Ink soup!

Blogs: what do you do?

2012-02-02T02:01:00.000-08:00

Hey guys, I am looking to revamp my web presence with a new blog and maybe look at online portfolio sites, etc.

I was wondering what blog sites you guys use and what you think of them??

- any really good features or stuff you cant do, etc. looking at blogger, tumblr, wordpress, etc.

Cheers :)

Anyone interested in digital comics, this is super cool

2012-01-06T13:37:00.001-08:00

makes you think about the posibilitiiiiiiiies!

http://effuchu.deviantart.com/#/d1unu9l

if you're up for a bit of reading this is really interesting

2011-12-08T19:01:00.001-08:00

http://heysawbones.tumblr.com/post/11971025964/the-schweizer-guide-to-spotting-tangents

Negotiated project progress...

2011-11-29T12:01:00.000-08:00

Well as of last week i had finished my comic and had printed it on the Risograph printer.

So i have spent the last few weeks, designing a cover and some simple merch to go along with my comic, working to very fast deadlines, pushing myself to produce elements of a complete body of work in a short time scale. My cover i designed in a day, printed in a day, the merch i designed in a day and printed in two. As now the majority of my negotiated project is completed , im tiding up a few loose ends and concentrating on my RCC work.

Competition for 9th January!

2011-11-28T16:35:00.000-08:00

http://www.fumetto.ch/index.cfm?nav=162,473,474&SID=2&DID=1&NewsID=91

Negotiated Project Pencils

2011-11-25T06:43:00.000-08:00

The script for this came from the 2000AD competition at thoughtbubble festival, Unfortunately I didn't make it to the event...as I am only on pencils anyway.

Not very happy with my hands throughout so I plan to work them up again. There are a few other bits I am not happy with but would be grateful for some feedback :)

Tim

All 4 pages for beauty and the beast

2011-10-27T13:46:00.000-07:00

I just finished up all 4 pages of the why Dogs chase Cats story comic today and placed in the caption boxes to rough out where I think they would fit appropriately on the panels.

Next step taking on the criticizing I got from my tonal rough is to improve on this contrast of BaW and clean up the pages of pencil marks on Photoshop.

The outcome has a few flaws in its line volume and perspective more with the background.

New comic for Beauty and the beast value test

2011-10-26T04:10:00.000-07:00

I have decided to enter something completely different in to the beauty and beast comic still using my concept of a roger rabbit cool world universe. its 4 pages based on a short American folktale from Virginia in tiled Why Dogs Chase Cats.

I already have inked in page using very fine pens to create a better sense of depth.

A tonal rough on Photoshop with tablet using BaW versions of Juan Diaz Oanales and Juanjo Guarnido’s Blacksad as a source of inspiration for values and contrast.

I have a manuscript for this as well but I would like some critical feedback from the first years or any other ink soupers. It’s still quite rough around edges with the drawing in terms of perspective more on the objects in the middle panel.

Comparison of my tonal value test to BlackSads book 1 that had some really interesting striking use of light in domestic settings.

Cover for the next issue

2011-10-23T17:58:00.000-07:00

Just about finished this I think, any changes I should make?

will post about my new comic soon when I've done a bit more!

cheeers

Testing testing 1.2.3.

2011-10-19T11:41:00.002-07:00

Just thought I should post somthing, I get alot of mixed feelings about this piece, don't know if I should like where it's heading...It is just experimentation anyway, just thought 1+1=? you know...Was sort of going with a Screen print look, with some over lapping colours, I think the line work though brings it down a little, some lines didn't translate into vectors too well.

Might push it further...

New layouts with panel alternatives.

2011-10-19T03:24:00.000-07:00

Yeah, sort of digitally collaged together panel alternatives and redrawings of some others into a bit of a mish mash format to see how they all work together. Obviously it's all still very rough, but would rather have to make any further alterations while it's at this stage; before I transfer it to the final boards...

As for the optional(?) fifth page... I have yet to consider it - I'm working towards the Ink Soup submission guidelines, but with a Historical subject matter.

red/blue mech pencil refills & art books.

2011-10-19T01:23:00.001-07:00

Hi guys,

A few people were asking me where I got my red/blue pencil leads on Monday. I ordered them online from tiger pens. just over £3 for a pack of 12 leads.

Also i found an amazing torrent (which obviously i have not downloaded, and nor should anyone else, cuz illegal downloads are wrong!) for drawing books on anatomy, characters, manga, pretty much everything you can think of for drawing people/ characters. Plus loads of stuff like Scott McCloud, Eisener, etc. there is about 120 books on the list all in PDF format.

anyways hope you find these useful :)

Beauty And The Beast

2011-10-14T13:44:00.000-07:00

Made some changes which was discussed on Monday, like detail, panelling in page4 and added the text. I liked how it was obscur with 'him' and 'her' rather than names, dont hate me Tim.

Top Cow Submissions.

2011-10-10T08:44:00.000-07:00

Okay I was particularly curious concerning this, so I'll throw it out there in case anybody else is wondering, or can shed some light on it. Top Cow are a publishing company, who helpfully have put submission guidelines on their website concerning Scripters, Pencillers, Inkers and Colourers.

For Pencilers or Complete Artists:
Quick tips:
1.    Backgrounds are as important as dynamic figures! If you send us some great pinup work but either not enough or bland backgrounds you will most likely get filed in the trash. Give us a showcase of all your skills.
2.    Use a variety of camera angles, depths of shots, and shot selections on each page. The easiest way for an editor to spot a novice penciler is medium shot after medium shot. Your pages don’t just have to be competent, they have to be exciting!
3.    Your first job is to tell the story. Is your story-telling clear and easy to understand even without the dialogue?
4.    Hands and feet. Editors look at characters’ hands and feet.

For Inkers:

Quick tips:
1.    Be true to the artist’s intent. Your job is to strengthen and enhance the penciler’s work, not over-ride it with your own intent. Make sure you understand what the artist is trying to convey (shape, shadow, texture) with every line.
2.    Separate forms and create depth by using varying line thickness, breaking up lines, and different rendering techniques. This is one of the inker’s primary jobs.
3.    The tool you use to ink is not important, but use the right tool for the job. Classic tools like nibs and brushes rarely fail in a skilled hand. Typically, technical pens and markers will not give your line the life it needs to enhance the original pencils. Digital inking is an emerging discipline, but remember that computers are no substitute for technique.
4.    Vary your technique to convey texture. Metal should not be rendered with the same technique as fur or wood for example.

They're pretty handy things to keep in mind I think, especially considering those are the expectations they have for if they're going to pay you...

What was of particular interest however, was:

For sample pages of Top Cow characters to ink download the images from the following links. Right-click these links and choose “Save target as…” for high resolution 300dpi JPGs. For best results, it is recommended you print these samples in non-photo blue ink on comic book art stock board (ex. Blue Line Pro).

The paper is here: Comic Board from Blue Line Pro . This board's 11x17 with a 10x15 working area, which means they want the pencils printed onto this, which at the time left me wondering: does anyone know if printers can have different calibrations and be formatted to print to different sizes? On CS5, with my crappy desktop printer, there's no option for printing at 11x17, even though it does fit in my printer.

Even if noone knows, it's good to be aware that at sometime in the future we may be required to do this, (if you decide to go into 'mainstream' comics) and knowing how could well be of use!

Newz

2011-10-04T13:56:00.000-07:00

Hello you inky buggers.

I've made an Ink Soup facebook page so add it and let's build up some support! Also I intend to post some work from previous issues on the page (is that allowed Chiu or do I need permission...?) so please let me know if you don't want me to - this would only be finished pieces from actual issues for now.

tata

hand written text

2011-09-28T06:36:00.000-07:00

Last bit of lettering...

2011-09-27T03:46:00.000-07:00

Morning people! After the meeting yesterday, and due to the deadline for submissions, I'm looking at lettering my beauty and the beast pages before getting too stuck into writing scripts. What would be helpful would be some opinions on said lettering, I've tried digital fonts, calligraphy nibs and brushes. I know which I prefer, i'd just like some other input before going ahead on the final pieces.

This is the digital lettering, the font being an edited open source typeface found on the internet.

Calligraphy Nibs. I followed http://www.blambot.com/handlettering.shtml This tutorial thing on filing down a nib I didn't often use. It does give the letters a nice quality.

Finally brushes. Apart from the 'o' in Know, the freedom of weighting of a brush led to a nice mix of formality found in the calligraphy nibs, and the rather artificial looking digital type.

NEXT ISSUE OF INK SOUP

2011-09-26T10:00:00.000-07:00

'sup. Anyone who wants to submit something for the next Ink Soup please send me an email at peetoman@blueyonder.co.uk (and ideally let me know how many pages)

Provisional submission deadline: Monday 10th October

ULTIMATE DEADLINE: MONDAY 17TH OCTOBER

cheeeeers

Beauty & Beast page 3

2011-09-19T16:21:00.000-07:00

So, this has taken a long time and there's not much left, BUT the third page is done! I'm already working on the last two. And I've learned to draw boats.

Also, I've started working on something new, only a few pages, and still at storyboard level. I °might° enter it into the Observer competition, though first of all I just want to lay it out and use a bit of watercolours, for fun. Next step is photo references. I'm also trying to make my storyboards a little more comprehensible and closer to what the final image should look like, at least even if something stays at the first stage I can go back to it later and actually understand what I had in mind.

2011-09-12T04:41:00.000-07:00

great find by Tim Ki-Kydd:
http://timebombcomics.blogspot.com/

Some of you may be interested submitting work?
http://timebombcomics.com/submissions.html

Button Phobia/ Zipper Phobia

2011-09-10T10:38:00.000-07:00

These are the pages about Button Phobia and Zipper Phobia. the first picture is about how the Button Phobia woman reached for sweets that were on a pile of button boxes. dramaticly they fell on her and she was forever traumatised.

The Zipper Phobia guy developed his fear during a camping trip. When he was about to lay down ad opened his tent an angry racoon attacked him. Ever since he wont open any zippers.

Below you see the sketch for the layout. I'm ok with it but need to check on size and better perspective. For example the way the Butto Phobia girl reaches for sweets. She could be way more in bird's eye perspective (hand much bigger than her head). and the lid of the candy glas could be slighty open so you can see some lollipops. My next step is to redraw both childhood storys and of course think about the final page how they get together. I could use some feedback on this please.

Have a look at

2011-09-08T00:28:00.000-07:00

Comical Animal

late research?

2011-09-07T06:59:00.000-07:00

http://whatson.visitbirmingham.com/birmingham-royal-ballet-beauty-and-the-beast-746100016

Though I'm not sure how I feel about ballet, what are the chances that it's on? :)

Competition

2011-09-07T06:56:00.000-07:00

05 Warsaw Rising Graphic Story Competitiondeadline 03.10.2011

Beauty and thew Beast thumbnail layout development

2011-09-01T02:13:00.000-07:00

I have tried to give much more depth to my fractured Georgie Porgie in my story RVJ. By looking deeper in to the character of the duke of Buckingham (who was Georgie in the rhythm) and his relationship with king Charles the 2^nd and discover why all the girls cried. I find some useful information in to these two characters

The script for the story with

pieces of text proving my point on

Georges sexually.

From now on I am using secondary and primary photos and images to aid in a stronger execution.

rough thumbnails

Final roughs

Visually the comic will look like what i showed on my pervious post on visual direction of the work.

My final finish will be digitally coloured on PS seeing as that’s a media I am much more familiar and I believe i can be creative on. I did a quick colour test on page 1 to see how and what sort of atmosphere and style of digital painting the final will be.

I am hunting currently for other digital artists who expand Photoshop and tablet software to new heights to produce sharper imagery. Learn their techniques to make this much more enjoyable and experimental.

personally i think this could help in my ambitious
idea.

Josh

visual project concept and Colour tests

2011-08-31T10:38:00.000-07:00

It’s been a while since I posted any work relating to my developing negotiated project partly because of the size of the idea and scale of research.

I essentially want to produce a comic that combines a roger Rabbit, Cool world vibe. Where reality and cartoons meet but my universe would be visually unique, animated, surreal, and geeky, while maintaining a sense of real life culture and people its quite ambitious to be honest.
.

Cool world had such a haunting creepy atmosphere that works for its crazy cartoonly inhabitants sort of like Tex Averys work. Almost each animated back drop has a hidden face and twisted sky scrapper in it which

Inspires me in the architecture aspect of the project.

The idea of cartoons and reality blending together in a separate society really seems like an interesting angle to go with my developing practice could make for great comics if my narrative I choose is strong. But unlike Roger Rabbit my setting will be either present day or universal. Because i want a wider range of characters and environments then just the classics of the golden age era.

My beauty and the beast comic and RVJs are working on this style as well.

here are some of my best thought colour tests and drawings so far from over the break

i got one sped up recording of my working progress on one of the pieces.

I found the interiors to be much more tricky to portray so i will use secondary resources like books and photos to improve upon this experiment and area of the visual language.

I will post up my finished thumbnails and colour tests later on.

Josh

Zombies Don't Love

2011-08-26T06:54:00.001-07:00

This was sort of like a side piece I was working on, tho I am working on a picture book (to be uploaded) for the Picture book blog.

I am messing around with textures digitally, but also going to try and continue some vector ones and overall keep up a similar style of work that I produced last year but definitely try and improve.

blublu

2011-08-25T10:23:00.000-07:00

Hey guys, most of you probably now this website already. Still wanted to share the link.

http://www.blublu.org/ Some of the wall art can be found in Berlin :).

Junji Ito

2011-08-21T10:12:00.000-07:00

I love this gruesome shit (read right to left cos it's Japanese)
http://monsterbrains.blogspot.com/2010/12/junji-ito-thing-that-drifted-ashore.html

The same guy has done one called Gyo that's even more crazy - I'm saying walking fish, gas powered corpse robots, the lot.

Beauty and the Beast/ BUTTON PHOBIA

2011-08-19T07:52:00.000-07:00

Hey Guys, for my Beauty and the Beast project I had more than one story I would like to tell. The first idea was about the hairiest man alive, suffering in a circus. He gets saved by a kind clown woman. I will continue with the freak show idea when i'm done with the button phobia one.

For those of you who haven't been to the meetings, I thought of things that could be the beast, so I thought about a documentary I saw about strange phobias. One of them was button phobia which really effected people in their daily lifes. They screamed, jumped up and down and started crying because of buttons. The phobia is the beast!

My story is about a woman that is terrified of buttons and I tell how her phobia developed.
I started all over again with my character design and focused on facial expressions. Also what expressive traits each character will have and which style suits my story. (Scott Mc Cloud's Making Comics)

I did some research for my character. the button phobia woman is either disgusted, or absolutly horrified of buttons. Fotos by Hitchcocks films helped me to work on the facial expressions.

Marijpol inspired me for the style. She uses strong contrast through her shadings. (The shadings follow the object or the figure which creates dynamic).

As you can see above I used strong shadings for my story. The character itself was way too "cartoony" so I changed to a more realistic style. Still I felt like something was missing and I disliked the neat and stiff look of my character. To break out of my comfort zone I continued to work with pencil. I haven't done anything in pencil in ages, but figured it will help me to get more lose and create a different style. The artist below uses pencil for his story. Also the unusual style for a graphic novel inspires me a lot.

I kept the hair in strict lines which is another contrast in style. It also stands for her compulsive way/ fear of buttons.

I will post more this week. Don't want to bomb you with my work. Thanks for your time and I'm always thankful for feedback.

Mmmmm pretty..

2011-08-12T04:53:00.000-07:00

nice elegant storytelling and art work by Sarah Mensinga

thought peeps might enjoy

always find this site useful, thought i'd share

2011-08-08T16:49:00.000-07:00

http://meathaus.com/

Help! - i need contacts / my new portfolio

2011-08-06T07:51:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

I am looking for professional contacts (writers, Illustrators, and publishers/ editors) to send out my beauty & the beast pages to.

I am struggling to build a good list of contacts, though i have a few, I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts and tips on finding contacts? any good resources for finding email/ post addresses, or even just names that i can start from?

Maybe it would be good to do some of this as a group? maybe build a shared database/ list of contacts? Dunno if peeps are precious about sharing this stuff?

On a separate note i have finally sorted out a couple of online portfolios, only on carbonmade and behance but its a start! There is a set of recent commissioned corporate/editorial pieces i did a couple of weeks ago on there. Would love some feedback on the portfolio - Not sure if it is too varied/ not specialist enough?

Cheers folks :)

Observer Cape Graphic Short Story Prize

2011-08-05T13:11:00.000-07:00

I sketched these out for the Observer comp, having hit a bit of a wall with the Beauty and the Beast project, and actually like these more... So much so i'm tempted to work in another page and use it for the Beauty and the Beast brief.

They're a bit sketchy, didn't really want to devote too much time to it, and i'm already looking at better producing some frames, or sourcing reference for certain poses in certain frames.

Beauty and the Beast

2011-08-02T08:06:00.000-07:00

Hey here's a concept illustration for Beauty and the Beast done using black ink and tippex and watercolour.

Enjoy!

Beauty and the Beast

2011-07-30T02:41:00.000-07:00

This is really unique must have taken some intricate cutting skills and unfortunately the original book is destroyed but it looks really interesting.

http://talesoffaerie.blogspot.com/2011/07/beauty-and-beast-altered-book.html

Clint Magazine & inspiration

2011-07-26T03:11:00.000-07:00

http://titanmagazines.com/t/clint/features/announcements/see-your-work-clint/

Check out clint magazine - run by folks like Joe Cornish (of Adam & Joe fame) and Mark Millar, calling for comic artists -

Magazine very much in the spotlight featuring stuff from Jimmy Carr and Jonathan Ross amongst many more 'real' comic artists.

also this vid/advert is really cool

thought this was really cool and need to share

2011-07-24T16:02:00.000-07:00

i felt really inspired by this

http://emcarroll.com/comics/prince/andthesea.html

Beauty & the beast - finished(ish)

2011-07-16T15:37:00.000-07:00

Howdy y'all

Here are my five pages for Beauty & the Beast.

They are 'finished' but I am still keen to tidy it up and make improvements - especially on the text, both actual dialogue and visual presentation.

Thoughts & comments please

characters and colour

2011-07-15T13:29:00.000-07:00

Started drawing stuff and generating ideas, these are a few of the initial ideas and experiments. I will move on to developing a more refined narrative. Im unsure of what approach to take and would appreciate some constructive criticism/feed back.

Creating Worlds

2011-07-13T06:52:00.000-07:00

I've been focusing on the 'World Building' chapter of Making Comics as my environments are very lazy, but also trying to work on my making my characters more expressive, compositions more interesting and generally working on a more professional aesthetic.

Here's my (very) rough storyboard:

There are three environments in the story; The bar, the desert and the cave all of which I will work on before creating the final pages.

As for the mountains I like the one with the holes best, inspired by Moebius and Max Ernst who I'll look at in more detail when drawing them all proper like.

Pencil study for the cave:

And a pen one which I much prefer:

Finally I got a bit sidetracked by a painting of the bar scene, still not quite finished but you get the gist:

I stand by the fact that this was useful for refining the seedy bar characters and the environment of the bar itself, but it would be extremely time consuming to paint every panel in this way...

Rules are made to be broken

2011-07-12T07:32:00.000-07:00

I found this in a Milo Manara story...who says speech bubbles can't interact with characters? Haha

Short Graphic novel competition

2011-07-11T01:29:00.003-07:00

http://www.vintage-books.co.uk/about-us/jonathan-cape/Graphicshortstoryprize/

FYI

Pages 1 and 2

2011-07-07T09:40:00.000-07:00

Pretty much final, but obviously there's always plenty of room for improvement. I don't really know if I'm happy with them or not. The story is still a bit incomprehensible at this point. The Beast is the misunderstandings between a couple basically, and in this world it's turning the guy into a "beast" (he looks a little more beastly as it goes along and as he falls in his misunderstandings more and more) while the Beauty (always the saviour in this fairytale) is trying to bring him back down to earth. I tried keeping a few elements of the original fairytale - the "Beast" in the castle, the rose (although that's a lilly) under the glass case, etc. Also I stuck to handwritten text, slanting it when she's talking just so they look a little different, it's definitely not a very high standard of lettering but I think I prefer it to computer fonts... Aaanyway, let me know what you think while I crack on with the rest of the pages :)
(ah also my scanner is not very good, but I'll photocopy them as soon as I get the chance so they'll look nice and smooth)

Visuals by Sound

2011-07-06T02:47:00.000-07:00

Have started to record my progress of drawing using my diverse range of music as a guideline for future creative ideas this rough wacom tablet drawing is inspired by the sound track to rockstars L.A Noire composed by Andrew Hale.

link to video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mz6ze_b31oo&feature=channel_video_title

I will continue this series as a development for ideas and to show my rough work in motion.

If anyone knows of a better free screen recorder please tell me so that stupid watermark dose not interferer with the viewing.

Channel http://www.youtube.com/user/Jowybean

hey guys

2011-06-26T13:51:00.000-07:00

i need some help please!

i need to figure out whether to use colours to fill outlines like this..

or keep all lines black like this...

or to completely go against everything i believe in and combine the two?

this is bells father by the way. i've decided against the normal 18th century dress, i've done it so often and i just wanted to draw a completely different era. so this is pre ww1. it's a pilots outfit. mmmmhmm

and i know it's really scrappy and badly coloured and whatever, but it's just a draft until i figure out the best way to do the silly outlines!

Welcome to my world for the moment

2011-06-26T06:21:00.000-07:00

Its been a while since I posted anything on ink soup but this is to generally give you an idea of exactly what sort of world and style I am going with for my practice. I want to have a blend of realistic environments people and situations contested by cartoon elements and characters. Essentially a Roger Rabbit sort of universe with the distorted architecture of Cool world but each area will be different to the last.

This is a rough digital drawing I did combining elements of the secondary photograph (I will try and do my own for the projects) with the characterized objects and figures in the composition this also will help in my colour theory which is why photography will help make this style more practical and accurate.

Concept for devil character

2011-06-24T10:23:00.000-07:00

New direction for the devil character, think this is much better than the cartoony version i had in the draft?

I think i like the original pencil sketch i did of this better than the finished version. ho hum!

Beauty & the Beast final draft

2011-06-22T08:35:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

In the spirit of community critique and all that jazz here is the final draft of my piece for Beauty & the Beast.

The drawing is pretty rough as I was concentrating on getting the narrative pace, plot clarity, frame comp, etc rather than the aesthetic.

I am pretty happy with it so far, Couple of things I will change - firstly on page 2 the top two frames , Firstly frame 2 is not clear enough - it is supposed to be the candles flaring and filling the room with smoke, secondly i dont think it is clear that the boy is causing the candles to flair - there is not a strong causal link (i was thinking of having the boy clicking his fingers?)

From here I plan to develop the aesthetic with particular focus on characterisation - I want to make the priest more creepy looking (i was thinking hook nose and pointy chin like the old punch & judy puppets) The boy needs to be cuter and more innocent at the start to emphasise the transition and major one is the devil as he is massively cheesy!

Anyway - THIS IS HERE FOR CRIT!!! please don't just tell me it's nice! constructive feedback please.

Panna a netvor.

2011-06-15T13:59:00.000-07:00

The Czech version of "Beauty and the Beast" - dark, poetic, and subtitled. It's all on youtube if you're patient enough to click on the next part every ten minutes or so :)

Ideation

2011-06-14T09:56:00.000-07:00

After last week's meet up, I pretty much just kept going in the same direction. Character concepts, areas of focus and narrative.

This was a little side project, Mostly looking at action-to-action sequences and expressions, following Eisner's chapter of expressive anatomy. Also, when possible, this will be a perfect piece of work to experiment with finishing styles on.

These were some quick character concepts, focussing more on the juxtaposition of the two characters, further edifying the idea of Beauty and the Beast. Personally I'm not really happy with the scientist - I'm planning on doing more sketches until I feel comfortable with the design as a whole, whereas the assymmetric design of the monster i'm far happier with.

Unfortunately, I have work all of this week (foolishly assuming that a bit of extra work could accomodate the cost of books, art supplies and cider), which I will intersperse with reading the rest of Eisner's and McCloud's books.I also have a brief narrative sketched out, with this week being spent on transferring this into an actual panel to panel script, with A5 communicative drafts supporting it.

Also: Chiu wanted to see these... They're something a guy working for Disney threw together, identifying some common errors that crop up in sequential art, so... Enjoy!

Beauty and the Beast

2011-06-08T13:11:00.000-07:00

Here is my first attempt at a comic for this issue's Ink Soup! Any comments are welcome! Thanks.

Grzegorz Rosinski

2011-06-07T09:49:00.000-07:00

Grzegorz Rosinski - Lames de fond from Libertago Ltd. on Vimeo.

Mr Wonderful - by Daniel Clowes

2011-06-06T08:48:00.000-07:00

Mr Wonderful , an ironic title with its narrative about a man who is by all observations shy, neurotic, and like many self-examinations of "post-modern" american life, unable to amount to what he would liek to be.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/16/magazine/funnypagesClowes.html

Enki Bilal, dessinateur de bandes dessinées

2011-06-06T08:43:00.000-07:00

fans of Enki Bilal interview on his new book romeo and juilet (in french)

Another Graphic Novel competition, but for many more pages

2011-05-21T08:42:00.001-07:00

http://www.myriadeditions.com/First%20Graphic%20Novel%20Competition

Comics Festival 2011

2011-05-20T05:50:00.000-07:00

Contest

Tree Time Tales

2011-05-07T11:50:00.000-07:00

This is my finished piece for the Cheltenham competition. I think the lithography printing really paid off to give it a nice effect and printing onto watercolour paper made it easy to add colour.

cheltenham Illustration final colour test 2

2011-05-04T06:31:00.000-07:00

I personally think the sepia scheme is stronger i tried to be less dramatic and more tonal with the colour overlay this time.

Macbeth page 1

2011-04-29T08:13:00.000-07:00

first page in colour, i still have a lot to edit on it, abit more colour to add but it seems to be taking a lot longer to ink and colour than i thought it would.

movie page 1

2011-04-28T05:13:00.000-07:00

Page 1 of 2, based off of Japanese film versus / ultimate versus.

This is one of the tasks I've been looking at over the holiday, i think it still needs a lot of work, but its a start, i don't think panel 3 to 4 are clear so I'll have to edit it slightly so it makes sense.

I'll upload Macbeth page 1 coloured tomorrow.

my final entry

2011-04-27T14:32:00.000-07:00

Cheltenham Illustration final colour test

2011-04-26T18:09:00.000-07:00

Goya was a major inspiration for the piece

The in art on this ambitious piece was very challenging trying to reinterpret the techniques of the old etching masters like Gustave Dore while giving it a personal edge.

I felt some of the finished lines looked flat or inconsistent with the design and composition but this colour dropping I did seems to hide those floors in the work and instead crate a tense surreal scene.

see if it can work in black and white

Gustave Dore

2011-04-25T06:43:00.000-07:00

It wont make sense out of context but just wondering what people think of the finishing style? I will upload my full page roughs soon + plus the general story.

Colour and inking Finishes

2011-04-24T11:20:00.000-07:00

Following the decent outcome of my last colour test I wanted to try it again but this time on a digitally inked piece.

This is the text I have been using to create this 2-page spread

The Funny Dream

Written by Marie Birknshaw

“Well, I never!” said the turtle.

“Did you see that ostrich Fly?”

“Well, I never!” said the ostrich.

“There’s a sheep in the sky.”

“Well, I never!” said the sheep.

“Did you see that Tortoise run?”

“Well, I never!” said the Tortoise.

“There’s a mole in the sun.”

“Well, I never!” said the mole.

“Did you hear that dormouse roar?”

“Well, I never!” said the dormouse.

“What’s that there on the floor.”?

“Well, I never” said the girl

“I thought I heard a scream.”

“Well, I never” said the girl

“What a very funny dream!”

The context of the rhyme is what really made me think outside the target demographic barrier this story is aimed at. I wanted to mature this simple narrative by setting it in a challenging

time and idea.

I decided to set the comic in the 50s and make all characters animalmophric Just because of my current interest in to the quality of Juanjo Guarnidos colours and designs in the comic series BLACKSAD.

The middle image of the first page of Blacksad volume 3 i found really eye catching with the over dosing use of sleazily mucky yellow and brown that similar scheme is found in my experiment.

I used a lot of the horse photos as a guideline for the running panels and also copied some of the existing compositions in to the story to aid me in my visuals.

Also drawing horses and individual anthropomorphic characters was something I had a lot of trouble with so that’s another reason why I choose to do this quite twisted obscure story on something that’s really innocent fun.

Outcome

I feel slightly more positive about this three-coloured experiment I believe it does more justice to the period it’s parodying its not too dark or lighthearted it has the right amount of tension from my point of view. My second goal was also not to copy the oblivious Junanjos style I mean. There are connections to his work and mine but my limited palette makes this feel a lot more personal than a rip off of an existing formula.

What worked?

· Using a digital method of inking leaves more free space and time to alter the original pencil lines and looking in to the depth and distance of characters and objects both foreground and back.
· The merging of the mucky green and light orange scheme shows that vintage timeless feeling petty well.
· The darker shadows display the crowded squashed scenes decently this is contrasted by the cream coloured highlights of the actual race.
· The exploration of camera angles and subject to subject shots show intendancy with the characters and there horses.
· I really adore the 2^nd page last panel perspective on the body and the spotlight effect
· I feel most of my character designs including the background figures show action and life but also fear and excitement within the spreads.

What did not work?

· Even though I stuck two three colours the colour seems to put slight more variation in the crowd scenes just does not feel as there’s a delicate consistency.
· Certain thick inked lines look out of place with the rest of the focused subjects on the. panels example the roof girders and lamp on the 2^nd page last panel
· The over all finish is not slick or structure so not all marks are restricted within there requested lines.

Conclusion

This comic feels like its pushing me in to the correct path it seems that these two experiments have made me realize the importance of colour schemes in your work.

That being said I would like to continue discovering more relevant colour schemes as well as developing on my line quality.

Comic finishes tests colour

2011-04-17T10:16:00.000-07:00

Apart from sending countless hours on creating Gustave Dore etchings for my Cheltenham submission and developing and refining my early RVJ experiments.

I have been using my time as well to explore my colour theory as others have always considered a lot of my colouring too be confusing or flat.

So to prove these individuals wrong I tried out a Photoshop tablet colour test today.

I used a really quick rough 2-page spread depicting a scene of tension for this test.

i hope that this helps me discover what sort of atmosphere I want to show through the use of three or five colours.

Here are the results

Test 1

Test 2

I looked at Juanjos Guarnido colour work in Juan Diaz Canales BLACKSAD for inspiration and guidance he had shades of certain colours that would show up in certain panels in the 2nd volume i really adored.

What worked?

· I feel both colour tests were varied in success with panels. (examples)
· Guy getting out of car on test 1
· Girl with the head phones panel on test 2

· Number 1 I feel is very momcrome and raw with its use of greies and dull browns but I felt it worked well with the shop interior.
· Number 2 seems more dramatic and filmic with the direction of the sunlight and does the job a little more passionately

What did not?

· Possibly it’s the quality of mark making on both it feels rushed and the sketchy lines can effect the colours purpose as it was all done with pen without any pencil.

I think I should try this technique again out on a finished standard spread.
Could give more depth and understanding of how effective my style will be in future story telling.

In terms of story I am sticking with my initial idea of children’s rhythms and tales and crating my alternative version on them.

hiho

2011-04-15T09:46:00.001-07:00

penciled without colour yet
empty space on top left corner is for title, name etc.

Cheltenham Illustration alternative idea in Progress

2011-04-02T15:05:00.000-07:00

I am working an alternative design for the tree time tales piece but looking at the idea of time using mark making achieved by the old masters like Goya and even early 20th century artists like Boris Artzybasheff and then modernizing it with urban propaganda and references to animated shows very suttlery.

The left picture is the rough layout for the piece I have a video showing the image being sketched http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKQXxK8YrzE&feature=channel_video_title and the right is the obvious refined composition starting to ink it in but thinking more carefully about the marks and lines I create so it flows better with the pictures concept

Tree Time Tales Competition entry

2011-03-30T08:14:00.000-07:00

I will post the watercoloured version soon, let me know what you think of the overall design and whether it makes sense comments are appreciated!

Cheltenham Illustration entry colour theory experiment

2011-03-30T00:27:00.000-07:00

I plan to use digital techniques limiting the colour scheme to give it the eerie mood it desires But the source of light is the focal point in the images content.

and I am also possibly going to try and refine the lines and cross-hatching.

Cheltenham Illustration entry

2011-03-28T04:37:00.000-07:00

Well half the page anyway. If I can stay on track I should be able to finish the other half before May

Original artwork in Paris

2011-03-14T12:39:00.000-07:00

found a wonderful shop near Notre dame which sells original Bande Dessine pages http://www.danielmaghen.com
and then it got me thinking about other places that may sell original artwork:
http://www.bdartiste.com/dotclear2/index.php?category/De-crecy/Nicolas-de-Cr%C3%A9cy-S%C3%A9rigraphies

one of my favourites De-Crecy
Now to check if there are any galleries in London? a tad closer to home

another page...

2011-03-12T20:20:00.000-08:00

what do you think of this?

btw check this out Making Graphic Novels

Acryilc Colour does it work for me

2011-03-10T12:59:00.000-08:00

I am interested very much in working with traditional techniques to broaden my practices use of media to develop this i started doing studies from my own photography and looking in to colour and its tones and shading with acrylic paints.

This is not supposed to be a complete copy of the figure itself but i can see i need to look at limiting my palette to try and crate more realistic atmospheric pieces.

this study took about 2 hours cause of the focus on colour.

i used a large range of colours for this figure so obviously this study is mixture of colder and warmer than its original source i plan to continue these sorts of studies to further improve on my colour theory and create comics with more personal hands on like Juanjo Guarnidos Black Sad (though he uses water colour and so does French comic artist Luc Brunschwig) than just straight forward digital software which I already know about.

.

2011-03-07T12:36:00.000-08:00

hiho

2011-03-05T04:34:00.000-08:00

Hey, I played a bit with colours, what do you think?

Krystian

Inspiration

2011-03-02T02:15:00.000-08:00

by John Kenn

2011-02-25T12:15:00.000-08:00

a competition i think us illustrators would like

http://www.dandad.org/awards/student/2011/categories/18/illustration

cheltenham-illustration-awards 2011

2011-02-23T00:31:00.000-08:00

well worth entering for sequential narrators
http://www.cheltenham-illustration-awards.com/

2011-02-21T15:40:00.000-08:00

http://www.graphicsdirect.co.uk/

this is the website for the markers, it has quiet a few things that are useful.

French Publisher

2011-02-21T11:43:00.000-08:00

This is a video interview of Juanjo Guarnido he is a Spanish artist who does Black Sad which was introduced to me by Josh. He publishes under a French publisher known as Dargaud, the way they advertise their comics is interesting as they do an animatic of the comic to give you a preview of the comic before you buy it!

Juanjo Guarnido Interview

Dargaud Publishers

Endless talent from Europe

2011-02-17T14:59:00.000-08:00

Below Sophia Martineck in "A love story in five acts"

a lot of interesting artists mentioned that can be found in the following links
http://www.electrocomics.com/
http://grandpapier.org/?lang=fr
http://www.printeresting.org/2009/05/15/frederic-coche-auteur/

http://www.chihoi.net/comics/
http://www.ansichten-des-jordan.de/ (check the drawings link)
http://www.marijpol.com/index.php?/comic/strips-/

Sophia Martineck

2011-02-05T12:36:00.000-08:00

more of her wonderful work here:
http://martineck.com/projekt.php?number=37

L5 Find Your Publisher!

2011-01-31T06:43:00.000-08:00

Find your publisher!

Search for publishers in which

a) you feel your style and content would be appropriate,
or
b) you wish to develop your own work towards the type of work they represent.

my own initial examples are:

Canicola: http://www.canicola.net/home.htm
Grand Papier http://grandpapier.org/?lang=fr

However I will do some more research to find even more inspirational publishers

The Abaddon - by Koren Shadmi

2011-01-26T15:13:00.000-08:00

"Koren Shadmi has started serializing a great-looking new webcomic called The Abaddon. Just a few pages so far, so now’s a good time to grab a front row seat."
from http://scottmccloud.com/

merry merry

2010-12-24T01:24:00.000-08:00

found this online comic...

2010-12-07T17:01:00.000-08:00

...thought I'd share it

http://www.romanticallyapocalyptic.com/home?page=3

2010-11-30T14:03:00.000-08:00

http://www.kapowcomiccon.com/

i already got my tickets

Comic continues...

2010-11-08T16:05:00.000-08:00

Although the first projects over i intend to ink the entire thing, because... well, because I'm actually buzzing off doing it.
This is the fifth page (of 12) for 'Hotdog Hansel', the first glimpse of the monster 'Gret'. Its coming along, I've stopped putting speech bubbles in, as computers apparently take care of that easier... so yeh any feedback is good feedback.

oh and the rest is on my blog, leehallamillustration.blogspot.com

fumetto - Comix Competition (Int.)

2010-11-08T06:04:00.000-08:00

http://www.fumetto.ch/index.cfm?nav=162,473,702&DID=1&SID=2

Comix Competition (Int.)

Energy

Each year, Fumetto – International Comix-Festival Lucerne holds a competition to give comic creators the opportunity to compare their work, present it to a broader public and to exchange views with others. The competition’s theme this year is Energy.

Conditions

Deadline: 17th of January 2011 (date of postmark)
Format: A4 or A3 (other formats will be disqualified)
Form: only Comics (stories in picture form), no cartoons accepted, no digital entries
Number of pages: maximum 4 (only 1 comic)
Labelling: name, address, telephone number, e-mail and date of birth on the back of each page
Packaging: sturdy envelope, no rolls
Return Postage: if the return postage is not enclosed or not sufficient, the works will not be sent back but kept for one year only
For Siwss Nationals: stamps, or money in the value of the stamps needed
For Foreigners: 5 Euro
Categories: Cat. 1: 18 years or older / Cat. 2: 13 to 17 years / Cat. 3: up to 12 years of age
Schools: Please enclose a list with names and details (see Labelling ) of the participating students and information about the school/class.

Sandman's Assistant 02 and 03

2010-11-05T03:19:00.001-07:00

There are parts of this page that look off to me now, after looking at it again. And I'm not too pleased with some of the colour-work. But I'm determined to finish this, lol.

EDIT: I need to make some changed to the third page, there are a few inconsistencies with the room that have been bothering me.

Sandman's Assistant 01

2010-11-04T09:33:00.000-07:00

This is a coloured and worded version of what I started working on for the summer project. I had so much fun with it that I decided on continuing it in my spare time.

2010-11-03T13:00:00.000-07:00

General idea of my first page, If anyone has any finishing suggestions would be greatly appreciated :D

2010-11-02T01:35:00.000-07:00

http://joysukew.blogspot.com/

i know its a late update but i found the blog of one of the artists ive been looking at, i found it really helpful,

Emergency post!

2010-11-01T15:39:00.000-07:00

The BIAD Moodle brief link:

http://moodle.bcu.ac.uk/biad/course/view.php?id=1179

is completely incorrect - it is one that George put up without my knowledge

You should be following this blog, and the brief on the following moodle link only!

http://moodle.bcu.ac.uk/biad/course/view.php?id=1302

lol!

page 2

2010-11-01T13:02:00.000-07:00

this is a photo of page 2 i think it is a long way from finished so ill be adding to it until the final hand it date haha i want to edit it digitally but i would rather have everything else up to date before i do, same with page one, plus i need to make the panel edges neater because the markers had a bleeding effect grrr
sorry about the lateness of this post

Final inks...

2010-10-27T12:22:00.000-07:00

This is one of my final pages. I think a cel-style digital colour will compliment the bold linework, but I'm not sure. If anyone has any good finishing ideas, please suggest some. Still got to word it, but I'm looking for a suitable typeface. This was a last minute change of idea, and with it comes a different brief, which I'll post also.

I found the humour in this really hillarious

2010-10-27T06:29:00.000-07:00

I found this random image on the net, its very funny and the thing that makes it work is the text even though the imagery isnt very imaginative.

return to Eurotica and why

2010-10-26T14:04:00.001-07:00

(from bottom to top)
these 3 examples are published by eurotica
first the story of o
similar style to where with development my work may be

second perverts of the unknown
similar niave figure style and shading

third chica
similar cross hatching style to the current pages im working on

this is the work of Michael Mannings who im going to compete with i know you will say he's better but he's got 20 years of illustration experience over me so in time i hope it to be of this quality

Inking attempts

2010-10-26T11:23:00.000-07:00

After roughs, and drawings i decided to attept inking. So these are re-drawn panels off the main pages to attempt inking some characters and settings.

http://leehallamillustration.blogspot.com