Today is a special Review Day Tuesday. Rather than reviewing one book, I’m reviewing a slew of Marvel (and other) books at once! All of these books have been out for a while, whether it’s a year, a month, or a week. Still, if you don’t visit a comic shop very often, I hope these are helpful.
Now, since I’m reviewing more than one book, these reviews are going to be as concise and short as possible. Like, one paragraph (ish) each.
Let’s go!
Captain Marvel #1
Writing by Kelly Sue DeConnick and art by David Lopez and Lee Loughridge.
The colors are a softer quality to me, but it works well with the dialogue and the environments the characters are in. The characters themselves are fabulously relatable and have great moments with each other. The first issue doesn’t have a whole lot of action in it, but for a first issue, it doesn’t have to. It can just show off the characters, and this issue does it well.
Fun fact: Kelly Sue DeConnick is married to Matt Fraction? What the hell?
Rocket Raccoon #1
Writing and art by Skottie Young.
It’s good to see Skottie Young do something besides Oz titles (but after reading this book I really want to read them). His playful lines and vibrant colors makes the sci-fi space adventure really stand out in comparison to other sci-fi space titles. Seriously, it’s a breath of fresh air in a genre full of gritty technological realism and drama.
Plus, you know, Rocket Raccoon and Groot are fun characters in general.
Ms. Marvel #1 and #2
I have to review these two together because reasons.
Writing by G. Willow Wilson (whom you might remember as my favorite comics author after I read Cairo, another title of hers). Art by Adrian Alphona and Ian Herring.
I adore this series. Absolutely adore it. G. Willow Wilson’s writing is, of course, stellar. I wasn’t sure how she would write these teen characters, but she did a lovely job. I also love seeing into the life of an Islamic family in America because it’s not a perspective you see often (there need to be more of those stories in general, not just comics).
Also, the art is bright, softly lit, and full of great expressions and character moments. These are great gestures captured here in this comic.
I’ve blathered on enough. READ THE DAMN THING.
Rat Queens
Writing by Kurtis J. Wiebe. Art by Roc Upchurch.
Oh hey! An IMAGE title!
Anyway, if you’re a woman who loves playing Dungeons and Dragons, this is a must read. It reads like a D&D session, but without a pesky DM (or if the DM is there, the presence is weak). Reading the adventures of these ladies is risque, raunchy, and even very bloody at times thanks to a group of assassins out to get them for some reason. I’m sure future issues will explore what the assassins’ intentions are, and I look forward to reading them because these ladies (though not fully developed yet) give enough of a glimpse of their characters to keep me intrigued.
Have you read any of these titles? What were your thoughts? Let me know in the comments below.
Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you tomorrow with some new sketches.
Man, between all the blog posts, Validation comics, Johnson & Sir comics, freelance work, and the day job (yep, I got a day job) keeping me busy, do I have time for personal projects?
Yes. Yes I do!
Project 1 is very different from what I usually do. Project 1 is a large acrylic painting.
Step 1.Step 2.
By “large,” I mean it’s larger than my usual scale. I’m used to working on, at most, 9 inch by 12 inch pieces of paper. This is 16 inches by 20 inches on canvas.
This is a painting that my mind demanded I make, because there are lighting techniques I want to try with this.
Project 2 is connected to Validation. It’s a portrait of one of my favorite characters ever…
Roxie.
This is a piece I’m doing in colored pencil, which I haven’t used in years. It’s a good refresher to brush up on my old skills. I’m also doing my best to use colors in ways I haven’t before. I’ll post more pictures as I work on it.
Project 3 is a comic I’m hoping to get out by October. I’ve mentioned it a few times previously here on the blog.
It’s Charlie & Clow.
The cover is done and I’m so happy with how it turned out! I need to make the next few pages and take care of a few other things. With any luck it should be online by Halloween.
The story is about a young punk lady named Charlie. When she’s walking home from classes one day, she discovers a monstrous golem, and it decides Charlie will be its next meal! Charlie runs for help only to find a tall goth man who calls himself Clow. Who is Clow? And will he help her fight off the golem menace?
Of course, there are other projects I have in the works, but they’re all either very personal or top secret surprises. So I won’t say any more.
Which project are you most excited to see? Do you have any personal projects in the works? Let me know in the comments!
Also, I’m skipping the Favorite Artist Friday feature this week because I’m still scouring the internet for new artists to add as my favorites. If you have any suggestions for artists I should look at, let me know in the comments!
Thank you for reading, and I’ll see you on Tuesday.
Bartez is a comic I found at Intervention Con, mostly because the author, Ryan, was right across the aisle from me. I never heard of the project before that weekend, so I bought a copy of the book. Once the convention madness died down, I finally sat down to read it.
And you know what? I like it.
Is it life-altering? No. Is it fun? Yes, and delightfully silly to boot.
The story follows Jimmy Barton, an average guy who works in IT, who still hangs out with a lot of his old high school buddies, and lives in the town he’s always grown up in. He’s also a bit of a quitter – he tries new things, but he never sticks to them for very long. Tae Kwon Do? Wrestling? Parkour? Nope, nope, and nope.
That is, until he discovers one of his old friends was murdered by a rogue member of a secret society. And now, Jimmy might be next on the murderer’s hit list! Will he be able to actually stick to something and learn how to save himself?
The book I read is the first volume in a series, but I don’t know how long the series will be. It’s a series I want to read, though! Now let me tell you why.
The art, which seems (very) influenced by the likes of Bryan Lee O’Malley and Vera Brosgol, is sharp, clean, and easy to read. In an art style like this it can be easy to make the characters look alike. Thankfully, the artist (Gale Williams) does a wonderful job creating unique character visuals. I could tell Jimmy apart from his friends, and even the ladies look varied and stylized.
The action scenes are sporadic, but are drawn very well. I look forward to seeing what future action scenes in later volumes will look like!
The writing is, at the start, slow. The writer definitely takes his time developing the characters and scenarios, which isn’t a bad thing. I appreciate the slowness a bit because in too many comics nowadays people are rushing to get to the action. In Bartez you’re supposed to see what life is like before things get crazy. And Ryan Peraro does a great job showing everyday situations.
Once things start getting crazy, Ryan has built up the characters and the scenario enough that you believe what happens in the story. It’s actually pretty brilliant.
And you know what? The art and the writing work fantastically together in this comic. There are two creators on the project but it feels like one unified voice. That, to me, is wonderful.
If you want to read Bartez, they have the comic online and in print. My vote? It’s worth the $10 to get the first volume.
Have you found any comics worth reading? Did you read Bartez? Let me know in the comments!
Thank you for reading, and I’ll see you tomorrow with new artwork.
So on Thursday (July 24), I went to the Toledo Art Walk thanks to an invite from Packo’s at the Park and my friend Chloe. Packo’s wanted some caricature artists to help promote their restaurant and be a part of the Art Walk this month, and I was happy to do so because…
I like to draw,
My friend Chloe is awesome, and
I drew caricatures at Cedar Point for 3 summers and knew what I was doing.
The day of the set up, we got there early and stopped at The Art Supply Depo.
Inside the Art Supply Depo.Another shot of inside the Art Depo. They had artwork from local artists on display as well.
The Art Supply Depo is an awesome store situated on South St. Clair street right behind Packo’s in downtown Toledo. They let Chloe borrow an easel for the night to draw caricatures on, and they had just the right markers and board that I needed to draw with.
The nice thing was Packo’s advertised for us in the Art Walk map, so that helped a lot in getting our name out there.
The front of the map. These were available at The Art Supply Depo and other sponsoring shop fronts.The back of the map.Our listing.
Once Chloe and I got everything we needed, we set up our tables by Packo’s.
Chloe’s table sat next to me.
I didn’t bring any Validation or Johnson & Sir books with me. But I did bring Prologues, IF-X, and a bunch of smaller things like bookmarks and stickers. I also had a book of prints.
I also had some copies of Mr. Dino and Friends and Ghost to give away for freebies.I had to keep the stickers in the sorter because it got breezy.These bookmarks will be listed for sale online soon!The Book of Prints. There were also a selection of $1 prints in the back.
Here’s Chloe’s table:
This was before I remembered that my book of prints had a few of her works in it.Close up on her prints, for RWBY, Wreck-It Ralph, and Sailor Moon.
Our friend Alex also set up just down the sidewalk from us, selling some of her work. I meant to get pictures but by the time we got done setting up people were approaching us for caricatures left and right.
I managed to catch a few pictures before the customers left!
I loved drawing their hair.Their friends were teasing them the whole time. It was kind of adorable.
While I didn’t sell a whole lot of bookmarks or prints, I did get a lot of tips for working on caricatures, which is awesome!
Once 9 o’clock hit, we finished up drawing our last customers, and then we packed up.
This cart was the best gift I have ever received. Also, I’m a pro at condensing all the things into small packages.
And then Chloe, Alex and I went to The Durty Bird right around the corner for burgers and drinks to celebrate!
Left to right: Me, Chloe, Alex.GRUMPY CAT FACES.Inside The Durty Bird. Their burgers are delicious.
Of course I had to send the appropriate thank-you notes to folks, because I had a great time and the event went really well! I’m planning on going again when the next one happens August 28th. Hopefully then I’ll have more books (if people are interested!).
I intend on getting more involved in caricatures and doing them at art festivals and parties. But since comics and caricatures are both separate kinds of art forms, I’m making a separate blog specifically for caricatures.
It’s called “Caricature’d!” and you can find it here.
I’ll be adding more to it over the next couple of days, so keep checking back to it.
Here on this site I want to keep the conversation about comics, appearances I’ll be making, and the process of making comics (among other comic-related things).
Speaking of which, I’ll be making more of them soon…
Last time I spoke about How I Make Johnson & Sir. Today I want to show how I make a comic strip for Validation, the other webcomic I work on, because the process is a little different.
If you ever get lost in the technical bits (especially in the Photoshop section), I explain some of those steps in How I Make Johnson & Sir so hopefully the techno-lingo won’t be so confusing.
I don’t (really) write Validation. Christian does (though we often talk story ideas over). I wait for her to send the script over to me first, and then…
Step 2: Layouts
Sometimes I skip this step, depending on how simple or complex the strips are in the script. Since I work in three panels, it’s important to know where characters will be placed and where speech balloons will go, to make the strip as readable as possible. That way it won’t be so cluttered.
I did not do layouts for strip #105 because it was scripted in a pretty straightforward way, and I had an idea for how I wanted the strip to look.
However, I’ll show the layouts I did for #103, which had some weird camera angles.
click to enlarge
Step 3: Ready the Paper
I tend to do this step ahead of time. Thankfully I can get two strips from a single sheet of 9 inch by 12 inch Strathmore Bristol Vellum, which is my paper of choice for Validation. I trim the paper (to make it easier to fit on my scanner) and I’m good to go.
Step 4: Pencil the Strip
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Pretty straightforward. Although, if you notice two extra characters, one looks like me and one looks like my boyfriend. Fun fact!
When that’s done, I send the pencils to Christian (via DropBox) for approval. This is where any changes that need made can be done, though 99.9% of the time she gives the ok.
Step 5: Ink
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Once I get the ok, I ink!
To add a little depth, especially in panel 2, I made the foreground figures in thicker lines to make them pop more. I used a micron pen with a 1.0 width. The background figure in Panel 3 was drawn mostly with 0.5 and 0.3 width pens, with finer details in a 0.1 width micron pen.
Step 6: Color with Markers
My markers of choice are (from most preferred to least)…
Copic markers
Prismacolor markers
Sharpies
I used to do the entire comic in marker, but now I only do half. Sometimes it’s because a marker died, the markers will not blend well for the background, or I need a color I don’t have a marker for. So I just color what I can.
Step 7: Scan and Tweak in Photoshop
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Once marker coloring is done, I scan the strip in at 300 dpi (dots per inch) and open it in Photoshop. The first thing I do is adjust the brightness and contrast (shown in the above picture). That way the strip isn’t so dim. Then I adjust the curves.
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Doing this will let the colors really pop.
Once those adjustments are done, I make a new layer in Photoshop and call it “EDITS”. This is the layer where I correct color errors I made with the markers, fix any wonky lines, and clean up smudges and spots.
Step 8: Color the Background
Then I make another new layer on top of that and call it “BACKGROUND”, because here’s where I add background color.
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If you notice, I adjusted the blending options for this layer. For “EDITS” I left those settings alone, but with “BACKGROUND” I set it to Color Mode: “Multiply” at a Fill Opacity of 100%.
The reason I do this is because Multiply mode actually keeps the lines clean while still coloring. It works like this:
Rather than it looking flat and gross like this:
Then I just color in the background colors as needed.
click to enlarge
Step 9: Color the Rest.
Once backgrounds are done, I make yet another layer on top and call that “FLATS.” I also set this layer to Color Mode: Multiply and Fill Opacity at 100%. This is where I color in the things my markers missed, like Jim’s coat and the game table.
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…Sometimes I have another file open to reference for color.
Step 10: Color the Shadows
This step is one I talked about a little bit in my previous tutorial, but here you’ll really see it in action.
I make a new layer on top, call it “SHADES,” and then set to Color Mode: Multiply and – here’s the surprise – Fill Opacity at 35%.
Notice it’s not at 100%? That’s because I don’t want the shadows to be overpowering. I also want the color of the shadows to blend, instead of getting any weird effects that would happen if I changed the paint brush opacity (yes, you can do that).
Once I do that, I color the shadows in, and it looks like this.
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I did something a bit unusual in Panel 2: I put the two figures closest to the reader in shadow. I did this to frame the picture and keep the focus on Ally and Kyle.
So now the colors are done! I save the file, and then flatten the image so all the layers merge. Then I make another new layer and save the file for lettering.
Step 11: Write the dialogue
For this step, I have the open file of the script handy so I can refer to it.
Then I write the dialogue and captions.
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I try to arrange them in such a way that they won’t block too much of the art, and to ensure it can be read easily.
Then, once everything is written and checked for spelling, I get to the bottom layer, make a new layer, and start placing the balloons and boxes with the rectangle tool.
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I use the rounded rectangle for dialogue and the plain rectangle for narration.
To make the tail for that balloon, I got to the bottom layer again, made a new layer, and painted it in.
Once all of that is done, I merge the layers to flatten it out, and then…
Step 12: Save the File!
I save it first at its current size and call the file “Validation105_large.”
Then I adjust the image size.
click to enlarge
The large file is at 300 dpi, which is the right size for print, but it isn’t too web-friendly. So to make it nice and tidy for the website, I shrink it from 300 dpi to 100 dpi. And I save that file as “Validation105_small.”
I send the finished strips to Christian via DropBox, and shazam! I’m done!
I hope you enjoyed looking at my process, and I hope you found something useful from it!
