Wolvie & Hulk

Here's part of an old promotional poster for the Wolverine Hulk series i did ages ago.

Different Generations

Maxx: Hooley Cover

The blur effect on the feet was done with pastels.

The pastels were too oily, so the Maxx figure was done on a  small piece of bristol board then pasted into the cover. 

Bats Cover

An frozen Batman Logo for you . . .

Epicurus Panel

Turns out the greek goddesses were very curvy.

Or, at least how i draw them.

Hey kid . . .

. . . the sad deterioration of Artumis P. Gone.

Another day . . .

. . . another post.

a Chibi Bimbo

 Just for fun.

The other side of me..

. . . likes to balance out all the Maxx and old Marvel covers . .


. . .  with *this* kinda stuff too.

Fortunately in this eclectic world we live in,

there's room for both.

MCP 90

Blast from the past... !

Man.... those vines & bricks took forever to draw. 

Legs, again.. Original vs. Printed

Another of these comparison -

original on top,

vs. printed version below.

I always felt mixed feelings about legs, i liked it, but it never really fit into the Maxx . . . or the Twout a-verse either.  I guess that's fine - and probably why i just did it as a one shot. 

Maybe some of the better original Legs pages can find a home in the next Worlds volume?

Hulk panel

Panel from the only issue of the Hulk i drew, # 368.

Maxx in progress

Started this today . .

. . kinda in a Bernie frame of mind when i started inking it.

Such great of an artists.  No one can take his place.

He'll always be remembered.

Bernie Wrightson

Just heard the sad news this morning.


His art says more . . .  than any words I could hope to praise him with.


Influenced a whole generation of comic artists, 


myself along with them.




- Sam 

Abrams Star Wars Piece.

Did this a few years back for the Abrams Star Wars book.

There are way better artists in this book than me, so i was kinda surprised and at first didn't believe that Lucas actually had asked me to be in it.

I was disappointed by the initial two pages i did for him, so i sent him a Maxx page with an outback creature, as a sample that i could do "something like this" instead - and asked for another shot, luckily he agreed and suggested i do this extra piece for the limited edition.

So . . . once again, Maxx bailed me out.   

Here's the full page. Almost looks like a outback creature, doesn't it?

Maxx Issue 5 cover

I kinda like how quiet and reflective this cover is. The original version was a typical action pose.

But I like this introverted cover now better.

Though Maxx has humor and nonsense, there are some deeper issues in there. Though he's a grown homeless man, the Maxx reminds me of how withdrawn we all feel during adolescence, crap happens, and think were crazy, told we'll grow out of it once were adults.

In the series, i wanted to validate Maxx neurosis, in effect, say:

" Yes Maxx, it's true, things may seem crazy . . .   but the pain was real. " 

Critters Cover . . . & Kim Thompson.

Someone in the comments mentioned this Critters cover i did, which was a nod to Donald Duck artist Carl Barks. 

My original black and white art for this is kinda boring, but i hand painted the color for it myself, and it came out kinda interesting, texture wise. Five o'clock shadow, bullet holes in the hat, small details were fun to paint.

The late Kim Thompson was the editor, and he was a big funny animal and Carl Barks fan, so in a way i was partly trying to impress him.  Kim was super supportive of my efforts to break into comics, and a short wile back, he passed away quite suddenly. 

I'll miss him.

So here's the awesome Barks version, which inspired me to do it in the first place.

Connections

Potbelly. Female Disapproval. Nostalgia.

Three phrases at the top of a potbelly picture, from my 'Worlds' art book.

I had to go look up what i wrote in that paragraph, trying to remember what the heck i was talking about.  Guess those three things belong together in my mind somehow.

Weird, isn't it. . . the different things our brains connect together?

Cropped Outback

Here's a cropped version of one of the painted Maxx covers.

Sometimes a cropped image, like the Dark Twout image, or this Maxx is an example.  

Just seeing *part* of an image, can helps me see it with fresh eyes. 

Lobo Spread

Twout Question?

Okay - here's two versions of this Twout drawing for the Twout-a-verse Book i'm finishing.

Which background do you like better:



The Lighter background?

Or the Sepia one below?

Blonde Jungle Queen and her Rabbit

Will Rules!

Couple of days ago was Will Eisner's 100th birthday.

While trying to break into comics, I drew a detective story as a tribute to Eisner's fine brush work.

Once I broke into comics, in Batman Secrets i added a news paper editor character, who was a nod to commissioner Dolan in the Spirit. Never met Eisner personally, but my old pal Bill Lobes was good friends with Einser, so i felt a connection there, in some modest way. 

Although he's gone now,  i'm just (joining many others) in paying tribute, not only style wise, but also for adding respectability to the whole form of graphic novels, way back when most considered comics to be only funny books for kids.

   

Couple of Chickens . .

 . . . to be collected this year. 

Jon's swears it.

Me too.

Epic Post

A couple of vintage Epicurus Panels, from the first graphic novel.

Maxx Painted Cover 33's history

This cover has a interesting backstory:  I originally painted it towards the end of first Maxx series, but never wound up not using it.  Then later, i threw it into a Maxx trading card set, but was bummed so much of the detail got lost in such a small card.

So for the Maximized books, i tweaked it a little, plus added this new Logo and it found new life in the reprints and the upcoming 100 Maxx Covers book.

It's a little bit 'old Maxx', little bit 'new'.

Eleanor and the Egret, Second Cover.

Another Eleanor Cover - gee, what is it with me and animals lately?

---

Here's some processes pics:

 

Chapter 2: . . . more early years of bitter struggle, aka: "Cry of the Oinion Man"

Hint: Double Click to make Larger:

Here's a panel from an unpublished, badly drawn underground comic i drew before i broke in.  It was about an Onion who took up a life of crime because of his troubled childhood.

Wise Quote: "It takes hundreds of bad drawings, to get to the good ones. "

Of that, . . . I am living proof.

Bonus Post: "2 Maxx-Covers-in-Progress"

I know i've already posted today, but one of these Covers came together really quickly today for some reason.

For something different, the goal here was stuffing Maxx figure into a snug little square compositional space , then - (and I have no idea why, but for some reason ) - Maxx's back . . just started bunching up like a thick baggy carpet.  Weird, huh?

Julie's also a lot loser and stylized here too just for fun.

This second one's a Klimt version of Julie still in pencil, and a more typical bulky Maxx, which still needs to be finished.  I've only got half a dozen more covers to finish for the "Maxx 100 Covers" book.

-----

I know, you guys keep asking ( understandably) when i'll finish Nola, or the Big Book Of Twout, ( ~ all  good questions. ) -

Hopefully both will come out this year, so stay tuned.

I don't wanna get mushy, but just gotta say . .  I've never felt so honored I'm able to do this stuff for all you guys n' gals out there -  i'm truly humbled that all of you fans out there,  are the ones who have made goofy ideas like the Maxx possible in the first place!

The last twenty years..

Something else , athough her nose is a little low. Was trying for a distorted "looking down" angle. Oh well.  Still thought it was worth re-posting.

Don't worry, there's a fresh batch of new Maxx covers on the art table which i'll be posting soon. 

Legs Comparison

Here's the original art for Legs spread,

and the printed comic below that.

Obviously there's some detail the printed comic lost, but on the plus side, there are darken the blacks in the printed comic.

Which do you like better?

. . . from "The Mysteries of the Trout-a-verse" book.

I posted a Scary Looking Twout here,

but the Twout is different things to different people through out history . . .

. . like in this old 60's poster above.

Here's a satirical cartoon from the 1900s newspaper that shows various attitudes from people on the Twout in the past . . .

. . including some familiar looking critters in that last panel.

Classic "Sam Kieth Bonsai" ... whatever that means.

Here's an old piece - one fans seem to really dig it, and i do too. Not because i did it, i just love the subject matter.

Cool thing about Bonsai art is there's such a wide diversity in branch shapes, and wildly different kinds of tree leaves and colors, isn't there?