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2010 SKETCHBOOK (60 pages, black/white/tone, print run 100 copies)

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Monday, March 15, 2010

Markers and Amazon

A warning: this will not be pretty. I know of some artists whose lay-outs and sketches can be considred the work of art...not mine.

To answer an earlier question I wanted to post something that shows how I work out my storytelling for panel-to-panel pages.



Above are my 3 sketches for the last page of a short story "The Bronze Horseman" (those who have the published version, will note that the final version of the page is actually a bit different). The first 2 are simply me moving a pencil or a pen around trying to figure out what will be on the page. What I need to show to move the story along? Is is going to be a splash page? How to arrange panels to make it interesting? What angles to use in the panels?

Once I get to the point where I think the story is served, the compositions are interesting, the storytelling is clear, and there is something interesting to draw, I take out a marker and spot my blacks. This I do so that even though the lay-outs are very tiny, with the solid black shapes drawn I should be able to tell what is going on on the page. If after spotting the blacks the page looks like an unreadable mess...I start again.

That is my approach to it...if any other artists are reading this and would like to comment on their methods, I would love to hear it :)

Amazon this week....it turns out that there was some sort of pricing problem between Diamond and Amazon (something got lost in the process of transfering information from one to another) and all the books carried by Diamond got priced at $15 (even the books that should be going at $40). This was especially true of the "coming" items. Tons of people placed orders...and now there is a mess. Some orders will stand, some orders got canceled. You will note, now you can place an advanced order for Robotika, but you can be notified by e-mail when it arrives. This of course is a bit of a bummer and has regretfully happened a week before Robotika 2 arrives :(

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Everyone has their own way of laying out a comic page, and all that matters is that it works for you.

I think your idea of black spotting with a marker is a good idea, and I might give it a try.

Myself, I usually go through several pencil stages before I get to a final drawing that can be inked - or more recently for me, not inked and just colored.

My tendency is to draw too large, so I wind up scanning the pencil sketches, reducing them down, printing them out, and tracing them on a light-board.

My process has always be too labor intensive for me ever to successfully do a monthly comic.

Jamie Parks said...

I appreciate your insight and you addressing my question specifically. Now I know exactly what you meant by 'spotting the blacks'. I kinda assumed that was what you were referring to. I haven't tried comic illustration (yet) mostly drawings/paintings.. but I've got an idea for a series and am in the research phase, looking into other comic book artists' various approaches and what not. Your blog is certainly helpful. Thanks again for the follow up post :)

Dan said...

Amazon just told me to expect my Robotika GN on the 24th. Awesome!

Alex Sheikman said...

I saw that the comic shops got their copies last Wednesday, so I was hoping the Amazon orders won't be too far behind.

I hope everyone who reads the second volume, will take a few minutes and fill out an Amazon review :)

Dan said...

Did they? It must a by-warehouse thing, I don't think HI is getting theirs until this Wednesday.

I'll definitely leave an Amazon review!

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I think this is the best, I mean creating an story which showing how we work out, because we can express feelings and making out own versions.