Do the mm-mm, pigeon . . .

I’ve had a few pigeons pop out of my pencil recently. Here’s a quick Photoshop feathered friend. All he needs is a couch . . .

Robot Marathon

Why would a bunch of robots be rushing down a street? I thought I’d follow that last post with another slightly more detailed image. I just read Brian Wood’s Supermarket, illustrated by Kristian. His use of color is really fantastic. Reminds me of Paul Pope’s work.

I was just playing around with color and texture, attempting to emulate some of that energy.

Shameless deadline bid

Just minutes under the at-least-a-post-a-week self-imposed deadline, I’m submitting a knockoff of an ingenious robot design by Cadence. My Illustrator lines aren’t as fluid as his #2 pencil creation, but I did it in about 7 minutes.

Commissioned Mermaid

A certain, short patron asked me for a drawing of a mermaid. This is what I came up with . . .

Panel 7 . . .Finally

While I was out and about I grabbed some prismacolor markers and made a sketch of what Panel 7 of the Labsquad page (June 18 post) might be. The story is free form at this point. I made a cleaner sketch in Photoshop and here’s the comparison of the two. I need to rework a few things on the page before I ultimately ink it. I’m also not sure if I am going to color it but I’m toying with a 2 or 3 color/tint version.

County Fair!

Sadly, I left my trusty waterbrush pen in the van so these sketches are pen only, but I probably wouldn’t have been able to spend much time with the color anyway .

I used a micron brush pen and a Uni-Ball Vision Fine point.

Chidler Sketches

Our housemate recently moved out leaving an empty “playroom” which the chidlers quickly annexed. I grabbed my markers and a rubber band sketchbook* and proceeded to give art direction to my band of diminutive dramatists. Here are some of the resulting drawings.

* Take 10-15 8.5″x11″ sheets of paper fold in half to create a 5.5″x8.5″ book. Put a rubberband aound the middle to create a temporary binding. Voila.! Start sketching.

Bunsen Sketch

A Sharpie Sketch of the ill-tempered mechanical member of Labsquad. I’m still working out some of his design (mostly his hands). For more fun robot sketching check out Matthias Inks Blogspot.

Lindsey Wildlife Museum

I took my family to the Lindsey Wildlife Museum in Walnut Creek today. It’s a great place for drawing animals, especially raptors. I was able to get much closer to the animals than I normally can at the zoo. It’s also a lot smaller and lower key than the zoo. Definitely a place to return to at a future date.

I used my trusty Windsor Newton travel watercolor kit, my Niji waterbrush pen, and my Le Plume brush pen (for the Harris’s Hawk).

Spooky Tighter Pencils

I pulled out my lightbox. I don’t often use it but I know it’s a vital tool for a  lot of artists and, specifically, comics professionals.

The benefit of the lightbox to me is clear: since the basic composition has already been worked out, my attention is geared on refining, cleaning and detailing without distraction. In the past I have sped over background details, but with the lightbox, it’s like coming to a fresh drawing instead of feeling like I’m beating a dead cat.

I went ahead and scanned the page in, cleaning it up a bit in Phostoshop. I’m going to print out another copy to either : 1) clean up still further, 2) use as a basis for hand-inking 3) practice ink 4) some combination of the above. I think I’ll also take one of the panels and do some digital inking, for practice and comparison.