This fall Marvel Comics is celebrating the 50th anniversary of the creation and release of Fantastic Four #1! When you consider the impact this comic book and the unique storytelling of the team of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby had on the super-hero funny book industry you realize it’s a celebration to be shared not only by Marvel, but by fellow creators, artists, retailers and readers alike! Joining in on the Fantastic Four first issue party is Dearborn, Michigan comic shop Green Brain Comics and Headspace Gallery located within. On Wednesday September 21st an exhibit opens which recreates that historic comic with a different artist on each page! The end result is new and different takes on some very familiar four color comic book panels. (One I have seen re-envisions the characters as if they were members of the Peanuts gang!) The exhibit will run through the end of December 2011.

                                          Page 20 through the ink and pencils of Dave Acosta

I managed to touch base with one of the contributing artists Dave Acosta, and throw a few quick questions at him. Here’s what he had to say:

Nerding Out: Jack Kirby fan?

Dave Acosta: I’m a huge Kirby fan. I think about Kirby every day. Sometimes I’m just in awe of the scope of his imagination. Other times, I use his work ethic as inspiration. He would pencil four or five pages a day! His talent was larger than life, even more so than his characters.

NO: What is your favorite part of your piece in the exhibit?

DA: I was lucky, I got a page with two monsters and a babe. I played up the cheescake quite a bit. But my favorite part was using Photoshop to give the page an old school, printed on crummy newsprint vibe. I added halftones, smudges, and shifted the Magenta channel to simulate a shifting printing plate. Fun!

NO: What other artist’s interpretations are you really looking forward to seeing at the exhibit?

DA: I always love to see Sean Bieri’s work. And of course, my man, Robert Barnes.

NO: You have seen your own work in print in the pages of Drago Bentley, have you ever imagined what it would be like if all the hours you put into each page has an impact on people 50 years from now like FF #1?

DA: It’s crazy to think about anything I’ve done lasting that long. Part of the beauty of art is going back and looking at the influences of the artists you respect. Kirby’s work and creations will live on forever, until they become a mythology of their own.

(Info on the exhibit can be found at www.greenbrain.biz/Gallery.htm For more on what Dave Acosta is up to please check out www.davedrawsgood.com or www.stause.deviantart.com/)

So recently I sat down with comedian extra-nerd-onaire Mike Bobbitt for a NERDING OUT interview shoot. I have known Mike for quite a few years now, having bonded with him around 20 years ago over our shared interest in all things nerdy, especially Star Wars. So when the idea came up for doing the interview I threw out the idea that we should shoot the whole thing while we both complete some Star Wars crafts! yes, you heard me correctly. Crafts. Glue and felt, needle and thread, etc. Mike and I had both recently bought the STAR WARS CRAFT BOOK by Bonnie Burton, so we decided to just choose a project right out of the book and run with it!

The interview went very well (it’s coming soon!) and the crafts went even better! So much cool stuff in the book! CHEWBACCA TISSUE BOX COVER? HAMMERHEAD SOCK PUPPET? AT-AT HERB GARDEN? It wasn’t easy making a decision on which project to pick. Finally decisions were made. Mikey created the WASHCLOTH WAMPA and I put together the ADMIRAL SACKBAR SACK PUPPET! It was a little challenging I have to say, but sitting around making something with your own two hands was really fun! The fact that it was Star Wars related was even more rewarding! (Mike was much more ambitious than me, showing off his sewing prowess while i merely glued stuff together! haha!)

Mike and I displaying our masterpieces!

I actually didn’t know a great deal about the book’s author Bonnie Burton, so Mike filled me in. Bonnie Burton writes for starwars.com, making contributions to the kid’s section with her cool craft ideas, as well as teaching them how to draw Star Wars characters (she has a couple books on that subject as well!). She also maintains the Official Star Wars blog (http://starwarsblog.starwars.com/)! How cool is that bloggers? Well, if Star Wars isn’t your bag of ice no problem, you can head over to www.grrl.com to see what else interests and drives this intelligent and creative journalist to put words together for you to read! From grrl.com you can link to so many other things that Ms. Burton has left her mark on. Impressive… most impressive.

So thanks Bonnie for writing such a fun book, and keep up all your other amazing work! An interview with Bonnie (and some more Star Wars crafting!) is definitely now a goal for myself and NERDING OUT! Fingers crossed….