I got it for the articles!

First time buying one of these. Playboy Magazine!!! Why did I buy this? Because of Marge Simpson of the cartoon show, Simpsons. Today's the first day of release. I went to a few stores and they didn't have them. I could have bought one off EBay, but didn't feel like paying over $25 to get a copy from the secondary market. Besides, I wanted to see it now! NOW NOW NOW! After a few more shops, I finally found one and bought it. Look that it... all sitting there by itself in the "Adult Interest" section. Here's a close up photo. This is really a Playboy Magazine. No joke. I bought this because I wanted to see how Marge Simpson looks in her birthday suit.

Apparently, the cover is an homage to another Playboy issue from October of 1971 where they first had another person of color on the cover with an extreme hair due. Why do I know this? No, I don't have a collection of Playboys in my attic. I know because it was on the news a week earlier where it was mentioned it. That's what made me want to buy it in the first place. Anyway, I rip open the polybag and flip to the table of contents so I can find Marge Simpson quicker. "Page 52 The Devil in Marge Simpson". Flipping pages can't flip fast enough.

I quickly got to page 52. Bingo! There she is! You can't see it, but I'm smiling ear to ear.

There's an interview with Marge Simpson as if she was a real person responding to an interviewer. If you want to read it, just click on the picture below and it'll expand. Haha. "Springfield's Sexiest Celebrity Reveals All". Every part of that sentence is so make believe.

Here's a closer look at the splash page on the right. Look at Homer Simpsons shadow in the background. Such a nasty man. I also notice a subliminal drawing around Homer Simpson's crotch area. That can't be an accident. It's a drawing. Every line is drawn there for a reason.

I notice Matt Groening's (creator of Simpsons) signature on the bottom of the page. Of all the people to draw Marge Simpson, I would expect it to be by the creator for this. Anybody else drawing Marge Simpson for Playboy would be the same as looking at fake breasts. Just not original. I want the real deal.

I turn the page and it's the pull out image. I'm thinking AWESOME! THIS IS COOL! A CARTOON CHARACTER TOTALLY NAKED! Gotta turn the magazine sideways to get the fill effect.

Not much of an effect at all. Here's that pull out page. Wasn't what I was expecting. The image is just two pages tall. The top page is the interview page which we already saw. Aren't these Playboy pull out images supposed to be three pages long? Nice can of Duff Beer near her butt. What's up with the donuts? Is Marge Simpson supposed to be seducing some police officer? I turn the page and it's the Model Date Sheet with all of Marge Simpson's stats. If you like to read it, click on image to expand. Funny stuff especially her measurements. 26,26,26...

stright as a pipe. Nothing sext about that. Funny though. After this page... That's it!!! There's other naked pictures of real people, but I don't buy this magazine for that... I wanted to see more Marge Simpson in the buff. I feel gypped. No totally naked boobies of her either. Just a see through blouse. For all I know, that could be a white blouse with boobs painted on. Seriously, wouldn't it be easier to draw totally naked breasts? It's just two half circles and a couple of dots. So this is as close as any of us will ever see. For Homer Simpson's eyes only. *sigh*

You know... I never imagined her nipples would be colored like that. I thought they would just be black dots... same as Homer Simpson when he runs around topless in the cartoon show.

That said, here's a picture of Matt Groening and myself. Yeap, This is the guy who created the Simpsons.

After that Playboy issue with Marge, this picture of us makes me feel so guilty inside. Like I saw a father's daughter in the nude. *yeesh*

UPDATE: Just read in the magazine that the Marge Simpsons illustrations were drawn by someone else. Which means Matt Groening's name was slapped on. Great... Fake Boobs.

TRINITY VOL. 3

Got a comp copy for TRINITY VOL. 3 which I did some work in. Here's a picture of it.
It's out in stores now and you can read more about it by clicking here.

Packages and Comp Copies

Yesterday, I stepped out for a moment only to come back to see my door with these tags. Shipments from three different carriers. When pencillers send me pages to work on, I would know in advance that I'll be getting a package so I hang around for it. Other times, I would get unexpected packages of comp copies, art returns, or whatever it is. Every once in a while, I may get one door tag. This is a first for me. Three tags in one day.
At least one of packages was left behind. In it, were these Comic Books wrapped with a packaging list from Marvel. Very nicely organized.

There was this one packaging list that didn't include comics. Just a stamp that reads "Out of Stock". I wasn't expecting any comp copies, so getting anything is always nice. Getting this "Out of Stock" packing list is like someone saying you won the lottery, but they ran out of money so you get nothing. This could have been left out of the package and I won't be the wiser. But it did tickled me funny.

Here's all the comics in the package. Comp Copies of Comics that I did some inking work a long while back. Three copies of each title.

Below is THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN FAMILY #6. There's a bunch of different stories in there. I worked on two of the stories. On the right are pages from the different stores I inked. One story was pencilled by Tim Levins and the other by Adam DeKraker.

Here's MARVEL APES GRUNT LINE SPECIAL. I opened up one of the books to the double page spread in which I inked over Reilly Brown's pencils.

This here is DARK REIGN YOUNG AVENGERS #2. On the far right is the FIRST page I've ever inked over Mark Brooks who pencilled the book. I remember being asked to help out on three or four pages over a weekend because of deadlines. That weekend came and I ended up helping out on eight pages. Everybody, including Mark, was so impressed with the way I work that I got to do more issue later on. Working with Mark is a blast! This one is for MARVEL APES SPEEDBALL #1. Again, two pages from the interior over Chad Hardin's pencils.

The comics above, I inked on Blue Line except for the Speedball Special which I inked over original pencils. These books are out and in stores now.

Strathmore Comic Boards

In the past, I've bought a lot of Blue Line Pro boards. Pad after pad they always seem to bleed on me. When I say bleed, what that means is when I'm drawing a line with pen and ink, that line starts to look like a caterpillar with all those legs because of the bleeding. I actually still have quite a few pads that are useless to me for inking. I buy a pad, pull out a page and ink one line, then it bleeds. Which makes the whole pad useless for me.

A package of Strathmore samples was sent to me recently. That was very kind of Strathmore. They started making Bristol boards with pre-ruled blue lines with comic book dimensions on the boards. So I inquired about the boards and they sent me these samples. Here's what was included.

Two packets of 11x17 bristol boards, 200 series and another I'm not sure of. A smaller pad of Bristol boards in the 500 series surfaces. A pamphlet/comic called Attack of the Sequential Artist with different artists testimonials about strathmore products they use and how they like it. A folder of Bristol & Illustration Board which consist of small swatches of different boards, thickness, smooth and rough. This will come in hand in choosing which boards to buy and the difference of each. And finally, a sample pack of Illustration for Wet Media.

The quality of Strathmore boards are up there when using it for pen and ink. The ink won't bleed and drys faster on these boards. In the past, I would buy these big pads of Strathmore drawing boards for pen and ink. I would cut them down to size to match comic book boards. The extra cut up boards, I would just throw away. Seems like a waste of money because Starthmore boards can get expensive compared to other brands out there.

I'm glad Strathmore is producing these comic book size boards. Not only are they already cut to size, they also have the blue lines mark ups for print. And the good new... They don't bleed.

JUSTICE LEAGUE of AMERICA #37

Got three comp copies of JUSTICE LEAGUE of AMERICA that I did some inking work in. I inked two pages. Pictured here is the actual issue and each page I inked.
Below is the page for "Epilogue the First" as seen above.

This one is for "Epilogue the Second". Both of these pages are the last two pages of the book.

You may recall this last page with the gun on the last panel. This is the same page I blogged about when FedEx damaged the artwork. If you haven't read that blog, you can click here for it.

This issue is out in stores now and you can read more about it by clicking here.

Commission and Sound Effects

No... This isn't a a cover to a comic book called SHINE. I finally finished this commission piece of Colossus, Wolverine, and Nightcrawler. Scanned it and decided to add some special sound effects. Here's what happened when I added those effects to this piece. We all know when Wolverine pops his claws, you hear the sound effect, SKINT. When Nightcralwer teleports, you hear BAMF. I was going to type FART because that effect was right under his butt. Then decided to just go with BAMF to give each character their own distinctive sound effect. As for Colossus, he doesn't have a special effect. Didn't want to leave him out, so I gave the effect SHINE behind him. Is that even an a sound effect? How does SHINE sounds?

Below is my completed inks without any lettering. Well... I did letter my name by hand. The scribble that I do.

This piece was pencilled by Mike McKone which I printed out in blue line. Before I printed everything out in blue, I used photoshop to only print McKone's signature in black so I won't have to ink that. Everything came out blue except for his signature. Then I scribbled my own name under his.

Desktop Monday

This is what's on my drawing table this very moment. Had a little bit of spare time so I started a commission piece of Colossus, Wolverine, and Nightcrawler over the weekend. Pencils by Mike McKone printed out on Blue line for inks. The only thing left that needs to be inked are the speed lines on the bottom of Nightcrawler. That part may seem like something that can be whipped out quickly. On the contrary, it's going to take longer to ink than the rest what I've already done. Nice part about working on commission pieces is there's no deadlines. So I'm going to put it aside and come back to it later when I have a bigger chunk of time to spare. I'll post the completed image when done.

Commission Piece

Another commission piece over Mark Brook's pencils on Blueline. Spider-Man and Vulture. There was hardly any blacks to fill on this piece except for Spider-Man's eyes. So I decided to thicken up the holding lines around Spider-Man and the camera around his neck to pop the perspective more. Normally, pieces that hardly have any blacks to fill are faster for me to ink. In this case, it took longer because of all the detailed buildings in the background. All of that back there took much longer to ink than the characters itself. For this piece, I used microns, tech pens, brushes, crow quill, templates, and a ruler.

WARLORD #6

Just got a bunch of comp copies for WARLORD #6 that I worked on. I threw all of the comps on top of the original artwork and for it and snapped this picture.
I inked half of this issue. Eleven pages. Below are a couple of double page spreads from this issue that I worked on. Double page spreads are two 11x17 pages attached together which gives it an 22x17 art area to draw on.

Another double page spread with a panoramic first panel.

This issue is out in stores now. Find out more by clicking here.

Spatter and Splatter

What is this??? Every so often, I would pull out the white ink and do different techniques with my inking work. Sometimes I'll use the white ink and ink with it. There are also times where I can use the white ink to cover up mistakes. Then other times, I'll use the white ink to spatter or splatter. *SPLAT SPLAT!*
Here's a effect that I did with white ink. I take a toothbrush and spatter it on top of the inked artwork. Here's the trick. When I hold the toothbrush directly on top of the art and do the spatter effect, I get perfectly round dots. Some big, some small. The distance where you hold the brush to the art also determines how big the dots will be. When I hold the toothbrush in an angle and do the effect, I get directional splatter. Splatter with an "L". It gives the effect more of an action sense. In this case, I've done both. On top of that, I've done both the spatter and splatter above an inking technique that I often do. It's sort of a cross hatching/blooping thing. I've been told that I'm the only inker who can make that effect look like that. Nice compliment. I'm sure there are others who can do the same.

And that's how I got that cool effect. Below is the page where I did that effect on, last panel right side.

This page is from the comic, Dark Reign: Young Avengers #4 (see blog below).

DARK REIGN YOUNG AVENGERS #4

One of the books I've worked on, Dark Reign: Young Avengers #4, is out in stores today. I inked the whole issue in Blue Line over Mark Brooks pencils. I didn't get comp copies for this issue, so I clipped an image of the cover to that issue I found online and pasted it on top of a picture I took of all the original artwork that I worked on underneath.
Here's a splash page from from this issue.

And here's another page with the current Wolverine whom I didn't know much about from my earlier blog. There's also Hawkeye, Iron Man, and a bunch of of other characters.

To learn more about this issue, click here.

VIZ Media

I just love looking at comics no matter what kind there are. Super Hero Comics, Manga, hieroglyphics, or anything drawn, I like to look at. I can be given a comic book in a foreign language that I can't read and still enjoy it for hours.

On a side note, when you go to book stores and look for graphic novels, there are usually different categories for them. More popular being American Comics and Manga. Then there other publishers who call their comics, Manhwa. There's also Anime which is different from Manga. Anime means cartoons. Manga is comics. Still the literal translation for Manga is "Comics". Same with Manhua, "Comics". Which makes me wonder about the other side of the world... What do people in Japan or Korea call American Comics to separate it from their own? "Comic-Book-Ka"? "Coooo-mic-KU"? "Co-MIC!"?

Anyway, all this thinking about Manga led me to take pictures of a Manga Publisher here in San Francisco. Here's some pictures of VIZ Media. They publish Manga comics such as Pokemon, Dragon Ball, Naruto, and more. Huge Building. I think there are 4 floors. I only hang out at the first floor, the rest of the floors are uncharted territory for me. I can get lost in there.
Front doors are these cool looking metal doors that looks as if it's bullet proof. I dig how the company name is right there in silver.

Going in, they have this sort of media room which looks a lot like a comic book store with lots stuff they produce. Here are some big dolls and a Manga display stand.

Towards the left, is what you'll see here. They have monitors running Anime all the time. showcasing some of the Anime they do as well.

And here's a picture towards the right. Toys, gadgets, lost of fun stuff.

Walking in closer, I see this huge wall. Almost three stories tall. With these blocks with characters in light. It's very impressive to see in person. I couldn't even take a picture of the whole thing because it's so massive.

Here's a picture of that same wall on the other size. That's me standing in the stairs. There more of those light up blocks above and below. Just can't seem to get it all in one shot.

So here's me with one of the blocks. This character is Doremon. I use to read... well... Not read because the comics were in a foreign language to me... I use to look at Doremon comics. This character would pull anything and everything out of this little pocket at his stomach. That's why I'm covering up his pocket. So he can't pull a rabbit out of it. See.. He's tickelish too!

Now here's something cool. I'm standing in front of a page. Yeap, That's one page from the Manga, Phoenix, drawn by Osamu Tezuka. It's almost three stories tall. My friend was lying on the floor to take this picture for me. It was massive. But why is this page so important, you ask? WHACK! THWACK! WHAM! THUNK! I lettered that page. I removed the Japanese text, replaced it with English, and retouched the backgrounds. My letters in lights... Sorta.

Going towards the back of the building, I see this on the back wall. Posters, prints, and original art all in one place. Again, VIZ is a huge place, so I just took pictures of the areas I hung out at.

Here's a framed piece of original art I see all the time. All done by hand. Painted too. I don't know who the artist is and for which title it's for. Just really cool to look at. Man... There's that flash reflection effect on the boobie area again. What's up with that?And here's a piece of original art that everyone will recognize. A piece of Pokemon original art from the artist. Drawn and colored by hand. It cracks me up because it's thumb tacked to the wall. I can't read the writing, so I don't know what it says. I just like looking at it. I can stare at this for hours.

So that's it for VIZ Media. Speaking of Pokemon. Here's a couple of pictures I took from SDCC. Here's Pikachu stomach. This was hanging in the middle of the convention. I like how SDCC has things for all age groups. This hanging Pokemon were for kids... This Pokemon was for Adults... I don't remember Pikachu wearing stocking with red bows on it.

Mommies and Daddies would have their five year old child turn away when they see this Pikachu. And here I thought Pokemon was for all ages.

Inking body organs

Here's something I don't do everyday. I recently did some work for the Turpin Foundation. They contacted me to ink a Heart and a Pancreas with a comic book feel. These images will be used to make T-Shirts for a motorcycle rally on to raise funds for Johns Hopkins Pancreatic Cancer Center. I inked the first two images with minimal rendering. Really thick outlines and thinner insides.
I was asked to ink one of each. But I decided to give them couple of each so they have more choices to pick from. So I inked the next two with more cross hatching... giving it more dept. The numbers you see were just something I added on so it would be easier for people to point out which piece they're talking about.

My first time inking body organs and it was fun to do. Made me feel like one of those artist who does art for medical textbooks. I believe they're going to use it in a slogan reading "I (heart) my (Pancreas)." Where the images will replace (heart) and (Pancreas).

PREDATOR #2

Here's a comic that I did some inking work on. PREDATOR #2. Dark Horse Comics sent me three comp issues as pictured below. This time, I got creative with the pictures. I pulled out the original art I did for it and use them as a backdrop for the picture. Neat, eh?
The pencils were drawn by Javier Saltares. Well... I should say "laid out by". He is the series artist and does the inking himself. I'm not sure if he went to San Diego Comic Con or not. In any case, the Editor contacted me right before the convention to help out on a few pages. I told him I'll be attending the convention and won't be able to do anything during that time. He said it was okay as long as I can do a few before and after the Con. He also mentioned the pencils were more like layouts because the series artist would ink himself, leaving the detailing for the inking stage. So when I got the pencilled pages, I had to fine tune them and here's how a couple of those pages turned out...

Here's a page with the Predator. This was my first time working on Predator so that was a treat for me. If you click on the image look closely at the rifel scope, you can sorta read my name in on it. The penciller sketched that on and I went with it. Very nice of him to plug my name.

Have any of you seen the Predator movies which stars California's "Governator", Arnold Schwarzenegger? Anyhoo, in the movie, the Predators has this cool effect where they use this infrared vision. They can see their prey in color hues with the body heat it's emitted. So, I just couldn't resist doing this. Lets say one of the Predators got a hold of that original art work above. He came to my studio when I was asleep. Pick up the art work, but couldn't see it in the dark. So he flipped on his infrared vision and this is what the Predator sees...

Sorta like looking at the mirror for him, no? But how is the artwork emitting heat, you ask? Simple, I was sitting on it a few hours before I went to bed and that's the lingering heat which came from my butt!

This book is in stores now. To find out more about it, click here.