Jon Hartman's clay Thing bust!

The world is a place fraught with danger, full of tribulations and travails, but there are still some good things in it, as evidenced by this NEW THING BUST BY JON HARTMAN!

Is it my birthday? Yes, it is, but the reason I got this new addition to the Thing club is instead because...I wanted it a lot, and it's tough to say no to the Thing.

What you see here is a custom order from Pittsburgh's own Jon Hartman, who created this model of Ben Grimm, perhaps staring out into the Negative Zone as the hordes of Annihilus come barreling in toward the Baxter Building. I saw some of Jon's work on other models and knew that I had to get one for myself.

Jon used Sculpey Premo to create this work, a modeling clay that is shaped and then baked to maintain its form. It's attached to the wooden base, where it will sit for generations to observe, probably in a museum or something after I kick it. The model sits just about four inches high on top of the base. The shade of orange is just right and the individual rocks are smooshed just right into place. (That is a technical term.)

I debated asking for the mutated, "pineapple" version of the Thing when ordering this. I couldn't stray from the classic Thing, though. After getting this in the mail, I think I made the right choice, and I think that I will also eventually purchase another of Pineapple Thing. These are important decisions.

This Ink Runs Cold on Kickstarter

The Kickstarter for Scott Morse's This Ink Runs Cold graphic novel is now live! I've talked about this book a few times, and it's now off to the printer, with 89 different one-page stories, including one written my me!

What must it be like to run a campaign that's immediately successful? Is it stress-free? Do you pay even more attention to it? I may never personally know, but this one reached its funding goal in just about two days, which is really impressive!

Scott created some graphics for the campaign, one of which lists all of the creators who worked on the book. How did I get on the first line? Bribery? No, never. But if you take a look at the list, you can see some really talented industry professionals like Stan Sakai, Brian Michael Bendis, Fabio Moon, Jim Mafood, Phil Hester and a bunch of other folks.

After last year's Comic-Con in San Diego, I posted a video that I made with Scott, talking about the book and what we might expect. The finished book should be ready by this year's convention, which is a quick turnaround and really exciting.

Scott is printing a regular version of the book, and a black and white "noir" version that'll be pretty limited. There's original art tiers, bookplates, and other physical rewards to get. I'm hoping that there'll be a group signing at Comic-Con during the summer, where I will definitely try to get a second volume going via the bully pulpit, if necessary. I'm really looking forward to this book. Check it out here, if you'd like: http://kck.st/3DvoBcS