Interview with D.C Comics Inker Sean Parsons

What is your name and what do you do?

Hi, Paul. My name is Sean Parsons, and I ink comic books.

How long have you been an Inker?

I was infected with the ink virus back in 1992 and I’ve been earning a living off it since 1994.

What is an Inker?

Inkers are small, hunch-backed cave dwelling creatures with bad eyes and withered, claw like forepaws that draws with ink the same things a penciler drew with a pencil. Our job is to add depth and clarity and cool little details to the art in a timely fashion so books can come out on time looking cool.

How did you get involved in this line of work?

I was fresh out of high school and hoping to write comics when I discovered the HOW TO SUBMIT guide from Marvel. One section mentioned inking and said if you sent Marvel an S.A.S.E.(do kids today even know what an S.A.S.E. is?) they would send you photocopies of published pencil art to practice inking on. I thought it would be cool to see art in pencil form so I requested some pencils. Once I got them, I couldn’t resist ruining them with ink. It was so fun I decided to make it my life’s ambition. Somewhere along the line I guess I started doing more good than harm at it so someone started giving me small brittle treats to keep doing it.

What Issue or issues are you most proud of? Why?

I’m mostly stoked to have worked with so many great artists in my career. Mat Broome, Pete Woods, Paul Pelletier, Matthew Clark, Will Conrad, Mike Deodato JR, Nicola Scott, Chris Bachalo, Ale Garza, Dale Eaglesham, Mike Ryan, Yanick Paquette, Art Thibert, Jon Sommariva, Tony Moore… the list of cool artists just never seems to end. I feel very lucky.

I had a nice moment once, outside of comics where I had been inking some stuff for Hasbro on G.I.Joe that was really cool. Mostly model sheets, but some ended up being the toy package art and I found one of the toys at the store and had to buy it. Being a kid who grew up on G.I. JOE, that moment meant a lot to me.

Are there any issues that you’re not proud of? Why?

There are things out there I don’t love. Some things had bad art, some had bad paper and all inkers know what a pain bad paper is. Some I just didn’t have the chops yet and didn’t do the work justice. One project I both loved and hated was X-MEN/ WILDC.A.T.S. THE DARK AGES. That was a career changing book for me.

I was inking Mat Broome, the biggest artist I had worked for at the time and it was intimidating, but I knew I would have one shot at impressing him and sticking around as his inker. We were doing some really cool work. Certainly the best of my short career, but we were getting short on time. That’s part of what made it such a good and bad experience.

The book became a real trial by fire. By the last week of the deadline, we still had something like 12 or 15 pages to go but at that point Mat had been putting 12 hours or more into every page and I was taking even longer to ink them. They were just insanely detailed pages. In order to meet the deadline, I drove down to Mat’s place in San Diego and stayed with him for the week. We were working day and night, getting almost no sleep and putting less and less on the pages. I developed a severe tooth ache and had to work with a rag in my mouth to keep my jaw from shutting all the way, and in the end, I had to leave and get an emergency root canal while someone else finished inking the last few pages of the book.

I really learned a lot about what getting through deadlines meant and just how hard working in comics could be. Mat later told me I was a real comic artist after surviving the ordeal.

What is your favorite comic book? Why?

X-MEN/WILDC.A.T.S. the dark ages. For the learning experience.

Who is your favorite Superhero? Why?

Daredevil. I read those books at a critical point of development in my childhood and they stuck with me.

If you could have any super power what would it be and why?

That’s a secret.

What projects do you have coming up that you’re excited for (that you can discuss)?

Check out VIBE and Aquaman to catch a monthly dose of my inks.

Thank you so much to Sean Parsons for sharing his Artwork and Story with me and Fanboygaming.com

To see more of Sean Parsons Artwork go to www.roughhouseink.com

Comment and discus or even give Sean your thanks below and as always Follow me on Twitter @pzenns and tumblr pzenns3.tumblr.com.