The Mort Drucker Influence

Ran across this Kyle Baker colored drawing of Wally. It shows so much Drucker in it. I know Drucker is a huge influence on my art. As much as I try to say it's all about Frazetta. You can't help but absorb Drucker when you look at it. Stephen Silver is his biggest fan. I see a lot of him in Marty's art as well.

Al Feldstein- Thanks for EC and MAD

Comic Book Resource article

Great Feldstein covers

Finished art

Needs color. I start back at Avis this coming Monday.

Looking to be creative during the redux on that job.

Going to do art not much more "finished" than this and call it illustration.

Panel 1- Low Rez

Marty. I realized it's dumb to create a high rez thing you then scale down and turn into a blue line. This should be plenty large at 150 dpi.

Since you're hopefully just re-drawing what you see. Not following the lines so much as the shading.

Makes it easy on me.

Art from new Magic The Gathering card games.

Humanoid Lions everywhere.

 

From Tom - And look at this cool Lion Man Warrior toy from Papo: http://www.amazon.com/Papo-38945-Lion-Man/dp/B0014GTZ0U/ref=sr_1_7?s=toys-and-games&ie=UTF8&qid=1398795671&sr=1-7&keywords=papo+mutant

 

Just hankerin'

Odd. Slightly greyed bkgd that looks white in photoshop and preview

You asked for it.

EDIT=Got rid of one of the links to the high rez images.
I think I'm slowing things down with these thumbnails being shortcuts to 300 dpi images.

Because Blogspot may need to lower the rez,

this is a link to the original 300 dpi version

The original crop barely includes the figure on top of the carriage. But I felt obligated to work her out so what survives the crop looks right.

How does this strike you Marty? A panel at a time. I'll try and finish the other "hard" one tonight. After that, it's all close ups, drama.

Notice the flames giving you some lost line opps on the archer's arm.

I hate horses.

Just a couple of shifts and scaling differences
The link just in case

Here's part two of the Better Than Fiction Podcast

http://betterthanfictionpodcast.podomatic.com/entry/2014-04-19T21_01_42-07_00

And NOW, straight from ECCC
Teen Ellis vs Frankenstein

That sketchbook was truly something.

I laughed at the one of Jeff sweating/sketching while the yokels complain about the shortage of talent.

 The plaid design dry brush on the yokel was insane mastery of that tool.
And the old guy thrusting his hand deep into the pocket of his cargo pants. Just all pumped full of character and  fun. I assume Stuart Ng is your biggest fan.
Thanks Marty.
Sent this extra large version of my personalized sketch. 300dpi in color. Get close.

Word Science at Starbucks!

Word Science, one of the games our team here at WildTangent has produced, is the App Pick of the week at Starbucks!  This really is a fun spelling game for your iPad or iPhone.  It's pretty cool that this has happened... it's fairly high profile for Apple and Starbucks to pick us out of what is probably 100s of apps that apply for this.

Cosplay

Thought this fit into the blog.

Hey. Got an interview with Avis tomorrow. 

If I get that job back, I'll not take another job until it is the perfect art job.

Which I have two in the works.

One a state job.

Fingers crossed on that one.

Wish me luck comrades.

The Wonder of "Wonder Con"

You may have heard that, after months of encouragement from Ranjo, I bought a pass to WonderCon specifically to attend his "Frozen" panel, (not that I was particularly interested in "Froze'd" tidbits, but, y'know, the man asked me...).

I turned up to the room, only to find myself barred from entry. OF COURSE.

Ranjo skipped our pre-arranged meet up time (that HE ARRANGED), and then it was too late...panicked, I jumped in line--but I was too late.

Shut out.

But I'm glad, because otherwise I would never have had the chance to run into Ben Montag and his wife Bessie. We grabbed lunch and had a nice visit--easily the highlight of my show.

(We caught Ranjo after the Froze'd panel let out--a college lad was trying to interview Ranjo after the panel--I stepped in and took over as interviewer. Mr. & Mrs. Montag found our tete-a-tete amusing, I think...hoping to get a copy to post here at some point).

Here's some sketches from the day:

Sketched this while Ben, Bessie and I waited in line for the food trucks. This cosplay thing is completely out of hand...felt like 50% of the attendees were in costume.

 Pixar "Toy Story" alien hat.

 These were drawn in line for Starbucks--Ranjo, his coworker Ben, their kids and I seeking refreshment. I saw the Star Trek get ups and said, "Oh, look, is that a busted Kirk...?" Cut off before I could finish by both Jeff and Ben: "THAT'S PIKE (a little exasperated)"

I met Paul Wee and bought one of his sketchbooks--he does really nice life drawing and has been branching into more ink stuff (trained with the same guys as Jeff Watts, been working on The Simpsons for 14 years). We got to talking about publishing strategies, I mentioned my BPB book and he asked if I had one to show him (of course I did ;). He dug it and bought one, cash money. He is working on a book of movie monsters, so I did this drawing for him (which cracked him up--always a good feeling). Super nice guy! Check out his sketchbooks--there's quite a few and they're great!

Just one "hard" panel to go.

One more panel with horses and extra details and characters, then it's all drama and mid shots and easy stuff.
I'll do the last hard panel now.

 Corben's Beast of Wolfton

Big influence on my idea. Totally different story.

Corben's is a Beauty and The Beast retelling with a cynical twist.

But it has a lot of ideas and period detail that really influenced my story.

 

From Tom - Corben Color Examples: 

Yes Virginia, there is a carpet

 Well all the kaiju figures are packed up in the trunks (All 15 of them). Most of the books are boxed and will be working on the CDs and DVDs next. Then the sorting will begin and EBay'n will start. If it goes well. I'll be postponing the move at the end of July. This will give me a chance to liquidate a lot of stuff. Had lots more that I thought or estimated. Ugh!

Had an interview last week.

It didn't go well.

Can't wait to get these deciferable for Marty

I'm lying again. 

I can obviously wait because I'm giving it a break. 

But I'll whip this into shape tomorrow.

Not enough gangly super heroes. Spiderman...who else

Funny, mocking

Interesting that I run into this shortly after Tom is taking note of a character named Spurt.

Gotta love those early Ditko Spiderman villains.

Another collectible for Jim. 

Fletcher Hanks - Stardust

More Fest

Another T-shirt idea. The Fest is entertaining the idea doing a Twilight Zone tribute. If the T-shirt has to have 4-spot colors I made the left side. If grays are allowed, the right. The hero is inked in Illustrator. Haven't submitted to anybody in charge yet.

Reinked

Tumblr link to More Doodles.

And more on tumblr

I've been drinking Coronas and lime.

Great for naps and deep sleep. Not so great for concentration.

UPDATE: (from Marty) I had to ink this to show you how our next story collaboration could look. I'm just sayin'.... (tho' this doesn't do yr original justice, it is prompted by yr talk in the podcast about the difficulty of finding an inker...I want to audition!)

Tuesday Monster

Doodle inspired by Jack Davis-type E.C. Comics work. Tombow brushpens, which I'm still struggling with--if they aren't 10 years old, I have to lick 'em a lot to get what I want.

JMG ADDED: Another outstanding brush pen sketch by Marty but I had to put some levity here just for fun. This movie makes me laugh

Blender is amazing. Can I get an amen?

Free would be worthless if Blender wasn't so powerful and amazing. I love this program so much.

I tell all. I know where the bodies are buried

I am interviewed.

Better than Fiction Podcast

Did it Friday.

Quick turn around.

No doubt embarrassingly bad.

I haven't listened to it yet.

Enjoy the trademark Goodson disjointedness.

Nice Cartoon. Could use a better caption

I've probably seen the original Wilson caption.

My absolutely favorite part of Playboy.

Well, close.

The interviews of course.

Incidental Drawing

 

It started out with my thirteen-year-old visiting niece asking for a drawing of an elephant last week.  I found that drawing elephants and rhinos amused me, so when I woke up this morning and didn't feel like working on my comic book, I decided to let myself be distracted.

 

When I was a kid in the late 1950's, I overheard an older neighbor boy use a sentence with the word "pregnant" in it.  He warned me not to repeat that word in front of my parents or else we would both get in big trouble.  It puzzled and scared me a little.

Moving Chaos

 Chaos stills ensues. The painting is done, NOW the hard part....the sorting and packing. The Gorham Pit turned upside down. It's no Myth or Legend for future generations. It exists. Ugh!

My Class Painting

Still lots of work to do but it wasn't easy. No base drawing just blocking from a photo. It's got problems but it gave me a chance to use oils after 30 years.

A Last Opera?

Wow, I missed the blog the last few days, and lookit all the posts! Great to see the T.A.G. page bustling.

Ben, the Jose Delbo story is too funny. He was very friendly toward us--glad I didn't get on his bad side! Love the thought that someone believed the Western was the highest form of comic book art...I love the idea of The Rawhide Kid, et al, now that I'm a grown man--but never bought such books as a kid (maybe I could have dodged his horse assignments by drawing dogs instead???) I do remember an Avengers storyline in the mid-seventies where Hawkeye took a break from the group by getting a job on a dude ranch...and met The Rawhide Kid?? The memory is hazy....

Wednesday I went down to San Diego for possibly my last "Comic Artists Draw the Opera" session (see the news about San Diego Opera possibly closing for good after this week's performances). Our production at hand was Don Quixote, (sung in French). Looked wonderful, tho' I really couldn't follow much while I'm drawing. And I kept waiting for them to do do "Impossible Dream"...!

Sometimes doing the life sketching I get into a very linear groove--I would hesitate to call it "Hirschfeldian" in a more public setting, but here among friends I know I will be understood. Hirschfeld is better, but he's also doing something a little different--his drawings were very slowly produced in his studio, where he synthesized life sketches, photos, and endless studies of each actor's features to produced his super-polished and impregnably well-designed illustrations. To illustrate:

I, on the other hand, am just letting rip. In pencil. From life. The likenesses may suffer for it, but I like the liveliness. Plus, I can tune 'em up in Photoshop when no one is looking...But really--there's no comparison. Al killed it everytime!!

Too Creepy

I know they've been kinda sorta looking for a new Comic Fest T-shirt, and I know the powers that be like the ComicFest-Man that Scott Shaw! did, so I came up with an homage to his guy. It's a no go. Mike Towry thinks parents would be uncomfortable with this guy around kids. Mike said he might be opening up the T-shirt design to a contest, while Scott Shaw!'s surprised faced character is becoming the de facto logo in the various print and web SDCF exposures.

In a few days I should have the specs on doing badge art and all of you should do one, for free, with no name consideration whatsoever. Maybe a name in the program book, I have to ask.

A Cartoon by Tom Gauld

My favorite cartoonist. Makes me think of Ellis's Erica Jong quote.  He was at the San Diego Con last year, but I didn't get to talk to him.  I need to develop a style with a faster turnaround time like him.

 

ECCC Loot

 

I bought this volume of "Planet Comics" archives.  It's full of stories starring "Flash Gordon" types: "Flint Baker and the One-Eyed Monsters of Mars", "Captain Nelson Cole of the Solar Force" and "Buzz Crandall and the Space Patrol".  Best name of all though is

"Spurt Hammond - Planet Flyer",

maybe because of the way he spurts out of the great mortar in his super rocket?

One more shot from ECCC

Cutest cosplay award winners!