We just received a print sample copy of the THE INCAL Classic Collection. After having worked on the book intensively, it's awesome to have the book in hand. At over 300 pages in length in the oversized European album format, it's a hefty book (we mean that in the best way possible!). Also, the colors are even more vibrant than the original THE INCAL French publications. This may very well be the best presentation of THE INCAL series produced... and fortunately we're releasing the English language edition at almost the same time as it's French language counterpart. Below are pictures of the English edition. It looks like we will be on schedule to have the books in stores in November. The one thing that is not featured in the photos is the slipcase the book will be shipped in. Although we have early mock ups of the slipcase, we have yet to see it in its final form.

The second issues of our iHumanoids Digital Comics (Unfabulous Five: The Greasers From The Black Lagoon #2 and Bouncer: The One-Armed Gunslinger #2) are now online for your viewing pleasure. Please enjoy both comics for FREE if you're on a computer or iPad with streaming internet access. Please share your thoughts in the comments section below!

CLICK HERE to view Unfabulous Five #2 iHumanoids Digital Comic.

CLICK HERE to view Bouncer #2 iHumanoids Digital Comic.

This past Saturday, Humanoids Publisher Fabrice Giger had the entire Humanoids US team over for a pleasant evening of food amongst friends and family. It was the first time I had the pleasure of meeting both Bruno (a long-time Editor with Les Humanoides Associes) and Ladronn.

As a fan of Ladronn's work, it was wonderful to have a conversation with him about his career and to see his original pages in person.

What immediately impressed me was the small scale at which Ladronn was doing the FINAL INCAL pages. Ladronn is known for the immense detail he puts into every panel of his pages. Yet, his original art pages are only about 10% larger than a standard European comic album page. Looking at the pages up close, it was unfathomable how Ladronn balances detail and clarity, particularly at such a small scale.

Ladronn also showed us the meticulate wire-frame computer models he created of various rooms and spacecraft included in the FINAL INCAL. He'd often uses the models as reference for his final illustrations; but the models themselves were fully realized in both detail and proportion. Many of them were recreations of Moebius' original designs from previous books in the series. Ladronn was painstakingly faithful to Moebius' original designs... but he'd often have to design portions of the ships/rooms that were never shown in the comic.

I also had a nice conversation with him about his fondly remembered run on Marvel's Cable with Joe Casey. He mentioned that the first sample pages he sent to Marvel prior to getting hired had a very strong Moebius-influence. Marvel wasn't interested. The second time around, he decided to give his art a more Kirby aesthetic and finally got some attention from the Marvel editorial team.

Ladronn cringes a bit when he looks at the Cable art (I think he's crazy!). Beyond the Kirby influence, there was a lot of inspiration from Steranko (particularly in the AGENT 18: NEMESIS CONTRACT story). He said the guest-appearance of Black Panther and Klaw in issue #54 was a birthday gift from Casey. Casey had earlier asked Ladronn what were some of his favorite Marvel heroes and villains. Ladronn told him Black Panther and Klaw. On his birthday, Casey sent him the script for issue #54. Apparently, the Editorial stuff did not want Casey and Ladronn to have Black Panther appear in the Cable comic... but Casey fought long and hard to make it happen.

Overall, a very lovely evening with the entire Humanoids team and the amazing Ladronn!

Here's a first glimpse at the production version of the I AM LEGION hardcover. Beyond the lettering touches that we did to the previously published issues of the comic, we tried to give the book a deluxe hardcover treatment that would do justice to the amazing story by Fabien Nury and John Cassaday.

The book will be equal in height to an American comic book. But, as with the Metabaron graphic novels, the book is a bit wider to properly fit the proportions of the wider European sized page format the comic was originally published in.

I love the way the embossed hardcover looks with the I AM LEGION sigil. It may be hard to see in the pictures, but there's a nice relief/indentation to the sigil. We also embossed the spine with the title and Humanoids logo.

The actual pages also look beautiful. With the extra width, the art on the page is significantly larger than how it looked in the Devil's Due issues. This gives John Cassaday's art and Laura Martin's colors even more room to shine!

Now that we've approved the tests, our factory will begin official production on the books. I cannot wait for them to arrive at your favorite comic book retailer! A big "Thank You!" to Jerry Frissen for his amazing graphic design on the book.

I'm super proud of the production we did on the upcoming I AM LEGION hardcover collection. To effectively give the story the high quality collection it deserved we went back and meticulously corrected the lettering previously done on the DC and Devil's Due comic chapters. For reasons unknown, there were some creative liberties taken when the story was original lettered in English. Director Alex Donoghue, Art Director Jerry Frissen and I went through the files several times to match the word balloon design of the original French comic. We also established a standard means by which locations and times were captioned in the story. I feel that the story flows way better in its new form and clears up some minor bits of ambiguity.

Below you will see 3 versions of the same two pages. The first versions are the original pages lettered in French. The second versions are the pages as they were originally lettered for the Devil's Due comic issues publication. The third versions are the pages after we made modifications to the Deluxe Hardcover edition that are more consistent with the French edition.

Our iHumanoids Digital Comics debut has proven to be a success with the release of Bouncer #1 and Unfabulous Five #1! What do you think? Have you had a chance to view them on both your internet browser and IPad (if you have one)? Your comments are greatly appreciated! Please place your comments below:

Humanoids streaming comics are currently in the final stages of testing. As soon as testing is completed, we will be offering streaming copies of both BOUNCER and UNFABULOUS FIVE to you via our website and an iPad application. I had the fortune of testing out both applications. They're easy, intuitive and do a decent job of showcasing both the artwork and story. The iPad version is particularly exciting as it shows just how great comics can look on the iPad. The interface is unobstructive and easy. View the iPad in letter form, and you get to see the full page. View the iPad in landscape form, and the view zooms in so that the screen is filled from the left to right edges with art. Move you finger up and down to scroll through a page. Move your finger right-to-left to go to the next page; left-to-right to got to the previous page. Also a double tap of the finger on landscape view zooms out to give you a view of 2-pages simultaneously. Easy, fun, and a great way to enjoy comics! Neither application is available to the public yet, but as soon as they are, you'll hear about it right here at Humanoids.com.

Today we got ahold of our first batch of books in their final printed form: Whispers In The Walls #1, Metabarons Vol. 1 and Metabarons Vol. 4. We are very happy with how they came out. Print quality and paper were nice, keeping the integrity of both the color and sharpness of the artwork. The overall feel of both the comic and trade paperbacks were also very nice. After so many months of working on the comics in their digital form, it's nice to be able to hold them in hand. Since their being printed in China, there's going to be a bit of a delay on the comics' releases. It's looking like everything will be in stores in July (rather than June). We're also working hard on the July releases (the I AM LEGION hardcover will be a beauty!)... but those will be slightly delayed as well. Below are pictures of my grubby hands sharing the test print copies with the world! :-)

-MPB