Countdown to Meltdown: Thursday

Today I inked the cover to Echo 5 and loaded it onto Brian’s ftp with a few color notes and come photos I took of Arizona from the plane yesterday. He promised to get it to me by midnight Sunday, even though he is snowed under with other covers all jamming the freeway before San Diego. Brian is incredible.

Then I began inking pages. I inked 3 pages, scanned them, cleaned them up in Photoshop and added Julie’s metal gray. The 4th page for today (p.7) is on the drawing table, half-inked. I plan to finish it before retiring for the night. In the midst of that work I realized the ad for Diamond’s August issue of Previews was due today, soliciting Echo 7 for October shipping. I haven’t made notes for issue 7. I can’t even imagine October. I sure as hell have no idea what to put on the cover. And with the deadlines greedily stealing all my time, I realized I had no image prepared. So I scrambled through my Echo files and found the only cover idea I haven’t sent to Diamond (well, it was included in an article). It’s a stand-in, like Francine’s red-herring statue cover (you know about that, right? It’s the stuff of solicitation legend), but it does the job for now.

Also had to proof the covers to reprints of SiP Pocket Readers 2 & 4. They’re called Pocket Readers now because Harlan Ellison pointed out to me that Pocket Books are a copyrighted imprint.

Talked with Vaneta at Newsarama.com about Echo today. That may appear on the site tomorrow or next week. The holiday causes a gap in things.

Rick Klaw sent me this fun article and an interesting job proposal.

Got my copy of Jeff Smith’s RASL in the mail today and read it during lunch. Wow. The atmosphere of the story is so rich, with the low rent settings in a tiny desert town. There are a couple of real gems of scientific observation in this one too. Yes, it was a new experience to see Jeff’s art doing gritty and naked things. But you look at that, then go back and read the issue and get lost in this tense, dark world where odd things happen and somebody is dancing the quarks, and it’s clear that we’ve caught this guy’s story just as he’s about to unravel. It’s a murder mystery, a sci-fi thriller, and a Tarantino film all rolled into one and delivered in that unmistakable Jeff Smith style.

What else? …That’s it. Tomorrow I’ll try to ink a billion pages. Robyn plans to treat Trey and me to a July 4 cookout of burgers, dogs, potato salad and hummus. Hummus? Okay. She makes great hummus, so… I’ll be well fortified for my stint at the drawing table.

Happy 4th!