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Andrew MacLean Chats About Head Lopper, Mignola And Self-Publishing

Travis Ellisor writes;

I first found out about Andrew MacLean's work when my friend (and comics colorist) Simon Gough was collaborating with him on some pages for a new comic. Andrew has a unique style and a vivid imagination that I immediately admired. Since then I've read all of his comics that I could get my hands on and even bought some art from him. Recently I got Andrew to take some time away from drawing long enough to answer a few questions for Bleeding Cool.

How did you get into comics?

We always had a small collection of comics around the house growing up. I'm not even sure where they came from or who they belonged to. But I poured over those few books, studying and mimicking the art. Eventually I started buying Spider-Man, Iron Man, X-Men, and other Marvel comics at grocery stores and pharmacies when I could, but they rarely carried the same titles every month so I never got to read a whole series. Eventually, of course, you're old enough to seek out what you want to read and I did.

Oh man, I had a network of bookstores, pharmacies, grocery stores and gas stations I would hit constantly, trying to make sure I never missed an issue of X-Men. When I discovered comic book stores and pull lists, it was pure joy. Anyway, when did you start drawing and at what point did you decided you wanted to do it professionally?

I started drawing very young, maybe three or four. Pencils and crayons like any other kid but I did a great deal of it and never really gave it up. In high school I would have said I wanted to be a comic artist but I had no idea how anyone would do such a thing and I stopped really thinking about it once I starting playing music. I never really had much formal art training. I took a semester of very generic art courses at a community college after high school but by then I was in a metal band which was much more important to me, so I quit that. A few years later I went back to school, but for music. But by the time I finished school, I felt the tug of drawing comics again and just kind of jumped in.

Anyway, I guess the point is that it wasn't really linear but now it's hard to imagine doing anything else.

Well, since you brought it up, tell us about your music and the bands you were in. And what all instruments do you play?

I was in a handful of metal bands, most notably was probably a band called Pinscorch. There were others but they all fell apart too quickly. Keeping a band together was really the hardest part of making music. I went to school for songwriting as a guitar player. But under that major we had to learn piano and sing. Eventually I took drum classes as well, but that was just for fun. And now I haven't played for years. I loved learning music more than anything, but I think it lost a little magic by the time I finished school.

Okay, moving on to your comics work. The first pages I ever saw from you were from your unpublished story "Practically A God". Those pages looked great and helped make me a fan of your work. Tell us what that story was about, and what you learned from working on it.

Sure. Practically A God was about a young man who had been raised by the creator of the world's greatest martial arts style deep in a secluded part of Mongolia. After tragedy takes his father/master's life, the young man moves to America and rockets to stardom in a brand of organized fighting. He is rich and famous and invincible, he is "practically a god." However, this organization is like MMA meets Professional wrestling but all the rivalries and shenanigans are very real and dangerous and often carried out by illegal means outside of the ring. Very quickly the young man's personal life is completely destroyed and he's forced to take matters into his own hands. Or at least that's the ultra-abridged version of PAG where I give no details away haha. It was born from a love affair with martial arts films (obviously) like Enter the Dragon and Kill Bill.

I loved plotting that story and drawing the sample. But more than anything, it was a huge lesson in plotting/writing a miniseries. At that point I hadn't been making comics for very long and anything I had written was either garbage or very, very short.

I was planning on pitching it around to publishers and I figured it would be taken more seriously if there were some amazing colors on my lines, so I hooked up with colorist Simon Gough. He did a fantastic job, of course. I then pitched it to a small handful of publishers. While they were mostly complimentary, no one I spoke with picked it up. They either weren't crazy about the story or it didn't fit their brand identity. BUT, it being my first conversations with publishers, it was a fantastic introduction to the business and I was extremely grateful for the open dialogue I had with them. Also, most asked me to come back the next time I had something new, which of course was encouraging.

At the time I hadn't considered self-publishing, so to me Practically A God was dead in the water. The sample, however, was posted around online for people to read for free, and that I think got me some of my first paid work. Also, while no publishers seemed crazy about PAG's story, other people I have a lot respect for in the industry encouraged my writing (which I had no reason to believe was any good), so even though my next endeavors were collaborations with other writers, I knew I wanted to get back to writing as soon as I could.

Well, I know that you've learned a bit about self-publishing now, so I really hope that we eventually get to see a completed Practically A God.

You were involved in a successful Kickstarter comic with Meatspace. That comic looked awesome and I really liked the look of the main character, Lance Brighton. What can you tell us about that experience?

Meatspace was a first in several ways. My first full comic, first Kickstarter, and first long collaboration with a writer (Josh Gorfain). And I couldn't be more grateful for the opportunity. Not only was it a huge learning experience but the Kickstarter and the book in general raised fan awareness for me.

In terms of the Kickstarter itself, Josh really ran the whole thing. I had very little to do with it. But until then I was completely unaware of its existence. It was, however, amazing to see that a passion project can come to life with or without the help of a publisher, something I'm sure I'll take advantage of again.

In terms of designing the universe of Meatspace, it was a tough task. Half of the story takes place in an MMORPG, of which I am totally unfamiliar with, and the other half of the story takes place in a very weird version of our future. It's been a few years so I am sure I'd make a lot of different design choices now, but the main character Lance is one I'd stick with. Lance has a robotic body but I really didn't want to draw a clunky machine. Not only is it typical but it's just a pain to draw again and again. So I designed Lance to have a very specific metal body but covered in a white foam-like material, so he would feel a little more organic. In terms of his shape and simplicity, I was trying to design something that would harken back to designs from my very early childhood, something reminiscent of the type of character you'd see on Johnny Quest or a Scooby Doo villain or something like that. And really for no other reason than it speaks to me and I'd enjoy drawing him repeatedly.

Yeah, simple designs can be the best designs. Overly complicated ones just get to be a pain when you have to draw them repeatedly. I'm looking at you, DC New 52 designs!

Haha, yeah I agree. But beyond a tougher design to draw repeatedly, an overly complicated design just feels like white noise to me. Like every new line, seam, pouch or pocket you add makes the last one you added have a little less impact. The hope is there is a nice balance somewhere . . . hopefully!

Anyway, after that you drew Department O #1, which I thought was a great concept. How did that comic come about?

I'm doing Department O with Jamie Gambell. Jamie found my work pretty early on. I did a few designs for him or something then we did a short comic together called Samurai Billy. It might be posted for a free read somewhere. Anyway, he eventually asked me to draw Department O (the letter, not "Zero"). It was really that simple.

The concept is a pretty fun one. I describe it as BPRD meets The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen in Victorian London. Which is extra nice because Jamie is British himself so he knows a lot of good settings and even adds a little of the British humor which I think makes it a little more authentic and unique. His scripts even have British spellings which I usually leave in for fun.

So we made and printed issue one. Then I had some other projects to draw and in the meantime he had another child. So Department O was on the back burner for us for a little bit. But I'll start drawing issue two within the next two months I believe. I'm guessing we'll see the next installment within the year.

I was wondering if we'd be seeing an issue #2, so that makes me happy indeed.

And btw everybody, Samurai Bill can be read here.

Okay, the next comic I saw from you was drawn AND written by you – Head Lopper. Now this seems like a story you were born to tell. Big old tough guys with swords, monsters aplenty and of course, decapitated heads. What more can a man ask for in his comics? Tell us all about it.

Like most creators I imagine, I have a small library in my head of characters and their stories I want to tell before I die, and it's ever-growing. A good chunk of these come from random drawings I did somewhere. If I create a character, I can't help but ask myself who they are and why they are the way I drew them. Head Lopper was really no different.

Over at Brand New Nostalgia we did a Viking-themed week and I did a drawing of a character who would eventually become Norgal after a redesign. So as mentioned, I just had to know who he was. In this case not only did I answer the question of who this guy was but also who was the head hanging from his sword. She of course became Agatha, our second main character in Head Lopper.

To be honest, while I do really enjoy swords and sorcery stuff, I NEVER thought I enjoyed it enough to want to draw a story in the genre let alone WRITE one. But the deeper I get into comics the more I recognize how much fun it is to grab a genre you may or may not be familiar with and just ask yourself, "Okay, if I was in the audience, what would get me excited?" Then, like anyone else, I try like hell to capture that excitement.

Excitement is special. You know what I mean? I want to create special things. There are tons of GOOD stories/characters out there but there are a very few that have that intangible quality. You really don't know what it is that makes something special so great but that mystery element is what elevates it to that intangible level. If you could put your finger RIGHT ON the place that made that character/title so special than it probably wouldn't be so special. It's a mystery element. Now I'm not saying that Head Lopper has that element or that it's even attainable intentionally (it is a mystery after all), but that is the lofty goal on every one of those character/stories in that mind-library . . . and I guess that's what I mean about trying to create the thing that would get me excited if I'm the audience.

As a little kid, I loved the original Clash of the Titans, and Arnold Schwarzenegger Conan movies. So now working on Head Lopper, I try to tap into exactly what it was that got my attention as a kid. And I don't need to re-watch them because that might ruin it. But the stuff that has stuck with me over the last 25 years is the stuff that stuck and would stick with me again as an audience member.

I don't need to know the entire "formula" of Head Lopper (or would even want to), but I think it's probably pretty clear that I adore Hellboy. A huge chunk of the Hellboy library is light-hearted even in the darkest of times. I hope Head Lopper is that way too. Even with all of Head Lopper's decapitations, I hope that you read it and smile once every few pages . . . that is assuming you have the same dry sense of humor that I have.

On the publishing front, I'm really small potatoes in this industry. Self-publishing is less of a preference than it is a necessity. Things like Head Lopper are special to me and it would break my heart to see them wither and die in a portfolio or cardboard box in the closet. When I set out to draw chapter one I decided I would self-publish so that I could share something that I wrote in 2013. I knew that even if a publisher grabbed it immediately it wouldn't reach anyone's hands until 2014 at the earliest. Once it was printed and available to everyone, then I started pitching. It's still much too early to say anything more about publishers, but one way or another I plan on seeing it through to the end.

So as of right now, you can get issue one from my online store in both digital and printed formats. I BELIEVE it will be available on comiXology at some point, but I did a poor job setting up the files to their specification at first, so we'll see when it actually becomes available.

In terms of moving forward with it, I've scripted chapter two. Unless I add more edits, it wraps up at 40 pages. I didn't concern myself too much with page count. I just told the story to the point I felt was a solid place to wrap up chapter two. But self-publishing in small print-runs like I've done with chapter one is just too damn expensive. So it looks like I'll be running a Kickstarter campaign to fund the printing of chapter two, so we can print at a higher quantity and therefore drive down the cost.

My wife and I are finalizing the budget, but we think we'll run the campaign in October.

Well, I know what Kickstarter I'll be backing in October!

One story I just read was your collaboration with Peter Brandvold and Cris Peter in Outlaw Territory Volume 3 – Rogue Lawman. That was definitely something different from you, though I loved the little touches you put into it, like the sleeping skull. How did that story come about?

Michael Woods edited the series of Outlaw Territory for Image and he invited me to join up. He gave me a handful of scripts and I chose Peter's. Not that the other scripts were poor (far from it), but Peter is such an amazing writer and his character (The Rogue Lawman) is such a true badass, so it was a no-brainer for me. If I remember right, I think Peter has a few novels with the same character. But this guy is the type of character you want in a western. He has that no-f'ing-around Django Unchained attitude. Stoic and quick on the trigger. I loved drawing him. It was a true pleasure working from Peter's script.

Also, I'm a huge fan of Cris Peter's colors and at the time I had been drooling a good deal over some of her Casanova work so she came to mind immediately. I reached out to her and asked if she'd be interested. She said she'd be glad to and Michael was cool with it, so that was that. And she TOTALLY killed it as she always does. Hopefully we'll get to work together again someday because her shapes and palletes are gorgeous.

Well, I hope that we get to see more artistic collaborations between you two.

Coming in October is Dark Horse Presents #29 with "Snip Snip", a story I know you've mentioned a couple of times online. What can you tell us about it?

I guess I would describe Snip Snip as a marriage between Roger Rabbit and Pulp Fiction. It's about Mindy Cooper and her partner-in-crime/hallucination Harvey, who is a cartoon dog "animated" in the style of early Black and White Mickey Mouse (think "Steamboat Willy"), except Harvey is a foul-mouthed, trigger-happy gangster (think Scarface). Mindy is an exotic barber, and Harbor City just won't seem to leave her alone, so her and Harvey live by their own brand of justice.

The story in DHP #29 is called Death Roll, and while it hints at a 5-issue mini I've plotted (I should mention there are no plans for publication at this point), Death Roll is an independent and complete tale of a local gang of lunatics who are a little more wily than they appear.

I'm definitely gonna check that story out in October. Now before we go any further into future comics, let's talk a little more about your art – who/what are your biggest artistic influences, both inside and outside of comics?

The artists I turn to most are probably Jack Kirby, Gabriel Ba, Mike Mignola, Toby Cypress, James Harren, and Rafael Grampa, to name a few. There are many more of course, some that I am aware of, and more that I am probably unconscious of. But I find it helpful to just really look at a ton of art all day, everyday, with a wide variety. That's the greatest thing about the internet. You can see so many different styles from all over the world at any time. And that sounds obvious of course but I think I've learned a lot just by absorbing bits and pieces from all the seemingly endless solutions people come up with.

When it comes to storytelling and composition, I'm awestruck by Mignola but I also turn to movies a great deal. Directors like Quentin Tarantino and Stanley Kubrick are an enormous influence on me.

While I do read comics, I don't read a lot of comics. Possibly as a result, most of my writing influences come from movies and novels. For whatever reason I find a lot of dialogue in comics really unnatural. Now I am, by all accounts, very much a novice writer but I do try to keep in mind something Tarantino said, it was something to the effect of, "give every word weight." And he does. Every single word in every single line of his movies hits your ears with an electric charge. He doesn't waste a single syllable. I think there might be a lot of wasted syllables in the average comic and for that reason I am much more influenced by writers like Tarantino than most comic writing. Of course, not all comics are average. I love the writing of Gerard Way's Umbrella Academy, Mignola's Hellboy (surprise-surprise), and John Arcudi just might write the most natural-sounding dialogue in comics, in my opinion.

I think you might just be a Mignola fan, Andrew! I'm a big fan of his, too, and can never decide which I like best – his solo writing best or his collaborations with Arcudi.

To me, John and Mike's work are two different things. They have different tones, they just share some characters. So in the end I love them both, but for different reasons. I love how John treats supernatural characters as if they were humans and so they seem all the more relatable. And that's a word thrown around a lot, but here I just mean it's the first time I've had an actual emotion regarding a bubble-headed ectoplasm man. I don't know about you, but that's pretty new for me! I mean, the dude doesn't even have a face! As for Mike, he's just an absolute master of atmosphere. You're taken to a whole new world when he draws his own writing.

Well, tell us what your work processes are like, both when you are drawing for another writer, and when you are both writing and drawing yourself.

My process alone versus my process with a writer is nearly identical. I still have a script in front of me and I still draw my little tiny scribbly layouts. Where it differs is what I see in my head and how I feel. Working from a script by another writer can be a little anxious for me because each new word or idea I read in the script makes my mind scramble to put together images and build this world, and really I have no idea what will happen in the next panel, let alone the next page or issue. It seems silly to get anxious over it, but I'm trying create this world as if I own it, as if it is entirely my own. When in reality, that's just not true. This is someone else's world, someone else's characters. So I always feel like I'm scrambling to keep up. I feel behind. Also, the things I get excited to draw in a script, or the things I'd really like to highlight in the story may not have that same attention in the script. For example, if there is one really cool action on a page or I've realized we are past due to show a character from head-to-toe but the page is written for 7+ panels . . . it's pretty tough to find the room to put that nice large panel in to show that action or full body shot.

Now that's not really a complaint, just the nature of the beast. I guess I just mean it's not as comfortable as drawing my own writing.

When I am drawing from my own script I am drawing something I dreamed of well in advance and I know what the page will look like (more or less) before I even do the layout. I have a pretty tight outline of the entire series, let alone that particular issue before I even script something. Like in the case of Head Lopper, I developed it in my mind for over a year before writing issue one. Then once I sit down to write a script, I've got a very good idea of what the setting will be. Also, when I write my own script I write it for only a few panels per page. I know that once I do the layouts I'll have a few new ideas and will want to add some mini panels. If I write every page at 7 panels, it's a squeeze for me to fit that all in, let alone add any new ideas.

I guess overall it's just less stressful to draw from my own scripts . . . plus I can change whatever I want, haha. I just might be a control-freak.

What characters (besides your own) would you like to work on someday? I'm guessing at least something Hellboy/B.P.R.D.-related.

Yeah, I suppose you guessed right. I don't think about that question too much, but when I do I usually think of Hellboy, BPRD, or anything of the Mignola-verse really. I actually really love Baltimore, too. I haven't read the comics, only the novel, but the idea of a vampire hunter with a fake wooden leg banging in one crooked nail per vampire killed is just brilliant. I love that premise. But my gut tells me that stuff isn't in the cards for me, and I'm okay with that.

I really like the Strange Tales books Marvel did with all those great expressive indy artists. I have a mini story I'd love to tell with Nightcrawler someday. He's always been a character I thought was interesting, with or without the priest bit.

Other than that, I love the Umbrella Academy characters, and Matt Fraction's quirky story-telling like Casanova, and Batman is a hell of a lot of fun to draw . . . threw that one in for good measure!

Now that you've mentioned Nightcrawler, I REALLY want to see you draw him. I think your style would be perfect for the character.

What are your preferred art tools, both physical and digital?

I don't get too down and dirty with digital. I use Photoshop for colors but I don't get too fancy with it. I once bought a little Wacom thing with a pen, thinking it might improve or speed up coloring compared to a mouse but it didn't really do much for me, and so it's pretty neglected now. People do some amazing things digitally, but it's just not my thing.

Specifically, I use a 5H lead for pencils (not too hard, not too soft) on a cheap Canson bristol, and lately I've been playing with some watercolor paper as well, that texture can be really fun. I use Dr. Ph. Martin's Bombay Black India ink with a Rafael 8408 size 0 brush for my lines and any random old size 2 brush for spot blacks and chunky lines. For finer lines and scribbly stuff I use Pigma Micron pens, usually sizes 01, 03, 08 (chunky stuff and lettering), and a Graphic Size 1.

When I grey tone traditionally I've learned to use black watercolor rather than an ink wash because I just find it easier to handle over all.

Alrighty, now tell me what was the last really comic book you read?

I actually just read Rachel Deering's Anathema which was really great, particularly the first chapter of the tale. Not only was the language really potent but Chris Mooneyham drew that section. I really love his work, something about it seems so classic and dark and moody. His Five Ghosts written by Frank Barbiere was really fantastic as well, both art and writing.

Before that, my favorite thing I had read in recent months was Becky Cloonan's Demeter. Her mini comics are really great. Her writing is really fantastic in those, and there aren't many black and white comics that could rival her approach. The way she uses grey is much deeper than just adding shadows. It's really inspiring.

Speaking of Becky, I really really want to check out Killjoys both for her art and I loved Gerard Way's writing on Umbrella Academy and I'm guessing he's pulled it off again. Not that that's the only book I've fallen behind on . . . there are too many.

You recently contributed art to the Criterion Collection'sZatoichi: The Blind Swordsman box set, along with many other talented artists such as Paul Pope, Scott Morse, and Bill Sienkiewicz. How did you get involved in that and are you a big fan of the Zatoichi films?

Well, Eric Skillman over at Criterion put the artists together (as far as I know). I've known Eric for maybe a year or so. At one point he was putting together a sort-of-anthology comic where he wrote a whole bunch of short stories and had different artists draw each one. That was the first time we worked together. It was a very fun little story with almost no dialogue, which I always find fascinating. I'm not sure what became of it, though. Maybe it's still in the works, maybe it's on a back burner, maybe it's dead. Not sure. But really I didn't know Eric worked at Criterion until this gig came up, but like anything else, he just shot me an e-mail.

I wish I could say I was already a fan of Zatoichi but I hadn't seen any until now. I'm a huge fan of the genre and I've had Zatoichi recommended many times but I had just never got around to checking it out. It was such a perfect reason to get acquainted, for sure.

All right, finally, tell me what else you have coming up and how I can give you some of my hard-earned cash!

I'm wrapping up a mini-series that I've been drawing off and on for about a year now called Colonial Souls, written by Nolan Jones. It's a sci-fi about a pair of asexual aliens traveling around the universe in an attempt to save their nearly extinct race. It's four issues total and will be released as soon as its ready. I'm guessing no sooner than October.

I'm also working on a project called Mars which is the brainchild of Jim Gibbons with my art and Ryan Hill's colors. We're going to have a sample as a webcomic available very soon… wish I could be more specific with dates but this one will be fun for sure.

KaBOOMbox, The 200 page Brand New Nostalgia and Out of Step Arts cooperative anthology that I curated with Brandon Clarke will be available in the coming months. We're just nailing down the final edits and crunching some final numbers before it hits the printer. And I've got to say, the content in this book has surpassed my expectations, gorgeous work in here.

As mentioned earlier, I'm going to run a Kickstarter for a very chunky, 50 page, Part Two of Head Lopper this October, which I am very excited to begin the work on. I think folks will enjoy it.

Also, we should see a Department O Part Two before the end of the year.

Apart from those, I've got a handful of very exciting things in the works but it's still WAY too soon to mention them. They could very easily fall apart before they come to fruition.

Andrew MacLean can be found on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and deviantART.

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