Robot vs. the Aztec Mummy

When I was checking the listings on TCM and saw this title, I knew I had to record it. Robot vs. the Aztec Mummy is a terrible 50's grade Z scifi movie from Mexico about a mad scientist who builds a "human robot" to fight an Aztec mummy so that he can steal the ancient treasure that the mummy guards. The robot and the mummy were a sad looking mish mash of cardboard and playdoh, but the actors in the movie were a lot of fun to watch.

The hero (I think he's doing the Mexican version of 'Blue Steel'):

His fidgety egghead sidekick (his giant glasses should have gotten the screen credit):

The mad scientist (he looks more jolly than mad):

His fidgety scarfaced henchman (a little moisturizer should take care of that):

Mayday, Mayday!

Still messing around with the oil paints a bit. I used this old movie still as reference:

It looks like David Niven in some kind of war movie, but I'm not sure which one. Anyway, I wasn't going for an exact likeness, but more of an idealized kind of feel:

POW! Right in the Kisser

I was messing around with some oil sketching on 9x12 canvas paper over the weekend - this took about 2 hours total:

Here's the photo I used as reference:

The proportions are all out of whack, but I had fun keeping it loose and simple.

The Good, The Bad and The Freakin' Weird

I'm on my own this weekend, so I've had movies playing while I putz around the house. Yesterday was western day - I watched For a Few Dollars More (a classic), Django (rough around the edges but fun), and El Topo.

El Topo is a 'mystical western' written, directed by and starring Alejandro Jodorowsky. Jodorowsky is a Ukranian who was raised in Chile and is best known for writing French comics. The movie has some interesting visuals, but man is it weird. It starts off with in the fairly standard "man with no name" scenario but quickly goes off the rails and ends up with a cave full of deformed midgets with a lot of flute playing, dead rabbits and old men wearing make-up along the way. Not for the faint of heart:

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.

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:

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:

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:

Lines & Colors

I'm still playing around with style & technique. I found a still from the Ten Commandments and decided to try and break it down and do a study of it. I like it because it has strong but simple lighting and color and a nice sense of depth with a very loosely defined background:


I wanted to see how it broke down in terms of tone and how I might interpret it in black & white, so I desaturated it and pushed the contrast until I had something I could study:


Using pens and a black colored pencil I made this drawing, trying to further simplify the values and avoid any line work that would make it look to overworked or overdrawn (like feathering or cross hatching.) I like the way the colored pencil comes through in the scan - it holds it tone and gives the drawing some organic texture:


Once I had that scanned in, I colored it using as few colors as possible. The colors I chose had to be a little bit darker and less saturated that the colors from the photo since I was working within a narrower range of values. I learned a lot about using saturation as well as value to define lights and darks. There are only about 4 basic colors, but lots of variation in saturation and tone to create variety:


What did I learn? I learned a lot about drawing less and keeping in mind the overall image - what I would define with line and what I would define with color. The next step is to try something from scratch without reference and see how much I can carry over from this study.

Am I wasting my time? Maybe. I'm sure a lot of artists a lot smarter than I am can figure this stuff out without going through all of this effort, but I want to push my drawing style and make it simpler yet more sophisticated at the same time. I know it's a fool's errand to chase after someone as talented as Alex Toth, but my instincts tell me that that's the direction I need to go in.

Portrait of a Bastard

Still trying to get a handle on this character I've been working on. I'm trying to give him the Romanesque nose, big cheek bones and sullen eyes of Charlton Heston without having to resort to constant use of photo reference. I want him to have that same mix of broad shouldered heroism and haughty indignation that Heston had in his prime:


I was actually looking at a photo of Humphrey Bogart for the lighting, but trying to apply it to this face:

Go Speed Racer, Go!

I drew this today for a raffle at my wife's school this week:

I cut a lot of corners to get it done on time, but it came out alright.

Process #4

Here's the final version of my Charlton Heston sketch:


I laid the wash down pretty loosely - I didn't want this to feel stiff as a lot of photo referenced drawings tend to feel. The paper got too wet when I was putting in the background so it's kind of messed up. That's what I get for doing this on a piece of scrap paper.

Oh well, it was a fun change of pace.

Process #3

Got a chance to finish off the inks tonight:
Since I'm going to lay in some ink wash, I left a lot of medium & darker values undefined in the inks, especially towards the bottom of the figure. We'll see how it goes this weekend.

Process #2

Not quite done with the inks tonight, but it's getting there:


I don't ink with a brush very much anymore, so I'm feeling my way through this one. I had hoped I'd pull off some crazy new way of doing things as a result, but I'm not confident enough to let that happen. As usual, I've fallen back onto the same old crutches I've always used.

Maybe I'll redo this one when it's done and force myself to ink it differently. I'd like to get away from any and all feathering and find more varied ways of laying in texture and shadow. Why? I just think it time for an overhaul. I'll never be Wally Wood so I might as well explore some other approaches.

Process #1

I'd been wanting to draw Charlton Heston since I'd heard that he'd passed away. As a kid, we didn't have big budget CG extravaganza superhero movies coming out every week so Charlton Heston was as close to a superhero as we had. On any given weekend, you could catch a re-run of Planet of the Apes or The Omega Man on TV and of course, every Easter we got to watch The Ten Commandments and Ben Hur. I certainly didn't agree with the man's politics, but he could play bigger than life heroes like few others.

I just had time to do some rough pencils today, so I thought I'd post each step of the process. I'm thinking this is going to be pen & ink with some ink wash laid in when it's done. We'll see:

Edited to add the reference photo I'm using (a still from Ben Hur):

Spaghetti Sketchin'

When I watch a favorite movie for the umpteenth time I like to pause on interesting shots and sketch. This is a page I doodled a while back while watching Once Upon a Time in the West:


There are some amazing faces in that movie - Woody Strode looked like he was carved from stone and of course Charles Bronson was Moebius's model for his Lt. Blueberry character.

Home Stretch

Last post from the road - here's an experiment with ink wash from a long time ago: