O Do Tell

Tell the Truth

Here are some previews and sketches for a short comic I'm working on for a group called the "Mini Comics Dump Truck".

Headed by one of the co-hosts of the "Art and Story"and "Big Illustration Party Timem" podcasts, Kevin Cross, this is part of the 'Supreme' membership group that makes a pledge to create a mini-comic to be mailed to all members.

I usually need self imposed deadlines to get personal projects done between freelance work so this creative group was a perfect motivator. Here are some pages at the penciled stage and a shot of some inks strewn on the lightbox. I don't want to give too much away, but generally, it follows the events previous to my first short story "The Sunless Circus".

My convention copies of "Sunless" are currently sold out but you can find the p.o.d. version available here. There were also some limited edition ones I made that included a sketch card and premium cover on the Collectors Society forum, which was pretty neat to see at this early stage~

It's been fun exploring this world in the story and reverse engineering ideas for characters and locations that I may or may not have subconsciously had in mind when making the first silent comic. This one has a more complicated story involving the inventor of Ardee the Acrobatic Robot Boy and the Ringmaster.
The text is still left out so there's some room for your imagination to tinker.

The Ink Raven

Lightboxes: They make everything more epic~

Don't Graphite, Just Ink About It

This story was my first mini-comic that serves as a intro to a longer 4 part story I'm working on. There is Norse mythology influence in this particular tale and is meant to ask questions about self fullfilling prophecies, the origin of folklore, and the power of belief. Yep, all that in 5 pages~

My first stab at making a mini comic came from much inspiration from the folks at Art & Story.

Much thanks for advice about materials from Mark Rudolph (whose "Echoes from Astroid X" I was using as a quality barometer). I planned to screenprint the band that wraps the mini that lines up with the image, but time constraints forced the monastic discipline of hand painting them in time for the Alternative Press Expo (APE).

[EDIT: for the Long Beach Comic Con, the bands were indeed screen printed!! For a process series, see the link at the bottom of this post]

And now, a story from colder skies:

"Where once there were three

two would remain

bound to the old keeper

of fury and spear.

Flown high from the Tree

to know a dire fate

born to escape

and chase a tale,

a new post--

a ghost. "

-old poem

....

All Part of the Process

In an effort to not overcrowd this blog space (and maybe hide my hodgepodge comics-making process~) I put the "making of" pictures for this minicomic on my Flickr. I thought I'd share this after one person at the Long Beach Con recognized that the band was indeed screened, not just colored paper-- the awesome n' talented Dustin Nguyen! I scored a beautiful sketchbook of his full of amazing watercolors and some of my favorite characters.

The inch strips were actually leftovers from the 11 x 17" single sheet trimmed to make the mini size divide evenly into 8 parts. They wrapped around perfectly, and some part of me wanted to feel like I was honorably using 'every part of the animal' which is paper.

Only some of these minis included a bonus "poster" on the reverse side, a collage of raven sketches I did leading up to writing the story. I think the process pictures can clarify the construction~

Here's a preview for those interested--

If you want more, just jaunt on over HERE!

Back to Triple-two

I will be having another show at this cool little clothing store in Huntington Beach, 222 Clothing. I'm excited to showcase my comic art specifically for this one. I'll have original pages and some new work on display with ole pal Digitalcasm debuting some new songs.

This happens with the monthly Huntington Beach Art Walk. Directions here!

[EDIT: I forgot to note a fun factoid: The 222 Store specializes in Scandinavian and Nordic Indie Brands of clothing-- a perfect perch for a Raven~]

Convention Peeks

" Hey watch where you're goin'! "

Pictures from APE

Before going into the above image, I must say, I had a stellar time at the Alternative Press Expo-- even with the rainy Sunday! I just wish I had more opportunities to browse the other tables and pick up some indie comic gems. It was good to see Javier Hernandez and meet some of the other Cartoonistas there. Also 1/3 of the Art & Story hosting team, Kevin Cross was in attendance. Though far up North, I also met near home local artists like Kevin Woody, who had a small anthology of his work with some diverse stylings I really enjoyed.

I also got a couple of Jim Lujan's Ghettomation DVDs. A great collection, the interview "Conversatio," especially had me in stiches~

Our booth with the fierce and formidable Ralph Miranda ("Man Fighting Street")

Raul Aguirre Jr. ("Man vs. Art") on my right and Kevin Cross ("Art & Story") on my other right.

Kevin Woody sports a fancy 'stache along with similarly themed fun comic ("Between Mars").

[The banner and title totally piqued my interest]

Rule #135: It's not really a Con unless you have last minute projects to finish

Pics from LBCC

Conventions only we apart! Pardon for the backlog but the times have been eventful~

To see more of these pics from Long Beach Comic Con, find my illustration page on Facebook or see some selections on my Flickr.

Each of these events seems to have a different appeal and it's always great to meet diverse crowds at these conventions. The "Soviet Space Simian" screenprints which got no love at APE (ironically~) were very popular at LBCC and are now sold out! I'll likely be trying my hand at more screen printing techniques in new work too. I'll be putting up some pics from my haphazard process in another post.

Our table setup featured the "INFECTED" Anthology,

prints, "Man Fighting Street", and an assortment of mini-comics

McFly! Caught gliding around the convention floor

When pint-size cuteness collides...

Frankie wants a hug!

Goofing around among greats: Dean Yeagle and Amanda Connor

The Sunday of the convention fell on Halloween, so there was an even larger surge of costumed characters-- many creators taking part too.

It was a great pleasure to meet the amazing cover artist for our "Infected" book, Dean Yeagle and one of my favorite comic artists out there, Amanda Connor (in full skunk regalia!).

Fun with Fotoshop

Part of the fun of the Con is getting to see some of the great costumes folks put together. I ran into a detachment from the 501st Stormtrooper Legion while waiting for my morning coffee...

The Imperials occupation of Seattle's Best

I got one of them to humor me this shot:

Which resulted in:

(Bluescreens not included)

...and just because I can:

:]

'(Near-mint'/ 'Fair' condition)

An All-American Astro Ape

Chimps in the Mist

Now it's time to turn out attention to the good ole' US Space Program after the Soviet inspired stuff. I found an image online of this chimpanzee in the modern orange NASA Launch Entry Suit and wished there was a poster. I couldn't find one after many a Google search so decided to just paint it. It was started a couple years ago and forgotten until I recently dusted it off, gave it a coat of paint, threw it outside, and took a picture.

Seeing the similarities to the previous "Soviet Space Monkey," this just might be the start of another series. Whatever the name, it will likely need to end with

"... in SPACE !"

[A rare image of the Space Monkey in his more natural habitat...]

"American Astro Ape" 2010

22" x 28"Acrylic on Canvas in the Bushes

This will be on display along with many fine works in the theme of Portraits by the talented staff of Art Supply Warehouse this Sunday (9/12) . Their new counterpart creative space CATALYST, recently opened doors and is located in the same plaza. Find more about it and directions here.

I'll post up pics with less foliage from the show. If you're local to town, come check it out! The painting itself will feature a bonus little addendum piece at the gallery... You'll just have to come to see! (or... y'know, just wait for the pics :/).

Some other cool space monkeys:

- Apelad [A. Koford]! (his Twitter feed is more frequent and funnier than most comedians)

- "Space Chimp" video for World Wildlife Fund! (I still think of wrestling if I spell WWF)

- SpaceMonkey.NO ! ("No" for "No.rway"..! Art and Story contributor Kim Holm's chose-your-own-adventure comic strip)

- This old article on BoingBoing features the image which sparked my initial interest in space simians (appearing ever briefly in the Special Features section on the Borat DVD)

Hey you Kids!

Get off my lawn! ...and go read a Comic!

I can't make it to this event until they perfect teleportation technology, but if you're in the Dearborn, Michigan area, you should really check this out! Running from June 12-13 and supported by the folks at 'Art and Story'. It's a free event and a really great place to foster interest in the comics medium for the next generation ['cause otherwise we'd totally die out :( ]. Cheers to sustainability! There'll be workshops and panels for both patrons and creators/educators alike.

It looks really fun. If you go, take pictures for me won'tcha :]

Shortest Post Ever...

It's been good n' busy, will post up some new works and sketches soon (including a short comic and a new Nouveau Robotica) !

Building a Birdman

Going Gizawatt

[Scroll to bottom if you don't wanna read/see an animated .gif !]

Here's a process post about the making of this Thadius Gizawatt, galaxy renowned space explorer from Mark Rudolph's "Mulligan's Run". Mark does a microcast "Mark of the Beast" as part of the Art & Story Supreme content and posed some questions about the process. It did so happen that I saved some images while working on this piece, so here's how it all went down! :

I usually start with a pencil sketch that I scan in-- but I went rogue this time. An idea for the painting was in my head pretty early on, so I worked out the pose straight into the computer using my Intuos tablet. No special brushes at this point, just good ole Round, with pressure sensitivity turned on.

I realized I needed better reference for Mr. Gizawatt to familiarize myself his costume, proportions, and see which parts of him are anthropomorphized. I would later use the bird photo reference to put in subtle feather textures on him.

I kept this nice image of him being choked (I know, how cruel) as I laid out some of his environment. I pictured him as being a reflective kind of guy and wanted him to rest his chin on his fist, but hadn't figured out where his elbow would go at this point.

The spaceship consoles were actually desiged around him to fit as I added in more background. Once I knew just about where things would go, I separated him onto another layer and began to define his silhouette. My favorite brush for this part was from a Chris Oatley's set of custom ones: "Soft Oil Tapered 88" and a modified Calligraphy Oval set to Pressure sensitive.

For the most part, I paint at about 70-90% opacity.

Here I started to add a strong light source. I wanted something bright and saturated so went with a red glow from a radar screen or something. I wanted to keep with a very colorful palette and also a compliment to his green suit.

I shrank his feet [thanks Transfom tool!] to better match his small stature. I also cut out the metal box onto another layer so I could compose it as a foreground element later.

At this point, you start to see more form being described as I darkened the figure using Multiply in my Brush options. Using the same or slighter lighter color in multiply seems to keep it from getting too muddy. I try to sample color [alt/option] while using the brush tool to stay within a decided color palette and use HSB sliders in my Color selection window so I can see both value and saturation.

The paint challenges at this stage feel like a mix between Acrylic and Watercolor so I treat a bit like Gouache. I used less opacity for laying down darks and higher opacity for lights (Something I read from Paul Lasaine's blog-- an exceedingly amazing Dreamworks artist who's very generous in sharing his knowledge and methods)

A lot of the background was very angular and geometric so I used a lot of Shift-click and turned off Pressure sensitivity to draw in the spaceship interior. Once the forms were in there, I used Magic Wand to select planes of shapes and added in some 'painterly' strokes to give it a bit more lived-in look. I used the Burn/Dodge tool to do the same and punch it up. The floor was a photo texture Transformed with Perspective/Skew to fit.

The Nebula was added in to give it the second rim light source (putting multiple light sources throws a form in the round real quick). He's actually lit by three (the third one at his feet shining his boots...maybe coming from somewhere behind the box) just to stage it bit more 'theatrically'.

I could have taken the easy route and just found a pic from NASA.com, but decided to draw the the spacescape from scratch. Here's a how to build your own universe:

Galaxy Quest

Draw a simple starburst pattern from the center using the Polygonal Lasso tool, then

[Filter > Distort > Twirl]

[Edit > Free Transform] to manipulate it into the right perspective.

Start to add some brush texture. I used a combination of Spatter Brush and a custom Oatley's "Feathers" Brush while adjusting Scatter in the Brush Presets. The custom brush creates that speckle pattern if you don't drag the stylus, just dab like a real-life sponge and let Size Jitter from the Presets do the work for you.

It kind of jumps here... I must've got too excited about creating new life and forgot to save a step (it happens ie: Cambrian Explosion~). I selected a bluish/purple hue with a slighted cool white and alternated between them painting the spiral arms. I tried to finish with the lighter stars opaque on top. For the galactic core, I used the brightest white.

The interior core was a white with an orange [Outer Glow] set in [Layer Styles]. I played around by duplicating and using a combination of Blending Modes.

To create just a few billion (well technically...) more wayward stars, I duplicated on another layer, set the blending mode to Screen, reduced Opacity, and scaled it it to haze out the edges.

Eat your Heart out Hubble

That lonely black needed some colorful nebulae (nebulas? nebuali~?), so here's how that came about:

There's tons of ways to draw a star field I'm sure, but I used the Photoshop trick of [Filter > Noise > Add Noise]. Check Monochromatic, play with the sliders, and watch a black canvas turn into deep space. I selected a swatch of the dots, duplicated, and Transformed them larger to make bigger stars-- Screen Blending in Layers to see all of them.

On two Layers, bottom one black and second one a saturated color, select top color and [Filter > Render > Clouds] and repeat the filter until you get some clouds you fancy. I took a piece and blew it up to the size I liked.

Repeat the process using another color. You can see where I Lasso'd the shape of the other one. While selected, going to [Select > Feather> ~15 pixels or so] softens the shape nicely. Use Blending Mode Screen to see them both.

Combine that earlier star field with on a Screen layer to get something like this. Use these two layers to move/rotate/scale them around till you get something like the startup screen on a Mac.

Voila--!

I drew in the larger stars with a standard Round Brush and duplicated to add some variety. As an afterthought, I kind of wish I had spelled out something clever in the constellations.. o well, you can do that.

Choosy Moms Choose GIF

(It's the poor man's process vid !)