Today’s EPIC WINSDAY features an artist that had a booth at Long Beach Comicon. I met Jerrell there, a humble guy, good sense of humor with some great table pieces. theREDr is his baby, conceived out of a school project, Jerrell took things to the next level and ran with the comic.

He self published and distributed (don’t worry, he’ll tell you all about it), and is currently looking for his big break. Having already spoke with him at Long Beach, my goal in this interview was to figure out what makes Jerrell tick:

I first met you at Long Beach and we spoke about art and inspiration in general, but we never talked about what theREDr means to you. What would you like your readers to take with them from theREDr?

To me, theREDr or Revelations is about infusing classic, EPIC stories from the bible with a contemporary/futuristic visual aesthetic, while staying true to the origins of the story.

These stories are important, and it has been a passion of mine for the past several years to get them out in new mediums.

Your usage of silhouette and attention to detail help contribute to unique character designs. If you had to choose one of your characters as a favorite to draw, who would it be and why?

Wow. That’s tough. They are like children, and you don’t want to pick favorites! *laughs* Well, I’d say my favorite to DRAW would have to be Chloe. The fans seem to like her (even though some think SHE’s a HE). I think because she has really basic shapes and is very playful and fun. It’s easy to just go off and have a good time with the drawing. The story is pretty dark and deals with heavy concepts, and most of the other characters really reflect that. With Chloe there is room to play and not be so heavy handed (which I seem to be most of the time anyways)

If I were a fly on the wall in your studio, what would I see and hear?

Of late, you’d probably just hear crickets, since I’ve been so busy working full time on an animated feature (Cheech & Chong’s animated movie) in an actual office studio space.

When I do have time and there’s a show or convention coming up, you’ll see me slaving away in my studio hunched over my art desk drawing or painting.  You’ll hear a collection of music video DVDs like Bjork, Radiohead, Travis, or the Yeah Yeah Yeahs… they’re really good “ARTING” music. You’ll also see piles of boxes, books, debris and other nonsense (it gets really cluttered and crazy around these kind of events).

Do you incorporate any digital elements into your artwork? If so, how does this aid or impede your process? If not, what drove you to adapt an “old school” approach?

For me it’s both, and it really depends on what I’m working on or how it will actually come together, analog vs. digital.

The Revelations book series was meant to be more of a hybrid, but has turned out being about 95% digital in its creation (for the same reasons above, time). I still try to work in textures, and things that were painted and hand drawn to break it up and give it a more personal touch (not as much as I’d like) but [enough to have] a look that I’m happy with and it’s still evolving.

For gallery work and other shows, it’s pretty much the reverse. I use this as my outlet to get my hands dirty. I still love ‘old school” drawing and painting, even though I love working on the computer and it’s so convenient. For me, [the computer] will never REPLACE a pen and paper, or paint and a board. I feel I NEED to express art in these kinds of ways as an artist, and I don’t want to ever give that up.

Is their any contemporary comic or animation that continues to surprise and amaze you? If so, what stands out to you about that/those piece(s)? If not, what would you say is your biggest influence?

Sometimes I get super swamped and I’m in my “art cave” and loose track of what’s “kool” out in the world. I try to avoid this, because as an artist I feel it’s vital to really know what’s going on in the world. We have a calling to shape culture, and I feel it’s pretty necessary to actually be aware of what’s going on out there.

Any books from Ashley Wood. His visual aesthetic has been a BIG influence on me, especially the early Revelations stuff. His character designs and paintings are truly awe inspiring. Big fan.

There’s so much great animation going on. One of the recent things I remember seeing that made an impact was the animated trailer for the Beatles Rock Band video game. That was truly a jaw dropping piece of work. It made me want to buy the game… So great.

Self publishing is not an easy task, what would you say was the spark for the Redr? Do you have any advice for aspiring comic book creators out there?

Not an easy task AT ALL, but if we were in it for the EASY I guess we’d be doing something else with our lives. For me, the spark came from KNOWING this was a project that I NEEDED to do and once it made the jump from an animated short to a graphic novel miniseries I figured if it stayed independent I wouldn’t have to deal with losing rights to the work, or answer to a studio that didn’t share my same vision. So self publishing was the way to go.  I had to get funding and find out HOW to put out a self published book (lots of research).  Writing the book and doing the art, that part came easy!

The main thing that I’d offer as advice to any aspiring creators out there, is that DISTRIBUTION is the heaviest hurdle. Getting my books done, printed and ready was cake compared to finding a way to get it on shelves. Going door to door to comic shops and bookstores is fine, and I did it for awhile, and got a few books out there and did some signings and met some great people, but to get my books nationally distributed, that bird just wasn’t going to fly. Most distributors and wholesalers WON’T take books from new publishers, unless you have 3 or more books published, which put me in a pickle… so in essence I had to wait till I got more of my titles out to be carried (and am still waiting, I have one more release before I ramp up again) Diamond pretty much has a monopoly on comic distribution so if they don’t take you’re book, your options become super limited and quick!

Then again, it depends on what you’re going for as a publisher. There is always a niche out there for almost anything.

You can check out Jerrell’s site for theREDr and purchase his books here.

[--Bio--]

@Zombologist, or Richard Bashara, is a zombie attack survivor from the future.  He currently writes for iGeektrooper and Comicimpact.com where he spreads word of how to survive the impending zompacolypse he has witnessed himself.