Only The Shadow Knows

Just a quick Shadow marker sketch today:

Bad Mojo

Just a quick Jonah Hex after reading some of the recent issues drawn by Jordi Bernet:

Zeppelin Fight

I've had a very hectic couple of weeks, so I haven't done a lot of work on the Lord Bastard project. That's not to say that I haven't been thinking about it a lot - I'm finally to a point with the story and characters where I can see things playing out like a movie in my mind. The characters are coming to life and the whole thing is starting to have its own 'feel'. On paper, I'm behind where I want to be with the project, but I feel good about where it's going.

I took some time last night to loosely concept an idea for a scene I've been kicking around:



One of my most cherished possessions is an old copy of Prevue magazine from the late 70's that had a big pull out poster of concept art that Jim Steranko did for Raiders of the Lost Ark. I love the rugged feeling he gave the paintings and the warm tones he used to give the desert a romantic, pulpy feel. This is my lame attempt at capturing that same feeling.

Insert Bad "Who Watches the Watchmen" Joke Here

I'm going to see The Watchmen tomorrow with a group from work, so I drew a quick Dr. Manhattan today.

The movie looks like it's going to have some amazing visuals. The shots in the trailer where Dr. Manhattan & the Comedian are in Viet Nam always catch my eye because it looks like they dropped them right in the middle of 'Apocalypse Now'. I'm also looking forward to the flashbacks to the original Minutemen back in the 40's & 50's. That's probably the closest thing to a big budget Golden Age superhero movie that we'll ever get:

Another Study

Another quick concept piece to try out some things.

I realized that I've never posted anything that takes place after the first act of the story, which is when things really get going. Although there's a definite John Carter influence to it, Bastard doesn't end up on Mars. I was going for kind of a Spaghetti Western sunset and went a little nuts with the red:

Technique Study

I got tired of working on my story outline, so I messed around with some techniques I've been thinking about for doing the backgrounds. Again, just throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks:


Not the most ambitious example, but hopefully tomorrow I can find the time to try something a little more involved.

And Now for Something Completely Different...

I managed to make Valentine's Day dinner for my wife without poisoning us or burning down the house. She wrote about it on the food blog she and a friend started recently:

http://creating-a-foodie.blogspot.com/2009/02/valentines-day-dinner-part-two.html

Pre-pre-production

Having just wrapped up the game I've been working on, I was able to have a long weekend off and managed to get a lot done on what I call pre-pre-production for my graphic novel. I already had a rough outline and a lot of notes, so right now I'm working on a more detailed final outline, nailing down names for people, places & things, and organizing my reference material for everything.

Once that's complete, I can move into regular old pre-production where I filter all of the things that inspire me into my designs for everything that will appear in the story - all of the key characters, locations and props. I'll also take the final outline and use it to break down the story scene by scene, loosely laying out the pages and writing all of the dialogue. At that point, I'll have a pretty good blueprint to follow.

I'm an organizer and planner by nature and since this is going to be a long term project that will undoubtedly have stops and starts as my free time allows I need to have this guide that I can use to keep me on track.

It's going to be a lot of work, but I'm long overdue to try something like this. I look forward to the opportunity to do something 100% the way I want to do it. That way, the only person that can hold me back and the only person I can blame for failure is me.

Major Dundee

One last movie sketch, this one of Sam Peckinpah's first films, Major Dundee. Charlton Heston plays the title character, a Union officer who leads a pack of rag tag volunteers and Confederate P.O.W.'s across the Mexican border to track down a band of Apache's who have been raiding forts and settlements in Texas.

There are lots of interesting characters all played by great actors in this one, but I really liked James Coburn as the scout who tracks the Apache for Dundee. This seemed like a part more suited to Lee Marvin, being a gruff, scraggily bearded frontiersman, but Coburn played it well. The fact that Coburn was so damn skinny helped. Usually when an actor hides one of their arms under their shirt to play an amputee it's very obvious and looks weird, but it actually made Coburn look beefier and more heroic:

Dr. No

Last weekend was great for catching up on some of my favorite old movies on TV. After watching The Big Heat, I caught some of the James Bond marathon on BBC America. I just watched bits and pieces, but saw three different Bond films in one day.

The last one was Dr. No. - still one of the best Bond movies despite being the first. Even though it had a crazy villain with metal hands, a cool hidden lair in the Caribbean and membership in a secret society called S.P.E.C.T.R.E. it will always be remembered most for introducing the first Bond girl. The first time we see her, she's walking out of the ocean wearing a white bikini complete with knife belt. The only thing that ruins the scene is that she and Bond both sing "underneath the mango tree", a song that's heard about 10 times throughout the movie. The producers definitely got their money's worth out of that licensing deal:

The Big Heat

I watched one of my favorite film noir movies this weekend - The Big Heat. Glenn Ford plays an honest cop who doesn't know when to back off in investigating the suicide of a police official with ties to the local crime czar. I think I like it so much because it's very simple but very well done. The story is straight forward, but it hits all the right notes and has some pretty intense stuff for the time. I highly recommend it if you like that sort of thing:

Getting Back Into the Swing of Things

I've been busy/distracted lately, and whatever free time I've had has been spent working on/learning about writing, so I haven't had much to post. I am trying to get back into regular sketching though.

Here's a quick study from a movie still, just messing around with basic Photoshop brushes and working with a limited palette. Not the best likeness - it looks more like Robert Redford than Roger Moore. About 45 minutes of work:

Squid Mobster

Going through a pile of old random doodles on my desk:

IT Crowd

I've been watching The IT Crowd, a British comedy with a lot of the same actors from Garth Marenghi's Dark Place, a favorite show of mine. Just a quick doodle of the main characters who are nerdy IT guys, if you can't tell:

The Original Rebel

Last week Betty Page, the Queen of the Pin-Ups, passed away. I think one could argue that she inspired almost as many young men to pick up a pencil and learn how to draw as Jack Kirby did:

Solomon Kane & Candy Canes

Let me try this one more time - the first time I posted these, the images weren't clickable.

Anyway, I finally got some time to finish the last page of the Solomon Kane story I had intended to wrap up by Halloween. I didn't get the last page done in time, then things conpsired to keep my from finishing it, and suddenly it's almost Christmas.

Here's the whole story:

Other Stuff

The last page of the Solomon Kane story is coming, but I've been working on a few other little projects too. Here's a little 4"x6" oil sketch I made for a friend in lieu of a card:

It took about 2 hours to paint and about a week to dry (aargh) - I've got to try acrylics some day.

Off the Rails

I missed my Halloween deadline to finish my Solomon Kane story and things keep popping up eat the time I need to finish the last page. Since I haven't had anything to post, I thought I'd point out that my friends at Midway Games just released Mortal Kombat vs. The DC Universe. I drew this back when the project was just getting underway - seems like forever ago:

Shipwrecked Page Five

Got a little behind this week, so I missed my Halloween deadline, but only one more page to go:

Shipwrecked Page Four

Shipwrecked Page Three

Shipwrecked Page Two

Forever Cool

Just a quick sketch of Paul Newman, who passed away a few days ago, from his role as Cool Hand Luke. He was one of the last 'Old School Cool' actors in Hollywood. Like Steve McQueen, he didn't have to act cool - he just was:

Shipwrecked Page One

Here we go:

Halloween Project

I started this blog last year right around Halloween and my first posts were all monsters of some sort. Since I'm holding back on posting anything related to the graphic novel I'm trying to get going I haven't had a lot to post, but I wanted to do something special for Halloween. I've had an idea for a short Solomon Kane story in my head for a while, so I thought I'd do something with that. Here's the first panel:


For the sake of trying something new, I'm doing the whole thing digitally and I'm messing around with making custom brushes to achieve some of the pen & ink techniques of the old E.C. horror comics.

My goal is to have the whole thing done by Halloween - we'll see how that goes.

Operator 5

I've been reading a book about the history of the pulp novels - it's got chapters on all of the usual characters, like The Shadow and Doc Savage, but it also talks about some of the forgotten heroes. Most of them are forgotten because they were either cheap knock-offs or just plain schlock, but a few sounded pretty interesting, like Operator 5.

The premise of the stories is that an invading army rolls through the US in the early 30's and locks the country down under martial rule. The military is destroyed, the government is dissolved (the president shoots himself), and the only hope for salvation is a small band of freedom fighters led by Operator 5, the last remaining government agent.

Like a lot of the pulps, these stories were a weird mish-mash of current events, future speculation and crazy sci-fi which lead to some very strange ideas and imagery. Operator 5, the wholesome hero, wore the death's head skull as his symbol (pre-dating the SS), blew up buildings and bridges and regularly used his girlfriend as bait for enemy. I guess they didn't call it hard boiled action for nothing:

Keeping Things Under Wraps

I'm still working on the beginnings of a graphic novel, slowly but surely, but I've decided to keep it under wraps for a while. I'm wrestling with the story right now, with art as a secondary concern, and with things changing from day to day (for the better I hope) I think it's counterproductive to start showing anything more yet. Just a last few doodles for now:

Sketch Challenge #2

From the Penciljack forums - illustration based on "the day 15 year old Danny Moore discovered he could levitate objects":

Recharging the Batteries

I haven't been doing much drawing for fun lately, so I looked around online for some sketch challenges to try. James Gurney, of Dinotopia fame, posts a random phrase from old sci-fi books every week on his blog as an exercise for his readers to illustrate. This week's quote was, "the old man felt a tendril of anger rising." My quick take on it:

The sketches don't have to be drawn in any sort of genre style, but I'm a sucker for old pulpy sci-fi.

Giddy Up!

I've been busy recently and have spent most of my free time working on the outline for the story, but I had a chance to do some drawing last night:


Since I was just doodling, I didn't bother with any reference, and so the horses are pretty goofy looking.