One-A-Day #62...and going APE

Ok, so I think the Starlin spell is broken :) Here is a sketch of Swamp Thing...does anyone remember the great first 10 issues of Swamp THing by Wrightson?



I have also made arrangements to attend APE in San Francisco (October 17 and 18)...possibly the second double sized Robotika issues might be there as well.

The bandwith...or whatever happened?

Have you ever picked-up a comic book and were totally blown away by an artist who just came out of nowhere? I sure had a couple of experiences like that and I would start looking for more from these artist, but for some reason I just could not find any more of their work, or if I could find more work it was way different than what I was expecting....

Marc Sutherland drew a book called "Chiron" that was published by Hammac Publications back in the late 80's (and it came out the same week that my first published comic book, "Moonstruck", hit the stands). I was totally taken by his illustrative style that had a bit of Kaluta and a bit of Vess (before there was Vess). Have not been able to find any more of his art since:


Adam McDaniel I met in the 90's when I was doing some short stories for Tim Vigil's "Raw Media Mag". Adam was a young artist just starting out and his style was slowly maturing, but when I met him he was just starting to get away from his part Wrightson part Adam Hughes influence. He drew "Cuda" and "Tool" and, it seemed to me, was destined for great things. And then he sort of disappeared...last I hear (and I don't rememebr who told me this) he was working in a karioke bar somewhere in Midwest:


Rob Haynes came out of nowhere like a steamroller. I bought an issue of Daredevil that he did and my jaw just dropped. I read that he was going to do a 3 issue Daredevil miniseries and I bought every issue...and I have not seen any more of his artwork since. I did see an interview of his a few years back and I believe I read that he just really enjoys storytelling/storybording much more than doing actual pages, so I believe he is very happy working in Hollywood.



Aron Wiesenfeld, whom I mentioned in the earlier post, was another one of these "Wow, where did he come from...and where did he go?". He did a 4 issue "Team 7" miniseries for Image, Deathblow & Wolverine cross over, and a 2 part black and white story in one of the Image anthology books and they are all great. Real nice style, wonderful storytelling. After googling his name I found out that he is now doing gallery paintings in the Symbolist tradition.



Trevor Von Eeden...I have to say that his Batman Annual and Green Arrow miniseries from the mid 80's where eye opening for me. I think I just went nuts when I read both of them because I never realized comics can be drawn with such style and be so bizarre and at the same time be so approachable. I went out looking for more of his stuff, but it seemed that with in a year or two he moved on into a different direction and started experimenting more with a looser line work. Even though I appreciated his newer work, it has never touched me like his earlier work did. Just this year, I read an interview with him in which he talked about how he was discriminated against over at DC right after he finished Green Arrow mini and just how mean the editor and how it effected his work (in a very negative way). What a shame.



Arthur Suydam's art woke me up and told me to learn how to use a brush, because the kind of lines he was getting there was no way to make with a pen (even if you traced the lines over and over). I also re-discovered Frazetta through Suydam and I am very glad of it. Suydam's stories in Heavy Metal, Epic Illustrated, and this portfolio were awesome. I also liked his issue of Deathdealer (Verotik, Deathdealer #4) and I was real disappointed when he sort of disappeared from the comic book scene. Recently, he re-emerged doing covers for Marvel, but I again, just like with Von Eeden, he has went off into a different direction and I just don't find it as appealing as his earlier work.





And last but not least, something to smile about. Two of my favorite artist drawing an explosion in a very similar way. I do believe that the Swamp Thing came out in '72 and Warlock came out in '75:

One-a-Day #61

One-a-Day #60

Norman showed me his copy of Marvel Masterworks Warlock Vol 2...and the next day I ordered a copy. I should have it in a week or two :) So of course I am still drawing Starlin's heroes:


This is a scan of one of the earlier drawings that I took the time to scan before I started inking it...I REALLY like how the blue pencil looks. I migth do a whole story just in blue and black:


This is another one from "the file". Back in the day, when Ryan was working on the very first Hellboy spin-off, BPRD, he was gracious enough to let me try inking a few of his rejected pages. My hope was to build-up an inking sample portfolio to try to get some inking jobs. It did not really work out that way, but I did learn a lot and I had a wonderful time inking Ryan's pencils...in fact I believe I learned just as much about penciling as I did about inking from this:

Viking

I have finished reading Bernard Cornwell's "The Last Kingdom" and "Lords of the North" (the library did not have "Pale Horseman", so I had to skip that part of the trilogy for now). I like these books almost as much as his "Winter King" cycle and most of his Sharp novels and I thought I would post something along the lines...with lots of liberties taken on historical accuracies :)

Going "viking":


I also wanted to post about a book that I just read that was simply amazing: Deathblow & Wolverine. It is written and drawn by Aron Wiesenfeld and according to the back cover received 2 Eisner nominations back in 1997 (?). I don't believe I heard of it before, but I just love it! The story telling is awesome and the drawing is real cool. I did a google search on Aron Wiesenfeld and it turns out he left comics to pursue a career in fine art...that is too bad because judging by this book, he has a real knack for storytelling!

Sketchbook designs...

I was kind of inspired by the Guy Davis sketchbook that he put out this year, so I thought I would try using photoshop to put together some muck-up pages. It was fun, bu it took up all my free evening time, so I did not get to draw anything new at all :(

One-a-Day #59...Shape of Things to Come

I have been working in my sketchbook since June and I did not realize that I am almost done with it. I only have about 10 pages left and inking is a bit tough now because of the uneven surface created by all the completed pages (makes me hold a pen at an awkward angle). Wow, I can't believe it...I will actually FINISH a whole sketchbook...what does one do with his own finished sketchbook?

I am still grooving in the "Starlinverse", so here is a Warlock close-up with Magus:


And here is something that I found in the "crypt". A photo of me and Mick Gray, probably from 1992-93, attending a local convention right after we finished working on "Bloodlust" for Slave Labor Graphics. Mick, apart from being a swell and fun guy, is also an Eisner award winner for his inking on ABC's "Promethia" and Lee Bermejo's "Joker" graphic novel.



The thing that this photo made me realize is that I have been hanging around comics for a long time, doing an issue here or there but always talking about doing a "real" series. Time is brutal...it flies right by. It was not until 2004 that I started getting serious about working on storytelling and focusing on writing and drawing something longer than 32 pages.

One-a-Day #58....Madness of FuturePast

Yes, I am still reading the Warlock reprints :)

This is Warlock in his "old" Gil Kane costume:


And this was a real treat! Ryan saw the Batman drawing and had a couple of minutes of free time so he colored it for fun and I just love it (!) Ryan has penciled/inked /colored his own work for all sorts of projects (covers, interior pages, commercial illustration...) but I believe, I have a distinction of being the only artist who has gotten the benefit of Ryan Sook's color on his drawings. We worked together on a couple of cards for DC (I got to draw Teen Titans jet (!) and PlasticMan AND Green Arrow AND Black Canary) and now this Batman drawing :)

One-a-Day #57...Thanos the Mad God!

....or "Gamora the Deadliest Woman Alive".

Gamora really works much better if green is used. Since I did not want to color I blacked-out her costume, but because I was thinking of the way Leyendecker painted I left some rough highlites to make her stand out a bit from the black background.

Thanos was fun to draw because I never really think of drawing such distorted features on my own (does anyone else see a resemblance to a Skrull?).

I am enjoying the Warlock reprints so much, I went ahead and bought Starlin's series from the mid 90's called "Breed" and "Breed II". I am also thinking about digging around and pulling out all the "Dreadstar" books and giving them a read as well...I might be drawing Vanth Dreadstar in a few days :)

I also realized that I have never read "the Death of Captain Marvel"! I need to look that up and see if it is available in reprint.

Batman "Aminated"

A few years ago I had a chance to try out for a Batman project that was supposed to look "like the animated Batman series". I did some sketches but did not get the job (it was cool to be even considered for the assignment, the other guys tries were Norman Felchle, Ryan Sook, and Brett Blevins (who in the end got the penciling part of the job and I think Norman somehow ended-up coloring the cover for it) :


Recently I got the "bug" again and tried my hand at Batman one more time: