Comic-Con is pretty cool so far. Hooking up with friends, drooling over expensive merchandise, laughing at my own age and nostalgia (I get all wispy when I see things like the Micronauts, which are these cool toys from my youth which I can’t afford now).
The best thing I picked up was a book — The Busy, Busy World of Richard Scarry — a biography of an artist / author whose work had an impact on me as a child. His best books are oversized, superdense with words and text, very innocently drawn, but definitely educational. I loved the details in his work. I loved the fact that there were always things going on on the page which were not referred to in the text. For me, a visual child, always, this was a special treat. Words and pictures can interact – this is a core principle of comics. It’s not simply illustration. It’s not merely writing. Comics happen when you multiply the two together!
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I was reading the biography last night. I got it from the booth of Bud Plant (a great comics and culture book dealer). The book is out of print on amazon, but they have it at budplant.com and they have it at the Con.
Unexpected things delight.
