John Martz's Notebook

It's Snowing Outside. We Should Go For a Walk.

Sat, 13 Mar 2010 17:04:00 -0800

Since people have asked, and because I should have had it online long ago, I've put my the minicomic that was recently nominated for a Doug Wright Award up here: It's Snowing Outside. We Should Go for a Walk.

I'm running short on physical copies, so I won't have it for sale online just yet, but I will have copies at MoCCA and TCAF.

It is an uneventful, but true story from last winter.

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Picture Book Report illustration 2: You'll need to have this fish in your ear

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 09:05:00 -0800

I am cross-posting this over at Picture Book Report.

Ford, with a lightning movement, clapped his hand to Arthur's ear, and he had the sudden sickening sensation of the fish slithering deep into his aural tract. Gasping with horror he scrabbled at his ear for a second or so, but then slowly turned goggle-eyed with wonder. He was experiencing the aural equivalent of looking at a picture of two black silhouetted faces and suddenly seeing it as a picture of a white candlestick. Or of looking at a lot of coloured dots on a piece of paper which suddenly resolve themselves into the figure six and mean that your optician is going to charge you a lot of money for a new pair of glasses.

The Babel fish is a living hearing aid that decodes the brainwaves embedded in all speech patterns. Like Star Trek's universal translator, the Babel fish is a simple plot device used to avoid the obvious obstacle of an interstellar language barrier.

But like all good science fiction, the story and the characters here exist as vehicles for larger ideas. And with the Babel fish Douglas Adams, a self-described radical atheist, dismisses both Intelligent Design and the circular logic of religious extremism in one fell swoop:

Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mindbogglingly useful could have evolve purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as the final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.

The argument goes something like this: 'I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, 'for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.'

'But,' says Man, 'the Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED.'

'Oh dear,' says God, 'I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

I nearly didn't illustrate this scene. After my first illustration, I was very aware that I hadn't actually drawn any of the main characters yet. So I thought my next move should be to introduce Arthur Dent, the story's protagonist, in some straight-forward, literal interpretation. But as I started to reread parts of my dogeared 1979 paperback, this image of the Babel Fish with a brain for a speech bubble materialized.

And it's these little moments in the book that make Douglas Adams so much fun to read. The characters really do take a back seat to the ideas and philosophies sprinkled throughout. The main character isn't Arthur Dent. As Douglas Adams would say, he's just this guy, you know. It's the book within the book, the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, that allows Douglas Adams to bounce from one idea to the next, and inject his world view into a series of events that can give it shape.

I've included iPhone wallpaper versions of this and my first HHGG illustration over at the Picture Book Report post.

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Doug Wright Awards nomination

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 08:52:13 -0800

When I checked my e-mail this morning, I was very happy to discover that I've been nominated for a Doug Wright Award for Best Emerging Talent.

The nominated work, It's Snowing Outside. We Should Go For a Walk. is a minicomic I debuted at last year's TCAF. This nomination is perhaps the kick in the pants I need to put the comic online so more people can see it.

This is my second Doug Wright Award nomination. Two years ago my yearbook project Excelsior 1968 was nominated for the Pigskin Peters Award for experimental or non-narrative work.

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Chinchillacorn

Sat, 06 Mar 2010 12:48:37 -0800

A monster for Robots and Monsters based on the keywords happy, hairy, and gentle.

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Moonstrucker 5000

Sat, 06 Mar 2010 12:47:05 -0800

A robot for Robots and Monsters, based on the keywords portly, lovestruck, and monocle.

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chickaDEE movie puzzle

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 19:31:57 -0800

I drew this double-page movie-themed puzzle for an upcoming issue of chickaDEE Magazine. It's a little noisier than my usual work, but that's the nature of a dense find-em puzzle. Less is less in this case.

It's shown here without any of the accompanying text, so you'll have to use your imagination and figure out how to play the various bits all on your own.

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Picture Book Report - Illustration One

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 10:02:00 -0800

…the Thursday morning sun was bright and clear as it shone on Arthur Dent’s house for what was to be the last time.

I am cross-posting this from Picture Book Report.

Once I had decided to interpret The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, I knew that this scene would be my first illustration. Whenever I even think about the story, it’s these first small chapters that enter my thoughts. It’s the opening scene in the text adventure game version, as well, which I never had the patience to conquer, and always found myself, in the role of Arthur Dent, dead before ever leaving the house.

I’ve always loved the parallels between the large, yellow bulldozers intent to demolish Arthur’s house and the large, yellow Vogon ships, which would do the same to the entire planet. The layout for this illustration drew itself.

I can remember being twelve years old, and reading this paragraph for the first time:

The great ships hung motionless in the sky, over every nation on Earth. Motionless they hung, huge, heavy, steady in the sky, a blasphemy against nature. Many people went straight into shock as their minds tried to encompass what they were looking at. The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don’t."

I must have re-read that last sentence at least ten times. What an odd, but wonderful analogy, I thought. It was one of those moments that seems exclusive to childhood — that feeling of having discovered something special that could become my very own. I felt a connection between myself and the words, and something in that sentence ignited in me an appreciation for looking at things with a slightly skewed perspective. I was soon to learn that Douglas Adams was a master at this in the way he blurred the lines between nonsense and clarity.

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OpenSRS sports team logos

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 18:43:00 -0800

Several weeks ago, Ken at OpenSRS asked if I'd be interested in helping him invent some sports teams to exist in the OpenSRS universe -- sports teams that the mascots and characters that populate their website would potentially join or be fans of. These teams would be realized in the form of t-shirts for OpenSRS staff and clients. Here are the final designs, which I think turned out great. In addition to designing the logos, I also got to brainstorm and give the teams their tames.

See the full gallery on posterous

I thought I'd share some of my process. After zeroing in on the team names (rejected ideas included the Zambonis, Netizens, Dribblers, and Bowl Weevils) I sketched up some rough ideas:

Ken liked these, but wanted these shirts to be tied closer to the OpenSRS branding. I took my favourites from the various roughs, and redesigned them to incorporate the colours, shield, and star from the OpenSRS logo:

Eventually we used different colours for each sport, but these refined roughs were enough for me to then create the final versions.

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Deduce, You Say

Mon, 08 Feb 2010 11:18:49 -0800

"Your name?"

"Shropshire Slasher."

"Occupation?"

"Shropshire Slasher."

Gets me every time.

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Picture Book Report

Tue, 02 Feb 2010 09:34:25 -0800

I am excited to announce the launch of Picture Book Report -- fifteen different illustrators, each of them illustrating a scene from one of their favourite books, once a month. I'll be tackling Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

The project is being organized by the wonderful Meg Hunt, who just posted my introductory bio at the PBR site.

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Less room for lies

Tue, 02 Feb 2010 07:40:00 -0800

I prefer drawing to talking. Drawing is faster, and leaves less room for lies.

-Le Corbusier

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Stop dragon my heart around

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 13:53:36 -0800

The latest monster drawing for Robots and Monsters. This one was based on the words dragon, feathered wings, and rain.

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These just arrived, and I am tempted to stop working altogether.

Fri, 29 Jan 2010 11:05:31 -0800

The Best of Punch Cartoons and Around the World with Mouk. Would you want to sit at your desk and work if you could, instead, be spending time with Ronald Searle, Quentin Blake, Arnold Roth, and Marc Boutavant?

See the full gallery on posterous

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Latest robot drawings for Robots and Monsters

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 13:39:25 -0800

Here are the latest two robot drawings I made for Robots and Monsters. I was given the words "short, fat, and orange" and "test tube and love bug".

See the full gallery on posterous

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Picture Box

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 08:52:01 -0800

Just launched this site redesign for my friends at Picture Box Distribution.

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Last.fm visualization

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 13:44:58 -0800

Last.fm unveiled some new data visualizations. They offer the charts as downloadable PDFs -- for printable posters, they say, but I think it's because the readable data is so small, that poster-size is the only way to actually read them. They're pretty, and and irresistible for music nerds and data nerds alike (check and check), but aren't well suited for sharing without a little zoom-and-screenshot action. Still, pretty cool for machine-generated visuals.

For my infographic money, though, you can't beat Nicholas Felton; he just unveiled his latest annual report.

See the full gallery on posterous

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Nick Lowe on style

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 16:40:00 -0800

I've been using Huffduffer to bookmark found audio into a custom podcast. Tonight I re-listened to an interview with songwriter Nick Lowe. His thoughts on developing a style—and how affectations eventually meld together into something original—apply to any creative endeavour, cartooning included.

Obviously, like everybody, your first efforts are really just rewrites of your heroes' songs. It's basically the same song with a couple of words changed. And you get very keen on somebody. And then you use them up. You sort of rewrite all their stuff, and you move on to somebody else, and do the same to them—rewrite all their stuff. And somebody else comes along, and you do it them.
And then one day, you'll put a little bit of the first person, whose songs you all rewrote, into your latest fad, and you have a little touch of these two things going on. And then maybe a third element will come in on a song you're writing. So you'll have three different influences in there. And then the more you do it … 'Cause it's all been done. It's all been written. There is nothing new under the sun, especially nowadays. Absolutely nothing. But what IS new is the way you tell it, and eventually, you have so many influences in a song, that it just turns into a new style.

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A finished panel

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 18:22:25 -0800

Here's a panel for a comic I'm working on. The story is currently titled Heaven All Day, but who knows how I'll feel when it's done..

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Twitter recommends Drawn!

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 17:50:48 -0800

This makes my day. Drawn! is one of Twitter's suggested Art & Design feeds.

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Robots + Monsters Partners with Doctors Without Borders for Haiti

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 17:48:19 -0800

Robots + Monsters, the fund-raising art project I belong to with other great artists including Joe Alterio, Adam Koford, Michael Fleming, and David Huyck, is now directing its donations towards Doctors Without Borders to help the relief efforts after the devastating earthquake in Haiti last week.

Donate and get an original monster or robot drawing based on three words of your choice, like this here Tennisbot.

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