| San Diego 2005 News |
August 3, 2005
To view the full HTML version of the newsletter with all the pictures go to www.steverude.com/live/newsletter.html
Time for another update!
We survived San Diego. Scroll down to the bottom and read "YAKIN WITH THE DUDE" to hear Steve's take on the show and other news.
RUDEBOARD MIA
For those of you who use the rudeboard, you've probably noticed that it's currently MIA. Some hacker tried to use it to get to the server, so we temporarily pulled the plug on it while we upgrade the system. My web guy is a bit overloaded these days, but hopefully it will be up and running soon along with a bug that seems to have infected my news. Its out there just fine, but it wont let me update or add anything.
NEW STORE
On top of those lovely happenings, I have decided to pull the plug on the eBay store. We switched to Vendio. The shortcut will still work (www.steverude.com/store), but bear with us while we make everything functional again.
SKETCHBOOK DISASTER
During the San Diego con Steve had a cup of coffee spill on his sketchbook. He's started a fresh one, but wanted to put the word out that if anyone out there has contacts for art restoration of that kind he'd be thrilled to hear from you.
Cheers!
Jaynelle Rude
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ON THE DRAWING BOARD
DC BATMAN STATUE
Steve is currently working with DC Direct on a Batman statue for their Batman Black and White series.
DC HERO CLIX
Steve has also accepted a commission from DC to do a series of 4 paintings for the DC Hero Clix statues.
THE MOTH
Negotiations are in progress for the next MOTH miniseries. If you didn't catch it all, pick up the trade paperback in our store!
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WHAT'S NEW??
MOTH T-SHIRT
Our new MOTH T-shirt arrived during the San Diego con. It's a fabulous design in black with the Moth logo on the sleeve. It's available on eBay or in our store for $15. We quickly sold out of Medium, but still have some Large, XL and XXL available.
VIEW T-SHIRT: http://www.steverude.com/Ebay/thumbs/MothT-shirt.jpg
WONDER WOMAN POSTER
We had several requests to turn the cover of the 2005 Commissions book into a print, so we did! It's on really nice firm glossy cover stock, size is 13 x 19 and quantities are limited. We only ran 250 and they're going fast. It's available on eBay or in our store. Cost is $20. See image below.
VIEW WONDER WOMAN POSTER:
http://www.steverude.com/Ebay/thumbs/WW_web.jpg
COMMISSIONS
Steve's paintings usually run $3,000, but for a LIMITED TIME he'll be accepting commissions for single character sketches done in watercolor for only $500! These would be on paper approximately 11 x 17 in size with no or little background. Email me at commissions@steverude.com for more information.
EXAMPLE PAINTING #1: PHANTOM LADY:
http://www.steverude.com/Ebay/thumbs/05-SD-phantomcolorjpg.jpg
EXAMPLE PAINTING #2: WONDER WOMAN:
http://www.steverude.com/Ebay/thumbs/05-wwpaint.jpg
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APPEARANCES
NEW YORK BIG APPLE CON; SEPTEMBER 10-11, 2005
http://www.bigapplecon.com/
Admission Only $10
SAT (10AM-8PM)
SUN (10-8PM)
HELD AT: THE PENN PLAZA PAVILION
401 7TH AVE AT 33RD ST, NY, NY
ACROSS FROM MSG AND PENN STATION
SPECTRUM EXHIBITION Sept. 7 -Oct. 1 (Galleries 1 & 2)
www.spectrumfantasticart.com
An exhibition of the best fantastic-themed art culled from the last 11 editions of the Spectrum Annual. Steve's Wonder Woman "Day at the Fair" with the kittens that was published in the Wonder Woman coffee table book then again in WW #200 will be on display. It is currently for sale for $15,000.
SOCIETY OF ILLUSTRATORS
http://www.societyillustrators.org/exhibition_competition/schedule.html
128 East 63rd Street
New York, NY 10021-7303
p 212.838.2560 f 212.838.2561 info@sociatyillustrators.com
Steve and Jaynelle will be in attendance for the official reception on Friday, September 9, 2005, from 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm
ROYAL FEST CON
I was unable to get in touch with the Royal Fest organizers and we have taken the show off our 2005 schedule. Due to a temporary problem with our online news system I have been unable to take the store off our site.
TUSCON STORE APPEARANCE
Steve has accepted an invitation to appear at the grand opening of Charlies Comic Book shop on October 1st. Steve will be there to sign book and do sketches. We will also have some original art pages for sale there.
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EBAY AUCTION HIGHLIGHTS
http://www.steverude.com/auctions
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YAKIN' WITH THE DUDE: ADVENTURES IN SAN DIEGO
And now a word from Mr. Humility...
Jaynelle wanted me, the Dude himself, to write a few words about what happened at this years San Diego Comic Convention. Sure, why not...then I'll go back to drawing my DC/ Batman statue job.
Well, for starters, we drove rather than fly. Those who have read our previous newsletters know of my reluctance to use the airlines to get somewhere--anywhere--as in, I'd rather be dead than fly--so we drove the 6 hours thru the blast furnace heat of the desert with the a/c comfort of our van.
We left our home in Phoenix AZ. Monday morning and arrived by early evening for a quick, overnight stop in Pasadena, where we used to live. I needed some jogging shoes, (remember--I'm trying to get in shape!) and wanted to see some of the old haunts and pick up some art supplies for the show.
When we arrived at our hotel in Pasadena I was reminded to ask the front desk, once again, why no hotels on this earthly plane ever believe in door stops.
I mean, isn't it the first thing you look for when you walk thru your door? You walk in with your cache' of 4-ton suitcases, and you look for something to block the door with, so you can carry in the rest of your gear, right? This hotel, as with all the others, couldn't give me an answer.
Imagine that.
I never found my jogging shoes, either.
Anyway, cut to arriving in San Diego.
What a day. Sunny, with a nice breeze. Beats the 120 heat of AZ.
Gino and I checked in at the Westgate, probably the classiest hotel in S.D. After driving down to the con center to set up our booth, I was back at the hotel in time for croissants and harp music. I also took advantage of their great exercise room. Had the whole place to myself. Tried to talk myself into a free massage but it didn't fly.
By the way, when we were setting up for the con on Wednesday morning, we had some nice volunteers helping us who flew in from Phoenix. One of them, Mark, is a cop. He's the one who took me on a late night ride-a-long program thru gang territory. I wore a vest on that one. Lots of fun.
Anyway, cut to Wednesday night, which was Preview night to those in the know. This is traditionally a fun time, since it's held at night, rather than in the usual 10am -7pm spot that makes up the rest of the con. During this time, people float around looking to get the early bird special on all the merchandise that gets snapped up by the weekend. At the Dude booth, I'm always lucky enough to have lots of nice and interesting people to chat with, get books signed, and to ask me when Nexus is coming back.
Anyway, the rest of the show is basically me doing much of the same. I take names for my sketch list, since I always like to be drawing, and do alot of meet and greet. One thing that many of you don't know about, since I've never revealed this close and personal secret grievance about attending comic cons, is this;
Why in all the years of doing these conventions do all the tables next to me get more gorgeous chicks than I do??
I mean, one year in Atlanta, I watched freak after freak being swarmed by these perfect 10 knockouts, with almost no one ever coming over to visit
me-- Mr. Humility himself. Sure, I had Gino next to me at that show, and she's pretty much a perfect 10 herself, but even before the Gino days, it was like that. Maybe if I greased myself up alot and started covering myself with tattoo's, my luck would change.
Another let-down ( there's never just one) that happened to me this year was seeing the new issue of DRAW magazine, the one with my cover article on it. Whereas the pictures of the art itself turned out well and represented much of the extra studying I do to make myself a better artist, the interview itself sounded pretty messed up. I myself, couldn't make sense of what I was supposedly saying half the time. It also included more typos than any good proofreader worth the price of a college degree could imagine. I guess the revised, make-sense version I turned in before press time never made it to the typesetter in time. A shame...
Oh, here's another good one you may find amusing...
During the entire 5 days I was attending the San Diego show, I decided to take a poll among various audience members, about the new Fantastic Four movie, a movie I had not yet seen .
To my surprise, since I had expected good things from this movie (the advertising blitz was phenomenal), it was almost universally panned by my audience of shrewd and discriminating critics. It barely rated a C+ with most of the people I talked to. One friend even called it "unwatchable". Whereas all these fans seemed to give a thumbs up to the new Batman Begins movie, they barely gave a passing grade to the new F.F. movie. Wow...
Here's the punchline...
Meanwhile, at a theatre near you...
Last weekend, Gino and I at last took the plunge to our local movie theatre, to witness for ourselves the entertainment value of this long-anticipated (and fan-panned) Fantastic Four movie. Well, lo and behold, much to our surprise, (but not to mine, 'cuz I never listen to critics), we loved it! That's right, we both thought it was just great. Heck, Kirby himself would've been proud! The pathos with Ben Grimm's tragic and double-edged transformation to the Thing; the tense, relational triangle between Doom, Reed and Sue; the hotheaded, humorous, and egotistical antics of Johnny Storm--c'mon man, what more do you want?? The effects were great, the story made sense, and the good guys took home the prize.
Anyone else agree with the Main Man?
Send your cards and letters to the below address...
Back to the Batman statue!
The Dude |
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