Tag: comics

Creativity thrives on Free Comic Book Day!

Today, May 6, was annual national Free Comic Book Day!

Southern California Comics in Kearny Mesa held a big event celebrating the day, and I dropped by to see what I might see. (And to pick up a big bag of free comic books! Later arrivals were allowed to grab 15 comics. I have some reading to do!)

In the parking lot outside the store a number of small vendors were selling all sorts of pop culture collectibles, and independent artists were showcasing their original creations.

I wandered a bit and spoke to some of the friendly artists.

One thing that was obvious is these people are driven by dreams and ambition and a relentless passion to create. As an author of short fiction, I can relate.

No matter what level of success any artist might achieve, it’s good to remember these words by Frida Kahlo: “I paint flowers so they will not die.”

Every artist has the ability to work that magic.

I really like the work of Ruben Rosas. He does illustration and digital art. See some of his stuff here.

I learned there’s a group of artists who call themselves the Comicbook Artists of San Diego. The two guys who greeted me were super friendly. According to their website: CASD was founded with the intention of building a local community of comicbook artists to foster artistic growth and to showcase their artwork. They want to put San Diego on the artistic map!

More cool artists! These smiling humans are two of the creators of Accidental Aliens, a local comic art studio! Check them out here. A description of their 2nd Shift Volume 1 includes: When evil incarnate tears through San Diego, four fledgling superheroes band together…

Oh, look! It’s Horrorgasm! I once saw an exhibition of their art at the Comic-Con Museum here.

It appears Ronald McDonald has traveled to Free Comic Book Day from a galaxy far, far away.

Great cosplay. And an earnest pitch to check out the 60 Pages 14 Creative Teams 1 Big Punk Rock Comic Kickstarter page here!

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Trino’s World exhibition opens at Comic-Con Museum!

What is Trino’s World? It’s a world of cartoon fun that opened today at San Diego’s Comic-Con Museum in Balboa Park!

Trino is the “pen” name of popular, award-winning Mexican cartoonist José Trinidad Camacho. You might recognize some his wacky characters.

With his humorous, often irreverent art, Trino both lampoons and celebrates Mexican life. I noticed that his subjects include lucha libre, movies, soccer, politics, ordinary people…

The funny thing is, his humor can provoke laughter from just about everybody. His wry illustrations can resonate with many. Human foibles seem to be universal.

The cool artwork on display for Trino’s World comes from the artist’s personal collection. This is the first exhibition of Trino art in a United States museum.

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Sunday morning walk around Comic-Con!

It’s Sunday, the last day of Comic-Con 2022. Things are beginning to wind down a little bit, but thousands are still enjoying the annual pop culture convention.

In the morning fans were heading to the San Diego Convention Center, and many families had driven in from around the city on what is typically a more family-oriented day.

The offsite lines aren’t as bad as Saturday, but they’re still fairly long. I’m afraid I didn’t have the patience to wait. I like to keep moving. Perhaps I’ll go on one more walk around Comic-Con this afternoon and analyze the situation again.

This is what I saw…

People head in toward the San Diego Convention Center on Sunday, the last day of Comic-Con.

Congratulations Rachel Smythe! Eisner Award winner for best webcomic.

Cool cosplay!

The IMDboat has already wrapped up. Or, I should say, is unwrapping.

These friendly folks are launching JAM. It’s a spoken word app for your phone. You can record or listen to mini-podcasts about a minute long! “Your story. Your voice.” Brilliant idea!

Check out the JAM homepage if you’d like to join!

Here comes Batman. He forgot to use a grappling wire.

Creative steampunk and flames cosplay!

UH OH! Looks like the dragon escaped from the House of the Dragon’s castle.

No, it’s just friendly T. rex and his buddy.

As the morning progressed, the crowd heading toward the convention center grew.

Walking during Comic-Con, a few minutes before some of the outdoor activations open.

A somewhat longish line at the Abbott Elementary offsite.

Minimalist cosplay. Nezuko’s box.

Another smaller box, with a head poking out of it.

The Dragon Ball offsite gave away lots of great swag!

Hela and her small red sidekick.

I was tossed a tiny rubber ducky that squeaks!

If you’d like to view my coverage of Comic-Con so far, which includes hundreds of cool photographs, click here!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Another cool batch of cosplay photographs!

As usual, there’s a whole lot of cosplay to enjoy during Comic-Con this year!

Every imaginable character from popular entertainment (movies, television, comic books, video games…) can be seen roaming the streets and sidewalks in downtown San Diego. Most of the outdoor cosplay is found in the Gaslamp or around the convention center.

I passed hundreds of awesome costumes yesterday and this morning. Every so often poses were struck and my camera shutter clicked!

Star Wars cosplay at Comic-Con.

Mighty Thor.

Maleficent.

Good old Captain America.

Sailor Moon.

Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver.

Spider-Gwen.

Zenitsu Agatsuma of Demon Slayer.

A cool Spider-Man family at Comic-Con!

Another Cap and Spidey. Two very popular cosplay characters.

Chun-Li from Street Fighter.

Who ya gonna call? Ghostbusters!

Black Widow and Hawkeye.

Princess Peach.

Iron Patriot.

A very scary Batman.

Captain Marvel.

MTV astronaut!

The second Indiana Jones I’ve seen this year at Comic-Con.

Riddler has a diabolical scheme.

It isn’t every day you see flappers at a con.

Ciel Phantomhive.

Squid Game.

Dr. Artemus Peepers.

The Umbrella Academy cosplay.

Uh, oh. I didn’t catch who these folks are. Mad Max? Leave a comment if you know please!

Old school Hawkeye.

Here’s another one where I need help. Everyone knows Captain Marvel on the right. Who’s that on the left?

Jedi and his young Padawan practice using the Force on me. I’m an easy target.

How many Lokis are there in the multiverse, anyway?

Doctor Strange has been stripped of magic. He’s gonna use his fists.

Butterfly Lady of Children International uses her smile superpower to help kids in poverty.

Chainsaw Man looking for devils to saw.

Cloud Strife.

Vision.

Doctor Strange casts a magic spell!

If you’d like to view my coverage of Comic-Con so far, which includes hundreds of cool photographs, click here!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Hemingway in Comics previewed at Comic-Con Museum!

There’s a modest exhibit at the Comic-Con Museum that previews a much larger exhibition that is coming later this year. Those visiting the museum to see Spider-Man during Comic-Con should head down to the lower level and check out Hemingway in Comics!

I love reading literature, and Hemingway is one of my favorite authors, so I was pleasantly surprised when my curious eyes spied this comic art today.

The styles that are represented are quite varied, and the fictional stories involving the celebrated American author can seem fantastic and implausible, but that is art! And it’s all very cool!

I really look forward to seeing the full exhibition when it opens at the Comic-Con Museum this coming September.

Read the sign below to learn more….

If you’d like to view my coverage of Comic-Con so far, which includes hundreds of cool photographs, click here!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Cosplay before Comic-Con Preview Night!

Cosplayers converged in the Gaslamp this morning, the day of Comic-Con Preview Night, to take part in an MTS press conference.

2022 Comic-Con is right around the corner, and downtown San Diego is abuzz. My camera is now in high gear.

Check out these cosplaying members of the Science Fiction Coalition!

Dude Vader has become a San Diego and Comic-Con fixture over the years. Christopher Canole is a super nice guy, too!

It’s Ms. Marvel and Alvin, here to save the day!

Arwen Evenstar is joined by an elf friend from Middle Earth.

Spider-Man and Moon Knight join forces for a photograph!

Supervillains in San Diego better make your escape now.
Here comes Ms. Marvel again with a steampunky character.

A classic Spidey pose!

If you’d like to view my coverage of Comic-Con so far, which includes hundreds of cool photographs, click here!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Comic books on a trolley! Anime on a bus!

If you’d like to read comic books on the San Diego Trolley, there’s a special car just for you!

The latest Amazon Prime Video trolley wrap for 2022 Comic-Con states: Comic Crushing – See Where It Takes You.

Get on this car, dive into a big stack of comic books, and you’ll be taken to the next station!

The San Diego Trolley will provide a Special Event Line all during Comic-Con. I posted information concerning that here.

And check out this cool anime wrap on an MTS bus that promotes Crunchyroll! Anime is for everyone!

If you’d like to view my coverage of Comic-Con so far, which includes hundreds of cool photographs, click here!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

World premiere Spider-Man exhibit opens!

The world premiere of Spider-Man: Beyond Amazing opened yesterday at the Comic-Con Museum in San Diego!

The extraordinary exhibition, which occupies nearly all of the Comic-Con Museum’s large first floor, celebrates the history of Spider-Man.

Visitors can see dozens of pieces of original art used in the creation of the comic books, and important props from many of Spider-Man’s immensely popular movies. The superhero’s appearance on television and in video games is also documented.

I spent a full hour today just reading the many displays and viewing incredible, historic artwork.

Originally drawn from the imaginations of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, Spider-Man has evolved over time, as new writers and artists have built on Spidey’s complex story. Societal norms and comic book sensibilities have shifted over the decades, but one thing has been fairly consistent. Spider-Man represents a youthful, optimistic “everyman” hero, who copes with life’s ordinary problems while battling fantastic villains.

A good crowd had already arrived as the museum opened at ten o’clock this morning, and I saw numerous families and excited kids–many wearing Spider-Man shirts and costumes. There are many opportunities to take selfies, and the atmosphere created inside the dynamic exhibition is truly exciting.

Walking through, I felt my old passion for Spider-Man flaring again. The exhibition makes it obvious why the wall-crawler remains one of the all-time favorite pop culture icons!

During Comic-Con, a shuttle bus will run between the San Diego Convention Center and the Comic-Con Museum. I encourage Comic-Con attendees to come up to Balboa Park and check out the exhibition. It’s well worth the time and effort!

Spider-Man: Beyond Amazing will continue at the Comic-Con Museum through the end of 2022.

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Batman Family and Villains street art!

Ready to see some awesome Batman street art? Check this out!

A long fence and gate in Logan Heights was painted earlier this year with characters from the Batman Family and with assorted members of the Batman Rogues Gallery.

The spray painted artwork is by prolific San Diego muralist Fizix (@alexfizix), whose more ordinary name is Alex Julian.

You can see this great comic book inspired street art on 33rd Street, just south of Broad Avenue.

The long mural by Fizix actually continues up the fence and onto Broad Avenue, but the subject becomes something quite different, so I figured I’d post those photographs on a separate blog, which will be coming up shortly.

If you like this comic book-style street art, you’ll like another mural painted by Fizix several years ago with even more superhero and pop culture characters. You can enjoy photos of that amazing mural by clicking here!

Looking from left to right along the long Batman-themed mural by San Diego artist Fizix.
Penguin by artist Fizix.
Catwoman by artist Fizix.
Batman by artist Fizix.
Bane by artist Fizix.
Batwoman by artist Fizix.
Poison Ivy by artist Fizix.
Continuing left to right…
Robin by artist Fizix.
Joker by artist Fizix.
Harley Quinn by artist Fizix.
Red Hood by artist Fizix.

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Power Avengers beat Darkula in Chula Vista!

In Chula Vista, the dastardly supervillain Darkula has been defeated, thanks to the superhero Power Avengers!

Don’t believe me? The exciting comic book story fills the walls of the Energy Station at the South Chula Vista Library!

When local sixth grade school students enter the Energy Station, with its action-packed walls, they might be inspired to become real life heroes. At the Energy Station makerspace they learn about energy conservation and sources of renewable energy, such as solar or wind power.

This unique City of Chula Vista project, created several years ago in partnership with San Diego Gas and Electric, aims to inspire the next generation to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics or STEM. Having a pipeline of future STEM workers is essential to the health and growth of our regional innovation economy, which depends on technical expertise in fields such as electrical engineering, biomedical research, and wireless communications…

No matter what a kid’s talents or interests might be, at the South Chula Vista Library they can learn how to create a brighter future and thwart the menace of Darkula . . . as members of the Power Avengers!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!