Next year is going to be a big one for me as I have at least three books hitting the stands. So thanks for all the support in 2005, and I promise to kick it up a notch in 2006!

I just finished coloring Dan (Gung Ho!) Norton's contribution to Hi-Yah!: How to Draw Fantastic Martial Arts Characters. It reminds me a bit of the great Ninja Boy character Dan drew with Ale Garza.

I am pleased to announce Carlos Barberi (Impulse, Young Justice, and Justice League Unlimited) will be contributing some artwork to Hi-Yah: How to Draw Fantastic Martial Arts Characters. Here is a sneak peek at one of his character designs.

I don't know what the holidays mean to you, but I know when I hear Christmas I think, "Oh Boy! an opportunity to Photoshop the Dogs!" So Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and a Happy New Year, to you and yours from all of us at illustratorx.com!

I think the real reason Pirates are no longer around is that they relied too heavily on Parrots when they should have been employing monkeys.

Just a quick pic preview before I hit the drawing board for the day. Here is a Ninja from fan-favorite artist Brett Booth.

I feel terrible about this weekend in more ways than one. I want to apologize for anyone who went to Mid-Ohio Con this weekend to have me sketch or sign books for them. I have the flu and can barely sit up to type this post today. This is the first Mid Ohio Con I've missed since 1992. Hopefully I'll be able to make it up to you guys by hitting a few shows next year.

Another character from my upcoming martial arts book. I wanted to give him the look like he was cocky and about to take on a much larger off screen opponent. He also must use Tide to get his colors bright as they can be.

All of us at illustratorX.com wish you and yours a Happy Thanksgiving!

Who is this guy? Read Hi-Yah and find out!

I couldn't resist posting this fellow. Pencils by Brett Booth, with inks and coloring by moi. The character is an evil samurai from my upcoming martial arts "how to draw" characters book.

Posts will be few and far between for awhile while I put the finishing touches on my martial arts book. I'll try to post new art when I can.

Monkey Kung Fu Brett Booth style!

Remember the Pepsi Challenge, basically a taste test to see which you like better? Well here is my own version of the two different covers which do you the loyal reader like better. A. with big afro or B. hardly any afro?

Here is a band logo I did long ago. Don't know what ever happened to the band.

This was not supposed to be a self portrait. It is a picture I drew back when I had hair, but somehow it ended up looking like me now that I'm bald. weird.

The measure of catman. An oldie but a goodie from my first book "Freaks!"

Yet another image needing to be purged to make space. This is the first time I colored a piece by Arthur Adams. I would totally redo the amateurish water effect if I had the chance to do it again. Live and learn.

It breaks my heart but I have to delete a lot of images from my harddrive to make space for new work (don't worry, everything is backed up.) Here is a poster Arthur Adams did for Monkeyman and O'Brien. It was reprinted in my first book Freaks!

Before I jump head first into my kung fu book's artwork I needed to clear some space on my harddrive. Here is an image from my first book Freaks by Brett Booth. The imagery at the top is rendered in a 3d modeling program, which I play around with from time to time.

Well with Halloween behind us I'll be highlighting some images from my upcoming martial arts book Hi-Yah! Here is a kung fu character Brett Booth created called the Jade Tiger.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN! I hope you enjoyed our month of images from "Scared!: How to Draw Fantastic Horror Comic Characters" Thanks for coming along for the ride and we'll see you back here in a few.

BETTER CHECK YOUR PULSE..... Later today the PULSE ( http://www.comicon.com/pulse/ )will be running an interview with yours truly. Check it out! Big thanks out to Jennifer Contino for setting it up.

I almost forgot, here is a link to a web ad for SCARED! if you want to buy the book there is a link to Amazon.com. Thanks for looking! http://www.wideopenwest.com/~illustratorx/ScaredAd.htm

One of the things I always try to include in my books is insight from industry pros. Marc Silvestri and the whole Top Cow crew were gracious enough to provide some artwork and instructions for those seeking to break into working in the comic book industry. Here is a page from Marc's run on the Darkness comic book published by Top Cow.

Frank Cho is known for drawing beautiful ladies, but I think people are finally realizing he draws everything beautifully! Here is a giant gorilla (Pong not Kong) fighting a T-Rex from the book "SCARED!: How to Draw Fantastic Horror Comic Characters." Frank also contributed some sweet cartoon strips to my third book "Thunder Lizards!"

Bill Bronson is a long time friend from my art school days. We both ended up working for toy companies after art college so I have a lot of respect for him as I know the crazy industry stuff he had to put up with, plus he draws ghouls, girls, and Gwar stuff like no one else! We needed a haunted house for our "SCARED!" book and he really came through for us! One look at this place and you get that "don't go in there" vibe.

Originally the STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE was written by
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON after a vivid nightmare he woke from in 1885. Here is the uber talented Bryan Baugh's version from SCARED!

Bryan and I were incredibly fortunate to get Bernie Wrightson included in Scared! Bernie Wrightson is the master of the macabre. Check out his website at: http://www.berniewrightson.com/ This is his bio from that site: Legendary Artist Bernie Wrightson has been bringing us some of the most detailed and horrific art for thirty years.

Best known for Swamp Thing and original Frankenstein artwork, Bernie continues presenting his horrific and mystifying images through creator-owned comics and film production companies.

From Stephen King's The Stand to Batman and The Punisher, there's not a comic book reader who hasn't heard his name. But it's his horrific, flesh-dripping illustrations that attract thousands of fans - they just can't get enough of his detailed inks. And it's the style he likes most.

So, who is Bernie Wrightson?
Bernie is considered a horror legend. To himself, and those who know him well, he's just Bernie. You don't have to call him "Mr. Wrightson," as they say, "he'll look for his father."

This pic by Bryan Baugh of a classic looking Witch was just a ton of fun to color. It isn't often I get to use greens for skin tone.

I'll get you my pretty and your little dog too!

Here is King Mecha Daikaiju X-Osaurus in his Black and White state. This is actually just a really tight pencil drawing I darkened in Photoshop to make it look like ink work.

Daikaiju means "giant monster" in Japanese. Here he is colored green before I came to my senses and realized he looked slightly like another well known giant monster.

Here is the giant monster from Scared as he appeared in the book.

Here is my fly guy from Scared! in black & white. I was trying to kind of merge the two screen versions of the Fly we've seen, the old Vincent Price 1958 black and white one with the disturbing human head on a fly body "help me, help meeeee" scene and the 1986 Jeff Goldblum movie directed by David Cronenberg.

I knew an old lady who swallowed a fly
Perhaps she'll die.

I knew an old lady who swallowed a spider
That wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly
Perhaps she'll die.

I knew an old lady who swallowed a cat
Just think of that! She swallowed a cat.
She swallowed the cat to catch the spider
That wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly
I don't know why she swallowed the fly
Perhaps she'll die.

I knew an old lady who swallowed a dog
Oh what a hog! To swallow a dog,
She swallowed the dog to catch the cat
She swallowed the cat to catch the spider
That wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly
I don't know why she swallowed the fly
Perhaps she'll die.

I knew an old lady who swallowed a goat
She just opened her throat and swallowed a goat
She swallowed the goat to catch the dog
She swallowed the dog to catch the cat
She swallowed the cat to catch the spider
That wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly
I don't know why she swallowed the fly
Perhaps she'll die.

I knew and old lady who swallowed a horse
(spoken) She died, of course.

Here is the cover after with the logo and type in place. When you design a cover you got to leave lots of room for type!

Here is the cover of "SCARED!: How to Draw Fantastic Horror Comic Characters" without the type.

Bryan introduced me to the wonders of EC comics while we were in art school together. One of our goals on the book SCARED! was to pay tribute to all those great EC characters and artists. I think Bryan's love of those old EC books shows through in drawings like the SEAHAG shown here.

Continuing our spotlight on monsters and mayhem during our Month of Horrors, I thought I would spotlight some of the work Vince Locke contributed to my book "Scared!: How to Draw Fantastic Horror Comics." Many now know Vince for his work on the graphic novel "A History of Violence," which is now a major motion picture, but I've been a fan of his work for over a decade and I think the following illustrations show why.

Here is a great page of artwork from Vince Locke's run on the Dead World comic book. I've never been a big fan of gore, but even I can appreciate that no one can draw maggots as good as Vince can.

My co-author Bryan Baugh owns this original page of art. It hung in our apartment all through art college. For some reason our dates never truly felt safe at our place.

Vince Locke first caught my attention with his Dead World comic book back in the early Nineties. He is a Michigan native so I would often see him at comic cons not far from my home in Ohio. I never guessed I would have the oppurtunity to work with him, but when Scared got okayed by my publisher I immediately gave him a call. He was only too happy to help out and contributed many fine pieces, as well as allowing us to reprint some of my favorite pages from the old Dead World comic.

Well our Month of Horrors is almost over and I have so much great artwork from my book SCARED! yet to share, so I'm going to try to double the output on images until the end of the month. That's right, you heard me correct, twice the pictures, the same great low price-free! Here is my favorite piece Mitch Byrd did for SCARED! I had a blast coloring it as well. I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've had the oppurtunity to color Zombie Pirates, hopefully it will not be the last.

What can I say about Arthur Adams that has not already been said? His artwork was the main reason I got serious about drawing when I was in high school. I had always drawn and I always loved comics, but when I saw New Mutants Special #1 I decided I wanted to draw for a living. Arthur just makes everything look fun. I had met him a few times at comic conventions and was surprised at how approachable he was, so I contacted him about doing some toys based on his Monkeyman and O'Brien series when I got a job at an action figure company. Eventually that company went belly up and those figures never got made, but Arthur and his wonderful wife Joyce still return my phone calls and have been super cooperative about getting me their artwork to use in my books. This is the first piece of Arthur's work I colored for print and I was so nervous about painting it, but I think it turned out alright.

One of the things often overlooked by artists is the opportunity to design cool set pieces for their illustrations. Everything from the sky to the foliage should be designed to convey a sense of atmosphere.

I was working in the lab late one night
When my eyes beheld an eerie sight
For my monster from his slab began to rise
And suddenly to my surprise

He did the mash
He did the monster mash
The monster mash
It was a graveyard smash
He did the mash
It caught on in a flash
He did the mash
He did the monster mash

From my laboratory in the castle east
To the master bedroom where the vampires feast
The ghouls all came from their humble abodes
To catch a jolt from my electrodes

They did the mash
They did the monster mash
The monster mash
It was a graveyard smash
They did the mash
It caught on in a flash
They did the mash
They did the monster mash

The zombies were having fun
The party had just begun
The guests included Wolf Man
Dracula and his son

The scene was rockin', all were digging the sounds
Eegore on chains, backed by his baying hounds
The coffin-bangers were about to arrive
With their vocal group, "The Crypt-Kicker Five"

They played the mash
They played the monster mash
The monster mash
And it was a graveyard smash
They played the mash
Its caught on in a flash
They played the mash
They played the monster mash

Out from his coffin, Drac's voice did ring
Seems he was troubled by just one thing
He opened the lid and shook his fist
And said, "Whatever happened to my Transylvania twist?"

It's now the mash
It's now the monster mash
The monster mash
It's now a graveyard smash
It's now the mash
It's caught on in a flash
It's now the mash
It's now the monster mash

Now everything's cool, Drac's a part of the band
And my monster mash is the hit of the land
For you, the living, this mash was meant too
When you get to my door, tell them Boris sent you

Then you can mash
Then you can monster mash
The monster mash
And do my graveyard smash
Then you can mash
You'll catch on in a flash
Then you can mash
Then you can monster mash

Okay, dinosaurs are not monsters, but I wanted to share this review of "Thunder Lizards!" from Mike Fredericks' Prehistoric Times, one of my favorite magazines.

Thunder Lizards!: How To Draw Fantastic Dinosaurs (Paperback) by Steve Miller $19.95 144 pages Publisher: Watson-Guptill Publications ISBN: 0823016633 A grand, new dinosaur drawing book for adults, focusing on anatomy and encompassing the latest scientific research to show serious artists exactly how to draw realistic dinosaurs. Thunder Lizards covers everything from Tyrannosaurus rex, to Allosaurus, to Velociraptors, to the plodding Apatosaurus � more than 50 dinosaurs in all, plus flying and marine reptiles and tips on drawing dynamic dinosaur sequences. I asked the author (a fan of PT) to send us a quote about his new book. "I hope everyone enjoys reading and drawing from Thunder Lizards! It represents over two years of research, writing, and illustrating. I feel incredibly fortunate to have gotten to work with such a wide range of excellent paleoartists. I still can't believe artists like Gregory S. Paul, Bernie Wrightson, and Arthur Adams contributed illustrations to the project. I learned to draw dinosaurs from looking at their art and now I have the opportunity to showcase their talents and that of others like Bryan Baugh, Frank Cho, and Brett Booth. Hopefully Thunder Lizards will energize the imaginations of the next generation of dino-artists. I also got this quick note from Ray Harryhausen who also has a book out from my publisher. "Good luck with your book. Young people for many years have had an interest in prehistoric life, probably because the dinosaurs seem like creatures of the imagination." Steve's new book includes many names you've seen submitting art in PT over the years. The dino art is all quite excellent with leanings toward comic book style dino art (very similar to my own style I suppose) and I think you will really enjoy it. Chapters cover bone structure, muscles, basic dino classification, individual dinosaur types and more. Grab this book!

Don't call her "Buffy" this slayer is probably closer to the same "vein" of hunter as "Blade." Just one of the bad, beautiful, and bodacious Brett Booth characters from "Scared!: How to Draw Fantastic Horror Comics."