Thursday, April 19, 2012

The future of Imaginos Workshop

Imaginos Workshop is a name we have given to a group of friends that came together through fate, or coincidence, or whatever you choose to call it. We are very different in age, race and personal history but the one thing that ties us together is a common appreciation of the arts. We are just a small chunk of a generation (or two generations, really) that grew up on some form of comic books, movies, television and every other form of storytelling out there. Since we were quite little we gained an appreciation for storytelling no matter what form it was packaged in. For me it was having my father read the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy to me and my younger brother before we fell asleep at night. At that time I decided I wanted to be a movie director and make an exhaustive, line-by-line adaptation of the books and put it on the silver screen. Now I'm older and I do a lot more writing than I do directing, and some scruffy Hobbit-looking guy beat me to the task. Regardless, I have never lost my fascination with faraway worlds, and how they help to open my eyes to the world around me.


Mark Dudley, Founder and Head Artist at Imaginos Workshop


Sitting down and writing a comic book and a movie script is just the beginning. I do not know what the future holds, but I don't see myself ever losing my interest in these various storytelling mediums. What I would like to see Imaginos Workshop become is a community; a wide-spreading network of people that grew up, like us, listening to stories. If we get enough people together willing to produce those stories together there is no limit to what we can accomplish. I've grown up in the metro Detroit area and this has always been home to me. It is a city that's gotten a bad rap for a long time, and it is still hard to count the number of derelict buildings; forlorn husks of dried-out memories. But there is also an attitude of hope now that has been gone for a long time. People can feel instinctively that Detroit is coming back, and Imaginos Workshop wants to be there when it does. By then we want to be not just a group of friends, or a even a company. We want to start a Revolution. It starts with anyone who's ever picked up a paintbrush or written a short story, or feels like they could make a kick-ass movie about a giant monster attacking Manhattan. 


In the meantime, we are content to fly under the radar and work towards our goal. You can help us get there by reading our blog, or by "Liking" the stuff we post to facebook. If you see something here you like, please comment and start a dialogue. See that group of members to the right? Click on "Join this Site" and you can get updates on our activity. We need people like you to get to that place I've been telling you about. (For me, it culminates in holding a surprisingly heavy gold statue of a man in my hand). Ultimately, we want to blur the line between "fan" and "creator." If you have skill with writing, drawing, coloring or editing shoot us a line and we will get back to you. After all, we are still fans ourselves, making a go at doing what we love most.


Jon

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Imaginos Hits C2E2 Part 1

Part 1

Last Thursday the Imaginos Workshop crew (Nik, Joe, Jon, Alexa and yours truly) set out for Chitown to attend the third annual Chicago Comics and Entertainment Expo aka C2E2. From the start something was crazily amiss. As the crew came to my house to pick me up they ALL got a chance to meet Kim (my wife) and Delores (my mom-n-law). Moms and the wife were thoroughly entertained by Nik's jokes and Jon's...err...BLACK CAPE (who does this lol).


As we set off to Chicago we made a pitstop at the airport to pick up my lightbox from my buddy and collaborator Bar Scorpio and we were off again. After a few stops and some more hilarity we arrived at our hotel. Now is where the insanity begins. The Chinatown Hotel Insanity!!!


After dropping Joe and company off to handle the check-in business, Nik and I set of to find some Petrol to feed the conveyance. Little did we know until we got a call from Joe that all hell had broken loose. These clowns had screwed up our rooms a week earlier and then reneged on a promise to give us upgraded rooms for the mistake.

We ultimately ended up staying in a room no bigger than a broom closet, with some of us sleeping on the floor and others manning the beds. The first night Nik and I (angry as hell) got no sleep. A good and hilarious thing happened that night however. As we sat in the hotel kitchen/lounge/dungeon pondering how we were going to pay these Triad Gangsters back for messing up our rooms we found a kindred spirit in the form of DONTE. Expletives flew everywhere as Donte, a comic dealer from New York City, proceeded to tell us how he was being played like a sucka and was not gonna stand for it. He also went on his own tirade about the crappy room situation. Another good thing is that I was able to finish page one of Candy Coated.



Morning came and we finally got ready to get dressed and set off to the con and WOW!!! It was worth every penny. I felt like I was given the red carpet treatment the minute I walked up in McCormick Place. Huge Banners, multiple floors and EVERYTHING a comic convention could ever need all under one roof.
Restaurants, Kinkos and escalators EVERYWHERE. Also good (but expensive) food all around too. Man I was in heaven.

Monday, April 9, 2012

The Honeycomb Hideout: Episode 9: Occupy March!!


This time around our boy JJ revisits the Hideout as we get mad serious and go a little more mad! We make up for our lack of a Black History Month show with a serious discussion on American history, cultural holidays and education in American in general. We also delve a little bit into some current events. It's an edumacational show here on the Hideout so come on down, laugh your ass off and get edumacated!

Download this episode (right click and save)