{"id":3748,"date":"2018-10-16T23:24:45","date_gmt":"2018-10-17T05:24:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/?p=3748"},"modified":"2021-05-19T21:36:02","modified_gmt":"2021-05-20T03:36:02","slug":"doris-danger-vol-1-chpt-1-page-023-gene-colan-commentary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/archives\/3748","title":{"rendered":"Doris Danger (vol. 1, Chpt. 3), page 023 GENE COLAN – Commentary"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>
\n\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

My best friend, GENE COLAN <\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"This photo is from San Francisco’s Wondercon 2007.<\/p>\n

My experience with Gene Colan was a perfect lesson in what NOT to do, when trying to get a pin-up from one of your idols, or what TO do, if you want to annoy the hell out of them and feel ashamed of yourself, and make them hate you.<\/p>\n

Early on, during my hours of obsessing and searching and fantasizing to find artists to draw pin-ups of giant monsters for my book, I found Gene Colan’s website online. He was one of the first artists I looked for. I sent him a letter about how much I loved his art, and how great I thought it was that he was accessible online. He sent a very brief thank-you-very-much type of note.<\/p>\n

At this stage (this was the early 2000\u2019s), I was new at the whole email thing. In fact, I was new at the whole computer thing. I had had an eighties model, which I used just as a word processor. But when I met (my wife) Elizabeth, she introduced me to the internet, and to emails.<\/p>\n

But as I say, I was new to email etiquette. I would write pages and pages. I suspect most people would read a sentence or so, and then get bored or irritated and delete the letter without finishing it. At least, that\u2019s what I would have done. But I didn\u2019t know this at the time, because I hadn\u2019t gotten any emails yet, so I just kept writing. I also didn\u2019t have any experience trying to get pin-ups from artists. So my strategy was this. I\u2019d write a long, annoying introductory letter, and I wouldn\u2019t ask about the pin-up. I would just say hello and I love you so much. Then I would wait and see if I got a response before bothering to put myself on the line and ask for a pin-up. I guess I thought this technique would strengthen their bond to me somehow, and make them like me so much, that when I wrote a second time, they\u2019d not only remember me, but also see what a nice and polite guy I was, and then we\u2019d be best friends, and they\u2019d WANT to do the pin-up. As if they wouldn\u2019t have done it if I just asked the first time. So after receiving the very brief and appreciative thank-you from Gene, I wrote again, telling him about the book I was doing, sending some samples of the monster pages Dick Ayers inked, and asked if he would do a pin-up I could publish.<\/p>\n

I told him if he wasn\u2019t really interested in drawing a monster, he could just include a hint of one. I thought maybe he could do a deserted spooky street, with a monster peeking into an alley, or a giant shadow falling over someone, or a graveyard, with a giant foot stomping down. But something moody, since he\u2019s so good with that gothic horror atmosphere.<\/p>\n

This email got another brief reply. This time it was from his wife. She named a price which (in my naivete) I found high, but which in retrospect was a fair price for his work, considering what he had planned to do for that money.<\/p>\n

I wrote another way-too-long letter, saying I assumed the price was for an 11\u2033x17\u2033, the standard size for a comics page. I asked if he might be able to do something smaller, or less detailed, for cheaper. I went on and on about possibilities.<\/p>\n

Another brief reply from his wife. As for \u201cdetail,\u201d she said that Gene works very hard, and if he skimped on \u201cquality\u201d, neither of us would be happy with the result. But she also said that he had planned to do a \u201c22\u00d728\u2033 piece (Holy Christ! That would have been HUGE!) He would do an 11\u2033x 17\u2033 for half the original price. At the time, I thought it was still expensive (although I now realize it was a fair price for his work), but closer to a ballpark that I could afford.<\/p>\n

We wrote back and forth – from here on out, all correspondences with with his wife and not with Gene – she wrote their concerns, and I responded with naive, annoying, relentless, way-too-long correspondences. I think we both got exhausted. Finally, I received a letter that was so funny and so simple, it made me ashamed. It said, Fine, he\u2019ll do the pin-up. Don\u2019t send any more emails. And then it said, \u201cSeriously.\u201d How embarrassing. How humiliating.<\/p>\n

Shortly after I sent Gene a payment, I found a message on my answering machine from Gene in New York! He just wanted to check on the composition he had in mind for my pin-up. I was so excited, I didn’t delete the message, so I could play it for my wife. This was back when answering phones were on your home phone, because not many people had cell phones yet.\u00a0 I was trying to figure out a way I could record a copy and save it for my personal records. At this time, I was also saving the envelopes artists sent me their pin-ups in, because it had their names in their handwriting, and it was really cool to me to have these little pieces of their everyday lives as mementos.<\/p>\n

I called him back, and it was a rush to speak with him on the phone. He was so polite and friendly. He made no mention of what a pain in his ass I had been. He said he planned to draw a graveyard with a kid in it, who\u2019s jumping back in shock, right as a giant foot stomps down at him. Sounds great, I said. Do whatever you like.<\/p>\n

That day, when I got home from work to share the phone message with my wife, I went to the answering machine to play it for her, and the machine said there were no messages. I literally howled with anguish, and she came running out. I said, \u201cThere was a message on the machine I wanted to share with you!\u201d I was crushed. She had seen a bunch of old messages on the machine and assumed they were all ones she had heard, so she deleted them without listening to them first. I couldn\u2019t believe it. I was in shock. I was devastated.<\/p>\n

The pin-up came, and it was gorgeous. And it was still huge. Even though we agreed on 11\u2033x17\u2033, it ended up being 14\u2033x22!\u201d<\/p>\n

I decided to publish it in the first comic I ever published.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\n\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My best friend, GENE COLAN This photo is from San Francisco’s Wondercon 2007. My experience with Gene Colan was a perfect lesson in what NOT to do, when trying to get a pin-up from one of your idols, or what TO do, if you want to annoy the hell out of them and feel ashamed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"default","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[83],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3748","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-doris-danger"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"woocommerce_thumbnail":false,"woocommerce_single":false,"woocommerce_gallery_thumbnail":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"cwisnia","author_link":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/archives\/author\/cwisnia"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"My best friend, GENE COLAN This photo is from San Francisco’s Wondercon 2007. My experience with Gene Colan was a perfect lesson in what NOT to do, when trying to get a pin-up from one of your idols, or what TO do, if you want to annoy the hell out of them and feel ashamed…","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3748"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11605,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3748\/revisions\/11605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chriswisniaarts.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}