Joe Kubert 1926-2012, photo copyright The Kubert School
The news that Joe Kubert had passed away caught me at just after I finished last week’s blog. I was tempted to dive in and rush a last minute tribute in an effort to be timely but I have too much respect for the man and all that he did for comics. I chose to digest the incredible loss to his family, his school and the entire the comics community so that I could write a memorial deserved of a man of his stature.
Whenever I think of Joe Kubert the first thing that comes to my mind is a cover image of Tarzan, knife in hand, battling a savagely maned lion that struck fear in my heart as a young comic reader. The ferocity of the glare in the lion’s eyes, the sinewy muscles of Tarzan, and the dynamic gesture of every appendage on the page (right down to Tarzan’s toes!) captivated my attention in a way that few comics did or could. Joe was capable of creating something primal on a page with lines so kinetic that the images leapt from the page into the deepest, darkest part of the imagination.
Click image to see more Kubert School Advertisements
The name Joe Kubert captured my imagination again with a simple ad for The Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art that ran in the back of every comic book in the late seventies. Though I couldn’t convince my parents to let me go to a school that promoted itself in a comic book, the idea of studying art for the purpose of creating comics became my goal. A few years later, as a publisher at Comico, I was offering small scholarships to students at Joe’s school in Dover, NJ hoping to encourage the incredible young talent that was being cultivated there to want to work for Comico. The gesture paid off when we had the opportunity to work with Joe’s sons, Adam and Andy on our JONNY QUEST series.
Joe Kubert visited our modest offices at Comico once when we were first developing our relationship. Our Studio, as we called it, was half a duplex in the middle of blue-collared Norristown, PA. It was a humble creative space littered with art supplies, drawing boards, decrepit furniture and dated, orange shag wall-to-wall carpet. Joe loved it! There was a gleam in his eye as he looked around that space and at us young guys, full of enthusiasm about making comics. He told us stories of how he was reminded him of his early days, holed up in a small room with a bunch of other young writers and artists cramming out entire issues over night in a frantic effort to meet a deadline.
Joe was an infectiously dynamic person with a passion for comics that he was always excited to share and teach. He was the ultimate father figure that commanded respect and returned it when you earned it. That day he visited Comico, without intending to and unknowingly, he ordained us as professional comic creators with his glowing approval.
Similarly, Joe’s impact on the comic industry can never be measured. He has influenced and educated so many comic professionals that it would be impossible to imagine what the industry would have been like without him, his family, or his school.
Bill Cucinotta, the extended CO2 Comics family of creators, and I extend our very heartfelt condolences to the entire Kubert family and to everyone that loved and respected Joe Kubert, one of the very great men to have ever professed to making comics.
Gerry Giovinco
We at CO2 Comics have a long relationship with a former Kubert School student, Chris Kalnick, who worked as an inker on ROBOTECH when we published it as Comico. His comics NON the Transcendental ExtraterrestrialandDepth Charge are regular features on the CO2 Comics site. At our request he has offered his own remarks regarding Joe Kubert:
Baker Mansion-Kubert School circa 1977.
It’s funny how sometimes you don’t realize how much someone has impacted your life until you hear of their passing. This was definitely the case with me regarding Joe Kubert.
35 years ago, fresh on the heels of its groundbreaking first year class, I was one of the second year students who attended The Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art. The school was small compared to today’s incarnation. There were something like 25-30 students returning from the first year, and Joe only accepted around 50 of us for its incoming second year class. The students ran the spectrum from the intensely-focused-and disciplined-artist/storyteller to the recent goofy-high-school-graduate-not-really-knowing-what-the-hell-they-wanted. A lot of us fell in between.
I don’t need to expound on how amazing the school was, its atmosphere, its creative energy, etc… suffice to say, there was nothing like it at the time. Plenty has been written about the school over the years. Even if it wasn’t your intention, you were bound to learn some amount of craft there… not only from Joe and the teachers, but from the other students as well. Everyone ate, drank, and breathed comic art. The place swam in it. Those who were there know what I’m talking about. Their life experience and their art is a little richer for it.
There are many more XQBs than I who have had longer, deeper, more extended relationships with Joe, and they have their stories to tell and their feelings to share. My relationship with him was somewhat brief, but what I can tell you about Joe is that he was no-nonsense. He shot from the hip. You knew if he liked something or felt it worked… and you knew if he didn’t. He commanded respect, personal and professional. My personal talks with him were few, but they definitely left an impression. As I’m sure his conversations did with the majority of his students. My last conversation with Joe is forever etched in my mind, for it was sad in nature. It was about my leaving the school, and Joe expressed his disappointment. For a cartoonist… not an easy moment to shake.
Joe opened his unique school and by doing so, opened the doors for a tremendous amount of artists who may not have otherwise had the opportunity, support, and camaraderie to develop their craft. If it wasn’t for Joe, I wouldn’t have developed my craft or the sense of identity that I have today. I wouldn’t have made the professional friends I have now. And my youngest daughter wouldn’t have grown up in my studio to become an accomplished young artist herself. Joe passed away the day after my daughter left home to attend Ringling College of Art and Design as an illustration major. The coincidence of it is not lost on me… and his legacy seems so much more poignant, his influence so much more obvious.
You are respected, Joe. I know for a fact that you will be missed. Thank you.
I can’t believe that 2011 is finally behind us! The year sure went fast and boy was it rocky but hey, some of us enjoy a wild roller coaster ride. Now we have to look forward to the brave new year of 2012. Thanks to the Mayan calendar and a few other prophetic hijinks many fear that this year is targeted to be The End of the World.
Bring it on Baby!
Regardless what the predictions may be, you can bet 2012 will be the end of the world as we know it, especially in the field of comics. 2011 set the foundation for the Digital Age and I think that this year you will see comics taking a foothold as a dominant player in digital media.
Beware of the little guy!
The nature of digital marketing and distribution as it stands today will make the market an open free-for-all and don’t be surprised to find some of the smallest fish making the biggest waves because of their ability and willingness to navigate freely, unencumbered by bureaucracy, corporate red tape, and allegiance to traditional systems of distribution.
This sounds like a lot of hype from an Indy guy like myself plugging a web based comic site here at CO2 Comics with my partner Bill Cucinotta and a loyal roster of comic contributors that for the last two and a half years have been plugging away diligently. We are happy to be little guys in times like this because we have been there before and we know the potential of the current environment.
Gerry Giovinco, Bill Cucinotta & Phil LaSorda
2012 marks the thirtieth anniversary of our first attempt at publishing comics as Comico the Comic Company. Bill and I, along with former partners Phil and Dennis LaSorda, were little guys with not much more than a dream when we attempted to tackle the then fledgeling Direct Market with our first black and white anthology comic book, Primer #1. Within a few years we had surprised the industry as we grew to be a dominant player, publishing acclaimed color comics, securing daring licensing deals, and working with a long list of some of the most talented artists in the field.
A lot has changed over the last thirty years, in the industry, in the world and in our lives, but one thing is still the same. Bill and I, along with the rest of our CO2 Comics family, have big dreams about creating comics and we know first hand the potential of being the little guy. I am a sucker for nice round numbers and twenty twelve rolls of the tongue in a robust kind of way but a thirty year benchmark is a great excuse to stand up and want to be accounted for.
This year for us will be a celebration of our past accomplishments and a reminder to ourselves and the world what we are capable of. 2012 may not really be the end of the world after all but don’t be surprised if a new world emerges, especially where CO2 Comics is concerned.
Since this is my last blog before Halloween I thought it would be fun to take a jaunt down the old, haunted Memory Lane starting with an illustration I did of a baby Bela Lugosi for a project as a student at the Philadelphia College of Art.
Thirty years ago, when Bill Cucinotta and I were still hacking away with friends at our student newspaper, DUCKWORK, Matt Wagner had joined our little band of ducks. The DUCKWORK staff had that year, by proxy, become the Arts Council of the college and it became our job to coordinate the 1981 Annual PCA Halloween Ball.
Matt accepted the responsibility of designing the poster for the event which we screen printed with black ink on white paper and added a touch of red by hand. The original prints were roughly 14×18 inches and were posted around campus for all to see.
I came across the preliminary sketches that Matt had made in one of my sketchbooks, and since I am lucky enough to have the poster as well I thought it would be a nice Halloween treat to share.
The following October,DUCKWORK would be gone, but as Comico, Bill and I, along with partners Phil and Dennis LaSorda would publish our first comic book, Comico Primer #1. Matt Wagner would introduce his popular Grendel character in issue #2 and the rest is history.
Time sure flies when your making comics. Three decades later we’re still at it, bringing our readers great comics right here on the internet with CO2 Comics. We do sure miss the smell of paper though so stay tuned for another treat that will be announced sooooooooooooooooooon!
Steve Jobs’ passing was no surprise. His failed health had been quite public and his recent resignation as CEO of Apple was a clear sign. The dignity with which he handled his final days in public is as much an inspiration as his life and the impact his vision has had on the world.
It is hard, now, to imagine a day without some technological influence that Steve Jobs and the company he stewarded did not have some impact on. As a comic creator, I can tell you that the course of the entire comics medium has been redirected, in large part due to innovations derived from Apple.
There certainly were computers before Steve Jobs and Apple came on the scene. In 1974, when I was in 8th grade at Saint Titus in East Norriton, Pennsylvania, I had access to an already obsolete computer that had been used for actual Apollo moon missions. It was a clunky machine that had to be programmed with binary punch cards and its output seemed no more sophisticated to me than that of the newly released Mini Bomar that launched a frenzy of low cost handheld calculators on the world.
Learning to program that two digit dinosaur was a real trial and to this day the words of my Math teacher, Rev. Joseph Oechsle, ring in my ears, “Trash in, trash out!” The lesson was that computer was only as good as the person programming it.
Vintage home computing
A few years later I would sell computers meant for the home as part of my job working in the electronic appliance department at K-Mart where I tried making some extra cash while we struggled to build our fledgling comic company, Comico. I sold machines like the Texas Instrument TI-99/4A, the Commodore VIC-20 and the Commodore 64. These computers saved data on audio cassette tapes and sophisticated gaming was PONG.
By that point in my life I had no interest in computers. I was totally focused on comics and the ugly pixelated images and type that these computers could barely generate were of no use to me and my aspirations to be a comic artist and publisher. I was blind to their potential.
This all seemed to change in 1984 when the hammer was launched into a giant screen during Apple’s first and most memorable Super Bowl commercial. Not only did it change the impact that Super Bowl commercials had–it changed the way the world would look at personal computers. It also introduced Graphic User Interface(GUI) which put icons on our desktop suddenly making computers much more intuitive and useable to the general public.
We had one of those Macs at Comico when it first came out and immediately we used it to generate all of the type that we used for our letters pages, graphics and editorial columns. Between the Mac and our photocopier we had practically eliminated our dependancy on our local typesetter and the graphics house where we had most of our photostats done. This transition to a variation of desktop publishing ended up saving us us a ton of money.
In 1985First Comics publishedShatterby Peter B. Gillis and Mike Saenz. This was the first all-digital comic commercially published. It was created on a Mac exactly like the one that sat in our office at Comico.
Digital comics have come a long way since Shatter. Where Shatter’s pixelated digital imagery made it obvious that it was generated on a computer and was in fact a badge of honor for its accomplishment, today it is nearly impossible to tell which comics are drawn by hand on paper and which are generated completely digitally.
Steve Jobs recognized the power of digital art which was evident when he bought Pixar from Lucasfilmin 1986. Under his guidance Pixar changed how animation was created and delighted the world with Toy Story in 1995 followed by a long list of incredible 3D CGI films that set new standards not for just animation but entertainment in general
3D CGI hashad its affect on comics. Many creators use it to create their comics entirely, others use it as a form of reference for everything from anatomy to architecture.
The biggest impact that Steve Jobs has had on comics in my opinion, however, has been in the area of web comics which would not have ever been possible without the advent of the personal computer. Since the turn of the century (boy that sounds weird!) digital comics have been proliferating on the internet at a rapid pace. Almost anyone with a computer, a scanner, and internet service can now publish comics on the web.
Thanks to the personal computer there has never been more diversified work available in the comics medium. We take full advantage of that here at CO2 Comics. The computer and the internet have given Bill Cucinotta and me a chance to publish comics again and to reach an audience that before was never possible.
Distribution of comics is also changing thanks to Mr. Jobs and company. Just as Apple redefined how music was heard around the world with the 2001 introduction of the iPod and iTunes, the iPhone and the iPad are quickly becoming the place where people read their comics with apps purchased through the App Store. These of course are not the only options for digital comic distribution, but as with the introduction of GUI and the Macintosh personal computer, Apple seems to always be the innovator of record.
Maybe I’m biased. This blog is spat out of my dependable iMac every week and Bill does all the designing on his. We’ve both done our fair share of work on other PC’s but it is our Macs that have always been the faithful workhorse. This is a certain to me as the notion that the future of comics is brighter and more diverse now than ever dreamed possible thanks in large part to innovations set forth by Steve Jobs and Apple.
Rest in peace, Steve Jobs but expect your legacy to survive for a long, long time. You made a difference in the world and it will always be remembered. Thank you for making a difference in the world of comics, wether you intended to or not. The art of making comics is far richer thanks to your innovation and inspiration.
Remember the commercial where one person eating a chocolate bar collides with another eating peanut butter presumably inspiring Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups? The ad capitalized on a well known fact that some of the best ideas are the results of accidents.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could anticipate these unlikely turn of events and forecast an outcome accurately in advance? Scientists attempt this all the time and perform experiments to prove their hypothesis.
Well, I’m no scientist but I think I know a few things about comics and I have been witnessing some developments in technology, distribution and comic art production that lead me to believe that 3-D is the key to a bountiful future for the comics industry.
(Laughter?)
I know this is a daring statement considering that 3-D has never been anything other than an eye-blurring, headache-inducing fad requiring optical accessories that defy all fashion sensibilities but the stars of fate are lining up like the reflection of lights in disco infinity mirror!
Ever since the incredible commercial success of AVATAR, Hollywood has been cramming 3-D films down the throats of audiences in theaters everywhere. Any film that can be remotely adapted to 3-D is going under the stereoscopic knife. Still, most audiences prefer the traditional 2-D versions so what is the rush?
There is a 3-D technological boom on the horizon.
3-D has been steadily infiltrating our homes as more and more HD televisions are equipped with 3-D capability. Though these televisions still require the use of eyeglasses with polarized lenses or more the sophisticated shutter glasses, the 3-D effects, especially on large screens, are astounding.
Hand held mobile devices, however, are poised to overtake the market using a new technology called APB or Autostereoscopic Parallax Barrier. They are capable of displaying crystal clear 3-D on their small screens without the need for any special glasses. These gaming units, cell phones and, soon, tablets are also being equipped with 3-D cameras making them capable of capturing, sending and sharing photos and video of unique 3-D content.
Content is the magic word!
For these new 3-D devices to succeed there needs to be content. Lots of it. Hollywood is scrambling but it can’t make it fast enough. Video games, tapping into the already present 3-D CGI will be broad providers of material. Web developers will employ more and more 3-D imagery as the viewing devices become more readily available. Manufacturers are betting the house that users will become the biggest provider of 3-D content simply by sharing their images and video. Anaglyphic 3-D content that requires the use of the old red and blue lensed glasses is already proliferating onYouTube, paving the road for the more easily viewed autostereoscopic material.
I believe that no media can produce more dynamic 3-D content at an economical cost than comics. Comic art is a natural for 3-D with its traditional dependancy on line art and frequent use of dramatic forced perspective. The effects in 3-D comics are enhanced and the layers of depth are more clearly defined than traditional stereoscopic photography and even 3-D CGI. Comics also give the reader a greater opportunity to appreciate 3-D in each static image of a story while in a 3-D video the effects stream by quickly, offering little chance to digest the depth of the graphics.
Motion comics offer the best of both worlds. In fact it was my having watched DC’s commercial for the New 52 and noting its achievement of creating the illusion of depth with its graphics and motion of layers of art, combined with an ad for a newly released 3-D cell phone that includes a 3-D camera that pushed the chocolate into the peanut butter for me. I had already seen the trailer for Green Lantern displayed on a 3-D capable Nintendo 3DS and was quite impressed by the technology and the clarity of the image. The idea that any user could easily generate this type of 3-D photos and videos with their cell phone camera gave me hope that comic artists could do the same with simple ingenuity and the help of a program that could generate stereoscopic images from line art.
Click and Visit M2
I came across a 3-D motion comic made by the guys at M2 on Bleeding Coolthat is a must see if you have an old pair of red and blue anaglyphic glasses on you. It will give you a chance to see the potential of motion comics in 3-D.
If you are enjoying the motion comics please be sure to check out Bernie Mireault’s Jam motion comic right here at CO2 Comics. I’m sure you can easily imagine how great that would look in 3-D.
Check out Bernie Mireault's The JAM Motion Comic
I have always been intrigued by 3-D possibly because even though we live in a three dimensional reality it is so hard to capture. As an artist the biggest challenge is being forced to capture that third dimension on a two dimensional canvas.
My first experience with simulated 3-D was with a Viewmaster. We all had them as kids, staring through those binocular-like viewers at a disc with a series of transparent slides. They were a toy adapted from basic stereoscopes that had been around since 1838.
Mighty_Mouse_3D
I was also a big fan of 3-D baseball cards that used lenticular graphics to create the illusion of depth. I at one time even owned aNashika N8000 35mm 3-D camera that took photos that were processed and printed with this same lenticular process as the baseball cards.
3-D Comics have been around for a long time. The first 3-D comic featured Mighty Mouse and was published by St. John Comics in 1953. The 3-D effect was created by none other than the legendary Joe Kubert along with Norman Maurer and his brother Lenny. The 3-D comic fad in the 50′s was short lived but 3-D comics enjoyed a comeback in the 80′s under the guiding hand ofRay Zone.
We published a ROBOTECH 3-D comic in 1987 while atComico aond used Ray Zone’s expertise to produce it. Of course it contained pencils by CO2 Comics contributer Mike Leeke. Here are a couple of scans that you should be able to enjoy with a pair of 3-D specs.
With all of these new viewing devices and autostereoscopic technology 3-D may be here to stay permanently and comics may benefit. Digital comics will have an opportunity to separate themselves from print entirely offering an eyeglass-free experience that cannot be had in book format. Will the added dimension create added value? More importantly will it create an interest in comics that attracts a broader audience? I’m betting that if it helps to sell more 3-D devices then the answer is yes. Only time will tell if my hypothesis is correct but right now I’m in the mood for a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup.
I recently had an opportunity to reread and old blog post by Tom Spurgeon on his site The Comics Reporter. In the blog post Tom takes a look at one of our old Comico publications, AZ by our late partner Phil LaSorda. Tom questions the cultural impact that such an obviously crude attempt at making comics may or should have on the market and the medium.
Now I along with my current publishing partner Bill Cucinotta who was also a partner back in those early Comico days may be biased but we also have a unique perspective just by having been there. We know, retrospectively, that the work we did in those days was seminal at best and was often criticized as being crap. It is easy to look back and be embarrassed by our rudimentary attempts to both create and publish comics. The irony, I suppose, is that as rudimentary as that material was, we are both still very proud of it for many reasons, so much so that we published it all again, right here on CO2 Comics.
Slaughterman #1
Skrog #1
SLAUGHTERMAN and SKROGmay not have had many more redeeming qualities than AZ but they were all cornerstone publications that established a foundation that Comico, one of the most influential independent publishers of the eighties, was built on. For this reason alone, despite their critical ineptness, yes, they had, and continue to have cultural impact.
I remember a scathing review by Cat Yronwode in the Comics Buyers Guide that questioned, “who gave us the right to publish such crap?” My fiery response was that we all have the right to publish what we want to in America and that, crap or not, it will be the market that decides the success of the product. I wish I had those CBG articles today.
One thing we did well at Comico, in those early days, was to learn from our mistakes. It did not take long or us to realize our success would come from publishing others. It was, however, our relationships that we had developed hanging in artist alleys at comic conventions, and our ability to relate to young and maturing talent that allowed us the opportunity to work with the likes of Matt Wagner, Bill Willingham, Sam Kieth,Chuck Dixon, Judith Hunt, Neil Vokes, Rich Rankin, Reggie Byers and many many others.
We also published a new talent showcase called Primerwhere we published the earliest work of many other budding artists who were not quite ready for the Big Two.
Comico Primer #1-6
To me the biggest impact that Comico had on the comics industry, was that it gave evidence that if a handful of guys with apparently limited talent and experience could build a company that at one time was ranked #3 behind Marvel and DC in monthly sales, then maybe, just maybe, anybody can.
I believe we created an opportunity for creators to get bold enough to publish their own work or feel more confident when presenting it to others. We all did it as artists, looked at other work that we considered weak and say, “hey, I’m at least as good as this, if this can be published than so can mine.”
Gerry Giovinco, Bill Cucinotta & Phil LaSorda
We may have been naive or overconfident when we launched Comico but we had one mantra that we held to that was first spoken by Phil, “We don’t want to look back years from now and regret that we didn’t try when we had the chance.” To us, the fear of failure was never as great as the fear of never having the opportunity to make comics professionally. To do what we loved.
Today the internet is the greatest thing for young comic artists and for the entire medium. Anyone can publish on the web and, yes, there is a ton of incredible crap out there but more people than ever are taking a shot making comics and we fans of the medium are the winners because tremendous comic talent that may have never tried before is now offering our eyes a feast of variety that has never existed in comics.
So to answer Tom Spurgeon’s quote: “The question that many of us near comics ask — if only to each other — is if the art form can survive without the occasional cycling back to cruder efforts like this one, unpretentious material devoid of any hope for life or riches beyond its publication schedule that helped revitalize the art form four or five times during a low ebb.”
No! The art form, or more accurately the medium of comics or any medium for that matter, cannot survive without a cycle that includes cruder efforts. No crude efforts would imply no young talent and with no young talent to revitalize a medium, that medium will die a death of eventual mediocrity.
To paraphrase McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc, “When you’re green you grow. When you’re ripe you rot.”
So, be brave and create! Express yourself as well as you know how and be willing to show the world. Make mistakes. Learn from them. Never stop growing. But when you do someone new will begin making their own mistakes and we will all have the pleasure of witnessing their adventure.
When we finally became serious about publishing comic books under the Comico imprint we realized that we were going to have to actually sell our comics and generate substantial revenue.
Business card Side 2
We had always sold our handmade, photocopied comics directly to the customer and were never really in a situation where we actually had to profit from the comics we made.
The issues of DUCKWORK that were produced were distributed freely on campus at PCA, supported by student council and meager funds generated by advertisements that we solicited.
Comico, however, was a real business and we had to get our comics sold to as many readers as possible in order to stay alive.
In the old days that meant Newsstand Distribution and its dreaded return policy, but in the early 1980′s the Direct Comic Market was young and growing. It offered an opportunity for an upstart company like Comico to solicit to retailers through several distributors.
Product was solicited three months in advance. The orders gave publishers a solid idea of what their print run needed to be and there were no returns to fret about. This made it easy to borrow money since you could show actual sales ahead of time. It also let you know if you should pack your bags and quit before you absorbed the expenses of production and printing.
Publishers just had to convince the distributors that their product was worth the time to solicit. This generally meant that if one distributor would take a chance on your product the others had to as well so they would not have to explain to their retailers why the guy down the street has a particular title and they don’t.
Our first comic book was a black and white comic titled Primer #1. Historically the reviews on the comic have sucked but it was our first product and at the time we were very proud of our work.
PRIMER #1
Today, I believe that it is highly underrated as a collectible since so few were made and it is significant for having launched a company that discovered many great talents, produced great product and established a business model that other great Independent publishers would follow.
Back in 1982 we had to find someone to solicit Primer #1 before it was even complete. We had very little to show except photocopies of of pencils and a proposed cover.
We wanted to make a great first impression so we put our efforts into a nice presentation package and focused on our business card because we thought it would be the one thing the distributers might keep in their rolodex (who still has one of those dinosaurs?)
The original Comico logo was designed by Phil LaSorda and was as unique as it was cumbersome but it lent itself well to the unusual business card that I would design around it.
The logo was designed to bracket the corner of the covers of our comics and it only survived the black and white comics that we originally published. It repeated the name Comico twice, hinged by a shared letter “C” that would eventually provide the basis for several other designs that would represent the future color line.
The card I designed was also hinged, die cut and folded so the Comico logo would read on both sides. When it opened our information was displayed inside. It was black and white, innovative and elegant, just the impression we wanted to create for our line.
The card could stand on a desk where others could only lay and it encouraged the holder to manipulate and study it. Let’s just say it was hard not to notice and easy to remember.
Above all, it was a conversation piece which came in handy when we did follow-up calls to the distributors. In those days, when you made the call, you spoke to the head guy, himself: Steve Geppi, Bud Plant, Milton Griepp, Walter Wang, and so on.
All of these guys were friendly, and were more than happy to offer advice and honest criticisms of the product. There was a lot of criticism and we listened and learned.
Just when it looked like we were going to have to go back to the drawing board with Primer #1 we got our first order. I’ll never forget the moment. I was away from the studio for a rare weekend trip when Phil called to tell me that Bud Plant had ordered one hundred books. You would have thought that I won the lottery!
Bill Cucinotta taking initial PRIMER 1 orders
That week Phil, Bill Cucinotta and I worked the phones to let every distributor know that Bud Plant had given us an order. As we expected they all followed suit, not to be outdone.
We sold less than two thousand books but it was enough to cover the printing costs and generate enough interest for Primer #2 which enjoys it’s place in comics history for the first appearance of Matt Wagner’s Grendel.
PRIMER #2
Today the card of CO2 Comics is simple. It bears our logo and a lone piece of contact information, co2comics.com. Follow that link and everything you need to know about CO2 Comics is at your fingertips!
We hope we still know how to make a great first impression.
As CO2 Comics closes in on its first anniversary we can’t help but reminisce about what got us this far. Looking back over the past year doesn’t require much of a stretch of the old memory muscle in our heads but Bill and I have a history in the comics industry that goes back nearly 30 years and believe me, some of those memories need to be jogged with a crowbar to snap back to the surface.
That’s why we were so tickled when Mike Sterling resurrected a vintage Comico promo kit that was circulated to retailers back in 1985 and posted it here for the world to see on his website progressiveruin.com.
Most folks that have been following CO2 Comics know that Bill and I were two of the founding partners of Comico. Seeing this promo kit online brought back a lot of memories of Comico and those early days of the Independent comic movement.
Inspired by the archives shown here we’ve decided to dredge up little gems from our own collections and share them here on a weekly basis.
We hope you’ll enjoy them and share some of your Comico treasures with us as well. So please enjoy the link to Mike’s site and return regularly for future updates about the past.
This is sad news for all Robotech fans and fans of Anime.
UPDATE:
First, let me apologize for the brevity of the above post. I had just heard the news and wanted to forward it as soon as possible and was not available to follow up on it until now.
Carl Macek had a profound impact on Comico. It was the relationship that we had with Carl and Harmony Gold that solidified the notion that Comico was a viable force in the comic industry. ROBOTECH, more than any other property, made people notice us and trust that we would do a great job publishing anything. Carl trusted us early on and never wavered. The rest is history.
When Bill Cucinotta and Phil LaSorda first met Carl at a Las Vegas comic convention in 1984 they returned home infected by his enthusiasm for Macross. Carl was not just a producer that had landed the rights of an interesting anime series. Carl genuinely loved the medium, and the source material.
We were all fans of anime back then but it was clear that Macross was special. Carl was the preacher and we were the choir. I like to think that Carl saw that we loved making comics as much as he loved producing the English adaption of Macross and knew that we would treat it with the same admiration and dignity that he put into his work. Maybe it was just fate.
At the time we were all little fish in a big sea. Then ROBOTECH happened. Without boring anyone with the history of how the series boomed onto the scene, one thing was clear, ROBOTECH was bigger than all of us. Carl of course rose to the occasion and orchestrated a masterpiece. He had all the opportunity in the world to put the comic adaptation of ROBOTECH into the hands of DC comics but he stood his ground and insured that Comico would continue to be the publisher of his baby.
Carl had not only proven his own integrity but he boldly displayed his trust in us. Before ROBOTECH, I can assure you that Carl micro managed the developement of Macross #1 actually scripting it himself and having his wife Svea render the pencils. The enormity of the ROBOTECH project forced him to step back and hand us the creative reigns of the comic books, which he did unflinchingly. We returned Carl’s good faith by producing comics that he could be proud of.
Carl Macek was a man with a dream as are we all. But Carl separated himself from most by ferociously acting on his dreams. Transforming them into a string of success stories. I am happy to have been part of one of them.
It would be nice if there were more guys like him in the world but it is a tragedy that we have just lost the one-and-only Carl Macek.
My sincerest sympathies to Svea, the rest of Carl’s family and the extended ROBOTECH family.
The World of Ginger Fox
by Mike Baron and Mitch O’Connell, originally published by Comico in 1986 as a 64-page graphic novel, is nothing short of stylish eye candy derived from the exciting nineteen eighties’ era of high hair, shoulder pads, and excesses of wealth.
Ginger Fox is presented anew beginning this week on the web pages of CO2 Comics.
The tale of romance, adventure and intrigue, set in the Hollywood of the mid-eighties featuring the smart, sexy and savvy Ginger Fox and a cast of strippers, martial artists, hit men, drug addicts, gat-toting bodyguards and celebrity cameos will be released in weekly installments and is available without fee or subscription as are all comics currently available at http://www.co2comics.com/pages/co2_comics.html.
One quick look at the credits of Mike Baron and Mitch O’Connellwill give a good idea of what a treat to expect.
Writer Mike Baron has been one of the most innovative and honored creators in comics since he broke into the field withNEXUS in 1982 with artist Steve Rude.
He has written numerous mainstream comics, including Marvel’s The Punisher and DC’s The Flash. He is also the co-creator of BADGER, FEUD, SPYKE and a number of other renowned titles. He also penned the ROBOTECH graphic novel published by Comico.
His stunning illustration work since has been featured in magazines from Newsweek to Playboy, on the covers of million selling CD’s and advertising campaigns from McDonalds to Coca-Cola! Mitch’s fine art masterpieces have been exhibited from New York to Berlin to Tokyo and his tantalizing tattoo designs are a fixture on the walls of tattoo shops around the word! Mike and Mitch join the ranks of former Comico creators, Bill Anderson, Reggie Byers, Chris Kalnick, Mike Leeke, Bernie Mireault, Andrew Murphy, Rich Rankin, Neil Vokes as well as publisher creators Bill Cucinotta and Gerry Giovinco on the CO2 Comics site that also features work by Tina Garceau, Robert Jackson Jr., Onrie Kompan, Giovanni Paolao Timpano, and Joe Williams.
There are over 400 pages of free comic art available to read at CO2 COMICS.
I can’t believe that 2011 is finally behind us! The year sure went fast and boy was it rocky but hey, some of us enjoy a wild roller coaster ride. Now we have to look forward to the brave new year of 2012. Thanks to the 
Distribution of comics is also changing thanks to Mr. Jobs and company. Just as Apple redefined how music was heard around the world with the 2001 introduction of the iPod and iTunes, the iPhone and the iPad are quickly becoming the place where people read their comics with apps purchased through the App Store. These of course are not the only options for digital comic distribution, but as with the introduction of GUI and the Macintosh personal computer, Apple seems to always be the innovator of record.
I know this is a daring statement considering that 3-D has never been anything other than an eye-blurring, headache-inducing fad requiring optical accessories that defy all fashion sensibilities but the stars of fate are lining up like the reflection of lights in disco infinity mirror!
My first experience with simulated 3-D was with a 
With all of these new viewing devices and autostereoscopic technology 3-D may be here to stay permanently and comics may benefit. Digital comics will have an opportunity to separate themselves from print entirely offering an eyeglass-free experience that cannot be had in book format. Will the added dimension create added value? More importantly will it create an interest in comics that attracts a broader audience? I’m betting that if it helps to sell more 3-D devices then the answer is yes. Only time will tell if my hypothesis is correct but right now I’m in the mood for a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup.
The logo was designed to bracket the corner of the covers of our comics and it only survived the black and white comics that we originally published. It repeated the name Comico twice, hinged by a shared letter “C” that would eventually provide the basis for several other designs that would represent the future color line.
