ive been looking for some odd jobs etc to help out with money and found a few, some without even looking, and I thought I might tell you all the exciting news.
One guy is opening a straight-edge tattoo shop and wants me to do a mural on one of the walls- he will pay for supplies, food let me hang my art for sale and give me 50% tattoos (which i will take him up on for sure).
Also Tom Lyle, my super-hero mentor, at scad got asked to suggest an artist for Faber Castell (the main supplier of inking supplies like the "pit-pens" that I normally use and the tech-pens most sequential artists use) who was looking at someone to do an original comic page for them for a new "super-hero drawing kit" they are releasing later this year. Lyle suggested me, saying I was one of "the most dynamic main-stream super-hero artist that he's got" as far as camera angles etc. So I have the break (2 1/2 weeks to do a single page comic with an original super-hero that I have to pencil, ink and color it with their stuff and document it at every stage as an instructional guide. They may use the image in other things as well and I will be additionally compensated each time. Did I mention it paid and I also get a $100 faber castell gift certificate. Wow, I'm honored and blown away! My art is going to be seen by up and coming youngsters getting into comics and people in hobby/art stores around the country <--- awesome!
Also, I did some pages for Tom's class that are my best yet and I believe professional quality, AT LAST! So I will be sending out submission packets to Marvel and DC over break so they have my name in mind, for when they come in may for Editor's Day. Here are my breakdowns etc. for those pages. another thing, I actually did the same pages tom did for his submission packet about a year ago (sensational spider-man 34), so with his permission I'll post/link his pages with mine so you all can compare. But overall I think I've finally done some pages that really show my best that I have to offer in every way and I was super ambitious with some of the camera choices and spent about (20-30hrs) = 3 times as much time on them as I have for the last 2 projects. But this quarter, in general, I've spent more time on my pages progressively so I think this has been a long time coming/in the making.
so this is the sketch i gave myself, full page, to layout the splash and then did the following page, the actual tight rough, on the back.
this is pages 3+4 pgs 1+2 this was a in-class assignment, we used lyle's cars to draw the hulk holding one, as dynamic as we could. I did a thumb and liked it so much i took it down to the projector and blew it up and got the one on the left. I liked it. this was some other sketches i did for panels 1+2 on pg.1 and panel 5 on page 3 when i thought about shooting it over the railing of the second story. and a sketch of myself while working on the pages and taking a break, i know i look tired but i was just cold.
Its critique time and I've been hearing a lot about my work recently and I figured I'd post some of it.
Writing for the screen and stage I wrote a period piece for Robin and was one of three people to have it on time (two weeks ago) but he stopped the reading after the first few pages and told me he would read it himself, and that it “just wasn’t working” so I waited over the weekend to see what he thought, once he read it all. But I got it back, with no specific comments and it had, not a grade but an R –for “revise.” I asked him about it and for some direction after class but he said he didn’t know what I could do to fix it, I mentioned the possibility of writing an entirely new script, and I did, in two-days. And he liked it better, however it was a more stereo-typical work, for my writing, thematically, and the dialog and subject material for the previous work, the period piece, was a vast jump and very ballsey, I thought. But it didn’t seem to matter.
Senior Project Though he says differently, the outlook of Maelstrom actually being a completed book or even issue is about as solid as my partner's word. I've done two issue's worth of pencils (25pgs total), 3 issues of breakdowns, 8 (soon to be 16) pages of inks and two issue's worth of scripts, not to mention outlining issue-by-issue the plot of the whole mini-series. And on his part, he doesn't like the pages he did and plans to redo them, period. So I'm looking at them as a learning experience, artistically and professionally. This whole roommate situation, which he was a part of, and this whole last few months has really shown me how flaky people can be. Even Bryan has mentioned that "maybe once this thing is all over, you may say hay I don’t need that James guy” and I have kept my story fairly self contained, except for the ending. So you could read it as a hospital-drama but the whole intrigue for me was adding story to balance James’ craziness so that readers could have both and then constantly being able to cross-cut between the two, so you could build tension/anticipation quickly just as any good story does (prominent examples where they’ve come out and said they use this are the original Star-Wars trilogy and the TV-Show Lost). I did enjoy writing my story however and could actually see myself writing soaps or something but I love writing episodically because that’s enough of a structure and it’s fun to play to its strengths. Artistically, though, Bryan has mentioned that my style, that realism that I have is “very unforgiving” and where some artists, because of their style, could draw a blob with some hot dogs hanging off in any direction and we would be non the wiser, when you try to draw a realistic hand (and it seems to be hands specifically that he has a problem with), people know what their hands do and do not look like so they spot it in a second, just like backgrounds. So I need to find out how to address this, if its going more stylized or just working on drawing more and drawing from life more considering except for backgrounds (and even then rarely) I don’t really use reference, especially for poses. Though I will use more for these next spider-man pages in…(seg-way)
Superhero I've been trying to figure out how to and actually drawing "hot comic book girls" all quarter, as they had been "man-ish" before, and these last pages for spider-man will be drawing the black cat, and the same pages Tom did for submissions with Hanna to Marvel (by the way I found an ergonomic chair, just like Hanna, or other professional comic book artists who sit at the drawing board for as long as he does a day, to help my back) so we'll see how they compare. "Shame-less" is the word Lyle used to describe them, but conceited to making similar decisions when doing his pages. I'm really excited about them and really only have the splash page totally the way I want it, so I'm taking tomorrow to map-out and start on the pencils, that I'll finish Tuesday before class (when they are due). He also mentioned sending packets out and emphasizes that I needed to meet with Axel and Bob, from Marvel and DC, respectively, at Editor's day. He said there is "something old and something new" about my style, but regardless there is an "undeniable energy" about my work, so he thinks someone will snatch me up fairly soon. So I'm really going to try and polish these Spider-man pages so I can send them out and be proud of them. He mentioned previous students who had opportunities with these guys and blew it by not keeping true to their word and being relentless with their pursuit of the goals; Going to New York if they ask to see you and sending packets every month. He also mentioned something about there being hostels for people in my situation that aren't too expensive and that was news to me since the absolute cheapest place we found last time was $80 a night, which wouldn't be too bad for a night or two but who knows how long I may have to be there before getting something. So he's going to push me to get there, because he thinks I can do it and soon. I've given myself 5 years to break in and make a decent living at comics, to the point I don't have to have a side-job. That is an extremely tight deadline considering most artists don't get their big break for 10-15 years. I'll be there to see that as long as I can make due in the meantime, meaning, taking on whatever work comes along and looking for it, endlessly.
the top panel is mine from my "the Tragedy of Wild bill Hickok" page that's getting published by Top Shelf in the SCAD anthology and below is Weshoyot's caballero page from DeviantArt. though she did change a lot and her hand is better than mine but storytelling-wise, layout, compositionaly its the same. you can see her whole page here and decide for your self. i left a comment on her page and she says she did the pencils almost a year ago, she showed me and she had. anyway i kinda gave her a hard time about it but i guess im just paranoid.
In other news, as I had mentioned in the previous post, I needed to change my pose for the pg. 9 splash pg so it didn't look as close as J. Campbell's, who i did not draw it from but had seen before. Here's my final page
Danger Girl Natalia by *Blasterkid on deviantART I still have to say its about as close as I've ever come to looking like I was straight up copying and it's scary. But to think I put all the work into drawing and redrawing that pose several times, even getting my girlfriend to pose and then to find someone who had already done it better is almost worse.
these are the tights that ill be pencilling for thursday. ill be inking one of them and ill be inking one of someone elses, as well as they will mine. not to mention i have to ink teh 1st 4 pages of maelstrom (iss 3) by monday and finish pencils for 9-12 by tomorrow. this 1st cover was the 1st version of the other cover after i found out i put the grizly side of two face on the wrong side, but i couldnt just flip it because the face on teh coin pointed the right direction in my picture so me and tom talked and settled on teh one below and to teh left. people have been telling me my style seems to shift too much from cartoony to realistic, and it does but i think i found a nice medium with this shot. kind of combining mark weringo and peter cheung. i did some similar faces on the 1st two pages i did for phil. here's a link to the finals
X-MEN: DEADLY GENESIS - ISSUE 5, PGS. 7-10 Here's the link to the final pages in case you didn't get here from my DA page.
10 hrs for four pages, from the tight rough stage, that's actually a lot for me. and I'm really proud of them. some pages i actually spent hours on certain panels, like the sentinel crash. i've kind of changed the way i work and the way i render a lot since doing the spider-man pages. Now i blow up my tight roughs using an artograph so i can resize stuff, like i always did but i trace it using a mechanical pencil, finish it using a mechanical pencil and x-in all my blacks, some side of pencil stuff but not much. also i was getting a lot of comments that my spider-man pages looked very dated, as far as rendering went, very 90's. that's not a bad thing, those techniques worked and they got the job done but there is certain connotations with a 90's mainstream artists that i did not want my work labeled with so i spent a lot of time looking at some new stuff and kind of found a new way to render. its something they don't really cover in school but has, i think, helped this project tremendously. i stared at this piece by Frank Cho and this one by Bryan Hytch
Ultimates 2 - Inks sample by ~retardacon on deviantART quite a long time to see it and then realized even some of my Favorite contemporary artists like Oliver Copiel and Shawn Cassiday use it as well. so from what i can decern its a kind of sketchiness with straight lines, moving different directions to describe a core shadow. it kind of helps to think of it in a planar way. its actually really fun. I think i pulled it off especially in shots like the close up of cyce's face. I also spent a lot of time on my metal textures and making the sentinels look metallic. I drew a lot of inspiration originally from Adam Kubert's run on some of the first issues of Ultimate X-men, (you can tell he works so fast). And I tried for some of the same aesthetic/simplistic and quick rendering he did, with sort of thick thing wiggly lines around the outside and towards the core of the form but it just didn't fly, so I went back and looked at some JR+JR and Niel Adams etc and saw the circles they would cut back out of the blacks, and after looking at, coincidentally, 90's stuff enough I think I got it. The actual artist for the page had good rendering skills but his storytelling was atrocious, and he played it so safe with all of his camera shots, no real angles, as i tried to push A LOT, he kept the figures far enough apart that he never had to do an up or a down shot. It was good reference for the costumes though. Here are the actual pages in case you actually wish to compare, only pages 8 and 9 are on there though of the pages I did. See More X-Men: Deadly Genesis Various at IGN.com See More X-Men: Deadly Genesis Various at IGN.com
STAR-TREK DEFIANT - EP. 32 On another note, my new star trek cover is out. You can see the colored version on my DA page, here. A completely different style altogether than the X-men pages but its still cool in its own way. Lots of dry brush and a kind of cool design. I've heard from a couple people at Pendant that they think I come up with some of the coolest covers, conceptually and I've heard the next few episodes should be a very different tone and shorter - less reading for me, more time for art - yay! Anyway this image is based off of a photograph and I inked it in my sketchbook, lol. I blurred things further away to give it the effect of depth of field, and because I didn't really draw anything back there, lol. And then layed a light texture over the Blood to make it look liquidy, and sadly yes it is potato-colored and it took forever for not even that great of an end effect. However the inks were really fun and I was very pleased with how they turned out.
PHIL'S STORY I've also had a little while to work on Phil's book, and got a few pages done, or as done as I'll do them before inking, during which I'll add a lot.
STORIES And I've also been writing some one-act plays for my "Writing for the Screen and Stage Class" that can also be viewed on my DA page here.
now unlike most artists ill tell you i started learning how to draw by tracing. my mom bought me a small 8x10 light table and i was also lucky enough to have a small projector. some times i did copy line for line, like if i wanted a poster of a certain shot. it gets your hand used to the proportions that other artists are using especially id you sketch on top of another artists work.
then i moved on to compiling shots and mixing tracing to make a story, this, however is where i started to really learn, because you have to break down the figure and start to make it look like your own and make the clothes/costume/hair etc. fit the form. i used to feel so bad about it, because i wasn't confident enough to draw each panel and i couldn't stand the idea of drawing inside a certain sized box - which why tight roughs have been cool because i will draw it, and resize or move certain elements around to make it fit as a whole. Ive also seen artists draw all their stuff in a sketch book and then resize and trace each element onto the final, like Adam Hughes normally works. if you can keep the energy of your original drawings this is good because you will have the confidence you need to draw it yourself, by whatever means you need as long as you can accomplish that it doesn't matter what you do.
drawing from comics has always been a mixed thing, some say do it, others say you'll pick up bad habits or wont know what your describing. and id agree, but i did. i think its especially important when picking up rendering and textural techniques. Ive also been looking at a lot of inking recently.
then the next step would be trying to draw and original picture and use techniques you found when looking at someone else's work, and trying to apply the same ideas but make them work. then you'll relay start understanding what they were trying to do and where to use them. or i used to like to trace a figure and try to change the light source, or if he is cropped trace what you have and finish the rest of the body.
you can also trace photographs, or draw on top of them, or with comic book sand follow background and objects lines back to a vanishing point and find the horizon line, we did this for school at scad, and then even try to "hang the figures" on that line. <-its a techniques for figures in perspective, if you dont know what it means look it up.
THESE ARE ALL THINGS TO PRACTICE AND LEARN FROM - NOT FOR YOUR ACTUAL PAGES. Reference for your pages should be like i said for textures and rendering, but applied to your drawing (ie: a different angle, different environment etc)don't find a character that fits the perspective of a separate background and then trace them together. though that could be helpful, don't use it for your finished pages, maybe just for practice. i think i did all these tings when i didn't have any friends who knew how to draw and i was kind of making habits and building techniques, but i didn't know what they meant.
look at a lot of stuff as well, i used to subscribe to wizard magazine as a kid and go through the 10 cent bins in my comic shop, though it was the early/mid 90's, now its the dollar bins, to get a ton of material from a lot of different artists and compare and see what they are doing well that is the same, you'll start to learn the conventions of comic books, layouts, storytelling, composition, and you'll see who is taking risks, who's playing it safe, who is not doing so well, and what is too much.
now recently when doing the tight roughs i did alot of sketches for the splash page where Karen makes her dressed up, flirty, sexy entrance to entice the doctor into leaving her husband alone. but when i went to go do it, it fell flat. its like i was trying for a stereotype and it didnt work, like the witter of aliens said he first wrote a comedy but it wasn't funny, so he turned to horror. but i stuck it out, and liek i said earlier, started referencing and comparing artists who drew great looking females and then applied those same techniques in my work, once they had become normal, and in my head. i used the reference for my sketchbook but just the memory for drawing it, that is important. there was a certain pose i was looking for and i looked at tons of models, my girlfriend even posed, but it just wasn't clicking. i changed a few things and bam, there it was. a few weeks later i was looking through an issue of danger girl and saw a pose almost exactly like mine, in fact i had toyed with the idea of giving her a fur coat just like the image i was thinking, though it wasn't next to me and i hadn't seen it for some years, i was unconsciously referencing that image. this seems to happen alot when i come up with story ideas, something will happen too easy then ill realize it is because it is just like something i liked and forgot about. so here is the image and here is my image.
they are strikingly similar and i scared myself. however i felt like the way i had worked and the differences in the images, (campbell's is way better and sexier than mine) allowed me to stick with it. but i promised myself not to look at that image too closely when i did my final, and i wont, ill draw from my drawing. i was actually more trying to reference teh whole idea of the scene from the old Romita sr./stan lee, spider-man issue/scene where he finally meets MJ.
however the other day i was searching deviantart and found an image that was ridiculously close to another student's of mine. i found his myspace and found his drawing and compared it, he had traced it, he had zoomed up a bit and changed the costumes (a bit), but the whole thing was WAY too close to even be a drawing based of a drawing. However, I am friends with this student, I will not disclose his ID or what image he referenced. i thought of that, of turning him in to SCAD, i felt it was my duty and i was so conflicted/mad at the same time. and yet if i said anything i knew things would be weird, and he might get in trouble. he's been through a lot these last few quarters and just like anybody in that situation he probably cut a few too many corners and was on a tight deadline, but in the real world he is going to get sued and fired. i just wanted to look out for him but i cant find myself to tell him in a way that will seem like i am trying to help and not trying to turn on him. i didn't even want to know if the same technique applied to the rest of his work and stopped looking right there, i figured ignorance was bliss.
anyways to sum up, a few of the big "no-no's" in comic books can be alot of help IN YOUR SKETCHBOOK, you can learn alot about how comics work and artists you like IN YOUR SKETCHBOOK, but when it comes to drawing your final pages make sure those times you look at other artists stay IN YOUR SKETCHBOOK!
some links you may find interesting related to this topic are as follows, particularly with Greg land and Adam Hughes (AH!).
hers some inks over lee weeks and angel medina. also the tight roughs for the x0-men pages im doing, missing a giant splash of the sentinel crashing but im working on it.
