Gallery: These DIY Comic Makers Are the Heart of Comic-Con
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Every year, Comic-Con gets bigger. And every year, the same refrain echoes: Hollywood has taken over, and *the Machine* has devoured Comic-Con's *soul* like some IP-licensing Galactus. (Caveat: this is not a very catchy refrain.) And sure, judging from the Hall H panel lineup, it would be easy to think that big-budget blockbusters have displaced the art of comic books. But while the banners festooning San Diego's Gaslamp Quarter celebrate Comic-Con as a celebration of "the popular arts," the lifeblood of of the show is still comics. Specifically, it's the Small Press Pavilion, that section of the Convention Center show floor where mostly independent illustrators, writers, and craftspeople gather to show their work to the world. These aren't the names that get tossed around in comic-book-shop conversations, or the books that show up on bestseller lists. Yet they're as passionate and driven as any of the most popular comics writers and artists--they simply just engage their passions at night, after they get home from their day jobs, and self-publish their own work. For many of these creators, Comic-Con is the big show, that single burst of limelight that helps sustain their comic-book dreams for the rest of the year. On the press-focused Preview Night, before Comic-Con's official Thursday opening, we headed to the small press area to talk with some of them. __*Above:*__ Neil Segura & Ray Mendivil, [*Forever Freshman*](http://foreverfreshmancomic.blogspot.com/) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Band camp. Social awkwardness. High school. When you have 20 years of friendship and embarrassing stories to draw on, how could you *not* work together on a semi-autobiographical comic book? Segura and Mendivil's shared Orange County adolescence provide all the material they need for *Forever Freshman*, a *Wonder Years*-style look back at teenage shenanigans. Mendivil's the writer and Segura's the artist, although both of them are still moonlighting. "It wasn't until we started making our own comic book that I got a real appreciation for the storytelling involved," Segura says. They submitted the first *FF* to Comic Con in 2011 and were accepted to the small press area, and have come each subsequent year with a new issue. Day jobs complicate matters, but Mendivil maintains that they're going for the big guns this year: "Two issues! Look out!" 
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Claudia Aguirre and Eva Cabrera, [Boudika Comics](http://www.boudikacomics.com/) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- When you're a queer female artist living in Mexico, comics aren't the easiest path to take. "We don't have many women creators in Mexico," Aguirre says, "and the very few that are there do children's illustration. The male creators are incredibly sexist, and don't take you seriously, so we tried to feature strong women and represent the queer community as well--to show other people that we can do our own stories." The two met five years ago at a convention in their home city of Monterrey, and became friends and occasional collaborators; last year, they officially joined forces to create Boudika. The first release, fantasy book *The House of Dreams*, has made their fourth Comic-Con their first as exhibitors. While they do three or four conventions a year, Aguirre says, "You can't compare Comic-Con to anything else. It's the biggest thing I've ever seen." 
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Randy Reynaldo, [WCG Comics](http://www.wcgcomics.com/) ------------------------------------------------------- Reynaldo's been doing coming to Comic-Con for 27 years--"I've seen it grow from something focused on comics and pop culture nostalgia to the mega-show it is today"--but the one thing that's remained constant is his love for adventure comics in the vein of old strips like *Terry and the Pirates* or *Buzz Sawyer*. "It's really old-school," he admits. His ongoing series, *Rob Hanes Adventures*, brings that throwback aesthetic in a modern-day setting, starring a suitably blond and barrel-chested private eye. He has a full-time job, so *RHA* is essentially a once-a-year title, with issue #14 premiering at SDCC this year. "Adventure strips are dying out," he says. "But a lot of working pros tell me 'if I could do whatever I wanted, I'd be doing a book like this.'" 
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Art and Franco, [Aw Yeah Comics/Electric Milk Creations Art Studio](http://artbaltazar.com/) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Co-owner of Skokie, Illinois comic book shop [Aw Yeah Comics](http://artbaltazar.com/), Art Baltazar is testament to the networking power of conventions. He and his partner Franco had been selling their self-published book *Patrick the Wolf Boy* for years, and in 2007 an acquaintance they saw on the convention circuit asked if they wanted more work. It turned out she was an editor at DC, and that exchange turned into *Tiny Titans*, which ran for 50 issues and led to the all-ages DC title *Superman Family*. Currently, Art and Franco are publishing *Aw Yeah Comics* and working on the upcoming *Itty Bitty Hellboy* for Dark Horse. "Comic Con is always exciting," Art says. "This is the place where everybody gets work, gets jobs, shows their stuff, has meetings. It's all here." 
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Jaime "Jimmy" Portillo, [Jimmy Daze Comics](http://jimmydazecomics.weebly.com/index.html) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- In 2006, Portillo was working in security at the State Department in DC, and had been working on a vampire novel in his spare time. "It wasn't going too well," he admits, so he decided to quit his job and turn the work into a graphic novel told through a series of black and white photographs. The result was *Gabriel*, which brought him to SDCC in 2009. This year, he's here with *Hell Paso: The Story of Dallas Stoudemire*, a new trade paperback based on the life of a real-life marshal in El Paso in the 1880s. The graphic novel was funded in part from a grant by the Wild West History Association, and features cover art by onetime *Ghost Rider* inker Javier Salteras. "More people are open to small presses now," Portillo says. "You can't just break into DC and Marvel, but now you have companies that specifically serve self-publishers." *Photographed above with his wife, Maribel.* 
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Jim Heffron, Lawdog Comics -------------------------- "Comics were always a bucket list thing," Heffron says. "I got some ghost work in the ’90s during the boom, but I never had the speed or the chops to make it as a monthly guy." His day job, though, as creative director for a retail organization, had given him the organizational skills to understand the business side of self-publishing, so he and his brother Mike founded Lawdog in 2004; they both write various titles, and collaborate with artists from all over the world. The resulting books skew toward revisionist history, whether the Teddy Roosevelt-horror mashup *Riders to Moreau*, conspiracy-minded adventures like *Jesse James, Templar Knight*, or stagecoach robbers taking on aliens in the graphic novel *Territory 51*. "I love the small press area," he says. "I'm pushing for the commercial crowd, but there are men and women here who are really pushing the envelope." He gestures to his neighbor at the next booth. "He published a book called [*Clown Fight*](http://gingerrabbitstudio.blogspot.com/p/blog-page.html)! And it's nothing but clowns fighting! And it's *awesome*!" 
