Hermes
Press is best known for reprinting essential comic strips and
producing high quality History of Comics and Illustrators books. The
publisher has recently started to release new comics like Tails
and
Sparrow
and Crowe,
and got the Howard Chaykin to do an all new Buck
Rogers mini
series.
CBNAH
caught up with Alissa Fisher, Graphic Designer of Hermes Press to
discuss the history of the company, Howard Chaykin’s all new Buck
Rogers,
and much more.
CBNAH:
For people who are unfamiliar with Hermes Press, can you give us a
brief history of the company?
AF:
Hermes
Press is a specialized publishing company founded by our Publisher,
Daniel Herman, in 2000. Dan is an avid comic art collector, of all
genres and his love of comics lead to the idea of starting a
publishing company in order to preserve the classic material. The
first book he self produced was Gil
Kane:
The Art of Comics in
2001 and following that he produced Star
Hawks, and
here we are today! Troy and I jumped on board about 3-4 years ago and
since then we've increased our production schedule and taken on most
of the work.
CBNAH:
Can you tell us a bit about Howard Chaykin's all new Buck
Rogers?
AF:
Howard
Chaykin's Buck
Rogers is
a revival series comprised of four issues with a slightly different
take than the original, classic Buck
Rogers series
— a little more provocative through the language and plot. This
time around, a second civil war broke out in America that was pelaged
with environmental
disaster
and widespread tyranny that engulfed Europe, Asia and South America.
Buck awakens to the futuristic world, five centuries later, of a
barely populated America that is under siege by China.
CBNAH:
What are some recent and upcoming releases of the History of Comics
line?
AF:
Right
now, we don't have any new releases under the History
of Comics line,
but had intentions of doing a Funnies
in the Comics. I
can say if we publish it, it won't be for a long time though because
of our current production schedule.
CBNAH:
Any new information for a release date of Smokey
Stover and Spooky the Cat: The Collected Sundays?
AF:
Smokey
Stover has
been postponed for some time now. We have intentions of finishing the
book, it's just hard to say when due to some technicalities
surrounding interest in the title — the same goes for I
Spy.
It's very unfortunate though, because I receive numerous emails
regarding interest in both titles. Reprinting classic comic strips
has a very limited audience which makes publishing a title a little
frustrating at times because it needs to be financially viable for
us, as a company, to reprint.
CBNAH:
Outside of the Pre-Code comics and the first volume of the newspaper
strip, are there plans to release more volumes of Brenda
Starr, Reporter?
AF:
No,
sadly, we are not coming out with another Brenda Starr collection, at
least not any time soon.
CBNAH:
Can you tell us about Tails
and
Sparrow
and Crowe?
AF:
Tails
originated
as a web comic created by Ethan Young. In 2011, Ethan self-published
the collection of strips from his website and sent us a copy to look
over and ultimately publish. We were immediately drawn to his graphic
inking and over all style of the layout and agreed to publish Ethan's
work.
Tails
Book 1 is
a semi-autobiographical graphic novel written and illustrated by
Ethan Young, that tells the tale of Ethan, a quirky, hipster
cartoonist trying to make it in New York City, working at an animal
shelter. When the going gets tough, Ethan's side creation, Crusader
Cat, begins to interact with him in
effort
to help Ethan escape the heartache and stress of his everyday life.
Ethan created a character that is easily identifiable with that
evokes sympathy and hope for him to catch a break.
Ethan's
story does have it's funny moments when he gets revenge, of specific
characters, in his day dreams. It's a very enjoyable read with
fantastic art work. I did an interview with Ethan last year you
should check out — it's on our Tumblr account:
hermespress.tumblr.com
Sparrow
and Crowe originated
from creators David Accampo and Jeremy Roger's award winning, full
cast audio drama, podcast series called Wormwood,
it
ran for three seasons consisting of 97 episodes(available on iTunes
and wormwoodshow.com). Wormwood is a series about a former
psychologist, Dr.
Xander
Crowe, who had a terrible tragedy that sent him spiraling down a
dark pathway. After having a strange vision, Doctor Crowe is lead to
the hidden town of Wormwood, where shadows are lurking in every
corner and evil stains the souls of every inhabitant.
Jared
Souza, the comics' artist, got the job after submitting his fan art,
which was concept art for a comic that followed the podcast series.
From there, the idea of producing a comic that was a spin off of the
Wormwood
shows
came to fruition.
We
met the Sparrow
and Crowe crew
at the San Diego Comic Con in 2012 at an open portfolio review we
held at our booth — they pitched their idea and gave us a sample of
their comic and the rest is history!
Sparrow
and Crowe is
a five part mini series with Issue 4 coming out in November
exclusively on Comixology. Here is what's a little sneak peak about
what's going on:
The
Sparrow
and Crowe saga
continues in Issue 4 with Amanda
Marino, daughter of a Los Angeles mob boss, unwittingly conjured
forth an evil spirit, which took possession of her body. Now, under
the gun of Don Marino and armed with the Ring of Solomon, Doctor
Xander Crowe enacts a harrowing ritual to confront his old enemy, the
demon Adramelech, and expunge the spirit from Amanda’s wrecked
body. That is, of course, unless the devil has another trick up his
sleeve… or maybe even more than one...
If
you check out Issue 1 and 2 of Sparrow
and Crowe,
you'll see a few original pages Jared submitted at the end we put in
as extra art. I definitely suggest checking out the Wormwood
podcast
too! Sparrow and Crowe Issues 1-3 are available at Comixology.com
CBNAH:
Is there any title that you would recommend for somebody who isn't
familiar Hermes Press?
AF:
Hmm...
let's see. If you are a horror fan, since Halloween is around the
corner, I'd suggest Sparrow
and Crowe Issues
1-3 and the Sparrow
and Crowe Halloween Special,
which is great because it has a variety of artists and writers
putting their own spooky twist on Sparrow
and Crowe — definitely
a great
piece
to pick up! Also, the Famous Monsters of Filmland's Fear
Book Volume 1 when
the title is released in late October/November. If classics are more
up your ally, try Johnny
Hazard Volumes
1 and 2, and The
Phantom Dailies have
some good old fashioned humor, as well as, being one of the first
super hero comic series. If any of the readers have kids, Scratch9
is
fantastic! It's a comic about a cat who, through the work of a mad
scientist, is able to summon his nine lives! Scratch9
Cat Tails #1 is
a collection of stories based on the nine lives of Scratch — each
story has it's own theme ranging from Bektah, the mummy cat of Egypt,
the French feline, D'Argent, to a futuristic breed of superior cats
lead by IX. It's a really cute, fun read. Cat
Tails #2 is
coming out soon, so if you liked Cat
Tails #1,
you'll love the second edition!
CBNAH:
Are there any difficulties of transferring old comic strips or comic
books into the digital format?
AF:
Transferring
old strips to a digital format is rather easy, however, editing them
for the book can be the difficult part. I'll use The
Phantom as
an example — when we reproduce the dailies, although they are black
and white images, after being scanned into the computer, the color
scheme is in gray scale. To
get
the final black and white strips found in our books, we have to clean
out the gray matter out from the negative space and select the black
channel to bump up the curve to make the inked lines black again.
This sounds simple enough, which it can be, but we have to make sure
the original art is unaltered in the process. The same applies to the
colored strips, which are more tedious in editing. In some instances,
we have to partially redraw images due to torn pages, lack of
material, and most of all, poor printing quality. Over all, the
better the material the less we have to edit. More times than not,
since this material is very old, it is difficult to find in good
condition. We do have several contacts and
collectors
that provide us with fantastic material for The
Phantom Dailies
and Sundays and Buck
Rogers series,
and we thank them tremendously!
CBNAH:
What does the future hold for Hermes Press?
AF:
We
are expanding our collection of books and starting to collaborate
with Famous Monsters to reprint their annual editions, so we can only
go up from here! I'm currently working on The
Psychedelic Rock Art of Carl Lundgren, a
well-known Detroit, Michigan based artist, who is known for his
psychedelic rock posters as well as illustrating covers to novels for
publishing companies such as
Image
and Dark Horse, and is still active as an artist today. We hope to
get more projects like this in the future — it's been really fun
working on this type of book. Next years schedule should be equally
exciting, as we are close to announcing an all new comic title!
Also,
checkout Hermes Press at the official website:
http://www.hermespress.com/
On
Twitter: https://twitter.com/HermesPress
On
Tumblr : http://hermespress.tumblr.com/
On
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HermesPressPublishing
