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Hikky from MIDNIGHT HORROR SCHOOL

Years ago, my wife and I had the opportunity to write several episodes of the Japanese animated series MIDNIGHT HORROR SCHOOL, created by Naomi Iwata
The show was a relative success in Japan and many other countries around the world, unfortunately they were able find a market to sell the show to here in the U.S.A. So we were never able see our episodes broadcast in English.
I would have really been nice to show them to people, especially to help promote our animation careers for other series.
Maybe it’s not too late.

Hikky and his school friends are objects that human students loose during the school day. Such as a pencil that falls off your desk. At night the school becomes magical and all these lost objects become alive and go to their own school. There they learn to do amazing things and to one day graduate and become one of the Wonders of The World.

It was a fun series to work on. It got me my first animation writing credit and membership into the Animation Writers Caucus of the Writers Guild of America West.

Living around Burbank

Today I was sitting in the lobby of a television studio’s office building, drinking my Starbucks iced tea, and reading about a live action movie that was being made from an animated TV series from the self-same studio.

I thought that there was a young actor from one of the other TV shows this studio has produced would have been perfect for one of the leads of this movie if he was a bit younger. (Turns out I wasn’t the only one who had this thought.)

While this was going through my head an even younger boy sat across the lobby from me, he had a couple script pages of ‘sides’ and he was practicing his lines. He was preparing to audition for something. He was putting himself completely in to the role, ignoring all the people walking around him.

It was fascinating to watch.

I don’t know if he was there to audition for the young teenage lead of the movie mentioned above, but looking at him, watching him perform, I knew he would be perfect for the role.

I love living in the Burbank area and witnessing things like this. Going to pay attention to the casting of this film.

If you know anything, “Call me, Beep me.”

What’s the sitch?

Kevin Paul Shaw Broden
Four Names of Professional Creativity

Libraries

While at last weeks Sister’s in Crime meeting it was mentioned how this was National Library Week, and it got me to thinking of the Libraries in my life.
I suppose the first library I knew was the one in Elementary School, it was a side room to the Multi-Purpose room, and didn’t have a lot of books, but enough for what was needed for the school.
The second Library was when our town opened up a brand new city library. There had been a previous library, going way back to when it was shelves in a corner store. The main library is now a museum, but when the new library was opened my mother made certain that I was the first one there when the doors opened and I was the first to get a library card in the new library.

I was never a great reader growing up. Having to take special course to help improve my reading.  Thank goodness for those instructors because they let me know that it was okay to read comic books. “If he’s reading, let him read.”

Later, in Junior High and High School, I spent a lot of time at the school libraries.  Mostly it was to get away from the bullies of the school. I didn’t have a lot of friends then, but I did have books.  I probably read more books during those lunch hours than I had anytime previously.  I’m very thankful for those times.

I would continue to go back to our city library, renewing my library card every few years.

Now I live in another city with a great big library dedicated to the arts. I know I’m going to be spending a lot of time there.

And perhaps one day, one of my books will be in a library near you.  Would you check me out please?

Walking the Plank with Christ

As a little child I usually attended Sunday School while my parents went to church and their own adult classes. For our group of kids we were taught through colorful Bible stories in ways that were understandable for little ones. Hearing about the animals on ‘Noah’s Arc’ comes to mind.

As fun as those stories were, they were the simple beginnings of my understanding of the Bible. This period of my young church life I look back on as the ‘Jesus loves me’ time; for we sang that song over and over. I was only starting to know what that truly meant.

My first Bible lesson that struck deep with true meaning probably came to me one Sunday while I was sitting on a pew with my family in church. I was probably no older than 7 years of age.

Our pastor was giving a sermon on Mathew 7:3-5/Luke 6:41-42

Luke (NIV)

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”

The visual image of a plank (or ‘beam’ as used in the King James version) was something my young mind and vivid imagination could see.

Every child by that age has gotten dust or dirt in their eyes and knows just how uncomfortable that is. So to imagine what it must be to have this massive plank of wood stuck in ones eye is a horrifying thought. Then to think trying to get a dust out of another’s eye with this thing stuck in my own is equally horrifying.

This imagery embedded itself into my mind.

It was my earliest lesson in not to judge others and it has stayed with me ever since.

It seems like an easy lesson to learn; don’t make such a deal out of pointing out the flaw in someone else’s life and act like you are the only one who can fix them, while completely ignoring the major problem within your own life. Yet we do it all the time.

Though I try not to judge others, I would be an equal hypocrite if I said I never judge other people. It’s far too easy to do so. But I try very hard not to. I have to stop and realize that I could end up going through the same thing they are and if others point out my faults with such an attitude, would only make my situation worse.

If you can help me, great, but don’t treat me as a flawed and only you can help me. I won’t do the same thing to you.

However, in an attempt to not judge people, sometimes I imagine my plank is much larger than it truly is, or imagine it is there even when it is not. It can be too easy make your own flaws greater than they actually are. So in your attempt to not judge others too harshly, don’t judge yourself too harshly either.

After #AnimateAugust

Wow!

Thank you all for following, liking, and sharing, all my #animateaugust sketch series of animated characters whether on instagram, deviantart, facebook, twitter, tumblr, or pixiv in Japan.

Really appreciate the support and encouragement.

It began as turning my

instagram

account into an art portfolio of my work in a more animation styles, as I’m use to drawing in a traditional comic book style (such as my webcomic Flying Glory and the Hounds of Glory –

www.flying-glory.com

), and to promote myself. So I decided to devote all of August to drawing characters from current animated series I enjoy and some I didn’t even know about.

This has become a really enjoyable experience and challenge, as I discovered what drawings people liked best, what worked in one picture and didn’t in another. Discovering what shows are popular, not only here in the U.S. but also around the world.

Images in this series got more likes and shares than any other post I’ve every made.  That’s kinda thrilling.

“Music on Swan Lake”Duchess Swan and Sparrow Hood from Ever After Highreceived 27 notes on Tumblr, and 24 likes on instagram

“Is her destiny to be forever alone” of C.A.Cupid also from Ever After Highreceived 39 notes on Tumblr, and 26 likes on instagram

In the process of doing these sketches I discover shows I knew nothing about:

Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir (a sketch that got 63 views on Pixiv).

LoliRock

Regal Academy (which I felt awkward about after drawing all the Ever After High princesses).

I also drew characters from:

Monster HighVoltron Legendary DefenderDisney’s Descendants’ Wicked WorldDC Super Hero GirlsStar DarlingsMy Little PonyEquestria GirlsGlitter ForceWinx Club

Some people wanted me to color some of the drawings, others gave me a suggestion of shows I had missed out on, and others wanted me to draw one of their original characters, (I might do that in the future, we’ll see.) I am contemplating doing commission work, but don’t know how that works or if anyone would be interested.

Anyway, as I said, it was a great experience and experimenting in art styles I’m not use to working in. I hope to do a lot more of it, and I’d really love to be able to work on any of these shows or ones like them.

I plan on expanding my portfolio of work, drawing more of my own character sketches, designs and animation art experiments, but from time to time I’ll sneak in another drawing of some of your favorite animated series characters as well. I have an idea for another Monster High sketch, but it maybe a while and will probably give it more time than the ones I did this past month.

Again, thank you all for your supportive likes and shares, and encouragement.

See you around the sketchpad.

Best,

Kevin Paul Shaw Broden

Four Names of Professional Creativity

 

Celebrating 15 Years of a Webcomic

Celebrating 15 Years of a Webcomic by KevinPSB4

Though only a few months have passed for Debra and her friends, the webcomic FLYING GLORY AND THE HOUNDS OF GLORY have been around for 15 years.

FLYING GLORY AND THE HOUNDS OF GLORY (www.flying-glory.com) is the story of ambitious Debra Clay who’s grandmother was the wartime super heroine FLYING GLORY. Now the teenager always looking for ways to promote her rock bang, The Hounds of Glory, is thrilled to discover that she has inherited her Grandma Elsie’s super powers. Once she’s convinced her friends to put on costumes as part of their performance, a new team of super heroes is formed even if they didn’t want to be. Because they are soon fighting super villains between, and sometimes during, their rock concerts.

Be sure to pick up FLYING GLORY FLASHBACK a special 15th Anniversary edition that my co-writer Shannon Muir put to get. It includes all the song lyrics she wrote for the series as well as character bios. (amzn.to/293eI1L)  Only 99cents.

Legends of New Pulp Fiction

I have an illustration in this book along with other great artists and writers.

Mother of the Universe

Really got a thrill from all the people who liked my blog about Star Wars the other day, thanks a lot.

Tonight’s random thought is about He-Man and The Masters of the Universe.

I haven’t been following the current comic book version of THE MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE so I don’t know if they’ve cover this in their story, but I had a thought while driving tonight. (Yes, animation from the 1980s fills my mind from time to time).

There could be some really interesting stories told about Prince Adam’s mother. She could be a female Flash Gordon or Buck Rogers.

In the original animated series, we learn that Queen Marlena is actually from Earth. That she was an astronaut on an experimental trip to Europa but was knocked off course and crashed on to Eternia. As the story is told, King Randor finds her and eventually marries her.

That’s nice and romantic, but there is so much more that could be told. An Earth Astronaut (probably with military background) lands on a very alien world would want to know her new home and explore it. There would be many adventures she could have before finally marrying the King. Eventually having children who would become He-Man and She-Ra. She might even oppose the king until she finally falls for him (or he for her.)

As I said, Marlena Glenn (her last name obviously not a random choice for an astronaut) should be a female adventure hero like Flash Gordon on the planet Mongo, or Buck Rogers in the 25th Century.

I write New Pulp, stories in the fashion of the old Pulp novels and about adventure heroes of the past, Marlena of Eternia would make a great heroine all on her own right standing up there with some of the greats.

There might also be a romantic triangle between her, King Randor, and the man who would become Skeletor (in some stories he’s Randor’s brother, so this would really work).

As a writer “I have the Power” to create adventure stories like this. I may have let that power go to my head.

Kevin Paul Shaw Broden
Four Names of Professional Creativity

A Saturday morning thought – Star Wars.

Saturday morning thought:

Thinking of the different outfits Princess Leia wore in the original movies. Most people think of the basic white from the first movie, and then they go directly to the sexy Slave Girl Leia outfit.

But I like her dressed as the bounty hunter “Boushh”, even though you can’t see that it’s her. It is perhaps the most romantic of the outfits, because it shows the effort Leia goes to in order to save the man she loves.

Just my thought for a Saturday morning.

Silly late night comic book thought…

Silly comic book thoughts (not based on any ‘announcement’ or image released today).

If the modern day Batman was became Ra’s Al Ghul in a similar way to whats happening in the ARROW tv series; he would move the entire League of Assassins to Gotham. They would become Batman Inc. and he’d put at least one member on every street corner.

A week later the Joker would have killed half of them with Joker gas.

…Okay, I’m too tired. Going to bed now.

New Story: THE COP WHO WOULDN’T DIE

Anyone who follows me on facebook or twitter (or Google+) will know I recently released a new story as an ebook. I really hope to be doing this more often, but for now here’s a little something about this one.

This short story was almost more fun to write than the original novel CLOCKWORK GENIE.

Though it didn’t start off all that fun. I had begun by working up a sequel novel, but all the characters wanted their moment in the spot light and that resulted in distractions from the main plot of the book. So I pruned away some of those side lines and found a very beautiful flower, which I call:

THE COP WHO WOULDN’T DIE: A Clockwork Genie Story

Police Detective Whitney Manning escaped from the horrors of the crimes she witnessed nearly everyday into the fantasy worlds of her books. Then one day, fantasy became all too real when she met a girl with a power genie and her life would never be the same.

Having faced on of the most powerful beings on the planet, and survive battle with a dragon made of living stone, how can Detective Manning return to the everyday world of crime and murder?

She was off duty and wasn’t supposed to be there when the bullet struck her chest. Detective Whitney Manning should be dead.

THE COP WHO WOULDN’T DIE

This is the first short story in a series of stories taking place in the world of CLOCKWORK GENIE, and eventually will all be collected in an anthology.

The next story in the series will be about the handsome homicide Detective Marcus Lambert as he discovers more of the secrets his new wife’s family and the genie of the watch.

After this anthology is complete I will return to the second novel fresh.

To those who have read and enjoyed CLOCKWORK GENIE (which you can purchase at one of the links to the right), let me know which of characters from the book deserves their own short story.

Thank you all again for your support.

Kevin Paul Shaw Broden

Four Names of Professional Creativity

BLACK FEDORA – “The Man Who Stole Manhattan”

You have read the hero’s story, about how he saved the day and defeated the evil villain. Now it’s time to read the villain’s tale. Who is the man that is performing these most vile deeds?

You’ll get that answer and more in the pages of the Black Fedora.

Black Fedora is an anthology produced by New Pulp publisher Pro Se Productions with tales of the adversaries, or the evil ones, of the super villains.

It is my honor to stand alongside fellow authors B.C. Bell and Philip Drayer Duncan in these pages of crime, under the guiding hand of Tommy Handcock.

“The Man Who Stole Manhattan” is my submission to this collection about a villain who threatens the entire city for reasons known only to his dark heart.

If you pay close attention, you may discover connections to the hidden origins of Flying Glory.

Black Fedora is available in both paperback and ebook formats, at Amazon and Smashwords.

Give it a read and support your local bad guy.

More importantly, support your local author.

Kevin Paul Shaw Broden

Four Names of Professional Creativity

I can’t write comedy, and some how, that’s funny

I have never considered myself a comedy writer, but that isn’t to say that I don’t write comedy. Rather, I never set out to write comedy, and in so doing the comedy tends to write itself.

If any of that makes sense, I hope what follows will as well.

I am a writer of characters.

Usually, I have a rough outline of a plot, hardly a skeleton to build upon. I start with a simple idea, usually a question. I see something, or read about something, and ask “What if?” Lots of times it has to do with looking at something from a different angle.

A lot, or a few, notes go down next. But that all just sits in a pile and does nothing if there aren’t any characters to march through it and kick up the dirt. Otherwise, it’s just a garbage heap of useless words.

Just writing that paragraph gave me a simple idea. A Garbage Heap. What follows is finding the story, and the first question I ask is “What is it like working on a garbage heap?” You know, those people who take our trash to the dump, and those that sort through it. Some for recycling, and those who scrounge around the dump looking for things they can sell in order to survive. (I know old door nobs can bring a penny or two.) But the job isn’t interesting enough. So what if I changed the question: “What is life like for those who live on the garbage heap?” I think there is some drama in that, and maybe some comedy too.

(Almost forgot my blog’s topic there didn’t I?)

We’ll have to wait and see if I actually discover a story in garbage heap and expand upon it. I see a lot of drama, even depression, about the people living in lean-to huts atop or even inside the garbage mounds.

But is there comedy among that garbage and depression? If you find the right characters there are.

What if our story is about a teenage girl working along side her parents looking for scrap and selling what they can. She has a boyfriend, but when he shows up to take her on a date (what kind of date can there be on a scrap heap), she complains that he was cuter before he took a shower.

Okay, that might not be the funniest thing in the world. Like I said, I don’t write comedy. However, if I wrote this story completely out, I think our little Dust Bunny (yes, I just named the girl Dust Bunny. The boy’s name is Smudge, no, Kruntch ) would have a whole lot of funny things to say as she is clearly the only person on the garbage island that enjoys being there.

The point, if there is one, is that comedy like everything else in a story comes out of character. Creating a funny situation and dropping your characters into it doesn’t necessarily make it comedy.

Learn about your characters; find out what makes them tick, and what ticks them off. Don’t tickle them; annoy their pants off. They’ll tell you what’s funny when they start throwing mud back at you.

Maybe I will write this story sometime. Maybe set it on a garbage planet (this story is getting gout of hand). (Kruntch is out; the boy’s name is Smudge again. The letter K didn’t test well.)

Then we’ll discover if I can write comedy or not, and see if I am really worthy of being:

Kevin Paul Shaw Broden

Four Names of Professional Creativity (certainly not of comedy).

Darkness Approaches from under the Black Fedora…

As the sun sets upon this hot-as-hell day, and the shadows creep across the alleyways of our cities, criminals raise their heads to steal your Aunt Harriet’s silver candle sticks, or mad scientists wind up their giant robots to take over the world.

She never figured it out. Who’s aunt was she?

The villains who make the heroes…. heroic… are out and about, and soon they are about to get their day in the sun.

No, I’m not talking about DC Comic’s Forever Evil comic book event.

What I’m asking you to do is be careful and look inside the Black Fedora.

In this evening’s twilight I received word of the release of a New Pulp anthology by Pro Se Production entitled the Black Fedora will be released later this month (September, 2013).

I’ll have more to write about it as we get closer to the release. In the meantime, be sure to check under the cover for ancient monsters and alien invaders, the bad guys are about to get their day. Will the heroes survive?

Pleasant dreams.

Kevin Paul Shaw Broden
Four Names of Professional Creativity

Post San Diego Comic Con 2013 – #Mission818

Well, I’m back from ComicCon and survived being one in 130,000 people on the convention floor.

I won’t tell you how many conventions I’ve been too, and have only missed one in all that time, but what I can say is this may have been one of the most productive cons so far.

Over the next week I plan on writing short blogs about different parts of the con that I experienced. I hope it’s worth the reading.

Shannon and I road the Amtrak Train “Surfliner” down to San Diego and back home again each day. (We didn’t go for Sunday. We needed the rest.) It was a relaxing way to do it, and actually get some writing done. On Saturday we met someone at our hometown train station that was also going to Con, and saw again when we got back late that night. It turned out we had other connections, and this chance meeting may lead into some positive networking with companies down the road. We can only try.

Each day was crowded with people, and sometimes that can be frustrating when you’re trying to keep up with your partner salmon swimming up stream, but it is still fun.

The TV news kept going on about the costumes (or cosplay), but there was so much more to it than that. Though there were some really great costumes. The ones that really got to me were the families. Not just a group of people together, but families. A family that was dressed as Superman/Wonder Woman and Supergirl/Superboy. Another family that was the main pantheon of Star Wars characters. Do what you’re children love, and your children will do what you love.

As stated in my last blog we were going to avoid Hall H and Ballroom 20. However we did make one attempt to get into 20, Steven Moffat was there about the TV series SHERLOCK. The line which began at ground level near went up a long set of stairs and then Disneyland Lined back and forth. We spent 40 minutes in the line, but once the actual program began we knew we’d never make it inside. A friend of ours spent 3 hours in line for the same panel and still never got in.

We never even contemplated going to see DOCTOR WHO in Hall H. Not only getting in line itself can be bad, but also a lot of people decided to camp out in line or in the Hall itself once inside. The simple concept is that you go into see one panel even if you’re not interest in it and stay there until you see the panel you want. Sometimes if you sit in an earlier panel you might discover something new that interests you. Sounds like a good plan, but then you decide to do it for Hall H. Waiting 3 hours might be okay for some, but would you be willing to camp in the Hall our outside the convention center all night long? Well a lot of people did. Not me; no way!

Even avoiding the masses, we did end up in some very good panels. We sat in on one about writing for television and the experience in the “writer’s room.” It was fun that one of our friends was on the panel, would be even more fun if we were friends with the rest of the panel. We got in but the line beyond use couldn’t, this was a much smaller room.

Shannon really got a lot out of a panel on Digital Comics in Schools and Libraries. She’ll be writing her own blogs about that.

There were also a couple of spotlight panels that we attended. Those were cool to hear the people we look up to talk about their careers in their own words. I’ll be writing about one of those later. Of course it was also great to meet people on the floor, in artists alley, they we’ve worked with in the past.

We also attended the Writers’ Guild of America gathering, but could only stay for about half an hour, as we had to get to the train station.

It doesn’t sounds like a whole lot, but the little things are what matters. Each a small part of my #Mission818

We really had a good time.

More Con Blogs to follow.

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