Happy Cthulhu Krismas

Belated Happy Krismas from the team at Flying Dodo Publications (that’d be Abe and Angela and all the dodos).  Here’s a black and white version you can print for yourself on a legal-sized paper (8.5×14).

And here is our Krismas card!

Ink Tub Show

We will be at Egress Studio this Saturday from 2-8. It is in Bellingham, so if you are in the area, I hope we see you.
We will have all sorts of stuff for sale.All our prints and comics. Even Abe will have some photos for sale (they are beautiful by the way). And Anita will have a bunch of stuff – poetry, prints, original art, cards. Great stuff. We are thinking, we might even sell some Jerks originals.
We will also have a raffle. $1 is one chance to win a set of cards from Anita of the Humane Society Dogs or Cats. And you will definitely get to pick one of four postcards that I drew. Proceeds of the raffle will be donated to the local Humane Society near Egress Studio, so the post cards have an animal theme.

Short-run 2012 walkabout

We had a great time this weekending wandering around Short Run Small Press Fest. We were broke so we decided to see if people would trade. People were really nice about it. We traded some great stuff. I hope they felt it was worth it, too.

I think the most beautiful thing we found was the screen printer, Tory Franklin. She has an amazing screen-printed bestiary book bound in fake crocodile skin. The screen printing was done in gold and black, and metallic ink is notoriously difficult to screen print with. She did an amazing job. She was kind enough to trade An extensive and practical guide to protecting your chickens from coyotes for her book on lycanthropic folks, Les unfortunates, Vol 1: Origins of Society’s Lycanthropy, another beautifully screen printed book. Olive green paper with yellow ink on the cover. So gorgeous. She also told us a bit about Vera Project’s screen printing and sent us off to talk to the actual people that run it. Abe is really excited now, so expect some screen printing in our future.

Aron Nels Steinke does kids books that look adorable (like The super-duper dog park andThe crazy cat lady dance), has an autobio that I want to get (Big Plans), and has a new comic online called Mr. Wolf. He is a teacher, grade school I think, so I bet his kids books are great. We couldn’t get anything at the time, but possible Xmas gifts this year!

And just down from him was another teacher, Nicole J Georges! Grammar and writing, it seemed. She also has a memoir coming out Jan 22 and is doing a reading on Jan 30 at Elliot Bay Books that I would love to go to. We got her mini comic, Invincible Summer #21 ~ Clutch #24, and it was quite funny. She does it with her friend, Clutch McB, and they each document each day for a couple weeks or so.  Looking at her site, it seems Invincible summer has been collected into two volumes, so Drat! I have to go get those now too! Nicole happens to be very funny and made me laugh out loud several times. This bodes well for her graphic novel in January. I also got a 2013 calendar from her for my work desk. Adopted animals (she is also a pet portraitist). So great. I can’t wait to look at it all next year. She also mentions whales, XX.

We checked out Chelsea Baker, who we have seen at other cons. Abe got to talk with her for a while at the Portland Zine Symposium. When I went back to Nicole’s booth to get the calendar, Abe went back to Chelsea and got a preview of a book she is doing about her sister, Moira (also the title of the book it seems), who has down syndrome. Looks like a good book and has sciency stuff, which Abe loves.

Then we stopped by Breanne Bolands’s booth. She wasn’t so much comics, but a very funny writer. She also made me laugh out loud. I traded two comics for two zines with her, including Tighty-whities and their men, which made me happy. I got How to be more creative more often, even if you have a job, responsibilities, and need more than three hours of sleep a night. Quite enjoyable actually, and I think I will flip through it again when I am feeling uncreative. Here is my favorite quote. “Your dream is your cub and you are a mama bear. Find what threatens it and eviscerate it.” But then there was  a tiny zine called A selection of surreal moments from my recent vacation, which cracked me up. Tiny little stories with an illustration. Great way to commemorate a trip. I just loved it. I will be checking her store when I have disposable income again.

I got a little mini comic by Colleen Frakes called Sketchbook Follies #2 and it made me laugh right out loud. And I am so jealous because she got to go to the Comic Workshop in Vermont at the Center for Cartoon Studies.

Oh man. That isn’t even everything. Almost. Sorry. I just get so excited.

Bellingham ComiCon 2012 wrap up

We survived Bellingham ComiCon. It was quite a turn out. Way busier than last year and I believe busier than Jet City Comic Show. It was exhausting and fun. I love meeting all those people. Abe went even though he had a sinus infection. What a stud.

If you are from Whatcom County, and I hope we have some new readers from there, you might have seen some images on the Bellingham Herald’s Take 5 that are pretty familiar in these parts. Yes, Angela’s art was featured on the cover. Pretty thrilling.

Angela, of course, made tons of little drawings again. People seem to enjoy them and they are fun to make. So they will likely be at all future cons for $2. You can always tell who the Doctor Who fans are because they call them adipose, but I really did start drawing these before I saw that adorably creepy episode.

If you are in Whatcom County and just can’t get enough of us, we will be up again on Saturday, November 17 for an art show at Egress Studio from 1-7 at 5581 Noon Rd, just outside Bellingham. And if you stay in the area, on Sunday, Abe and Angela will be teaching a workshop on comics collaboration for $35. We’ll show how we collaborate. Then attendees will get to practice collaboration together and hopefully walk out with a minicomic. Email Abe at abe@flyingdodopublications.com or Angela at angela@flyingdodopublications.com or Anita of Egress Studio at akboyle@egressstudio.com. Hope to see you there!

Jet City 2012 recap

Well, we survived Jet City Comic Show. And had a good time. Bonus, I didn’t get sick, though it does mean I have had one year of unknown hives. At least the zyrtek squashes it.

Anyways, this was our best show yet. We sold a lot of my $1 mini originals. I was pretty pleased with that. I have noticed, without surprise, that the emotion + action ones are more popular at indie shows and fan art ones, like Doctor Who, Star Trek, and superheroes, sell better at the pop culture cons.

I was pleased to see a higher portion of alternative comics this year, less cheesecake stuff. We did significantly better than last year due to the change in booths. Another factor is that we have a full year of conventions under our belt, so we weren’t sweaty and nervous this time. People are also starting to recognize our comics from shows and shops. A huge thanks goes out to Sean Kent at Comic Stop in the U District for pushing our comics. We had no less than three people tell us that’s how they came across our comics.

 Also exciting, we sold some 2011 collections. People really liked getting a custom-drawn wrapper. The only one I remember is “crying and flying.” No picture. I forgot.

Another fun thing were costumes. I like that part of pop culture cons. There was a cute little blond boy dressed as Batman who kept throwing his plastic Batarang down the aisle and sliding after it. And a lady in a superhero man costume with actual tightly whities on the outside of her costume. We would have given her a free copy of “Tightly whities and their men,” but we didn’t see her again.

So for all you new folks to the site, look around! Under ‘by comics,’ you can find a page for each describing each of our comics. Most of them have a link to an online version of the comic. Now hopefully we see more folks at Bellingham ComiCon next month!

Jet City Comic Show 2012

Why yes! We will be at the Jet City Comic Show! How did you ever guess? Oh, did you see that we are on their web site? Why yes you did! That’s wonderful. And did you know that we will have a new comic there? You didn’t?! For shame. Well, let me give you a hint. It is titledTighty-Whities and Their Men. You’ll have to come by to find out more. Or wait for us to put it online.

As a reminder, here’s where you can find us!

Jet City Comic Show 2012 show floor – Can you find the Flying Dodo Publication booth?

The Seattle Aquarium

We went to the Seattle Aquarium a few weeks ago.  Our friend Jeff came from out of town to visit. Angela made a bunch of drawings, which she might post later on and Abe took a pictures which you can see here. We had a great time!

We're alive

Sorry for the lack of posts. Things have just been crazy at the FDP headquarters, which is our apartment. We have been trying to move for a couple weeks and it failed! Who knew that could happen. Anyways, I will try to post more here later. We just don’t have much to announce right now.

Have you been keeping up on Angela’s autobio comic at spazhandscomic.blogspot.com? People seem to be enjoying it.

Brief notes on Geek Girl Con. I loved it. I had a lot of fun talking with everyone and there were some great costumes. I look forward to going back next year. I didn’t go to any panels or anything, but I did wander down to the Connections room just in time to see the end of the comic editors group! Which even the last 5 minutes of was encouraging. I thought I had a picture of my booth (our first time with a half table since I split it with my mom, Anita Boyle of Egress Studio), but I couldn’t find it. Instead, here are some things I drew.

Shh, says Batman

The Doctor is shocked

Don’t Blink

The Doctor is happy

The Doctor and Tardis in love

I got a magnet made of one of my images!! I love Cardassians.

The Joker thinks it’s funny.

PZS follow up

So, everything went great at PZS! I had a blast and it was really fun doing the InDesign class. As promised, here are the notes I wrote that I based the presentation on. If you have any questions please feel free to email me abe at flyingdodopublications.com

August 11 2012 Con Info

Just a quick reminder for everyone that Angela will be at GeekGirlCon on both Saturday and Sunday this weekend at booth 314. Also, Abe will be at the Portland Zine Symposium on Saturday. Abe is also teaching a one hour class titled Using Adobe InDesign to Create Layouts for Print. It starts at 11 am in room 2. So, drop in and take part!

News!

So in a month, you will be able to see Abe at the Portland Zine Symposium (Aug 11) and me at Geek Girl Con (Aug 11-12) with my mom. My brother, Isaac, will be watching the booth with Abe so he can, you know, eat and go to the bathroom. I will also have a new setup at my booth because I will only have half a table! But it will probably carry over into our over full table at other cons. As part of this consolidation, we will have the 2011 collection of Flying Dodo Comics (and the one 2010 comic) for sale at $20, which is a 33% discount! It includes a little wrapper to hold it all together. I will have some blank-ish ones with me at Geek Girl Con so I can draw something of your choosing.

Flying Dodo Publications 2011 collection

In addition to comics, we will both have prints and I will have necklaces. There will be a few new prints, including “Alces caeruleus.” We will also be offering a special deal at conventions where you can buy “The Saddest Sasquatch” poster (20×30 inches) for free shipping. That’s a savings of $8. The necklaces are $20 for a single panel one and $30 for a 3 panel one. I hope you like them.  All of these will eventually be for sale online.

I also started a new web comic of my own auto-bio stuff, Spaz Hands. It is going to update on Tuesdays and Thursdays for now, but I have a lot so if it so if I can keep up, I might up it to Monday, Wednesday, Friday, eventually. Actually, I think this web comic will include three different styles for different types of comics. And who knows. Maybe I’ll have a sampler to give out at Geek Girl Con.

Abe and Angela skipping (from Spaz Hands)

Abe has also started a new Etsy shop for his photography. I think they’re great, so check them out. His shop is Calamitous Platypus. The photos are mostly flowers, but lots of strange plants, really. Eventually, we might do something together with his photos similar to the photos at the end of Bubbles and other tales.

Outer space plant, Photo by Abe Olson

Necklaces

Angela made some necklaces over the weekend. She had a great time making them, so expect more. They will be available on Etsy sometime (we will announce when they are up) and Angela will have them at Geek Girl Con in Seattle on Aug. 11. So without further ado, here they are! The first one is the test and Angela is keeping it.

3D Comic Necklace!

Kissy face

Dance Party

Daw! Face.

Alces caeruleus print

We have a number of things to announce. First up, we have a print for sale up on our Etsy site! This is a print of a painting by Angela, Alces caeruleus. The original is watercolor and sumi ink. The print is 5×7 inches, the same as the original painting. You can buy it for your very own for $10.

Alces caeruleus in the wild

We also have news on The Jerks front. It was our two-year anniversary of the strip on June 8th, so we went to color. Angela still does all the inking, but now Abe lays in color. To accomodate the new color strip so it looks nice, we updated the colors of the site, too, and the banner will be updated to something appropriate soon. 

Before changing to color, we have a contest on The Jerks Facebook page to guess the lip color we would use on Georgie. We only had five people guess, so everyone is a winner! They get a poster of Arthur. Cedar guessed correctly, so she also wins a set of bookmarks. We will get pictures of the lucky winners as we can and post them here.

Screen-printed two-tone poster of Arthur from The Jerks

That’s it for now, but expect more soon. Abe’s out of school, our dashing new graduate, so he will get to spend a lot of time working on Flying Dodo Publications. We have some great ideas brewing up!