patokon blog

Hello! It's me, patokon with an update on some of the work I've been doing lately. This year, my good friend Junya Hanada told me about his plan to open a guest house in Beppu which is about 3.5 hours away from Mifune where we both live. He also told me that he wanted me to design a series of cards featuring local little-known establishments that guests could choose in order to make their own personal itinerary. I was asked to handle design and illustration duties in addition to managing the volunteers who were students from various countries studying at Beppu's Asia-Pacific University. First, let me tell you about the guest house. It is called In Bloom Beppu  and is just a hop, skip, and a jump from Beppu Station. My friend Junya is one of the nicest guys you could ever meet and is doing his best to make In Bloom Beppu a great place to use as a home base for exploring Beppu. This is Junya showing me around the Hell Hot Springs.   This is In Bloom Beppu...

[Note: Check This $#!% Out was originally a seperate blog but is now a feature of patokon blog ] Everybody loves Harley! Right? She’s quirky and funny and petite (depending on who is pushing the pen) and gothish-ish and very naughty. She’s able to make us sympathize with that madman, The Joker just as Robin made the Batman more accessible. She was born in the 80’s animated Batman show and animated-world Harley is always much more fun than the “canon” comics Harley. So why did I buy Harley Quinn #0 written by Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiatti after I was so disappointed with the last time she had her own series? 4 names – Timm, Cooke, Hughes, and Kieth (that’s how you spell it!). More than anything I wanted to see how BruceTimm would interpret Harley’s recent costume. A page of that right there would be worth the cover price to me, a die-hard Timm fan. Darwyn Cooke is one of my all-time faves and has earned mega-respect from me for his Parker adaptations. Adam Hughes ...