Worldcon Members, Nominate Nordguard for a Hugo!

It’s Awards Nomination Season, including the Hugo Awards!

Nordguard: Across Thin Ice is eligible to be nominated this year for the Hugo’s “Best Graphic Story” category!

This is really pretty awesome. The category is a relatively new addition to the Hugo Awards, and as such, the “underdogs” have more of a chance of getting noticed and included.

So what does that mean? It means I need you fine Worldcon members to nominate Across Thin Ice!

To nominate, you must either currently be, or have been, a member of either a 2011, 2012 or 2013 Worldcon. (If you are not a Worldcon member and want to become one, you may join Chicon 7 or LonStarCon 3, the 2013 Worldcon, before January 31st 2012 to be eligible.)
The deadline for nominations is March 11th, 2012!

The Hugo nominations are being handled though the Chicon Hugo Nomination Website. You can submit a ballot either online (click here!), or mail-in a paper ballot (more info!).

If you happen to be a Worldcon member and you haven’t yet cast your nominations, we would greatly appreciate the moment of your time to include Nordguard: Across Thin Ice on your ballot!


The pertinent information you’d need would be:
Catagory: Best Graphic Story
Title: Nordguard: Across Thin Ice
By: Teagan Gavet/Tess Garman
(For “Magazine,” I’d say: Publisher, Sofawolf Press, ISNB 978-1-936689-10-1, www.nordguard.com)

You can put up to five names down for each category on the Nominations Ballot, so you can give all your favorites from 2011 a shot at being nominated this year!

Thank you very much!

It’s been a whirlwind kind of year so far. Really, thank you everyone who’s gotten a copy of Across Thin Ice, left kind comments, shared the book with friends, penned great reviews, sent nice emails, or simply just said at conventions “I can’t wait until the next book!”
Being able to write and make comics is truly a dream realized for both of us. It’s exciting, and encouraging at how well the book has been received, both within and outside of the fandom. Thank all of you guys for that! :]

Now, back to sketching the next Nordguard book I go…

Inked Page from Book Two

Here’s an inked page from the second Nordguard book–of which the title hasn’t been announced just yet. :]

  
(I actually did these inks ages ago, but considering things are moving forward again, I figured now was a good a time as any to post ‘em.)


Also, here’s a few Maguruq wolverine studies I did, since you’ve not seen the last of ‘em!

Lastly–you can still order a copy of Across Thin Ice and have it arrive before Dec. 25th! The official cut-off date for domestic orders from Sofawolf Press is Dec. 19th!

Order your copy here! | More info on shipping cut-offs from Sofawolf

Website Revamping

Since you’ve found yourself here, you’ve probably noticed the website has changed quite a bit! We’re still in the process of putting together a few things (namely, the development/concept art section,) but we should have everything in place by the end of the week.

In other news, outside temperatures hit a balmy 0° –which is the perfect temperature to stay inside and work on the next Nordguard book.

Nordguard Reviews & San Diego ComicCon

Nordguard Reviews:

First things first! Have a couple Nordguard: Across Thin Ice reviews!

• Across Thin Ice review on IGN
• Across Thin Ice review on FurryNewsNetwork

…And of course, you can pick up a copy anytime online from Sofawolf Press! Click here! ;]

ComicCon:
In a nutshell, ComicCon was fantastic! I haven’t been in a few years, so it was great to get a chance to run around, buy art and books, find cool comics, canoodle, break out some dice for a spot of gaming, be spoiled by San Diego’s weather and delicious sundries, and generally be entirely overwhelmed by the 150k+ people. I’m also pleased to say Nordguard: Across Thin Ice was very well received!

Thank you to everyone who stopped by to pick up a copy and have it signed!
Also, Pi was roaming around a bit every day at SDCC!

     

     

     

Headed to ComicCon!

Tomorrow afternoon I’m headed west for San Diego and ComicCon 2011!



I’ll be running around most of the time, but you can catch me at the Sofawolf Press booth various times during the weekend. I’m more than happy to sign anything, as always! I’ll be using my @screwbald Twitter for the convention, and to alert folks to when I’ll be at the Sofawolf Booth in case you wanted to swing by!

So stop by Booth #1236 (in the webcomic section, that orange one, on your map!)

You can grab a copy of Nordguard: Across Thin Ice, or Dog’s Days of Summer, or any other fine Sofawolf books!

Sofawolf Press’ will also have the last hardcover Across Thin Ice copies, so if you wanted one and missed out at either AnthroCon or the online pre-sales, now may be your last chance to get the first print/first edition hardcover!

Also, you might catch sight of Pi running around ComicCon!

Across Thin Ice: PG 4

Here’s page 4 from Across Thin Ice.

You can order the comic right now from Sofawolf Press!
Once again, for any new-comers–softcover copies of the book are $19.95, 75 full color pages, and rated for audiences 14+ for language and violence.

(You can find more information on ordering the book online right here!)

(And, for any one interested–I’m resuming a painting from last night over on LiveStream. Stop in, if you want!)

The Books!

It’s a pretty great feeling to finish a large project, in a kind of abstract and liberating way. It’s an entirely different and equally wonderful feeling to finally be holding the physical final product in your hands. :]

The fellows at Sofawolf Press were kind enough to overnight us a soft and hardcover copy of Across Thin Ice, soon as they received them from the printer. They turned out great! The paper is high quality, the colors are nice, they are heavy, and smell like new stickers. The hardcover is especially meaty and I think I could fend off a hungry bear by using it as a club. Not that I intend to, but, you never know.


(Front and back covers)

  
The “world map” I made for the interior of the hardcovers turned out really cool. :]

  

Across Thin Ice – Cover

Here is the cover for Across Thin Ice, Book One of the Nordguard graphic novel trilogy.

Across Thin Ice – Release Date Announced

I am very happy to write this journal, and to have finally come to this day…



Across Thin Ice, first of the Nordguard books, is finished.

That small statement represents the culmination of two years of work: close to 3,000 hours of layout, sketching and painting comic pages, snow and sleddogs. I am excited, not to mention relieved, for it feels like the weight of the world has come off my shoulders. The last four months I was working on it were especially monotonous: rolling out of bed, pouring coffee, and painting for fifteen or eighteen hour stretches.

Some days (alright, a lot of days toward the end,) I’d catch myself wondering why I’d ever done something so stupid as pick up a pencil in the first place. I’d rather be a fish monger, or a cowboy, or wear a gorilla suite outside a car dealership than have to draw another comic panel. But, the desire to tell a good story won through and kept me motivated. Most days, the work came easily enough, and I loved the challenge of it. Here, at the end, I’m proud of the work. I feel like I’ve accomplished what I set out to do. I did it to the best of my abilities, and learned a whole lot along the way.

It’s done. I can’t say that enough. It’s done. Well, I won’t kid myself–the first book is done, but it’s that first step that is usually the hardest.

Across Thin Ice will be released first at AnthroCon this summer, followed by ComicCon in San Diego. You’ll be able to pick it up both places from Sofawolf Press, or, starting July 1st, you can buy a copy online.
With fingers crossed, ATI should end up in Diamond Distributor’s magazine, and be available at a wider selection of comic book retailers either later this year or next.

And, to the information you really care about! ;]
the softcover edition of Across Thin Ice will be $19.95, and be 75 full color pages and 9×11.5 in size.

There will be a run of signed hard cover books at $39 and preorders for those will begin this Saturday and run through the week (or until all of them are sold)–check out the Sofawolf website for more information. Pre-ordered copies of the hardcover edition can either be picked up at AnthroCon from Sofawolf Press with a valid ID, or shipped to you starting July 1st. There are no pre-orders for the softcover editions, since there should be plenty to go around at AnthroCon, and online afterwards.

I’ll also be posting the cover for Across Thin Ice this weekend.

Thank you everyone for your patience and interest in the comic, and for the moral support, buying Nordguard patches, tuning into the LiveStreams, and for the kind comments and encouragements.

For now, I’m off to do some more non-comic-related things, like have a social life. I’ll just leave with a skip, one more “It’s done!” and a short excerpt from Nansen of the North.

Cheers!
-Blotch

11 July 1885

A monotonous life this on the whole, as monotonous as one can well imagine it – to turn out day after day, week after week, month after month, to the same toil over ice which is sometimes a little better, sometimes a little worse – it now seems to be steadily getting worse – always hoping to see an end to it, but always hoping in vein, ever the same monotonous range of vision over ice, and ice again…We do not know where we are, and we do not know when this will end. Meanwhile our provisions are dwindling day by day, and the number of our dogs is growing seriously less. Shall we reach land awhile we yet have food, or shall we, when all is said and done, ever reach it?

…It is hard to go on hoping in such circumstances, but still we do; though sometimes, perhaps, our hearts fail us when we see the ice lying before us like an impenetrable maze of ridges, lanes, brash, and huge blocks thrown together pell-mell, and one might imagine one’s self looking at suddenly congealed breakers. There are moments when it seems impossible that any creature not possessed of wings can get farther, and one longingly follows the flight of a passing gull, and thinks how far away one would soon be could one borrow it’s wings. But then, in spite of everything, one finds a way, and hope springs eternal. Let the sun peep out a moment from the bank of clouds, and the ice-plains glitter in all their whiteness; let the sunbeams play on the water, and life seems beautiful in spite of it all, and a worthy struggle.

~ Fridtjof Nansen

Painting the Last Page

Tonight, I am very happy to begin work on the ‘last’ page of the first Nordguard book, Across Thin Ice. It marks the culmination of a lot of time and effort, and I’m excited and proud to have finally arrived here at the “end.”

I’ll be painting on it through the night until it’s either finished, (or I fall asleep with the paint brush in my hand, again.) I’ll be streaming the painting on LiveStream for a while, so stop by if you want!

In a couple of weeks when everything has made its way to the publisher, I’ll get back with a longer post about the official releases and other pertinent information!

And until then, back to painting, one more time…!