Catwoman. Terni, Italy. 2010.

Another convention sketch. This time from the Fumetterni event in Terni, Italy. Had a wonderful time there sketching mainly Captain America, Judge Dredd and Hal Jordan (the original Green Lantern) but occasionally there were some feminine distractions. Wonder Woman is a popular request but this Catwoman was my favourite from the whole weekend.

Stacy - UKCAC sketch. 1989.

First convention sketch for UKCAK, London 1989.

The Human Torch. Paris Manga 2010

This week's sketch is The Human Torch drawn for a fan (Alexis) at Paris Manga in February.

Kinda tried to channel an Alex Ross painterly quality with this one. Started with a rough outline of where Johnny Storm would be standing and began using a large wedge marker for most of the figure-work and fire. Went in afterwards with a thinner pigment liner (about 0.7mm) for the more delicate detailing. This would work well with colour but for the purposes of a convention sketch still turned out quite well. Maybe about ten minutes in all.

Thanks to Guillaume for the scan.

The Tempest wins an IPPY award.

Congratulations to the Classical Comics team for another award to add to their collection. The Tempest won another Bronze at the IPPY awards this year. Last year's Macbeth success is mirrored again. We all worked very hard on this book so it's nice to get recognition for all our efforts. Well done to Jon Haward for his wonderful pencils, John Macdonald for adaptation of Shakespeare's original work, Nigel Dobbyn for his magical colour and Clive Bryant for keeping the book focused and on schedule.



Graphic Novel/Drawn Book – Drama/Documentary
Gold (tie): Hatter M: Mad With Wonder, by Frank Beddor (Automatic Pictures) and Ars Memoria: The Art of Memory, by Menton J. Matthews III (Prudentius Publishing)
Silver: The Vampire Conspiracy, by Marc Morgenstern and Adam Gorham (Five Strangers Press)
Bronze: The Tempest, by William Shakespeare (Classical Comics Ltd.)

Macbeth wins an IPPY award.

Classical Comics graphic novel adaptation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth picked up a gong at the Independent Publisher’s Book Awards, tying with Michael Pearl’s Good and Evil for the Bronze award in the Graphic Novel/Drawn Book – Drama/Documentary category. Frank Beddor and Liz Cavalier took the Silver for Hatter M, while the Gold spot went to The Red Star: Sword of Lies by Christian Gossett.

Congratulations to Jon Haward on a sterling pencilling job on the book. It was a great opportunity to work with him inking his pages. Further recognition to John Macdonald, Nigel Dobbyn for his wonderful colouring and Clive for his stewardship on the series.

Kinky Boots. 2009.

The original image (or pose) is from a Jean Paul Gaultier promo seen in Vogue Paris from December 1986. The figures and provocative nature of the image stayed with me all these years and I am glad to have finally committed it to paper (with some digital colouring) There is also a kinda Twin peaks thing going on with the curtains and floor but who hasn't thought of mixing those two together. There is also a Ranxerox nod in there too. Maybe a proper sketch of the hero next time?

Captain America. Paris Manga sketch 2010.

Another sketch from Paris Manga.

Aplogies to all the Scotch Corner followers for the late post. Real life has intervened yet again.

Wedge Antilles, X-Wing Pilot. Paris Manga sketch 2010.

This sketch of Wedge Antilles was one on many drawn over the weekend at the Paris Manga event. The Star Wars link was helped by a couple of the actors appearing as the show's media guests. Mostly superhero inspired sketches over the course of the day but Wedge (and the X-Wing itself) proved very popular. All drawn from memory and not bad considering it has been over ten years since I last worked on the books.

Have included a selection of the other Wedge Antilles sketches below for comparison.

Machine Man and the Silencers. 2009.

From the vaults.

This week I am featuring a portfolio piece done in a couple of hours before an interview with Glasgow based Red Lemon Studios a few years ago. It features Litany and Gitane (from Silencers) and Machine Man from Dark Horse Comics (who I drew in the Mask World Tour series from March 1998) Very pleased with this study and the speed at which it was done.

The interview went well enough and I received some good advice at the time.

Punk Too. 2009.

Another in the series of Riot Grrrls. I used a model for the pose and then overworked the photograph (using the colour as a base) Quick and easy process to garner an acceptable end image. The eyes were my favourite part of this digital colour sketch. Kinda Ladytron. The flock is another regular feature background. Years ago this character would have been in Warheads, all tooled and suited up for some cyberpunk hardware skirmish. sigh.

Maybe sooner than you think?

Paris Manga 6-7th February.

I will be attending Paris Manga on 6-7th February. Looking forward to this event (as I missed last year's) Sorry to disappoint the Anime fans but I won't be in CosPlay. I may however wear my kilt. For the ladies, of course. Hoping to see some of my French fans there!

The main draw for me is superb artist Benjamin. Love his work. His digital paintings have so much colour and vibrancy. Very inspiring.

More details can be found here.

Elektra - Evolution of a comic character panel.

This week I have decided to show the introductory character panel of Elektra from the short story I did for Panini recently. Having thrown a bad guy through a restuarant's glass window, our heroine steps after her prey clamly with sai in hand. I liked the balletic elegance of her stepping gracefully through the sharp cutting hole. The intent of her actions is there.

The first panel shows my biro sketch. I normally thumbnail panel layouts in the margin of the script and work out the page quickly on A4 with a pen. This looks as near to the finished page as possible and most of the good ideas come out of this process. Fast and spontaneous, it is very exciting to see the page form so quickly, even in this raw state.

Panel two shows my layouts draft. I work in some shadows here and there and balance out the composition and correct any dodgy anatomy. To save time this is also done at A4.

Panel three shows the pencils (generally done with my inking pens as a kinda practice run of the finished page) This is the stage where I work in all the feathering and textures and some corrections are made here too. Pages are scanned again and turned into bluelines for final stage.

The fourth panel is the inked page. Sometimes I can be confident enough with a story to miss out the third stage pencils and go straight to inks (as on Dare) but Elektra was special and I wanted to make sure I got the details and storytelling spot on. The writer James Peaty had fashioned a tight lean script of only six pages but with near seven or eight panels per page, space was at a premium and getting a nice introductory shot of Elektra was tough.

The final stage is the addition of colour by James Offredi (who did the lovely job on my Knights of the Pendragon collection cover shown here recently) Ed Hammond edited the story at all stages and offered some good advice on creating a PG friendly Elektra for the Panini line, hence the cycling shorts. These concessions are part of the process of working for specific audiences and I feel the end product works very well. The final version appears complete in Marvel Heroes issue 19 on sale now.

Next blog will feature a whole Elektra page breakdown and will show more clearly the different choices and approaches made to create this action story.

Punk.

Another colour sketch. A spunky Riot Grrl. Who'd have guessed?

Had a lot of fun with her working the texture of the hat and designs of badges (which were all rotated and sized individually) I drew up some rough designs and ideas, pencilled, inked then coloured digitally. Probably going to be part of a larger series.

Futureworld illustration - 2009.

A sort of nod to the original Westworld movie although The Terminator might prove a more topical reference for the younger fans out there! My colleague Dominic's wife, Sharon posed for me during the Jack Cross sessions a few years ago now (playing both female parts) and this portrait was an outake. I re-worked it a bit with the face plate and added the circuitry and mechanics underneath. It has a kind of whimsy about it that reminds me of the early Metal Hurlant covers. Liked the focus on the eye in this one too. Nice and veined. The rabbit pattern on the shirt (Sharon's own! ;) really pops in the final image.

And no, Sharon can't remove her face plate in real life.

As much as I love blue-skinned woman (Enki Bilal's Jill Bioskop is a favourite) the equally lovely Jennifer Susan Walters AKA She-Hulk is a very close second (albeit a different hue, literally) For this colour sketch I kept the image simple and flirty.

Xena, Warrior Princess.

Another cheesecake piece.

I loved the original Xena series (before the later epsiodes got silly) Lucy Lawless was an astounding presence on screen and the costume looked practical (if a little skimpy at times! ;) I worked up three different poses of the character and decided to colour this one for my blog. Great to see Lucy return to our screens in the new Battlestar Galactica and this series may well spur me to do Starbuck for next week.

Vote now!

Tank Grrrl!

Tank Grrrl (sic) has always been a favourite character right from the early days of Deadline magazine and following series. Alan Martin and Jamie Hewlett's spunky heroine and her boyfriend Booga hit a note of anarchy on release that few other characters have touched since. Over the top and downright rude and offensive and entertaining. How could it fail to amuse this adolescent mind? That glorious work continues with the added visual flair from Rufus Dayglo and should be actively tracked down!

This early morning sketch is proving popular with fans on the convention circuit too and I added an Antipodean flavour to the helmet for this image but with a Tank Grrrl twist. No they're not shells. Work it out for yourself.

Joker. 'Why so serious?'

This week's post is the Joker. Been a very popular sketch this one (especially after I changed the composition from a side profile) Many requests for this at Lille and previous festivals. More so than Batman! I have included the original layout below for reference. I don't generally use a pencil but instead sketch out the design in marker pen and then tighten up with layout or 80g photocopier paper. My 'tracing' approach is always scunnered though when fans provide their own 260g sketch books for me to work on and I have to resort to 'aquiring' fellow artists and colleagues pencils to draw with. I still have a pen from Cameron Stewart after our Lille trip and more than a case worth of Chris Weston's markers from Bristol!



Anyways. The Joker. I like this pose a lot and the addition of the playing card helps the composition. The actual card changes from sketch to sketch depending on what mood I am in but mostly remains the Joker of the pack. The Joker's eyes are my favourite and I was especially pleased with the bleached-out effect in the original layout. Kinda lost it when inking the sketch but will get it right next time. Biggest influence for this sketch? Brian Bolland's Killing Joke. A difficult character to do well... too many artists turn him into a distorted paody of the original villian and he ends up looking like a melted Spitting Image puppet. The performance by Heath Ledger is possibly the closest to the best Joker in years and another influence on this sketch.

Death.

Another sketch from Lille. Death is becoming my second favourite sketch after Oola, the Twi' lek. More cheesecake but prettier than Dredd. I added a flock wallpaper background to the sketch for texture (and in keeping with the character) Finishes off the picture nicely. Chris Bachalo was the artist who most inspired this piece. He really captured that young Gothic emo-chic look beautifully in the Gaiman series. Fragile and delicate. Like a young Siouxsie Sioux?

Would probably continue to work on some more images of Death. Maybe for a future post?

Oola, a sexy Twi' lek - Sketch.

A proper sketch this week. This was a spare piece from my trip to Lille Comic Festival. As much as I would hope to be constantly busy from ten till seven at these events, there is always a little down time between fans and I keep myself amused by continuing to sketch. Usually Dare, Batman or Terminator portraits but occasionally I try my hand to some cheesecake. Always a bit partial with my sweet tooth and the practice is good.

This character piece is of a sexy Oola (the dancing Twi' lek from Return of the Jedi) A few years ago I had the pleasure of meeting the actress Femi Taylor who played the part of Oola at a Sci-Fi convention in Loughborough University. Myself, Colin MacNeil and Wil Simpson were asked to sketch Femi over the course of an afternoon. Too say I was star struck would be an understatement. She was positively delightful (mischieviously a little flirty too) My sketch then really didn't do her justice and I spent the rest of the convention working a better piece before she left. The Fallen Angel post (previously shown here) helps give you an idea of the pose I eventually used for her in her character Oola.

Anyways. About time I actually included a proper sketch here for the blog. Next week... Death.