Years back, I published a comic called PALEO: Tales from the Late Cretaceous. It was a ton of fun- I love dinosaurs and I've always been a fan of comics such as TYRANT and AGE OF REPTILES. Sadly, neither of these books are published any more and PALEO has also been among them. Much like dinosaurs themselves, these types of comics seemed to fade away into non-existence.
But not really.
I had a story that I wrote a while back that probably would have appeared as PALEO 9. I took this story and rewrote it and expanded it and ended up with a 72 page tale that now will be published as a TPB. I'm not sure when this will happen as the book is only half-pencilled at this point but I hope that it will be later on this year. I inked 3 pages yesterday and couldn't wait to share them. This is, of course, the title page- I'll post more as time goes on.
I'm looking forward to it! I miss that series. I'm not downplaying the work, but it seems like something that was really comfortable/easy for you to do. Your style seems to be tailored for it.
ReplyDeleteI just met a fellow Highlights illustrator by the name of Robert Squier who just got work on a big series of Dino Books. Perhaps you and he could talk dinosaurs, he's nuts about them. He lives in NH.
http://robertsquier.blogspot.com
All the best!
ReplyDeleteI loved these books. I tried to get the library I was working for at the time to carry them but they thought it was "Too Scary" for kids...like only 5 year olds like dinos (and as if dinos all really behaved like Barney.)
ReplyDeleteI thought they were beautiful, and I loved how you stayed true to how the animals most likely were while giving them character, and creating a wonderful story. Its a shame these kinds of comics don't do better.
The dinosaurs we saw in the 4th volume of the tmnt comics, do u suggested peter to have them in the comics or was it pete's idea?
ReplyDeleteI'm always wanna read Paleo... Sadly, I can't. All I have it's your Dino Island (awesome story too -- to me, it's so close to Lost TV-show). But I'm looking forward for the new book!
ReplyDeleteThose talkin' dinosaurs from Volume 4 were Pete's idea. Pete pretty much has total control over the story content of Volume 4. The mutated dino Raph was a design I did, though.
ReplyDeleteSarah-
ReplyDeleteYeah, as far as mass-market appeal goes, I'm aware that the scenes of "violence" in Paleo probably hurt it's sales to some degree. I've played with the notion of possibly rewriting some of the material for a younger audience. Or, all new stories maybe. Don't know.
My personal feeling was, these are dinosaurs. They didn’t run around singing “Itsy Bitsy Spider”. You might as well be upset that a nature documentary shows a lion eating a gazelle- what did you think she went through the burger king drive through?
ReplyDeleteI understand that little kids like Dinos, but so do big kids, teens, and adults. I think marketed the right way; these sorts of books are fantastic. Wonderful stories, and they spark people to go find out more about the science behind the animals.
I just thought they were excellent as is, and the teens I loaned my copies to agreed. I thought we lost out by not having them in the library big time.
-->> .. this was an intense and actually educational piece .. dunno how the ' toning it down ' is gonna make it any more or less enjoyable. //
ReplyDeleteWas told an interesting and short story based on the RAPH / DON mutated dino design and the subsequent Dino Don Figure accosted with it and how excited everyone was about it.
>v<
-->> ** nods to Sarah ** ~~
ReplyDelete