Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Off To The Print Man

Jime Litwalk's long overdue Sketchbook 3 is finally finished. Jime filled this gem of a book with "Monsters, Misfits & Maidens". I will post a preview up soon, but it is done and on it's way to Hong Kong. Book 3 has a street date of the first week of February 2010. Now armed with this knowledge please spread the word the book is coming so Jime can stop getting all the phone calls and hate emails about finishing the new book. Just kidding...kinda.

New Presto Site

The all new prestoart.com is up and running. We have streamlined the site a bit and now have a brand new Presto store. Along with our books the store is going to feature some original artwork as well as some other attractions. A big thanks goes out to Jared for helping us build the site, so if you love the new site, it was a team effort. If you don't like it, blame Jared. We kid, we love the new store!

Sunday, December 13, 2009

The Proof Is In -Three Sixty Five

I almost can't believe the proof is in, I have to pinch myself. This project has been in production for years. It has been a complete joy to be involved with. As I worked on it, I would always think about how great it would be when I would get to the proofing point...know what...it does feel great.
Three Sixty Five has been a huge undertaking. Artist Martin LaCasse set out on a quest to draw everyday for a year. He was looking to fill some sketchbook with tattoo ideas that he could refer to for years to come. This idea rolled into the development of a book project, where we would publish his results upon him finishing the year.
What both Martin and I found out along the path of this project were some life lessons. Martin's challenge was pushing himself through each month to work up enough ideas and execute them. It then became a struggle to work each day. His personal notes reflect this. He also pushed himself beyond burned out, but the final result was worth the painful journey.
As for me the challenges were daunting. How to manage this much art, and how to present it, so it's both an enjoyable view and a functional tool for other artist. Part of the challenge was also the process. Martin's art has been scanned and re-scanned, it has been printed on transparency and re-re scanned, then color corrected and filtered. Then they were set up and dated and sized and filtered again. Times three hundred and sixty five times each time. Whew.
I loved working this project and both Martin and I are at a point of being very excited. Three Sixty Five is going to be packaged as 4 volumes in a slipcase (wait till you see the slipcase art). Martin has also created 12 all new paintings for the book. He focused on a single topic for each month and than explored it from every angle. The proof looks great, the colors are right on, a few specs needed to be tweaked but the books are now in production and our release date is 1/15/2010. So get ready to start the year right.

Monday, December 7, 2009

Joe Capobianco Invades Great Britain

Artist Joe Capobianco is headed to London England for the European drop of his new Presto release "Knock Yerself Out". This all new sketchbook features brand new art from loose sketches to fully rendered Pin-ups this book is jam packed with goodness! The title has been flying off the shelves here in the U.S. - Joe will be signing books on Thursday the 19th at Lal Hardy's "New Wave Tattoo" -157 Sydney Rd. Muswell Hill in London Tel: 020 8444 8779. Call for times. If you are in the area stop by and check it out, Joe would love to meet you, and then you will have a great story about meeting a crazy American bloke!

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

"Knock Yerself Out"-In Stock by the Kilo!

Artist Joe Capobianco's all new sketchbook "Knock Yerself Out" is in stock now. It arrived just the other day direct from the printer. For Joe's new book we used a printer in South America hoping to cut down the turn around time we experience when printing in Hong Kong. It took just as long. I did however feel very Miami Vice when I would tell people that I was expecting a shipment from Bogota, Colombia.
I was a little worried before the books came when I had an international shipping and import manifest sent to me that had both my name and the fact I was importing 3700 Kilos from Colombia on it. Seems like that might red flag me in some one's computer. I half expected a visit from Crockett and Tubbs.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Presto...It's A Blog

Greetings and welcome to the all new blog from the Presto Publishing house. We are planning to post news, release schedules, sneak previews, production pics and specials here. We have many great projects underway and want to say thanks for stopping in. We hope to see you around -Presto