Just found out that Mike Wieringo, one of my most favorite of comic book artists of the past 15 years or so, died on Sunday. He was the awfully young age of 44, and passed away thanks to a heart attack. Which is extra depressing 'cause seemingly all of the writings online from his still in shock friends mention how incredibly healthy he was.

I became an instant fan during his Flash / Impulse stuff. Then he went over to Robin and then became in my humble opinion the best of the modern era Spider-man artists. You can look him up on Wiki or just type his name into Google to check out his bio and his art. Won't bother repeating all that info here.

Despite having attended geek fests as nearby as in my home town to all the way to California for the glories of the San Diego Comic Con, I never did get a chance to meet him. Never got a chance to chat with him and get a sketch. His career and life have been cut tragically short. And that makes me sad. I haven't yet read the latest issue of 'Spider-man and the Fantastic Four' that he drew, going to go do that now.

The second Killer63 fest is underway. Thirteen filmmakers are all in the midst of production on their projects, with the looming deadline upcoming in early October. In my case, having a production underway means that I have not a letter of script typed and no idea what I'm going to do just at the moment. I'm thinking something around ten minutes long and horror themed.

Ralph Gethings (one of the thirteen) has been kind enough to set up a website. So I'm going to halt the K63 blog, just to try and encourage participants and interested parties to go to that site instead (check out the link over to your right).

In a few short hours, at the horrendously early hour of 4:30 in the AM, I'm off to the airport to begin my journey down to California for the glory that is the San Diego Comic Con. Not going to bother sleeping, I'm usually up 'till about 4AM anyhow. So I'm just going to multi-task and catch some sleep while in transit. Spent the day doing about a million procrastanated pre-travel chores...well, maybe not an actual million...but there were at least a dozen different things. Got my keys to the condo, got my sketchbook, got a PSP that a friend was kind enough to let me to steal, dug through my archives to find some books to get autographed. All ready for a packed week of geeking and networking. And in all likelyhood, networking with fellow geeks.

Along with the help of one of my frequent collaborators, went and shot the opening night of Jesse Buck's new show 'Bubkus'. Nothing fancy in the shooting department, I think the final product will be used for grant applications and media stuff...that sort of thing. The show was great. If you're local, or in Ottawa during it's run, you'd be doing yourself a favour by going to check it out (for all the pertinent info, check out Jesse's website).

Blast from the Past part Two

Where did the name Batturtle Productions come from? Folks actually seem to ask me that often enough, especially when I hand over a business card. Well, like many a name for companies or bands or things, the name is much more interesting than it's origins. I like Batman...I like the Ninja Turtles (the Mirage originals of course). Then came a drawing from my friend James, back when we were in the trenches of Canterbury High School (well...not really trenches, they were nice enough times). About the same time, a doodle was sketched of a Batman logo wearing a TMNT style headband around it's head. Plus, I used to use the initials BAT when I got high scores on video games. Anyhow, somewhere amidst all that, the word Batturtle was born. Mystery revealed!

Final version of a Villains storyboard for the pitch. Crime King scheming and talking to himself moments before undertaking a Christmas themed robbery. The deed is almost complete, the looming deadline is to have the thing done and all printed up before I'm off to San Diego on Monday.

Run for your lives! Crime King has a gun! Save yourself! Oh wait. Never-mind. That's not really Crime King, it's just a drawing of him. Or more specifically, another storyboard rough from the in development animated series pitch. Sorry about that. Call back the police. False alarm.

Now for an actual Batturtle Productions related update: Here's a storyboard rough by Barry Bradfield for the Villains Animated series pitch. A drawing of a disgusted Ghost Man standing by as his room-mate Crime King counts out his thieved earnings from a Salvation Army Santa robbery.

Thirty feet or so up in the air, high above the crowd at the Canadian Opera Company performance at Lebreton Flats last weekend. That's me in the middle.

Happy Canada Day! I hope you have a good one at least, I'll be working two-fold like a chump. In the midst of much business. This week I've been crewing for a big outdoor show of the Canadian Opera Company (it's going to be on Bravo sometime...no idea when). Working the last day related to that on July 1st, then off to tear down a Canada Day stage in the evening. Next on the calender, I'll be follow-spotting for Blues Fest, then some Sound and Light Show stuff on Parliament Hill. If I make it through all that, then I have my San Diego vacation to look forward to.

In more Batturtle Productions centric news: The assemblage of the Villains pitch is going well. Storyboards are being drawn. Scripts are being written. Want to have it done before the end of the month. Also working on a second round of interviews for the Comic Book Connection. Re-interviewing some of the same folks, but getting some more updated info. That too will be done (not the final product, but at least some interviews) before I flee for California as well.

Amanda Leigh as Victoria Albee in 'Pirates of Snake Island'

Received an e-mail of thanks (as did the rest of the cast and crew) from the producer of 'Pirates of Snake Island'. Which reminded me that I hadn't posted an update that the movie had wrapped production as of last Sunday. I don't know when exactly it's set for release on DVD, though I do remember a rumor that the plan was to get it out around the same time as that other pirate movie starring that Johnny Depp guy hits stores.

Surprisingly enough I had another letter published in Buffy (#4). Extra surprising due to the fact that I didn't write the thing. I double checked my outgoing gmail just to make sure that I wasn't losing my mind. Evidently I was not. Some kind of editorial mix-up I guess. So, I get credit for someone else's letter and my name in the book two months in a row. Boring news for you, but kind of kewl for me (though it's kind of a dull little bit of correspondence). There's probably some angry geek out there, fuming that proper credit was taken away from them and is currently in the midst of plotting revenge against me.

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away, I starred in a Star Wars comic. Okay...I wasn't the star per-say, but I did play a very vital role in the story. I was the first person ever to be seen killed by the intergalactic bounty hunter Jango Fett.

You see, a friend of mine is a comic book artist. He found out the he got a gig drawing a
pre-Episode II comic, that would serve as a prologue to the character showing up in 'Attack of the Clones'. My immediate question was if I could be drawn into the thing. I have no shame. And it's very likely the closest I'll ever get to being in a Star Wars movie. He wasn't sure at first, as he didn't have the script yet. It could have been a story about a bunch of Droids and Jawa's for all he knew.

A little while later, he phoned and asked if I would like to be killed by Boba's dad. Yes. Yes I would. And that is how I got myself into real actual Star Wars continuity (those who don't count comics as canon can go straight to hell). Currently, the story has been re-released as part of Dark Horse Comics celebration of the 30th Anniversary of Star Wars. So now I have another shot for the character to be noticed and turned into an action figure. Star Wars always gets toys made based on character's who were on screen for a third of a second, so why not one from a comic?

Mega Villains Light Explosion! Sounds like the title of a new Saturday morning, Pokemon-esque, Japanese cartoon. Actually, it was just the title of this picture when it was e-mailed over to me. A more finished version of a sketch that can be seen a few images below this here update. Think I might use it as the cover-page for the pitch for the show.

Another pair of logo / title card rough designs from Basement 24. Both Crime King themed. You might recognize that bottom one as a homage towards the Bruce Timm styled Batman animated series that we all know and love (rip-off is such a harsh word).

I had mentioned to Barry from Basement 24 that I was in need of a logo design for Villains. And that if he had any ideas to keep me posted. Well, within a day or so he sent me over a whole bunch of sketches. If he keeps this up he's going to ruin the reputation that artists are lazy.

The one at the top I think would work very well on the title page of a pitch. And I can picture the one on the bottom looking nice on a TV screen as the opening logo for the show. If this whole concept does manage to come to fruition, I'd like to make use of a title-card in front of each episode (like they did in the good ole' days on cartoons, and as has been seen in recent years on Batman and currently on stuff like Fairly Odd Parents). So there'd be plenty of opportunity for designs like these ones I hope.

My favorite character in the Villains U is Mary Mime. A kick-ass backstabbing evil mastermind with pale white skin, spades tattooed over her eyes and a penchant for brutal violence. She may or may not show up in some of the scripts that we're compiling for the initial pitch. She doesn't appear in the one that I've completed. That would be a Christmas episode starring the central three loser characters of Crime King, Ghostman and Ric (changed from Rick for comedic spelling reasons). I'm sure she'll show up sooner or later though.

Some years back, I had the crazy idea to do a trio of short films that stood on their own but could then be packaged together as a feature length anthology. Hence three Villains shorts were produced, and then they appropriately enough became an anthology titled 'The Villains Anthology'. They were fun shoots, lots of my friends worked on the things, and I was very pleased with the final product. They were screened here in Ottawa and at a number of fests around North America (...off the top of my head I remember that they were shown in New York, Toronto, Utah, Vancouver and elsewhere). They were featured on a couple of online film places, and got me listed on IMDb for the first time. Alas, as happens with most indie films, the effort did not grant us riches, fame and fortune.

I've always had in the back of my head that I want to take another shot at the concept though. I really love the characters and the world. So currently, with the help of some alike mind friends, we are whipping up some scripts and storyboards and stuff and slapping together a pitch for an animated 'Villains'. I'd like to do a comic too. Especially with all the nifty Internet options available for publishing nowadays.

Those pictures up above are concept designs for a couple of the central characters from the Villains Universe. As illustrated by James Lagowski. More to come.

Peter Laird does a segment on the TMNT website every once and a while called Blast from the Past. Wherein he posts random things from the Mirage / Ninja Turtles archives. In that tradition, here's a lil' blast from the Batturtle vault. A page of conceptual art done up while trying to figure out the logo design for Batturtle Productions. The Batty in the lower centre of the page won. Which if I remember correctly was actually the artists least favorite drawing. I like that Batty the best though 'cause I could picture him as an action figure.

Worked on of all things, believe it or not, a pirate movie a couple of days ago. Served as A.D. (that's assistant director for those of you who have better things to do with your time than to familiarize yourselves with film crew terms). Sometimes one can have the strangest things to talk about whilst travelling in film-making circles. The movie is titled 'Pirates of Snake Island' and will continue to shoot on and off for the next few weeks. I'm crewing again for the project on Saturday...with the stipulation that we'll be done shooting before game two of the Senators / Sabres series.