alright thing. It's nothing special, but it's money, and that's what I'm after. There's a lot of down time there which is affording me the luxury of working on projects (and to write this post).
* One of those projects is my next thing for Wowio. I'm about a month behind on this, but the extra time I've put into it will be worthwhile. It's called 'Midwestern' and will be a serialized novel updating monthly. I'm working up the story beats on it now and should begin writing in earnest soon-ish. More on this as it develops.
* Fans of my Image book The Believer will enjoy Midwestern.
* The book's going to expand on a lot of the concepts already presented in Black Chamber and Too Late, fleshing out that world and furthering the uber-story that is 'Unbroken Circle'.
* I'm also in the process of researching for 'Too Soon', the next Eddie Mann story. I've just got a few people to interview and then I should get into working on that in earnest. Hopefully there won't be any substantial gap between 'Too Late' and 'Too Soon' on Act-I-Vate, but I'll be realistic with my scheduling as well.
* These last two Garbo pictures are me working out some of the ideas I want to play with visually in 'Too Soon'. I'm going to open up my color palette a little more.
* Friday night Katy and I are going to a burlesque show and I'll probably be going to another Sunday night at Dr Sketchy's. I haven't been to the Doc's for a while now and am itching to do some figure drawing. It'll be sad without Laurenn but I'm sure Rita Bee will do fine.
* Saturday is the wrap party for Too Late with the folks who contributed and some other folks who helped me out along the way. I'm really looking forward to that.
* Now that things are calming down I think I'll work up another Reinventing Rob plan for 2008. I've got a lot going on and need to keep it all straight.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:59 PM
January 12, 2008
Book Am Done (and other good news)
A couple of days ago I finished work on 'Too Late'. I'm really proud of how the complete book looks and reads. I couldn't imagine a better way to spend six months than to to be eating, breathing, and sleeping making a graphic novel. As much as I enjoyed the twist ending on 'Black Chamber', I think the ending to this book is so, so much better.
The day after finishing the book, I accepted a job offer that I think will be very nice. Not comics or art-related, but a nice steady income.
So now I'm beginning work on my next book. It will be following Eddie Mann on his next case and it's tentatively going to be called 'Too Soon'. (Get it?) It's going to be about the history of professional wrestling in Kansas City, KC's current resurgence of Burlesque shows, the sub-prime mortgage crisis and its impact on the city, painting, and the relationship between a girl and her grandfather. It will also continue to flesh out the broader 'Unbroken Circle' story by giving the first glimpse of the bigger story's ramifications on the world.
I'll be starting on the research for it really soon, talking with our fair city's Burlesque girls and getting in touch with a local wrestling legend or two, both of which I'm excited about for entirely different reasons. I'm also going to take a slightly different approach with the art that I'll be working out to get it to a point I'm happy with.
Story-wise, I'm going to use a slightly different narrative style that I'm stealing from George Pelecanos, using more than one focal character to better flesh out the world they're inhabiting. The wider and more ambitious scope I'm tackling with this story will be well-suited by this, I think.
Good times ahead!
Posted by Schamberger at 11:43 AM
December 06, 2007
State of the Rob 12062007
* Black Chamber's over. To quote the immortal bard Ric Flair, "WHOOOO!"
* I've got ten pages of 'Too Late' left to pencil. Yesterday I felt like I broke through to another level with my art. Something clicked and I ended up doing the most detailed pages I've ever done, and they look good.
* That's pages 98, 99, 102 and 103, for those of you keeping track.
* Yesterday I had a seed crystal form in regards to the uber-plot for all of my books. I didn't originally plan for Black Chamber and Too Late to be related, but now they do. You'll only see that in a very small way in Too Late, but there's a big pay-off down the line.
* The line name is going to be "Unbroken Circle". Don't know if I've ever mentioned that or not.
* The Wire Season Three? FUCKING AWESOME. The penultimate episode really pays off in a big way. I'm watching Season One again now. It's amazing the things you pick up from multiple viewings.
* I'm reading George P Pelecanos' "The Sweet Forever" right now. I'm enjoying it quite a bit. He wrote several teleplays for The Wire.
* Veronica Mars Season Three? FUCKING AWESOME. I'm putting it on the record that I don't agree with any of the critics who obviously didn't get the season, and that the network executives are god damned retarded for not picking up Season Four. There's some seriously hardcore moments that keep me thinking back on it, especially with the Logan character.
* I'm beating out what I'm going to do with the next 'Too Late' book. It'll still be very Kansas City-centric, and I'm thinking of incorporating professional wrestling, burlesque, Mr Arkadin and Once Upon a Time in the Old West.
* Also getting ready to start writing 'Midwestern', which will be a series of pulp-style magazines ran on Wowio. These will also be 'Unbroken Circle' related. Twenty pages a month or so.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:20 PM
November 26, 2007
(Most of) 2007 in Review
01. What did you do in 2007 that you'd never done before?
Bury four relatives
Essentially take a year-long sabbatical
Finish drawing a graphic novel (hopefully two by year's end)
02. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more?
My life changed so fucking drastically this year that my resolutions became moot points by June or so. Next year I'm hoping to have things back on track enough and going in the right direction to have new ones set up.
03. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Nope.
04. Did anyone close to you die?
Helen "Grandma" McDonald
"Aunt" Kathleen Schamberger
"Aunt" Doreen Schamberger
"Aunt" Lois James
My mom's cats Lucie and Zippy
Every one of them still hurts to think about. It will take quite a bit of time to come to terms with the losses I've suffered in my life this past year.
05. What countries did you visit?
The US of A.
06. What would you like to have in 2008 that you lacked in 2007?
A dependable source of income
07. What date from 2007 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
July 1st. A very good birthday, but coming on the heels of three funerals and being laid off from work. Bittersweet.
08. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
The work I'm doing on my graphic novel 'Too Late'. This book's going to be a real milestone for 2007.
09. What was your biggest failure?
Even with all of the tragedies and setbacks suffered this year, I can't think of anything I'd classify as a failure.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing to speak of.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
The Wire Seasons 1-3
12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
My cat Monkey. She's become a real sweetheart.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
A family member at my Aunt Lois' funeral. It was like we were all transported to the Twilight Zone.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent.
Car.
Comic books.
DVD's.
And a pretty sizable decrease in income at the end of June.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Drawing.
16. What song will always remind you of 2007?
Paper Planes by M.I.A.
My buddy Jason Preu got me a copy before it came out and I was digging hard on it. Then it was playing at the first Dr Sketchys and every one since, but the first stands out as that was the night before I got laid off.
This bit of dialogue sums up my year as well:
Everyone's a winner, we're making our name
Bonafide hustler making my name
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder?
Honestly? I don't know. There's a lot of good things in my life, but there's a lot to feel sad about as well.
ii. thinner or fatter?
Slightly fatter.
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Nothing, really.
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Going to funerals.
20. How will you be spending Christmas?
With people who care as much about me as I do them. Take that for what it's worth.
22. Did you fall in love in 2007?
With my buddy cat Korma.
23. How many one-night stands?
None.
24. What was your favourite TV program?
Monday Night Raw
25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
I don't hate. That's a weak emotion.
26. What was the best book you read?
Novel? "The Long Goodbye" by Raymond Chandler
Comic? "The Black Dossier" by Alan Moore, Kevin O'Neill and Todd Klein
27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Nothing really stands out for me this year. Just continuing with new music from artists I'm already fond of. New Beastie Boys, Chemical Brothers, Black Keys, M.I.A., etc.
28. What did you want and get?
Want? To make 'Too Late' better than 'Black Chamber'.
Get? A body of work that I'm very proud of.
29. What was your favourite film of this year?
Not actually from this year, but the best I saw was 'The Killing'
31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
27. Had a party at my pad with a bunch of really good friends and a very special woman who I love very much.
32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Having had a better final conversation with my Aunt Kathy
33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2007?
Dayjob - Dress Casual
Personal - Comfortable
34. What kept you sane?
Comic books.
Monkey.
Drawing.
35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Greta Garbo
36. What political issue stirred you the most?
The fact that all politicians lie. I can't get past that.
37. Who did you miss?
Grandma, Kathy, Doreen, and Lois.
38. Who was the best new person you met?
Korma Schamberger
39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2007.
When your life story is written, you're measured by the obstacles you faced and more importantly, how you dealt with them. Have I had a worse year than 2007? Oh hell yes. But only one year I'd consider to be worse. But I made it through that, and I've made it through this.
I've had to reinvent my life from the ground up before as well. I'm sure I'll do it again in the future, too.
But I know what my measure is now, and I'm pretty proud of what that is.
Posted by Schamberger at 11:47 AM
November 21, 2007
State of the Rob 11212007
* Man, I've been busy lately. Probably the hardest I've ever worked on my art and writing has been over the last month or so. Never happier, either. I look forward to the time that I'm able to do this every day for a living.
* Which realistically should be within a year or two. Providing Wowio keeps going, I may be able to generate a livable income just from their service. That's not including the print versions of my books or the eBooks which should be going up on Amazon in the next week or so. Diversifying content across platforms is really the way to go anymore.
* Isn't it funny that I can realistically make an income from doing comics without going to one of the major publishing houses? That I can actually make more from the online versions than I would going with one of the smaller houses? I made $500 off of The Believer from Image. One issue, all of the money made off of it was from one day of sale, and I haven't made a penny off of it since. In my first month with Wowio I haven't quite made that much yet, but I will, and I'll continue to earn off of it for the life of the site.
* Not to knock on the publishing houses, of course. I want to work with them in the future. But as little as five years ago they were the whole puzzle, and now they're just a piece of it.
* Speaking of being busy: I've been working exclusively on 'Too Late' for a while now and that's why I haven't been posting up too much art or other stuff. I'm feeling a little under the weather, so I'll probably just read and maybe get my files ready for Amazon.
*The color version's ready to submit, but I need to get the black and white version formatted. Amazon's new reader only displays in grayscale, so I thought it'd be wise to have both options available.
* Last weekend was the best in a good long while. Friday I finished up reading Moore and O'Neill's 'The Black Dossier' (more on that later), then we went to Laurenn McCubbin's Art Tarts in the West Bottoms. She's done such an amazing job with Dr Sketchys, but this was an AMAZING show! It was great introducing Katy to all my peeps and also catching up with Tony Moore and Jason Aaron, who I went on an ice run with and we all swapped stories about crazy people with guns.
Saturday night we had my friends Brandon and his wife Robin come up for dinner (my universally acclaimed enchiladas which I have rechristened funalottas (no, I won't give out the recipe, you just need to schedule a time to come up and eat them)) and a game of Risk. Neither of them had played before, but by the end of the night they were way into it. By the time we decided to wrap it up, I had Asia and Australia, Katy had Africa and South America, Brandon had North America, and Robin had Europe. It was about to go nuclear.
Sunday we had the only drawback of the otherwise amazing weekend, which was watching Transformers. I had to make up a word to properly describe this movie, and that is SUCKTASTIC! I won't even go into it. Just avoid this piece of excrement and know that this is why I detest Michael Bay and Jerry Bruckheimer's work. For dinner though we had Indian food from our favorite place, Swagat. I am a sucker for Paneer Masala! Then we ordered Survivor Series which was so many shades of awesome that it made me forget about the awful viewing of the morning.
Following on the heels of the great weekend I got two and a half pages penciled and watched Chris Jericho's glorious comeback on RAW.
* I've got thirty two pages left to draw for Too Late, excluding the coda which may run eight pages. I'm really excited to share this book with y'all.
* Oh yeah, 'The Black Dossier'. Wow. Moore had said something along the lines of this may not be the greatest book ever, but it will be the greatest thing ever. Pretty dead-on. I think Todd Klein deserves a ton of praise as well for all of his BEAUTIFUL typography work throughout. Moore, O'Neill and Klein all brought their A-Game for this fine tome. Each section is not only done from a different time period, but in a different genre and format. It's a comic, it's an essay, it's a chap book, it's a Tijuana bible, it's a pulp, it's a beat poem, , it's a series of correspondence through post cards, it's an erotic story, it's an unfinished play by Shakespeare, part of it you have to read with 3D glasses, and every bit of it tells a narrative and expands upon these characters and the amazing world they inhabit, and the creators completely change their styles to properly reflect all of this. AMAZING. I mean, I'm in awe. Everyone involved in producing this must feel incredibly proud of what they've brought into this world.
* Okay, that's it from me for awhile. We're going out of town tomorrow morning and not returning until Saturday. I hate to put down my pencil for that long, but I do need the break too.
* And with that, I leave you with my special Thanksgiving message: A year after the famous original Thanksgiving meal, the Pilgrims went out and slaughtered the Native American tribe. So eat up!
Posted by Schamberger at 08:00 AM
November 05, 2007
State of the Rob 11052007
* I've got 74 pages drawn for Too Late. I was originally thinking it would run around 150 pages, but now I don't think it will go over 130. I gave myself a lot of 'breathing room' in some scenes that I don't think I'll need to take advantage of.
I'm pretty excited about the book, though. It's about as different from Black Chamber as it can be. Like I've said before, BC was Peckinpah and this will be Hitchcock as written by Chandler.
* Did you know that Chandler was originally tapped to write 'Strangers on a Train'? Here's what Hitch had to say about it in 'Hitchcock/Truffault':
A.H. ...and that raises another point. Whenever I collaborate with a writer who, like myself, specializes in mystery, thriller, or suspense, things don't seem to work out too well.
F.T. You're referring to Raymond Chandler?
A.H. Right; our association didn't work out at all. We'd sit together and I would say, "Why not do it this way?" and he'd answer, "Well, if you can puzzle it out, what do you need me for?" The work he did was no good...
Here's what Chandler had to say about it:
"Look at that fat bastard trying to get out of his car."
* Back to 'Too Late'. I colored the first seventeen pages yesterday in a bit of a marathon session. I'm really happy about how they all came out. I was on a fence about leaving them in their original state, but as the examples in the last post show, I think I made the right decision.
* Putting Black Chamber up on Wowio has turned out to be a good decision. It's not huge money I'm making off of it, but it's adding up pretty nicely into a nice chunk of change. Also? I'm going to be earning off of these for the life of the site (which I hope is a nice long while). Most comics today live and die from the sales of their first week of release. With this revenue stream, it's all about being slow and steady to win the race. Although if I get to the point where I'm getting a thousand downloads a week, this would be a full-time income.
* Did you notice I quietly put up the third chapter? The full announcement for it of course goes out Wednesday with the normal PR blitz.
* Katy and I are going to WRESTLEMANIA!
* The Fabulous Moolah passed away this weekend. What a broad she was (which I mean in the most endearing way possible)! She debuted in WWE (then the WWWF) at its inception in 1963, although she had started wrestling in the 1940's(!). In 1956 she defeated Judy Grable for the Women's Championship of the World, which she held for the next 28 (!) years. That's a title reign that has not been beaten by anyone else, man or woman, not only in wrestling but not in any other sport ever.
In 1999 she returned to rasslin' after a twelve year vacation to win her fourth women's championship. She was in her 70's! My buddies and I all talk about how hardcore Ric Flair is to still be wrestling at the rate he does at the age he's at. He doesn't have anything on Moolah, though!
Truly a remarkable loss to the world, but just look at how much she gave us!
* The recent announcement about the ComicSpace/Webcomics Nation merger has me thinking more about using the web as a realistic tool for distribution and income. I'll probably put up a new essay at TB about that on Wednesday.
* I finished up Greg Rucka's 'Patriot Acts' last week. Seriously good. I don't know that I like it better than my favorite of his, "A Gentlemen's Game", but it rates pretty close. Man, he just gets it.
* I don't talk about Katy's job too much, or like, at all. She's the editor of Gatehouse Magazine for the Leavenworth and Wyandotte areas. If you're in one of those counties, be sure to check it out. She does good work coordinating everything as well as doing some writing for it.
* She got me this for our anniversary last month. It rules.
* Paneer Masala rules, too.
* Back to working on TL pages!
Posted by Schamberger at 03:13 PM
October 19, 2007
State of the Rob 10192007
* Man, I've been busy lately. Every day, I'm working on something related to my graphic novels. Coloring Black Chamber, drawing (and coloring) Too Late, planning what the follow-up(s) to Too Late will be. I wouldn't have it any other way.
* But unfortunately, soon enough I'm going to have to have it another way. Unless I start getting a thousand downloads a week on Wowio, I'm going back to the workforce. The freelance stuff's just not bringing in enough to do this full time right now.
* I was bummed at first about that, having a lot of self-doubt and the like, but ultimately its only reinvigorated me to continue to improve my craft. I'm excited about what's coming up for Black Chamber, and I think folks are really going to dig Too Late. Hopefully my plans for the book after Too Late pan out, because that would be seriously cool.
* Next week I'll start rolling out a forum/social networking app to promote my work more, and probably start up an email list as well. Within the next month I should be able to announce where you'll be able to buy your copies of Black Chamber as well. Both the inkwash and the color versions will be for sale in the near future.
* Too Late's rolling right along. Today I'm going to start drawing the big chase scene, which I'm excited about. Hopefully people will be able to see some growth artistically between this book and Black Chamber.
* I'm also slowly working on a painting that I'm cautiously optimistic about. It's a manner of working I haven't done since school and its fun working out those old muscles.
* I've been reading a lot lately, too. I finished up the 'His Dark Materials' series and really enjoyed it (thanks Dennis!). I also read the full run of Stray Bullets which blew my mind all over again. Hopefully Lapham will be able to finish that up some day. Right now I'm working on reading all of Morrison's Seven Soldiers and also Chandler's last novel 'Playback'. I'd read the Seven Soldiers stuff while it was coming out, but there's a whole other level reading it in larger chunks that I'm thoroughly enjoying. Reading the last Chandler book is bittersweet. I've been making my way through them over the last couple of years and I'll be sad when there's not another to pick up. I guess it'll be time to finish up all of the Jim Thompson novels after that, huh?
* Back to work!
Posted by Schamberger at 09:08 AM
October 03, 2007
She's Gone
Goodbye Lois. Goodbye Grandma. Goodbye Kathleen. Goodbye Doreen.
I'm really ready for this year to be over.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:51 AM
September 29, 2007
State of the Rob 09292007
* Last night Katy and I hung out with friends, watched the incredibly bad movie 'Shooter' (First Act: Surprisingly solid, Second Act: Jumps the shark, Third Act: Shark Bukakke), then went to the Mutual Musicians Foundation. The MMF is still the best-kept secret in Kansas City. The music is amazing, the venue is the very definition of intimate, and the staff are incredibly friendly. Plus I got some great reference shots for 'Too Late' there as a couple of major scenes happen at the location.
* When we got home around three in the AM, I had a message from my mom that my Aunt Lois is most likely going to pass away this weekend. I'm...really, there's no words. This has been a bad year, gang. I've already lost two aunts and a grandmother this year, on top of getting laid off. I'm really just ready for 2007 to come to an end. I'm pretty sure my Uncle Clarence won't be around too much longer, either. I'm very lucky to have such good friends, my art, and most especially family and Katy in my life. It makes these trials bearable. Here's to hoping 2008 will be nothing but good things happening.
* So I didn't sleep worth a damn, and then went to the convention today. It was great catching up with everyone, and running into folks I haven't seen in years as well. I got a lot of very constructive criticism on my work, some very humbling, some very glowing, but all were things that will help me continue to grow and to improve my craft. I was too tired and had too much on my mind to stick around for long, so I left around 1PM, came home, watched some cartoons, and passed the fuck out until a few minutes ago.
* Tomorrow is the next Dr Sketchy's, which I always look forward to. Laurenn's planning to go bi-weekly with it, which I'm totally stoked about. All of this life drawing has been insanely helpful to me, and I hear that echoed from everyone else who attends.
* And I'm just waiting to hear about Lois. I liked her. She's a very creative person, skilled in many areas but none as strongly as her ability to play the piano. She was mostly a fan of Big Band, and man, she could make those ivory keys scream. She'd get her whole body into it, to where she would just become a blur of sonic motion, laughing and smiling the whole way through. Beside her music, her laugh is the thing that I'll remember the most, and that I'll miss the most. A good, big, honest laugh is one of the best things in the world. I like to think I got mine from her. I know I got my serious interest in art from her, thinking back on it.
* Otherwise, I'm just going to continue to plug away on my art. This past year has definitely put front and center just how important it is to be doing the things I want to do in life. It's too short to not take a chance, and way too long to live with yourself for not taking that chance. Hopefully I can make it work out.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:41 PM
September 07, 2007
Checking In
Things have been super busy of late!
Over the holiday weekend Katy and I went out to Western Kansas for the annual Schamberger Open golf tournament. It was her first full exposure to the family, and she managed to survive! It's always great spending time with Grandma, the aunts and uncles, and the bazillion cousins. We got back in town Monday afternoon and did pretty much nothing the rest of the day to get our strength back.
For the rest of the week, besides battling off some sickness Wednesday that kept me from going to see my folks perform, I've been working on some freelance work and Too Late pages as well as continuing to get the word out about The Black Chamber and AIV.
During the two weeks before this one, I felt like I absolutely hated everything I was doing, but just kept plugging along. After being out of town for four days and coming back to the work though, it's like I'm seeing it with brand new eyes. Like, "Hey, this ain't too bad!" The pages I'd been working on were really difficult and forcing me to draw stuff I normally wouldn't which is where I think the frustration was coming from.
Also this week I finished reading Philip Pullman's 'The Golden Compass', a book I normally wouldn't have picked up on my own, but that Dennis Hopeless got me for my B-day. Thanks for that D, I really enjoyed it and am already into the second book.
My current obsession right now is with Indian food. There's a place within walking distance of us, Swagat, that was almost like having a religious experience when I ate it for the first time, and leaves me feeling post-coital after eating it still. Mmmmmm. I'm really interested in learning how to cook it and have been reading up on it and talking with their staff about how they prepare their paneer, or what they put in their masala. I can totally see why Spain had Columbus try to find a quicker way to get those spices.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:53 AM
August 19, 2007
State of the Rob 08192007
* How the hell did I miss that a new Josh Rouse album came out last month? I'm listening to tracks from it now on MySpace, and of course I'm all about it.
* I did a big photo shoot Wednesday night and have completed five pages since then. The one in the post below is from that batch. I'm doing my best to bring my A Game on these, and I hope that's showing.
* I'm also trying to find homes for these kittens:
They showed up the other day on my porch in the 104 degree weather and I just couldn't leave them out there. Now of course I'm stuck with the task of finding a home for them. The shelters around here are all full, and I'd rather not take them to the pound, but if I can't find a home for them in the next couple of days that's where they're going. They're very sweet, litter trained, and they tested clear for viruses and parasites. They'd make a great addition to anyone's home. Please, please pass their picture along to your family, friends and coworkers and see if anyone would open their door to them. If I had a house and not an apartment I'd totally keep them myself, but I need help for these poor souls.
* The switch to being a freelance artist is coming along swimmingly. I'm making a lot of contacts and have several mailers going out to potential clients over the next few weeks. Fingers crossed!
* Katy's birthday was Friday. We had a GREAT time. Here's the painting I did for the big day:
She liked it alright.
* Wrestlemania 24 tickets go on sale January 13. With Andy living down in Florida now, our chances of going this year are pretty significant. Oooooh Yyyeeeeaah!
* Okay, back to the pages!
Posted by Schamberger at 05:46 PM
August 15, 2007
Sorry Honey
Taken by Laurenn McCubbinn. I swear, I was just reading the articles!
Posted by Schamberger at 01:59 PM
August 04, 2007
State of the Rob
Busy week!
Monday wasn't that bad, mostly just drawing.
On Tuesday, I got an email from an editor wanting to set up a portfolio review. That was the moment I realized I didn't actually have a hard portfolio put together, so I pulled out all of my art and picked out about thirty pieces that I felt were really strong, bought a case and some sheets, and gave the editor a call. He was available on Friday at 11:30, cool by me. I spent the rest of the day running around town taking care of odds and ends.
Wednesday, I caught up on the Garbo portraits, bought the first 'Scalped' collection (very enjoyable) and, drumroll please, the Paul Pope art book, 'Pulp Hope'. Mind? Blown. Later in the day my postcards came in, all one thousand of them, and the evening capped off with a lead on a freelance job from my mom.
Thursday, I called up the new prospective client and arranged an interview for Friday at 9:30, did more Garbo work, paid bills and had some pizza for dinner with Katy. She had a show to go to around nine, so I went to pick up a six pack from the gas station before Burn Notice started. On the way there, I noticed that my steering was a little off. I pulled in the parking lot and, son of a bitch, one of my tires was flat. I filled it up, got my beer and went home to watch one of my new favorite shows, drink a beer, and lay down the pencils for the last Garbo piece.
Friday, my busiest day in over a month, the day of two interviews and a scheduled photo shoot? That's the day my tire can't hold air anymore. I get it down to the local tire shop, but they're already behind on work and can't guarantee it until the late afternoon. Fuck a duck. The always-able assistant Katy did me a huge favor by taking me to both interviews. The first one lasted all of five minutes ("I already know about you") and I walked out with two trial assignments, and the second was about fifteen minutes ("You've got the exact style we're after.") with one trial assignment. I got home, picked up the car, and finished one of the jobs, and then we were off to First Friday and the photo shoot, capped off by a nice dinner and an end to the busy week.
This weekend, we're going out of town for some well-earned R&R, and then back to rock it out all over again.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:14 AM
July 02, 2007
Birthday Festivities
A big thank you to everyone who came by for my birthday yesterday. Also, thank you to everyone who has been so supportive over the last week. All of you are the best.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:08 AM
June 27, 2007
Yay For Socialism!
Apparently, since I started my claim this week, if I don't complete it until next week, my unemployment check will go up to $407 a week! That works! So children, my words of advice to you: get an unstable job in Kansas. My other words of advice: Get a good job, for fuck's sake, so you don't have to be buggered with this bullshit.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:25 AM
June 25, 2007
So Far Today, I Have...
* Filed for unemployment
* Updated my resume
* Applied for two positions
* Cleaned the apartment
* Did the dishes
* Went to my old apartment and cleaned up there until it got too hot
* Fixed my USB hub so that I can start scanning again
* Inadvertently hacked off Kevin
* Ate a slice of pizza and an apple - not too hungry for some reason
See, I'm trying to do things where I know I can fix an immediate situation, helping me to feel like I'm, you know, doing something.
Now to put up some art, letter a page, talk with the freaked-the-fuck-out-Katy about our new reality, and watch some rasslin'.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:02 PM
Not a Promising Start to the Week
Got laid off this morning. I've already hit the ground running, getting things in order, so this should hopefully only be a temporary setback.
Still, sucks. Happy birthday to me!
If anyone's aware of a decent job opening, please let me know.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:26 PM
June 17, 2007
Moved In
The majority of the moving is now done. I'm sore over my whole body, bruised, cut up, but it feels great to be done with it (mostly). We've got most everything unpacked now except a few boxes. Here's how my space looks right now:
(Click for a larger view)
It's nice having everything all together now, and within reach. The closet is HUGE. I'm able to store all of my comics in there with no problem, and shelving to store art, plus room for growth. I've also got my own bathroom connected, which will be handy not just for shitting, but also for washing out brushes and the like. The complex is also really nice, which is a breath of fresh air compared to how my last place had become.
I've still got more art to hang, and there's some shelving we need, but all of the hard work is now done. We should be completely settled in within the week, which is great. I'll have pictures of the rest of the place up soon, for those who care about such things.
I am SO ready to get back to work on 'Too Late'.
Posted by Schamberger at 03:03 PM
June 07, 2007
Where I'm At Online
ComicSpace - There's a few galleries I've got up there that for now you can only find on that site.
Engine - So far, this has been a great networking area.
MySpace - Just set this up today. It's mainly just another place for folks to come across my art and direct them back here. At least, it will be. Also! So that my girlfriend will finally get off my hump about it.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:11 PM
May 07, 2007
On my mind
I'm paralyzed by the fear that Black Chamber may suck.
Posted by Schamberger at 03:21 PM
May 06, 2007
Weekend Update
* Sorry I didn't make it to the show Saturday, gang. It would have been about one by the time I got there, and I just didn't want to spend fifteen bucks for four hours. I'm strapped from paying taxes and buying CorelDraw, and need to conserve money with the upcoming move.
* We're currently debating between City View and Union Hill to move to. The floor space on Union Hill will be the deciding factor, which I'll be checking out tomorrow evening. Katy and I are both going to be needing a lot of space wherever we end up, what with my art thing and the upcoming business with Mom, plus Katy's got a start-up of her own in the works. We're one of those Go-Getter Couples.
* My Aunt Doreen died last night. I really, really liked her. She was always very kind to me, and a very neat lady. I especially feel for my Uncle Ken now, as they were one of those classically great couples. Also for my cousins Lance and Blake, because she was such a great mom to them.
* I think three deaths in a matter of weeks is taking its toll on me.
* My brother AJ and I went to see Spider-Man today. It was a fun movie. Seeing it through a twelve-year-old's eyes made it especially neat.
* The Black Chamber is all lettered now. I just need to finish up some tidying here and there, and then it's time to submit. Fingers crossed.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:39 PM
May 02, 2007
More Random Stuff
* Lettering in CorelDraw ain't that bad. It took me about an hour to familiarize myself with the program, but once I got going it wasn't no thing at all. I ended up getting twenty pages done last night.
* Ain't ain't a word.
* DJ Shadow's 'The Outsider' is a really, really good album. I haven't really taken it out of rotation since purchasing it. I glean something new from it on each listen.
* I turned in my 60 day notice yesterday to move out of my apartment. End of an era. I was underpaying on it so much that my landlord's eyes kind of sparkled when I told him.
* Speaking of 'end of an era', I'm going to miss Tom Poston. I really liked him.
* I brought a chess board to work yesterday. I'm like a cat with a mouse on that game, man, slowly picking my opponents apart until I finally, mercifully end it. Of course, if I had to play against someone who's actually good, I'd be massacred. I've got no real strategy except for controlling the center of the board.
* In Chandler's Marlowe books, Marlowe keeps a chess board in his apartment and moves the pieces as shown from transcripts of famous maneuvers and games. I'd like to do that myself, but those things are in some sort of code I've never been able to understand. I'm worthless, aren't I?
* I'm going to try to put up a daily 'snapshot' of what I'm working on. Yesterday's post was the first of those. Sometimes it'll be a photograph, or a snippet of a page, or a screenshot, but I thought it'd be interesting to do something like this. I'm sure I won't nail it EVERY day, but it'll still be something cool to look back on.
* I'm really looking forward to the last issue of '52'. I've enjoyed the hell out of this series. I'm excited for 'Countdown' as well. I've dropped almost all of my monthly titles in favor of collections, but I enjoy picking this sort of thing up every week.
* Man, I've had a lot on my mind lately. Lettering 'The Black Chamber'. Writing 'Too Late for Smiling'. Conceptualizing a series to spin out of that. The day job being weird. Submitting 'The Black Chamber' to publishers. Moving. Grandma dying. Aunt Kathy dying. Aunt Lois being very ill, most likely terminally. Aunt Doreen being terminally ill. Start-up business with Mom. My buddy Brandon being out of work. My neighborhood going to shit. Being overweight. Mom's health. Step-father's health. Niece being in the hospital from diabetes. Sanjaya being kicked off of American Idol...wait...
* For those of you going to Planet Comicon this weekend, I'm hoping to have an ashcan of 'The Black Chamber' to hand out. I won't have a table or anything, just wandering the floor and making a scene in front of Kevin and Dennis' table. If you're going, and you want one, say something in the comments here and I'll be sure to hook ya up.
* Seriously, lettering this thing is going QUICK. I really didn't have much dialogue at all, as I really wanted to have the images tell the story, and paced it similar to how Koike and Kojima did on 'Lone Wolf and Cub'. 'Smiling' is going to be a MUCH denser read.
* The new 'D'Airain Aventure' is out today, too! Sweet!
* I'll leave you with Ashley Wood's cover to the new Tank Girl series, as I don't have any art myself to put up today, and seriously, it's gorgeous, isn't it?
(Click for a larger view)
Posted by Schamberger at 07:36 AM
April 30, 2007
"I Want to Kick a Puppy" or alternately "I'm Ready to Move"
It was an overall good weekend.
Friday, we had Mexican for dinner, and I picked up Serenity and a present for my mom. Serenity was more enjoyable to me than Firefly, and served as a good cap to the story.
Saturday, I finished up 'The Long Goodbye'. Good book. It lagged a bit in the latter part of the middle, but it was definitely one of my favorite Chandlers.
I also rewrote the opening part of 'Too Late for Smiling', as what I had written last week just wasn't working for me. It felt too similar to 'The Black Chamber', and I really want this to be different in approach. It's definitely denser. Black Chamber rarely goes over a hundred words per page, and this one's already averaging two hundred per page. I ended up using portions of a radio script I had written a few years back for the opening chapter, which if any of you remember that, you'll appreciate that I'm going to couple that with my 'bodiless voice' approach from Empty House. I'm REALLY stoked to draw that portion already. Actually, this is going to be an insanely fun story to draw.
Saturday night, we met up with a friend and ate at Granite City down south. Very, very good food, and they brew their own beer there as well, which was tasty.
Sunday morning, we headed over to Borders, as I had a ten dollar off coupon. I picked up the new Lethem, "You Don't Love Me Yet", a cheapie Picasso book, the latest DJ Shadow album, and a book on forming LLC's for my mom and I's business.
Then Katy and I headed on over to EH Young Riverfront Park to read our purchases. I got a little burnt on my freshly-shaven head as well as on my bare feet. The new Lethem is very, very good, in case there was any doubt. Still, it was very, very pleasant. We ate at Argosy's Crazy Olives after that, which was good as always.
Then back home, so that I could work some more on the book and listen to the DJ Shadow album. The album is most definitely not what I was expecting. It's a lot harder and...angrier than his other work. I'm noticing that a whole lot more in entertainment. There's something bubbling under the surface in our culture. Wartime brings that out, I think. Still, insanely good hip hop.
In the evening, Katy and I discussed the possibilities of cohabitation, as she's going to be moving in the next couple of months, and I've grown to really hate my apartment complex. In the last six months it's really gone down the shit tubes, and I'm sick of it. I'm sick of having to call the cops. I'm sick of the trash in the lawn, and the trash living in the apartments.
Leading me to the title of this entry. I got three hours of sleep last night. Three. Hours. Why is this, you ask dear reader? Because of some of the trash living in the adjoining building to mine, who left their puppy on their back patio All Night Long, where it whined and yapped incessantly until I finally called the cops around midnight. They talked to the tenants and they seemed to bring the dog inside, problem solved. So I layed in bed for another hour until finally falling back asleep...
...to wake up around three to more of the fucking dog's whining. It stopped shortly, but I was awake, and stayed awake. My landlord's hearing from me today about the dog and its inconsiderate, immature, and incapable owners, and tomorrow about my notice that I will be moving out of that blight on the face of the Earth.
EDIT: Just got off the phone with management, and they slipped up and told me that those fuckers aren't even set up to have a pet. Kneel before Rob.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:50 AM
April 24, 2007
Update From Rob Land
I think I'm finally getting back on track now. Last week was...rough, to put it mildly. Things are gradually turning back around, though.
Random stuff:
* I should start finally lettering Black Chamber this week. I ordered Corel Draw last Thursday, so that should be in any time now. I'm really looking forward to putting this in the can once and for all. Even if no one publishes it, really.
* I got the next book all plotted out over the weekend and started writing on it. I got all of the little story kinks worked out that were keeping me from getting in and working on it. It's looking to be a fun one to make.
* I'm tired of making millions of dollars for other people. To that end, my mom and I are finally starting up our business together, starting this week. More on that once all of the paperwork is filed.
* Andy, last night's Raw was really fucking awesome. The main event between Cena and HBK went for a full hour! Easily Cena's best match, like, ever.
* Morningstar Farms' Spicy Black Bean Burgers? Fucking good.
* Have y'all been following the marketing campaign for the new Nine Inch Nails album? Lots of idears there for us creative types. The new album? I like it, but I'm not floored by it. Still really solid, though. I feel for Trent, in that Downward Spiral was such a huge success it will always be the elephant in the room with him. I've enjoyed this the most out of his albums since, though. I'm not as angsty as I used to be, though, so I don't know that I'm the target demographic for his music anymore.
* I finally watched Firefly last week. Pretty good. It didn't give me a nerdgasm or anything, but it was still enjoyable. I need to pick up Serenity (movie and comic) now, which I've heard is enjoyable. I guess I enjoy Whedon's comics more than his TV shows.
* Has anyone read the new Lethem yet? I know I'll like it, but I'm still working my way through 'The Long Goodbye'. It's next on my list, for sure.
* Peace out.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:53 AM
April 19, 2007
What a Week
Two funerals in a week can really wear a body out. Then coming back to an apathetic day job doesn't improve things in the least.
I'm exhausted and feeling like I'm in a nasty mood. I don't like that.
So. Share your good news with me. Brighten my day up.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:36 PM
April 13, 2007
She's Passed
She died at around two this morning. This is the last picture I took of her, I don't know how long ago. The fact that my grandfather's standing next to her means it was probably fifteen years ago.
Strange fact: The two of them never smiled at the same time in the same photo.
Mom and Roger and I went to the hospital to clean up her room this morning. Most of her belongings we're donating, which I feel good about. I think the service is going to be on Monday.
I'm not going to give some bullshit speech about loving the people you have while they're still around, because you're going to do that anyway, and no one stops loving people after they die, either. I think my only real revelation from all of this is to live your life being true to yourself and to who you really are. Too many people, like my grandmother, live their lives unhappily. I find that to be one of the most horrible things that I can imagine, spending the majority of a ninety plus year life being unhappy.
Don't let that happen to yourself.
Oh, and love the people you have, whether they're still with you or not.
Posted by Schamberger at 02:35 PM
April 11, 2007
Does it HAVE to come in three's?
My dad just called me to let me know that my Aunt Kathy died a couple of days ago. Heart attack. She was an...interesting individual. She did a lot of bad things towards my mom during the divorce between her and Dad, so it's always been weird dealing with her, you know? The last time I saw her was about three years ago at a reunion, and she was a little too drunk and started spouting off about Mom, and I just shut her down right then and there, really put her in her place, and that was the last time we ever talked.
My grandma's probably going to die tonight or tomorrow. We've been, as bad as it sounds, waiting for her to go for the last ten years or so. She's been ate up by alzheimer's and dementia for all of that time, so this will really be a release more than anything. I don't find it a coincidence at all that a couple weeks back I started reading Chandler's 'The Long Goodbye'.
So, yeah. Two's company, three would be a crowd.
EDIT: Hopefully, this is the third. Vonnegut had a huge impact on me when I finally got into his work a couple of years back. So much so that I actually broke up with a girl last year using a quote from 'Timequake'. For you fellow creators out there, I really recommend picking up a copy of 'Like Shaking Hands With God', a conversation about writing between Kurt Vonnegut and Lee Stringer. I read that before having read any of his work, so it was like getting to know him first, which I think made his books that much more personal. So it goes.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:42 PM
April 08, 2007
Weekend Update
* All of the pages for Black Chamber are now cleaned up
* I think I'm about ready to start plotting out Too Late for Smiling
* My hand really hurts from cleaning up all of those pages
* I'm about through the first season of Law and Order: SVU, and my main thought is: Mariska Hargitay is really hot.
* I mean, my hand fucking hurts
* I'm reading the latest Jules Feiffer collection, 'Passionella', and totally love it. Why have I deprived myself of his work for so long?
* I feel like I've got 'big tit' arthritis. You know, like, you see a stacked chick walk by, and you say "Check out the arthritis on her!" and your friend looks all puzzled, until you give him the visual cue? Yeah, like that.
* I'm really excited to start drawing the next book. I've got a lot of neat visuals planned out for it, and I'm going to do a lot more with lighting for this.
* Hand? Hurts. Yes, I know I whine like a little girl. You know what? I don't care.
* I like the Charlie Parker and Thelonius Monk CD's I picked up last week.
* You thought this was going to be about my hand, didn't you?
* On Friday, I had four different people at work ask me how I got my art into the email I sent them. My answer? Oompa Loompas.
* Oompa Loompas using a fucking scanner.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:03 PM
March 22, 2007
No, That's Not Me on the Cover of This Week's Pitch
I'm putting this up as a public service message, as I know I'll be hearing about it all week:
Posted by Schamberger at 08:47 AM
February 09, 2007
Meanwhile...
So, sorry for the lack of posts lately. I've honestly been working my ass off on getting Black Chamber done. I'm on track to be totally completed by the end of the month with the drawing portion.
So, until I have some art to show off, here is the definitively best scene from any movie ever:
Posted by Schamberger at 02:55 PM
January 25, 2007
On The Believer
'The Believer' was supposed to be my big break. But the Universe just didn't want it to happen.
The story starts in 1998. I was fresh out of high school without a clue of what I wanted to do with my life. I was drawing quite a bit, but I'd fallen off track considerably since graduation, and I was down to mostly sketchbook stuff. I'd gotten it into my mind that I really wanted to revamp The Shadow. Because, really, who doesn't want to? I was writing quite a bit at this point, too. Warren Ellis and Brian Bendis were really hitting their stride right around then, and it really seemed like a rock star sort of thing to do.
So, my long time mentor Phil Hester was doing a signing and I stopped in to BS with him. He was flipping through my sketchbook and came across the Shadow stuff and asked me what I was up to. I told him, and he just nonchalantly said, "I'd like to pitch that with you."
You could have knocked me over with a feather.
So, I wrote up a script for the first issue and shot it off to Phil. He liked it for the most part, and we started putting some feelers out. We were putting it together that it would be our main story and then have back-ups by other folks in the field. We had some Big Names attached to this. Really, make a top twenty list, and except for Ellis, Miller, and Moore, we had them. This was going to be capital C Cool.
Then Dark Horse told us they were going to let the license lapse. Then Phil got the Green Arrow gig. Then I was wondering what the hell I was going to do next.
Luckily, Phil put me in touch with KC local Thom Thurman. Thom and I hit it off right from the get go. We had totally similar tastes and Thom was just a hell of an artist. Phil had told me about how The Coffin was originally a pitch for revamping a comic called Rust, and told me I should do the same with the Shadow script. I did, and then we had The Believer.
We sent it out to several companies, but the one we wanted, Image, said they wanted it. Oh my god, I'd never been so excited in my life. That was the single best email I'd ever read. This was also a week after my 21st birthday. Hell of a present!
It turns out that Image was starting up a new line called Image Introduces, and they wanted to fast-track us to be in the second slot, following a book called Primate. (Primate, incidentally, was what funded the formation of IDW.)
We didn't realize at the time that we were Greg Brady fitting into the Johnny Bravo suit. Image needed a complete book for the second month, because the other people in the line weren't even close to completion.
We got pretty good press when the line was announced. But we started realizing pretty quick that Image just wasn't set up to be doing something like this. There were a lot of production things that they had never done before, and Thom being in production art noticed a lot of the kinks that were coming up. Like, on the cover above, do you notice how that awful red doesn't match the red on the scarf? Or that my name is mis-spelled? Yeah, stuff like that.
Also, the press release was really vague on what the line was. Everyone thought it was an anthology, and we all know anthologies don't sell. With us being the second release, retailers thought it was a second issue, so we got the kind of orders that the second issue of an anthology would get.
Also, our solicits went out in October of 2001, which just so happened to be the worst month in retail history due to the terrorist attacks in New York and DC.
On top of that, we weren't able to use our marketing plan because of the changed climate in the world. Our marketing plan? Personalized death certificates for people who helped promote our book and free minicomics for comic shops to hand out where the owner gets 'killed'. Image rightly said that while before 9/11 this was a great, cool idea, post-9/11 it would be in poor taste.
So, we were the second lowest selling book from Image that month. Due to poor planning, the Image Introduces line collapsed. The original idea was that if a book got positive word-of-mouth and/or positive sales, the book would become a series. We had very, very good reviews on the book. Even the Comics Journal liked us. But, the line got tanked, with the only book going on being Rex Mundi.
Jim Valentino told Thom and I that he liked what we did, but he didn't want more Believer. So, I went with my follow-up project, a Believer-style take on Doc Savage. But, by this point, Thom and his wife had brought a daughter into the world and Thom had gotten a job at Hallmark. He wasn't able to draw a book anymore. His desire to draw a book had gone away, too.
We had some really neat stuff going at our site, doing a free downloadable monthly anthology called FREE COMIX! that ran for six months or so before Thom finally wore out. We had some really cool stories in there from folks like Steve Lightle, Phil Hester and Steven Grant, plus a continuing story of our own called Confidence Man. We were getting AMAZING press on that, with several articles in Newsarama and a feature interview as well. But, all of that folded rather abruptly.
So, I found myself desperately trying to find another artist. I hooked up with several promising folks, but I found myself a constant victim of Art-Flake-itis. Finally, I came to a breaking down point where I had to decide between quitting or the long arduous journey of teaching myself to draw again. Obviously, I chose the latter.
The Believer is something that I'm still very proud of, though. I would have loved to really explore the concepts I'd planned in there, and I will some day in some other form, I'm sure. It was a strange set of circumstances where it was more that we were in the wrong place and time than that we had a bad book. Because the book most assuredly was not bad.
I'd love to continue to collaborate with other artists, but I am quite enjoying not having to worry about them, too.
Posted by Schamberger at 10:37 AM
January 09, 2007
Something that definitely rocks
Well, I can finally say it, since the announcement got made. I've accepted a new position at the day job. I'll be starting up several new ventures for the company, which is the kind of work I enjoy doing the most. So, same pay, but managing about a tenth as many people. That's a'ight in my book. I'll get about a week and a half vacation in between, some time this month, and then I go back and start up my new job.
Pretty cool.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:29 PM
December 03, 2006
2006 In Review
01. What did you do in 2006 that you'd never done before?
Become middle management
Fire someone
Hire someone
Use inkwash
Get published more than once
02. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more?
Overall, yes. Also, my resolutions for next year will more than likely be my most ambitious yet.
03. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Jason and Sarah Preu welcomed in the lovely Roman Awesome to our plane of existence. Otherwise some broads at work popped some kids out.
EDIT: Oh yeah, Andy's wife popped out a little critter. We're still holding out that it's not his, though.
04. Did anyone close to you die?
My Aunt Ree
Not necessarily close to me, but a kid I'd known since grade school, Dallas Bromley
05. What countries did you visit?
The US of A.
06. What would you like to have in 2007 that you lacked in 2006?
Finish motherfucking Black Chamber
07. What date from 2006 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
October 13th, when I met the lovely Katy Ryan
08. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Began to draw in a way that I'm getting comfortable with.
09. What was your biggest failure?
Getting so stressed out at the day job that I had a heart attack. Fuck that jazz.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Heart attack
Some flu here and there
11. What was the best thing you bought?
The complete Little Nemo
12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
My cat Monkey. She's become a real sweetheart.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
A broad at work. She makes me weep for humanity.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent.
Car.
Comic books.
DVD's.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Drawing.
16. What song will always remind you of 2006?
Teenage Riot by Sonic Youth
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder?
Honestly? The same.
ii. thinner or fatter?
Slightly thinner.
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Exercise and drawing. Relaxing.
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Stressing about the day job.
20. How will you be spending Christmas?
With people who care as much about me as I do them. Take that for what it's worth.
22. Did you fall in love in 2006?
Yup.
23. How many one-night stands?
A handful.
24. What was your favourite TV program?
Monday Night Raw
25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
I don't hate. That's a weak emotion.
26. What was the best book you read?
Novel? "It's Superman!" by Tom De Haven
Comic? "Criminal" by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips
27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Left of the Dial
28. What did you want and get?
Want? An improved life.
Get? An improved life.
29. What was your favourite film of this year?
Miami Vice
31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
26. Crashed a party at Kevin Mellon's house.
32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Finishing Black Chamber
33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2006?
Dayjob - Formal
Personal - Comfortable
34. What kept you sane?
Comic books.
Monkey.
35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Greta Garbo
36. What political issue stirred you the most?
The fact that all politicians lie. I can't get past that.
37. Who did you miss?
Actually, no one
38. Who was the best new person you met?
Katy Ryan
39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2006.
Honesty and transparency makes you invincible.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:30 PM
November 18, 2006
2007 Looms
So, I find myself starting to ponder on what the hell I'm going to do next year. What the Plan is. This year has been all about Hard Work. Developing my craft as an artist. Pushing myself at the day job. Work work work. I think next year is going to be about harvesting the fruits of those labors. 2006 has been about building a foundation for Future Rob to build a house on. 2007 is going to be homebuilding. I'm going to get myself closer to doing what I want to be doing with my life, to a greater extent than I'm already doing now.
Off-Topic:
* I just realized I've had this site going for a year now. Go me.
* I finished watching West Wing Season Four today, and it kills me that Sorkin left on such a cliffhanger. Because, like, I really don't want to buy the next season, after all the bad reviews I've heard, but damn...
* I've been on vacation for the last week and thoroughly enjoying it. I've gotten quite a bit of Black Chamber done, too. Look forward to checking out the page count tomorrow.
* I'm reading Tom De Haven's 'It's Superman' right now, and wow, what a book. It's like Chandler doing Superman, if you can imagine.
* Why has it taken me this long to start loving Sonic Youth? Damn, I've really been in a cave my whole life, haven't I? Rob, meet Culture. Culture, ridicule Rob.
* I'm going to put together an annual compilation CD starting this year. I think I'm going to call it 'Schambergerama 2006', and have it go with a collection of choice pieces of my art. The only way to get one is to meet up with me in person somewhere around town. It'd be cool if other people did the same thing, like, get a tradition going. "Here's a mix CD and a small collection of my art/writing/whatthefuckever, what have you been up to?" That'd be fun.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:39 PM
October 30, 2006
Weekend Round-Up
Saturday was...eventful. Productive. Yes. I came into the office in the morning first. Why? To do work? Nope. Master prankery. I filled up two of my coworkers' cubes with packing peanuts, chuckled maniacally, then got back on the road.
I went to the local convention, caught up with some friends I hadn't seen in a while, got a good critique on my Black Chamber pages from Phil Hester, went to an Ed Brubaker panel that was really well-done, and BS'ed for a while with Mellon and Hopeless. The show didn't seem very well-attended, but I think they didn't really promote it that well, either. Too bad, because there was some top-notch talent there.
After that, I picked up the first season of Justice League Unlimited, watched some of that, until my lady friend gave me a call and invited me to a Halloween party, which I decided to attend. I hadn't met any of her friends yet, so that was fun. My costume? Someone who was invited at the last minute and didn't have a costume to wear AKA The World's Best Looking Man.
Sunday, I did two paintings for this Friday's show (I'll scan them in soon-ish), and got together with Mellon, Hopeless, Mrs. Hopeless, and Grant "Gold" Bond for dinner. We had some good conversations, and it's always good to hang out with them. Good for them, of course, because my company raises the quality of anyone's life. The highlight of the night was their story from the show about a guy showing off a sculpture made from vegetable ivory of a penisvagina.
Then? I went to bed. This morning at work has been great, of course, because of the reaction to The Grand Prank. Now I'm stuck with the dilemma of what to do with two giant bags of packing peanuts. Anyone moving soon?
Posted by Schamberger at 11:21 AM
October 14, 2006
The Month That Wasn't
Where did the last month and a half of my life go? Ugh. The overtime's killing me. All of the backlog at the day job will be caught up this coming week, so that's nice. It'll give us more time to recreate it, I guess.
I'll be traveling to Columbus OH some time in the near future. I've got two employees out there I've never met, and I finally talked the boss into letting me. This means I will have to finally use a cel phone. I've fought off this century for about seven years now, but I must finally succumb.
I'll be taking a week off from work in November. I'm looking forward to that. Lots. I really, really need the vacation. I plan to overhaul the gallery sections of this site during that time. A lot of the art on here is not very indicative of where I'm at now, I think.
I'm listening to the Easy Star Allstars right now. Picked up both of their CD's yesterday, and it's blowing my mind. See, they're a reggae band that covers classic groove albums. A total 'duh' concept, you know? Taking albums that stoners would love and doing them reggae. Duh. Rob circa 1998 would have been all over this. Their first is Dark Side of the Moon, and the current one is OK Computer, and they're both AWESOME. Total awesomeness.
DMZ #12 came out this week. It's gorgeous. Lived up to expectations.
Joe Kubert's amazing. I picked up a buch of Sgt Rock comics last weekend and have just been poring over them and bowing to the master. (Kevin, what's he like in person? If he's a douchebag, lie to me. I'd hate to have another one of those moments like when I met John Byrne.)
I'm now reading the collected short stories of Raymond Chandler. It's a massive 1300 page tome, but so far it's worth it in every regard.
I'm watching the second season of The West Wing while working on Black Chamber pages. The rich dialogue of the show makes it really conducive to doing something creative. Sorkin gets it, doesn't he?
I've decided that I'm going to hand-letter my next graphic novel. That gives me a few months to bone up on it and get myself ready. Expect to see me posting lots of crappy lettering samples over the next while as I try to beat the crap lettering out of me.
I love you all.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:02 PM
September 26, 2006
Hey! I'm Not Dead!
I've just been kicking my own ass lately between the dayjob and the Black Chamber stuff. I've clocked in over a hundred hours in the last couple of weeks at said day job, and on top of that plugging away at the book in my off time (what exists of it). Did five pages on Sunday alone. Machine!
So, until I get some art up in this mug, here's some of my patented random thoughts:
* I miss watercolored coloring for comix. For reals.
* Brendan McCarthy is amazing.
* Outside of Solo #12, this is my most looked-forward-to comic of the year.
* The new Ray LaMontagne album is incredblamazing.
* Not only did I do my first termination today as a manager, I let two go at the same time. Afterwards, I had a meeting with that department, which went verbatim like this: "As I'm sure you overheard, I sent them home. I'm looking into ways of filling those positions, but in the meantime, I'm expecting all of you to continue the exemplary work you're doing. Well, that's all I had for you." They all stand there a bit dumbfounded. Then, I stand up, slam my fist on the desk, and yell, "BACK TO WORK OR YOU'RE NEXT!" Got some amazing productivity today from all of them.
* I've got until Friday of next week to complete eight paintings. What, me workaholic?
* Jaime Hernandez is amazing.
* I've killed enough time here. Off to work!
* Oh! Check out Sequential Shop Talk, a new group blog I'm associated with. So far it's just myself and Grand Mellon Sexay, but we've got some invites out as well. There's bound to be some quality reading to be found there, if you're into making comix or just interested in the creation side of things.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:37 PM
September 16, 2006
Why Did It
Take me this long to discover that Eric B and Rakim are the shit? What cave have I been living in? J, once again, thanks for the tunes.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:09 PM
September 14, 2006
Nuckin' Futs!
Dayjob's three syllable cuh-razy right now, hence the lack of post-age. It's probably going to be like this through next week as well. Pages are still coming along, though, so for those of you who care about such things, you can stop crying into your pillows at night.
READING: Pride of Baghdad (just finished, actually, and found it quite enjoyable), Hitchcock/Truffault (still!), and a whole heap o' comix (I find myself busier making them than reading them of late, though).
LISTENING: TV on the Radio, Miles Davis, Groove Armada, Dusty Springfield, Paul Oakenfold, David Bowie, Radio 4, Belle & Sebastian, and whatever else I'm in the mood for.
WATCHING: NYPD Blue Season Two (again (Carusso's a real dickbag on and off camera, isn't he?))
PAINTING: 'Rasslers
Posted by Schamberger at 07:05 PM
September 08, 2006
Managerial Whoa's
6:30 AM, Walking in the door
Employee 1 From T Department: Rob, what are we supposed to do with these phones?
Rob: What phones?
E1FTD: These phones. (Points to shiny new black phone sitting on his desk)
Rob: (Raising his brow, a mix of bewilderment and humor dominating his facial features) You know more than I do at this point, buddy. Let me clock in first.
Rob gets back to his desk to discover another new shiny black phone sitting on his desk. Fascinating. This should make for an interesting morning, yeah? Great way to begin the cap for the week. Well, the macro's not working for the spreadsheet that pulls up the orders to be done today, so Rob sits down to manually put it together. Over a hundred today. Great. Two trainees in that department, and an inundation of update requests. "I can manage it," thinks Rob. Of course, he has to, it's his job description. Rob is...
THE MANAGER
The two trainees are ready to fly solo, though, so breaking the orders up, it will only be twenty four a piece for the four old-timers, and a handful of easy ones for the trainees. That will please the rabble.
6:45 AM, Chaos has already been unleashed
The shiny new black phones are beginning to remind Rob of some sort of Lovecraftian Tentacled Beast of Doom. This is not a good thing. The genius in the IT Department (a department that Rob is just POSITIVE had its first two letters dropped off) just dropped off the Lovecraftian Tentacled Beasts of Doom, and didn't find himself arsed to actually set the fuckers up. Swell. Rob's people are starting to file in. They're coming in early, because Thursday was a busy day and they want to get their work caught up. Good little drones. Except, and here's the rub, they have to use phones to do their jobs. They don't have phones anymore. They have Lovecraftian Tentacled Beasts of Doom.
Crisis mode. Rob is starting to feel alive for the first time in the day. He calls the Help Desk. He thinks, most of the time, it should be called the No Help Desk. Luckily, this is an off day, and an actual helpful person picks up the line.
Rob: I need these phones set up.
Actual Helpful Person: What phones?
Rob: The new phones that your genius didn't set up.
Actual Helpful Person: New phones?
Rob: New phones. Don't work. Rob smash.
AHP: Please don't smash the new phones, Rob.
Rob: Rob angry. Rob smash.
AHP: We just need to put some software on the computers.
Rob: How this make puny phones work?
AHP: Trust me.
"Okay, so these phones are kinda cool," thinks Rob. He doesn't tell the Help Desk clerk that, of course. That would be giving them ground, and Rob can't do that. But, now half an hour's been killed getting the new phones set up. The extra lead time to make up for the prior day has been soundly vanquished. Rob goes to buy a muffin. Blueberry. Mmmm. Warm.
7:30AM, Rob tries to eat his muffin
Rob gets a call from his employee in Ohio. She doesn't have a phone yet, she tells him. Obviously, she is telepathically submitting this message to Rob. You go, girl. Rob is beginning to sorely detest the Phone Guy. The Phone Guy is Rob's bane in existence. Rob puts Phone Situation Number Two on his list. Rob decides to make one person from T Department responsible for all email requests. The workflow is instantly sped up by this decision.
Employee 2 From T Department: Are you going to send us our list, Rob?
Rob: GET OFF MY BACK, I'M TRYING TO EAT MY FUCKING MUFFIN!
E2FTD: Eat your fucking muffin after you send us the list, please.
Rob likes E2FTD. He's going to promote her next week, he decides. Good ol' gal. Rob finishes up the list and shoots it off to E2FTD, and then sets in to eat his muffin. Rob's boss pokes his head into Rob's office, as the muffin is about half consumed. "Girl in Ohio no phone. T Department fucked by phone guy too. Puny spreadsheet still no work. Rob want muffin. Argh." Rob's boss smiles and walks back out. Rob likes his boss, he lets Rob do things Rob's way. Rob finishes his muffin.
8:00AM, the rest of the employees arrive
E2FTD alerts Rob to the fact that the two new employees have defective worksheets. Another macro that doesn't want to work. Rob thinks they should be called micro's. Rob has to call the president of the company to come down and fix them. Why does Rob have to do this? Because the --IT department can't be arsed to, of course. Rob decides this will also be a good time to corner the Prez over some Accounts Payable situations that have arisen in the last two hours, in between crises. Rob and the Prez both decide that they have no idea how to fix the AP problem, but the Prez does fix up the two new computers. The crowd rejoiced. Yay.
Rob greets the rest of his employees. He makes a point to walk from desk to desk every morning and talk with each person about how they are doing. One's son quit his job. One's planning to go salsa dancing tonight. One got a new dog. One just nods and says he's doing fine. One is excited for a concert next week. One may come play poker at Rob's friend's house on Saturday. One didn't do much last night. One did a whole lot last night.
A compatriot from a sister company stops by to talk with Rob about XML. Rob knows a little bit more than the average man about XML, but not, alas, enough to help the compatriot. During this discussion, Rob's computer crashes, losing the report he was putting together. Oh, bother.
Somewhere along the line, Rob enters a time warp and it is all of a sudden a quarter to eleven. Rob goes to talk to the Accounting Department about the AP problem. Rob comes out of that talk even more confused. It shouldn't be this hard to print fucking checks. Rob is now hungry. Cheesey potatoes and broccoli. Weight Watchers brand, because Rob is trying to regain his girlish figure.
Rob pencils a page of his graphic novel during his lunch break. Said lunch break is only disturbed twice by minor emergencies.
The afternoon, of course, is quite dead. Rob mostly walks around, seeing if anyone needs help. They don't. It's a helpless situation. Rob decides to type up a story in third person about his day.
Posted by Schamberger at 02:34 PM
September 05, 2006
State of the Rob
The back of my neck is sunburnt and has made it up to the mildly annoying level, as my shirt collar rubs against it. Said sunburn was acquired this past weekend during the annual Schamberger Open out in Western Kansas, where most of the Schambergers reside. The tournament was fun, mainly because none of us actually know how to play the damn game. My twelve year old brother AJ took the trophy for the second year in a row.
It was more subdued this year than last, mostly because there are quite a bit less of us drinking. Most of the time was spent comparing our heart conditions, which made me feel about sixty years older than I actually am. The drought has been really hard on the farmers this year. Third worst in recorded history, actually. My Uncle Earl lost his entire corn crop in the matter of a couple days. Yikes.
Back to the day job today, where I've got three new employees starting. One of them is in Ohio, which is equal parts frightening and exciting. I now have more people working for me than were in the whole company when I first started with them. I've got two departments under me, with a possible third in the works. I'm getting moved into a new office in the next week, which will be the twentieth time I've moved since starting with them three and a quarter years ago. I keep a Post-It note with tally marks on it by my name tag, as I've become a bit of a legend with that around these parts.
I only got three pages of Black Chamber done last week. Equal parts of extra hours at the Day Job, creative dissatisfaction, preparing for September's Day Job gallery (which had a great response, as always), and the holiday weekend all contributed to this. I pencilled up a page last night, though, and will do another during lunch today. So, two more done tonight, at the least. Back in the saddle.
Bought Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbie's 'Lost Girls' last Wednesday, but haven't read a word of it yet. Argh. I need more hours in my day. I'm overall behind on the amount of books I need to read this year. There's a new Dennis Lehane out that I should be able to breeze through, then I'll read some more Chandler, which is always fast-going. Hitchcock/Truffault is just one of those books you have to take your time with, I've found.
Watched the first season of The West Wing last week. Great show. What season is Sorkin's last? Is it still somewhat as good after he leaves? He seems kind of goofy in his interviews. David Milch comes off as nervous until he starts really talking, but Aaron Sorkin just seems like someone I would make fun of in person, but still respect. Of course, I can't really talk, as I have crippling stage fright and would just be a blubbering idiot on screen. Sorkin and Milch get a lot of respect from me, though.
I need more hours in my day. I'll put some art up from BC tonight.
Posted by Schamberger at 09:54 AM
August 20, 2006
My Apartment
I thought about going with a title like 'Back to the Lab', 'Crib', or 'State of the Pad', but all sounded equally lame. Thought it'd be fun to show where I do most all of my work, and talk over how I'm planning to change it up.
Here's what'cha see once you walk in the front door:
Yes, I take the term 'Living Room' to heart. I do my drawing on the floor there in front of the tube, watching DVD's while I work (right now it's season four of NYPD Blue). I'm planning to get rid of the couch against the wall there in the next week (just need a hand hauling it to the dumpster, but I've got someone lined up for that), and then moving my drafting table in. Seems to make more sense.
I hung up those tree paintings along the wall, to nice effect:
Lord, I hate that couch. About as much as the cat sitting on it hates my mom.
Here's three Black Chamber pages, laying out on the floor, so that I can be sure to keep myself consistent while working on the latest:
Down in the left corner there are the four issues of Batman: Black and White that I read over again last night. Damn, that was a great miniseries!
Anyway.
Here's my bedroom, where across from the bed I set up a small couch:
On weekend mornings, I'll lay there and do some reading while drinking tea. Just a great, relaxing way to start off the day. I'm still working through Hitchcock/Truffault, but this morning I also read Gilbert Hernandez' 'Sloth', which goes right up there with Rick Veitch's 'Can't Get No' as the best graphic novels I've read so far this year.
Moving on into the office, here's a nice view of the whole room:
The computer desk is obviously a hub of activity, as the over-run appearance can attest to. You can also see that the drawing table has become nothing more than an overglorified shelf. I really need to actually put that thing to use!
Here's my graphic novel bookcases:
I've no idea how many GN's I've got. I do know that except for two, I've read them all, though.
Here's my other bookshelf, made by my stepfather Roger from my old waterbed:
As much as I hate my couch, my old waterbed will forever be my most hated piece of furniture ever. The bookshelf it's evolved into, though, is very much beloved. You can also see my leaning tower of Pisa comics boxes to the right there. I really need to build some shelves for them one of these years.
Now get the hell out of my apartment. I've got work to do!
Posted by Schamberger at 03:44 PM
August 01, 2006
Why I Love Being on the Internet, Reasons 374 and 375
After congratulating Dan Goldman on his and Anthony Lappe's very, very excellent Shooting War getting picked up by Warner Books, Dan gave me a really damned cool response:
"I've been to your site quite a few times over the last year or so... you're a pretty talented little fucker yerself. Looking forward to your OGN..."
He thinks I'm little! The diet/workout regime's working after all!
Then, today, I got this super cool email:
"Hello Rob
I am Paul Schamberger and I live with my wife Wendy in Johannesburg. Where are you? I work part-time as a sub-editor on a business newspaper and have also written a history book about the Second World War. My later father was August Schamberger, born in Bavaria in 1910, the son of Johann and Rosa Schamberger. Dad grew up in Switzerland and came to southern Africa in 1936. I am currently writing up his memoirs.
Kind regards
Paul"
Wow, how neat. I knew being the number one search engine result for "Schamberger" would pay off some day. Other than being my sole claim to fame at the annual Schamberger Golf Classic. It's pretty awesome, finding other creative folks with my same last name. My dad's family are mostly working type people, but sometimes folks like me pop up. My cousin Blake runs Irezumi tattoo here in KC, for instance. I know there's a fairly famous photographer Rick Schamberger somewhere in the Southeast US. There's a Dr Rob Schamberger out there, too:
Dashing fellow. Actually, he's reason number 376, I guess.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:53 PM
July 31, 2006
This Thursday
Be sure to check out the Previews section in The Star, for myself and Duane "I Look Just Like Rob Thomas" Cunningham will have our internationally acclaimed Band on the Sun featured for the month.
This one's got it all! Brazillian camel biker gangs! Robot Cowboys and Robot Indians working in harmony! Vandalism! A pig dressed up like Rambo riding on a flatbed truck throwing up the Shocker! Mopeds! That dwarf from High Plains Drifter! Rick James as a bartender, bitch! Duane whipping Asian people! Boobies! We's got's it all, muthafucka!
Seriously, this strip is sure to guarantee that neither Duane nor I ever get work again in The Star! It's that fucking rotten!
You can't fucking wait, can you!?! The Hoff can't wait!
Posted by Schamberger at 08:59 AM
July 28, 2006
My Miami Vice Dream
I guess I must be excited about going to see the new Miami Vice movie, because I had this cuh-razy dream about it last night. This is my actual dream:
So, it starts with me going to the movie, but then in one of those wacky Last Action Hero moments, I'm suddenly IN the movie, as the villain. I keep getting bugged by this massive handlebar mustache that I have for some reason (I'm reading Hitchcock/Truffaut right now, and there was this bit where Hitch was talking about the old silent movies and how the dastard always had the big mustache, so that's probably where that came from).
Anyway, the plot is that there's a hit out on Sonny Burnett, the undercover identity of James "Sonny" Crockett (a dangling plot thread from the second season, where a drug lord discovered that they were one and the same, and had a standing contract out on him). There's two actors cast for the movie who look somewhat like Don Johnson and Phillip Michael Thomas, playing these roles. The dude playing Thomas really bugged the fuck out of me, because he was overacting in his portrayal of the overacting Thomas. The swerve is that it's Farrell and Fox who come in to play the undercover roles of Crockett (Burnett) and Tubbs (whose undercover name I can't remember, and apparently the internet doesn't care (Sonny Crockett has his own Wikipedia entry, but Tubbs doesn't (because he's a loser)))(Okay, a little more digging found that it was Rico Cooper (still a loser)).
So, I'm sitting in the theater, wondering when the hell Farrell and Fox are going to come into the film, because obviously the real Crockett and Tubbs are going to get whacked, when all of a sudden, I'm standing in a shopping mall, holding a gun, and I see Sonny Crockett walking by, and I straight blow his head off. Edward James Olmos, reprising his role as Castillo, but now sporting an eyepatch (Yahr!), comes up on me and we've got ourselves a standoff. Then, the real Tubbs shows up, and we're in a Mexican Standoff (Wee Ooo Wee Ooo Wah Wah WAH!), because all of a sudden Tubbs turns evil and he's trying to help me escape.
Out of nowhere, some teenage girl in hotpants and nothing else (because it's Miami, and hey, it's my dream) goes walking by, and I grab her (guess where) and hold her hostage. So, we back our way out of the mall and into the parking lot, and get into her SUV, which for some reason is loaded up with bulletproof vests. I keep asking her if she's over eighteen, because even in my dreams I don't want to be a pedophile. We start driving, and I cover myself up with the vests, and ask her, "Why the hell do you have all of these bulletproof vests?"
Then she pulls over, gets out (I can't stop her because of all the vests on top of me), and says, "Because I'm a cop." Bitch! Then she takes off running, shoots at me once, and I shoot back at her and miss. Obviously, she was kinda dumb, because I was covered up in vests.
So then, we cut scene to the garage from the house I grew up in, which was a seperate building from the rest of the house. I'm in there with Tubbs, and we're having a standoff with the cops. For some reason, they're not just tossing in some flash grenades and storming us, because, you know, this is a dream and not reality.
Then, I guess this became a bi-coastal operation, because in walks Eddie Murphy as Axel Foley, Beverly Hills Cop. So, I beat him up and kick him back out. Finally, Tubbs and I (even when he's a dramatic cop gone bad, he's still a sidekick (loser)) decide to give up, and go walking out of the garage. Through some sort of dream logic, we walk into the living room of the house I grew up in, rather than just the outside, and laying on the couch, acting as if he's a bum under a bunch of trash, pops up Axel Foley again.
He's got me down on the ground cuffing me, and all of a sudden we're not in the living room anymore but back outside, and I say, "Way to go, Eddie Murphy!"
And he says back, "What's that, motherfucker?"
"I said, way to go, Eddie Murphy!"
He gets pissed, and I feel him sticking his hand in my pocket (don't go there), and he says "Oh, looks like our guy's got some drugs on him!" As if being a cop killer wouldn't put me in jail for long enough!
But! Apparently Castillo is hiding on the roof of the house with a sniper rifle (the second season revealed that he's actually some covert operative whose been given a new ID, after all, I shit you not), and spots Foley planting the drugs on me, and kills Foley.
Then I wake up. Oh! My dream was scored by Jan Hammer, to boot.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:56 PM
July 24, 2006
Poisoned
Well, Poison Ivy, that is. Woke up this morning to discover myself covered in the shit. Argh! I haven't had it since 2002, when I got it between my toes (miserable!), so I guess I was due. So! Off to the doctor's today (I'm really sick of going to the doctor's office) to get some 'roids, so that not only will the ivy go away, but my testicles as well.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:52 AM
July 17, 2006
Busy Busy Busy
* Finished watching The Wonder Years. Great show.
* Finished watching the second season of Miami Vice. Not a great show (first season was great, though).
* I've got a few more to do for that pulp series. Definitely the Whateley brothers and Conan. Any suggestions?
* Met with a client last night about some web design work. That'll probably eat up most of my time for the coming week.
* Sent the final script for Duane and I's run on The Star over to him. This will pull back the curtain a bit and show our working process. Oh, and it'll show boobies, too.
* D and I are talking about doing a monthly with BotS. I think it's doable. I just need to sit down and write 'er up.
* Finished up the first draft of something for a start-up business my mom and I are starting. Yes, I figured the best thing I could do for my weak heart was to start a THIRD career. Honestly, though, I'm excited about it.
* Day job's going well right now. A lot of interesting things are falling into place.
* The new Alexi Murdoch album is fantastic. Seriously.
* That's about it.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:05 AM
July 05, 2006
Latest Happenings
* I feel old, but not in a bad way.
* My mom wrote a letter to The Star and they published it yesterday. It's about her favorite topic, which would of course be me.
* Speaking of, I got word yesterday that Duane Cunningham and I's 'Band on the Sun' will be in there through the month of August. Looks like I need to write up an extra script, huh D? Five Thursdays! Y'all are not going to BELIEVE how wild this one's going to get!
* I'd like to write and draw a month for The Star on my own. Maybe something along the lines of 'Secret Agent X-9' or 'Steve Canyon'. That'd be fun.
* Mom got me the complete series of 'The Wonder Years'. Damn it, I love that show.
* I like the current color scheme on 'Reckon'.
* Read Rick Veitch's 'Can't Get No' Saturday morning, and it was a spectacular experience. Highly recommended. J, remind me to loan you this one.
* Picked up the complete collection of Raymond Chandler's short stories (Yay!) and Truffaut's 'Hitchcock'. Good, good reading in my near future, once I finish up Chandler's 'The Little Sister', which is so far fantastic, as I'd expect. I've also got Michael Lark's graphic novel adaptation of 'Sister', which I think I'll have to read again once I finish up the novel.
* Got the results back from my doc. Apparently I have an extra heartbeat, which on its own is not a bad thing, until those extra beats start doubling up in succession, and that's where the problems come from. They put me on a medicine which should regulate that, which I only need to take for a week (good, because I just hate the idea of forever taking pills), and then I should be fine. Of course, the whole thing was triggered by the extreme stress of the first couple weeks of June, so I just need to keep that in mind. Really, it's making me redouble my efforts towards getting my art career off the ground (I guess it is off the ground, though, isn't it? Just on a rickety hang glider). I'm going to accomplish the things that I want to in my life, and I'm taking no chances with that anymore. Some people cower when faced with their mortality. I thrive.
* Another page of 'Reckon' goes up tonight.
* I'll have four new pieces up tomorrow night, including the first landscape watercolor I've done since high school.
* Been watching the first season of 'Justice League'. I dig.
* Picked up three new albums: the new Oakenfold, the new live Fatboy Slim, and a live Queen album. The Queen stuff rocks more than I expected it to. The Oakenfold album, where I expected it to be his normal Trance stuff, is instead a mostly Breakbeat album. The Fatboy Slim album, where I expected it to be his normal Acid House stuff, is instead a mostly Trance/Happy House album. Up is down! Black is white! My expectations are shattered!
* Time to get to looking like I'm actually working.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:31 AM
June 29, 2006
Back Online
FINALLY! got it taken care of. Three days can seem like a fucking ETERNITY offline. Jee-Hezus! Expect lotsa lotsa content over the next couple o' days, including: The Director's Cut of my Superman Strip!
Posted by Schamberger at 03:04 PM
Go Check Out Today's Preview
It has my Superman strip in it, which I'm pretty proud of. I think it turned out pretty cool. The section also has the last Scotty Skyrocket in it. I don't really have any thoughts I'd like to share publicly with how that turned out. I may put up the strips alongside the scripts I had written originally with notations, and let y'all decide how that shook out.
Band on the Sun should be coming up soon in there, I think. Maybe August. I don't really know.
God damn it I wish my internet were working at home.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:37 AM
June 27, 2006
Offline-ish
My SBC's acting up, preventing me from connecting at home or even checking email remotely. It should be resolved soon. So, I'm not ignoring you. Unless I am.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:23 PM
June 23, 2006
Life and Times of a Lifetime Fan
J put up a great post yesterday about how this is the 20 year anniversary of The Beastie Boys' debut rap album, 'Licensed to Ill', which of course inspired me to make my own:
I remember hearing the album when it came out. My stepbrothers from my dad's second failed marriage were into whatever was hot at the time in music, so I got to listen to most everything of the time. If we weren't jamming out to Def Leppard or Iron Maiden, we were bouncin' to the B-Boys, Run DMC or The Fat Boys. I also remember trying to get my mom to buy the tape for me at one point, but she read the names of the songs and decided to buy me a Weird Al tape instead. I wonder which song title steered her away?
1. Rhymin' & Stealin'
2. The New Style
3. She's Crafty
4. Posse in Effect
5. Slow Ride
6. Girls
7. (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party)
8. No Sleep Till Brooklyn
9. Paul Revere
10. Hold It Now, Hit It
11. Brass Monkey
12. Slow and Low
13. Time to Get Ill
Mom, read those over again and lemme know, OK?
So, anyway, after the buzz of the album wore off, I didn't really think of them again until an 8th grade lip-synching competition, when three of my buds did "So What'Cha Want" and tore the house down. I was like, "Hey, I remember that song from Beavis and Butthead. Huh Huh, Cool." Then I didn't really think of them again until the next year, when Ill Communication dropped like a bomb on everyone's ears.
A friend and I were walking around Lees Summit, probably going to the comic shop, and he said, "Dude, I know what CD I want to get next."
"Cool, yo, which one?"
"Three Communication, man."
"I haven't heard of that, dude."
"With, uh, with that Sabotage song, Rob. IIIIIIII can't stand it! You know!"
"..."
"Shit's tight."
"..."
"You haven't heard it?"
"Ill, man."
"You not feeling good?"
"Ill Communication, genius."
"...Whatever. Shit's awesome."
And it was, indeed, awesome. But I wouldn't actually hear it for another three or so years. See, I was a rocker back then. I was totally into the Grunge scene, as well as the stadium rock stuff of Metallica. I needed my wailing guitars and angst-ridden fashion.
Fast forward to 1997, and I'm gainfully employed at Pappi's Pizza and Pub in Lees Summit (a job I quit five times altogether, but that's another legendary tale). I'm also a Senior in high school, with, I don't know how I managed it, but all art classes. I'm going through this phase (that I'm still in, really), of hunting down all of the creators who were 'first' in their field, or there at the beginning. So, after a while, I pick up 'Licensed to Ill', when I get to rap, and it blows my mind, man. "How the hell did I miss out on this all these years! Shit!"
So, anyway, Pappi's. That job introduced me to every vice I'd ever seen Crockett and Tubbs bust up in Miami. Drinking, drugs, sex, all the good shit in life. I was having a blast! But, it also turns out almost all of my coworkers were also B-Boy fans, so we'd all be busting out rhymes all night long, changing the names so we were singing about ourselves instead of MCA, Mike D, and Adrock. I was, of course, AdRob.
I did a mixed-media painting of The Beasties in-between projects at school (I always finished before everyone else, because, obviously, I had All Freaking Day to work on the stuff) on a lark, and then on another lark, entered it into my portion of the Senior Show exhibition. I'd won a few awards over the last year, but nothing really special. Seeing where I'm going with this? One of my buddies and I cut class to go check out the show, now that the judging was complete (At the time, I'd thought it strange my teacher OK'ed us going, and thought it even stranger the grin on his face). So, my buddy and I walk in and Lo and Behold, there's a gigantic purple ribbon hanging off my painting. Best of Show! Get outta town!
So, a few months later, and the new album is about to drop, 'Hello, Nasty'. There was a record store in Independence that was having a midnight opening to sell it, and I was god damned excited for this. Most excited I've ever been for an album, EVER. My friend Chris and I made it from my house in Lees Summit to the store on Noland Road in, I shit you not, five minutes. The gods favored me that night, I guess. We get there, and there's a line wrapped around the building. Ah, well, it was a party, man, I could wait a few extra minutes. The staff there was doing a good job of keeping the line moving, and we get inside to discover that they had hired a stripper to dance on the counter while they sold albums. Rad!
We get our copies, pop the fuckers into the radio, and drive around town just bumpin' to the awesome sounds. Great. Fucking. Album. I still listen to it all the time. My best time listening to it, though, was a few weeks later when, for my graduation present, my mom got me a trip to Chicago for the big comicon. There I was, 18 years old, walking around this awesome foot traffic metropolis, playing 'Hello Nasty' in my walkman. It was the soundtrack for my amazing experience in that trip. Every time I listen to it, I get amazing flashbacks of riding the El, walking around the city, and feeling so...Alive.
Then I came back to town, and my buddy Chris had bought me a ticket to their concert as a birthday present. Sweet action. We drove around the parking lot of Kemper waving Wiffle Ball bats around, pumping the bass for 'Paul Revere'. Best. Show. Ever. Seriously, I've never been to a better concert.
Flash forward a few more years, and I'd become a legal dumbass, having been in jail a couple times over some stupid traffic bullshit that was my own fault, and I'd taken the day off work to pick up the new album, 'To The Five Boroughs', as well as to make sure my mom got her bail money back by taking care of the last of that nonsense. The album wasn't great, to me, but still better than most other music, and hearing the new beats and rhymes from my boys put me back to those great memories of days gone by:
*Six years old, loving the xylophone of 'Girls', and trying to do it on glasses of water with my now deceased stepbrothers.
*Fourteen years old, wandering around the city of my childhood with a good friend long since moved away, talking music and comics and girls and art and becoming my own voice, my own man, but being so free and happy for a short while.
*Seventeen years old, driving around in the car of my two years since decased grandfather, listening to cassettes of B-Boys music.
*Still seventeen years old, smoking a joint with some friends who I haven't talked to since I moved away, pondering on what the lyrics in 'Paul's Boutique' really meant.
*Eighteen years old in Chicago.
*Eighteen years old, getting drunk on shots of Sex on the Beach with one of my employees from the gas station, rapping along with 'Paul's Boutique'.
*Nineteen years old, having just stolen some beer from said gas station which I had quit, speeding away with two friends, screaming to 'Sabotage'.
*Twenty One years old, having had an all-night drinkfest with my good friend Tom Denzer, listening to their instrumental album, 'The In Sound From Way Out', having had probably the longest and best conversation of my life.
*Twenty Four years old, my now ex-girlfriend moving out. I decide instead of being all depressed, I'm going to keep my head up and just have some fun. 'The Sounds of Science' is in constant rotation during this time.
*Twenty Five years old, and my eleven year old brother tells me that the B-Boys are his favorite group. Good taste, little man. I burn off all of their albums for him. The look on his face was just...awesome. I'm betting it was a mirror image of when I bought 'Hello, Nasty' lo those many years ago in Independence.
Full circle. Unbroken circle. Soundtrack of my life.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:26 AM
June 13, 2006
Drained
Well, the big-ass project at the day job is now done, at least for my aspect of it. I worked over a thousand property history reports in the last fourteen days, single-handed, working every day including weekends and not taking lunch breaks.
Ugh.
Glad it's over, but definitely looking forward to the nice overtime pay.
So. I'll be catching things up here on the site over the next week or so, and then we'll be back to normal-ish.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:06 PM
June 04, 2006
Lack of Post-age (and a super big secret revealed)
The day job's gotten insanely busy over the last week, and will continue to be for the next week or so. Like, sixty hour work-week busy, with weekends being worked as well. Three syllable cuh-ra-zy. SO! That means I can't dick around at work and post here, nor can I dick around at home because I'm going to be really busy with several commissions, and, like, sleeping, or something. And watching the first season of Miami Vice on DVD.
Now, big revelation time...
...my secret project I've been alluding to for the past couple weeks?
It is...
Superman. For The Star. To promote the new movie (you've heard about that little film, right?). Super. Man.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:08 PM
May 31, 2006
Boy, things move fast, don't they?
Looks like I got the gig. More soon. (thanks, j!)
Posted by Schamberger at 08:04 PM
May 25, 2006
Mystery Solved!
Responding to an inquiry my mom made, I discovered that, yes, the George Washington statue IS still there. If the illustration was correct, though, I think the statue's been moved. He's now facing East away from Union Station, and quite a bit further East on the other side of the park. Oh, and these pictures don't do it justice. This is a MAJESTIC statue.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:30 PM
May 22, 2006
Yet Another Reason Why PETA Are A Bunch Of Flaming Idiots
I cry bullshit! I'M THE WORLD'S SEXIEST VEGETARIAN! NOT MOTHERFUCKING PRINCE!
Posted by Schamberger at 03:38 PM
May 18, 2006
Best News...Ever?
Just got off the phone with someone who gave me a super opportunity, that's honestly one of my dreams come true. More on that soon, as things get finalized.
I am so freaking excited, folks.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:22 PM
May 17, 2006
Back On Top
Posted by Schamberger at 01:59 PM
May 15, 2006
My Travels To SPACE
So, starting at the ass crack of dawn, eight brave souls set out on an epic journey to...SPACE! Which is in...OHIO! The birthplace of...AVIATION!
Myself, Duane Cunningham, his wench, Happy Mad Hawkins, Shaun Gray, Kyle Strahm, and Josh and Eve from...ICECREAMLANDIA! all made the journey. We set out at 7:30 in the AM, with Kyle and the Ice Cream People riding with me, for a twelve hour travel to beautiful Columbus...OHIO! Along the way, we stopped for lunch at a place called Blue Springs and had a...MILE HIGH PIE! which was actually more of a quarter mile of meringue, but hey.
Once in town, I bought a twelve pack and took the edge off, causing myself to wake up under the weight of an elephant sized...HANGOVER! We got lost a lot driving around town, first going to the show, and then Happy Mad and I decided to decorate up our table by stealing, er...borrowing a bedspread from our hotel and using it as decoration, putting a pillow at the end of the table. That got the people to come to the table, but it was Happy Mad, Duane and I's cuh-razy selling skills that made us nearly sell out of all of our...COMIC BOOKS!
By the end of the day I was waving our fat wad of...CASH! around in peoples' faces, letting them know that, yes, we made more money than they did! HA HA, fuckers! Eat that! We were doing a 'fire sale' offering all of our books for five bucks a set, and that shit just...SOLD! Best deal on the floor, hands down! MONEY!
After that, we used our fat payroll to buy dinner at a fancy Eye-talian ristorante that gave us huge-looking 32 ounce beers. We started having some fun personal bashing of each others' personalities, resulting in me hollaring at several members of the group in the parking lot, rousing attention from the locals, along the lines of, "Well, in Whineyville, USA, all of our waitresses have HUGE TITS AND IT'S ALRIGHT TO STARE AT THEM! I FUCKING HATE YOU ALL!" Man, that was some great beer.
Then, Sunday, we drove back. And got fudge from a place called 'Ozarkland', where I made fun of the girls behind the counter for being...PROFESSIONAL FUDGEPACKERS!
Good times, good times.
Posted by Schamberger at 04:23 PM
May 12, 2006
Off to SPACE
Hey gang,
I'll be gone until Sunday night, travelling to and from SPACE.
Behave. Or Klaatu will make you his prison bitch.
In the meantime, be sure to check back this weekend, as something special and very limited-edition will be popping up, and then going away again Monday morning.
Peace. Or else.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:25 AM
April 22, 2006
Why Being a Comix Writer Totally Rawks, Reason #765
Because I get to write things like this:
BAND ON THE SUN
PAGING JACK SOLARA! PART THE FIRST
PANEL ONE: Full-width panel of Jack on a motorcycle with a biker gang of anthropomorphic camels dressed like stereotypical Mexicans. I totally just wrote that sentence. Have at least one of them driving while drinking from a bottle of tequila, and another one with those cross-straps with all the bullets in them.
DIALOGUE BOX: MEANWHILE, JACK SOLARA IS RETURNING FROM A MONTH-LONG BENDER IN MEXICO WITH A GANG OF VENEZUELAN CAMEL BIKERS.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:22 PM
April 21, 2006
Wouldn't You Feel the Breeze or Something?
So, I go to Borders last night to pick up a CD, and as I'm leaving, I hold the door open for someone to come in, and the guy looks up in my direction and says, "You're dick's out."
I'm thrown by this for a second, and mutter out a standard, "Huh?"
The guy nudges with his head to look behind me, and says, "No, him."
I turn around and there's some old man fumbling to get his junk back in his pants. No joke.
I bolt, man. My mom genetically cursed me with being a 'Weird Magnet' just like she is, and I've learned over the years to put as much physical distance as possible between myself and these situations. I Dukes of Hazzard it into my car and get the fuck out of Dodge.
...Seriously, how could you not know?
Posted by Schamberger at 06:27 AM
April 18, 2006
My buddy Buddy
Praise be to the Internet. Blessed be thy name.
Okay, time for a Rob Schamberger History Lesson, y'all:
8th Grade, I was the fat dorky kid sitting at the back of the class doodling superheroes in the margins of his notebook paper, trying not to be noticed but desperately wanting to be. Yeah, not a lot's changed. Well, I'm not as fat, at least.
But! My love for my craft, even at that age, was fucking contagious. At age 13 I'd already completed about ten full comix, and when someone's that passionate about something, others start to take notice. My art teacher at the time, Mr Klausing, was so impressed, he actually started up a comic book drawing club, hoping others would be as inspired. It was there that I met my good friend, Buddy Hanson.
We hit it off, right away. We were at each others' houses every weekend, drawing like two pubescent madmen, creating all sort of crazy and amazing stories and concepts. It wasn't unusual for the two of us to produce a complete, fully-colored comic in the course of two days. We worked a lot like I later found out Kirby and Simon did, drawing on each others' pages, helping each other out on weak points, and having a god damned blast.
But, over time, and for various reasons, we went our separate ways, and Buddy moved away a couple years later to Chicago. We lost touch, and hadn't talked since '98 or so. Well, imagine my total delight last week when I got an email from him, after he discovered this here internet site while searching for my name.
We got on the phone a couple nights later and talked for a good three hours. It was like we didn't miss a damned beat. Good, good times. We're already talking about sharing a table at WizardWorld Chicago, seeing each other for the first time in about nine years as well. Can't. Wait.
Anyway, here's the last few pages we did together. I think we were both 14 at this point. Not bad. Not bad at all:
Posted by Schamberger at 08:36 PM
April 14, 2006
To Do This Weekend:
Letter the first twenty or so pages of Black Chamber and put together the next Rob Schamberger Makes Comix (no, seriously)
Talk with Sullivan about the last page of Scotty Skyrocket
Write Band on the Sun for Duane for our trip to SPACE (maybe do a pitch for The Star, too...)
Put up next page or two of Reckon
Go on Boulevard Brewery tour for Andy's birthday Saturday
Breathe
Posted by Schamberger at 07:48 AM
March 29, 2006
Rasslin'!
The Smackdown show last night was all-cap's F U N ! We were friggin' close to the stage, like, you could see the sweat on the guys. We were maybe 20 rows back, and at an elevation just above the ropes, so we got to see it all. My little bro AJ had a damn blast, really getting into it, screaming at the heels and cheering for the faces (though I had to correct him a couple times on who's who). The crowd was hot, really staying excited the whole time, making for a really neat environment. Everybody was talking to everyone else about the show.
And seeing The Undertaker live?
Worth every penny.
Watch the show Friday night, and look for a bright green five-person sign saying either "We Love To Fight" or "We Love 6 1 9" (which we altered a few times taking the '1' out). That's us, having a blast.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:32 AM
March 21, 2006
Great News
Scotty Skyrocket has been pushed back until May (okay, that's not such good news), but now we're going to run for two (!) months, with the second month being, drum roll please, IN FULL COLOR! This cool gig keeps getting cooler all the time.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:03 PM
March 19, 2006
My Cousin Sarah
From an email that my cousin Cindy sent out:
Hi All,
What started out as a project for an eBusiness class turned into a labor of love, for my daughter and for the families with children who have had vaccine reactions. The hope is that by sharing this information, it may help others understand the risks involved with vaccines and find resources for assistance.
Here is the website www.sarahsstory.freehomepage.com
Please feel free to forward to others who may be interested or may benefit from this information.
Thanks,
Cindy
Posted by Schamberger at 06:26 PM
Weekend
Friday night, I got together with Mike to check out the final(ish) pages of Scotty Skyrocket. Holy shit, y'all, this is going to be so damned cool. Yes, I'm a walking talking hype machine, but I'm being for-real on this. I haven't been this excited about a collaboration since The Believer.
Now, we need to do the porno sequel, Scotty Cockrocket, and we'll go down in the annals of history right next to Flesh Gordon, Bonan the Barbarian, and The Cocketeer. They'll be selling the movie adaptation in a box with Barbarella. Mike, let's get on that, buddy.
Saturday, I went with Tommy D and his recently-released-from-jail buddy to see V For Vendetta. Eh, it's an alright movie. It seemed to be a little too fond of itself, really. Once again, I'll bring up the story most-attributed to Raymond Chandler, when asked about how the movie of The Big Sleep ruined his book, he walked over to his bookshelf, pulled his copy off, flipped through it, and said something along the lines of, "The book looks fine." The Big Sleep was, incidentally, a better adaptation than V, but that's just my personal opinion. It wasn't a waste of money, it just wasn't great. After that, we watched some rasslin', and then I came on home.
Today, I did some reading, some cleaning, had a couple brews with The Sasquatch, then some actual work. I (hopefully) finished up that website for my client, and did some drawing-for-fun, as you can see in the post below.
Hopefully, y'all have bought the nice black and white Showcase Collection of The House of Mystery. Gorgeous, gorgeous book, isn't it? Alex Toth, Gil Kane, Neal Adams, Berni Wrightson, Joe Orlando, Tony Dezuniga and the incomparable Sergio Araganes, all in stunning black and white. 552 pages for 17 bucks? How can you NOT buy that? I mean, hell, the two Gil Kane stories are inked by Wally By God Wood!
Back to the day job tomorrow. Lots of stuff developing there. I've just taken over an additional department, plus we're short on help, so things have been a little hectic, to be sure. I'm also developing some software for them that'll be just wicked cool once it's done, that'll make our already cutting-edge company the leader by a mile. The other day, the big boss told me that I'm "the man". So, I'm like that commercial where I can't say that I'm 'sticking it to the man' anymore. C'est la vie.
So, enough about me, how have y'all been?
Posted by Schamberger at 06:01 PM
March 16, 2006
What I Did On My Non-Vacation
I can't draw comix worth a damn.
That's what's been on my mind of late. Yeah, I know it's not entirely true, but I feel I'm on the cusp of getting to where I think I may be good, so my body of work up to this point really just aggravates me.
Like, I totally hate Black Chamber at this point. It just looks like garbage to me. It doesn't look like something a publisher would want. But, I might also be going slowly insane. I'm about one productive weekend away from having it ready to be submitted, and I think I just need to do that, get it all done, and then either finish the book if it gets picked up, or just move on to my next OGN.
Comix have been depressing me lately. I think it all started with that big hub bub over the demise of the CCN (yeah, there, I said it again. The group's done, y'all, time to move on to the next iteration, a'ight?). So much negativity came out of that, man. It just...I don't know. I haven't felt right since.
Oh, and public scrutiny time: Both of my anthologies are officially shelved now. I just don't have the time, resources, or motivation to do them right now. Sorry to everyone who this affects. I suck.
This is feeling cathartic already.
I'm going to start doing sketchbook stuff again. A daily self-portrait, maybe, or just going to the park at lunch-time and sketching with ink. That sounds fun. I haven't drawn for fun in a month or two. I'll do my best to post the worthwhile stuff here.
I have a deep, inner passion to express myself through comix. I have things that I need to say to my society, and I plan to do it through this medium. Time to refocus my energies and get back to work on that.
Oh, speaking of, be sure to check out the Previews comix page starting next month, for Scotty Skyrocket. I'm writing, and the incomparable Mike Sullivan is illustrating, doing the best work, I feel, of his life. It's just straight-up all-cap's FUN. Explosions, damsels in distress, see-through spaceships, wacky aliens, bizzarre worlds, hoLosexuality, and a few punches to the face. I think y'all are going to have as much fun reading it as Mike and I did making it.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:44 PM
February 27, 2006
Update
Sorry for the lack of post-age lately, folks. I've been working through a case of the blah's, and I'm coming out of it now. Had a rough couple of weeks that were important enough that I frankly wasn't doing much art or anything else. I'm catching back up now, though.
And, of course, I can't show any of you any of the art I have been doing. I've been doing a lot of logo work for, and I know this sounds all hype-ish, multimillion dollar corporations. That's going really smooth. One finally got approved, and I'm having a meeting on Wednesday about another one. Once the final approvals are through, I should be able to share them here.
Black Chamber's frankly moving at a snail's pace, as I've had a real crisis of faith in my abilities. See, I'm totally learning as I go, and there's some stuff that's making me cringe now. I'm almost done coloring the first thirty-odd pages, though, then I'll need to letter them and start submitting around. Anyone want to help me get a pirate copy of Illustrator or CorelDraw? I'll hook you up, yo.
The dayjob's going miraculously well. I'm over four people now, and our order count keeps rising and rising. I also had a really good meeting with the big boss last week that helped me see things in perspective, and what his long-range plans for me are. I actually really like going into work, anymore.
I've got more illustration work on the horizon, too. One that may be pretty big. I just need to get in there and get it done. I'm also going to be designing all of the sales material for one of the companies that I'm doing their logo, as well. It's a pretty cool, fresh, innovative design that I think will do well for them.
Scotty Skyrocket with Mike Sullivan is going to just knock your socks off, folks. Mike and I have every intention of making a full book out of this concept, and I think it will just totally rock. This is Mike's best work EVER, and that's saying a lot. That's coming up in April in the Star, for those who don't remember.
I've lost ten pounds since the beginning of the year. I work out 5-6 times a week. Rahr.
I'm going to see Smackdown! with my 11 year old brother and a trio of Irish Catholics at the end of March. My brother doesn't know yet, so shhhhhh.
That's about it, I guess. End of the month post goes up tomorrow.
Posted by Schamberger at 04:26 PM
February 19, 2006
On February 18th 1952...
My mom was born.
The youngest of three, Delores McDonald, born to Robert and Helen McDonald, spent her childhood in Independence, MO, where she grew up next door to famed mass murderer/cult leader Jeff Lundgren, although that's not really her claim to fame (which would be giving birth to me, ha ha).
She got into the banking industry as soon as she was able to work, and has been in since, becoming one of the most respected and knowledgeable bankers in the Kansas City area. She has worked for a number of institutions, even at one time the now-infamous Home Savings, although she had nothing to do with that whole destroying the entire Savings and Loan industry. She did handle the White Water documents while working there, though, which led to an interesting time of us being tailed and tapped by the FBI.
In the 1970's she married Gerald Schamberger, who later left her in 1980, but not before getting her knocked up with yours truly. She then spent the next eighteen years selflessly devoted to raising me and giving me the best childhood that any brat could hope for. Those eighteen years were probably the hardest that she ever faced, but I like to think that they really paid off.
In 1996 she met Roger Clark through a personal ad she'd placed in the Kansas City Star, and in a whirlwind romance married him about a year later. In Roger she finally found the perfect mate, match, companion, husband, and friend. They have the most sickly sweet marriage I've seen outside of 1950's sitcoms, doing all sorts of cute things together. Things like running antique trains in Baldwin, KS or forming a country band together, or just staying home to watch sappy romance movies while petting their geriatric cats and Pomeranian named Banjo (who I named, by the way), surrounded by her dozens of exotic plants.
Mom's impacted just about every life she's run into, and I don't know how many of my friends have said the words, "Rob, your mom's just...cool."
Delores Clark: Banker, Musician, Friend, Wife, Daughter, Sister, Train Conductor, Mother.
The world's a better place for having you.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:37 PM
February 09, 2006
Feeling a bit off
Say something to me to cheer me up.
Posted by Schamberger at 05:00 AM
January 24, 2006
New Ride
Posted by Schamberger at 04:54 PM
January 21, 2006
Sunday Cancelled
Hey Gang,
Sorry to have to say that I'm going to have to cancel the deal tomorrow. My car finally gave up the ghost today, so I'm without traveling ability until Wednesday.
Sorry, yo.
Posted by Schamberger at 03:23 PM
January 20, 2006
The Invisible Man
Sorry for the lack of post-age over this week. I've actually been really active, but nothing that I can show here, between Black Chamber pages and a potentially big thing. I'm designing logos and sales material for my dayjob, which could maybe turn into a really good thing for me. They have a TON of sister companies that I may be able to do their work as well. Hopefully.
That's in addition to my increased workout regime, the dayjob being really slammed busy (moving desks, piss erupting from the floor, training a new employee, setting up new products, managing my other two employees, looking for a new employee, and researching to write some software -whew-), the stress of car shopping, and putting together the next Rob Schamberger Makes Comix anthology (I should have the new cover up this weekend and it should be on the stands by the first Wednesday of February). Plus, All-Star Superman came out, Infinite Crisis came out, and Frank was having a dollar sale where I got all of Dean Motter's Prisoner books, finished my collection of Thriller, and got the first issue of The Predator (gorgeous cover!). I'm also almost done reading The Big Sleep, which is just slam-bang awesome. The term "desk ashtray" just isn't in our lexicon anymore, y'know?
Don't forget, I'll be hanging at The Crave all Sunday for whoever wants to stop by and join in or shoot the shit.
Peace out, y'all.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:14 PM
January 16, 2006
Only Me
So, last Friday at the day job, yes, the 13th, there was a plumbing misadventure. I went into the bathroom and the urinal was just continuously flushing. This is pretty common there, so I shrug it off and walk back to my desk.
Where a fountain of urine is erupting from the floor. A piss geyser.
I go back into the bathroom, and the urinal's still flushing. I can't get it to stop. Someone else goes in and beats it until it finally does stop. The Black Gold coming from my floor finally stops at the same time. Coincidence? No, I don't think so.
Our maintenance guy comes down and looks at the giant puddle below my desk and tells me "It's not waste." Bullshit, I counter. That's piss. It smells like piss. Like warm frothy piss. Piss.
He brings down some white powder stuff that he says will clean the carpet. While he's down there scrubbing it in, he looks up at me and let's me know that, yes, it smells.
Duh.
He then tells me it's something I'm going to have to just live with. Uh uh. No, sir. Rob is not sitting on top of an open sewer that spews out the piss that I spewed into it. In the words of the immortal bard Carlito, "That's not cool."
I take it to management today (as they were all off Friday), and I'm told that, yes, sitting in a puddle of piss is indeed disgusting, and yes, they feel bad for me, and yeah, they'll definitely do something to remedy the situation.
I've been working at this company for three years today. Today I got moved for the 18th time. Eighteen. Average of six moves a year. I got moved from my nice office to a cube farm. Yee Haw!
Fuck, I really need to sell the movie rights for Black Chamber.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:26 PM
January 12, 2006
Mark Your Calendars...
...because Mike Sullivan and myself will have the Previews comix page in April!
Mike and I have a really cool story we're working up, that's most easily explained as a Buck Rogers written with a modern sensibility and injected with 1960's Marvel energy and dynamism.
Watch the skies, because Scotty Skyrocket is coming!
Art by Mr. Sullivan himself.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:22 PM
January 11, 2006
FUCK!
So, I need to decide on whether I'm going to dish out the 500 bucks to replace my radiator or get a new car and have monthly payments. Son of a bitch.
Posted by Schamberger at 12:27 PM
Coloring Is...
...a little more time-consuming than I'd originally thought it would be. Just a little, though. It's still pretty damned quick. I should have some pages to post up by Sunday for y'all to check out.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:39 AM
January 09, 2006
State of the Rob - 01/09/2006
Life is good right now. I've got a lot of stars aligning, and a lot of hard work paying off, which is creating this nice and pleasant atmosphere for me to inhabit.
My plan for last year really worked. I set up a solid foundation for myself to work from, and now I find myself thinking on what kind of structures I'm going to build on that foundation.
Black Chamber's a quarter of the way done now. I started coloring those pages last night, and I'm pretty damned excited. I look to get ten pages colored this week, and around three more pencilled/inked. Three pages a week is my minimum from here on out.
I had three people commission new art from me last Friday, because of that gallery thing I do at the day job. I never thought of myself as the type of painter that people would pay money to, but I guess I thought wrong. So, I'll have to change my mindset, I guess.
I saw 'Paper Moon' for the first time Saturday night. Well, the second half of it. I'm going to have to buy that sucker. Fantastic movie that didn't pull any punches. Talking to Mike Sullivan on the phone last night, he told me they filmed some of that in the town he grew up in. I know they also filmed around Hays, KS and St Joseph, MO. Also watched 'The French Connection' and 'Rocky' again. The Rocky movies make me cry every time. I don't know, they just connect with me in an insane personal way.
I need to start writing my next graphic novel soon. It's tentatively titled, egotistically enough, 'Rob'. It's the true autobiographical story of me being held up in two separate robberies (get the play on words for the title there?), and the emotional fallout from that. I'm hesitant to start writing it, because I know it'll bring up all of that stuff again, but I think I'm finally ready for it. If 'The Black Chamber' is my 'Licensed To Ill', 'Rob' will be my 'Paul's Boutique'. I've got a really cool storytelling tool that I think I may have created that will make it really unique and powerful.
It's time for me to start planning the next Rob Schamberger Makes Comix collection. It may be 24 pages this time around, but I don't want to put filler in, you know? I want to deliver the quality. This one will have stuff y'all haven't seen yet, too, which was the biggest complaint about the first one. I'd like to get these out quarterly, but focusing on the OGN's and other projects is making that a little difficult.
The collaborative anthology is progressing nicely. All six people are aboard, and the working title is, drum roll please, 'COMIXPERIENCE!' We figured the name had some resonance here locally, from my prior efforts, and we can use that. Plus, I'm working on something that will get the name even more recognition. Other than the quality the book will have, of course.
The day job's going really well. They've made an investment in me, and I'm going to continue to insure that it pays off.
How are things going for y'all?
Posted by Schamberger at 07:03 AM
January 02, 2006
This Week, I Will...
Finally get that private message board set up for planning the anthology. My technological inadequacies can be embarassing at times.
Pencil and ink three pages minimum of Black Chamber.
Hang out at The Crave Thursday night and make comix, talk shop, and have a good time.
Make my financial plan for the year.
Posted by Schamberger at 08:51 PM
December 28, 2005
I'm A Deadbeat
At least according to SBC.
I get home last night, and as is my normal routine once I'm done with my workout, I sit down to check my email. Except, this time, my DSL connection won't go through, telling me that my login and/or password are invalid. Huh?
I figure it's just network problems, so I go in the other room and spend an hour on a painting, then come back, and it still won't connect. Argh.
So, I call tech support, and they tell me right off that they aren't experiencing any outages and that I have a zero balance (meaning I'm paid up, for the mouth-breathers in the audience), and they say they're transferring me to the appropriate department. I think this next department is in an Asian country, but I'm just assuming. As soon as I tell this new department my problem, they tell me that I was transferred to the wrong place, so I get sent to another department. I think this new one was India, but again, I could be wrong. I'm feeling like that dotted red line that goes over a map in the Indiana Jones movies at this point.
The guy I get on the phone, while struggling with English, is extremely helpful. Very courteous, very sympathetic, just what you want in a customer service department. He tells me that my connection was disabled because of non-payment. I'm getting frustrated at the whole situation by now, and in my scary voice (if you don't know about my scary voice, feel lucky) I tell him that the first person that talked to me told me I had a zero balance, and that my check to SBC had been deposited at their bank on the 19th. The rep apologizes very quickly, and tells me that rather than transferring me to the accounting department, that he'll put me on hold and take care of the matter himself, so that I don't get cut off.
Now that's service. He breaks up the hold every now and then, telling me the progress of the talks, sometimes sounding flustered himself at the absurdity of the situation. Then, I hear myself getting transferred, and I'm talking to another rep now, who's there to make sure that I can connect again, which I am. I thank her very graciously, then go and drink a beer after my 45 minute phone call, which I would say only about five minutes of I'd actually spent talking to someone.
So, I got great service from the actual rep's I was dealing with, but some dumb ass clerk somewhere didn't bother to read the right screen or something. Corporate America, I love you and your snake-eating-its-own-tail ways.
Posted by Schamberger at 01:22 PM
December 22, 2005
Website Updates
I'm going to update the 'Comix' section this weekend to include stuff that I haven't drawn, but wrote. Band on the Sun, Apocalypse Gone, and hopefully a couple other things. I might put up my last couple 24 Hour Comix, too. The world needs Devil Joe.
I'm going to set up a private message board for the folks working on the Anthology Thing. That'll be easy, I think.
Going to start playing around with the Social Networking application, too. That's something that I'd like to get going by the end of January.
Posted by Schamberger at 10:25 AM
December 20, 2005
Well, I'll Be Damned
Apparently I'm up for a Day Prize for Best Digest Comic for the collection of "Band On the Sun", written by myself and drawn by the incomparable Duane Cunningham.
I had no idea at all. Wow. Does it mean you've finally arrived when you're a finalist for an award and you didn't even know it?
Posted by Schamberger at 08:38 AM
December 12, 2005
Over the Weekend, I...
* Went to the office holiday party on Friday night. First and last time. I just don't get into that kind of stuff. I think that overall I prefer to be paid to be around those people, and doing it pro bono just doesn't sit right.
* Drew the best page I've ever done. Seriously, it just Turned Out Right.
* Watched Flash Gordon (the movie, yeah, it's still awful, but so bad that it becomes good), Heat (I just adore the pacing of this movie), and Ronin (great chase scenes)
* Read some more on my tenth novel for the year
* Did some routine maintenance on my car
* Inked two pages
* Did some website work
* Finished up two commissioned pieces (here's the other one)
Overall, a productive and good weekend.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:20 AM
December 09, 2005
Work Night
Really had a good time last night with the Work Night/Shop Talk session at The Crave. I got a page mostly pencilled and inked, and had some good conversations with Mike Sullivan, Scott Hassler, and Tom Iforgothislastnamebutithinkitstartswithab. I really enjoy this and think I might start doing it a little more frequently, like every other Thursday instead of just once a month.
It's a really laid-back yet productive thing, you know? I mean, I'm totally stealing the idea for this thing from Parrish Baker and Dan Spottswood, but it seems to work well. I love the lack of pretentiousness and that it's an individual thing and not a group thing, so that no one has to worry about being a 'joiner'.
Plus we had some whacko Beautiful Mind guy telling us about how China is subverting comic book art.
Posted by Schamberger at 07:31 AM
November 30, 2005
Work Night - Thursday 12/8 @ The Crave, 6PMish until Whenver
Hey gang,
I'll be hanging out at The Crave Cafe on the above night inking some pages of Black Chamber. It'd be cool to see some of you and hang out, make some comix, and talk shop.
Posted by Schamberger at 01:44 PM
November 26, 2005
Knowing My Place
So, my good friend Jason Arnett has been saying some nice things about me lately. The first, a comment left on one of my older posts, went something like this:
"I believe you've solidified your place in KC comix history alongside guys like Parrish Baker. You've been an instrumental part of the scene for, what?, nearly five years now? That's amazing. First with Six Shooter, then coming on board with the CCN and now striking out on your own.
"You're an INFLUENCE man. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. It's True. You're not just Inspiration, we can look at what you've done and we can see what we should be doing. Not in terms of content, but in terms of passion. You're IT. Tag.
"Determination. That's what it takes to make comix, we've both said it before. You've shown us why and how we should do it. We should tell our stories because we can. If you want to measure success by any yardstick, do it by seeing how much more vital the scene is because of the things you've done."
That's some pretty heady praise. He elaborates more over at his LJ:
"Rob Schamberger is constantly trying out new approaches and new ways to get his stories out in front of people. He is an inspiration to anyone who wants to pay attention to him, but he’s influenced me by just being out there and trying. I’d given up drawing a couple of years ago, but now I’m willing to give it a shot again because I’ve been watching him over the last year or so really working hard to keep making comix. The usual deal with writers is that we find an artist and the artist then flakes out on us and doesn’t want to make a commitment after having said ‘yes’ to something. Schamberger says ‘fuck it’ and makes comix anyway. He’s decided that Moebius is a worthy example and is pursuing a set of graphic novels called THE BLACK CHAMBER, rolling several old ideas into a new one and then illustrating it himself, trying several different styles."
Comparing me to Moebius in any sort of positive light is a very nice compliment indeed, I think. I mean, hell, France had a national celebration for him and he designed that year's postage stamp for the country. I don't really feel I'm on that level. Yet, at least.
What's funny is that the things Jason said in his post at his LJ is the exact reverse of what got me into drawing again. It happened when J sent me a copy of his book The Stone Man. I'd known Jason for a few years at this point, and I'm sure he'd agree with me, he wasn't a fantastic artist. But he'd broken through some barriers with The Stone Man with his art, and even more importantly, he'd completed a 24 page novella. I was going through troubles with artists at the time, and I said, hey, why the fuck not, I'll draw my own stuff.
So, that's what I've been doing for the last couple of years. Drawing every single day. Studying the real comic book artists, like Eisner, Wood, Krigstein, Jack Davis, Johnny Craig, Kirby, Toth, and Kurtzman. Guys that were amazing illustrators, but with the same level of craft applied to sequential art, and getting it all done on schedule.
In the last year I figure I've made about 200 pages of sequentials, and filled up almost two sketchbooks with studies and practice pieces. I've still got a ways to go before I'll be at the skill level to match what's in my mind, but I figure I'll reach that within another year. Considering that just two years ago I wasn't even drawing, it's pretty amazing that I'm getting paid for my art.
I've built up a bit of a following, or at least some folks who take the time to find out what I'm working on, which is really rad. Even more cool is that it seems there's a larger percentage that are female than male, which I haven't quite figured out yet, but I'm definitely not complaining about.
I've also inspired some folks to pick up their pencils and brushes again, too, which is great. I've decided to lead by example rather than with an iron fist cast in velvet. I want folks to see how easy it is, if you just set a goal, set a path, and stick to both.
But, in all honesty, I've got my feet firmly planted on the ground. I'm a newbie with a lot to learn, and a long ways to go. Maybe what sets me apart, though, is that I'm not only willing to do that learning and go that long way, but I'm excited about it.
A few years back I set a list of goals for myself. For the age of 25, which I'm at now, I'd set the goal of having a limited series published. I'm going to get that done, or at least signed, by July the first of oh six, and it's going to be The Black Chamber. For the age of thirty, I'd set the goal of having my chief income derived from comix creation, and I'm going to do that as well.
Hopefully y'all will come along with me for the ride.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:36 PM
November 22, 2005
Dreaded Day
There's three occassions that I deeply dread: Food Day at work, Christmas, and Thanksgiving. No, I don't dread them because of my family and co-workers all being batshit crazy, or because of some religious thing. It's because I'm a vegetarian.
Because I'm a vegetarian, I have to run through the same gauntlet of questions every time. Every. Time.
So, to save all of you some time, here are the same questions that get asked Every Time, with the Same Answers that I give Every Time:
1. Is it part of your religion?
A: No. I don't ascribe to any doctrine of faith.
2. How long have you been a vegetarian?
A: Since 1998. It happened during a vacation of Florida (which my mom and step-dad do NOT fondly remember).
3. What made you decide to do it?
A: I was eating a hamburger, and it all of a sudden hit me what exactly I was eating, and I just couldn't do it anymore.
4. So, what do you eat?
A: Everything except dead animals. I'm twenty pounds overweight, so it's pretty obvious that I'm not starving to death.
5. Aren't there nutrients from meat that you need to survive?
A: Yes, protein and B-12, both of which I'm able to get from other sources. I've been a vegetarian for seven years now, and I'm still not dead.
6. So, are you one of those whacko's who spraypaints fur coats?
A: No, I'm not a member of PETA. I personally detest all of those stump-humping hippies. It's those retards that make it so that I get these questions all of the time.
7. What about fish? They're not animals.
A: Seriously, I get this question every time. Listen, geniuses, just because it doesn't live on the land doesn't mean it's not an animal. Go back to grade school science class and learn your differentiation between animals, plants, and minerals.
8. What about dairy?
A: I'm not a vegan, so I do consume dairy and eggs. I will also occasionally buy leather. I don't, however, consume anything with gelatin, nor caesar dressing, because both cause animals to be killed.
9. Don't you just want a big juicy steak sometimes?
A: Fuck, no. I always hated steak. I don't have any cravings for meat. Ever. Other than pussy, of course.
10. I don't know how you do it. I couldn't live without meat.
A: I think I'm evidence that yes, you can safely live without eating rotting animal flesh.
11. Would it piss you off if I eat this hamburger in front of you?
A: Not at all. We're designed to eat both, I just choose not to. If you choose to eat meat, that's your decision, your body, and your life. I don't want people telling me how to eat, so I'm not going to tell them how to eat, either.
12: I could slip some meat into your food and you wouldn't even know it.
A: Yes, I would, and you're a sick little fuck for wanting to do it.
13: Have you eaten any meat since you officially quit?
A: Maybe four times, and each time made me violently ill. No joke. Once you've quit, your body can't handle all of the rich content.
Hopefully this clears things up for everyone, and will save you the effort of running through those questions. Oh, who the hell am I kidding, if folks think that fish aren't animals, they're not going to accept the fact that I don't eat meat.
Posted by Schamberger at 06:58 AM
November 19, 2005
A Very Good Bad Night
Actually, the whole day was a great bad day. I had planned to meet up with my good friends Mike Sullivan and Greg Gildersleeve to go out to Lawrence to see one of my very best friends who I never get to see, Jason Arnett.
But, of course, I wrote down Mike's address wrong, so I turned around to go back home, and on the way, ran out of gas. So, after hiking over to a nearby gas station, I poured some gas into the ol' Cavalier and gave Mike a call, found out where he actually lives, and that was that.
The trip out to Lawrence was really nice. We had a good time, I got to know Dale Martin a little better, and got to see Chris Garrett and Bill Hook as well, which was a pleasant surprise. I got a page of Black Chamber inked, too, which was great.
I got home and got a call from my dad and little brother, wanting to meet up with me. That was a great visit. It's always fantastic seeing AJ, my little bro, and Dad gave me the best news I've heard all year: He finally got divorced, and got to keep his kids. Anyone that's talked with me with any degree of depth over the last year will know how much that whole situation has been tearing me up, and this is the best possible outcome.
But anyway, here's where the extraordinary stuff comes into play. Dumb ass me never actually went and filled up the car, so, you guessed it, Idiot Rob ran out of gas AGAIN on the way home, coming up I-435 from Nebraska Furniture Mart to my home base in Riverside. Like, buttfuck nowhere. I walked a mile up to the nearest exit, and luckily, for me, there was a police officer at the top of the exit, having just pulled someone over. I flagged him down, and he gave me a ride to the closest gas station, which was three miles away. He was super, super nice, and I could tell he really felt for me. He wasn't able to give me a ride back, and I could tell that was upsetting him, but he told the guys in the station to look after me, as they were friends of his.
I swear, I'll rip anyone a new asshole that makes fun of Middle Eastern people running gas stations, because these two gentlemen were exactly that: Gentlemen. They offered to give me change to call up someone, but I really didn't want to bother my family this late at night (10:30PM at this point). So, I went to hoof it back to my car.
A minivan was driving by, and the guy, the Saint, actually, who was driving it pulled over and offered me a ride back to my car. I find out quickly that he's the owner of the Jazz restaurants, having just gotten done with a big catering event. He said he just felt awful seeing someone out walking at that time of night, in the cold and rain. He drove me all the way back to my car, and didn't ask for anything in return. Well, believe you me, he's going to be getting something very nice from me.
So, I get back to the car, and while I'm pouring the gas in, another car pulls up behind me and asks if I'm okay. I tell them 'yes' and they go on their way.
My faith in humanity has been totally reaffirmed. We live in a great world, with great people, and I can say that with complete honesty. I've really been making an effort this past year to be a better person, and to treat people around me better, and I really believe that this positive energy that I disply is making its way around and back to me. As bad as this night could have been, I think it became one of the best ones I've had in a long while.
I know I tell all of you close to me how much y'all mean to me, but I'll just say it again here. Friends, family, and loved ones are what life is all about, and because of all of you, my life is a very rich one indeed. And, to everyone else, you folks are just as important, we just haven't had the chance to realize it yet. We will, though, with time.
Oh yeah, and everyone go eat at a Jazz restaurant soon. That fine saint of a man deserves our money.
Posted by Schamberger at 11:36 PM