Research is Hard

...and time consuming. That's not to say that's all that I've been doing since September of last year (there's been the procrastinating) but I have been doing a lot of it. Really want to make sure that I'm not unintentionally ripping someone off. At least I know I won't be intentionally ripping someone off...like this: Hot Topic soap t-shirt rip-off.

So there's been the research of that as well as researching/learning CSS. I'd really like to transform this blog into DLG Headquarters, as well as showcase my portfolio, sell prints and copies of books that I've worked on, that sort of thing. So I've been looking at a way of really sprucing it up. I'd love to see it happen within the next couple of weeks...but like research, CSS is hard.

On a wonderfully positive note, we've added a new member to the DLG family. John "Big Daddy" Schirano has joined us on writing duties! He's really excited to be a part of it and collaborating with him has certainly renewed my excitement in the project. We've come up with a bunch of cool new designs and characters and some hilarious situations. I've got around 8 pages of story from him that are absolutely beautiful. I actually got chills when I read the last page.

So far I've thumbnailed out around 6 pages and Hope and I have begun drawing the intro.

Another cool thing about doing all that research, is that I found tons of inspiring artists and blogs out there that I can't wait to share (and eventually put in my "Links" section, whenever I get one).

I give you Aaron Blecha. What an amazing talent! I first got turned on to his work thru Kreepsville's Cereal Killers blog. His ghoulies and beasties are the bestest. Be sure to check out his blog and site and watch some of the sweet sweet animation!

Until next time, Kreepy Kidlettes!

-c

Site News

I've been working on the new DLG site as of late. Some pretty cool stuff. Javascript, cascading style sheets, lots of bells and whistles...now I just have to come up with some content. ;p
Speaking of content, my comic coloring gallery is back online and is about as up to date as I can make it. Check it out. I'm dying to add some of the pages that I've colored for this project w/Bisley but I still have to keep it under wraps. But man, when the news breaks and I can start showing around some preview images (not to mention the video trailers, posters, soundtrack, etc), it's going to be everywhere!

Everyone will be sick of seeing all this Hellfire from me.

Hope and I are still sketching in between her dance classes and homework (yup, that's right folks, homework in kindergarten). Hopefully I'll get some of those scanned in this weekend.

Also, I've revamped the logo a bit for the second wave of DLG shirts to come out. Just in time for Halloween!

Sacriliciously yours,
c

Halloween...a month early

Well, tonight's the night...Rob Zombie's Halloween!! From what I saw at SDCC and bits on the web, it's going to be fantastic. The only thing that bothers me is that it's released so early. And while it's Halloween all the time in my head, it just seems too early to watch it. End of September would've been perfect. At least around here, leaves would be falling, autumn chill in the air... ah well.
Speaking of Zombie, Rue Morgue Radio has an excellent 2 part interview with him. And Tomb Dragomir, the demon DJ, concocted a Halloween themed show for the Aug 24th episode. Great stuff.
Another great little horror radio show is Doktor Viktor Von Kreep's Headless Spectre Radio. Tho there hasn't been a new one in quite some time, I can listen to the old one's for hours. Each show is packed with creepy commercials, horror trailers, spooky music, excerpts from films. Always puts me in a Halloween state of mind.
Also, be sure to check out Von Kreep's other projects, Monster Shindig and Cereal Killers!
-c

Watercolour

Here is a watercolor piece I did when we were coming up with different designs for Daddy's Little Ghoul herself. I was thinking of an almost Charles Schulz type of style. Very simple shapes, only unlike Schulz, very clean lines. Almost as if each character were a 3D model.

I soon discovered that no matter how hard I try, simple and smooth just aren't inherently in me. While I can do it, it doesn't just flow... and I want DLG to just flow from me. I don't want to have to "work" on it. Granted, I'm still trying to keep things as simple as possible for my own sanity but my natural way of drawing has taken her design in a different direction.

Regardless, this was the first time I'd picked up a paint brush in about 10 years. 10 years!!! That's far too long but (hopefully) explains why it looks so amateurish. But man, was it fun.

-c

mmmm...Sacrilicious

For those of you that saw The Simpsons Movie, you probably missed our cameo. We were only on screen for a second. Here's a pic that they took of us on the set.

-c

hrm...

First and foremost I have to extend my sympathies to the family and friends of Mike Wieringo. He passed away this past weekend at the young age of 44. While I didn't know him personally, I've been a fan of his art and of his humbleness and professionalism. RIP, Mike.

Nothing since March, huh? That's disappointing. Tho, not exactly unexpected for a Chad Fidler blog I guess. What's been going on over the last 4 months, you ask? Well, even if you don't...I'm going to type it anyway.

M and I are both another year older. She's more beautiful with every year that passes. I just seem to be getting less hair and new mysterious pops and creaks in my bones. And speaking of beautiful, Hope has grown so much. She's now nothing but legs! Where'd my bald lil'baby go? Now she's 5 ("and a half", she makes sure to tell everyone) but looking 16. Eep!

My day job as Art Director allowed M and I to attend Comic Con International in San Diego, last month. One of our biggest clients at work is HasbroToyShop.com and at a dinner with them they said that I should come out and help them with the show and I agreed. ;) The show was amazingly huge. I've heard all about how big it is but nothing can really describe it's size. No wonder it's a 4 day show.

Some of the highlights:
- Dinner w/M at the Liars Club
- Getting to see Jim Heffron at the show. Thanks for taking the time to seek me out, dude! In that place, that's a lot harder than it sounds.
- Getting to finally meet Michael Mendheim, the genius behind the mysterious project that I've been coloring. We've been working together for years but had never met in person. Thanks for the beer, Michael!
- Meeting and getting drinks w/my collaborator on the Mendheim project, Simon Bisley! I must admit, after stories that I've heard of Simon, I was a little intimidated... but what an amazing guy. We left the convention hall and went for drinks at an Irish style pub and had the most amazing conversation about self-respect, living life to it's fullest, self-worth...it's hard to describe but I'll be taking what we talked about with me for the rest of my life. What a truly awesome guy. I hope we have the opportunity to meet again.
- Room service w/M Saturday night. We had both had our fill of "nightlife with comic geekdom" so we got ourselves a couple of bottles of wine and hid away in our room for the night.
- The wine guy at the bottle shop M and I stopped at. "You let her breathe...15...20 minutes..." >;)
- Attending the Rob Zombie Halloween panel and then later getting to meet Tyler Dane at the HTS booth. He's playing Michael Myers. Really great (and tall!!) guy.

I'm sure there was more that I'm leaving out... it was a lot of hard work (there are a lot more people out there that want to buy a Stan Lee Spider-man figure than you would think, true believers) but a lot of fun as well.

Beyond that, I've just been trying to enjoy Summer. Treating every weekend like it's a vacation, cooking at least one gourmet meal a week and spending as much time outside as time (and heat) will allow.

On the DLG front. Hope is still very excited about it. She's always making suggestions for stuff to go in it. And we've both started sketching in our sketchbooks. Her's is quite a bit more full than mine but at least I'm drawing again.

Hope everyone is having a great summer!

-c

Hippity Hoppity, Easter's On It's Way!

The Easter Bunny Hates You.



Sorry for the lack of updates. We're working on the site now and getting some drawing done. Did someone say coloring books!?

-c

Double.oh.seven

Happy New Year, everyone.

The Holidays went well. Too fast of course...and time with my daughter and wife, even faster still. But we did a lot of talking and planning for Daddy's Little Ghoul. To keep me inspired, P even got me a new LENORE sketch book just for new DLG material. So I'm hoping to hold on to this level of excitement throughout the year and really kick this project into high gear.

Thanks for the support and please keep checking back for updates!!

Here's to the New Year!

-C

Christmas time is here...

As much as I love Halloween, Christmas still comes out on top as my favorite holiday.

I suppose it has more to do with how all of the things associated with Xmas make me feel like a kid again. I have so many great Christmas memories and now, being able to see it all new again through my daughter's eyes, is wonderful.

Speaking of wonderful, it's pretty much all melted now, but Mother Nature graced us with around 18in of snow a little over a week ago. I'm in the extreme minority around here but I love snow! Everything about it...even the shoveling. I'm hoping we'll see some more before the 25th.

In the world of DLG things have been progressing slowly. Very slowly, unfortunately. After Wizard World Chicago, work on Athena Voltaire kinda blew up and in still trying to keep the Bisley project moving, I had to put DLG to the side. Of course, none of these things affected my daughter's production. So I have a ton of new drawings from her to get posted up.
Also, we're still making plans...so 2007 is the year for Daddy's Little Ghoul!!

And hopefully I'll get the chance to post more before the 25th but if I don't, Merry Christanukkawanzaa and Joyous Yule to all and to all a good night!

Bah humbug!

Wizard World Chicago

Well... a week from today I'll be in Chicago for the Wizard World Convention. Since DLG is still in it's infancy I won't have my own table in Artist's Alley this year but hope to make a big splash there next year.

I will, however, be in the Ape Entertainment Booth in the new "Small Press Area" for the majority of the show. I think they'll have scheduled signing times and stuff so look for me there and get a Daddy's Little Ghoul postcard or ask to see my sketchbook.

I'm also putting together a slide show of some of the pages that I've colored on my laptop. Hopefully I'll have some table space to set that up.

I decided against Cafepress.com. Yes they do black shirts now but they're not as customizable as I'd like and you have to open a new shop to do more than one black shirt design. Instead I'm going with Zazzle.com. I've already gotten my shirt from there and it is awesome! Great quality, great printing and great turn around time. I'll probably be wearing it to the show on Saturday, so look for it! ;)

You can order it here.

I know it's pretty steep to pay for a t-shirt but you won't be sorry.

If you do pick one up, be sure to drop me a line. Or if there are products that you would like to buy, let me know!

See you in Chicago!
-c

Products

So... things are moving. Slowly, but they're moving.

I'm currently setting up a Cafe Press shop, mainly so that I can make t-shirts for myself ;)

I'll let you know when it's up and running. In return you guys will have to let me know what sort of products you'd like.

-chad

666

Happy 06/06/06 Everyone!

-c

Randomness

Trying to keep the updates a little more on the timely side. Here are a couple of character sketches.

It's been really nice to draw again, even though I'm under the gun with a couple of coloring deadlines. So if you're really jonesin' to see something new while waiting on DLG news, head on over to Geekenweizen. John and I are constantly updating with new art and beer reviews.

As always, drop me a comment. Let me know what you think.

-C

What Was

Thought I'd start out by telling a little about the project and posting the two page story that I did.

She's a character that is inspired by my 4 year old daughter. Who, in the upcoming episodes, will be doing a little writing and drawing of her own for it.

The story behind DLG started with me coloring a book for Lawdog Comic's Jim Heffron, called Territory 51 (you can check out some pages in my Gallery section).

In the process of making that book, Jim and my family became good friends. When I brought up an idea that I had about a character based on my daughter, he told me that he was going to be putting together a "jam book", the Lawdog Primer, and he basically made me draw the 2 pages that are in there. ;)

I had talked to my wife about my ideas but was having a lot of trouble thinking of a way to tie them all together, and she stepped up to the plate and did all the writing. And those are the 2 pages that appear here as well as in the Primer.

After the book was published, we talked a lot about how we didn't want to put another "Wednesday Addams" clone out there. There are enough little spooky "goth" girl characters. We really want DLG to stand out. So we've completely revamped the premise! Turned DLG's world upside down and I'm really excited with the new direction.

So...even tho I'm a little embarrassed by these 2 pages, if it weren't for them, this project wouldn't be where it is today.

-c

Daddy's Little Ghoul™ © 2006 Chad and Marni Fidler. All Rights Reserved.

Beginning

Here it is. Hopefully, the first of many posts to keep everyone up to date with the latest happenings of Daddy's Little Ghoul.

We're completely reworking the core concept of DLG and I couldn't be happier. New direction, new characters...new everything. Unfortunately it's pushed the launching of the site back a bit but it's definitely going to be worth it.

Our goal is to have the site up and running by this year's San Diego Comic Convention and have merchandise for sale at Wizard World Chicago .

In the meantime, keep checking back here for exclusive sketches and designs as we count down the days.

-C&M

Daddy's Little Ghoul™ © 2006 Chad and Marni Fidler. All Rights Reserved.