step by step... part 4

okay, so we're in the home stretch on this commission... you can see at this point i've added more mid range/ shadow colors to fill it out... and usually a quick trick to make it pop is adding a different cooler light source opposite the main one (and again, that light purple does the job pretty well)... not much left but the finishing touches...

oh, and since michael dooney (a CRAZY talented artist, i must add) asked a while back - all the inks for these (and 95% of what i ink) is faber castell pitt pens (either the S/superfine of the F/fine tips... and if i need a thicker line weight i'll redraw the line a few times, building it up slowly)...

okay, besides the commissions (i've got a few more to post soon, like a princess from "battle of the planets", a canson gwen stacy and a canson supergirl... and canson black widow is in the works now), i'm on my last page of our framing story for haps 6, the story for uncanny x-men first class special is done (i'll post a page or two when i get the okay) and work on my next marvel gig is underway...

i'm sure there's more i was gonna post, but since it's slipped my mind... next time.

-c

OH, i did want to mention i'll be at stillpoint comics in fall river, ma this saturday (may 2, 10am - 2pmish) for free comic book day, sketching and signing and more than likely, reading comics!

step by step...3!

alright, so here we go with some color... since the highlights and shadows usually play a strong role in these, i start with deciding where the light source is coming from - for this one, it's a dramatic up-lit image... laying in some highlight colors really sets the mood (and again, it lets the value of the paper play a big role in the finished colors)... i do all the colors on these with prismacolor colored pencils... from here, the next step will be laying in some darker values and some edge lighting and a contour to make it all pop...

hope everybody had a good week (and picked up their very own copy of the new haps trade that came out last week)... after being under the weather a bit (damn ick tearing though the house), had a great weekend with friends (some of whom have,alas , succumbed to said ick) and saw a great game at fenway on sunday with perfect weather for a game... finishing up the x-men story and jumping on a new supercool project at marvel for the same editor this week and getting everything ready to send issue 6 of the haps to image next week (finally!)

-c

step by step... part deux

i know some of you have been ANXIOUSLY awaiting this second post in the step by step process, so here we go!

after getting a tight sketch on plain ol' white copy paper i'm happy with, the next step is to transfer to the colored canson paper (i'm using the mi-teintes line, a heavier textured color paper that comes in a 19x25 sheet in a slew of colors) i should point out that choosing the right color goes a long way in making the picture work (trial and error has shown me that the mid-range/darker papers usually work best... and matching it to the larger color elements - costume, cape, etc - is a smart move... choosing the wrong paper becomes a struggle to get a solid color with the colored pencils - the green on the orange paper for aquaman was a good example of working against the paper).

since the paper is too heavy to see through on a light table... and i'm not about to redraw the whole darn thing, i use saral paper (think carbon paper - but i usually use the white) to transfer the image to the canson paper - simply laying the drawing on top of the canson with the saral in between (AND facing the right way - more than a few times i've traced the whole thing, only to find the saral was wrong side down... d'oh!) and tracing the sketch, leaving the white line art on the canson...)

once i've got the white tracing line down, it's time to ink (and by the time i'm done, i've smudged away most of the white lines... )

okay, so that should tide folks over 'til we get to the coloring in progress next week...

and hey, didja know, next week sees the release of the long awaited first haps trade from image?

-c

(season finale of friday night lights already?! damn)

step by step...

first off, had a great time at the boston comic con last weekend (spent plenty of time geeking out over mike allred who was sitting to my right - -he and his wife laura are absolutely the nicest folks you can meet )... thanks to everybody who stopped by and said hey (or, in the case of our own officer mulcahy, expertly hawked my wares all weekend as i sat with my head down over my drawing board)

okay, since i'm hard at work on getting pages done for both books right now (haps 6 and uncanny x-men first class special), i figure i'd use the next few posts to step through the process of a canson paper color sketch.... first up, the sketch.

so, the request was an 11x17 spidey loves mj style peter parker in an iconic pose... after a coupla false starts, i figured this was the way to go (after so many of these things, i don't do much prelim/thumbnail stuff, just get to the drawing)... after getting it tight enough, it's on to the next step...

-c