Nominated in the Inkwell Awards

I was informed that I was nominated in the Inkwell Awards for two categories...

MOST-ADAPTABLE and the PROPS AWARD. Here's a screen capture.

Voting runs from April 15-30, 2014 Here's the ballot...

http://www.internutz.net/vote.html

Arthur Adams' Chef Boyardee commission

Here's a commission piece where I've inked over Arthur Adams pencils. Why so much much blacks? Continue reading....   

I was commission to inked over one of Arthur Adams pencilled artwork, which originally had Wolverine, Beast and Rogue on it. I believe this pencil art was one of the pieces Arthur had done years ago for the packaging label for Chef Boyardee. Not sure if it was used for the labels, but I do know it's an original finished pencil drawing from Arthur Adams that I got the pleasure of inking. The art collector sent me the original pencil art and asked me to ink all three of the characters and make the background all black. Also getting ride of the logo areas that was drawn in. Here's the original pencilled drawing.

This is what it originally looked like after I was done inking all three character with a black background.

Just when I was done with the inks above, I was asked to get rid of the Beast and Rogue... fill them in with blacks so the only character you'll see is only Wolverine. I'm not sure why he decided that route and it seemed like a waste to get rid of Beast and Rogue... this was tough! Covering up the beautiful artwork that Arthur Adams has pencilled in and my inks over them. But what the client wants, is what the client gets. So I made this video of me covering it up. In the video, I've used a disposable watercolor brush to fill in the blacks.

Click video to watch me fill in the blacks...

Again, tough to do and painful to watch.

Pencils: Arthur Adams
Inks: Walden Wong

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles commission

Here's a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle commission piece where I've inked over Mike Bowden's pencils.  I've worked with Mike Bowden on World of Warcraft over at DC Comics and well as Avengers for Marvel.  This was a treat to ink over his original pencils and have the characters at TMNT.  How do you know which character is whom?  For me, I look at which weapons they're holding, as I'm sure most of you use the same method to distinguish them apart.  Donatello, Michelangelo, Raphael, and Leonardo.

When I was inking the commission piece above, it reminded of the last time I've inked a TMNT piece.  Which was also the FIRST and only time I've inked them.  It wasn't even a commission piece.  I just inked it for myself and used it as a sample piece for my portfolio... before I started doing professional inking work.  Back then, Jeff Matsuda gave me pencil copies of a cover he drew.  This was the time when I was getting critiques and advice from established artist in the industry.  He gave me copies of his pencils and I would ink over them for practice.  Below is that inked piece.

It was okay because it got me work in the industry.  This was one of the last pieces in my portfolio that got me work.  Looking at this now, I cringe.  I see so many mistakes and so many areas where I would ink differently if I was inking it today.  It was nice to ink the turtles again.  Maybe one of these days, I'll get to ink them on a book.  That would be fun.

GREEN LANTERN CORPS #27

Inked a 6 page story over Sean Chen's pencils.  Below are some of the pages from this issue.

Spaceship on panel one.  Every line was inked with templates.  I like to use templates on machinery to make them look like, well... machinery.  

DAREDEVIL DARK NIGHTS #8

My inks over Thony Silas' pencils.  Helped out on four pages.  The double page spread below was a nice fight scene.

Lot of straight forward solid black and white inking

RED HOOD AND THE OUTLAWS #27

My inks over Julius Gopez's pencils.  I've inked six pages in this issue.  This time, Julius changed his pencilling style.  When I got the files, I thought it was a different penciller.  It's a little different because there's no blacks.  Below are the pages.

Double page spread.

Another double page spread. 

RED HOOD AND THE OUTLAWS #26

My inks over Julius Gopez's pencils.

Here's a splash page where I used a lot of white out.  All those electricity was done using a white out pen.  

Lots of texture going on here.  You see those chains in panel 4.  Originally, Julius drew them as rope tying Dick Grayson up.  I decided to make those into chains links.

Continuing with the chain lines.  Only more this time.

Below is another page I've inked.  Except, it wasn't used for publishing the book.  It's a splash page of Dick Grayson/Red Hood.  There's an image of this in the book, but it was inked by someone else.  Anyways, I inked this piece up and give it to the Editor.  

GREEN LANTERN ANNUAL #2

My inks over Sean Chen's pencils.  Helping out on a few pages.  I've inked over Sean Chen a while back on a book for DC named, Salvation Run.  So it was goods to be able to ink over his pencils again.  Everything felt comfortable inking over Sean.  Sometimes when I ink over people I've never worked with before, there is a learning curve.  Seeing what inks looks right and what works.  When I inked over Sean again, everything came automatically.

Panels 1 and 2 were fun to work on.  I like when I get pencils that challenges the inks.  In this case, you have an statue's arm that reaches from a white background to the black background with starts.  Not to mention the cross hatching in between the black side and the white side, all the while being behind the statues arm.  The white halo around the figure in the black background.  But no white halo on the arm.  Just a lot of thinking and figuring out how to make it look right.

WOLVERINE AND THE X-MEN ANNUAL

My Inks over Nick Bradshaw's Pencils.  This marks or last issue working on Wolverine and the X-Men together.  Marvel is restarting the series over with a new #1 and new art team.

Double page spread.

Splash Page

Another double page spread with a lot going on.  How many characters can you cound?  When you're done with that, how many space ships can you count? Then when you're done with that, how many beams and lazers you see?  Have fun!

AMAZING SPIDER-MEN #700.4

My Inks over Timothy Green's pencils for part two, of the two part storyline.

Spider-Sense tingling.  Throughout the two part story, you don't really see much of Spider-Man.  You'll see more Peter Parker wrapped up in bandages like the above page.  Why?  You'll have to read to book to find out more.  :)

RED HOOD AND THE OUTLAWS #24

My inks over Julius Gopez's pencils.  Inking over Julius was tough.  When I would print out his pencils on Blue Lines, everything would be smudgy and hard to see and translate.  I believe it was because the pencils were smudgy.  For the most part, I approached this project as doing finishes, except it wasn't finishes.  All the lines were there, juts hard to see.  So I inked what I thought was supposed to be there.  Best way I can describe it is, you draw ten lines with a pencils.  Then you ink in the best fit line to make it look good.  Some of the books, you'll see that each inker approches Julius Gopez's differently.  Here are my results...

For me, faces, hands, and textures are very important in inking, among other things. Get those three things right and everything else is a breeze. 

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #700.3

My first time working on the title The Amazing Spider-Man.  This one's issue #700.3 where I've inked over Timothy Green's pencils.  Lots of happy for me to work on this issue... 

First off, I have a friend who collects The Amazing Spider-Man.  Specifically this title.  He even has the first appearance of Spider-Man, Amazing Fantasy #15.  I've seen it and held it in my hands.  From time to time, he would asked me when I'll be working on Amazing Spider-Man.  Because I don't work in comics, until I've worked on the title Amazing Spider-Man.  Well... I guess I finally made it as a comic book artist.  

Secondly, I got to ink Timothy Green.  I've been a fan of Timothy's work since he worked on Aeon Flux for Dark Horse Comics.  And I've been following his work ever since.  We spoke a five times viz e-mail, but never got to work with him.   Then when this project landed on my lap, I recognized the pencils right away (sometimes as an inker, we get projects to ink and not know who the penciller is until we ask).  I contacted Timothy Green right away and told him how excited I was.  Here's the results of the inks....

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #7

Helped out on ONE page in this issue over Doug Mahnke's pencils.  

Very happy with how this page turned out.  All the glass was inked with a technical pen.  

RED HOOD AND THE OUTLAWS #23

My inks over Julius Gopez's pencils.

Double page spread with all those Manbats.  Every one inks as a Manbat.  No scribbeling for me, I must ink all tiny Manbats!  If some of the pencils don't make sense, I will fix it and make another Manbat.  Manbats away!

Splash page with all the characters.  All the ghostly images were inked with a micron.  The main characters were inked with quills and brushes.  When I ink, I like to switch tools all time time to get the right textures for everything.

With the lion texture, I hatched in the lines.  Originally the penciller drew them in as one solid black strip.  Inking a black strip would be so much faster and easier.  But I always say, quality over quantity.  Then went the way of hatching fur on the lion.  Looks much better in my opinion.