What I Learned at the NY International Sci-Fi & Fantasy Creators Con...
Posted by Lenny on Monday, July 15 2002 at 18:47:59 GMT

(Sorry this took so long. I was ready to go but couldn't access the AMB! Better late than never.... And if you don't like long posts this one isn't for you.)

So I had planned to go to the NEW YORK INTERNATIONAL SCI-FI/FANTASY creator's convention the moment I heard about. A quick scan of the guest list showed a few creators I'd like to meet and get sketches or books signed.

Guys like Bob Almond, Sean Chen, Terry Austin, Peter David, John Romita Sr., Dick Ayers and, of course, Tom Smith.

I had gone the year before and met Dick Ayers, but truth be told there are really no Comicbook Conventions in the home of Marvel and DC comics - NYC. So I knew was going no matter what.

(And I admit, the idea of springing Bob's promise of a free Ultron sketch on him came to me the second I saw his name on the guest list.)

The day of the con arrives. Earlier in that day, while collecting in my backpack stuff to be John Hancocked by various creators, I quickly checked in at the Con's website just to make sure it wasn't canceled or anything like that.

What's this I see?

"Due to the sickness of a family member John Romtia Sr and John Romita Jr. will not be present at this years Sci-Fi/Fantasy Con. Instead they will be substituted by current JLA/AVENGERS penciler George Perez."

(Paraphrased)

I was stunned. This can't be real…

Since I wasn't leaving for a few hours yet, I shot off a quick e-mail to Avenger's Colorist at Large - Tom Smith. George and he are friends and he was going to be there too, so he'd know if this was true.

Tom mails me back - Yes! George Perez is going to be there!

But alas, Thunderous Tom Smith would be absent from the show due to back work and one of his daughter's graduation parties.

So out went the LAST AVENGERS STORY and AVENGERS INFINITY from the backpack and in went the George Perez stuff. Not wanting to push a huge stack of books on George, I tried to be selective but it was difficult.

I took more with me than planned, but I ended up hitting him in increments, hoping he wouldn't notice. (Thanks George!!)

So I drove into the city, parked in Chelsea and walked to The Garden. The Con doesn't take place on the floor of the arena, but in a convention room some floors up. I paid my fee and grabbed a program.

George Perez, George Perez…hmmm…A-hah! Table 329, last table on the center aisle.

As I make my way to the table I scan to see if Bob Almond is here. (With these 3-day cons you never know what day anybody will be there.) I see Chris Claremont sitting under a sign that read "Walt Simonson." Huh.

But wait…what's this? Who's that sitting next to George?

Tom Smith, ACAL!

Cool, somebody to hang out with…

(Tom had managed to catch up on his work. I bet he just wanted to hang out with George too.) J

Meeting George was great fun. If you've never met George Perez before, please go out of your way to do so. He's the most fun-loving, talkative, honest and passionate comicbook pro you'll ever meet. Seriously, to see so much passion and energy in somebody who is now a Master with a few decades under his belt is rare in any field.

When I asked him who his favorite character to draw this was the answer:

"I can't decide! It would be like choosing among my children!"

Anyway, this was the Avengers table, so I was gonna hang out for a bit….

Tom was selling prints of some stuff he had colored and was hand coloring George's sketches for a fee. He had with him his sack o' markers and was ready to go.

Captain America (6)

George was charging, and it was expensive. While walking into the show I immediately saw a dude from my local comic shop standing there. After saying what's up I asked if George Perez was there yet and if he was sketching.

"Yeah, he is. And he charging a fortune."

$60 for a head shot. $150 for a full body. Ouch.

Well, you only live once.

Head shot please. Captain America.

There's a waiting list. Can I come back tomorrow to pick it up?

No problem.

(My friend wanted to come tomorrow since he couldn't come today. Plus, he has tickets to the WWF house show in the Garden that night.)

Later on George is talking about the prices he's charging for sketches. He says because of JLA/AVENGERS he's taking a financial hit while doing it. Since it's his only focus and he's only getting the normal page rate. He seemed willing to do it no matter what, but mentioned his wife had some concerns, though she agreed JLA/AVENGERS would be worth the sacrifice since it's the biggest thing in comics in some time and will payoff in the long run. But this is why the pricey sketches.

I wanted something for Tom S. to color since George's sketch wouldn't be ready until the next day, so I went about perusing the other artists' stuff for something suitable.

I came across Sean Chen, slightly mobbed sitting with Norman Lee. Sean was sketching, so I got a quick Cap profile from him as I looked through his prints for sale. This guy is the complete opposite of George; he's soft spoken and came off as very modest. Any kind of appreciation for his work seems to confuse him or something…

Ah-hah! A photocopy on nice poster board of Sean's Cap pin-up from CAPTAIN AMERICA ANNUAL 2002. This will do nicely…

I ask Sean about AVENGERS INFINITY, and tell him I think he'd make a fine regular AVENGERS artist. He disagrees and says he thinks he would have a hard time doing the AVENGERS regularly, what with all the different characters.

I then ask if he created the appearances of all the aliens in AVENGERS INFINITY, and he said yes.

He also mentions that being the AVENGERS main artist would be a lot of pressure because of all the big names that have worked on the title in its long history, and how everybody who is anybody in the comic biz has worked on the book. It's too much of a microscope.

He tells me if I liked AVENGERS INFINITY I should go find a page at Spencer Beck's booth (the guy who sells original pages at all the big shows) and they should be pretty cheap.

"Nobody wants that stuff." He says.

But first I deliver my newly purchased Cap print to Tom S. for an appraisal on its coloring suitability. Gently rubbing the paper between his experienced thumb and forefinger he declared it was even better than good. He placed it on his drawing board and set to work.

He also tells me he's finally seen Bob Almond walking around. And he's thataway…

George was still sketching away and chatting with the fans. He was getting all the pics he needed done that day completed in order. Watching him was great fun - first he does Green Lantern with upraised fist and glowing ring (Tom colored this one. Sweet stuff.), then Wonder Woman with the best hair I've ever seen in a sketch. Then Wanda. Thor. Cap etc.

Since George had come to the con in 'stealth mode', nobody knew he was gonna be there, so nobody brought anything up for him to sign.

People would stand off and just watch him draw and chat with a huge smile on their faces. Some people would come up and say, "George, I'd just like to shake your hand," and say thanks to him. Or they would tell stories about how they met George when they were 7 and they can remember it like yesterday.

George had stories too. One about a kid who parents kept taking photographs as the child watched George draw him a picture. Afterwards, the parents said they had never seen their boy stand so still before, and needed documented proof.

Me, I busted out AVENGERS #141, George's first issue, and asked him what those funky backgrounds were about?

His response: "I didn't know how to draw then. So I was trying to fill space."

Heh. Compare and contrast.

I also asked him about him designing Wondy's costume from AVENGERS #161. He said he designed it but it wasn't him who "made it into a Christmas tree."

So as Tom S. kept the ball rolling on the Cap piece I went off to hunt down Bob Almond. He was only a couple of tables away, directly across from Sean Chen to be exact. He was sitting with another guy (whose name escapes me right now) at his booth, but didn't look to be sketching.

"Hey, Bob. I'm Leonard Tippit."

Bob was surprised and excited to see me. That is until I handed him a blank comicbook backing board and asked him about the aforementioned Ultron pic he offered on the AMB. The pressure was on, even more so since Bob had not planned to sketch that day and hadn't brought any tools with him to work with. He asked if I could pick up the sketch tomorrow so he could be sure to do a good job. Since I had to come back to pick up my sketch by George I said that was cool.

Bob knew he only had to beat out the "blue Sharpie" Kang head Tom did from Jim Hanley's a few weeks ago, but he also knew I was going to post the results here and wanted to do a good job. Little did he know that Tom Smith was right down the block completely in his element. (Coloring)

Bob had only been there a little while and hadn't quite become acclimated to the scene. So I told him I'd drop by again in a few. He also mentioned that he needed a pencil to do the sketch, and asked if I could try and get one for him. Then I went over to Spencer Beck's booth to find these "cheap" AVENGERS INFINITY pages Mr. Chen was talking about.

Turns out there weren't any. The guy who prices these pages knows art, and isn't stupid about what he's got. All the cool splash type pages with Eternity and such were way over a hundred bucks, with $40 being the standard price. I also checked out the Epting stuff but it was also pricey for the selection.

(Sean's pages are cool because on the back there are reverse breakdown pencils. Sean does all his stuff backwards on the back and then "light boxes" his own breakdowns onto the front of the page. Anybody who remembers the old "check the proportions flip-test" knows why he does this…)

I finally found a nice page of AVENGERS INFINITY for $25.

Page 21 of issue #3, with a nice pic of Monica right at the top. It was a good deal, and everybody I showed it to agreed. When I showed it to Sean and told him his pages on AVENGERS INFINITY are far from cheap, he asked me "What character on that page do you like?" I imagine he doesn't guess someone might just like the composition of his pages, even if he was right about my motivation..

"This one." I said, pointing to Monica at the top.

"Photon, huh? I was wondering because I hear people are buying up all the Jack-of-Hearts pages like crazy."

???

Learn something new every day…

Since Sean and Scott Hanna already signed the page, I took my leave to see how Tom S. was going on Cap.

He was rolling along with the piece, since he was only going to color Cap and not the background.

Watching Bob color is a little like watching Bob Ross paint, he pulls out a weird color any you're thinking: "What's he gonna do with that?"

And then he starts in and your like: "Did he just mess up?"

But four markers later it all comes together and looks great. The finish copy went right up on my wall, and it gets comments by everybody who comes through the door. My one friend went right up to it and said: "This is now the best piece you own."

(This small .gif doesn't really do this piece justice, since in actuality it's the size of a page of original comic art.)

So I hung out with Tom and George a little while longer, and Bob stopped by later to chat also. Titanic Tom Brevoort also made a cameo, poker face firmly in place.

I have to say the coolest thing about George, Tom and Bob is that not only are they AVENGERS book creators, but they really like the AVENGERS and can talk about them with you. I notice George refers to them by their first names (DC characters too), like they really are his children…Really nice guys all around though.

Tom S. told me it was him who got the Big John/George Perez cover for the ULTRON UNLEASHED reprint issue. Marvel really wanted George to do it but he wouldn't or couldn't. Tom, being the AVENGERS fan he is offered them this: "If you want George to do it, get John Buscema to pencil it."

So thanks for Tom S. for helping us AVENGERS fan get some Big John work before he passed away. I bought a color print of this cover from Tom, and asked George how much was him and how much was John's. He said it was mostly John, he only fixed Wanda's pose a little and Wondy's face. He said the Kirby dots were all Big John's.

George dropped a few tidbits about JLA/AVENGERS, but nothing that is spoilers. He mentioned several visual puns he and Kurt worked in, and a barbecue taking place at one point. Again, it's hard to explain the energy and creativeness that just sort of emanates off of George. He's the man.

At one point he was talking to a group of fans about how he keeps the creative ball rolling. He said he came to realize that "God had blessed him with gift that brings a lot of joy to people."

I quickly added that while George had been blessed with talent, we had been blessed with George Perez. And this brought a unanimous "Amen" from the surrounding fanboys and girls.

My time and money almost up, I went back over to Bob to ask him what a good time to come back tomorrow for the sketch was. He said he still needed a pencil before I could do it. He said maybe Tom had one and if I could ask.

So I went back over to Tom and told him Bob's predicament. With a wide grin Tom slowly handed me a black Sharpie to present to Bob. (Which brought about Tom's intended reaction from Bob. Bob sensed sabotage…)

I said my goodbyes to Bob and then back over to Tom and George to say 'Later' to them. Tom gave me his card and said he does commissions on any art, and if done from his studio it can airbrushed, painted or whatever. Then I shook George Perez's hand, and almost fainted dead away when he said:

"See you Lenny, it was nice to finally meet you."

Well, the pleasure was all mine George.

When I returned the next day it was only to pick up my pieces and do a quick stroll with my friend, who was quite surprised to see WWF wrestlers The Hurricane and Raven perusing the aisles for comic art. He even bought himself some old Hulk Hogan figures for his pals at work.

Both George and Bob where there with the goods.

(I've decided to stick to the theme sketch idea, and will be getting Cap whever I can. Tom had thought about getting some Doc Savage sketches for his own book, but I don't know if he did in the end.)

And Bob was there at the Marvel Comics booth this time. He was getting ready to leave, so I got there just in time. He had the sketch:

He said he originally had only two "floating heads" above, but it didn't look right. And to remember he didn't have his normal tools with him to work with. It looked great, and I told him I dug the Kirby Dots.

We shook hands and figured we'd hang again in another hundred years when a Con comes to NYC.

A really fun, if somewhat pricey time spent at MSG. Though the knowledge that it won't happen for at least another year motivated me to spend some money on some fun stuff.

And thanks to George Perez, Tom Smith and Bob Almond for making it that much better.