The Complete Baroness One-shot Pencils

Didn't think I'd show them big enough you could actually see anything much did you? ;)

A bit more Conan...

From the studio tonight.

The inking stage. Using line weights a bit this time! Pencil tones and watercolour to go. Will probably put up the plain line work if anyone wants to have fun with colour themselves after I finish my Wolverine image too. Though this one needs a lot more shading to work I think.





Cheers big time to everyone who took a stab at the Wolverine. Soon as I finish that one I'll blog a bunch of the ones people sent me! ( Or you can check out the flickr entries, the deviant art entries and the livejournal entries as they are. )

Got to do a big entry shortly too. Got CHOKER goodness coming your way soonish, not to mention a bit of BARONESS and I'll be all over the globe shortly, being in Brazil early next month as well as the UK in late October for MCM Expo as well as the Leeds Thought Bubble Festival in November and a few other signings around the place.



Deadlines? What are these deadline things? Shut up and rub my tummy damn you.

Aaaaaarrrr etc

The beginnings of another random sketch.

Humans are just furniture

Apparently.

Today in the studio...

Kitty in a box.



Favourite mug. For now.

And now, the art. Hoxford in Progress...












Whaaalaaaaaah.

And yes, I did fix the spelling on the final version as well. Brain fart.

Soundwave

Just put this sucker up on ebay.

Wolverine Image Updated...

Started adding some watercolour washes.



Also worked back in places with pencil and added more details with watercolour.



Dirtied it up after some of the finer work. Added some further darkening washes.



Aaah, the splatter!



Used my trusty white pen to add further definitions, also changed up the dog tags a little.



Almost finished before the colour stage. The work I did on the teeth seems a bit lost in this image.

Going to try and get it finished before next week but I've got a massive work load to get through before I head off to Brazil!

Around the studio...

Kitty comandeers the printer. Thanks, kitty.



Some art proofs. A little extra for a recent ebay auction.

Your first taste of a CHOKER page.

A page of the CHOKER prelude ( The new 6 issue miniseries written by Ben McCool and drawn by me over at Image comics ) went live over at a CBR article for the soon to be released LIBERTY COMICS #2! If you've not heard, it's probably the biggest anthology comic of the year with the likes of Neil Gaiman, Jim Lee and a slew of other huge names as well as Ben McCool and this lucky sod.

More Wolvie

Finishing up the pencils. ( Oh, I should point out, if you missed my previous post with Wolvie, this isn't for a cover or anything official. This was/is just a random piece I got the urgings to do to stay sane while working on some other more constrained stuff )

Was having fun not dealing with line weights and a distorted look. Probably thanks to the good dose of Frank Quietly, Geoff Darrow & Nate Simpson lately. ( Yes I know they do actually use line weight, more referring to their insane detail levels, but I can't remember the artists that don't and let the colour guys do all the work...) for me I plan on doing lots of tones on this one to bring stuff out, instead of the lines themselves perhaps.



I think I'm getting addicted to these close up shots of the art as I work. I just dig them to bits.

Most people who don't really know my work, read my books etc but know my name still dismiss what I do as "on the computer" as if I press a few buttons and it all happens. Sadly for me ( I wish it was that easy! ) it's not the case. Never was.

Now, more than ever, I seem to actually put more into the real world drawings long before it reaches the computer stage. It's funny really. I probably do more real world work than a bunch of the "traditional" artists now, as the industry in general goes from straight pencils to computer colouring. Yet I'm one of the ones accused of relying on the digital too much!

I love art as artifact. It would drive me insane not to have a physical record of the work I did...don't think I'll ever be doing art completely by computer, I'll just use it to help and augment the process. The computer, or rather the art programs on them, are really just new tools most of us learn to use differently.



Another pic as I do down the body, inking. No rendering, no weight, just one line consistency. Seeing what I can do when I change it up a bit.



Nearly done, except for the damn chest hair. Not looking forward to that. Not at all. But it must be done. For the whole image I've just used a .005 Pigma Micron. Archival ink, waterproof, which is good for the watercolour/ink tones I plan on putting into it later.



Here's the basic line work. Any budding colourists out there want to take a stab at it? Rather curious to see how others make it look. Hope this image is good quality enough for. Should be a bitmap .tiff file.

If you're reading this on the blog, get onto flickr and select "all sizes" then find "original" for the big arse version.

If you do colour it up, would love to see and indeed, post the results in later bloggins'. Then we can compare my final to the ones you guys do.

I should point out, the idea is to *not* try to emulate my own colour "look"...just to colour it the way you see fit.

Should be interesting!

BLACK ORCHID

A quickie redo of this week's character, BLACK ORCHID for Whitechapel.

Wolvie+Studio+Coffee

The early stages of a Wolverine I felt the need to do up as some paint was drying. Always got to have a little release & see where the muse takes you when you're stuck doing other art you're already wanting to move on from...or just not do more of, for the night. Alas, deadlines mean you have to keep going but a little diversion never hurts to keep the sanity.

Will update this piece as I go. I think I've done 3 Wolverine images in my entire life.



Controlled chaos but all the vital ingredients are there. The primordial soup if you will, from whence the art shall arise. All I need to do is add...something...& since I'm one of those evil evolution follower types, lets not say divine intervention, let's just call it a chemical reaction from my brain to my hand to the pen/brush/mouse/keyboard eh?



Never underestimate a coffee lid. It's how I am helping save the planet. The good ones make excellent palettes. The current ones I use have pretty much lasted over a year or two. Plus, they're easy to travel with, just fits right into my little art case.

LIBERTY COMICS! The Special JIM LEE VARIANT!

Not only will it be your first taste of CHOKER....The Jim Lee variant is pretty sweet. Always love seeing his more mixed media pieces.

Here's the official stuff:

17 September 2009 (Berkeley, CA) – JIM LEE, the fan favorite artist of Batman, X-Men & WildC.A.T.s, provides the Image Comics published Comic Book Legal Defense Fund benefit anthology, LIBERTY COMICS #2 with an all-new, limited edition 1-in-25 variant cover based off his collaboration with Sandman writer NEIL GAIMAN.

“Jim has long been a true Defender of Liberty with his ongoing support of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and his cover goes above and beyond the call of duty,” CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein said. “We’re very thankful for his generosity.”

LEE and his story with NEIL GAIMAN, ‘100 Words’, lead off an all-star ensemble of industry greats in the all-new second volume of LIBERTY COMICS. Passionate comic book storytelling, all in service to an important cause, the incredible contributions list includes a Painkiller Jane story by JIMMY PALMIOTTI and JIM RUGG; a new Mr. Gum adventure from MIKE ALLRED, DAVE JOHNSON and JAMIE S. RICH; The Apocalypstix by RAY FAWKES and CAMERON STEWART, a return to Channel Zero by BRIAN WOOD; a preview of Choker by BEN MCCOOL and BEN TEMPLESMITH; and a special Martha Washington piece by DAVE GIBBONS, alongside exclusive material by PAUL POPE; KATHRYN & STUART IMMONEN; CHYNNA CLUGSTON; PAUL GRIST; and JASON AARON & MORITAT. LIBERTY COMICS already features two covers, one by Batman: The Long Halloween’s TIM SALE and a new Kick Ass image by creator JOHN ROMITA JR.

LIBERTY COMICS #2 (AUG090303), a 48-page full color comic book for $4.99, will be in stores October, 14 2009.

Hello Cowboy: Monkey Juice cover

Another random piece for the week on ebay. This time I just put up the cover art to my very first sketchbook "Monkey Juice". I went on to give later versions a different cover but this was the original. Hello Cowboy.

Batman Quickee

Done for a bit of an exhibition in Brazil I'm going to next month. I just call this having fun with shapes really.