The Oz Squad website is in process. There will be, if nothing else, a placeholder page here before the end of September.
I know. Promises. Promises.
Oz Squad Portraits – the Woggle-Bug
The Woggle-Bug makes his debut in The Marvelous Land of Oz. He’s an insect who has been Highly Magnified and Thoroughly Educated. He is also, as drawn by John R. Neill, one of the creepier looking denizens of Oz. He looks like a cross between the Joker and the Penguin. Uggh.
So when it came time to think of drawing the character I completely redesigned him. I tried to make him look more like a bug. Hopefully a friendly bug because he’s kind of an arrogant ass so he needs all the help he can get. No doubt this just make him creepier looking to people who are not me.
I didn’t get as far as drawing a background for this illustration. I only got as far as the basic inking stage.
Oz Squad Portraits – the Wizard
In the first Oz book, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the Wizard is revealed to be a little man, barely taller than Dorothy, who is as bald as an egg. In every book thereafter the text describes him as a little man who is as bald as an egg. The illustrations by John R. Neill, however, show him with a lively fringe of hair. He’s also quite a bit taller than in the original Denslow illustrations.
As you can see I prefer a version with the lively fringe. If asked to explain the difference I’d say that the Wizard shaved his head during his first sojourn in Oz. A shaved head would have made it easier for him to slip on the disguises he needed to maintain his air of mystery.
I don’t have as easy an explanation for the difference in height.
Coloring Oz – Ozma 4
The finished portrait of Ozma. In The Marvelous Land of Oz Ozma is described as having a cloud of golden hair. In every book thereafter, however, she is shown as a brunette. I figure that, as a fairy princess, she can have any color hair she likes. Personally, I prefer the dark hair, so that’s how I’ll draw her most often.
Coloring Oz – Ozma 3
At the end of The Marvelous Land of Oz the hero, Tip, discovers that he’s really Ozma, rightful ruler of Oz and – a girl. When told he must be transformed back he’s not enthusiastic but he only spends a page protesting.
Finally he says, “I might try it for a while – just to see how it seems, you know. But if I don’t like being a girl you must promise to change me into a boy again.”
As far as I know, none of the Royal Historians have reported that she disliked being a girl.
Coloring Oz – Ozma 2
This illustration of Ozma was done back in March as I was putting the finishing touches on the cover layout for Oz Squad: March of the Tin Soldiers. I hadn’t intended to use this piece on the cover. The back cover (only available on the print edition) has four circular portraits of Dorothy, Scarecrow, Tin Man and Lion as part of the design. The ones that are on the cover now are actually the second set of portraits. The first set was too complex and clashed with the cover design.
While I was working on the first set of portraits I sketched up an additional four portraits of other important Oz personages. As with the main four each additional portrait was to have a scene from the character’s history in the background. For Ozma it’s a scene of her approaching the Emerald City on her first adventure. Of course, on her first adventure, Ozma was a young boy and didn’t remember having once been a princess.
This portrait of Ozma is the only one of the additional illustrations that I finished. I started portraits of Ozzy, the Wizard and the Woggle-Bug but they didn’t get beyond the basic inking stage. I’ll post those later in the week.
Coloring Oz – Ozma 1
I’m done with my summer quarter. I finished my last final a week ago. I’m still working an internship until the middle of September so I’m not suddenly blessed with a lot of free time. I’m just now able to think about things other than school, work and chores. Now it’s just work and chores. Yay!
One of the first things I want to get together is an actual website for Oz Squad. The current one is just a quick placeholder. I’d started work on a site before school started and then lost what little I’d managed to do when my laptop died.
Speaking of Oz Squad, the sketch above is my version of Ozma. I figured no one is going to keep the same look for a hundred years, so no poppies for this princess!
A Modest Proposal
By 1990 I’d written and drawn 18 minicomics on my own and contributed to quite a few minicomic anthologies published by other folks and I was feeling deluded enough to think I was ready to do a “real” comic. In my case a “real” comic was something printed rather than photocopied, that had a color cover and that would get distributed in comic book stores. I had two ways of going about it – I could self-publish (something quite a few artists were doing at the time) or I could find a publisher. I figured I’d see if I could find a publisher first and go the self publishing route if that didn’t work out.
I’d done eight issues of The Highly Unlikely Adventures of Moe and Detritus minicomic and had gotten fond of the characters. So I put together a proposal – a cover, two pages of a cast of characters, 4 pages of sample story and a back cover. I found that proposal recently while sorting boxes so I’m presenting it here.
Lord, that lettering is tiny. If you click on the above images you can see larger versions but the writing will still be almost illegible. And those images have been enlarged from the original proposal.
I don’t remember how many publishers I sent the proposal to. I know I sent one to Piranha Press, DC Comic’s alternative comics imprint. I’m sure I’ve got the rejection letter from Piranha somewhere in my files. It was a personal note suggesting that I try for something a bit less ambitious than a 30 issue limited series.
If I sent the proposal to anyone other than Brave New Words I no longer remember who they were. I definitely didn’t get any other replies. BNW picked up the series and we managed a run of five issues in a little over a year before we mutually agreed to cancel it. The four pages of sample story saw print as the first four pages in the first issue of Misspent Youths.
Don’t Get Sick!
I might not be able to draw much (at all) these days but some of the work I did earlier this year is seeing release now. Acute Care is available now at DriveThruMedia from 3Hombres Games. Dave Schuey wrote it and I did the illustrations. Imagine your worst doctor’s visit ever. Add in angry spirits and alien horrors and start running! (Too bad you’re strapped down. Good luck!)
Less Than Three Weeks to Go.
Between summer school and my internship the most art I’ve managed to produce has been a few doodles on the back of my Math tests and one sketch that was part of an assignment for my Humanities class. Grrrr.
