Random panels cut out and thrown onto a sketchbook. This is what I've been lying on my art table with during the flu, which is pretty much gone. The flu, not the drawings. Because i lost a week - 'course ....Everything is due at once! So.. here's a little bit of everything, jumping around from project to project.. trying to finish a.s.a.p.
Nola Book: I made the mistake of mentioning to Oni I had several hundred pages of the Nola book finished for a about a year now. So how is that news greeted? Why, they somewhat annoyingly asked, "well, ahh... why don't you, like, - SEND us some pages then sam? Grr them!
They're right. But... also not as easy as it sounds. Yes, they raw pages are.. (more of less) finished, but i often cut up panels, which i toss around the studio floor before deciding what goes onto what page. I find it's sometimes more creatively freeing than just drawing them in... or dropping them in digitally.
Above is the same background page, but with different panels dropped in over it. Looks totally different eh?
Obviously I don't just drop them on the page so it's visually pleasing.. but also TRY for each panel to have some point in the larger story. So, it's tricky, takes time. sometimes it flows, sometimes not. Meanwhile I've got a zombie v. robots story due today, a short DC story, some Aliens pages due too.
But I'm also squeezing in this Dana piece too. I'm a little picker on creator owned crap. Not that i don't TRY to do cool stuff on a work-for-hire book too. It's not like my brain holds back creativity depending on the book. The muse either comes in a gusher, or just dries up. At least for me.
But i also want room for creative surprises i might not even.. conceive of.. if i just drew regular super hero or horror books all the time, you know?
Going for something different here on this Dana one: a stylized thick outline, and a really light touch on the rendering on her face.. sorta like those Alphonse Mucha pieces?
Only mine will be a more cartoony version of that - with my usual ' Little Orphan Annie' or 'Peanuts ' eyes i always do. The danger with a piece like this is it's looks belabored and loses the life..
I've already gone too heavy, to saturated on her tank.. let's see if i can stay light on her skin. Don't worry about her folds looking so rough, i'll smooth those out a little.
Okay, quite a forehead on her, eh? I can already feel how... pinched? self conscious, the rendering on her face is getting. It's partly because i was so worried about smudges and trying not to over work it.
Crap, see it? I've already LOST some life in her face - damn. I'll do another Dana one in another style, but same pose... to show you what i mean. Odds are if i'm not so fussy over the face getting dirty i bet it'll flow much more naturally.
Okay, of COURSE now that i've a deadline on other books, these partially pages from Nola look soooo tempting, but gotta finish other stuff for now.
Here's a simple job: draw a dog, looking at someone walking up to it. Nice doggie. Course because it's a zombie vs. Robot book, you can guess what happens.
Here's a aborted version of a Zombie i decided not to finish, so i turned the page over and inked another version on the back, which i'll flip horizontally in photoshop, so he's facing the right way again.
There's that's a little better. I still think it needs more dead bodies piled up in the corner. Now, since I've already added a wash, i'll flip it back to the front and ink in some corpses on the front page again.
I'll drop these in digitally too. I don't mind these kinds of short cuts on something in order to make it look a little better.
Here's some doodles of some of the army guys in a fox hole for the same story. I often do a quick thumbnail of a character along side the script. It's just a way to peg who they are at a glance.
It's nothing that would make sense to anyone else but me, just a visual short hand. I bet tons of you guys do it too. skinny young guy, beefy guy with cigar, etc. Now here these same guys are on the second page.
Here's a rough for the 5 pager for the DC job. i scribbled it on the back of a list of chores my wife gave me. (YES, i did them! ) Note the order of the pages changed, pages 2 & 3 became pages 4 & 5. Since I'm dyslexic, i KNEW I'd visually go from page 1 to page 4, so i had to draw some little arrows down to the second row, also color code them too, so i didn't goof up.
I'm sure a' normal' person wouldn't have to go to such stupid lengths. But it's just one way my brain is crippled, but i've learned to work around it.
Okay, back to out little pooch. Doesn't look good for him so far.
I've added some washes to this story because the Editor was cool enough to indulge me by letting it be in black and white rather than colored.
okay, here it is more of less finished. Need to do a few more tweaks, then finish the DC 5 pager this morning, THEN ink up the army guys in the fox hole surrounded by zombies and robots.
Then maybe tomorrow i can take another stab at Dana's face ... throw together some Nola pages... and get back to this page here..
geez... sometimes i think juggling so much stuff... is the only thing that keeps me sane! : )
Thanks for not giving up on me guys!
- Sam
