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LudHughes

Old, Tired, and Cranky
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Whoa… 

It's been awhile since I've written a journal entry, hasn't it? Since November, it seems-- it's been a crazy roller coaster ride at the "grown-up" job, and it's going to end in one more day. My entire department just got laid off at the beginning of June; everything we did is being outsourced to an agency in Baltimore, Maryland. 15 people in all… Seven immediately were shown the door, and the rest of us got to show the Baltimore people what we did, and we're done on June 30.

I had only been with the company for only 5 years; others had been there for 13 to 35 years. Considering how long I've been in various stages of graphic design and production, this wasn't my first rodeo when it came to layoffs, but for the longer-tenured folks, this was a devistating punch to the gut. Now, to be honest, the writing had been on the wall for almost a full year-- our parent company haven't been happy with the losses we were taken, and our customer age range were in their late 50s and later, meaning our profit base was shrinking faster and faster, and not enough new customers were coming our way. Eventually it was all going to come to a screeching halt.

Now, I won't give the name of the place I work for various reasons (*cough* lawsuit), but that means right now, I don't have a continuing source of income, hence, it's time to go job hunting. This also means that I currently don't have much on my plate to keep me busy. Of course I've been drawing on a regular basis, but I haven't taken the time to scan and upload the piles of sketches that's next to my computer. Problem is, my computer finally gave up the ghost around last Christmas-- I've been keeping up with things digitally with my trusty iPad and my work computer, which I no longer have 'cause of the whole layoff thing. It's now time to get a new computer ASAP…

Once that's done, I'll be posting stuff like wildfire, and I'll finally give the call for commission work (NOT YET!!! Too soon! Let me get things straightened out first!).

So… Thought I let you kids know what was going on. It's gonna be crazy for a while longer, but I hope things get much better soon.

Fingers crossed...

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Man, this is a hard one to hear about...

Jeremy Dale, creator of Skywald, died on November 3, 2014 at the young age of 35. He leaves behind a grieving family, including his young wife Kelly, who always traveled with him to numerous conventions as a fellow fan of comics.

It was not that long that Jeremy had his greatest success in comics with Skyward, a critical and immediate hit...

Just last year I was lucky enough to get a Phantom Lady sketch from him; give me a moment and I'll post it. Give me a moment to wrap my head around this sudden loss of talent.

Too soon... It's just too soon.
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Hey! Yes, I'm still alive; I ended up taking the month off due to other priorities. Don't worry… I'll be back with more stuff soon!

I discovered this morning that long-time artist of both Timely/Marvel and Archie Comics Stan Goldberg died from a stroke on August 31. I got to meet him almost 20 years ago at a small convention in Pittsburgh, where he did a sketch of both Betty and Veronica for me. I'm currently cursing myself for letting that sketch go years back...

I may have waxed poetic about Stan and his unique relationship with fellow Archie legend Dan DeCarlo in the past: to me it always seemed that Stan had the misfortune (or opportunity, the case may be) to follow Dan throughout their careers-- Stan took over as artist on Marvel's Millie the Model after Dan left to work full time for Archie in the late 1950's, and stayed as Millie's primary artist until her cancellation in the early 1970's. Then Stan went to Archie Comics becoming the company's chief artist after Dan's firing from Archie Comics due to his lawsuit over Josie and the Pussycats.

But Stan was a major force for Marvel's early years as the company's production artist, handling house ads, and being the company's cover colorist starting with the company back when they were "Timely Comics", throughout the "Atlas" period, and into the "Marvel age", handling the early days of Spider-Man, Hulk, Iron Man, and the Fantastic Four. And he drew a lot of the teen and humor titles as well, not only Millie the Model, but Patsy Walker and Kathy "the Teenage Tornado" as well.

Stan's career at Archie was a long one as well, becoming principal artist for Archie's titular comic, as well as Betty and Me, which then became simply Betty. Stan handled the art chores on such classic comics as "Archie Meets the Punisher" with the late, great John Buscema, as well as what would eventually be called "The Married Life"-- the what-if adventures of Archie marrying Veronica, then Betty. 

I'm gonna miss you, Stan...
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Hello!
It's been a while, but believe me, I'm doing my best to get back to drawing fun stuff again, but my "grown-up" work has been expanding over the last few months, and that's been keeping me very busy. Things are beginning to slow down, and I've been drawing stuff lately… honest, I have!  ;-)

One of things I'm in the middle of doing is keeping the fun stuff separate from my "grown-up" work. I don't know if any of you have checked it lately, but I've taken down my ludhughes.com site. I've noticed that people have trouble that the graphic designer they've worked with for years also draws some wild & crazy stuff. So I'm in the process of creating multiple web sites: one for the "grown-up" work, which DOES pay most of the bills; and one for the stuff you guys know and love, and asking for commissions. If many of you noticed, I haven't been doing commissioned work for a while, simply because the "grown-up" work has been keeping me THAT busy!

Last month, I've created a new domain: www.lud-works.com. This will be the location for the world's crankiest artist, namely me! If you hop on it right away, you'll see that nothing's been done yet ('cause I'm THAT BUSY!), but rest assured, it will be bustling with tons of artwork you can buy and commission to your hearts content! Heck, I've finally set up a new email address: lud@lud-works.com. You can send me a note right now, but I'll tell you I'm too damn busy right now! Think I'm kidding…? I've just finally got it installed on my trusty iPad, so I'll answer you immediately, unless I'm catching up on sleep because I'M THAT DAMN BUSY!!!

BTW, if you don't know, I'm also on Tumblr: ludhughes.tumblr.com. Not so much on Twitter, but I do pop in once in awhile: twitter.com/ludhughes.

New artwork will be appearing after Memorial Day…
Let me sleep now!
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Yikes...

1 min read
Geez-- go on a business trip; follow with a three-day vacation... CHAOS!!!

It's like the world chooses to go insane when I'm on the road!

Oh, yeah... I'm back.

wooo....
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Featured

Hey! It's a Journal Entry! by LudHughes, journal

R.I.P. Jeremy Dale by LudHughes, journal

R.I.P. Stan Goldberg... by LudHughes, journal

Separating the fun from the serious... by LudHughes, journal

Yikes... by LudHughes, journal