Japandex Day 23!

JAPANDEX by MARTIN EDEN
It's me again! I just wanted to get this out of my system, just a nice black and white pic of the team, with all their names written in Japanese. If you're new to my comics, you won't know that my previous series, The O Men, was all black and white, and with Spandex I'm actually getting used to doing colour comics. So this is me going back to basics! It's also a nice opportunity to show the characters' names in Japanese lettering.

Japandex Day 22!

Mushishi/Musashi by Jay Faulkner
Jay got in touch after being told about Japandex by Stephen Downey (who he is working on 'stuff' for www.talesofthe.com/). Jay mentioned he might do a Neon Musashi image, and I mentioned to him a gorgeous movie poster for the film Mushishi (https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgk216ltuj-CRkxNv3iYdDKvijv3KwcFn7B-LLtORCijSWEH2oyRGTV_EbUvcPs4ZHcRSrEKy3kYX00h-vHJx-H3yZj-tInWYJzVK4O4GrFWr80HabGCqH981LAQwpOTY-JwzirgYPeTPI/s400/MushishiDVD.jpg), which might look good with Glitter in it - and Jay did both! Although instead of the eerieness of Mushishi, Jay went for a nice calmness and cherry blossoms. Jay only wanted me to put Mushishi up, but I've surprised him and put both up - a first for Japandex, a double whammy!

This is the first time that Jay has put paint on paper in form of a water-colour in nearly ten years - as he spends most of his time either writing his own published stories or publishing other people's work in his art inspired online magazine, 'With Painted Words' (www.withpaintedwords.com) - but loved the idea of Japandex so much he dipped his toe back in the water (when that didn't work he used a brush as every sensible artist does!) and has caught the bug again.

To find out more visit www.jayfaulkner.com

I am going to finish Japandex on Wednesday (last day of June) and a couple of people have dropped out (or at least gone quiet on me lol), so I have one slot left to fill, so if you would like to do a pic and have time, I have a couple of great ideas - first come, first served!! martrpeden@yahoo.co.uk

Japandex Day 22

PAPER PINK NINJAS by PHILIPPA RICE
If you’ve been to any comic cons over the past couple of years, you may have bumped into this talented lady, Philippa Rice. She is a bundle of unbelievable creativity. She does loads of comic projects, but her current main ‘thing’ is My Cardboard Life, which is a strip about a group of paper characters and it’s all put together by hand by Philippa. It’s pretty unique and it’s absolutely adorable and hilarious.
You can check it out here:
http://mycardboardlife.com/
She does a new one every weekday.
I knew Philippa would do a knockout job with the Pink Ninjas idea, and of course what she came up with was super kawaii (cute)!
P.S. ‘Interesting’ (?) anecdote: I actually knew Philippa’s sister, Kate, before I knew Philippa. Kate joined my Japanese class in my second term and was with us for a few more terms. I was at the UK Mini Comics/Web Thing and couldn’t believe it when I bumped into Kate – I thought it’d be the last place she’d be lol! But Kate joins Philippa at loads of comic cons, which is how I discovered My Cardboard Life. Interesting eh hehe?

Japandex Day 21!

HARAJUKU GIRL AND SALARY MAN by ROGER MASON
I’ve known Roger for a while, since my first Bristol comic con a few years ago. I love his art – it’s very bold, very stylish, very clever. A lot of his work is in black and white, and one of his most well known graphic novels, The Mice, is a great example of this. Roger has also had graphic novels published in Europe (jealous!), done storyboarding for TV and advertising (jealous!!), and most importantly, he drew a lovely cover for an anthology issue of my O Men comic!
You can check out all of Roger’s work at www.looksgoodonpaper.co.uk – go on have a look, it’s awesome.
I invited Roger to do a moody drawing of two of my J-Team characters (I love those guys!) and I was pretty stunned by what he came up with. He nailed them pretty well and makes me want to do a J-Team comic even more!!!

Japandex Day 20!

TOKYO LIBERTY POLICE by DAVID WITHERS
David contacted me about Japandex, and suggested a couple of ideas, and I really liked his idea to do a take on Tokyo Gore Police, starring Liberty. Lovely, eh?
David’s work can be found on Deviant Art under the name Chaingunchimp. He’s currently working on projects with talesofthe.com and Berserker Comics, and has also written a strip for Zarjaz.
He is currently writing three graphic novels, two of which are horror and one is a ‘twisted superhero’ story, and he’s also working on loads of short stories. Busy guy!!

Japandex Day 19!

AKIRA STARRING PROWLER by GARRY MCLAUGHLIN
Garry got in touch and we chatted a bit about what pic he could do, and he suggested this one - a take on a famous Akira poster. It's a freaky coincidence as that poster is actually above my bed!! Garry adapted the poster to feature Prowler and the Pink Ninjas - I love it! Love the colours!
Garry creates his own comics, and the best place to find out about them is here:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Laser-Age-Comics/133586496653375?ref=ts
He published a horror comic called The Abortion and is currently creating a 'Year of Fear', with a comic called Yellow coming up! Check 'em out!

Japandex Day 18!

SOMETHING FOR THE WEEKEND? by Dan Bell
Dan is another creator who got in touch when he saw a Japandex shout-out, and he put this together for me. Hehe very cute and fun!
Dan has done loads of books with Underfire Comics, check 'em out here: www.underfire-comic.com/online