Comic Book Resources

Idol Thoughts 11/19

Here’s my Q & A with Comic Book Idol 3 runner-up, Charles Paul Wilson III!

Enjoy!

1. For the finale, did you find yourself checking the polls constantly, or did you just wait until the end?

Oh, definitely reloading the page every minute. Then, for the first time in a really long while, my internet stopped working and I was forced to join the real world for a bit. Once it started up again, though, it was back to clicking on refresh. It was neck and neck for the most part, not a landslide in anyone’s favor at the get-go, so it was tough to tear myself away.

2. How did you prepare yourself before the voting results? Did you do the ol’ “prepare yourself for the worst” routine or what?

Ha ha I did that the first round. Totally prepared to be knocked out early in the game. Still, going by the statistics, I was surprised when Caio was eliminated the fourth round and from then on I realized the end result was still up in the air. Serious white knuckle action on that mouse before the end.

3. Who is the most surprising person to you who voted for you? Any old seventh-grade classmates?

Hmmm… I definitely saw a few people I ran around in high school with show up in the voting area, and I think I’m glad they know I’m still doing something creative.

4. Did any of the comments from any of the judges over the course of the competition strike you as unfair at all? Which comments were right on the mark?

Really, I’ve done portfolio reviews at noisy conventions over the past few years and here it’s been awesome to see the editors/artists be able to elaborate on certain aspects of my work they feel need improvement without having to look at a clock or contend with thirty more people standing in front of and/or behind me in line. I’m extremely pleased to see the critiques on my work this year are more advanced in terms of story-telling technique and specific anatomy/proportion issues as opposed to, say, “Your figures need work, your perspective needs work and the hair you draw looks like plastic!” (Ha ha, that’s actually from my very first portfolio review!)

But, yeah, the editors have shown us what they expect to see in our portfolios should we ask them for work, and the artists have told us what we need to be capable of if we want to be good at what we do and survive in the business once we manage to get in. And with the close
interaction between the editors and all the work over all five rounds it was a sharp reminder that editors are probably not going to want to hire an artist if they have to make corrections in every panel on every page, and I think that’s a cool thing to keep in mind not just for the contestants, but for all the other artists out there looking to break in as well.

5. Did the Legion assignment prepare you for another increase in pages, or was it still a shock to go to 5 pages in one week?

It did, and it still was. I’ve been training myself to be capable of turning in one good page a day, not script 4 and a cover in 3 1/2 days, and it was a little tough trying to figure out a way to make the fifth round my best round without sacrificing any quality. I managed to make a schedule for the weekend, threw that out the window once I realized I forgot to factor in something called sleep and, like that Silvestri guy said in one of his posts, proceeded to operate with a ticking bomb strapped under my chair and I still managed to have some fun! The concept of the assignment was cool, Jon Reed did an awesome, awesome job and I loved seeing the entries in the Play at Home thread.

6. Which style of script do you prefer working with - detailed or loose?

Doesn’t matter to me - it’s all math (and fortunately it’s a math I enjoy!) I’ve had the pleasure of drawing from a variety of scripts, but no matter how detailed or restrictive a script might seem there’s no way around working creative problem-solving into the mix. I still get to play the role of director, actor, stage set and design, etc.

Hopefully, whatever I do with either kind of script, the writer will be proud, if they see it, and it will be worth the reader’s time.

7. Has this encouraged or discouraged you from continuing to pursue a career as a full-time comic artist?

Well, nothing’s going to discourage me from pushing to make a career in comic art. If my arms fall off I’ll draw comics with my feet. But this contest has been both an opportunity and a challenge, and I need and want both. I’d never actually thought of competing with other artists directly before (certainly not like this), and being pitted against the awesome talents of my fellow competitors I felt I had to flex muscles I’d never even thought of developing, and it felt good. It’s been an extremely unique experience and it’s helped make my pursuit of a career in this field that much more interesting.

8. What compelled you to apply to Comic Book Idol?

My awesome girlfriend, Stephanie, found it online. She’s been extremely pro-active in helping me with this contest and has been supportive of my work ever since I met her. Given that and how much she liked the American Idol show, it seemed like the best of both worlds for her, I think, so I did some research on the contest and found that I had to try to get in. Thanks, Stephanie!

9. Finally, take this space to promote the heck out of whatever you would like to promote!

Well, I did a short horror story called War Diaries with my friend, Steve Talaba, a while ago and it was just recently published in the UK anthology magazine, Something Wicked #03 (thanks, Andrew Scott and Dave Evans!) It can be found here: www.futurequake.co.uk

I’ll always be working on my own untitled projects that will someday reach publication so keep your eyes peeled for my name, but in the meantime please feel free to join my friends and I over at tentonstudios.com. They have a weekly sketch challenge (everyone’s welcome to play!) and the artists there are great! You can see what they’re up to in the professional comics world, showcase your own work, play in the sketch challenge or talk about movies and weird news (eight-limbed babies and vomit-inducing meteor strikes!)

Thanks a lot, Charles!