Thanks for 100 posts

Posted on November 8, 2018January 30, 2020 by luxshine

100 posts in Calico Chimera and it’s all thanks to you guys. I mean, there aren’t many comments as I write this, but I know you’re reading and watching (thank you site statistics), so I really wanted to thank you all with some illustrations. And well, let you know what’s on the cards for the next 100 posts!

First of all, I really want to make this site a bit more interactive, so let me know what you want to see from me, ok? Second, let’s take a look to those illustrations (and their stories and what’s on their future)

Irene Doll, the girl who started it all. She wasn’t my first original character, but she was the first one I published professionally (meaning, I got paid!). Her story is kind of done, but I still have one extra surprise for those who miss her. (Check my newsletter for MORE information on that) Oh, btw, she was the 31 drawing for Inktober, with the prompt Slice.

I hope you guys are familiar with Robin and his magical messenger Gavin. Robin still hates that I draw him as a girl more often than not, but well, not my fault! He looks pretty. I hope to finish issues 4 – 6 next year, so you can follow his adventures at the Dream Keeper Robin page in Tapas. Or buy the books at my store and at cons!

Maria and the Traveling Seers had a bit of a vacation for two years, so it’s time for them to get back in the field. Murphy was kind enough not to eat the flowers until I was finished with the drawing. You can read all about this supernatural baseball team at Traveling Seers in tapas.

Romeo and I have a long story. The magazine where his story appeared was the first one I edited professionally, but his personal story was filled with executive meddling. So now in Gradients, I have the freedom to tell it as it was. For now, you can read the strips at my Patreon (one for free every month, three for $1.00 USD per month), but in 2019 I have planned to publish the longform story (And yes, mexican readers, THAT question you’ve been asking since 2002 WILL be answered)

And finally, Lily. She came to me in a dream, and I have been writing and redoing her story for two years now. But thanks to my new editor, Amy Zunk, it’s starting to take shape so you all will get a chance to meet her and her crush Raz in 2019. I promise!

If you want to know more about how these projects are advancing, as well as others that are still in the starting stages, please consider joining my newsletter (link on the column to the right) for free! I swear I don’t spam.

And once again, thank you so much for joining me in this adventure, I really appreciate every single one of your views!

Jem and the Holograms

Posted on August 9, 2018August 21, 2018 by luxshine

Jem and the Holograms has always been part of my childhood. I remember when I watched the TV series, and found ONE store that carried a stamp album of the series. I never got anyone to change stamps with, so it went unfinished, but I loved it with all my heart. We never got the toys in Mexico, so I had to make do with Barbie and the Rockers -which I always saw as an inferior copy to the outrageous fabulousness that was Jem.

Fast forward a lot of years, and IDW with Sophie Campbell made a dream I had come true. Namely, a more modern Jem comic. Sure, it didn’t last too long, and I still want the second omnibus volume, but while it lasted it was AMAZING. Seriously, go and buy it at your local comic book shop and wonder at the gloriousness that is a Jem story that doesn’t have to sell dolls.

So of course, during my weekly practices, I had to do Jem and the Holograms (And Pizzaz and Stormer because I ran out of time the day I was supposed to finish the Misfits)

And seriously, go and buy IDW’s Jem and the Holograms.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Posted on June 26, 2018June 20, 2018 by luxshine

Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a series that changed my life. I’m not kidding, it came on just as the first issue of my first pro-comic came out, and while not the same thing, they had somethings in common (In particular, the main character was a chosen one, and her best friend was a witch. Oh, and her sort of mysterious mentor a Vampire). So of course I loved the hell out of Buffy.

It also had some great characters, like my absolute favorites, Xander and Spike. And helped a lot of my friends to find themselves, and was one of the very first series that had real representation for LGBT+ characters that I saw (Even if I still have some issues with it’s bisexual erasure and I still think it would’ve been more logical for Xander to be Bi. But whatevs)

Nowadays, I don’t consider Joss Whedon the best director in the world, nor the best writer. But I still have a soft spot for Buffy and the Scooby Gang. Because for me, they were always there to make me feel like I was not alone.

Spooky Empire Experience

Posted on November 14, 2017December 14, 2017 by luxshine

The Cosmic Family 2017 Halloween picture. Grandpa is still confused about all the proceedings.

On October 27 to 29 I had the chance to be with Mandi Gordon (my writer on Writer’s Block and editor for Dragon Run as well as my dear friend) in our very first american convention as sellers, Spooky Empire at the Hyatt Regency in Orlando.

We went as Kaliko Dragon, our joint effort (As hers alone is Dragon Crest, and mine… well, you’re here in Calico Chimera) and had a blast. We had Dream Keeper Robin 1 and 2, Dragon Run and the very first Writer’s Block compilation for sale, as well as a ton of brand new prints (seriously, the only “old” one was the Sugar Skull Horsemen, that is still available in Mexico through my Calico Chimera store and will be available for everywhere else soon at the Kaliko Dragon store)

Isn’t he adorable? His hoard consists of books, movies, and coffee. Lots of coffee.

Now, Spooky Empire is a convention specialized in horror. So I wasn’t quite sure of how things would work and a bit nervous. Still, Mandi didn’t need to pull me out from under the table at any time and I even go to the Celebrity autograph hall on Sunday without being poked too hard by her so that was a win against my usual anxiety. But people did like our stuff, and they were all very nice when talking to us. I saw a Ton of great cosplay, some of which I had never seen before -ok, so there was an overflow of Pennywises. That was to be expected. But they were great Pennywises. Funny thing about the Pennywises… at some point, they started to lose their balloons. So the roof of the Hyatt was filled with floating red balloons. Between that and the Freddy Krueger mannequin that I swore was moving on it’s own as every time I lifted my head was in a different position, the atmosphere was amazing (Later I found out that Mand asked the people with the mannequin to move it, just to freak me a bit. I loved that because it proved that I was right: it WAS moving)

We were joined by the amazing Amelia Poole, Harlequinarts (https://www.facebook.com/harlequinartscosplay ) as our official Janna, Horsewoman of War. And she was perfect! I am almost 90% sure she didn’t kill anyone or started some conflict at the times she didn’t have coffee, but trust me, Mandi and I could have a full spinoff Janna strip with all the hijinks going around. You can check her page for more pictures, but at the end of the post you can see some (she still won’t tell me how she got those red balloons).

I could only see Richard Dreyfuss from afar (he had a TON of people all the time), and didn’t have the chance to see John Cusack, Molly Ringwald or Anthony Michael Hall. Fairuza Balk looks JUST as she did in The Craft, I swear (I also saw her from a distance). On the other hand, Eileen Dietz is a great lady, really funny, and Ken Foree already had me as a fan for life, now even more so. John Kassir was really fun, and, to my eternal glee, Jamison Newlander bought Writer’s Block! That made my day. I also had the chance to say hi to Jaeden Lieberher, Wyatt Oleff, Jeremy Ray Taylor and Sophia Lillis. All of them were amazingly professional -still staying long past the time they were supposed to sign autographs in order to accommodate everyone-, and really nice.

All in all, I loved the experience and can’t wait to go back to Orlando again. Florida man stories aside, everyone was really nice and welcoming! So if you’re a fan of horror, definitively hit the May edition of Spooky. Can’t promise Kaliko Dragon and Calico Chimera will be there -as we’re totally doing Conque in Mexico- but I can assure you you will have fun.

(BTW, all the pictures taken with an obviously better camera and an obviously better photographer were taken by Mandi Gordon)

The Pennywise Parade…

And now… some fun with Janna

Memory Lane: Lost

Posted on August 29, 2017September 14, 2017 by luxshine

Going back to the beginning of my career, Lyonesse (That can be read about in this post) was a moderate success. By moderate I mean well, it had about 20 readers (and I know this because that was about the number of copies we could print, and they tended to sold out). At some point during the second part, we moved it to the information fanzine we had started, named Animanga, mostly in order to make it have more pages, and then I kind of lost track of how many people actually cared for the story, but we never got complains, so I counted that as a win.

In any case, Lyonesse was drawing to an end, and I wanted to do something different. But I will be 100% honest, I do have a bit of an hyperactive muse, and I had more ideas than time (Or ability) to make them look good. So I had this crazy idea of showing five different stories, with a two page preview each, and let the Animanga readers vote for the one they wanted to see.

Lost won second place, but because the first place suddenly was picked to launch my professional career (more about that later), it was picked to replace Lyonesse once it ended.

The very first Lost drawing. I was so proud of it, back in 1995. (yes, you can see the signature there)

The story was pretty simple. An earth girl named Jan found a strange macguffin called the Chihenshinchikawasei (Can you tell I was starting to learn Japanese and had just got my first dictionary?) and since the thing opens wormholes, she gets transported (and physically transformed into a blue haired girl for… reasons) into a sand planet where two brothers find her and nurse her back to health. Due to language and culture clash problems, she thinks the brothers, Jial and Zahia, are girls, and Jial decides not to correct her. And then, well, they get adventures as Jial convinces Jan to use the macguffin to find treasures.

I honestly don’t remember what was I thinking, besides “I like Indiana Jones and gender-confusing characters”.

In any case, after publishing the first.. I think it was two chapters, or maybe it was just one, we (That is, Gaby Maya and I) decided to do a crossover between the Lost guys and her characters, the Pirates of Aquelonde, which ended up being the very last story published in Animanga. It was a very interesting exercise for me, as she drew most of the backgrounds and her characters, while I just drew mine and then she inked.

Now, unlike some other entries in this memory lane I’m doing, I did come back to the Lost guys in 2010. Not for publication, but for my portfolio. I made 3 pages, changing the concept a little bit, making the setting more steampunk, making Jial’s gender a bit more obvious as I had decided to go in a different route with Jan. To be honest, I am still thinking about working with this characters again, as soon as I find the right setting for them.

Memory Lane – Lyonesse

Posted on August 5, 2017August 24, 2017 by luxshine

I started drawing (and trying to sell) my comics when I was 15. I wasn’t specially good -between being a bit of a hermit, no internet tutorials, and a slightly over protective dad I was pretty much self taught. I still am, but now I actually talk to people and get their input on how to improve myself. Plus, I’ve got about 20 or so years of practice over my 16-year-old self 😉

My very first comic was a small strip I did for a baseball magazine. Unfortunately, most if not all of those strips are lost to time. If I find them, I might talk about them more another time. After that, and after renting Otaku no Video and learning that in Japan fans did their own comics in very small runs and showed them to the public, I thought “Why not?” and with the help of some friends back then I made Lyonesse.

It was… a bit of a mess.

Lyonesse was a story about a planet ravaged by war, three races in an eternal fight, and some magic thrown in between to show that deep down we’re all the same. It was divided in three parts, the first and second sold in 12 page, letter sized, photocopied issues (first issue had a run of 5 copies. I have no idea where my own copy is) -well, the second part had a couple of bigger issues, as it was published with Gaby Maya’s Pirates of Aquelonde’s first chapter. First part was 5 issues long, while the second part was about 4 and then the third part was published inside my other fanzine, Animanga, which is where you can say my career started to lift off.

Lyonesse was the first (and for a long time, the only, to my shame) story I finished. And once I finished it, I closed the file and tried to forget about it. From time to time, however, I remembered the characters and wondered if I could write their story better with my new experience and better art. Then I decide that it’s better to leave them as they are, a nice memory and a teaching experience.

Still, when people say that art requires “born” talent and not practice, I like to see that first Lyonesse issues (you can see the cover, done last century) and then, just to make the point clearer, I made the watercolor that opens this post in 2017. Practice does pay off 😉

Funny thing, though. I decided to make the watercolor off one of the most secondary characters. His name was Kyja and, while important to the plot, he LITERALLY only appeared in the third part, and in short flashbacks in the second. Still, he was one of the most interesting characters visually, and I had never done a full color illustration of him. So, 20 some years later, I had to give him his due.

The CONQUE Experience, 2017

Posted on May 11, 2017July 28, 2017 by luxshine

This weekend (May 4 to 7) and coinciding with the start of my site, I had the amazing opportunity to attend the Conque in the beautiful city of Queretaro. As I was part of the organizing team (not a huge part, to be honest, mostly some pr with the Cosplay area), I had the chance to arrive with the Mexico City guests from Thursday the 4th to the preview Star Wars night (CONQUE is the first Mexican convention to hold a preview night). We were so tired, however, that to be honest I barely saw anything. And from Friday to Sunday? It was madness. I was sitting at the cosplay area, so I had the chance to interact with them the most. Twin Cosplay ( I didn’t take many pictures with them and I am beating myself over it); Cesar Greenhouse and Hedelex (Mitica Studio); Rosy Duran, who does an INCREDIBLE Granny Webster cosplay (seriously, I was half tempted to offer her Indiana to play Silvester for a few photos) and an even greater Stan Lee; Eva 017 Cosplay who was the queen of all the area; Edom Elohim, with his great crafts; Alex Stark and Lady Synai; Puchys love, who was an amazing sport after a small typo that identified her as “punchis”; Shirahime cosplay and Ryuta; the always wonderful Lizz Sakura and Yagosha Cosplay; Killian and Daireth –who I had not much chance to talk to- and others that right now escape my swiss cheese memory. They all made the weekend amazing. And also, my dearest Roberto Martinez, who completely made my day on Sunday by helping me at the table and with his great Palpatine.

Sales wise I didn’t have as many sales as the people in Artist Alley, but I have to admit that that was mostly on me. I was so entranced by the great cosplayers around me that I kept forgetting to do my sales speech! Even so, I am very grateful to all the people who went looking for me and helped make Dream Keeper Robin’s launch a success! I almost ran out of bookmarks, which is always a good sign! (Seriously, I have 2 Janna’s left. And am considering keeping one :P)

And of course, there was the amazing experience of meeting new people, and reconnecting with old friends. I had the chance to talk to Jorge Gutierrez, writer and director of the Book of Life; to meet Kirk R. Tatcher, creator of Dinosaurs and a big part of my childhood, and to have an amazing dinner sitting next to Agnes Garbowska from MLP and Grumpy Cat’s fame. I heard Stefan Kapicic sing Cielito Lindo, and saw Sergio Aragones again, as well as one of my personal heroes, Arthur Adams. The guys from Touch markers who were so kind and gave me a great gift, as well as promised to check why my local art store keeps not getting the full color list. And of course, all my great friends in Mexican comics such as Gnomo del Bosque, Palmira Campaña, Juanele, the always sexy Quetzal Cardenas and Fers from Soulkeepers, El Hino, Edgar Clement, Oscar Pinto, Leonardo Olea, the always incredible Humberto Ramos, Mauricio Herrera, Aurea Freniere, Ariel Orea, Lobo Cuevas, Luis Fernando –who shared the bus ride to Queretaro with me and Alfonso Norman, Guto, Alejandra Gamez, and Axur Eneas, Augusto Mora, Tania Camacho and Esteban from Jours de Papier, and so many other people that I love and I hate that right now I am forgetting.

Of course, I can’t stop thanking the REAL organizers of the Conque: Luis Gantus, Rene Franco, Hector Hernandez, Melina Gatto, and again, Humberto Ramos, as well as the great staff like Monica Valencia, Daniel Garcia, Rodrigo LeVinson, Maria Fernanda Gantus, and Salvador Canez Garza –as well as the amazing volunteers whose names I didn’t get for my eternal shame. Oh, and to the great staff at the Serafin Boutique Hotel in downtown Queretaro that made me feel as if I was home every night.

So, here are the pictures of all the event. It left me dead tired.

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