"Junk-a-saurus"

More poop from the SVA Alumnus drawing class... GADS, I'm out of practice.
Still... I'll only get my hand back if I keep after it and push through the rough patches.

Two 15 minute sketches I ended the class with. Not much else happened of any consequence;-)

Dropped off the book for my letterer to peruse this afternoon after many hours of preliminary bubble placement talks...
Scaaary.

Keeping my fingers crossed...

Sketchdump Redux

Another group of sketches from a life drawing class I visit once a week... not all are successful, but they each show something a little different. Just trying to keep the hand moving between Photoshop sessions;-)

Hideously rusty is what I am though... yoink.

First is a 1 minute... followed by a couple of 3 minutes... and the rest are 10 to 15 minute sketches.












The last two are the only ones I have any intention of keeping. Something halfway slavagable in the gestures... might reuse the poses for a painting. Although I must admit, I wish I'd had more time on that 1 minute pose pictured first... who knows what might have come of it...

Done.

Semi-final state for last story image... might add some sparks or effects to the background fire... not sure yet.

Still... it is finished.


I'm not sure how I feel about it yet.

"BOOM!"

As the penultimate page is now in the can (barring possible last minute adjustments), I find myself reflecting back upon this seemingly endless project...

Will it all be worth it once I'm finished... or am I just putting it behind me before simply moving to another foolish obsession?

I think that once all has been said and done, the doing is the real reason behind the endeavor. I could have (and very nearly did on several occasions) quit this project when things got rough or difficult... put it all behind me and chalk it up to a "learning experience". But I'm hoping that the effort itself will be somehow gratifying once I've seen it to it's finish.

Or at least I'm HOPING so;-)

Hey... there's always the chance that Heavy Metal will actually print the accursed thing and pay me some cash for it!

Last Gasp...

Had some slowdown recently, work-wise... Lifeguard duty and the random shift changes really wrought havoc with my sleeping schedule (not that it's a really good excuse).
Still, some forward progress is always welcome.

I'm going to try to use the rest of this month to make some serious headway into the last two pages. They are complex, but I feel more confident with the tools with each passing panel. I hope that there will be minimal "touch up" on the older work once the main story proper is finished and I try to render the all pages into a general level of consistency.

This was a tough page for me, especially trying to match up the color schema from the earlier story sequence.
This is the point in the tale where the intro sequence and the story progression link up. We'll see how successful it all is once the next page is finished.

So.. without further delay, I'm off to work on the next page;-)

CONSUMMATION II

And so does the slow grind to the finish continue... ever painfully forward with a seemingly glacial pace;-)
Still... any progress is a good thing.

This was a difficult page for me... and probably still subject to a few last-minute changes before I finish this thing.
We shall see.
The consummation panel is finally finished.. let's hope it carries the visual weight it must in order for the story's finale to have proper resonance.

3 more pages to go in the story proper... and then a fronts-piece... wish me luck!

"Reversal of Fortune"

The endless crawl continues...

Still, with about 4 more pages to go, the end is certainly within reach now.

I'm trying my best to keep moving forward and resist the urge to "update" older pages. It isn't easy. I've learned so much from this journey, it's sometimes hard to look back at the early pages and not feel that they are almost substandard at this point. I suppose that if I have the time at the end of the project, I might allow myself a bit of revisionary time on the initial pages.

For now though... we push ahead...

"TOWER"

Another bit of progress...
Still struggling a bit with this one as I am trying to transition into more of a flat color schema as opposed to the heavily gradated style I used previously for the interior scenes. Hopefully, this will better fit with the prior and finishing exterior shots without making this sequence seem too out of synch with the rest of the story proper.
We shall see...

Also, here is a promotional design for the new sculpting class I hope to teach at the Art Students League this summer... wish me luck;-)

Backside Backside Squat

Ok... some sketch work from the SVA Drawing Class I periodically attend...
Nothing too fancy, but it keeps the hand moving, the technique sound, and the wrist somewhat supple.

Can't let the old man get too rusty, now can we?

I'm curious if someone looking at these or prior drawings would wonder why I usually eschew drawing the facial details of the model and instead focus on the limbs, torso, and abdomen...
Truth is, I'm not all that interested in capturing a portrait of the sitter... I'm more drawn the the mass... the volume and weight that the figure occupies in deep space. Sure, a little extra observation results in a pleasant immediate result with a recognizable likeness... but in the meager time allowed by these short poses, I'm much more compelled to get at the core of the figure than represent the face of the model specifically.

Still... every so often it is good to flex the old foundation muscles and bang out a very quick likeness.

These are all 3 to 15 minute poses... it's fairly easy to see which one is what.

"STOMPYPUSS!"

Another tough page bites the dust...

I'm just trying to keep chipping away at this project with a even level of enthusiasm now...
Trying to keep the pages consistent.

The earlier pages were quite simple... flat color and subtle gradations.
Once the titular character hit the final interior, I kinda went crazy with the techniques I'd learned recently and it's become a bit over-wrought compared to the clarity of the earlier work.
I'm hoping to switch back to the simple color schema once the story moves back into the exterior setting at the end.
We'll see...

Working on notes for the next session of my class at the League on the 16th... the first Comic Book Anatomy Class there seemed to be somewhat successful and I'm hoping to keep the momentum going for the following installations.

Wish me luck... "Go Sugar Rooster!!!"

"Now you see it..."

Again with the eye thing...
Still, with them considered to be the window to the soul and all... I suppose it is only fitting that such a monstrous voyeur should meet his demise in such a fashion.

Moving ahead again... slowly but surely.

Finally finished with the gore quotient of the story now... I can now focus on the character's resolution and the tale's dénouement.
Just got to keep moving ahead.

Recently several doors have begun to close in my life.
While new ones open to replace them, as they often do, I find myself wondering if the new directions are truly better than the roads already traveled... or merely different.
I suppose that I welcome the challenges ahead, for good or for ill...

Any type of change is better than just treading water... waiting for the next tide to roll in.

Just a short supplementary post today... some drawings I did the eve of my birthday this past Friday.
I was lucky that these turned out as competent as they did... I had a meeting with someone very important to me that evening after the session, and I was so excited to meet them that I could hardly concentrate on the work.

As luck would have it... or more specifically, MY luck... we missed each other by 5 minutes.
This is the way it is for me.

Still, something good came of it. Maybe there is a bit of intensity in the lines of these drawings that would not have been there otherwise...

The first is a 12 minute sketch... the second a five minute attempt.

The 5 minutes.

"Good to the last drop..."

Ok... another tough page in the books.
This one had a lot of tricky effects to it... I'm hoping that playing some of the background elements off the foreground action was successful. Who knows anymore;-)

Yesterday was also my birthday... a rather somber one in some ways... but in others... it was somewhat empowering.
Yes... things could be a great deal better (and not much worse)... but in spite of this, one fact remains...

I'm still here.

Just going to keep plugging away.
Something's got to give sooner or later.
I just have to be positive and be willing to be open to new possibilities... stop doubting myself.

Hey... it's a new year for me...

It's on!

"Tastes just like chi.. erh... finger."

Another page in the books as I inch ever closer towards the finish line...
Less than 10 pages to go now in the story proper... and then the lettering and fronts-piece.

Things are very tough right now so it's difficult to concentrate on something that isn't immediately paying the bills... but at least forward progress is being made.

Alumni Drawing Classes have begun again now and although the first session's model was a no-show, we still had a good time sketching one another. This was a 10 minute sketch of a classmate (I actually started late on this one because I had broken the piece of conté I was using on the sketch before... so it's more of an 8 minute drawing).



Aaand some recent Calligraphy madness...