Post Show Recap: Mid-Ohio

This trip flew by so fast I barely had time to realize it before it was over. The city of Columbus was just as I remembered it from last year, unbelievably clean and full of people so polite it's kind of unnerving. Here are some of the highlights:

• I saw Tony Isabella again and gave him a kiss right on top of his big ol' head.

• I finally met the international man of mystery, Dirk Manning. We have a ton of mutual friends, but had never actually hung out until this trip. Turns out, he's AWESOME. He gets the LG seal of approval. Anyone who was on the fence until this moment may now proceed to become friends with him. You're welcome.

• I went to Max & Erma's with Dirk & Sarah and we did nothing but make bawdy jokes and double entendres for the entire meal. Then ordered a giant plate of cookies. It was pretty much the perfect night out.

• I was able to spend some time with Enrica Jang and Matt Fletcher, both of whom are wonderful. Enrica (the head honcho of Red Stylo Media and editor of Shakespeare Shaken) is going to try to make it out to my signing next week, which is extremely exciting! Also, there is a Poe Anthology: Part II coming down the pike (Poe Twistier is the title, I believe) sometime in the not so distant future, so I need to start brainstorming for that.

• I finally got to taste some ice cream from Jeni's. This place is legendary among Ohio locals, who tend to speak of it in reverent/orgasmic tones. Since I've been spoiled by some pretty amazing ice cream experiences in my life, I wasn't expecting it to blow my brain apart the way everyone seemed to insist it would, but I will say that 2 of the 3 flavors I ordered were on par with the most delicious ice cream I've ever had... I know that doesn't sound like much of an endorsement, but it really is. The riesling poached pear sorbet was especially good, as was the brambleberry crisp. Whiskey and pecans was meh.

Me & Darth Maui

• Paul Storrie came out to dinner with us and he was as witty and entertaining as ever. I was also delighted to learn that he can do some decent impressions. I really enjoy silly voices, so discovering this talent of his bumped up Paul's coolness factor at least 6%… AT LEAST.

• This'll sound a bit silly, but I had Popeye's Chicken for the first time and their chicken tenders are one of my favorite foods now. The chicken itself is delicious of course, but the star of the show is their Sweet Heat sauce. It's like honey and Sriracha sauce had a baby. A sweet delicious baby.

The drive back home was unexpectedly scenic. Everything was covered in a really thick fog, which made even mundane things look mysterious and a bit foreboding at night. Even when we stopped at a Sunoco to fuel up, being unable to see anything beyond the pumps made it all feel like a dream - a sensation that was significantly enhanced by the appearance of the girl who we paid for the gas. She had bone white hair, which looked real, and pointed elf ears, which probably weren't. The boundaries between our world and the Never Never must've been especially thin in that area.

The next morning, I had the pleasure of waking up in rural Pennsylvania, with the sun just coming over the horizon. The scenery was all rolling pastoral hills and autumnal trees still silver with frost, and all covered in a low hanging fog that coalesced into clearly defined clouds that sat in valleys as if they weighed too much to float in the sky today. It was an absolutely delightful way to end a trip.

I'm back in Jersey, but there's no time to slow down yet.

This weekend is the Collingswood Book Festival, then my book signing at Stormwatch Comics on the 10th, and then NYCC starts the day after that. When I finally come to a full stop I'll probably collapse, but until then, momentum should carry me through to the end of the month.

Batwoman Sketch

Working on my contribution to the annual Wonder Woman Day art auction. It's a part of National Domestic Violence Awareness Month and all the proceeds go towards SAFE, a local women's shelter in Hunterdon, NJ.

This year, I'll be sending a Batwoman piece.
Can't believe I hadn't drawn her before now.

Also, while searching for reference photos, I found this AMAZING Kate Kane painting by Ashley Helling!
It's called "We Soldier On"

Post Show Recap: Wizard World Philly

I have my post show recap for X-Con ready to go, but I'm still waiting on some photographs 

before I can publish it... So, while we're waiting for that- Here's what happened in Philly!

I had less than a week after X-Con (just enough time to complete that Luna commission and catch a nasty head cold) to get my stuff together for Wizard World. It was the first time I've ever had an Artist's Alley table all to myself and it ended up being the most financially successful con I've ever attended!

I had a great spot in Artist's Alley, right across from Red Stylo Media and down the aisle from my friends Ken Haeser (of Living Corpse fame) and Mike Capprotti (cover artist extraordinaire).

Rough Sketch Studios was there in force as well, with Steve, Brielle, and Andy all taking up residence just one aisle away.




Directly across from my table was a talented young artist I've never seen before. Her name is Sasha Yosselani and her work is incredible. Take a moment to check out her website, you'll be glad you did.

I also had the pleasure of running into Alex Saviuk!
I'd been looking forward to showing him my work ever since meeting him in Chicago, but I wasn't expecting to see him in Philly! He did me the honor of looking through my portfolio and was a joy to chat with. I'm looking forward to the next time we cross paths.

I was assisted by my own personal booth babe, Thomas Mitchell. He spent the weekend dressed as Doctor Strange and was, dare I say it, the belle of the ball. If Tom hadn't taken time off from work to help me run the booth, there's no way I would've made it through the weekend. He is the best show partner anyone could ask for, and I suspect he likes to rave about my artwork even more than I do.

Having Tom nearby to take care of customers also freed me up to work on more show sketches than I would've otherwise been able to do. Almost a third of my income from Wizard World this year came from show sketches. I've never done so many at a single event... They haven't gotten easier or quicker, but they have gotten a little bit better.

<-- The first was Black Widow for a
customer who liked Marvel redheads.

The guy who gave
me a tiny zebra print
sketch book in Chicago
made an appearance!
His name is Chris
apparently and he was the recipient of this
(somewhat mannish)
Wonder Woman.

                                                                                                                                                                             Emma Frost as The White Queen of The Hellfire Club, complete with condescending bitch face.

This Octopus Mermaid is my personal favorite from the show! I LOVE how she turned out! I'm planning on coloring her sometime in the future. It's fortuitous that this sketch turned out so awesome, since the customer is planning on getting this tattooed on his body!

And last, but not least, is this drawing of Wonder Woman having a tea party with X-23.
I get the feeling it's some kind of inside joke between the customer and a friend, but she was absolutely delighted when she saw the finished piece and announced that I'd "made at least two people very happy"

Those four days sapped a LOT of energy out of me... I definitely learned how exhausting it is to work a convention when you're sick. I returned home on Monday with a bone-deep weariness that I have yet to fully recover from and had to keep on truckin' since the RAW cosplay fashion show was only a few days away... I'll blog about that eventually when they post the photos/video.

Now, if you guys don't mind, I'm going to go collapse in a corner for a few days.

Good Press

Ken from Heroic Times just featured a glowing review of my artwork on his blog! I can't begin to describe how gratifying it is whenever a total stranger sings my praises online.

Click here to read 

it for yourself!

(scroll down, towards 

the bottom of the page)

ChinaShop

Oooh! It seems I was spotted at C2E2!
Check it out! (It's about 17 pictures in.)



I promise I'll write up a post-con recap for C2E2 and Pittsburgh sometime in the next few days. I'm still catching my breath at the moment.

Tom Waits

Mister Scott Derby is an extremely talented artist and all-around awesome guy who I've had the pleasure of knowing for a few years now. He's provided me with really wonderful encouragement and advice on many occasions. He recently helped me through a couple tricky bits of freelance negotiation, so I wanted to create something just for him as a thank you for taking the time to help out of his busy schedule to an emerging professional.

I found out that he really likes the singer Tom Waits, so I set out to create a portrait, based on the reference photo below.

I'd love to give credit to the photographer, but I've no idea who it was.

If anyone does know, please email me: LauraGuzzoArt@Gmail.com

Steve gave me some of his old scratchboard paper the last time I was over at Rough Sketch Studios and I've been looking for a good excuse to use it ever since then. It wasn't until I was about halfway through the Tom Waits project that I realized that celebrity scratchboard portraits are a major staple of most high school art curriculums... If I wasn't careful, this image would come out looking REALLY amateurish and the last thing I wanted was for Scott's art present to look like something I'd pulled out of the back of a closet at the last minute.

The scratchboard version, from start to finish.

The other bit of trouble I ran into is deciding how much of his face to show. I like how it looks when you can't see anything except the tip of his nose, but I wanted to make sure that the viewer would be able to clearly identify the singer, and for that, he'd need a face.

The version Scott'll get in the mail is the one on the lower right (his eyes are hidden, but his mouth is visible), but I haven't yet decided on the version that'll make it into my online portfolio.

Update: Scott totally flipped out when he saw the finished project, so I think I can safely assume that is doesn't look like it came from a highschooler. He says he's going to frame it and hang it up in his bar, which is exactly where this piece belongs. It's so cool when an artist whose work you respect and admire gets excited about your work. That alone is a reminder of why I shouldn't give up and go work at Target.

The Bluewater Fiasco, part 39

For those of you still following the story, Amber has published another article in which Jerome Maida has his say about Bluewater's take on the whole affair.

I really can't express how frustrating it is that Bluewater's various representatives have listed reasons for why they pulled my cover off the book at the last minute- Totally glossing over the fact that they did not remove my cover from the book.

Instead they paid someone else to trace over my illustration so that they could continue to use my image without crediting me. That is beyond spiteful. And to claim that the two covers are as different as “night and day” is insulting and obviously untrue.

Amber's article also appeared on Bleeding Cool today, which is wonderful news. The more people hear about this fiasco the better.

The silver lining to this whole mess has been the outpouring of support I've received from friends and family. The comic book store I work at (Stormwatch Comics in Berlin) will no longer be purchasing any of Bluewater's titles, unless a customer specifically requests it. People I don't even know have offered their condolences and disgust over the whole situation, and I have been informed that Bluewater has received several unhappy letters on my behalf.

I'm sure I don't need to explain that, for someone who is just starting out as a freelance artist, to run into a company like Bluewater and suffer such a dramatic disillusionment right out of the gate is devastating. When I first cut ties with Bluewater back in January, it really took the wind out of my sails and it was quite a while before I was able to find my direction again.

I can't take it back, but if I can prevent another fledgling artist from entering into an agreement with this company as blindly as I did, then this whole mess will not have been in vain.

The Bluewater Fiasco, part 21

The lovely wonderful Amber Love has been using her blogger gravitas to help me get the word out about how Bluewater screwed me over. If you haven't already seen it, stop by and read the article she wrote about me.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I really can’t do anything legally. They own the image and technically can do whatever they like with it. I will never see a cent of the royalties, because the number of books that would have to sell before I could collect on it 10,000- A number that the most popular titles barely reach.

The best I can do is make sure that I tell as many people as possible about what happened to me so that they can avoid a similar fate.

Also, it is worth mentioning that I did get paid for this job.

This isn’t about money.

It's about ethics.

Even though they hired someone to trace over my “unprintable” cover, I should have been given credit for designing it. Everything from the composition to the color choices is the same as mine, so to say the difference is like “night and day” is a falsehood that anyone with eyes in their head can detect.

Owls Telling The Story of My Life

I don't usually blog about other websites, but this one is just too perfect.

So, for those of you who are not aware, there's a meme on the internet called Advice Animals in which different creatures are shown describing how to react in certain situations. Animals such as, insanity wolf or socially awkward penguin.

Well, last night I discovered F*ck Yeah Art Student Owl. And as someone who only recently disembarked from the crazy roller coaster ride that is art college, Art Student Owl is only too familiar. The late night projects, the highbrow B.S., and the deadly poisons we have to paint with are all part of the culture I've been surrounded by for the last four years of my life. Reading FYASO makes me experience something halfway between homesickness and Stockholm syndrome. Those four years were amazing, but god were they hard.

FYASO is a painfully accurate and absolutely hilarious insider's guide to what it's like to be an art major. Seriously, go check it out right now.

Keepin' Hope Alive

Morale has been down in the LG camp recently.

Things with Bluewater are NOT working out and I spent my Sunday afternoon working at a small comic convention, where I sold almost none of my work.

Aaaand I got my first student loan bill in the mail yesterday, which means the clock has officially started ticking.

So, feeling kinda shitty. Feeling down. And then, I saw THIS.

The man who bought one of my Wonder Woman Day donation pieces has been blogging about me and all sorts of people liked it and reblogged it.

Here's the link for his blog, Spandex and Sports Bras, as well as links to the first and second blog entries he wrote about me.

It's always nice when someone likes your work and it's even better if that person is a stranger, but it's the absolute BEST when you can eavesdrop on a whole bunch of strangers talking amongst themselves about how much you rock.

When the people involved don't know you and aren't aware that you're listening, they have absolutely no reason to be nice or polite- The only thing they're responding to is your work.

The internet is a mean place full of anonymous cruelty- so on those rare occasions when it smiles upon you, it is a very happy day indeed.

Upcoming Art Shows!:

This Sunday, on the 14th, I'll be at the C.H.U.D. Comic Book Show in Laurel, Maryland. You will find me at the Stormwatch Comics table, selling prints of my superheroine pinups as well as a whole mess of Doctor Who t-shirts.