Holly Foltz

First Post from Beantown!

2012-01-25T12:14:00.000-08:00

Well, I've packed my bags, crated my kitty, hitched up my wagon and headed southwards for new, exciting and exotic locales! But I got impatient and stopped in Boston. I've been in a comics slump recently and didn't produce anything new for a long time. I blame the stress of trying to find an apartment and moving and such. However, I'm settled now and back in the creative head-space. Having the ever-inspirational and talented Jose-Luis Olivares and Cathy Leamy in the area doesn't hurt, either!

Anyway, on to the scribblings:

Kick-ass animator Bill Plympton was at MoCCA last year and I rather geeked-out on him. Poor fella.

I had a sudden inspiration to draw a video-gamey-type character. I'm thinking post-apocalyptic cowgirl wielding legendary MUTANT BUTTER KNIVES!

Image Dump

2011-11-09T14:11:00.000-08:00

So, I've run out of finished, scanned comics to post and since my lab fee at CCS expired, I won't have more comics to post until I either cough up another lab fee, or cough up some moola for my own equipment to scan and edit my comics (which is actually my long-term plan). So for the time being, here's some stuff that I already scanned in my school's wonderful computer lab.

First up: some random sketches of random characters that are random.

Next up: my buddy Matt Aucoin and I had an idea to make a twisted pinup calendar featuring scantily-clad psychopaths in what are hopefully somewhat humorous, if grim, situations. I did pencils, which he made look good with his mad inking skills (check out his webcomic Percy and Grimm). The project has been back-burner-ed for the moment, but I look forward to picking it up again because it was a lot of fun! It also afforded me the opportunity to practice coloring in the computer. It's not perfect, but here's the most finished image of the bunch:

I'm still aliiiiive!

2011-11-01T12:17:00.000-07:00

Okay, I've been a total tool and not updated in, like, three decades, with no good excuse. (Plenty of bad excuses, of course, but no good ones) Anyway, a COMIC!

The misadventures of the well-intentioned matchmaking novice:

And, hey, here's a portrait my mom asked me to do for her co-worker's birthday (it's a portrait of the co-worker, not my mom...)

...And there was much rejoicing.

*key unenthusiastic Monty Python and the Holy Grail cheer*

Hooray...

Patriotism

2011-07-11T08:43:00.000-07:00

Well, I meant to post this comic on the fourth of July, but what with visiting D.C. (the capitol building is freakin' HUGE!) and working, it completely slipped my mind. But hey, July isn't over yet, and the flags are still out in Norwich, so here's my "American Pride" comic:

This is what America means to me.

Barefoot

2011-06-08T15:58:00.001-07:00

It's summer, which means one very important thing: finding out what you can and can't do in flip-flops:

Below is a colored sketch of Esperanza and Lord Zoloft from "Unpleasant People." I'm toying with the idea of giving "Unpleasant People" its own website. Then I'll have some place to dump all my sketches of the characters! In the meantime:

Congratulations, graduations!

2011-05-24T11:37:00.000-07:00

I feel like "Congraduations" should be a real word. Or "Congraduates". It just sums it all up this time of year. What I mean to say is, congrats to all the graduates from our beloved Center for Cartoon Studies! There's some crazy-good talent being unleashed upon the world, so look out!

In honor of the occasion, I'd like to present a comic today about the grace with which one accepts one's own diploma and the dignity that goes along with such a great accomplishment:
In other news, I've got all the material together for Brain Parts #3. I still need to do the layout and print, but here's the cover:

I discovered that drawing rotting flesh and exposed bone-parts is super fun!

Mouser Power!

2011-05-18T13:38:00.001-07:00

So I had a totally Ninja Turtles moment at work at the restaurant a little while ago.

Unfortunately, denial didn't turn the dude into Baxter, or his wife into an army of Mousers, but it was a nice little daydream while it lasted.

Many continuing thanks to Jim Lawson for being my super-awesome thesis advisor!

More things at work...

2011-05-10T06:13:00.001-07:00

Something else at work that makes me want to punch babies...

... over-sharing.

Also, here's a picture of some assassin-dude with a sniper rifle. It looked better before I inked and colored it, but I'm still practising.

Colored with markers and colored pencils.

Dracula has had enough.

2011-05-07T07:23:00.000-07:00

Remember the good old days when vampires slept in coffins and sucked blood and were considered monsters? Me too.

I was going to sell prints of this at Boston Comic Con, but realized it looked a little sloppy in areas and didn't want to charge money for it without some digital touch-ups. So here's the un-pretty-fied version.

Boston Comic Con!

2011-05-02T05:41:00.001-07:00

At left: me chillin' with some Ghostbusters from New Hampshire.

Got back from Boston yesterday! Matt Aucoin and I had a GREAT time at Boston Comic Con! Saw some familiar faces, saw a ton of new ones, and totally geeked out over some of my favorite artists. Matt and I stayed with our friend and classmate, the incomparable Jose Olivares, who even had a couple hours to table with us on Sunday morning! I feel his presence lent some much-needed credibility to our table!

Below: Matt Aucoin Chillin' with a couple girls I'm convinced represent the future of white-female-gangster-rappers

Matt and I were tabling nearby a couple artists that I've seen at MoCCA and SPX: Cathy Leamy and Joel Gill. I've traded with Cathy before and picked up her very informative guide to eco-friendly feminine hygiene.

I also picked up a pack of Joel's "Black Conservatives Trading Cards" (series 1). Included in each pack is four printed cards and a beautifully screen-printed card. I always kicked myself for not buying these at a previous convention, so I was thrilled to see them there! Can't wait to get the second series!

I got Darwyn Cooke and Frank Cho to sign some of their work for me. I was concerned that I might completely lose it and throw a bra at one of their heads, but thankfully, I kept my underwear and my composure. Well, maybe not my composure. I even got to see Frank Cho do a beautiful pencil drawing of Tigra battling ninjas in a train (done in less than 45 minutes!).

I picked up a sketchbook from Stan Sakai. He had about four or five different booklets he was selling for $10, with his autograph and a cool sketch of Usagi inside!

Also met Michael Dooney, of TMNT fame. He asked me how classmate and former Mirage Publishing intern Melissa Mendes was doing (she's good). I picked up his "Girls I Like" booklet with both black and white and full-color drawings, as well as his "TMNT Sketch Cards" book. He even sketched a couple turtles for me! He was incredibly nice and probably used to pacifying turtles geeks! He even told me I looked like a pinup lady!

I know it's an expectation at these big conventions to see a lot of people in badly-fitting costumes who clearly sleep in them, but for every one of those, there was one really great-looking, well-put-together costume. I thought I would find it a little intimidating, but it was a lot of fun to see all the different costumes and what people did with them. It added a lot of interest and color to the crowd! Plus, how often do I get to meet Sailor Mercury?

Update: Donald Jin, a nice fellow snapping photos at the convention, included a picture of me on his "Project 365" blog. I recommend you hop over there and check out his work, he takes amazing pictures!

Another hostess comic!

2011-04-25T13:44:00.000-07:00

More adventures in restaurant-seating-and-greeting. I should state, for the record, that the events in this comic may have been slightly embellished.

And because I happened to scan it:

Kinda like how the perspective on this one came out.

Plus, cleavage!

In other news: I'll be going to the Boston Comic Con this weekend with my buddy Matt Aucoin, so brace yourself, Bean-Town, because...

uh...

I'm going to...
to be there...

for the weekend.

Okay, then.

Paneled at the Nisus Gallery

2011-04-19T11:07:00.000-07:00

This news isn't exactly new anymore, but it's worth mentioning that the Nisus Gallery in Portland, Oregon is showing the original work of Center for Cartoon Studies students and selling their comics! I don't have any original art on display, but Brain Parts #1 and #2, as well as Unpleasant People #1 and #2 are on sale there for the duration of the show!

You can follow the event on Facebook as well.

If you're in the area, please check it out! There are works from some incredible artists on display!

I'm so lazy...

2011-04-18T15:39:00.000-07:00

Okay, so, it's not like I haven't actually been working, I just haven't been responsible. Which is why it's always, like, six months between blog postings. Well, now instead of posting some crappy sketch, I've also got an actual, real, black-and-white, multi-paneled, word-ballooned COMIC to post! Whoa!

And also a couple crappy sketches...

But first, my first comic from Job #2 (so far, Job #2, hostessing at a restaurant, has not made me want to punch babies) and is an actual conversation.

On to the crappy sketches! Robot folks!

ALL male-type steampunk robots have birthing hips, you should KNOW that...

She wears high-heels because she feels it makes her butt look nice.

Empty Spaces

2011-03-13T14:08:00.000-07:00

So, I was watching "Life After People" and looking at photos of abandoned buildings and such, and found myself inspired. There's something oddly reassuring about the knowledge that no matter what we do to this planet, even if we make it uninhabitable for ourselves, nature will always reclaim what we've built. Even the thickest of walls we've put between ourselves and the outside world will eventually be overgrown, crumbled and reclaimed by plant life.

So I made a couple crappy sketches.

So there's that.

Prehistoric Bitch

2010-12-11T08:40:00.000-08:00

Watched Ghostbusters 1 and 2 for the gazillionth time last week. Never gets dull. This is what happened next.

Gozer was rockin' the bubble-suit before it was cool!

Colored with marker and white-out.

Brain Parts and Unpleasant People Reviewed!

2010-10-14T16:42:00.001-07:00

HUGE news! Rob Clough picked up Brain Parts #0 and Unpleasant People #1 at this past MoCCA. I was totally stoked at the time, but kind of forgot about it when no review was posted in the following months. I just figured he didn't like them.

Turns out he liked them! The review was just posted on the Comics Journal website, alongside a review for Lena Chandhok's excellent work, which he picked up at the same time.

He had some constructive criticism, which I totally agree with, in problem areas that have been pointed out to me before. Knowing that someone read and really thought about my work is very motivating, as I've been in kind of a slump lately.

I realize a review probably isn't so big a deal to a lot of cartoonists, but this is the first time my work has been recognized outside of CCS!

Thanks for reading, Rob!

Hurrs a pik-churr! Herp-a-derp!

2010-10-07T10:47:00.000-07:00

This whole "Twilight" thing gives me panic attacks and seizures. They've already started to pussy-fy werewolves! WEREWOLVES, people! We have to stop this from happening!
Dude with a gun is robbing the person to your right!

More Sketchy... I mean sketches...

2010-09-28T10:45:00.001-07:00

Seaside shanty-town type deal... Pirate girl... I think I'd been watching the live action Popeye movie when this one came out.

Goth girl is goth.
Fun with a brushpen.

So, yeah, it's been maybe five years or so since my last blog post. Maybe a little less. Anyway, since my one-page comics are mostly about work and for discretion reasons I don't post them on my blog, I'll just post some random drawings. Sound good?

Volcano

2010-06-24T09:04:00.001-07:00

Poor priest-guy. A good virgin is so hard to find.

2010-06-15T10:23:00.000-07:00

Why, people? It looks SO STUPID! Why would you do that?!

Reasons why my sister and I should not watch reality tv together...

2010-06-06T14:08:00.000-07:00

Why, "Dancing with the stars"??! You have ruined me! WHYYYYYYY???!?!??!

Attention-Whore

2010-05-26T10:51:00.000-07:00

Time to get serious about regular updates! I have been quite negligent since MoCCA, but now that I'm graduated, I've got no excuses.

Okay, two jobs takes up a lot of my time, but not ALL of it!

My cat is an endless source of material. Not that I'm a crazy cat lady. Because I'm not. That would be crazy...

Judgement Day

2010-05-17T14:05:00.001-07:00

Okay, so I know I've been completely ignoring this blog since MoCCA, but I had a good excuse... I GRADUATED FROM CCS!! Woo Hoo! I already feel more mature! That's a lie...

This comic is kinda old, but I'm suffering from a severe lack of new material. That will soon be remedied.

To be fair, everyone is a zombie at 4:45 in the morning.

Unpleasant People #1 Preview

2010-04-01T11:26:00.001-07:00

So, I'll be at the MoCCA convention April 10 and 11. I'll be tabling with my pals Matt Aucoin, Tim Stout, Katherine Roy, Laura Terry and Garry-Paul Bonesteel (links to their respective awesome webpages at right). Here's a preview of my Sword-and-Sorcery-parody comic, Unpleasant People, the first issue of which I'll be selling. Along with other stuff.

Geek-out

2010-03-13T14:05:00.000-08:00

Reasons why my sister and I shouldn't watch tv together. Things like this happen.

Dynamic Sign-Bearing

2010-03-10T11:03:00.001-08:00

Anyone who was at SPX last year saw this kid. I've never seen such skilled sign-flipping in my life. I gotta say, that air-hump really got people's attention.

A Post With No Criticism!!

2010-02-28T08:48:00.000-08:00

See, I'm not bitter ALL the time!

Great Moments in Terrible Facial Hair 2

2010-02-25T07:43:00.000-08:00

The second instalment in the respected graphically representational series.

Poor cell phone etiquette

2010-02-19T09:04:00.000-08:00

So, generally I don't post comics having to do with work (I work the front desk at a fitness club) because it's a small community, everyone knows everyone else and some of these folks know I have a blog. If I've got something negative to say about someone, I don't want it getting back to them. I don't believe I run the risk of this guy visiting my blog, though, since he obviously didn't consider me to be a person.

One of these days, I swear to god!

Great Moments in Terrible Facial Hair

2010-02-17T13:52:00.001-08:00

Some things are just wrong.

Some Setting Sketches (Alliterative!!)

2010-02-15T14:11:00.000-08:00

So, I have major problems with backgrounds and settings. Namely, they look like crap. So as an exercise, I started sketching backgrounds and settings without any regard to characters, perspective, accuracy or anything else I get hung up on. These are the results:

Character Sketches

2010-02-09T13:20:00.001-08:00

Okay, time to stop being a lazy ass and start updating again. I've got some comics in the works, but for the time being, I'll throw out some sketches of sci-fi-type characters (bonus ass shot!), to warm up. Also, that's what I've got scanned right now. Voila!

One-Pagers

2010-01-07T12:45:00.000-08:00

The entire Upper Valley, and I mean the WHOLE DAMN THING, was under construction over the summer. You couldn't get anywhere without being delayed half an hour. And then, of course, there were the "road work" signs that apparently applied to roadwork happening in another time zone.

Seat covers are provided for our convenience. Sometimes they're our friends. Sometimes we get our zippers stuck. Both don't happen at the same time.

2009-12-07T15:26:00.000-08:00

We've had our first big snow of the winter here in sunny (*cough*) VT, so I felt this was something anyone up north could sympathize with.

Aghast: a dream comic

2009-12-06T07:15:00.000-08:00

I enjoyed the dream comic assignment, despite the fact that it interfered with a shit ton of other stuff I needed to do. I've been keeping dream journals for over 10 years. It's good to know that when I suffer from cartoonists' block, I've got a huge backlog of bizarre stories already outlined.

Also, that lady with dark hair totally looked like Sandra Bullock.

2009-12-05T17:34:00.000-08:00

The Miss Maryland competition was being held in the next room at SPX. It was a little surreal to see bleached beauty-queens milling around the lobby next to the Converse-clad-cartoon-crowd (thank you, gods of alliteration). It made me really proud to be wearing the badge I was wearing.

Although, if a fight had broken out between the two crowds, that would have been epic.

2009-12-02T11:46:00.000-08:00

Here's a comic. I made it. Go me.

2009-11-13T06:42:00.000-08:00

Some guys, including Dash Shaw and Seth, both of whom gave great presentations to my class. Then there's some guys and a rat.

2009-11-11T13:57:00.000-08:00

The above is the cover to a 24-page comic I did as my final project for the spring '09 semester at CCS. I wasn't crazy about the finished product, but I really like how my cover came out. I enjoyed drawing the characters, though (the comic was a fantasy taking place in the old west, hence the name of the town). I may revisit them.

Thanksgiving Hell Comic

2009-11-04T14:32:00.000-08:00

The above comic was done for a class assignment last year, requiring a 9-panel grid, four pages and using panels from "Wally Wood's 22 panels that always work". I ended up really liking these characters and I've just finished inking the first issue of a 10-page comic about them. Some of the stuff from this four-pager is repeated. I think I'm going to make it into a series.

2009-10-30T05:51:00.000-07:00

Examples of my graphic design work. These are all labels I designed for JJ Twister Sports Bars, made and sold by one of my co-workers. I've done T-shirt and logo designs for him as well. All the lettering is custom.

Some sketches

2009-10-16T09:32:00.000-07:00

Here's a few recent sloppy sketches. Most of them have stuff on the other side of the paper, which is why there's gray blobs and such. The scribbly stuff on the bottom represents both myself and my pal (and incredible cartoonist) Mo Oh. The dude is John Porcellino, who makes me want to draw kitties. So I drew kitties. We also have deadly underwear lady (which Matt Aucoin says are the best kind) and Zombie-killing midwest-mom.

2009-10-06T11:05:00.000-07:00

How's about a post in this here bloggy contraption? Tarnation! This is just a pic from my sketchbook. Started coloring it. Colorist's block.

First post brought to you by random bouts of country0-farmer-speak.

Hootenany.