Thursday, 21 May 2009

Earl Oliver Hurst 1946 - part II

Here are two more pages. The rest will follow this weekend.


It's early morning here in Sweden and I'm soon off to work. Actually I should be on my way now...

Tuesday, 19 May 2009

Earl Oliver Hurst 1946 - part I

Here are the first three pages of the Earl Oliver Hurst entry in "Forty Illustrators and how they Work" by Ernest W. Watson from 1946.
The rest will follow soon!:)

Monday, 18 May 2009

Kalle Anka & C:o 1938 (!)

If you are a Swede you are familiar with the classic Kalle Anka & C:o (Donald Duck & Co.) logotype that appeared on the very first issue in September 1948. If you havn't seen it, this is what it looked like:

Now, Thomas Storn at Svenskt Seriearkiv (Swedish Comic Archive) made a find some time ago. A theatrical ad from December 1938. Ten years before the first issue of KA & C:o but with a very, very similar logo!!!


Anyone seen an earlier version or knows the history behind it? Anyone seen it used between 1939-1948? Please let me know!

And fans of Fethry Duck, Al Hubbard and Dick Kinney shouldn't miss David Gersteins post on the first Fethry story "The Health Nut". There are some rare script pages by Kinney like the one below to be found there.:) Go check it out!

Thursday, 14 May 2009

Floyd Gottfredson dailies 1942

Some pure gold from 1942. The introduction to "The Black Crow Mystery" by Floyd Gottfredson, Dick Shaw and Bill Wright.
Just see how smooth the action lines flows and how well posed the characters are.
Download and save for inspiration. :)




PS. See previous entries on Gottfredson (And the uncut version of the Black Crow Mystery!) by using the Labels function.

Tuesday, 12 May 2009

Bamses äventyr #21


The new issue of "Bamses äventyr" is in the stores now.
And it's got a cover by Gerben Valkema!
Gerben is mostly known for his covers to the Dutch Donald Duck weekly and the comic strip Elsje.
I'm happy that he agreed to take a break in his busy schedule to do this cover for us! :)

/Joakim.

Saturday, 9 May 2009

91:an on the cover

Here in Sweden one of the most popular of the "traditional" comic characters is "91:an". A Swedish solider that debuted in 1932. At first only as a weekly page in the magazine "Allt för Alla" and when that folded the page moved to another magazine: "Levande Livet". But since 1956 he's got his own comic book.

Here are two rare examples of covers from "Levande Livet" featuring 91:an. The first one is from 1945 and in addition to the cover I've also scanned the competition that ran in that issue. Artwork by the creator of 91:an: Rudolf Petersson.


The second cover is from 1957. In addition to 91:an we also see Åsa-Nisse on this Easter cover. Åsa-Nisse is also one of those old Swedish comic characters that has survived at least 50 years, and is still beeing produced today. The cover artist is Gösta Gummesson.

Friday, 8 May 2009

The last issue of BAMSE


This issue will be the last issue of BAMSE published in Norway. So if you live in Norway you better grab a copy. Though it will still be published in Sweden and in Finland every three weeks. (In case you don't know I work as an editor at the Swedish BAMSE office where stories are beeing produced. ) Times are tough in the comics biz. But I hope they will get better... I really do...

Wednesday, 6 May 2009

Carl Barks tablet

[Edit: The image is, of course, taken from the Golden Helmet cover. Thanks, Francesco! I've probably seen that cover so many times I've become "blind" to it. You see, I have a copy of it on my fridge... This is really embarrasing... :)]
I recently bought this Mickey Mouse club drawing tablet on eBay. The cover is by Carl Barks and the image of Donald Duck looks familar, but I just can't pin-point where I've seen it before. Maybe as a logo for Taliaferro DD strips reprinted in WDC?

Any Donaldist out there who knows wich story this image is taken from?
Or was this a drawing made especially for this tablet and later re-used in WDC as a logo for the Taliaferro strips?

Now I just gotta draw some neat ducks in that tablet... ;)

Monday, 4 May 2009

Random roughs etc

Some random sketches and a pen and ink drawing done for the drawing jam over at drawingboard.org

Sunday, 3 May 2009

Dixie Dugan 1932 - samples

Thanks to Fortunato I now know that a lot of Dixie Dugans adventures can be found here. Unfortunately they seem to be missing most of the sept 1932 strips...
But still, it's a great place if you want to read the strip.
Just to show you some samples of Dixie Dugan (if you havn't seen the strip before) here are a few promotional pieces I downloaded from the site and some dailies from sept and october 1932. Enjoy!











And here's one of my original Dixie Dugan dailies that I posted on this blog in 2007.
(This one is from Sept 15 and the other I got is from Sept 8.)

PS. This is post #500 since I started this blog. I'm happy that so many people from all over the world are visiting it. Thanks!

Working on the Ba-Ba book

Today I'm working on the compilation of the Ba-Ba book that is scheduled for a september release. All the original dailies are scanned and I'm now trying to sort through the supplementary bonus material. Got loads of clipped strips and Rinaldo's sketchbooks, foreign publications etc.
It takes time but it's fun to do. Just to give you a glimpse of it here are a few photos of what's on my living room table. :)



Friday, 1 May 2009

Dixie Dugan 1932

[Edit: Turned out it was a good friend of mine who bought the strips. :)]
I'm interested in copies of this Dixie Dugan lot that sold on eBay today.
Why I'm so eager to get copies of these? I own two original Dixie Dugan dailies from sept 1932 and I'd love to read the story.
If you got any 1930's Dixie Dugan strips (or Adventures of Patsy dailies by Graff or Raab) and want to trade drop me a line at sekvenskonst at telia dot com

/Joakim.

Wednesday, 29 April 2009

The first Olli page

I'm finally back from Stockholm and SPX. We had fun the last two days and actually sold out before the show closed. :) Also bought some good stuff like Niklas Asker's graphic novel "Second Thoughts" and Ronnie del Carmen's "And there you are" (A must have for fans of this very, very talented Pixar artist).

And I also went to Seriegalleriet to pick up a nice piece of original art. This is the very first Olli page by Nils Egerbrandt from the very first issue of Tuff och Tuss from 1953. Olli had started as a strip the year before but this is his comic book debut. So the logo is even hand drawn instead of a stat. :)

I should also mention that my friend David Gerstein has started a new blog. The focus is on old cartoons, comics and music. It's called Ramapith: The Prehistoric Pop Culture Blog and I'm sure you'll enjoy it.

Saturday, 25 April 2009

SPX!

Things have been shaping up. :)
Not much activity on Friday but yesterday the floors were filled. "Emma & Sara" #7 and Hedvig's "som katt och hund" ("like Cat and Dog") sold out. Still some of Hedvig's skechbooks left but I think the last few remaining copies will sell today.[Edit: They sure sold out too.] Now I gotta go to catch the train. Just wanted to make a quick status update. If in Stockholm please come by our booth and say hi. :)

/Joakim.

Friday, 24 April 2009

SPX???

So yesterday we headed for Kulturhuset in Stockholm to attend the first day of spx09. The program said it would start at 17.00 and continue to 20.00 this day. But... to our surprise there was nothing. Absolutely nothing! When we got to the floor were spx was supposed to be there was a photo exhibithion. Not even a sign saying spx had been cancelled or anything. We saw people coming up the stairs looking around and just shaking their heads.
What more can I say that this is a pretty sloppy organisation failure. Myself I took one day extra off from work just to be able to attend all days. They could at least have updated their website mentioning this. Even having a small sign at the location that the event had been cancelled would have been a nice gesture to people. Just to give some information. But, no. This resulted in a pretty grumpy Joakim...
Now, let's hope things will shape up and that there actually will be something happening this weekend.