Our trusty illustrator, Glenn Miller, has taken a giant leap forward in life and embraced his true passion: drawing. After a couple of false starts, he’s launched his own comic book, Crónicas de Amaltea, where all his first sketches and breakdowns have been brought to life thanks to Fernando Peniche. We are quite happy for this, except it means the amount of drawings we can squeeze out of him will go down a bit.

Matters not, we are very proud of him and we had to get him interviewed, after all, we’ve exploited worked with him since day one of the website. So I won’t bore you and get to the chorus:

Hey Glenn, thanks for taking some time off from your superbusy schedule. Here’s a few interview questions for you.

You are fired, by the way.

1. Let’s start from the beginning: What got you into drawing?

Hello, Sam!  Well, since I can remember, I’ve always had a  very active imagination and drawing is the best way I can channel all that stuff out of my head and keep it from exploding!

 2. You seem to be passionate for Manga and Anime. Which one was your first one? Which one was the one that made you say “I’m drawing that, bitches!”?

You’re right,  I like Manga quite a lot.  I think the very first series that got my complete and utter devotion was Mazinger Z,  closely followed by Voltron and Robotech. I think the series that really made me want to tell a story,  an illustrated story, was definitely Saint Seiya.

 

3. We’ve been reading a bit of Crónicas de Amaltea. Could you give us a quick intro about this strange world and its inhabitants?

Yeah, sure!

Amaltea is, or actually,  was  the city of the gods. A place where the Old Gods sent their misbehaving offspring to teach them humility by making human sages judge their never-ending quarrels.

By the time our story begins, Amaltea has been in ruins for nearly a thousand years.  The young gods, stripped of their connection with their celestial thrones, plummet to the mortal world and take shelter inside whatever they can: things, animals, plants and of course, persons.  That’s the origin of magic artifacts, magical beasts, wizards and demigods.

The main characters are treasure hunters that seek these scattered pieces of celestial essences to protect them from the greedy hands of Kings and Tyrants that only see in them potential weapons or treasure.

 4. You mention there’s a definite Steampunk influence in Crónicas de Amaltea. What got you into the genre?

I think it all dates back to those old Animes with big robots mixed with my fanaticism toward some fantasy books where mechanical creatures called golems are common-place. Yes, you know which fantasy books, ha!

One day I started looking  for some steel golem images and started finding some very interesting stuff.  Not only about mechanical creatures,  but people with costumes incorporating some bizarre elements like steam pipes, corsets, gear wheels and so on. I had discovered Steampunk,  and I loved it!  

So I decided I definitely wanted to include some of that material into my story. It helped a lot that Fernando Peniche, the penciler for the webcomic is also nuts about the genre.

5. There seems that some of the characters are quite into meditation and philosophy, with stuff like martial arts, meditation and even funny stews. Any particular philosophy/spiritual stuff you’ve been following?

Well,  Orgot is a Master Altelion.  He follows  The Art of the 9 Sages  or Dao-Shin, which is loosely based in the Asian philosophy of the Kuji-Kiri.  Farian is his trainee, although he would never admit it.

6. From a doodle in a napkin to a sketch to a finished drawing… What’s the process to create your art?

Well, I usually start with a feeling (or couple of feelings) and then try to dress that feeling  (charisma, anger, courage, etc…) with a matching body, suit, dress, claws, fangs, magic armor,  whatever fits and is coherent with what I want.

Music helps a lot too. I repeat a song 20 times if necessary, but some tracks just have the right feeling about some characters and you just want it to match.

 7. Have you been “on tour”? Any comic conventions you’ve been hitting lately?

Only local conventions here in Mexico City, but hey, we’re starting.

8. We’re avid consumers of physical media. Any plans of a physical release for us oldies who love the feel of a comic book in our hands?

We’re hoping to get a printed version in November.

9. How about merchandise? We heard about notebooks with characters in the front cover…

Yes, so far we have notebooks, posters and pins.  Want some ?  I can get you some discounts, bro.   XD

10. Let’s say you can do a film version of Crónicas de Amaltea. Who do you cast? Who directs? Who makes the music? M. Night Shyamalan is not an option, btw.

Ha, ha, definitely NOT Shyamalan indeed. Gee, I think I would really like some new blood personifying Farian, the main character. I think Mila Kunis would make a superb Maram.  As the voice of Orgot, I would love Ian McKellen or Sean Connery. Director:  J.J. Abrams or Guillermo del Toro.  I love  Star trek: Into the Darkness  or Pacific Rim.

Music, I really would like Steamboy’s composer Steve Jablonsky or Kingdom Heart’s enchantress Yoko Shimomura to take the reins.

Thank you very much.

You can read Crónicas de Amaltea at their official website. Become a fan on Facebook. An English version is available too!