THE BOSTON COMICS ROUNDTABLE: a community of comics creators, meeting weekly since 2006.

Author: Roho

  • Art Framing Workshop

    Art Framing Workshop

    Print

    Are you a comics artist with pages you want to display in the upcoming MICE Art Show, in a gallery, or at home? Then you’ll need to frame that art! You could go to a framing store, but you’ll get better and more inexpensive results by learning to frame your art yourself. Good framing can preserve your art, enhance its sale value, and make your studio walls look great.

    The Boston Comics Roundtable will host a hands-on art-framing workshop led by artist EJ Barnes on Sunday, September 13th. She will cover such topics as how to prepare art for framing, where to buy frame pieces online for maximum flexibility and value, and what sort of hangers galleries prefer. Barnes will also show her special technique of displaying word balloons on comics art even if you added your lettering digitally.

    This workshop is FREE to all, though a suggested donation of $5 is welcome. Barnes will begin her demonstration at 2:00 PM. This event at the Boston Comics Workspace is sponsored by Ninth Art Press.

    About EJ Barnes

    Barnes is a professional artist and art teacher in Cambridge. She has published many of her own comics as well as contributing to such anthologies as Hellbound, Inbound, and Colonial Comics. She has also exhibited and sold her work across the country. You can find more about EJ Barnes’s work at www.ejbarnes.com.

    • When: Sunday, September 13, 2015 at 2:00 PM
    • Where:
      Boston Comics Workspace
      561 Windsor Street, Studio 306,
      Somerville, MA.
    • Facebook Event.
    • Calendar Event.
  • Print Membership Update

    Print Membership Update

    Print Membership

    Shared printing and scanning equipment is available to members during studio hours for a modest fee of $10 a month. We currently have a “Pro” level Color Laser Printer that is able to print up to Legal Size paper double sided. With a cost of 3.5 cents Black & White and 8 cents in Full Color (1 Sided Letter + Paper Cost) for all your Mini-Comics, Cards, and Flyer printing needs.
    Sign up here!

    Current List of Available Equipment

    • HP Pro Color Laser Printer ( Max Size Legal, Double Sided).
    • Epson Large Format Inkjet Printer (Max Size 13 x 18, Color).
    • Scanner (Max Size Legal).
    • Long Arm Staplers (x2).
    • Paper Slicer.
    • 2 Laptops and 2 Desktop Computers (Include Photoshop, In Design, and Illustrator).
     A Few Notes about the Print Membership:
     
    We now have a brand new Color Laser Printer at the Workspace courtesy of Dan Mazur (Thank you Dan!) and a Large Format Inkjet Printer (Thanks Cathy Leamy!).
     
    • We are in the process of acquiring a few more pieces of equipment that will make it possible for the Boston Comics Workspace to produce a wide range of Mini-Comics, Anthologies, Cards, Brochures, Posters, and so on.
    • Ongoing Monthly Memberships will help us allocate resources and more quickly improve and expand the production capabilities. So if you are interested, please sign up!
    • We have paper available at the Workspace for your minis for Letter, Legal, and Larger sizes. You are also encouraged to bring your own paper to print your comics in style. We also take paper donations.
    • More capabilities in printing/production at the Workspace mean more equipment available for all the members of the Boston Comics Roundtable and also considerable reductions in cost for future Anthologies produced by the Boston Comics Roundtable in house, which includes work by members (both Artist and Writers).
    • With the access to the equipment we also offer limited Professional Level Assistance and guidance (by appointment). Our Equipment Coordinator (Roho) has worked at a couple of local printers and produced several comics and anthologies professionally printed. He will be happy to answer any questions and walk you through how to use the current equipment at the Workspace.
    If you have any questions, clarifications, donations, or would like to get involved with our efforts to procure equipment. Please feel free to Contact us.
    Thanks,
    Roho
  • Creator Talks: LB Lee on Mental Health Comics

    Creator Talks: LB Lee on Mental Health Comics

    lb_lee_color_poster_socialBOSTON COMICS ROUNDTABLE PRESENTS: Creator Talks, with LB Lee on Mental Health Comics

    The Boston Comics Roundtable’s Creator Talk series will continue on Sunday September 6th with mental health cartoonist LB Lee. Held at the new Boston Comics Workspace at 561 Windsor St., Studio 306, the event is free and open to the public, though a suggested donation of $5 is welcome. Lee’s talk will begin at 2:00 pm and is sponsored by Ninth Art Press.

    Lee lives with Dissociative Identity Disorder, a topic explored in their comic MPD For You and Me. Their work, populated with “mentally unusual people,” incorporates rigorous research with a playful approach. They have appeared at various academic conferences and comics conventions, shining a light on the realities of trauma, homelessness, eating disorders, and other less-than-traditional but important topics.

    Lee’s Creator Talk will focus on process, from research to the final product. They will discuss the challenges that come with mental health cartooning—telling difficult stories and translating psychological phenomena into readable art—as well as personal challenges that come with working around a disordered memory.

    About LB Lee
    LB is a multivarious entity who make mental health comics, draw pretty pictures, and write stories about a mythical medieval Europe where the Roman Empire never existed. You can find more about LB Lee and their work online at http://healthymultiplicity.com/loonybrain/Home.html.

    When: Sunday September 6, 2015 at 2:00 PM
    Where: 561 Windsor Street, Studio 306, in Somerville

    Facebook Event.
    Calendar Event.

  • Constrained Comics Night

    Constrained Comics Night

    Please join us on Thursday, 8/20, 7-9:30 PM, at the Boston Comics Workspace for a constrained comics event! This will be an interactive drawing event that will culminate in a one-page comic of your own. A small group of us have been doing constrained comics for a while and they are both challenging and fun.

    You can see the results of our weekly experiments here:

    More Constrained Comics here: Your Drawing Sucks.tumblr.com/

    What are constrained comics?
    Constrained comics are comics drawn according to set rules and limits. This may seem counterproductive for creativity, but constraints can actually push you to try new approaches in your comics. For those of you with artist’s block, constraints can help you overcome indecisiveness and just get the ink flowing. Who knows, you may walk away with the first page of your next minicomic!

    What will we be doing, exactly?
    We will be doing a symbol comic. We will pull a random symbol out of a bag and you will have 10 minutes to draw a panel that incorporates the symbol (literally or figuratively). We’ll do this a total of six times and then have an hour to ink and letter. See if you can reign in the randomness and create a coherent story. Or don’t! See if you can make something wild and unsettling. The remainder of the time will be spent sharing our pages with one another.

    What should I bring?
    Basic drawing supplies like paper, pencils, pens, and markers. I recommend working at or near standard letter size.

    But I’m a writer?
    Writers are absolutely welcomel. You can use this as a writing exercise or perhaps pair up with an artist and work together.

  • Creator Talks: L.J.-Baptiste

    Creator Talks: L.J.-Baptiste

    Ludgy Jean-Baptiste Color Social

    SOMERVILLE, Mass. – Please join the Boston Comics Roundtable (BCR) for our next Creator Talk with cartoonist L.J.-Baptiste on his webcomic series COMIXSCAPE, a story about the absurd adventures of a young boy and his pet raccoon in his new town. The event will take place at the Boston Comics Workspace at 561 Windsor Street in Somerville, Studio 306, and begin at 2:00 pm on Sunday August 23. Admission is free and open to the public, though a suggested donation of $5 is welcome.

    L.J. will discuss the development of the web series and go over the process of creating each chapter as well as streamlining the upcoming fourth chapter. Additionally, he will go into his technique for creating motion comics, detailing each step from holding auditions, to directing, producing, animating, and all manner of logistics. L.J. will also talk about his forthcoming ventures such as a character song mixtape and how these kinds of outside the panel projects affect his writing.

    It promises to be an engaging afternoon of comics, animation, and fun.

    About L.J.-Baptiste
    L.J.-Baptiste is a 22-year-old artist from Dorchester, MA. His current work is COMIXSCAPE, which he began for DigBoston‘s Sunday Comics Project back in 2013. L.J. continues to work on the series in the hopes of reaching the climactic schoolgirl-zombie apocalypse that will be its final scene.

    Read his comics at http://www.comixscape.net/

    Where: Boston Comics Workspace, 561 Windsor Street in Somerville, Studio 306
    When: Sunday August 23 at 2:00 PM
  • Dwelltime Comic Show #2

    Dwelltime Comic Show #2

    Print

    The Jernegan Solution
    a Dan Mazur comic book gallery show.

    (Cambridge, MA – July 22, 2015) dwelltime’s third event in the dwelltime art fridays series will open an exhibition featuring local artist Dan Mazur on August 7, on view until October 2. The Jernegan Solution will feature a number of pages by Mazur, including sketches, studies and character designs. You will be also able to purchase a copy of the complete story featured on the walls.

    About The Jernegan Solution:

    A historical nonfiction comic “The Jernegan Solution” is the tale of a strange little gold rush that occurred in 1890s Maine. What Kevin Bramer at Optical Sloth calls “a thoroughly engaging comic that details a bit of American history that I was completely unaware of.”

    Join the Facebook Event:

    https://www.facebook.com/events/415555228654143/

    About Dan Mazur:

    Mazur wears many hats in the Boston comics community. He’s the creative force behind Ninth Art Press, the “unofficial publishing arm” of the BCR, co-director of M.I.C.E. (Massachusetts Independent Comics Expo), and an acclaimed author, cartoonist, and comics scholar. Most recently he is known for the compendium “Comics: A Global History.”

    To learn more about Dan’s work on The Jenergan Solution please check out his Creator Talk at the Boston Comics Workspace here:

    http://bostoncomics.com/creator-talks-dan-mazur/

    For Dan Mazur talking about this work please join this Creator Talk at the Boston Comics Workspace:

    http://bostoncomics.com/creator-talks-dan-mazur/

    More about Dan’s Comics at http://danmazurcomics.com

    Soft Opening:

    Friday, August 7, 2015 5:00 to 6pm
    dwelltime
    364 Broadway St, Cambridge, MA
    Free and open to the public.