Creator Spotlight: Chris Eliopoulos on the Wright Brothers
Chris Eliopoulos started out at Marvel as a letterer and has worked on thousands of comics since. He also illustrates Brad Meltzer's Ordinary People Change the World picture books, and his graphic novels include Cosmic Commandos and Monster Mayhem. The newest Meltzer book, We are the Wright Brothers, is out October 6 from Rocky Pond Books.
On his Substack he posts Lost Souls, a comic strip. We asked him about staging a picture book around two heroes, matching another letterer's hand on Weapon X, building a logo from Tom Orzechowski's Wolverine, and where someone starting a strip should begin.
For readers who might not know your work yet, how would you describe what you do?
I say I’m a cartoonist, but I do so many different things, it’s easier. I write and draw picture books and graphic novels, I executive produce a TV show, I run a lettering company and I create a little webcomic on the side.
We are the Wright Brothers puts two brothers at the center of the story, working side by side. How do you stage a picture book when the hero is a pair?
It was actually more fun to have two characters interacting throughout the book. And, those bowler hats created a fun look that brought them together.
You've said that drawing the heroes as kids "confuses adults and makes sense to every child." How do you find the kid version of a real person's face?
The idea is that kids can never imagine adults as being kids once, so we create an “avatar” of these heroes who are kids but look like their adult selves. I usually go through a bunch of pictures of the character and try to find their most iconic look. Then I draw a kid with those adult features like mustaches. It actually comes fairly easy.
What from lettering shows up in how you draw the Meltzer books?
Well, Brad and I are comic book guys, so the conceit going in was we looked at these books as comic book picture books with all the things that make comics comics. So, we have word balloons throughout which I letter by hand on the computer. It’s a skill I learned early in my career, so it was something that naturally happened in the books.
In your Weapon X post you wrote that the in-house letterers' job was "to match the style of the lettering to make corrections." How do you letter convincingly in someone else's hand?
It was tough. When you seriously look at different lettering, you see how different each person’s style is. I would create pens for each letterer that matched the size and style. Then I’d overlay some vellum over their lettering and try to get a feel and match that style. Luckily most times it was only a word or two we’d have to match, but if you are close enough, never perfect, the reader can’t really tell…but I can.
You built the Weapon X logo starting from Tom Orzechowski's Wolverine logo. How do you take a logo that already exists and make something new out of it?
The editor came to me in the bullpen with a logo that was already created. You can see it in the house ads from the time. He, and I believe Barry, wanted something a bit more interesting than the very plain block lettering. He explained it was how Wolverine became Wolverine, so I just went back to Tom’s logo and used that to match letter forms. Really, only the “A”, “P”, and “X” had to be made, but I turned the V upside down and added a crossbar for the A. For the P, I used the R from the Wolverine logo and removed that right line. Then the X, I just tried to match and give it the proper weight. Instead of a drop shadow, I made an outline to pull it all together.
You've said you mostly work digitally these days, but Lost Souls is all pencils, brushes, ink and paper, "imperfections and all." What does working by hand give you that the screen doesn't?
Working digitally is great in that it saves time, you can move things around, resize them and the all-saving command-z when you screw up. That said, I grew up drawing with pencils, brushes, pens and ink. There’s a form of meditation I get from working analog. What the strip does for me is give me an outlet to just do what I want. I don’t have an editor asking me to make changes, I don’t have someone telling me what I can and can’t do, and finally, as I’ve seen all this A.I. slop, I’ve realized it all looks cold and indifferent. There’s no soul behind it, so I wanted to do something where no one would say it was made with A.I. They could say it was bad, or there are mistakes or whatever, but it is all me.
If someone wanted to start a strip and put it out themselves, the way you do Lost Souls on Substack, where would you tell them to start?
There’s a number of steps. First, obviously, get good at your craft. Figure out what you want to say or what you want your strip to be about, then make 50 strips. Set a schedule and keep at it. Get better, be on time and then let them all go. Don’t even publish them. Then you can start making the strip the way it should be. Setting up a Substack is easy, but I’d also suggest listening to the Comics Lab podcast. Dave and Brad are seasoned pros at creating and posting their own work and actually making a paying career out of it. Now, if you want to do a strip just for the sake of making it without any goals of making it profitable, then just start posting to Substack. You can only get better by doing it.
What did you believe about making comics when you started out that you don't believe now, and what changed it?
I originally thought that comics were superheroes. As a kid, those were the only books I saw that I thought were comics. I saw Archie and the Caspers out there, but those were cartoons, not comics, in my head. When I was in college, I took a class with Gene Colan, who looked at my cartooning and said I’d never make a Marvel comic in that style. When I got to Marvel, I was able to write and draw comics with Marvel, in my style. I did a Marvel comic with my cartoony style and I realized that comics aren’t just superheroes. Then I started making my own graphic novels at mainstream publishers and realized comics can be anything…then I discovered manga more than I had known. These days, I enjoy middle grade graphic novels and Manga and making comics in those styles is just as important as superheroes.
What's something you're proud of that nobody ever asks you about?
It’s funny. So many people know me for my lettering work, so when I shifted to children’s books and then television, comics fans thought I fell off the face of the Earth. They come up to me at cons and ask what I’m doing these days since I’m not lettering and I tell them I’m making children’s books and a TV show and I can see the wheels grinding in their heads. “How does a letterer do these other things?” So, I’m really proud of the picture books and TV show I’ve done, but I also did a couple graphic novels called Cosmic Commandos and Monster Mayhem that I love and wish more comic fans picked up for their kids.
What are you reading right now, comics or otherwise?
I’m reading more manga. Loving Billy Bat by Naoki Urasawa. I pick up a lot of middle grade graphic novels, and sadly, I’ve become that old man that goes back and reads the comics he read when he first discovered comics—mostly the 80s. Simonson’s Thor, Byrne’s FF and Alpha Flight as well as Man of Steel, Hulk and others, Miller’s Daredevil and Dark Knight. I also read a lot of non-fiction books. Mostly history.
Is there a comic shop you think of as yours? Tell me about it.
I used to have so many shops near me and they’ve all gone out of business. The nearest to me is Joker’s Child in Fair Lawn, NJ. It’s been a while since I’ve gone…I need to rectify that…and I remember them being so friendly and helpful even before they knew who I was. Then, I go to bookstores to the graphic novel sections. There’s a newly built B&N nearby with giant manga and American GN sections.
What are you working on next that you can talk about?
Well, I head out next week on tour for the Wright Brothers book. That’s followed by Taylor Swift, and Steven Spielberg. Nate and I have finished volume 2 of Cow Boy which we’re figuring out the publishing stuff and I’m working on a new graphic novel autobiography that we haven’t announced yet. Then, I’m working with my team lettering Marvel’s comics, doing a few covers here and there and, as we mentioned, my Lost Souls comic strip. So, busy busy.
Connect with Chris
Thanks to Chris for the time.
About the author
Hey, I'm Michael! As the creator and developer behind VerseDB, I get to combine my love for building software with a serious comic book habit. While I enjoy collecting, I'm ultimately in it for the stories they tell. For me, it's all about getting lost in a great narrative and appreciating the artwork. I built this platform to give readers and collectors a clean, organized place to catalog the issues, runs, and art that mean the most to them. Log your favorites and welcome to the community!
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