After bouncing around at a few local colleges in upstate New York, Randy Gentile made the decision to move to New York City where he attended Pratt Institute. He landed an internship in the famous Marvel Bullpen and was able to turn that into a full-time gig in the now defunct Marvel in-house lettering department. He later transitioned to Chris Eliopoulos’ Virtual Calligraphy lettering studio.
With VC he lettered damn near every Marvel book at one time or another including Amazing Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Uncanny X-Men, Punisher, and Marville… wait, Marville?
Anyway, after 7 years of lettering Randy decided to make a go of it on his own without the aid of Chris “Obi-Wan” Eliopoulos. Since then he’s begun lettering for DC Comics where his work can be seen in funny books like Batman, Detective Comics, Gotham Underground, Teen Titans and Booster Gold.
Outside of his lettering work he self-publishes an autobiographical comic called NYComix and an uber-fast paced superhero strip called Randall. Both comics have been featured on Comic Geek Speak and Fanboy Radio.
When he’s not wallowing in lettering self-pity he spends his time in Brooklyn along with his lovely wife, Ereisa and their three cats Finnian, Don Fanucci and Olive.
This Thing of Ours
My 11-year-old niece, Sierra is becoming increasingly interested in art. Her elementary school had an art contest that called for the young artists to do their best Pablo Picasso impression. Sierra entered the competition and won. Of course her parents and grandparents were as proud as peacocks, but Sierra wasn't happy with the way her painting came out. Of course everyone's reaction was: "C'mon! You won! How can you think it's bad?"
My wife and I, both being working/starving artists know exactly how Sierra feels. She's thinking like an artist and an artist is never happy with their work.
Michelangelo painted over the Sistine Chapel numerous times before settling on the now famous masterpiece. He likely settled on it out of deadline pressures and frustration rather than his personal satisfaction with the piece. I was in Italy last year for my honeymoon and stood in the Sistine Chapel, looking up at the ceiling with tears in my eyes just astonished that something this beautiful could come out of one man's paintbrush.
Being an artist is a strange thing. It's not a life you choose as much as it's a life that chooses you.
A few months ago I had a table at the NY Comic Con and the plan there was to have a nicely printed trade paperback. For a number of reasons I wasn't able to get the book to the printer on time. But now that I'm a few weeks removed from the missed deadline I'm glad I didn't print the book.
First off, there's nothing worse than rushing something that shouldn't be rushed. At the end of the day these are self-imposed deadlines I'm dealing with here. A big advantage of self-publishing/web comics is that I'm running this one-man operation. There's no reason to produce something that isn't 100% the way I want it to be. 
The next convention stop on the LazyComix Train is the Comic Geek Speak Supershow the 6th and 7th of September. That gives me about 3 months to make the first NYComix trade paperback the best it can be. 3 Months to make sure nothing is rushed and everything is the way I want. During these four months I'm planning on adding about 10-12 new pages of story. Around a 4 page sketchbook section as well as handful of advertisements pimping my various comic endeavors. On top of all this I have to prepare the files for delivery to the printer. Oh, and let's not forget that I have to create a snazzy eye-catching wrap around cover. And all of it has to not suck.
Phew. Suddenly 3 months doesn't sound like enough time... if I only didn't have that pesky day job taking up 40 plus hours a week.
Anyway, if Sierra continues down the road of an artist's life she's lining herself up for a lifetime of hard work and self-doubt. But no matter how overwhelming and often disappointing it may be she won't want it any other way. The artist's life will have chosen her and she wouldn't have it any other way.
Actually, come to think of it, my original plan of adding 10-12 pages of new story is actually turning out to be like 20-30 pages of story. And 20-30 pages of NYComix in a style that I've never tried before. I feel like it's time to kick NYComix up a notch. While I was digging the slice-of-life/overheard in the city vibe I had going I really feel like the strip needs something more in order to take it to the next level.
Here's the biggest problem I face as a self-publishing comic book creator....
I can do whatever I want.
Now while this may seem like the best thing in the world for an artist and in many ways it is...sometimes total creative freedom can freeze up creativity completely. And that's kind of where I find myself with NYComix. After doing the strip for a few years I've found a road I'm comfortable with but I'm at a point in my trip where I think it's time to get off at the next exit.
But where will this next exit take me?
Have no friggin' idea.
But I do know that it's going to take me in a new direction. Maybe it'll take me down some new avenues of autobiographical exploration. Or if that sounds a bit pretentious maybe it'll take me down the avenue of exploring the disturbing feeling I get when I see a random bottle of yellow liquid under the seat on the subway.
Who knows? But I do know that getting off at the next exit has got me more excited about NYComix than I've been in a long time.
Now if I can only figure out a way to get more people to read the book.
Anyway, how about we take this comic out of the land of my own little read comic strip to the big bad world of mainstream funny books?
So what have I been reading lately?
DC Comics and Grant Morrison.
I picked up All Star Superman #11... a book that with every passing issue solidifies my opinion that we're in the midst of the best modern day interpretation of a superhero comic that we've ever seen. I don't utter this lightly when I say that Morrison and Quitely are crafting a story that is every bit as great as Miller's The Dark Knight or Moore and Gibbons's Watchmen.
Crazy I know, but it's been 11 issues now and this book just keeps getting better. 
Final Crisis #1 of 7. I've never read a single "Crisis" storyline and I know I'm entering the fray with the 3rd one here, but I'm such a Morrison fanboy all of a sudden that I figured why not?
The more DC Comics I read the more interested I become. The art by J.G. Jones was solid but he's treading that photo-referenced line for me. His Superman looks like some wrestler. I don't know the wrestler's name and being a columnist I should look it up, but I find professional wrestling such a colossal bore that I can't even bring myself to Google the fake fighter. Nevertheless I don't see how someone could cast a professional wrestler as Superman. Can you imagine if Hollywood did? God. Just take a moment and imagine "The Rock" wearing Supes' Red and Blue... let it sink in and now breathe.
So getting back to Final Crisis. It was a very eventful issue with some pretty major shiznit goin' down. We'll see where it goes and hopefully, being fairly new at the DCU, I don't get too confused along the way.
All right, that's enough for this week. I gotta get some time in on the ol' drawing table. September is breathing down my neck.
Thanks for reading.
Font You!
--Randy
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