Dear Jeff,

Normally, I don't run letters of comment that are simply praise. But, yours was so sincere and heartfelt that I wanted to share it with the rest of my readers. It really is a labor of love for me -- doing anything related to comic art, be it actual comics, commission and recreations... or whatever. I always try to give my fans their money's worth on my commissions and turn them around in a timely fashion.

That being said, I think I should use this space as an opportunity to thank all those in my recent commission sale! The response was, literally, overwhelming. As a result, I will  have to extend my usual 2-3 week turn-around time to about 12, in order to accommodate the staggering amount of commissions I received. Please be patient while I whittle away at the 3-page long commission list currently sitting in front of me. Sheesh!

As for you Jeff, thank you so much for the very kind words. I'll do my best not to disappoint you in the future with my upcoming projects.

Bob,

I want to take a moment to say that when it comes to Iron Man, well, you are The Man. For most characters, I will always associate a single artist as the defining one for that character. While I can still appreciate other interpretations—I’d love to get a John Romita, JR cover recreation of IM #256, for instance—it will still come down to one artist for a given character. For Iron Man, that artist is you. I don’t have a complete run of Iron Man, but I do have a complete run of Bob Layton Iron Man.

Thanks for your time,
Ryan Leasher

Dear Ryan,

I don't have a complete collection of Iron Man myself! So don't feel bad. However, I approve of your choice on which ones you've bought!

Recently I was asked in an interview about being "typecast" with a particular character, such as Iron Man, and whether or not that was a hindrance to me career-wise. 

In the past, regardless of the project I was promoting  at conventions or comic shop appearances, the conversation always turned back to questions about ol' Shellhead.  Occasionally, it has been frustrating for me when I was really excited about a project, say Doctor Mirage or COLONY, to be herded back into yet another question about which is my Iron Man favorite armor, etc, etc. But, the reality of it is I would be no where without the legacy of Iron Man being attached so firmly to my career. However--I had very little to do with that.  I was just doing my job the best way I knew how. What created that legacy, for me, was people like you -- the readers who embraced what David Michelinie and I were attempting to accomplish and caused that legacy to endure to this very day.

So, I actually feel lucky to have been "typecast" as 'the  Iron Man artist'.  I embrace that title with a great deal of pride.

Thanks,

Bob,

I completed work on the Secret Weapons #22 fan project web comic. I found most of the color art with script attached, but had to have 2 pieces re-colored by the original colorist - Mike McGuire. I had LOTS of help on the project including Scott Friedlander's great graphic design tips as well as coloring by Mike and was sent either artwork or scans by 4 ValiantFans.com board members. I think it turned out pretty good considering it was my first time lettering, doing graphic design on a comic plus I ended up writing dialogue for 3 pages.

I tried to email the pdf file to you last week, but it is 8mb and it did not go through. If you want I can email it to you in multiple pieces so you can look it over and let me know what you think.

It can also be downloaded at ValiantFans.com. It is in the registered member section currently (I am hoping to attract some new members to the site after the Newsarama article is released in the near future), but I am going to ask Greg to possibly move it to a section available to the general public shortly.

I am very interested in your thoughts on it :)

Your friend,

Chris Gould

Dear Chris,

I tried to access the link and this is what came up on the screen:

"Your site has used more than 20% of the cpu. Your account has too many processes running at the same time. Your site was consuming too many resources. This happens on occasion to very busy sites that have inefficient scripts running."

So, unfortunately I'm not going to be able to comment directly concerning the story and art. However, I applaud you on your efforts to put this project together. I think it's a great thing that there are Valiant fans out there as dedicated as you are. As soon as you correct the problem with the link, I'll be sure to look it over. If you wish, you can always send me a print out of the book itself.  Either way, I'm looking forward to enjoying a little "blast from the past."

Thanks so much for letting me know about this.

Hello.

I don't know if you remember me, but I am your "unofficial" technical advisor from Future Comics.

I remembered you were interested in Nanotechnology, so I thought I would send you this information for this free seminar. You can get it via the web in your office. The big use of nanotechnology in electronics, that I know of, is to build very high resolution picture tubes for large display televisions. As the third item below shows, smaller copper wiring is a big issue. This would be especially true in integrated circuits.

Have you seen an integrated circuit without a ceramic cover?

The semiconductor device is a small percentage of the total package. It has to be as big as it is due to size of copper wires inside the ceramic cover that connect to the semiconductor device. While surface mount components have reduced size slightly, more could be done with material advances.

Enough from me, I hope you and your family are doing well. I wish you well on your comic book and artistic projects.

If you ever do another Iron Man comic, let me know, I will be first in line to purchase it.

Robert (Bob) Smithers
SBInet Engineering

Dear Robert,

I tried to contact you many times over the last few years, but my e-mails were returned stating that your mailbox was no longer in service.

Good to have you back and thanks for the heads-up.

As for me and going back to doing any Iron Man projects, follow this link:

I’ll have all sorts of questions for you about Space Elevator concepts soon.

For those of you who may not have known, Mr. Smithers was instrumental in helping David Michelinie and me come up with many of the scientific principles we applied to the Future Comics line. Whenever I had a technical question, Robert was right on the case for me. As I've been known to say from time to time, "It's always great to have rocket scientists in your back pocket!"

Please keep in touch Robert,

Bob,

Greetings! I am wondering if you ever do commissions of someone's original character ideas. I have a character that I created in the online game City of Heroes that I would love to see drawn by you. Would something like this be possible?

Thank you,

Jason R. Smithwick

Dear Jason,

As a matter of fact, I just recently completed a commission from Michael Poe on his original City of Heroes character-- Thor's Assassin .

Generally, I have no problem working on such assignments as long as I'm given adequate reference. Therefore, if you or any other MMORPG players wish to commission me, I'm more than happy to take on the job! My assistant, the fabulous Sorah Suhng, happens to be a member of that community and has educated me (to a small degree) on how it all functions and that many players are avid collectors of original artwork.

Thanks for asking,

Hello Bob,

Thorsten from Germany here.

I met you at the NY Convention this year. I want to thank you for the great drawing you did in my sketchbook. With this email I’m sending you two pictures of you that I took at the convention.

Best wishes from Germany,

Thorsten Brümmel

Dear Thorsten,

Thanks for sending along the pics. As you can see, we posted them along with your letter. Give a big hello to all my fans in Deutschland. 

Hey Bob

I hope you remember me - Dave Braunstein - from Eldorado Comics.  We used to have you come to our comics shop (in Pennsauken, NJ at that time) in the late 70s / early 80s for appearances.  I've been out of comics for a long time, but always cherish the art that I still have from you.  I had to part with a lot of my art work during my divorce, but managed to hold on to a couple pieces that you did for me.  

I remember you introduced me to the single with cheese from Wendy's.  Boy, that was a long time ago when you were living in Delaware and working on the classic IM run with JRJR and Dave M.

What a thrill it was for me to stumble across your website.  I'm glad to hear that you are doing well.   Your website looks great and now that I see you do commissions, I will have to entertain an Iron Man cover re-creation. 

Any way, I had to drop you a line just to say hello.  I hope to catch up with you at a comic con in the near future.  I wish I would have known about that recent NY con.

Best wishes,

Dave Braunstein

Dear Dave,

It's always good to hear from somebody I was associated with so early in my career! When I read your email, I was a little stunned at first to find out that I had introduced you to your first Wendy's cheeseburger! I find it ironic considering the fact that I haven't eaten red meat in almost 20 years! Not that I'm a strict vegetarian or anything (Hell -- I'll bludgeon a cow to death just for fun!) but I found that restricting my diet and eliminating a lot of fats has kept me relatively young and good health. So, in case you're suffering from any ill-effects from said introduction, I offer my sincere apologies!

While we are on the subject! I'm very concerned about what we eat as a nation. I believe obesity is a major health concern in the United States and in the comic industry in particular. In my personal diet, I really try to stay away from fast foods, processed foods, or anything that comes "out of a box." My grocery bills tend to be a little higher than most since I do most of my own cooking and try to use only fresh ingredients.  I'm not a health freak by any means--I simply believe that the food industry and the pharmaceutical business are 'in bed together'. One makes us sick...and the other cures us so we can eat more crap!

I don't know what the HELL this has to do with what you wrote about, but I thought, since it's my website, I can talk a moment or two about what I consider to be The Poisoning of America.  So there! 

Onto more pleasant subjects! As far as my con schedule for 2007 -- I have yet to finalize anything at this writing.  As soon as I have any details about upcoming con or comic shop appearances, I'll be sure to post them here on my website.

Looking forward to seeing you again and introducing to something a bit more healthy to eat,

Hello Mr. Layton,

I've seen several mentions of this on various websites, but never anything concrete... Before the decision to revive Jean Grey was made, did you intend to include Dazzler in your X-Factor line-up?  Dazzler #42, the last issue, has Beast recommending X-Factor to Dazzler and Amazing Heroes #92 indicated that her shift to that team was even likelier since both books shared the same editor.  Could you elaborate on any of this?  If she was in your original plans was X-Factor still intended to be a "mutant hunting" front that secretly aided mutants?  Any info would be greatly appreciated it--I'm a big fan of the Dazzler character and have always been curious about whether this were true and, if it were, how things may have panned out.  Thanks for your time.

Jeff (no last name given) 

Dear Jeff,

As a matter of fact, that rumor is totally true!

When Jackson Guice and I were developing the series, Jean Grey was still stone-cold dead. Since we knew we would have to have the "babe factor" in any Marvel X-men series, we made the decision to draft Dazzler as Marvel Girl's replacement. As you can see in the version posted here (one of the seven covers that Jackson and I designed that were later rejected) we deliberately left the central female figure blank.

I added the Jean Grey features to the inked version only a few years ago when I found the original pencils. As it turned out, I believe it was Kurt Busiek who came up with the idea of how to resurrect Jean Grey and pitched the idea to, then Fantastic Four writer/artist, John Byrne. I believe it was Byrne who came up to me in the Marvel offices and said, "Hey Bob-- how'd you like to have Jean Grey back for X-Factor?" Naturally, I was intrigued. As the story goes, Byrne brought her back in the pages of the Fantastic Four and that allowed me to relaunch the original X-men with all members intact.

Unfortunately, the X-Factor story takes a downhill turn after that. But that's a tale to be told another time. Needles to say, poor Dazzler was left out in the cold through all of this.

Thanks for asking,