During the Baltimore Comic Con we tried out a do-it-yourself paper milk carton, customized with Blue Milk Special imagery. The idea and template came from T. Gatto, one of our biggest fans and a frequent commentator. The one demo version I made before the show (very fiddly by the way) proved that I should have printed onto heavy card stock instead of thin for better results.

Interest was greater than we expected and the 5 prints I had made disappeared quickly. Now we offer the BMS milk carton template free to download as a PDF so that anyone interested can have a go. If you have any suggestions for new artwork to replace existing sides of the box then shoot us an email or leave a comment. We rushed to throw it together and I’m sure it could look better!

Also, to those that have emailed us concerning getting copies of the BMS promo cards mailed to them, don’t worry, I have your emails and I will respond. We’ve just been completely overwhelmed lately. We still have plenty left and we will need major help at NYCC in order to get rid of them all. Volunteers? Hmmm? *yoda laugh*

New to Blue Milk Special? Start reading from the beginning!

Vote for Blue Milk Special

What a great show! Baltimore Comic Con once again did an amazing job hosting one of the very best conventions that still focuses on comics and their creators! This year was even more cram packed with talent and foot traffic reflected it. something like 15,000 people attended over the weekend and kids got in for free! A big thank you to the organizers for making it happen and taking good care of us throughout the weekend.

We had no idea so many BMS fans would show up. We were overwhelmed with the response on Saturday and it was a real thrill to meet all who were able to attend. We learned many of you read the strip but have not posted any comments. Hopefully that will soon change now you know us. And our apologies if we looked like we were planning to attend Baltimore’s Zombie March on Saturday night. That wasn’t makeup. We were seriously exhausted. We left our two promotional banners at home in the rush to get up to Baltimore and had to drive all the way back to get them. Causing us to get back to Baltimore at about 2:30 AM when we should have been settled by 9 PM. After that little bit of unneeded stress we were able to settle down and enjoy the show on Saturday morning and walk past a huge line that had formed 3 hours before the show. We also introduced the strip to many new potential readers. The number of people who came to our table having been referred by word of mouth at the show was astonishing to us. We’re so glad people like our work even if we do half ass it a lot of the time! Below are some of the awesome sketches that Leanne drew for fans as well as a shot of us at the booth with a Biggs Darklighter action figure kindly gifted to us by Xenon, one of our regular readers.

New to Blue Milk Special? Start reading from the beginning!

Vote for Blue Milk Special

Let’s review the Convention Center Floor Plan downloaded from this little R2 unit. You’ll be required to maneuver down these narrow aisles to table A54 on the far wall. We expect the aisles to be heavily congested. Watch for enemy fighters. Oh, and please no proton torpedoes.

Come see us for our first of only two public appearances this year! Collect the two exclusive FREE promo postcards that went like cheese on crackers at Celebration V just two weeks ago! Get a BMS Star Wars sketch card of the character of your choosing. Oh, and we’re still looking for costumed helpers for dissemination of the FREE postcards to attendees. Drop us an email or just stop by the table.

Sketch card $20 (example pictured to the right – includes gray tones)
Pencils $20 (9×12″ page)
Inks $30 (9×12″ page)
Inks with gray tones shading $45 (9×12″ Page)

More examples of Leanne’s commissions can be found on her website.

New to Blue Milk Special? Start reading from the beginning!

Vote for Blue Milk Special

Check out this great photo from BMS reader, Adam. Coffee drinking Vader LIVES!

And don’t forget…

Baltimore Comic Con is being held this coming weekend (Sat-Sun August 28-29). It will be our first show of the year and your chance to meet us in person. We will have the promo cards (seen above) available for FREE to everyone who attends and we will be doing sketches (not for free), but still worth considering… surely?

Sketch card $20 (example pictured to the right – includes gray tones)
Pencils $20 (9×12″ page)
Inks $30 (9×12″ page)
Inks with gray tones shading $45 (9×12″ Page)

More examples of Leanne’s commissions can be found on her website.

New to Blue Milk Special? Start reading from the beginning!

Vote for Blue Milk Special

Baltimore Comic Con is being held this coming weekend (Sat-Sun August 28-29). It will be our first show of the year and your chance to meet us in person. We will have the promo cards (seen above) available for FREE to everyone who attends and we will be doing sketches (not for free), but still worth considering… surely?

Sketch card $20 (example pictured to the right – includes gray tones)
Pencils $20 (9×12″ page)
Inks $30 (9×12″ page)
Inks with gray tones shading $45 (9×12″ Page)

More examples of Leanne’s commissions can be found on her website.

New to Blue Milk Special? Start reading from the beginning!

Vote for Blue Milk Special

Just thought I’d preview the latest pinup piece for my original Super Hero book, Once Upon a Super Hero that will be coming out early October. This stunning pinup by artist Mike Maihack really captures the spirit of the book and its central character. It’s a fairy tale story about a “princess” who doesn’t want the slipper… metaphorically speaking that is.

We will have the book with us for New York Comic Con and it will be available to purchase online in advance. There are more pinups at the website. Leanne is working on the front cover this week. After the issue debuts we will begin work together on a series of adventures starring the main characters. I don’t want to give away too much. I’d rather entice you to check out the 8 page preview and information on the website.

New to Blue Milk Special? Start reading from the beginning!

Vote for Blue Milk Special

Notice anything different about Han? Things are changing as we start towards the final run of side stories before The Empire Strikes Back. Splinter of the Mind’s Eye will start the first week of September, with TESB following at the end of October. Someone asked if we were going to handle the Ord Mantell Bounty Hunter in BMS, and the answer is YES, it is our intention to work him in before TESB begins. However, for continuity reasons, he should appear directly before TESB. This is due to Han Solo’s comment at the start of the film which implies the Ord Mantell encounter was a recent event.

Hope you like the photo of the Shadow Stormtrooper from Star Wars: Celebration V. Both he and Smoking Jawa (photos please!!) did BMS a great service over the weekend by handing out Blue Milk Special promotional cards to passersby, and sittersdown (as pictured). All the promo cards were given out! We thought 2000 FREE promo cards would end be a lot, as we’ve had trouble giving things out (even for free) at comic cons in the past. Evidently it helps to be at a Star Wars specific show with dedicated volunteers in awesome costumes. We will have an additional 2000 promo cards (the same type given out at Celebration V) at Baltimore Comic Con on Sat-Sun August 28-29 and New York Comic Con on Fri-Sun October 8-10. So there is another chance for folks to pick a couple up. Speaking of costumes and Celebration V, we hope to see some photos from the event in the next few days, so please share your links.

You may also have noticed that we are now only using one WebComic listing site and have dropped the others. Please only vote for us at TopWebComics.com as it is the only site whose maintenance and policing we have faith in. Lately we’ve seen too many WebComics get away with cheating on the smaller listing sites and it makes participation with those sites seem pointless. We hope this will make it easier for you to continue to vote for us daily.

Oh hey, I almost forgot. Remember a while back I posted about my comic book project? It’s now titled Once Upon a Super Hero, and is slated for early October. We will have it with us for New York Comic Con and it will be available to purchase online in advance. I’ve revamped the website which has an 8 page preview along with some new pinup pieces by some great artists. Leanne is working on the front cover this week. After the issue debuts we will begin work together on a series of adventures starring the main characters. I don’t want to give away too much. I’d rather entice you to check out the 8 page preview and information on the website. So, if you’d like to try my other work and want to get a taste of what Leanne and I are cooking up then head on over to www.onceuponasuperhero.com. Also, please start following Once Upon a Super Hero on Facebook while you’re at it.

Vote for Blue Milk Special

Greedo’s Cousins are joined by Boba Fett in their hunt for revenge upon Han Solo. We will endeavor to surprise you as this short story arc unfolds over the next couple of weeks.

Star Wars: Celebration V is now officially over. We have to thank Joshua (Shadow Stormtrooper) and Paul (Smoking Jawa) for going above and beyond that of ordinary readers by putting aside time while in their costumes and without to hand out Blue Milk Special promotional cards at the event. And to everyone who helped them, we thank you! We hoped everyone who attended had a fantastic time and we envy you all greatly. We hope to see some photos from the event in the next few days, so please share your links.

I suppose the biggest news was that the Return of the Jedi BluRay release next year will include the deleted scene featuring Darth Vader calling out to Luke through the Force while Luke sits in a cave on Tatooine putting the finishing touches on his lightsaber. It ignites with a powerful THX surround sound thrum that caused the Celebration V audience to roar with almost cringe worthy excitement. I was thrilled too. Hard not to be when the sight followed by the sound of the lightsaber was so powerful and… well… COOL! But the guy in the audience roaring “YEAH!!!!!!!!!” just makes me laugh every time I watch this clip. See the video above. Reminds me of the crazy Ronnie James Dio fan at the Black Sabbath signing a couple years ago.

Vote for Blue Milk Special

If you’ve been reading the strip then you’ll be familiar with our version of Jabba the Hutt… or Jabba Declan as we call him. Just to recap: George Lucas originally filmed a scene with Han Solo and Jabba the Hutt for Star Wars in 1976. He had planned to use special effects to replace the stand in (played by Declan Mulholland) with a more monstrous appearance, however the money and the effects just didn’t happen and so the scene was omitted from the final cut. I always felt this original scene worked better than the later CGI re-insertion for the Special Edition. I like to imagine Declan as simply one of Jabba’s top cronies, despite the fact Han addresses him as Jabba. In any case, for BMS we tried something of a “what if” when we did our Docking Bay 94 Jabba scenes using the Declan version and passing him off as the REAL Jabba. Long story short, we liked something about this take on Jabba who was uniquely our own, much like our Biggs is unique to BMS. This version will be sticking around for a while.

Greedo’s cousins were a lot of fun to write. I came up with this next series of strips early this year and they would have concluded our Interquel material between Star Wars and the Holiday Special. We sat on these strips for a while but finally they’re making their debut. Without them there would simply be no new strips for the rest of this month. Life has caught up to us again and that means putting together the necessary strips for Splinter of the Mind’s Eye and, inevitably, The Empire Strikes Back is going to take significant time to prepare. Thus, “Greedo’s Cousins” is a story arc that we hope will keep our most devoted readers happy for the meantime.

This new story arc and its direction will become clearer next week when the other key players are introduced to the story: Boba Fett, Han and Chewie.

Star Wars: Celebration V has begun. Although we couldn’t make the show, both Joshua (Shadow Stormtrooper) and Paul (Smoking Jawa) are there with the Rebel Legion and the 501st Legion doing their part to hand out our exclusive FREE promo cards. If you are attending the show PLEASE look for them and say hi. It’s not easy wandering around in a costume and a mask for long periods at a time and being stopped for photographs every few feet. Let them know you’re a BMS reader and pick up a free promo card.

Paul: I’ll be at the Rebel Legion booth twice each day (thurs and fri). The “Smoking Jawa” will be the 5:30-7 pm appearances. Will have both on me as far as Postcards/Flyers….Bring family and friends and get some. Cameras if you have them. I’m also gonna be all over (LFL family room, RL/501 pool party,RL photo shoot, The wretched Hive Photo shoot, R2 builders room throughout CV I’m sure, etc.)

If you will be attending Celebration V please don’t forget to share your photos with our Facebook fan page.

Still want to get your hands on a promo BMS card? A second batch of will be on hand at Baltimore Comic Con on Sat-Sun August 28-29 and New York Comic Con on Fri-Sun October 8-10. We will be at both shows and may have a few other Blue Milk Special goodies for those who don’t want us to feel lonely and dejected.

Vote for Blue Milk Special

You thought you’d seen the last of the Holiday Special, but consider THIS our encore. Something completely different begins on Friday and will last for the next couple of weeks. You may have seen the last of some of the regular costumes so be prepared for a visual change too.

On another note, we just sent off an order for a second batch of our exclusive Blue Milk Special promotional postcards. These are only available at our convention appearances this year, including Star Wars: Celebration V in Florida this weekend. We can not attend Celebration V, however we will be represented by the awesome Joshua (Shadow Stormtrooper) and Paul (Smoking Jawa).

Paul: I’ll be at the Rebel Legion booth twice each day (thurs and fri). The “Smoking Jawa” will be the 5:30-7 pm appearances. Will have both on me as far as Postcards/Flyers….Bring family and friends and get some. Cameras if you have them. I’m also gonna be all over (LFL family room, RL/501 pool party,RL photo shoot, The wretched Hive Photo shoot, R2 builders room throughout CV I’m sure, etc.)

If you will be attending Celebration V please don’t forget to share your photos with our Facebook fan page.

Still want to get your hands on a promo BMS card? A second batch of will be on hand at Baltimore Comic Con on Sat-Sun August 28-29 and New York Comic Con on Fri-Sun October 8-10. We will be at both shows and may have a few other Blue Milk Special goodies for those who don’t want us to feel lonely and dejected.

Vote for Blue Milk Special