Back in the days of the original trilogy, Star Wars was on my mind pretty much every minute of every day. Star Wars calendars were a regular thing by then; 1978, 79, 80, and 81 were covered, but as 1982 approached no new calendar was on the horizon. So I had no choice but to make my own.

To entertain my fellow employees at an ad agency in 1988, I’d crank these out (fast improv freehand style) and pass them around for laughs. I’d never lived anywhere but Michigan at this point, so they all kinda channeled stereotypes of the midwest.

One day I got a call from someone in the promotional department of Paramount Pictures asking if I could come in and talk about doing the art for a Phantom promo project, which was a pretty good gig for someone like me. Movies come and go, but a job like this comes only once.

After my first year as a professional comic book artist, I decided to gather up my advice and experience into an essay. Of course, it would be quite a different presentation today after thirty years of added experience, but the basics are still sound and it makes for an interesting time capsule from the pre-internet world.

The year 1986 was a huge turning point for me, the root of which was a yearly Science-Fiction convention called Babel Con. Here's what happened the year someone thought it would be a good idea to put me in charge of it.