Study Group Radio: Process Party

Welcome the creator of Snake N’ Bacon’s Cartoon Cabaret, Tales Designed to Thrizzle, Mark Twain’s Autobiography, & his new memoir All The Answers–Michael Kupperman! Joel Kupperman was an early child star who met wild fame early in life as a “Quiz Kid,” but that fame haunted him much of his life. Michael tells all about his new book, and about growing up with a formerly famous dad. What was it like moving into memoir from absurdist humor strips? And of course plenty of process talk about the making of the book. PLUS: Big jibba jabba segment, because Mike was Nominated for an Eisner (! Best Webcomic), and Zack’s Kickstarter is LIVE! (and a bit of not super spoilery Infinity War chit chat at the end)

Cartoonist Josh Simmons (author of Jessica Farm, House, Black River, The Furry Trap, and his new collection of short stories and collaborations Flayed Corpse) is one of our favorite creators of modern horror comics fiction. He stopped by the party floor to discuss things that make us uneasy, societal collapse, personal boundaries, and reassessing older work through the viewpoint of the person you are now. He's been spending a lot of time working with other cartoonists, as collected in Flayed Corpse, but also on the upcoming season of All-Time Comics, which we talk about as well as his general thoughts on collaboration and the specific logistics of working with other cartoonists. Plus: It's Spring in Portland! Zack derails Mike's story by talking about grilling and being excited to launch the Secret Voice Kickstarter (look for it soon).

This week we return with a great chat with Israeli cartoonist Keren Katz! Keren has had (and continues to have) a very interesting life and pathway to comics. Her first book The Academic Hour was recently published by Secret Acres. Learn about her early days as a dancer, obsession with flying, being an eternal student, art school days, to her current jet setting life as a cartoonist & performer. Who are: The Katz Sisters?! What is her connection to a deceased/never living metafictional Israeli poet? And much more! Plus: Mike did too much yoga!

Woo hoo! The Party Boys are back with another full-on jibba-jabba episode. First up: what's the deal with the Patreon? Well, we take just a minute or two to lay out the new status quo there, but it's only a short jump from there to talkin' 'bout trains (real and otherwise), making fun of Ready Player One (spoiler warnings, sort of), nerd culture, Zack is super close to being done inking his book, the two talk about what that feels like, kickstarter nerves, the New Jersey congressional race, our leftist leanings, mammal trivia, and social media coping mechanisms!

Please welcome creator of the new Image series Prism Stalker and the upcoming :01 book A Map To The Sun, Sloane Leong! Sloane and the boys discuss Prism Stalker at length and in depth. Sci-Fi, colonialism, gender representation, comics creation  workflow, writing and drawing process talk, this one has it all! Plus: Changes are afoot at the Patreon, Mike is continuously getting surprised by his kid's school schedules, and Zack reads a pertinent passage from Tips From Top Cartoonists (1982, Don Christensen) with some advice that both of us wish we'd learned earlier in life.

Please welcome Box Brown, founder of Retrofit Comics and the author of Is This Guy For Real: The Unbelievable Andy Kaufman, Tetris: The Games People Play, Andre The Giant: Life & Legend, & many many more! We talk andy Kaufman, fiction vs biography, childhood heroes, and lots and lots of wrestling talk! Plus: Mike took sleepy pills before they recorded! Cry for help or just bad idea? And: Zack talks reducing clutter, and his own personal JLA.

We're back (again)! Mike went to Hawaii, got crazy jetlag, and Zack went to Emerald City Comicon, and got con-lag. But now we're more or less back to normal. First up, the boys talk about their various adventures and generally knock the rust and dust off their talking machines. ECCC turned out to be a bit of a roller coaster, and Mike may not have wanted to come back from his island paradise, but here we are, none the worse for wear. Happily, we also return with ECCC interviews with Doc Shaner (Future Quest, Superman), Chris Roberson (iZombie, Hellboy & The BPRD), Dan Schkade (The Spirit), & Jeff Parker (Future Quest, Batman '66)!  

Please welcome very normel person Lauren Weinstein to the party floor! That's Normel Person, the incisive, hilarious, and often haunting weekly strip that's been running in The Village Voice, not a horrible typo. Lauren is also the author of Goddess of War, Girl Stories, & Inside Vineyland. We talk about transforming our modern existential malaise into art, parenting tips, and more! Plus: Mike & Zack are very very tired. 

Never let it be said that the Party Boys aren't giving back to our faithful Party Animals- you had questions you needed answered, and we did our best! This episode, we opened up the mailbag and answered a plethora of listener queries. Embarrassing things we grew out of, Moving on, Circling back, Favorite fictional Zack & Mikes, Thumbnailing theory, Dream collaborators, has Mike ever seen an Anime, the difference between manga & comics, and much much more! This one is for fans of questions posed and then answered.

This episode we welcome COPRA mastermind Michel Fiffe! His self-published comic quickly caught the indy-comics world on fire, capturing the minds of the Wednesday Warriors who mainline superhero comics, as well as the artcomix wonks, panel flow fiends and mark-making fetishists from the "other" side of the tracks. Bergen Street Comics stepped in to produce the collections and get the word out past the limited reach of the issues, and the rest is history. Michel's currently working in full on "COPRA Mode" on a 3 issue mini series for Rob Liefeld, detailing some lost history of one of his lesser known Extreme Studios creations, in BLOODSTRIKE: BRUTALISTS. We talk about that, the genesis of COPRA, his brief time writing for Marvel, some of his favorite creators, working process, comics theory, and much much more in this lively chat. Plus: Mike & Zack debate what makes a 'zine, and talk a little about ye olde internet harassment.  

That's right-It's a blast from the past when Mike's old podcast, Ink Panthers gets together to yuk it up live on stage at DiNK Denver! Alex Robinson & the Desert Panther Tony Consiglio join Mike to talk comics and other stuff in the far off world of Denver CO, 2014! Plus, in the modern world, learn about Mike's exciting trip to Scotland (hint: HAGGIS!)

We welcome cartoonist, public health educator, and Comics For Choice Co-Editor Whit Taylor to the party floor! We get into the themes of her new collection Ghost Stories right off the bat, talking about trauma, comics as therapy, and switching up your approach between stories. Whit delves in to the Chicago scene, what it's like to work (& pitch) for the New Yorker, the sustainability of comics fest culture, and more! PLUS: Mike has Cintiq troubles: He forgot how to draw on paper! And Zack starts a new comic on instagram, and the boys talk about photo reference in autobio.

This week on Process Party, we talk to Profanity Hill impresario, Fantagraphics Editor, and cartoonist Jason T. Miles! Jason joined Zack a couple weeks ago to talk about Zanardi for our Best of 2017 episode, and they ended up having a long ramblin' conversation before they even got to talk about that book. So here we have their chat, which dives fairly deep into the inspirations and themes of his new series EIGHTY-SIX. Topics covered include Masculinity (Toxic or otherwise), Sobriety, COPRA, Marvel trading cards, Comic shops in the 80s & 90s, Zanadu Comics in Seattle in 2018, The Death of Superman, the art of tidying up, Self-loathing, raising the next generations, and the comics of the black and white glut.

We're back from the holiday with our second annual Best Of roundup! Find out what our favorite books of the year were, and enjoy discussions with Sarah Horrocks, Austin English, Jason T Miles, Keren Katz, Sloane Leong, Eric Grissom, Ed Luce, Carta Monir, & Sammy Harkham as they detail their picks. Books discussed include Golden Kamuy, Alienation, The Interview, Anti-Gone, Doom Patrol, Shit & Piss, Diana's Electric Tongue, Variations, Pretending Is Lying, Street Angel, You & a Bike & a Road, Tarantula, Octopus Pie, Yours, Zanardi, and more!

Our holiday is taking a bit longer than we expected, so you get a small taste of what our Patreon subscribers get every week: this special bonus episode contains a Jesse Moynihan Real Talk and a recent AfterParty where we talked Netflix's Punisher show & how Mike ruined a cookie baking show by making the kids watch Spider-Man, plus: family moments with the Sonos (surprisingly not branded content)

2017, what a year! What a horrible, beautiful year. Mike & Zack take a look back at the year in review on a personal and professional level (ie we don't spend a ton of time griping about Trump). We look back at our goals and expectations for the year, assess how we met or didn't meet those goals, do a final page count for the year, talk about our strategies and how we might change the way we work in the future. What does 2018 hold for your humble hosts? Plus: who's inspired us in 2017? Zack drops a minor scoop in the middle of the episode, we discuss what the biggest comics news of 2017 was, and predict what's to come. Our last episode of 2017 before we come back from the holidays, and it's a good one.

From stories about boners, loneliness and bad sex to kids comics and the Star Wars universe - That's one heck of a career trajectory! We get into it with Jeffrey Brown, author of Clumsy, Unlikely, Darth Vader & Son/Vader's Little Princess/Goodnight Darth Vader, the Jedi Academy series, and his new series for kids Lucy & Andy Neanderthal (among many many more)!  PLUS: Zack & Mike talk about the recent problems with Patreon's fairly random fee restructuring, what that means for creators, and what options we all might have going forward.

Recorded live at the PULP Culture Comics Arts Festival & Symposium on October 21st in Burlington Vermont, this Comics Journalism roundtable brings Joe Sacco, Sophie Yanow, Iona Fox and the Party Boy himself, Mike Dawson to the stage to talk about their work specifically through the lens of journalism. Moderated by Andy Kolovos, and featuring James Kochalka and Glynnis Fawkes, this was a fun conversational chat, that was very illuminating. Thankyou to the organizers of the PULP festival for bringing these cartoonists to Vermont and putting on such a great show.

Sarah Glidden is the author of How To Understand Israel in 60 Days Or Less, multiple short form comics, and her newest book Rolling Blackouts. Rolling Blackouts is about Sarah's travels through Syria and Iraq with a group of reporters, and what she learns about those places, the people that live in them, and the fundamental philosophies and processes of journalism. We talk about her travels, her writing and editing process, journalism vs fiction, and her larger goals as a cartoonist. But First: Mike & Zack talk about adapting someone else's essays into comics form, and the pitfalls therein. We also give some accidental branded content for our speaker systems.

Jason Thompson and Jumana Al Hashal are a husband/wife cartoonist & project manager duo who have turned to collaborative game design. Their first game, Mangaka, was a pictionary-esque take on the Japanese comics industry, and their new game Cartooner looks to both skewer and explore the US version of the comics art form. We talk about the game, of course, but we also get into what it’s like to collaborate with your significant other, getting “civilians” excited to draw comics, the mechanics of getting your game (or comic) out there in the world, and of course Manga. Jason is the author of Manga: The Complete Guide & was an editor at the US version of Shonen Jump, among other things. The life of a manga editor is something we haven’t had the opportunity to get into before, so we found that to be pretty interesting & maybe you will too. But First! Mike & Zack talk about their history with non-video gaming & RPGs before getting into their SECRET ORIGINS! As in, key moments of their path to