In this episode Kevin Wada stops by to talk getting into comics and much more!

Topics include getting into the comics business by falling out of the sky, peeing pants a little, collaboration on this amazing covers, fear of interiors, years back doing test for interior art, the original X-Men cartoons, diversity in comics, fashion illustration, forward thinking with fan inclusion, and also what he’s reading.

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Transcription:

Kara: Welcome back to comiXology: Conversations, when we talk to the most legendary creators in the business.

Matt: That’s right. We’re here at New York Comic Con and Artist Alley. We have …

Kara:  An alley behind Artist’s Alley.

Matt: … special guest, one of our office favorites, Kevin Wada, welcome to the show.

Kevin: Hello, thank you for having me.

Matt: You’re a mega-star now. Can we call you a mega-star?

Kevin: Oh, no. Don’t.

Kara: Yes. Yes, we can.

Matt: Something we’re doing at the Con, we have a Fresh Romance variant cover, and you have done the cover for Fresh Romance, it’s great. On top of that, many people may have first seen your work, I think maybe my first time was the She-Hulk covers that you had done. It’s interesting to hear how you got into the comics business, because it’s very different than most other creators have.

Kevin: I kind of, just like, fell out of the sky out of nowhere, out of obscurity.

Kara: That’s Superman’s origin story, too.

Kevin: Oh my gosh.

Matt: I see it. Right before my eyes.

Kevin:  I think, here’s what happened, I think Brian Wood passed my name along. He bought a print from my store, I remember it was Bigcartel.com and I remember seeing the receipt of his purchase, and I was like, “Brian Wood, why is that name so familiar?” Not even connecting who this could be. I think he tweeted me a photo of his daughter with the print, or something like that. It was a print, I don’t know if you know, X-Men team is like fashionized fabulous ladies.

Then I think a month later, 3 months later, an editor was emailing me and asking me if I was free for a cover and then she was like, “I love you, I want to work with you again.” Three months passed again, and it was She-Hulk and I peed my pants a little.

Matt: And the rest is history.

Kevin: The rest is history.

Kara: Coming from a non-comic book background, then, how, what was your process for doing those covers.

Kevin: It’s very similar to editorial illustration. You’re working with one editor, it’s very collaborative, they feed you a prompt, give you some concepts, maybe, usually. Then you go, you sketch, you get approved, you do the final. The process is literally the same thing for covers. I’m sure it’s not at all the same for interiors, which is probably the reason why I’m so afraid of them. It was really easy and it was a lot of fun doing superhero stuff. It’s just crazy, silly fun and before that I was just doing magazine stuff, which can be a little dry. This was a breath of fresh air.

Matt: That was actually one of my questions. Would you ever want to do interior art, like sequential versions of artwork?

Kevin: The more people ask, the more I feel this really strong desire to, so …

Matt: Or at least to try it.

Kevin: Or at least to try. There have been a few offers, very casual offers that, one of them from Fresh Romance, to do something short, just to get my feet wet and see if I like the process, so I’ve been, that, I think, is a lot more interesting. Doing just like a really quick, short, 10-page, 1 off or something like that I think would be the next step.

I did test, oh my God, this may be a good story, I did a test for DC years ago, somebody, an editor contacted me, asking me if I wanted to do an interior test for them. I’m the kid who did not turn in his homework and I had to tell him this is taking too long and this is too hard for me and I am bypassing paying work to make this test happen, so I was like, “I’m sorry.” He was really nice about it and now I’m like, maybe I’m scarred by that experience.

Matt: At least you were honest enough to say, “This is too hard, I need to stop.”

Kevin: I know, oh my God, who does that?

Kara: It’s better than just trying to finish it and giving in something that’s not good work that you’re satisfied with.

Matt: That’s just not good enough.

Kevin:  That’s true. I did submit a little of it and it was really bad, but I just told him I couldn’t finish.

Kara: Those X-Men fashion illustrations that you referenced earlier, that’s actually my first experience with your work, but I didn’t realize it until the She-Hulk covers were coming out and I was like, “I know you, why do I know you?” It’s from those gorgeous X-Women illustrations. Did you grow up watching the cartoon or something? Where did that come from?

Kevin:  I did. I watched the cartoon, and do you know the funniest thing? I remember absolutely 0.00% of all the cartoons I watched growing up. I have these Gundam Wing postcards on my table. I could not tell you what happened on that show. I remember watching the X-Men, but I do not remember actually experiencing it, but I have this incredible nostalgia for it, and my cousin, who sort of got me into comics, superhero comics, a little, was crazy into it and we would always play it and it just takes me back to my childhood. I have a very casual memory of it all, I guess.

Matt: My memories of the animated series revolve around Wolverine, his tattered costume, but he’d be just shirtless, but still wearing the mask. What’s the point?

Kevin:  Oh my God, isn’t that like a meme now, too? Aren’t there screenshots of that, of him shirtless with the mask.

Matt: There are a few. He’ll like crush the alarm clock with his claws. I’ve seen that GIF everywhere. That’s probably the most popular one, then he punches Cyclops in the gut. I’ve seen that one over and over again. It’s true love, things happen when you’re in love with another man’s wife. Everyone knows that.

How important to you, is diversity in comic books, because you’ve done other prints with the X-Women, and they are women of color, but you are working with a book, Fresh Romance, diversity is very important. How important is it to you.

Kevin: I’m trying to be really thoughtful with this answer. It’s super-important to me, but the type of work I get published, I have very little control over what characters or, it’s so out of my hands and so, whenever I’m doing a piece for myself or any kind of sketch, I try to keep that in mind, just even in those little teeny tiny moments of, “Okay, I’m going to draw a character, be it an established, licensed superhero or my own little person, and I think to myself, "Okay, I feel like we all have this default setting of I’m going to doodle a man, he’s going to be white.” That’s just how, even if you’re a creator of color, that’s how you’ve been programmed since you were little, so I try to unprogram that, not always successful, I’m not saying I’m any kind of beacon of light of diversity, but I do think it’s important.

I think in a reaction to the fact that the work that I get, the work that I’m paid to do, often doesn’t reflect my own cultural, social, political beliefs and I try to then indulge that in the work that I’m just doing for fun, which I don’t have a lot of time or energy for, if I’m being totally honest. I fail on that front.

Matt: You know what would help that? Your own 10-page comic book.

Kevin: Good point. I’ve actually been talking with Jake Wyatt, who’s amazing and I hope you all know who he is, because he’s an all-star. He’s doing Necropolis’ own web comic, and kind of picking his brain about writing my own thing and creating my own world, and that would probably be my moment, right?

Matt: Yeah.

Kevin:  Then I can be your beacon of diversity.

Kara: With all those amazingly stylish women that you’ve drawn, what’s your background, in terms of fashion, because you have an evidently very good eye when it comes to that kind of thing.

Kevin:  Why, thank you. I have zero background in fashion. It sort of got picked up through, I don’t know how, but people seem to think that that was legitimately my training, was fashion illustration or fashion design, but it’s not at all. I just really like it and it came about out of school, where I was like, “Okay, I’m just going to draw and paint exactly what I want,” and it just tended to be really well dressed, pretty people. That’s become the thing that people come to me for. I’m not complaining at all, it’s a lot of fun.

Matt: You have an interesting modernized way of communicating with your fans. You Periscope all the time, your sketches. I think that’s very, I think it’s very cool, because there is not a lot of creators that I think would be up to date enough to want to try that. Maybe they’ll be like, “Here’s a sketch I just drew,” but you take it a step further, like let’s Periscope a live video of me doing the sketch and I’ll talk with you guys in the comments. It’s rare to see that kind of connectivity with creators.

Kevin:  I think, in general, technology is moving way faster than we are. By we, I mean people over 20, even. Snapchat, what? I don’t get you. I try, I think fans really appreciate that kind of contact with you. It can be really scary, too, because when you put yourself out there too much, as a persona, it can create trouble and very often I like to just let the work do it’s thing. It is fun and I think your followers get a kick out of it and, honestly, I think it can be really fun for you as a creator, too. It’s stressful, I’m sweating the whole time I’m Periscoping, you guys don’t see that. I just love social media so much, because it’s clearly been the reason why I have even made it as far as I’ve made it.

Matt: I think it adds a layer of finding out how your creative process works, or even as any artist, because I was watching one where you are sketching this woman, and they are like, “Who is that, is that Jean Grey? Is that Rogue?” And you’re like, “I have no idea, I’m just sketching.” People don’t realize that you start something and there’s no clear path, you are just seeing what comes next.

Kevin:  That was one of the moments where I was just like, “Okay, I don’t want to do another superhero. Not today, we’ll just hold that off.”

Matt: In your down time, if you have any, do you seek out other creators’ works? What’s on your top to-do list for reading?

Kevin:  The only 2 that I’m legitimately reading right now are Saga and The Wicked + the Divine. I’m a little behind on those if I’m being honest. I have an okay amount of free time. I’m also terrible at time management, so maybe I could be having more free time. When I have free time, the last thing I want to do is draw or paint, because I do that for a living now, which has been a kind of existential crisis for me, as an illustrator. I tend to gravitate more, if a book interests me, it’s usually because of the art. It just, whenever some artist that I find, I really like, then I’ll try to purchase their work, if I like them enough.

This is an example of an artist that I sought out. Secret Wars was largely because of Esad [Ribic], then the production seemed bad and the books kept getting pushed back and so I fell off of that one, because I never knew when they were coming out.

Matt: It just came out this Wednesday, the most recent issue.

Kevin:  Oh, thank you. I’m going to go purchase it on comiXology. Actually, that is how I get all of my stuff.

Matt: Nice.

Kevin:  That’s a really good one, where I was like, “Okay.”

Matt: His covers are bonkers. His Uncanny X-Force, I think, is when I started to get hardcore into his work.

Kevin:  What was …?

Matt: Uncanny X-Force, he did the covers.

Kevin: Oh, okay.

Matt: And Jerome Opena did interiors on that run, and Rick Remender wrote it. He did the covers for Uncanny X-Force, what was I saying, Uncanny X-Men? They were amazing, that’s what I’m saying.

Kevin:  He’s just amazing. I hate him.

Matt: I appreciate you taking the time out. We love your stuff at comiXology, and we’re excited for Fresh Romance too.

Kara: Yes. Thank you.

Kevin: Yeah.

Kara: Thank you for creating this beautifully populated world filled with people that you actually see walking down the street in any major city, it’s such a beautiful place you’re creating with your art, thank you.

Kevin:  You’re very welcome. Thank you.

Fresh Romance, She-Hulk, Saga, WicDiv, Secret Wars, Uncanny X-Men

In this episode Kevin Wada draws really well dressed pretty people.

Topics include similarities with Superman, his covers process, thinking about doing interiors please please please, that one time he did a test for DC Comics, vague nostalgia inspiration, that Wolverine clock slasher gif, maybe being a beacon of light and diversity as we all should be, Periscoping his sketch sessions, and what he’s reading!

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