I seems appropriate that I post my first entry just in time the San Diego Comic-Con. I chatted with John 'JG' Roshell earlier this week. We talked about Comic-Con, 9thWonders.com, and the online graphic novels. Here is part one of the interview.
9th Wonders: First of all, thank you for taking time out of your crazy schedule to chat with me.
JG: Absolutely! Thanks for asking. It's funny, in comics, the letterer/designer is way, way down the interview food chain list, but this Heroes thing has suddenly made a whole different realm of people interested in what I do.
9th Wonders: You mentioned you're a letterer/designer. What's your official job title, and where do you work?
JG: I started working at Comicraft before it was Comicraft -- just Richard Starkings and I lettering in his apartment -- in 1992, right out of college. I now work from home in Santa Barbara, CA. We're too small of a company to have any "official" titles, but I've become known as "The Secret Weapon" because I kind of do everything -- lettering, logos, websites, book collections and (my favorite) font creation.
9th Wonders: So you're a jack of all trades. Your title could be "jack"!
JG: john "jack" "jg" roshell.
9th Wonders: I think "Secret Weapon" sounds much cooler. It's obvious you have an amazingly fun work environment
JG: well, it's really just me & the dog most of the time, but I've had a great working relationship with Richard -- we really feed off each other's creativity, but we're not so close in proximity that we get sick of each other. Plus, my job is always evolving -- we started out as a pure comic lettering studio, which I got burned out on pretty quick. Somehow we managed to convince people we could also design logos and book trades, so I started doing a ton of that. I designed pretty much all of Marvel's books in the mid to late 90s.
9th Wonders: Have you met a lot of comic book artists?
JG: Yeah, in terms of having worked with them, definitely. But it's funny "working" with people in comics -- you can e-mail and talk to people daily on the phone for years without ever meeting in person.
Comic-con is usually the one opportunity we have to meet in person, face to face.
9th Wonders: Have you been attending those every year? and when was your first one?
JG: I went the first year I started working for Richard -- it was the summer of '93. I think I've only missed one since then.
9th Wonders: I imagine then you were at last year's Comic-Con when Heroes premiered its pilot episode. Did you see it then?
JG: No, I didn't -- I rarely get out from behind our booth to see any of the seminars. I'd seen it on DVD before that, though. In fact, that's still the only episode I've seen...
9th Wonders: The DVD is being released on August 28. You can catch up before the start of the next season, September 24! Will you be involved at all in Heroes stuff at Comic-Con or will you be manning your booth the whole time?
JG: Nobody's asked, at least not yet! I plan to be at the Comicraft booth (#2106 -- on the red carpet across from DC) pretty much full time. So if the Heroes booth gets too crazy, stop by, say hi, and check out our sci-fi comic book "Elephantmen". We've also got a couple of art prints by Tim Sale, and he will be signing there as well.
Hey, thanks for this interview, idallia! I just found another one about the talented Mr. Roshell (WebmasterJG) when searching for more about the Comic-Con HEROES Lunchbox: http://www.balloontales.com/interviews/heroes
