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A.R.C.H.O.N, February 1995

Filed Under Comics Artists, Filipino Artists, Internet, My Comics, Philippine Comics | 7 Comments

Another thing I should blame my brother for. Late 1994 the mainstream Internet wasn’t even in high gear yet, but my brother was connected online in those primitive Internet days of bulletin boards and there he met Russel Tomas, looking for an artist for his comic book. My brother called me up, we talked about it. He set a date for Russel and I to meet, and one day Russel and I met outside of Filbar’s on the 4th floor of the Robinson’s Galleria.

That got me involved with A.R.C.H.O.N, a comic book Russel was working on with a group of his friends including his brother Jay-Jay, Joseph Fouts, and David Hontiveros. Russel told me that computers will play a big part in creating the comic book. The pages will be scanned and then colored on the computer. During that time it was kind of mind blowing for me to hear stuff like that.

Coloring? On the computer? What? Are you INSANE? Do we even have computers here in the Philippines that can do that?

Of course, that was just me the technophobe that was talking. What did I know? Even I wasn’t into computers yet, and I didn’t know a thing about pixels or megabytes or whatever technobabble that was.

But still, it was rather exciting to be involved in a project like that. And to come out with a full color comic book, 44 pages printed on good paper… it was quite an achievement at the time. (It still is today, actually.)

A.R.C.H.O.N. stands for Assistance Response Contingent and Hazard Overseer Network. It’s a cop story set in the future out in space. Published by Alamat and Mega Magazine Publications in February 1995.

I inked 4 pages of Joseph Fouts’ pencils and also contributed a pinup.

When it came out, it caused quite a stir in the burgeoning local comic book community. Although the artwork came out slightly pixelated, it looked great. I gotta admit, this was probably the time I learned what the words pixel and pixelated meant. I couldn’t fault them for it. It was pioneering work in local comics and I credit them for paving the way for other people to use the computer better in the production of comics.

I thought it amazing that years and years after this first came out, I could still see it being distributed in 7-11s, reaching even here in San Pablo City.

Russel Tomas became a very good friend, and I have a story about him, Leinil Yu and myself, and our nutty little adventure in San Diego during the convention in 1999 which I’ve just got to share one of these days.

Comments

7 Responses to “A.R.C.H.O.N, February 1995”

  1. Ed on July 2nd, 2008 11:16 am

    It was very interesting when I first saw it. But before ARCHON, we saw Mere Mortals (or something) that did some computer coloring in the early 90′s. I actually attended their exhibit somewhere here in Ortigas; in their office actually.

    :)

  2. Azrael on July 3rd, 2008 8:13 am

    i was in my 1st year college when i heard this comic. and was featured on TV and it says this was the first digitally made and colored comics in the Philippines. hehehehe..

  3. Myke08 on July 3rd, 2008 12:06 pm

    I was also 1st year when this came out. I bought my copy through Brandie Tan (he even gave me a WetWorks dog tag). They went to our school around 95, kami nila Ian Sta. Maria, Michael David and Melvin and mga audience nun at saka un artis ng Memento Mori, si tisoy (nalimutan ko name nya) Sobrang ganda noon for a local comics at empre, impressed kami dahil computer colored sya. Sayang at nabasa ng ulan sa room ko un copy ko nyan, kasama ng Pinoys, Alamat 101 at Exodus 1 ko (ehem…Gilbert M! calling Gilber! may copy ka pa ba nun?).

    A great comicbook.

  4. noel on July 3rd, 2008 12:20 pm

    waittaminit!!! blame me for what?!? and what are the ‘other’ things?!?

    good thing i woke up already confused this morning…

  5. Gerry Alanguilan on July 3rd, 2008 1:27 pm

    Ya…. gagawan ko na lang ito ng blog entry. he.he.

  6. Jon on July 3rd, 2008 4:03 pm

    One of the first comics I bought back in college. Still in good condition with the other Alamat titles. Sayang at di na naituloy yung kwento. I remember I saw it being featured at Mornings @GMA. They said it was printed in Singapore.

  7. Nerp on July 7th, 2008 9:41 am

    wow! nostalgia. A.R.C.H.O.N. was the reason i chose Virtual Media among the comic book studios to join back then. it was a blast training in their studios, i really learned a lot from them.