Crypticon 2013

The David Hudnut booth at Crypticon 2013

Crypticon Seattle 2013 has come and gone. I had a booth at the show in the vendor's room, and had a great time meeting people who had come out to get their horror on.

There was all manner of craziness throughout the weekend. Tons of great costumes, art, music, movies, a haunted house on site, hearses in the parking lot, the works. I was ensconced at my booth the entire time, so I didn't have a chance to sample the show as much as I'd like.

I did get to hop over and snap a few pics of Cassandra Peterson, a.k.a. Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. The fans were happy to see her and say hello.

Cassandra Peterson, a.k.a. Elvira, Mistress of the Dark

Since I was sitting at my booth all weekend, I had plenty of time to make some art. I did some character design sketches that I felt were appropriate for the horror audience: a Zombie Hooker, an Evil Scarecrow, and an Evil Clown. You can see all three finished illustrations at the bottom of this article. Once again, I used mechanical pencil, Copic Multiliner SP for the black lines, and Tombow Dual Brush pens for color. 

Evil Scarecrow

There were tons of amazing cosplayers with great costumes walking the show. I wish I'd taken more photos, but I did manage to get the amazing dog demon guy who showed up Sunday. 

On the drive home, I was fortunate enough to see the most amazing rainbow I've ever seen in my life, and snap pictures of it. It was large, vibrant, and did a great job of posing for the camera. You can imagine the pot of gold that was waiting for me when I got to the end of it. As you can see in the photo, it was just over the hill. Sure, I had to split the gold with the other people driving through it, but there was so much gold under that rainbow, it was more than enough to go around. Needless to say, I'll be retiring early because of my newfound rainbow gold.

Thanks again to everyone who came out to Crypticon Seattle 2013 and made it a great show!

Dog Demon

Evil Scarecrow

Evil Clown

Zombie Hooker

Rainbow on the road

the HUDNUT IMP, July 18, 2012

Merchandising Madness!!!

Me and my split personalities.

Good and evil go so well together, don't you think?

There I am, all ready to sell my books: Night Walk, which I wrote and is very evil, and Owie Cadabra's Verbal First Aid, which I illustrated, and is very good.

The print edition of Night Walk was the big seller yesterday. I think in general, people tend to prefer horror over happiness. Just look at the evening news if you don't believe me.

But I did manage to sell Owie Cadabra's Verbal First Aid as well. Some people, it turns out, do have heart.

Note that Mr. Evil Clown was in attendance. He's such a follower, or should I say stalker.

For you writers out there, if I learned one lesson yesterday it was that you can never do too much advertising. I wish I had done more, but it was a balancing act between how much time and money I spent vs. return on investment (ROI for you business-types). In hindsight, a little more "I" would have been a good idea. You sell, you learn. Next time, I'll buy a 30-second Super Bowl commercial spot.

Copying Evil Clowns

Everybody loves Evil Clowns. Don't they?

I sure do. I thoroughly enjoyed reading Stephen King's IT as a teenager. Evil Clowns have never been scarier. I wonder how many nightmares the fictional Pennywise has induced?

The other top infamous Evil Clown of the 20th century, is of course DC Comics' JOKER. How can you go wrong there? Who doesn't love Ceser Romero, Jack Nicholson and the late Heath Ledger as Batman's psychopathic arch-enemy?

What I didn't know is that the Joker was inspired by the character of Gwynplaine, played by Conrad Veldt, in the 1928 silent movie The Man Who Laughs, based on the novel of the same name by Victor Hugo. Gwynplaine's father, a nobleman, offends King James II, and is put to death in an iron maiden. The King orders his surgeon Hardquannone to then permanently disfigure the face of young Gwynplaine, so that the boy will "laugh forever at his fool of a father."

If you look at images of Conrad Veldt in the Gwynplaine makeup, the resemblance to the Joker is clear. This is a reminder that all good artistic ideas are merely regurgitations, slightly altered, of previous good ideas.

Which leads me to an aphorism of mine, which is merely derivative of another great artist, but my spin nonetheless:

"If you choose to consciously avoid copying the Greats, you will unconsciously end up copying the Not-so-Greats."

-David Hudnut, c. 2010