Daily Desktop

Some stippling going on.

DOOM PATROL #8

Got two comp copies of Doom Patrol #8.  In stores now.  

Daily Desktop

Joe Kubert & Wonder Con

This morning when I checked my e-mail, I got a very pleasant surprise from Facebook.  

Then the fanboy in me takes over.  WOW.  Joe Kubert added me on Facebook!  Is that a Facebook Fan site?  Is that someone else running Joe Kubert's Facebook?  I dunno.  I'm just going to take it in... Joe Kubert added me on Facebook!!!

Many years ago in my early inking days, I've meet Joe Kubert at a local comic convention.  It was my first and only time I've meet him.  This was around the time one of his books, Fax from Sarajevo, was released and I believe he was touring.  I was still inking for independent comics and haven't stepped foot with any of the bigger publishers yet.  I decided to ask him if he would be so kind to give me a critique.  After all, he is the founder of the Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art. Of all people, he would know exactly what he was talking about.  Who better to ask for a critique?  I patiently waited until he finished all his signatures and sketches for people and built up enough courage to ask.  "Would you mind taking a look at my portfolio and giving me a critique?"   Sure, he said.  Joe took a look at all the pages in my portfolio, flipped back to a few pages, looked back up at me with a huge engaging smile and said (and I'll never forget this compliment), "You're one of those Inkers I would like to kill."  I was confused and asked, "What?  What do you mean?"  Then he explains... "You're one of those inkers who are so good that you can take inking jobs away from me. I don't see anything wrong with your inks."  Then we chatted a bit about inking and when I left, he wished me luck.  Joe Kubert is going to be a guest at the same convention, Wonder Con, where I first meet him.  Speaking of which, I'll be attending that same convention, Wonder Con.  

I'm looking forward to meeting Joe Kubert again.  If I see him, I'm going to ask if he remembers me and the critique he gave me.  From the first time we've meet, I think he'll be happy to know that I'm doing better with the inking.  It would be great to see him again.  This time, I won't have butterflies or the need to build up courage to meet him... after all, we're Facebook friends now.  :)

GI JOE ORIGINS #13

"He never gives up. He's always there, Fighting for freedom over land and air.  GI Joe.  A real American hero.  GI Joe is there.  Geee- Eyeee-Joeee! 

Okay, enough of the singing.  Here's something I worked on sometime last year that's finally out.  GI Joe Origins #13 published by IDW (Idea and Design Works).  I've inked the whole issue over S.L. Gallant's pencils.  There's two different covers for this issues and below are the comp copies I got.

All of this was inked on Blue Lines.  The guys over at IDW were great to work with.  They gave me a lot of time to work on this issue.  

Funny thing on how I got this project.  One day, I was at a comic book store looking to buy some comics.   There's this local comic book store that always over stocks their shelves and when people simply walk near them, comics just leaps forward and falls off the shelves.  Just like a domino effect, one at a time, PLOP... PLOP... PLOP.  

Anyway, while I was looking for comics, books next to me were taking a dive off the shelves as if possessed by spirits.  As a normal customer would, I go there, pick it up and put it back on the shelves.   While I was picking them back up, more comics were falling on top of me.  PLOP... PLOP... PLOP.  What the hell!  And one of those comics was GI Joe Snake Eyes, which the cover also caught my eye.  Probably because it fell on my head and there was a cool drawing of Snake Eyes on top of the Arashikage logo  printed in bright red foil (To see what I'm taking about, click here).  I bought that issue, opened up the bag and immediately notice an editor friend.  I contacted him about the book and how cool it was and the very same week, I got this project.  

Here are a couple of pages from this issue.  It stars one of the GI Joe characters, Ripcord.

I didn't see any links for this issue on the internet, so here's a quick overview of this issue so you know what it's about:

     First appearance of RIPCORD! The latest candidate for G.I. JOE status may already be dead! Meet Wallace Weems, a soldier everybody calls RIPCORD. Lost in a forbidding jungle, Ripcord has one mission: SURVIVE! And if he doesn't outwit, outfight, and outlast the terrorists hunting him, thousands more might die!

And knowing, is half the battle - YO JOE!

SUPERMAN RED SON MOTION COMICS

Here's a nice surprise. This come in the mail today. Superman Red Son Motion Comics DVD that I did some work in. Along with a nice letter thanking me for my contribution to the project. I knew DC Comics was doing motion comics for download. Didn't know there was an actual DVD that was released as well.

That paper in the back with all the DC Comic characters is just the back of the same letter. The neat thing about the letter is, if you hold it up and look at it through the light, Wonder Woman is holding the DC logo on top of her. The same logo that's in the front of the letter you see in the picture above. I get that same paper every now and then from DC, just thought it would be cool to show some of you guys.

Open it up and here's the DVD below. Nice Superman Red Son image on the DVD. Very cool
Here's the back of the DVD box. I dig the way the credits are listed on the bottom. The format is the same as those credits you see in movie posters. I'm listed there right before the colorist.
This is on sale now. 

WAR MACHINE VOL. 2: DARK REIGN

Today, I got a comp copy of War Machine vol. 2: Dark Reign which I did some work on.

More about this issue by clicking here. This volume is on sale now.

Disney Princess

My daughter's first grade class was talking about what parents do for a living. She told everyone "My Daddy's an artist". She comes home and asked me to draw something for her to bring to class so she can show and tell. Apparently, I'm the only parent in the class that's an artist. I though to myself maybe I can just give her some comic book original art and she can bring that. Then she says, "Can you draw some Disney Princess for me? I like Disney Princess." I said okay. Then I walk around the house, gathering up all the Disney Princess items I can find... toys, clothing, lunch boxes, shoes, and everything else. As long as there's an image of a Disney Princess on it, I gathered them up for references. Then I pencilled and inked this on a 11x17 bristol board.

After the black and white drawing, I was going to call it quits. Then I thought about kids in the first grade. How often do they see Disney princess in just black and white line work. Unless of course, it's a coloring book. Then I decided to color it. I asked my daughter to let me borrow her color pencils. It was either that or crayons. I choose color pencils because it was less messy. She brings me back about 5 color pencils. Not much colors to choose from. But at least there's the primary colors so I can mix them to get other colors and add tones. Two hours later and here's the results.
She took it to school and everybody loved it. Although I wasn't there, I've been told that when my daughter showed this in her class, everybody huddled around her to look. She said things like, "My daddy drew this! Be careful, don't bend it." Kids that age are cute when they're sharing.

Just another one of those moments where I'm proud to do something for my daughter to make her happy.

DOOM PATROL #8 Preview

A while back, I posted on how I inked up this cover of DOOM PATROL #8 before it was sent to the colorist. You can read that post by clicking here.

There's an exclusive DC Preview of this book, which will be on sale March 10. You can check that out by clicking here. Five preview pages. None of which I had any part of. The cover is the only portion I inked, which I was given credit on page 5 of the preview. Very cool.

WARLORD: THE SAGA

Trade paperback comp copies just showed up. Warlord: The Saga. This volume collects the first six issues of Warlord where I did some inking over Joe Prado and Chad Hardin's pencils.

This volume goes on sale now. You can click here to find out more.

T-Shirt and Deviant Art

Justiniano and I worked on a T-Shirt image recently. He drew up the whole image and I inked it on Blue Line print outs. With this image, there's no blacks to spot. It's all line work. Also, if you look very closely, I inked every character differently. The dog on the right has a thin outline, the dog on left is much thicker, the old man in the center was in between thickness, and the big dog on top had broken lines with a bunch of quill nib flicking thick to thin. The rest are as lot of cross hatching work. I'm not sure when this will be used. When I do, I'll blog it.

In other news, I have a DeviantArt site. I've actually had that account for two ways, but it wasn't until recently that I started uploading more of my work there.
At DeviantArt there's also a Journal where I can write about whatever. So if you like to read more of my ramblings, check it out. Here's the link. Drop by and say HEY.

Arthur Adams

Here's an interesting topic. Arthur Adams. I've known Arthur way before I started working in the comic industry. He used to run this comic book store along with someone else in San Francisco called "Ogleos" where I would buy my weekly comics. I remember him working the cash register every so often and when he wasn't ringing me up, he would be drawing in the back room. At the time, I didn't know he was drawing back there. But every time I walked in, he would come out and say Hey. I got to know Arthur outside of comics. Went to Great America amusement park, his home, and saw each other outside of the comic shop.

Then one day at the store, a FedEx guy came to pick up a package. The FedEx guy said, "No drawings on the box this time?". Arthur said "Nope, maybe next time." I asked him, drawings of what? He told me he would doodle drawings on the packages he sends to Marvel. "MARVEL? What do you mean Marvel? Marvel Comics?" Then he explains how he worked for Marvel and draws for them.

I started asking Arthur about the comic book industry. Is it hard to get into? Can people make a living working the comic book industry? How do I even start? What do I need to do? He gave me answer to all my questions. Much later on down the line, I decided to get into comics as an Inker which I asked Arthur about that as well. Not only did he have answers for me, he also gave me photocopies of his pencil work so I can ink over. Using vellum over photocopies, I started practicing on how to ink.

When I was done, I would show these to Arthur and asked him what he thought of it. These were inked way before I worked in comics professionally. Even before my last batch of inking samples that got me work, which I blogged about. The images above and below were stuff that Arthur did for action figures. Anytime Arthur gave me photocopies, I would just ink it regardless of what it was. Didn't matter to me, I just wanted to practice inking. Looking at my inks now, everything looks so crude and rough. No life with the inks.
Not a lot of people have seen these samples besides Arthur. Every time he critiqued my work, he would give me photocopies of some other current projects he worked on. Which I would ink up for more practice. I was very focused and driven on Inking. Arthur was always nice with his critiques. He told me what he like but never said what he didn't like. Instead, he would tellme how he would ink a certain area differently. Very kind, very cool.
These two cover pieces were also inking samples I've done just for Arthur. I've always wanted to work with him and I kept practicing. Looking back at these inking samples, I cringe. So many mistakes. So many line work which I would ink differently if I was inking them today.
Later on down the line, I got work for the major publishers inking other pencillers. I kept working, kept inking, and when I see Arthur at conventions, I would sit with him and chat. We would talk about what we're working on, how he saw my work on a certain comic and how I admired his work on comics he worked on. Then one day, many years later from these inking samples above, Arthur called me up and asked me if I would be interested in inking is pencils on the HULK. I told him, "Hell yeah!"

Below are a couple of pages for the HULK that we've done together. Published stuff!
One of the happiest times of my inking career. Sure, it was a lot of details and it took lots of hours to finishing inking. Long hours where I was able to finish inking one page a day. Still, I didn't complain. I enjoyed ever tiny detail about it. Going to his house to pick up art, meeting up at restaurants to talk comics, me picking his brains so I can get to the point where I can ink him like he inks himself. In fact, by the time we were finishing up the last batch of pages on the Hulk, Arthur gave me the best compliment ever. After looking over the my inks over his pencils, he said to me, "I can't tell if you inked it or if I inked it." I was in heaven.
And that's my story with Arthur Adams. How I know him, how I wanted to work with him, and how I got to work with him professionally. It feels full circle that i got to ink over Arthur's work. Especially since he was there in the beginning to guide me along the way. If given the chance to work with him again, I'll be all over it.

My last EIGHT Inking Samples

I found my portfolio I used to carry around at conventions. Unzipped it and was surprised that my last inking samples were still in them. I never took these out of the portfolio. Eight pieces that I've inked a long time ago. Before I gone Pro with the major publishers. These were also the last samples I showed at conventions to see if I would get work. I spent a lot of time on these. When I took them to San Diego Comic Con and Wonder Con one year, they were the deciding factors if I was going to work in comics as a career. Or move on and do something entirely different in the outside world. As luck with have it, I got work that same year because of these samples.

I had obtained photocopies of various pencils from different artist and companies. Then, I would tape the photocopy onto a drawing board and tape a piece of vellum on top of it which kept them in place. Nothing worse than hanging to match up the vellum to the photocopies when they shift. All the samples below were done this same way. This was before I knew about Blue Line print outs. Looking at these pieces, it reminded me how tough it was to ink on vellum tracing paper. They would wrinkle up once it got wet with ink. At times, it was hard to see through the tracing paper. While inking with one hand, I remember having to use a pencil eraser on the other hand to poke down the area I'm inking just to see what's underneath the vellum paper.

Aside from Editors, publishers, and some people at Artist Alleys, nobody else has seen these samples. Until now here on my blog. None of them were ever published. Looking at these older inking samples, I cringe because it's so bad. Of course I'm much better now. But this will show where where I came from. Everybody has to start somewhere and this was how I did it.

Below is a Cable piece which was pencilled by Chap Yeap. I believe this was a first page to a comic since there's a panel on the bottom left. Again, I only had this one photocopy and went with it. At the time, having any samples to practice on was nice. So I take what I can get.

Below is some character I don't know of. It looked cool and was pencilled by Stephen Platt. I started experimenting with toothbrush spatter effects. Wasn't sure if it was a good idea to do on samples, but I did it anyways.
Here's another from Stephen Platt. This character is names Prophet and that Tuscan character on his right arm was the San Diego Comic Con mascot. Not sure if that mascot is still the mascot. It may have been replaced by a Left Eyeball now.
Below is an interior page pencilled by Carlos Pacheco. I had to do some sequential panel inking because every so often, someone would ask I had any sequential stuff. I thought this would cover it that question.
For the most part, I did more splash pages because I wanted to concentrate on the inks. Besides, splash pages were almost always more detailed where I could show more of the inks. Below is Mephesto pencilled by Marc Silvestri. This was a popular piece because when I was in lines at conventions, I would notice other inkers with the same image in their portfolio. I believe I got the this pencil photocopy from Top Cow. Send them a self addressed stamped envelope requesting for samples and that was what I got. Check out how I signed my name... ridiculous. What was I thinking?
Below is the character, The Tenth, pencilled by Tony Daniel. I experimented with all sorts of things here as well. White spatter, black spatter, dry brushing, etc. Check out that signature again. I remember one year, another artist who was giving me a critique said he doesn't sign his name that big because it'll take away from his art. After he said that, I have to agree with him. So I started doing it smaller in my later samples compared to the one above.
Below is the piece that gave me the most portfolio review compliments. A Darkness piece pencilled by Marc Silvestri. I spent a lot of time on this piece. I made sure every line I put down was how I wanted it to be. Sometimes when you're doing something, you can get tired and rush stuff. Not for this one. When I got tired, I left it only to come back later to continue sample inking. Every leaf, every branch, every line weight was concentrated upon before I put pen to paper... um... vellum.
Below is the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles over Jeff Matsuda's pencils. I got to know Jeff at conventions and he gave me photocopies of the pencils and I worked on that.
There goes that signature logo again. See that up there on the bottom left? Not only do I not do that anymore, I don't even make an effort to sign my name in stuff I work on. Because I got burned out doing that logo in my inking sample years. It would take too much time to do when I started inking professionally. So what's easier? I chicken scratch it in. It's easy and fast. And I always make it a point to chicken scratch it smaller then the pencillers name. Don't need to spend time making my name nice and fancy. I rather spend that effort on the next page I'm going to ink.

That's how it all started for me. These eight pages of sample inks showned at conventions to publishers, editors, artist, and sent as sample packets through the postal system.

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #41

Another project that I did some work on. Justice League of America #41. I didn't get comp copies for it this time. Or, maybe it's en route. Could be I got it and forgot I did and can't find it. Here's the cover to this issue.

There's also a variant cover for this issue and here's how it looks.
I only inked four pages and another inset panel for this book. It's my first time inking over Mark Bagley who pencilled the issue. Here's some of the pages I've worked on. Those specks on Donna Troy's outfit was done by using a toothbrush. The bigger white dots, I used a white-out pen. The white lines in her outfit, I just inked around them.
Same with the page below. The background on panels 1 and 2, Black with Stars (or what's also labeled as "BWS") is also done with a toothbrush and a white-out pen. When The penciller drew this page, the background on panel four was marked with a "X" which means that area is supposed to be filled in with black. Since Donna Troy's outfit is black and the background was also black, I had to do something to separate them. I was going to halo (adding a white outline) around all the characters in panel four then decided not to based on some of the references I saw on other books Mark Bagley has done. Of course those could have been the decision of the inkers he's work with in the past. Which I decided to follow sute. So I added a halo on the inside of Donna Troy's outfit around the waist area to separate it from the black background. I did the same with panel two.

Another page with a bunch of characters below. That girl character wearing the jacket on the page below, I'm not quite sure who she is. When I was inking her, I kept thinking she's Mary Jane from the Ultimate Spider-Man comics. I know she's not because this is a DC Comic.
This comics is in stores now and you can find out more by click here.

The first DC Comic I ever worked on.

Following my blog about my first comic gig ever, here's the first DC Comics I've ever worked on. JLA ANNUAL #2 which I inked over Mark Pajarillo's pencils. The art for this cover was done by Bernie Wrightson. Not bad to be covered by him on my first DC gig.

This project didn't just fall on my lap. When I started as an Inker, there was a lot of leg work. Going to conventions, creating inking samples, showing my portfolio, and sending submission samples via snail mail. All of this before the internet age... or at least I wasn't using the internet at the time. A few years before the gig, I would always attend the DC Portfolio Reviews at conventions. Throughout the year, DC Comics would be at a few conventions that I would go to. In order for your portfolio to be reviewed, DC Comics had these one hour Portfolio Review Classes that you had to attend. After attendance, you would get this gold flyer to be admitted for a portfolio review. And, if I'm not mistaken, each gold flyer had a time slot for your review. If you don't have a gold flyer, nobody at DC was allowed to look at your work at the convention floor (I believe that's still the case today). I did that for a couple of years and as luck have it, I got the same editor who would review my portfolio in those few conventions I went to. By that time, the editor had an idea who I was and gave me his contact info to send in new samples. Which I did. Right after each portfolio review, I would go home and ink up new samples. I took my time on the samples and when done, I sent them back and gave a follow up call to see if he got them. About a year into doing that (which was two or three times), I got a call from the editor asking me if I would be interested in inking this book. Which I did. From then on, the penciler, Mark Pajarillo, and I became the regular fill in art team on JLA under artists, Howard Porter and John Dell until our run ended. I even got to ink Howard Porter when the regular team was falling behind. But that, in a nutshell, is how I started and got work for DC Comics.

Covering up DOOM PATROL #8

Here's a cover I inked over Justiniano's pencils. This is the first time I'm inking Justiniano over Blue Line pencils. Well... not really, now that I think about it. A while back when we were working on another title for DC comics, FedEx lost one of the packages Justiniano sent me. Luckily, he made photocopies of the pencils before sending the package out. So he later sent me photocopies of the lost pages, I went out and bought a large size printer and did of one my first blue line printout. Guess that started the ball rolling on my Blue Line inking. Having to create blue lines under deadline pressure is a good way to start.

Anyway, back to this cover. First, I used rulers and templates to ink everything in with a pen,,. Techinical pens and microns. This page took almost a whole day to do. I started working on this sometime in the morning. Since this page had such a large robotic dog head and a metal men, there was a lot of template work. Justiniano tells me I'm crazy for using templates, I tell him I like his art to look good. This process took a while because finding the right curve or finding the right oval can take a bit. I've been using my templates for a while now that I would know which to use very quickly at a glance. Still, not as fast as going freehand, but more precise with templates.

After all the line work, I pull out a brush to fill in the blacks of the main figures and taper all the lines within them.
At this point, all the blacks are spotted below. Not to mention it's night time already and I had to turn on the drawing table lamp to continue working. It's never good to ink in the dark. After all, ink is already dark and when it's night time, that's double the darkness. Definitely can't see anything without lights. I say this because sometimes I find myself so concentrated on working, that I forget to turn on the lamp. Before I know it, I'm inking in the dark. A simple twist of the lamp nob and *click*, let there be light!
Now, I start inking the holding lines of every object. Or, inking the outlines of ever object. At this stage, I would use a quill nib and/or brush depending on how thin/thick I want a line to be.
After the holding lines, I ink in all the interior lines of every object. This is usually done with a quill nib because I like the interior stuff to be thinner than the outlines. At this point, it's all done. Then I shake up my bottle of white ink and add in some white effects. Finally, I ink in Justiniano's name where he signed it upside down on a rock near the characters left foot. When I was talking to Justiniano, he noticed that there wasn't room for my signature and said I can draw in a rock there to sign my name. Signing my name to my work isn't something that I do often and when I do, I like my name to be as obscure to the pencillers name as possible. Signing it smaller so it doesn't take away from the pencillers spotlight. So I signed it teeny tiny and squeezed it right under Justiniano's name. Well, on top of or below of since both our signatures are upside down.
Below is the the final inks I sent out for production. Nice thing about inking in blue lines is I don't need to erase the page when I[m done. Just finish the inks, let it dry for a few seconds and straight to the scanner it goes.
After the colorist gets a hold of my inks, they'll work their magic and add pretty colors on it which will be used for the cover of DOOM PATROL #8.
I've only worked on the cover and this issue will be out in March. For more info, click here.

PREDATOR #4

Just got comp copies of PREDATOR #4. The last issue of the mini-series. I've inked ten pages in this issue over Javier Saltare's pencils.

Speaking of which, I've inked Javier Salatare's pencils almost ten years ago on a book called Avataars Covenant of Shield #3 for Marvel Comics. At that time, I was still a new inker new fresh in the industry. When I got pencils for the Avataar book, they were from a penciler who would draw for themselves to ink. Where not all the details were there. I did what I could at the time. Inking every line that was drawn. It was okay, just not as polished. Fast forward to a few months ago when I got the call to help out on Predator over Javier Salatare's pencils. It reminded me of the Marvel project I did years back. I was intimidated at first, then I thought this may be an opportunity to show what I can do with Javire's pencils today. After a few pages of inks, I got his pencils down! Working some finishes here and there, fixing lines, and inking what I feel as supposed to what I see. Feels good to go full circle over Javier's pencils. Here's a picture of the comp copies.

A page of the inks where I had a bunch of rendering fun.
Another with the Predators being blasted away. Ka-POW!!!
Below is a fun one. A stat page! First, the whole page was inked. In Panel one with the computer monitor, you'll see some predators running around on the roof tops. But you don't see it in panel three right below.
Since the Predators had a cloaking effect that made them invisible in the story, there had to be some way to draw that effect in for the colorist to work on and for me to ink. So a separate page was drawn for the cloaking effect which I inked with a flat blunt line. See below.

Those outer "+" lines you see are to align the Predator silhouettes with the inked page above. Put the two images together and you'll see the final image in the comp copies photo I've taken above. Very cool effect.

This book is out in stores now and you can find out more by clicking here.