Since his first appearance in Tales of Suspense back in 1963, Iron Man has always been a big fan favorite. His initial success was always credited to the creative team that originally launched him—Stan Lee, Don Heck and Larry Lieber. With the recent release of the hit Marvel Studios motion picture, we think a few more names will forever be attached to this character—director Jon Favreau, actor Robert Downey, Jr, and talented artist and designer Adi Granov.

Once Adi got his hands on ol' Shellhead, the look of the hero and the sales of his comics were never the same—in the best way! Adi's redesigns made Iron Man's armor sleek, functional, tech-savvy and just plain kick-ass! So much so, that Jon Favreau eventually brought him on with the design team for the film, to make Iron Man really come off for the big screen (thank you, Jon!).

We became fans of Granov's art like the rest of the...well, fanboys. In 2004, as a cover artist, he put his special magic on many a Marvel character and fandom lost its mind! Nova, She-Hulk, FF, New Avengers, Inhumans and the Silver Surfer were just a few of the titles that year to recieve "Granovision". In '05, his covers and interiors for the Extremis series with collaborator Warren Ellis were a slam dunk. We thought "Hey, this guy is bringing the funk!" 

We chatted with the Bosnian-born artist at his home in the U.K. and got the skinny on his background working for Nintendo, his adventures at the 2007 Comic Con and being a big fish in the gargantuan pond of Hollywood.

**In the interview, Adi mentions meeting the great special effects wizard, Stan Winston, who passed away after this was recorded. We too are big fans of Stan's work and are saddened by his passing. He was a real pioneer and visionary, and he will be missed.

http://www.adigranov.net/news.php

There's an old saying about youth being wasted on the young that's so true, it's scary. Just ask artist, Eric Canete, he'll tell you. The reference to rebirth in the title of his interview should give you a clue as to where he's been, and also—where he's going.

Eric got his professional start working in animation when he was just a 17 year old kid, not even out of high school yet. He did "ghost work" for a guy on shows like X-Men and EXO Squad, and eventually got a regular in-house gig on Phantom 2040. When 2040 ended, he got an offer from Peter Chung in San Fransisco to come up and work on a little show called Aeon Flux. You may have heard of it...

While he was fortunate enough to get started young, Canete says his early days were not without their stumbling blocks. The Cliff Notes version of his past could go like this: he worked in animation for a while, left under pretty bad circumstances for his first love—comics, had a good time in comics, but really wasn't prepared for that world either, and finally got back to animation with hopes of rebuilding his reputation. And rebuild it he did!

Since 2002, E's done storyboards, backgrounds and designs for shows like He-Man, Justice League, Teen Titans, The Batman and Legion of Super-Heroes. His full-time day job is with Cartoon Network on the re-launched Ben 10 and he still does the occasional awesome comic book job at night. Check out his Iron Man: Enter the Mandarin series for Marvel with those funky, art deco covers (the hotness!). And after Comic Con, be on the lookout for Eric's upcoming run on The End League for Dark Horse with writer Rick Remender (more hotness!).

This L.A. native's story is an interesting one for a couple of reasons. One, he went back and repaired bridges that he himself burned. Not everyone does that. And two, he's had the support of many a superstar mentor and cheerleader along the way. Names like Peter Chung, Dustin Nguyen, Bruce Timm, Dave Johnson, Mark Chiarello, Skottie Young and Glen Murakami popped up often during the conversation.

In addition to all of the above, Dwight and I also get some insights into Eric's approach to storytelling, the origin behind his blog Discard, and the 4-1-1 on how he started doing those glorious 90 minute sketches of his.

Here's to a cool interview with an even cooler person—thanks, E!

http://kahnehteh.blogspot.com/

Greetings, mystery lovers, and welcome back for Act II with writer and artist, Matt Wagner!

As the curtain goes up, we find our hero, Matt, still in a perilous stand-off with The Diabolical Siblings! Watch and listen, as he's coerced into confess his love of pulp and traditional flavor, his lack of love for too much continuity and a few secrets from his Sandman Mystery Theatre days.

"Herr Wagner, vee haff vays off makink you taaalk!"

He also lays out for the villianous duo the tale of Comico's demise and how it ended up affecting his ownership of Grendel. Plus a funny, but touching story about collaborating with one of his heroes—the late, great Harvey Kurtzman.

OK, that was cheesy enough, but all in good fun. Many thanks to Matt for coming on with us today and being such a cool guest!

Take a bow, Matt!

http://www.mattwagnercomics.com/

We've had a lot of guests on this show over these last 18 months and they've all been pretty great. Every once in a while though, it's a real treat for us to chat with one who has undeniable gravitas. With a career spanning over 25 years in the comics biz, Matt Wagner joined us on the esteemed SiDEBAR microphones and brought just that!

Where do you really start with a guy like Matt? Mage, Grendel, Batman, The Demon, Sandman Mystery Theatre—it's all good. Let's just say we jumped in at the deep end with the guy and did our best to keep heads above water.

He's the quintessential writer and artist in our opinion, from the very beginning, establishing himself with creator-owned projects (he's not new to this, boys and girls). His start with Comico is well chronicled, so we won't go into it here. His present and his past work with DC are also equally well known. Currently, he has two irons in the fire—Zorro for Dynamite Comics, in stores now, and Vertigo's upcoming Madame Xanadu, due out June 25th. Plus, he's in the midst of a Grendel run for Dark Horse, that started late last year to commemorate the character's own 25th anniversary (damn Matt, slow down!).

As mentioned above, Wagner is a man of many talents and he rocks at all of 'em. As a writer, it's terrific seeing him collaborate with great artists like Francesco Francavilla on Zorro and Amy Hadley on Madame Xanadu. As both the artist and writer, it's even more exciting watching him get back to Grendel and Hunter Rose after a 10 year hiatus from the series.

We had a great time talking with Matt and he was nice enough to put up with our nonsense. Do yourselves a favor and check out his many projects wherever you can find 'em—they really are all good. And look for his appearance at the Heroes Convention in Charlotte, June 20-22. The Con has a terrific guest list this year and by far, he's one of their heavy hitters!

**This is only Part I with Matt and for it, we played a snippet of Santana's incendiary Black Magic Woman. In honor of Matt's new...umm, madame.

http://www.mattwagnercomics.com/

Back in April, we were joined on the show by exciting, young newcomer to mainstream comics, artist Amy Reeder Hadley. She's collaborating with critically acclaimed writer and artist himself, Matt Wagner, on Vertigo's upcoming Madame Xanadu re-launch. This native Coloradoan graciously took some time out one sunny afternoon to chat with us.

Amy got her professional start in comics by winning Tokyopop's "Rising Stars in Manga" competition in 2002. Shortly thereafter, she wrote and drew an OEL manga series for them called Fool's Gold. Gold is the story of an artsy high school student named Penny and her social revolution against jerky boys and conformity.

Hadley's editor on the book, Brandon Montclare, eventually left Tokyopop and took a job up at DC working with Bob Schreck. When Scheck moved over to Vertigo and the Madame Xanadu opportunity arose, Brandon reached out to his former T'pop creator. The rest is...well, you know.

Our conversation with Amy covers much of the above and a whole lot more, so do check it out. She's a super person with a very different story to tell.

Oh yeah, and she can SING too!

Madame Xanadu hits stores June 25th.

**For this episode, we played a small portion of Ryan Adams' Amy for obvious reasons.

http://www.tentopet.com/

We're back and this is Part II with our buddy, comic artist, Skottie Young. Still awesome, still unrestrained and still all over the place, this conversation was a blast (...sorry)! We hope you have as much fun listening in as we did running our mouths—enjoy!

** For Part II with Skottie, we played a snippet of David Ryan Harris' Change 'cause it is good for you.

http://skottieyoung.blogspot.com/

Let me start by saying Dwight and I have friends, we have buddies and we have acquaintances in this here industry. But there are some people who, over the last year, have become much more like family to us. Mr. Skottie Young is one of them.

And he's not just family, we're also big fans of the guy's work too. He's an incredible artist with an edgy and raw style, and he wraps it up nicely in this great design sense. Allow me to steal a quote about him that I read on-line once. The blogger said "Skottie's work, like that of Katie Cook's, impresses me because of the obvious fun that he has while drawing. It's in everything he does". I tend to agree. I don't get the feeling he labors over his artwork like so much "render porn", but instead, tries to have a good time with it. Go look at his run on New X-Men or any of his covers—you'll see it.

And quite honestly, I thought dude's covers were crazy good before I even knew who he was. Being a fan of other podcasts, when he joined my beloved Around Comics as a regular, I was like "Who the..?" Then I checked out his site and was like "Oh." Then when I saw he was responsible for the Cable & Deadpool covers I'd been secretly digging, I was like "Oh, damn!"

We met Skottie exactly a year ago at the Heroes Convention in Charlotte, NC. We gave him a business card on a humbug, told him how much we liked AC and asked him to check out our podcast. He was polite and gracious enough, and that was that. After the Con, I emailed him and asked him again to listen in when he had time—he finally did. Since then, he's sent us a dozen or so very nice notes about our show, telling us how much he likes it and offering his help in any way. There's usually cursing involved too, but we got used to that...

Oh yeah, and he told everybody he knew to check us out! We got more emails and comments than a little bit from people who said Skottie Young told them about SiDEBAR. And that crossed the line for Dwight and I. We couldn't go back to just friends or acquaintances or even fellow podcasters with the guy at that point. For us, it's been family and brothers ever since—and that's the way we'll keep it.

**This is only Part I with Skottie 2 Hottie, and for it, we played a snippet of Public Enemy's Brothers Gonna Work It Out.

http://skottieyoung.blogspot.com/

The Method Man graphic novel come out July 23rd from Grand Central Publishing and for our friend, artist Sanford Greene, it marks the next step in the evolution of his career. Fresh off of DC's Wonder Girl mini-series, he sat down with us and talked about his latest effort and the whole experience of working on it.

We met Sanford at last year's Dragon Con and after grabbing a copy of his beautiful sketchbook, Deadlines 2, we knew we wanted to have him on the show. His covers and interiors on Batman Strikes for the Johnny DC imprint were awesome and we started checking for Wonder Girl as soon as we heard he was the penciler.

Being influenced by guys in and out of comics, Greene's style definitely showcases his love of animation. He recently had the pleasure of finding out that animators Bruce Timm and James Tucker, of Batman and Justice League fame, are both fans of his work too. 

The front end of our conversation details the funny series of events that lead to Sanford collaborating with hip-hop superstar, Method Man and writer, David Atchison on this new project. Later, we cover some of his background growing up in Charleston, SC, a few valuable lessons he's learned along the way and a hint at what his future holds.

**On this episode of the show, we played Jah Freedom's Give Up 'cause Sanford has his own theme music—just like Shaft!

http://www.sanfordgreene.com/

Dark Horse Comics is set to release Indiana Jones and The Tomb of the Gods in late June, one month after The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull comes to theaters. Writer Rob Williams and artist Steve Scott were chosen as the creative team for Dark Horse's first handling of the new license—and it looks like they've chosen well!

We've known Steve Scott for about a year now since the very first Atlanta Comics Expo back in 2007. After meeting him at the Con, we went back and took a look at some of his terrific past work. His skillful hand can be seen on books like Razor, New Warriors, Shadowpact, Creeper and Legends of the Dark Knight. Plus, currently on Marvel Adventures, episodes of the hit TV show, Smallville and of course, the upcoming Indy series.

Chatting with Steve in passing, two things stand out about him—he prides himself on good storytelling and he works harder than your average to meet all of his deadlines. Sometimes surviving on only three hours of sleep or staying up for 48 hours straight. Or even buying coffee by the keg (OK, we're exaggerating on that last part, but you get it).

At any rate, there's a reason why Steve's pal, inker Nathan Massengill, refers to him as the night walker and the day walker. We're just happy the guy had an hour to spare to talk with us period.

Our conversation with Scott covers his early days growing up in Gulf Port and Biloxi, Mississippi, his first exposure to comics, breaking into the biz by way of firefighting, and his exodus and return to comics after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. He also tells us about he and his wife Sharon's adventures on The Dr. Phil Show (yes, that Dr. Phil) and how he's recently gotten to know comics great, Gene Colan.

Steve's a true Southern gentleman and a heck of an artist, and it was a pleasure speaking with him.

Indiana Jones and The Tomb of the Gods hits comic shops everywhere June 25th—go check him out!

http://stevescott.deviantart.com/

http://acosmicodyssey.com/

Marko Djurdjevic finally visited the esteemed SiDEBAR mics and it was all that with leftovers. Of course, like anything else worth having, it was not without a cost. Let us back up...

When we started this show over a year ago, the very first podcast we made, praised and extolled the virtues of The Dreaded Marko (mispronouncing his last name, of course). We also used one of his X-Men First Class covers for the blog entry featuring his daring redesigns. I've (Swain) been enamored with the guy's style since he started doing covers exclusively for Marvel. Dwight's been a fan since he met him at the Concept Art Workshop in San Francisco back in 2005—wearing a beautiful hand-painted Elektra jacket, no less.

The super abbreviated version of Marko's path is this: he was born in Germany, started drawing, got work at 17, posted on Concept Art.Org in his early twenties, and took the world by storm minutes later. With a few...umm, embellishments on our part, that pretty much sums it up.

Check out the guy's handiwork and you'll be convinced like we were. X-Men First Class, Daredevil, Blade, Super Villain Team-Up, Marvel Illustrated, Wolverine Origins, Thunderbolts, Mystic Arcana, What If—the list literally goes on and on. Plus, tons of design stuff on Concept Art and they're all badass and all immaculately rendered by Mr. Djurdjevic. This man is the truth and YOU know it.

He recently made the excursion into doing interior pencils for the new Thor series written by J. Michael Straczynski and the book is a solid hit. He was filling in for the talented Olivier Coipel and just knocked it out.

OK, back to the cost. We tried several times in the past to reach the man, but to no avail. And all jokes aside, it wasn't him, it was us, going through the wrong channels (duuhh). Finally, after getting the accurate contact info straight from the source at the NY Comic Con (all thanks to the FANTASTICALLY TALENTED AND GRACIOUS, PAOLO RIVERA—PAINTER EXTRAORDINAIRE HIMSELF), we made it happen. 

Throw in three calling cards, six redials and bad sound coming out of Dwight's microphone, and you've got yourself one nice little Marko Djurdjevic interview. And we loved every minute of it!

**For this episode with Marko, we played a small portion of Depeche Mode's I Feel You, because we do!

"Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experiences of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success achieved." - Helen Keller

These are inspiring words from the great Helen Keller. We thought they rang especially true in the wake of our conversation with artist and art visionary, Jason Manley. His journey has not been without its obstacles, but talent, perseverance and the help and support of his friends has brought him far. And he's gonna go much farther.

We first heard about Jason like everyone else did, through his affiliation with Concept Art.Org and Massive Black. He's not only a co-founder of both companies, but also serves as their President.

Concept Art was started six years ago by Manley and two of his friends, artists Andrew Jones and Coro Kaufman. The three of them met and became buddies in their early twenties and kept in touch via the Internet. Creatively, there was a mutual respect and the interest to work and learn together—that's really how the ball got rolling. Jason got the idea of setting up a site where they could all share their projects and ideas, meet new artists, exchange information and the thing just took off from there. To date, there are 110,000 plus artists signed on as members of the CA community, posting over 1,000,000 images.

As time went on, acclaimed film artists, Chris Hatala and Pete Konig joined the group and they formed their second company, Massive Black Inc.  After spending time learning from each other and sharing previous art school and industry production experiences, they agreed that working together professionally, under their own banner, was their next step. A couple of partners came and went and the team eventually settled in nicely with the addition of Executive Producer, Melissa Lee and 3D Director, Dan Staton. 

Started on a meager $6000 budget, Massive Black is now one of the highest profile art studios in the entertainment industry—doing work for advertising, games, toys, comics, TV and film. It offers a full line of services to its clients: green light pitch development, concept design, storyboards, illustration, rigging, animation, textures, 3D modeling, product co-development and IP creation. Since the company's inception, they've completed over 175 projects for over 125 major companies working in the field—including 18 of the top 20 video game publishers. The MB teams are located in San Francisco, Shanghai and Bangkok.

While Concept Art.Org is a non-profit educational institution serving the international community and local students at the Concept Art Atelier, Massive Black is certainly its professional and practical other side. The two companies are essentially independent, yet supportive brothers when it comes to the world of art.

We caught up with Jason in Austin, TX right in the middle of a big move and talked about all of the above and a lot more. We also get into the terrific workshops they started doing around the world and some future plans for both companies.

Oh yeah, and Jason's over the whole "not doing art" thing, so watch out!

http://www.conceptart.org/

http://massiveblack.com/

The road to our conversation with the uber-talented James Jean was indeed a long one, but it was worth the wait. We contacted him some time ago through his site, http://www.jamesjean.com/, and got a polite response back that while he was interested in chatting, he was simply too busy. However...he would be in Atlanta in February visiting the Savannah College of Art and Design, and maybe we could do some podcasting then. Sounded like a plan!

We stayed on top of it for a couple of months, got his cell number before he left Cali (Thanks, Gary) and showed up Thursday night for the start of SCAD-Atlanta's Comics & Illustration Forum. That evening, James and artists Yuko Shimizu, Andrew Robinson and Eric Canete sat in the round with about 150 people and shared their stories and professional insights. Dwight and I had a great time and afterwards, much schmoozing was had.

The next day at noon, we met up with the man at SCAD and had a wonderful talk about his career and background, his time as a student at SVA, Fables and of course, art. We also touched on his participation in the West coast art event, Baby Tattooville and his upcoming 2009 gallery show in NYC.

And yes, James does love art. And art history. And jazz. And pizza too (he eventually got sustenance from Rick Lovell, one of the event's organizers).

The interview ran just under an hour and we couldn't have been happier with the outcome. Many thanks to SCAD for bringing these amazing artists to our city—it was terrific meeting them all. And a special shout of thanks to the "fairly reclusive Mr. Jean" for squeezing us into his hectic schedule—it was like that.

**This episode of the show features a snippet of CocoRosie's Rainbowarrior in honor of life in the Brew.

http://www.processrecess.com/

This is the last of our ACE panel audio and it's entitled, The Wonder of It All, unleashing imagination with a personal touch. It was all about expressing something different by reaching down inside yourself and these three panelists are certainly qualified to speak on that subject.

First up is Mike Kunkel, an artist, writer and animator who's done work for companies like Sony, Disney, Universal and Pixar. Mike also runs his own company, The Astonish Factory, where he produces all ages books like The Land of Sokmunster and his Eisner award-winning Herobear and the Kid. Herobear is the story of a boy named Tyler and his pet polar bear, and the lessons they learn on their journey together.

Kunkel's been a champion of kid-friendly reading for some time now and he's well known for his mantra, "Remember your childhood...and pass it on".

Next in line is Andy Runton. Andy is an Atlanta native and the writer and artist behind his own award-winning creation, Owly. Owly tells the tale of a lonely, yet friendly little owl who many say could be Runton's alter-ego. Published by Top Shelf, Owly won an Ignatz award in 2006 for Best New Series and an Eisner for Best Publication for a Younger Audience. Double honors and well deserved!

Andy works full-time on his graphic novels and every year he produces a new chapter in this wonderful little bird's adventures.

Then there's our good friend, artist, writer and character designer, Ragnar. Brandon Ragnar Johnson has an extensive background in animation like Mike and he too has some great all ages books you can find through Baby Tattoo Publishing. Got Your Nose and Izzy's Very Important Job are two special projects he created and dedicated to two of his children (a third is in the works now for his youngest son).

Back in '06, Ragnar wrote and drew a love letter to his time of traveling abroad called Kings of the Road. Celebrating if you will, hobo culture, Kings is a beautifully crafted book for older audiences.

The discussion in this one is pretty open and honest, and offers some real encouragement to creators who may be thinking of telling their story. And like all the other panels at ACE, it was a lotta fun for us to be a part of. Our thanks once again to the guests, attendees and promoters of the Atlanta Comics Expo for putting up with us—we had a blast, you guys!

http://www.theastonishfactory.com/ 

http://www.andyrunton.com/

http://www.littlecartoons.com/

What's up and welcome back for more with artist and illustrator, Celia Calle. This is Part II of a lengthy, but hilarious talk we had with her and it's chocked full of artsy goodness!

In the conversation, Celia covers: going from fashion to illustration, life drawing class, being cruel to your schoolmates, ADs vs. Editors, Will Dennis and the SDCC, AMERICAN VIRGIN AND THOSE AWESOME COVERS, her opinion of the series in general, criticism of her palette, people jacking her images, more Wuthering Heights, "Why is there no book of your art available..?!", kissing Storm Troopers, why Darth Vader is hot (...he is?), the NYCC and more.

Again, it was awesome having Miss Calle on the show and we can't wait to do it again—hope you dig it too!

**On this episode, we played a snippet of The Kills' What New York Used to Be 'cause it's in heavy rotation in the Circle.

http://celiacalle.com/

http://cofcircles.blogspot.com/

Have you ever met someone who was exactly what you thought they'd be, only better? Well, that's just where we found ourselves on the roller coaster ride that was our interview with illustrator, Celia Calle.

For months, we've been blown away by her American Virgin covers for Vertigo and her unique and individual style. We think comics is always best served by creative people bringing other elements into the medium and stirring up the mix. Celia does that ten fold!

For those of you just being introduced to her work through AV...trust, she's really a big deal in the commercial art world with clients like ESPN Magazine, Calvin Klein, Nike and Gautier. Of course, you'd never know that by talking to her, she's much too chill a person to brag. Minutes into our conversation, we were smitten by her down-to-earth charm and humor, and she was our new best friend. Celia's personality is a lot like her art—playful, energetic and well, kinda sexy. But with that, she's also warm, thoughtful and has a real sincerity that comes from the heart. She's the best of many worlds, we suppose.

As is our way, we went off the rails a bit just having some fun (there's maybe 25 minutes of hardcore art talk in the whole interview). But fear not, true believers, you can always go to CC's site and blog for the full skinny on this NY girl and what she's up to. Plus, this is only Part I of our talk with her, so hey—stay tuned!

**Celia's interview features a small portion of Portishead's Strangers 'cause that's how we started out. Now, it's friends.

http://www.celiacalle.com/

http://cofcircles.blogspot.com/

Hey All, welcome back for Part V of our ACE panel audio, this time featuring writer, artist, animator and storyteller, Mike Kunkel. Mike's well known for his Eisner award-winning creation, Herobear and the Kid, but what you may not know is he's also the publisher for Herobear as well. 

His company, The Astonish Factory, was established in 1999 to serve as an umbrella for all of his projects. No matter what the medium—comics, books, toys, TV or film, Astonish will usher those properties into the marketplace. That way Mike can stay hands on with every aspect of the process and nothing gets lost in translation.

In the panel, Kunkel discusses his beginnings in the creator-owned world and some of the challenges of self-publishing. He also shares his thoughts on juggling business and family, and the joys of creating for yourself.

This was a short one, but there were lots of great questions from the attendees and a wealth of information dropped by Mike, too. And our thanks to him for holding it down all by himself. Two of the other panelists got the convention flu and couldn't be there, so Mike braved it alone. We were well served!

http://www.theastonishfactory.com/

The World Wide Web has become an integral part of our daily lives. In many ways, it challenges the standards of what art and commerce were and forces us all to recognize the profound effect of what is and what's coming. A shift is occurring where the creative playing field is being leveled and everyone must log on to be a player or get left behind. 

Gina Biggs of the Strawberry Comics line and Greg Carter of UpDown Studios have taken up the challenge of web comics and understand the rules of surviving and thriving in this new frontier. They both attended the Atlanta Comics Expo in February and I (Dwight) had the pleasure of moderating a panel with them on this very subject.  

Gina spoke to us about her successful endeavors with the all-female comics group, Strawberry Comics. Her current works include Erstwhile, an adaptation of "hidden gems" from the writings of The Brothers Grimm and Red String, a coming-of-age story about a teenager named Mirahu Ogawa. 

Greg discussed his own UpDown Studios, an on-line collective of creators and artists who work in different media types and formats. UpDown's members not only represent comics, but photography, painting and fine arts. The studio also serves as a publishing imprint for the group on titles like Abandon: Borrowed Tale and Tombstone Sword Slinger.

In the panel, both these trailblazers cover much about their own projects and their growing industry. Included are some of the ins and outs on promoting and marketing, how to keep expenses down, effective site designs and some costly mistakes new web creators can avoid.

http://www.strawberrycomics.com/

http://www.updownstudio.com/

Hey 'Nation, sorry for the brief absence and yes, that's a not so veiled reference to Marvin the Martian. We had a computer snafu on our end and it's put us a tad behind (technology is a mofo and all). Anyway, worry not 'cause we've got some exciting chit-chat a-coming. There's more panel audio from the Atlanta Comics Expo, a conversation with illustrator and American Virgin cover artist, Celia Calle and a few surprises. So stay tuned, keep your ears on—and thanks for listening..!

As we continue to bring you more ACE panel audio, let's pause here for this impromptu talk we had with artist and convention guest, Phil Noto.

Phil's only been in comics a short time really, but he's attracted a legion of fans with his sexy, vintage spy girls and classic approach. He has his contemporary influences like J. Scott Campbell and Adam Hughes, but most of the illustrators Noto digs worked in the 50's and 60's. Guys like Robert McGinnis, Coby Whitmore and the great Bob Peak are all inspirations to this Florida native. 

As an ex-Disney clean up artist, Phil brings that experience, plus his appreciation for golden and silver age illustration to all of his comics work. Check out his skills on Birds of Prey, Beautiful Killer, Danger Girl and Scarlett: Declassified, and you'll see what we mean. 

In this quick sit-down, we discuss his schooling at Ringling and his past with Disney, his style and growth as a storyteller, plus the unusual way he got into comics. We also touch on Phil's first book of art, Jet Seven, his friendship with Howard Chaykin, being Mr. 4400 and his new Image project, The Infinite Horizon with writer, Gerry Duggan. Our thanks to him for stealing a few minutes away from the show to chat with us.

**And for those who haven't heard yet, Jet Seven is officially sold out!

http://www.notoart.com/

There's more where this came from! Today, we present another panel recorded back in February at ACE, the Atlanta Comics Expo. This one's called Character Design and it's full of info and insights on the subject from our four great panelists!

First up is Sanford Greene, penciler for DC’s Wonder Girl mini-series and the new Method Man/Wu Tang graphic novel. Sanford's done designs for companies like Sony Animation, Hasbro, SEGA and Nickelodeon, and was a member of the collective known as Artxilla Studios.

Then there's Stephanie Gladden, a wonderful character artist and designer who currently works for Cartoon Network. She's drawn tons of licensed characters like Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, Ren & Stimpy and The Simpsons, but you may know her as the creator of Hopster's Tracks for Bongo Comics.

Next is Ragnar, a designer and illustrator who's done development work for people like Disney, Nickelodeon and Warner Bros. Ragnar directed a five minute short film for Disney based on one of his own all-ages books, Got Your Nose.

And finally, Derek Yaniger, an artist with a delightfully retro style who's done work for Marvel Comics and Cartoon Network and event shows like Tiki Oasis and The Wild Weekend. You can also see his art featured in magazines like Atomic Barracuda and Car Kulture Deluxe. 

This was an eclectic blend of backgrounds and perspectives and I really appreciate everyone's candor. The discussion includes topics like working on established characters vs. working in development, trying to stay on model, pleasing a client (or not!) and responding to the Bat-Phone. I had a blast moderating this panel, folks and this time I even remembered to introduce everyone (yaay)!

http://www.sanfordgreene.com/

http://www.stephaniegladden.com/

http://www.littlecartoons.com/

http://www.derekart.com/