January 23, 2007

Jenny Gonzalez



Comics:Too Negative
Website: http://www.jennydevildoll.com
Making comics since year of: 1995
Art education/schools attended: Parson's School of Design

Tools

Pencils: Usually just the mechanical pencils I get at the 99 cent store--this is a pretty lo-fi operation here!

Inks: The Japanese brush pen I use comes with it's own cartridges of ink.

Brushes: none

Pens: I have an assortment of pens mostly from Kinokuniya, this Japanese bookstore in Rockefeller Plaza. Ironically, the main one I use is manufactured by an American company, Pentel, but only distributed in Japan, so they have to import them! Another one I have has the Mitsubishi logo on it, like the car. I like the brush pens because of the variety of line you can get with them. I also have a fine tipped mechanical pen for doing background stuff where I don't want the line to be as strong. Oh, and I also use the plain old Pilot Precise V, available at any drugstore for lettering and Sharpies for filling in large black areas.

Paper: I like to use Vellum paper even though it's a little more expensive. Though I've also been known to draw full comix on the back of junk faxes we get at work.

Lettering: It's all hand lettering

Color: When I do color strips for my online site I do it on Photoshop. Otherwise most of my stuff appears in black and white.

Layout/ Composition: I don't really think about it as much as I should, unfortunately. I just get so caught up in doing the drawings and moving the story along that most of my composition is very basic.

Convention Sketches (when different from illustrations done in the studio): I'm usually way too wired at conventions to sit and sketch. :) But if I did I'd probably use the same tools.

Tool timeline, starting from when you began drawing in any serious way until the present, and what spurred the changes: I've experimented with rapidographs, crowquills, and assorted calligraphy and brush pens trying to get a line I really like. So far the Japanese Pentel pen does it!

What tools you'd never use, and why: The Sakura brush pen. It's felt and the point gets blunt really quickly, so you can only get fine lines with it when it's brand new.

And lastly, any advice you'd like to give: The world needs more beautiful drawing.

January 16, 2007

Sorry for the long absence. I had a project that was devouring my time, but it's nearly done now, so I'm slowly beginning the blog again. No interviews for the moment, ideally I'll be back into them by next week, but here's a few links:

-There's a discusion going on at Make Comics Forever about lettering techniques that y'all might find interesting.

-Matt Bernier keeps a blog in which he talks about things relating to his comics, including some comments on paper. He also sent me this email after I posted about the T-3 nibs:

If you go here: http://mattious.deviantart.com/gallery/, every single thing not inked with a brush was inked with the T-3 nib. (Except panel borders and lettering.) Literally everything. And most of it with the same one, which I still have in my pen holder.
-Matt

So check those out!

-Shannon Wheeler sent me some pics of his studio & study awhile back which I had neglected to put up til now: