The all-consuming MCM expo appears to be getting bigger and more claustrophobia-inducing with each iteration, but a greater focus on movies and games doesn’t necessarily mean that the organisers have forgotten their roots.

The MCM Expo London Comic Con is apparently expanding its Comic Village by 50% area after tables for the October show sold out in record time. It’s encouraging news for the UK’s comic community, creators, and that ever-diminishing demographic who actually visit comic conventions for the comics.

“When all of the Comic Village tables were snapped up only a week after going on sale, we decided to expand the area so that some of those comic artists and writers who missed out can still come to MCM Expo London Comic Con,” commented show co-organiser Bryan Cooney.

“Attracting over a 100 top comic creators and 60,000 fans, London Comic Con is now one the most important weekends in the UK’s comics calendar, and the unprecedented demand for tables only goes to underline this.”

For further details and tickets visit www.mcmexpogroup.com/store

If the term “fotonovela” has you thinking of teen magazines, 70s football albums and tabloid cartoon strips, think again; Stavit looks to bring an attention to detail to the technique that might just change your mind about photographic comics. For Isness, which chronicles the last 24 hours in the lives of mankind’s sole surviving family, she’d already comprised over 40,000 images to work from before the project was fully funded.

Stavit was attempting to raise funds for the book via Kickstarter, and successfully attracted 102 backers and over $7,000 to make the project a reality. Not bad at all.

Images and progress reports on the project can be followed over at www.countercomics.com. There’s a hell of a lot of work going into this unique and macabre title, as you can see from the preview (or, if you will, “trailer”) below.

Comic artists, animators and cartoonists have anthropomorphised everything from dinosaurs to wabbits, but outside of Humpty Dumpty I’d be hard pressed to name another tale committed to sentient eggs. A dark comedy on the fragility of life, Marc Schmidt’s Egg Story chronicles the beginnings, ends and omelettes of a half dozen doomed foodstuffs.

Egg Story by J. Marc Schmidt

The eggs’ journey through farm and supermarket ends with a Death Row stint inside the fridge of one Julie, who thinks nothing of cracking open the condemned and feasting on their warm gooey innards. The heartless bitch. Feather, Five Spots and Cloud soon find themselves the sole survivors, and vow to enjoy the remainder of their shelf life before they hit the frying pan.

Egg Story‘s finest moments, such as Connor’s mental deterioration following damage to his shell, have a beautifully surreal indie sensibility to them, and while the book occasionally  suffers a bit of an identity crisis – Feather’s quest to become a ninja feels like the uninspired concept for a Dreamworks animation – there’s a sense of melancholic acceptance throughout that carries this otherwise bleak existential comic.

SLG has priced Egg Story at a stupidly low $3.95, and I’d recommend this pint-sized graphic novel to any reader who hasn’t already scoffed at the premise. Schmidt hasn’t strived for as great a degree of subtext as was found in SLG’s recent translation of Elmer, and the result is a book that revels in its own oddness. A scene in which Five Spots tells a chick that has recently hatched from her lover’s shell that a relationship between egg and poultry would never work has to be one of the strangest things I’ve ever read…

7/10

MASKS is a photographic poem and exploration into the nature of identity. The story takes place inside the psyche of a girl named Sara. Sara sees pieces of the past lives of others and memories of her own as she follows a phantom killer and his victims through a distorted reality.

MASKS #1 was one of the most downloaded and popular indie comics on Wowio. Since then Masks has built a cult following and has garnered some spectacular reviews such as:

“MASKS is very much a feast for the eyes…you’ll kick yourself if you miss this one.” –Ain’t It Cool News

“This is by far one of the most breathtaking graphic novels I have seen.” –Gothic Blend

“Masks is visually entrancing and the story reads like a poem.” –Herospy.com

“For fans of Dave McKean or film-maker Guillermo Del Toro, writer/artist Aaron Rintoul’s debut effort is a class act.” –Comic Book Jesus

“The images are at once beautiful, evocative and haunting.” –Comics And…Other Imaginary Tales

MASKS creator Aaron Rintoul says, “my intention with Masks was to make something highly original that I had never seen done in comics before and a book the reader would want to open up more than just once. Hope you enjoy it!”

MASKS also has one of the most unique and creative comic trailers the industry has to offer. It is a combination of live action, animation and comic art woven together seamlessly with an original soundtrack to capture the tone and mood of MASKS. The trailer was produced by Philip Carrer with Bleeding Apple film collective. “It’s been a pleasure collaborating with talented artists like Aaron and Philip and we are excited to share the full series of Masks with comic fans,” said Nick Defina, president of Septagon Studios.

MASKS is available digitally for your computer, iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad and Android devices. GET THE FULL FIRST DIGITAL ISSUE OF MASKS FRE – Visit www.MasksComic.com for details.

MASKS digital issues #2 and #3 are only $0.99 available at Graphic.ly, Wowio and MyDigitalComics. They also come with 5 Bonuses. The MASKS Hardcover Graphic Novel can be purchased at www.Amazon.com and www.BarnesAndNoble.com through the ISBN 978-0986885303

Visit www.MasksComic.com for previews, art and info.

Septagon Studios Inc.

Septagon Studios is a company focused on imaginative, innovative properties and concepts. We stand for creator freedom and artistic integrity. We embrace diversity with a major focus on art and inspirational storytelling. To learn more about Septagon Studios Publishing visit www.SeptagonStudios.com

Press Release: Once you have survived drugged toads, vampire attacks, and the attempted realignment of reality. What else in life can possibly phase you. Karl Christian Krumpholz tackles that question as his erstwhile hero Byron returns for another set of adventures in an all new comic book series Byron: Die Byron Die, from SLG Publishing.

Now thinking of himself as some sort of ‘Psychic Investigator’, he’s on the road, entering the wild places of America and searching for his missing brother, H.P.. How hard can finding a talkative two-headed pickled punk be? America may a big place after all, but such things tend to stand out.

Byron: Die Byron Die

Over his search, Byron will meet fashionable hillbillies, christian dominatrix, mad bartenders, tiki zombies, fox and spider women, pagan hippies, saintly murderers, spirits, gods, the Book of Life itself, and a strange woman called ‘Widdershin.’ Byron already realizes that his life is not what is seemed to be. Now he’s finding out that the world is not what is seemed to be either.

The first Byron story, Byron: Mad, Bad and Dangerous, was released as a graphic novel by SLG Publishing. The publisher has decided to do the initial release of Die Byron Die as digital comics serializing them in downloadable form. Issue #1 and #2 of the series were released on the SLG Publishing website as ePub and PDF files and will follow on all of the companies digital partners application at some point in the future. Issue #1 of the series is free and the subsuquent issues will be 99¢.

“The decision to go digital first with new releases has been popping around in my head for some time” said SLG president Dan Vado “The state of the marketplace kind of dictates that we, at some point, try something like this as a brand and market building exercise” then adding “we need to find out if the demand for digital comics extends to our type of comics and to what extent people who want our kind of material will support this method of distribution.”

Stream of consciousness storytelling is a rarity in comics, perhaps due to the script-to-art creative process which has standardised the medium, or the somewhat depressing fact that most aspiring comic creators attempt to enter the mainstream by emulating it. Aviv Ratzin’s Dreams and Everyday Life is that exception to the rule; a collection of three interconnected stories, each of which is comprised of numerous anecdotes and instances told via Ratzin’s faceless avatar.

Dreams and Everyday Life by Aviv Ratzin

There’s definitely a strong element of the autobiographical present here, though exactly what proportion of Ratzin’s rants, observations and philosophies are his own soon becomes obscured as the book takes numerous excursions, including a lengthy musing on the future of media. His droll takes on such familiar themes as creative block, illness (best line: “you’re having a bad case of cubism in your digestive system”) and our give/take relationship with technology feel genuinely fresh and entirely his own.

Dreams and Everyday Life’s peculiar narrative ricochets through time and space with a spontaneity that makes it impossible to guess where our top-hatted host will take things next. Ratzin throws his insecurity, ambitions and personal diatribes down in a deceptively chaotic fashion; just when we begin to dismiss the book as the random ramblings of a madman, he’ll returns to past characters and points with calculating wit. A trio of stickman frequently appear below the panels, commentating and bickering in tandem with Ratzin’s primary tale.

Dreams and Everyday Life - pg23

I liked Dreams and Everyday Life a lot. While many indie comic creators seem content to trail the conventions set by their peers, Aviv Ratzin’s first graphic novel (also published in Hebrew, apparently) speaks its own unique language, and is strung together by some sophisticated scene transitions that mark the debut of a thoughtful writer and inventive illustrator.

8/10

For more on Dreams and Everyday Life visit http://www.tabella.co.uk/Dreams.html.

Amity Blamity follows mute four year-old Gretchen and Chester, a potbellied pig whose ability to talk seems to have earned him a place in Gretchen’s grandmother’s home, rather than hanging from and abattoir hook. Their serene, Pooh-esque playtime is frequently disrupted by Winston, a paranoid gerbil riding a shopping trolley, and the unending get-rich-quick schemes of Uncle Downey; a feckless loafer whose aspiration to succeed as a moonshiner is only hampered by his inability to abstain from enjoying his own product. And mighty fine product it must be, too, having attracted the attention of wee extraterrestrial meddlers, who have the power to turn Downey’s homebrew into… that would be telling.

Amity Blamity: Book One by Mike White

Billed as a graphic novel for “children of all ages”, Mike White’s Amity Blamity started life as online comic Pigtails and Potbellies, and has been de-colourised in its transition from digital to paper. But the shift to monochromic hasn’t neutered the passion that is evident on every page, many of which are crammed with background gags and humorous “footnotes”, and White’s gift for comically contorted facial expressions carries the increasingly nonsensical plot throughout. Amity often flows like a collection of newspaper strips, which, at 160 pages, makes this a book best read in small, frequent bursts.

Amity Blamity is charming, juvenile fun; there’s no allegory or satire to be found here (nor would I expect there to be). White is plainly pitching for a younger audience, and while I feel that Downey’s proclivities fall into areas that only an older reader will appreciate, Amity will prove a laugh-out-loud experience for  younger readers . And, of course, older, balder, fatter kids with a love for such timeless cartoon strips as Garfield and Andy Capp.

7/10

Amity Blamity is available now. Be Sure to check out Mike White’s blog for more info, not to mention some great papercraft figures of Chester, Gretchen and Downey.

Press Release: Jenna’s life is stagnating. Her husband is a slacker, her job isn’t worth the stress, and hypochondria is her only diversion. That is, until she starts getting symptoms of what doctors are calling “the worst disease in the world,” and it’s not all in her head. Loserville, a new SLG Publishing graphic novel by Alex Cox to be published in June, explores what happens when one woman’s life gets interesting.

Loserville Volume One

Diagnosed with multiple sploderosis, Jenna knows that at any moment, she may explode. But with a little help from her subconscious mind, a wise advisor called Ice Cream Larry, and some mysterious portals, Jenna just might use the bad news to take back control of her life.

In creating Loserville, Cox was inspired by a friend who had to cope with receiving a life-changing diagnosis of multiple sclerosis. “She diagnosed herself on the Internet and I thought she was crazy, and then she actually had what she diagnosed herself with,” said Cox. “So the story is basically about what happens when someone is diagnosed with a horrible disease, in this case a disease where you might explode. I wanted to explore how the thought of ‘you might, or might not, explode’ affects someone’s life and relationships.”

Another influence on Cox’s work was the surrealist Franz Kafka. “I befriended Kafka. I read some stories,” he said, adding, ” I don’t if it’s true, but he I heard he also worked in insurance to support his writing and it drove him crazy.”

Loserville Volume One: And Then You Might Explode is scheduled for a June 2011 release and will be available at better comics and book stores as well as at Amazon.com and from the publishers own website. Digital versions of the book will be made available through Comixology, Panelfly and iVerse.

About SLG

Established in 1986 and celebrating its 25th anniverary, SLG Publishing is a San Jose, California-based publisher of comic books, graphic novels and related merchandise. Some of SLG’s more notable comics have included Johnny the Homicidal Maniac by Jhonen Vasquez, Elmer by Gerry Alanguilan, and Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer by Van Jensen and Dustin Higgins. www.slgcomic.com

Press Release: Sean Dietrich, the San Diego live painter who has racked up almost 900 live art shows up and down the west coast, brings his 2011 Art Tour to San Francisco this weekend for the WonderCon comic and pop culture convention.

Dietrich, who will be at booth SP60, will be selling and signing copies of his new books ‘I Brought the Gutter’, ‘Bubbles from Atlantis’,  limited edition prints, and original artwork, as well as doing custom sketches for convention attendees.  Patrons of the booth will be also treated to information on how to win an original painting valued at over $1000.

Sean Dietrich - Hansel and Gretel

Best known for his live painting shows in San Diego, CA where he has cut open a girl to give birth to a ‘pig baby’, and hired a 350lb man to sit with his face in a plate of pasta to recreate the gluttony killing from the movie ‘se7en’, Dietrich is offering his latest artistic rituals in literary form;  Bubbles from Atlantis, from award winning New Orleans journalist Richard A. Webster (Dietrich illustrations), tells of the first year of his existence after Katrina devastates the city.  The Fruits of Our Labor a tale spun by newcomers Rachel Andrews and Lexi Sadler, is a children’s book that Dietrich illustrates, telling the tale of Xander who finds out what he can be when he grows up as he plunges into plates and plates of healthy fruits and veggies. The book is alphabet style and will have your children holding onto your pant leg begging not to leave the produce section of your local grocer. Finally, after two and a half years Dietrich returns to the helm as writer and artist in his opus I Brought the Gutter, a 180pg compendium collecting the best from 10 years of art from over 800 live art shows, accompanied by stories of the clubs, the art, the drink and the state of the San Diego art scene. You’ve never read an account of what it really is to be one of the most innovative artists in the child city on the ocean, spending sometimes six nights a week in the depths of bars and nightclubs smearing his craft across the amazed and shocked faces of the patrons.  All books will be released through Colosseum Publishing.

The artist/writer will be available for interviews at the convention, or feel free to contact him through the outlets above to schedule any press. For an e-copy of his latest book please log onto www.industriacide.com/press-kit.html.  Sean Dietrich currently lives in San Diego, CA and can be found painting live weekly at various clubs around town.

“We have no huge overprint, no digital version and no back issue sales,” Beatty explained. “Indie Comics Magazine #1 is an instant collectible.”

Appearing in the first issue is Tim Vigil (Faust), Terry Cronin (Students of the Unusual), Douglas Paskiewicz (Arsenic Lullaby), Tom Kelly (DC’s Zuda), K.J. Kolka (The Cardinal), David Branstetter (Straw Man) and Beatty himself. The painted cover is from Marcus Boas (Heavy Metal).

“It is likely this talent will never appear in the same publication together again,” said Beatty. “I’m very pleased with the diverse styles and storytelling techniques in this issue and I’m happy to be able to introduce readers to talented comic book pros with regional fan bases that deserve wider audiences.”

Indie Comics Magazine features done-in-one stories so readers can get a feel for what the featured creators can do, said Beatty. Short biographies and contact information are included so readers can easily seek out more of the creators’ work. “These details make Indie Comics Magazine a valuable resource for anyone interested in the world of independent comics. We help readers cut through the reviews and hype to experience these creators’ raw talent.”

Indie Comics Magazine #2 appears on shelves in April and #3 is slated for summer release, for preorder through the Previews comic book order catalog under Aazurn Publishing. Information is online at http://indiecomicsmagazine.com.