Frank M Cuonzo

Dawnstar by Karl Altstaetter

2007-09-05T00:03:00.000-05:00

Latest Colors

2007-08-31T12:22:00.000-05:00

New Stuff!

2007-06-19T22:40:00.001-05:00

Well, it's been a while since I've been able to post anything. The good stork brought us a brand spanking new baby boy and he's been taking up A LOT of my time lately. However, through the bouts of crying and feedings I was able to find time to work on a few things. Some of which I can't share at the moment but as soon as I can, you'll see it here! Whoever "you" are that are reading this palaber.
Here's a couple of the covers I had the good fortune to be able to lend my color sensibilites to...
The first one is the cover to the third issue of Jon Pay, Private Investigator. Created and illustrated by my Norwegian brother, who lives in Spain and runs a pizza shop called Charlies American Pizza. I have a hard time believing it my self. Charlie's an uber talented creator of worlds and if so inclined, check out his websites located in the links section.
The second cover is for Moonstone Books. The Phantom #19. This one was pencilled by Marat Mychaels and inked by up and coming superstar inker Adelso Corona. Marat and Adelso are a great team and great guys to boot. I'm honored they sought out my services for their cover.
The third image is by my now frequent collaborator Michael Kasinger(check out his blog in the links). This is a pinup for the Koni Waves tpb published by Arcana Studios. I highly recommend the trade and the finding the original issues. Mark Poulton and Steve Sistilli have put together a great noir-ish supernatural book that just oozes cool and harkens back to the days of Weird Tales and Creepy magazine.
In poker news I recently played in a local charity poker tournament hosted by the Kiwanis Club. $150 buy-in with $150 re-buys and a $100 one time add-on. Their were approximately 35 entries in the tourney and some of these guys were re-buying 4,5,even 6 times! I was determined to make my intial buy-in last as long as possible. I was doing fairly well when we hit the break and I had brought enough money for the add-on, so I took it. Good thing I did. I ended up making the final table of 10 players and was about the third shortest stack. Fortune favored me and I ended finishing "in the money" in 5th place, taking home $500. My biggest pay day this year. For curiosity's sake I've been tallying my poker play for the year for all the games I've played and thus far I've been making a profit. I'll have to see if Lady Luck holds out for me by years end.
...until next time true believers!

I'M ALL IN!

2007-04-04T23:31:00.000-05:00

It's Texas Hold'em time. Some time since last summer I've been immersing myself into the addictive world of No Limit Texas Hold'em poker and I love it. Recently my buddy held his almost monthly Thurday Night Poker Club game. I've got to make a logo and t-shirts for that. Anyhoo, it ended up being a small game with only 5 of us playing. Still, a good time is always insured with this crowd and this Thursday was not a let down.

I can't recall how many chips my $20 bought me but we had denominations of, .25, 1.00 and 5.00. Blinds started out at .25/.50. And I went in planning to play my best tight aggressive poker. I started off as the small blind and got crappy hole cards so I was more than happy to lay those down. Now the second hand is where things just went loopy. I had 5/8 offsuit in the big blind. Everybody called around to me, so I figured sure what the heck. I've already got my money in. I check to see the flop. The flop hits 3/8/8. Hah ha! I am genius! Three of a kind. I'm fairly certain I have the best hand at this point. The small blind checks and I raise about 1/3 the pot. Everyone folds except my buddy on the button. He calls. Now I'm curious. The turn comes and it's a JACK. Now I'm slightly concerned since he didn't raise before the flop and since he limped in, he could have anything. Maybe even J/8. Some reason I don't think he does so I raise about two thirds the pot. He thinks long and hard, staring me down and re-raises me. Since I've played with him many times before I felt that he was trying to bluff me off this pot so I counter with an All-In bet. Now he's confused. After much deliberation he calls. He' got me chip-wise by a few chips so this might be the end of me. I turn over my 5/8 just as he turns over 7/8! He's got me dominated. I need a 5 on the river or my goose is cooked. A 9 comes on the river and through a total mental breakdown due to the stress of going all-in on the second hand of the night, I assumed his 7/8 beat my 5/8. I'm out. The guys graciously let me buy in for half the original buy so I can still play since I busted out so early. Then, before the next hand is dealt or rather played, the light bulb goes on. The best 5 cards win the hand. 8/8/8/J/9. His 7 and my 5 don't matter. Ugh! I'm an idiot. Fortunately everyone remembers the community cards and agree that it should be a spit pot. Phew! After all the confusion of getting half the chips back from the pot we continued play with a lot more attention to the cards from that point on.

It seemed like everyone had brought there "A" game and I saw a lot of improvement from our new guy. I was happy to see he didn't bust out first this time. Since I was playing pretty tight, my raises pre-flop were getting a decent amount of respect. Most everyone would fold and if I did have some takers, my betting after the flop usually made them muck their hands.

Down to three players now and two hands stick out in my mind. At this point I'm ahead in the chip count slightly. I look down at my hand and...pocket 2's. Okay cool. I'm going to try and get into this pot cheaply and hope I hit another 2 on the flop to make a set. Everyone had limped in and my buddy raises about half the pot after the flop. I don't remember what the exact cards were in the flop but there were definitely 2 face cards. Everyone folded again to me. I was pretty sure I had the best hand before the flop but now, not looking so good. I decide the best course of action is to lay down this hand. No need throwing my chip lead away just yet.

So I take a look at my next hand and KA-BLAM! Pocket 2's again! I'm gonna mix it up this time and raise! Oh yeah. I'm a wild man. I raise it 3 times the big blind and two guys drop out. The flop comes, 2/6/J. Hoo hoo! Got my set. I check and the guy to my left raises about 1/3 the pot. The next guy folds and it's back to me. I call the raise. The turn comes and it's as Ace. I check again hoping his ace made him a pair or better two pair. He raises again. About 1/2 the pot this time. Now I make my move and re-raise him 4 times his raise. That got his attention. He took a really long time studying me and the board. Muttering, "That was a good raise". Finally he made up his mind and mucked his hand. Later I found out he had a pair of Jacks.

Finally we made into heads up action. I had a feeling I would be finishing in the money this night. So what do I know of my opponent? We play together fairly regularly. He's been studying his game and has gotten much better lately. He's fairly loose and likes to see a lot of flops. He'll more often than not try to suck out on the river as cheaply as possible. He believes he can read people very well and plays really loose when he's been drinking. At this point in the game he's most happily inebriated. That's good news for me.

As we're playing I pick up on a huge tell from my esteemed opponent. Each time it's my turn to bet, as I ponder how much to bet, he immediately readies his chips from his stack to his side as if to say, whatever you do, I'm betting. I remember once reading that when an opponent acts strong they're actually weak. I go ahead and test the theory and bet 4 times the big blind. He exhales sharply and immediately mucks his hand. I was fortunate to exploit this tell for too many hands to recall. It was getting a little late and after numerous intoxicated pleas to go all in, I finally obliged once I had a 3 to 1 chip lead. I've got J/8 off suit. Not the strongest hand but I've got to believe his hand isn't that strong either since he's been calling all in so many times. We flip over our cards and he's showing Q/9 off suit. Okay, he's in the lead. He's about 63% chance to win the hand and double up. The flop come K/9/5 rainbow. Crap. He's got a pair now. Though it is a low pair. A Jack would put me in the lead. He's looking at a 85% chance of doubling up. Looking pretty slim for me. Then the turn hits. A 10. Ooof. A Jack will do me no good now. It'll give him a King high straight. My only salvation...a 7. Any one of three 7's left in the deck. About a 6% chance of that happening. We both stand up, cause...well, that's what they do on tv and I'm praying to the poker Gods. Finally my anticipation is sated when the dealer slowly turns over the 7!!! Whoo hoo! Big winner am I. I played my best poker that night and with a little luck, I made some money to buy some cool toys the next week.

Until the next game...as the poker ambassador Mike Sexton would say, "May your cards be live and your pots be monsters."

3 Minute "THING"

2007-03-18T21:44:00.000-05:00

The b/w was done by M. Anthony Castrillo for a book called 3 Minute Sketches, in which Marvel comics has given approval for artists to use any character from the Marvel Universe. The originals & published books will be sold and all the money will be given to ACTOR.
This was a lot of fun to color. Any time I get a chance to color Anthony's work I'll jump on it.

The Misadventures of Clark and Jefferson

2007-03-03T01:56:00.000-05:00

This piece was pencilled by Michael Kasinger and colored by me. It might be on the back cover of one of the issues to Clark and Jefferson from Ape Entertainment. Michael and I have been collaborating quit a bit lately and I'm having a great time coloring over his work. You can check my links for Michael's blog, The Art of MEK.

OFFICE DRAW-OFF: ROBOT COWBOY

2007-02-27T11:30:00.000-05:00

I usually don't get to draw that often lately so my offices' monthly draw-off affords me the chance to stretch what little graphite pushing muscles i have these days. And so, the Robot Cowboy. Had a lot of fun using the white pencil on the brown card stock to mess with the highlights. Enjoy!

New York Comic Con 07

2007-02-26T14:09:00.000-05:00

Friday - My friends and I arrived at the Con at 4pm when they were letting the public in and the line was a wee bit long. Good thing we didn't check our coats since the line was out the building up the block to the corner of 34th and 11th. The line moved a heck of a lot better than last year. It took us about 20 minutes to actually get inside to the convention floor. I immediately made my way up to Artist Alley to find Rob Liefeld's table. I saw a very tall guy sitting behind his table and introduced my self. It was Marat Mychaels. By the way Marat sorry for mis-pronouncing your name umpteen times. After talking with Marat for a bit he told me Rob was downstairs signing at Atomic Comics' booth. Off I go. Find the booth and Jump on line. Rob's been doing sketches and signing for at least an hour, so I'm hoping I'll be able to say hi and get a sketch. Rob's line had indeed eclipsed 2 booths by this time. One of which was the MOCCA booth and they requested that the line be moved to the other side of the Atomic Comics booth. Unfortunately I didn't get to the front of the line to meet Rob but the staff of Atomic Comics gave out numbers for the Saturday signing. I got number 8 so I was happy with that. By the by they did an outstanding job of managing the line and keeping things moving over all. By this time it was 6pm and I had to start preparing to leave the convention. I found Khary Randoph's table and signed up on his sketch list for Sunday and made my way back to Rob's table and asked Marat if he would do a sketch for me. He graciously obliged and took my sketch book back to the hotel to work on that night. Great guy. End of day 1

Saturday - Arrived at the convention at Noon and once again jumped on the long @$$ line outside the building. Now the end was down 2 blocks to 36th street. Again to the line moved fairly quickly. However, once inside the convention, it didn't seem like entrances and exits were clearly marked. I had to make a stink about getting back in after checking my coat cause one of the convention people didn't tell me I needed a wrist band to get back in. Found out Rob was signing from 2-4 so I made my way over to the Marvel editors and dropped off a color portfolio. I actually liked the way they ran the reviews this year. You'd drop off the portfolio and later on they'd look at it and if they wanted to meet with you, your name was posted on a list the next day with a time and place to meet. Unfortunately my name was not on the list this time. Back up in Artist Alley, I went to see Andy MacDonald of NYC Mech fame. Great artist and does really nice sketches. I had a sketch book of a friend of mine and had Andy do a great Colossus sketch in it. I highly recommend getting a sketch from him if you ever see him at a convention. 2pm now so I make my way downstairs to Rob's signing. There's a longer line than Friday and I make my way to the front with six other people who had numbers from the day before. Rob informs everyone that he can do sketches for the first 10 people and then is just signing. Phew! Just made it. I introduced myself to Rob and was happy that he recognized my name from his forum. As he started to sketch for the first person he asked me to take some pics of the line and the Atomic area. Hope I got some decent shots for ya Rob. It was the coolest thing watching him sketch away and hearing the line behind me say, " Oh man he's drawing Scarlet Witch! Oh man look at that Deadpool!" The best was seeing Rob interact with this young boy getting a Captain America sketch. The kid loved it. The guy ahead of me first askef for a Capt. America sketch and to Rob's relief, changed his mind and said draw whatever character you want. Thus Deadpool came to be on that page. Rob thanks for the Nightwing sketch. Love it and it was fantastic to meet you in person. Rob was very generous with his time and all the sketches that I happen to see him do. Well worth it. Later on I made my way to the Arcana table and looked for Mark Poulton and his crew. Everyone on the Koni Waves team is super nice and was excellent to meet you guys. I tryto get everyone I know to pick up Koni Waves and sure enough my buddy did. Closed the show out on Saturday scoping everything out, getting the lay of the land for picking up the swag on Sunday. End of day 2.

Sunday - Got to there and seemed like the convention staff had learned from the past two days and everything moved along very smoothly. Dropped off another friends sketch book with Dale Eaglesham to do a Starman sketch and went to talk to Guy Dorian about coloring one of his upcoming covers. Then off to find some Liefeldian comics! Picked up some of MAC's (Anthony Castrillo) Fist of Justice work from Digtital Webbing and a book from a fellow Kubert School Alum, Ken Haeser, called The Corpse. That's about it. It seems like a blur now. Had a great time. Already looking forward to next year. Here's the three sketches I got at the con.
See ya!