PLAINCLOTHES

On his blog, Paolo Rivera just posted a cover he did for an upcoming issue of Fantastic Four, in a 60's illustration steez. Love those graphic shapes and use of color, clothing and body language to talk about the character's personalities. I also love this page on the right from a 1969 issue by Jack Kirby. Awesome outfits!

click = embiggen.

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RAKTAVIJA!

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3Deluxe

Dialing in both my maquette and my 3D technique.

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3D

I did this little sculpt to figure out some lighting for the sketch I posted on Oct 5. I thought since I was working in 3D that I'd post the pic in 3D, too. If you have some old-school 3D glasses check it out.

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COMIC BOOK ABSTRACTION

Here are some examples of 5 comic book artists work. For each artist I chose pieces (in most cases) 20 or 30 years apart to look at how each has evolved over a chunk of their careers. It's cool the way they started out with more representational anatomy and rendering, and as they evolve as artists things get weirder, anatomy gets more distorted and abstracted, panels get bigger, figures take up more real estate. Generally things get more dynamic and expressive; blocky, cubist - and arguably just better.

click to enlarge

Jack Kirby: 1940's/1970's

Frank Miller: 1984/2001-ish

Mike Mignola: 1987/2007-ish

Bill Sienkiewicz: 1980/1987(!)

John Romita Jr: 1980's/2008

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VERMEER

... or, how to to compose like a badass. Vermeer painted "photo"realistically, but was not a slave to reality. He manipulated the way things "should" look to strengthen the composition.

check out the rest of the videos in the Vermeer series and other artists.

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RAKTAVIJA ROUGH

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KASHCHEI THE DEATHLESS

Here's a little digital sketch for a project. I started to really enjoy where it was going and took it a little father than a sketch, really. I love the looseness. I wish I had the chutzpa to hand in something like this. Maybe I will. Nah. But. Mm. Well. Noop. Maybe. Ngh.

Gotta fix those braids...

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INK

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RE.KALI.BRATION

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TURN IT UP

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GET YO SHIT

... by Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears.

"R-O-X-A-N!"

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BIRDS

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KALI

Oy. What with my computer's battery and power adapter both kicking the bucket, and the internet being down at home, I've essentially been offline for the last couple weeks. Schools on now, and I'll start posting some work - first is a rough of the Goddess Kali and some different background color trials.

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GEOF DARROW

... is a maniac. He's done comics with Frank (Sin City) Miller and concept art for the Matrix movies and a bunch of other stuff. He's known for obsessive detail. In 2004 he started doing his own comic, Shaolin Cowboy. It came out hells slow, managing 7 issues in 3 years. It's gorgeous, and the writing is completely bonkers. Below I posted 10 pages from issue #1 that make up one single giant panel in which our protagonist realizes his enemies have gotten the drop on him. The fight that follows beggars description, and is eventually halted by the leader of the gang, a talking king crab (you can see him behind the car), due to so many people getting super dead. I tried to post this as one huge image, but Blogger wasn't having any of it.

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ODYSSEUS IN HADES

... by William Russell Flint (1880 - 1969).

Nice use of black and white on a neutral background.

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BATWOMAN

So, Batwoman was a shitty character that was created in the 50's, then clumsily reinvented a few years ago and forgotten about. Last year, proving the adage that there are no small roles, only small actors, the creative team of Greg Rucka and J.H. Williams III got ahold of her and made something awesome. Their run won a grip of awards and landed the book on the New York Times bestseller list earlier this summer. I finally got around to picking up the hardcover collecting their first 7 issues (below, left) and it's really good. Check this:

Oh, man. The book is in amazing color by Dave Stewart, but the above black and white images are J.H. Williams' original art (sans word balloons). You can click on all the above for a larger image (you have to see Williams' art up close), but if you go to his Flickr page you can see huge versions - I'm talking 6000 pixels (also, a bit of his process). Gorgeous. As well, the story is pretty compelling, delving into her childhood and her expulsion from the military due to the "don't ask, don't tell" policy. The comic book industry is like, 90% superhero books, and 90% of those are unreadable. This is a gem. Buy it or take it out from the library.

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HALF FULL GLASS OF WINE

... by Tame Impala.

I think this might be my official summer 2010 jam.
Be sure to fullscreen!

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