Howdy folks!
This mailing list is going out late due to our mail server having been off and on courtesy of everyone's good buddy Katrina. Our servers are located in downtown New Orleans and a couple of daring bastards working for DirectNIC decided to fortify the servers and stay. With order restored in New Orleans they've been able to get a steady provision of diesel and our server situation has stabilized. Hopefully they'll be able to go off generators and back onto normal power soon.
Things are progressing very well on the book even though we're not getting a whole lot done. How does that work? Well, the usual schedule has been suspended so that Josh, as the publisher's request, could work on the cover artwork. I have also hired a clever Australian by the name of Jim Boswell to work on the cover design with Josh and it is really shaping up to be fantastic. I can't show you the cover just yet so you're going to have to take my word for it. It's very exciting stuff and I think it is going to do a great job getting across the unusual history in the book coupled with the comedy.
Since I can't show you the amazing cover that Josh and Jim are working on I'll show you the design that Jim came up with that we decided not to use. This doesn't feature any of the art, it's just a text and color layout, but I thought it was pretty cool. It just wasn't what I had in mind.
Black and white artist Mike Doscher has also been switched over to another project while Josh is working on the cover. I didn't want his completed work piling up too much and looming over Josh's head so I tasked him with creating the designs for four specific characters that will be appearing in the fanciful narrative portions of the book. The book is going to be divided into three sections (land, sea and air) and these character illustrations will appear on the introduction page for each section. Below you can check out Mike's concept sketches for the American and Russian characters.
This weekend I'll be finishing up my research on a tank-carrying hydrofoil tested by the Germans, but I know you guys want to hear the contest winners, so here they are!
3rd Place - Copy of "Downfall" on DVD from Amazon - "Mike B."
2nd Place - Copy of "Downfall" on DVD from Amazon - "Tamlin M."
1st Place - Copy of "Band of Brothers" on DVD from Amazon - "Robert B."
Congratulations to the winners and thanks to everyone who participated in the contest! The winners have all been contacted via email and will be receiving their DVDs as soon as Amazon can get them out the door.
If you have any questions about the book or comments about how much you hate this mailing list then please feel free to send me an email
See you next month!
- Zack
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