Taking my Talents to South Beach, part 2

Next week I'll be at the Miami Supercon. It's my first time at the show, and I'm very much looking forward to it. All I know about Miami, really, is that if I get in trouble I need to contact Michael Weston, and that it is filled with the tears of the underperforming LeBron James. I'll be at booth 820.

And, since it's me at another show, I'm doing another print. This Miami print has Abby and Amazonia taking a stroll in South Beach. It's probably the only place Amazonia would be considered appropriately dressed. Prints are 12x18 and limited to 25 signed copies.

Hope to see you there.

Kids Read Comics

Tomorrow, I'll be at Kids Read Comics in Chelsea, Michigan. This two day event is all about, well, kids reading comics. They named it pretty good, didn't they? Anyway, I'll be there, talking and selling comics, and scaring kids straight. If you're out that way, drop on by. It's free!

More Commissions

Commissionapalooza continues with this double punch of Amazonia and Charlotte commissions. Kinda makes you want to get one yourself, doesn't it? We can make that happen, you know.

Also, I think this is a fine time to make sure that you all know I have a DeviantArt account now. Check it out and see a whole smattering of my artwork.

Stopping a Bullet Cold

I'll be showing off some of my commissions from Charlotte over the next couple of days. Here's one that was actually just me messing around in a moment of quiet at the booth. I don't have any huge issues with the swimsuit outfit, especially if it's drawn tastefully. I think it's more iconographic than realistic, but so are a lot of superhero uniforms.

I also like the expression and body language. She's really throwing that lasso and using it as a weapon, isn't she?

Girls' Night Out

So, I've been asked to draw a bunch of things over the years. Some of them have been, well, a little weird. But when I got this request, to draw Power Girl and Ms. Marvel hanging out, the requester originally mentioned the two heroines at a bar with "Power Girl with a glass of red wine and Ms. Marvel with a beer," I had to remind the buyer that Ms. Marvel was a recovering alcoholic and wouldn't be drinking beer. The requester had forgotten that aspect of her character, and when I mentioned it quickly agreed "Oh yeah, that wouldn't be appropriate at all."

I've drawn a ton of weirdness, but drawing Ms. Marvel with a beer is apparently a line I wouldn't cross. Carol is clearly drinking a Pepsi.

This one was a lot of fun. The little things, like making them sit on bar stools and have it look right, is always a challenge. And I like the body language between the two of them too. Click and see if you like it, too.

My Students Inked By Me

This quarter, I've been teaching a "Heroes and Villains" drawing class at Hawken. We've been discussing types of heroes and villians, power levels, some history, along with a ton of drawing. One of the first things I try to teach is basic shapes and under-drawing. There's a thought when you start drawing that every line has to be perfect. I'm trying to teach structure.

One of the things I do to teach that is to give out some of my much-beloved Col-Erase Blue pencils. I get the students thinking in terms of blue lines and dark regular pencil lines. That way they start seeing the structure, and it gives me a chance to correct some things before they get too far along.

I also try to demonstrate some advanced techniques every once in a while. That's not so much for them to duplicate, but just showing them the larger art technique that's out there. The first time I heard about inking with a brush and understanding it was at art school. I want to introduce them to those methods a little earlier so they know why their drawings don't look like the finished ones they see other places. I know 10-year old me was confounded by trying to copy All-Star Squadron pages, wondering how they drew so small and their lines looked so interesting.

In our second-to-last class, I had them draw a hero or villain, their choice of their own character or an existing one. Then, I took their blue line drawings and inked them. I made as few fixes as I could, but just enough to show them what they're capable of down the road.

Here are three of my students' artwork. They signed their pieces, and I've scrambled their last names if they used it just because, well, it's the internet, you know what I mean. Click on any of them to see them larger.

Another HeroesCon Commission

Here's another commission someone pre-ordered for HeroesCon. Did I mention that I'll be at HeroesCon? And that I'll have exclusive prints for the show, among other Love and Capes goodness? I really should mention that more.

Anyway, this piece was Crusader and Abby as Titania. I've done more than a few Titania-based commissions, and given that Abby only had powers for eighteen or so pages back in 2009, I think the story must have really struck a chord with people. I'm glad it did, because it's one of my favorite Love and Capes stories.

Relentless Shilling Department

Next weekend, June 3-5, I'll be guided by the dulcet tones of William Daniels, TV's KITT, to Charlotte, North Carolina where I'll be a guest at HeroesCon. I'll be in Artist's Alley, Booth AA-224, selling books and doing sketches. You can, of course, e-mail me and get on my commission list early, and even request a color piece. (I color digitally, so I have to scan them in and do a print to go with the original black and white piece.)

I'm also, as usual, selling t-shirts and sweatshirts only through pre-order. Order here and I'll bring something down for you.

And, if you want want one of my display stands, you can order it here.

Go For the Gold-- Booster Gold

I've been putting out the call for commission requests as we run up to Charlotte, and it seems to be working. One of the most recent was to draw Booster Gold and Skeets. Booster was one of my favorite books back in the day, and I think Dan Jurgens did a good job creating a character with staying power.

I had to research to get the most recent version of the costume as well as the current Skeets design. I think I like the old one better, but hey, at least he hasn't been turned into a bluetooth headset.

It's Shark Week in the Dallas Metroplex

The best way to get work is to leave town. And the afternoon before I left for Spider-Man Weekend, I got an e-mail from the Fort Worth Weekly, one of my favorite clients. They needed a cover talking about shark-like lawyers in the public school system.

Later that night I was telling my Dad about it. "What are you going to do?" he asked. "Well," I said, "I sent them the rough half an hour ago…"

After I got back into town, I had to take it from rough to finished. It's actually a pretty standard turnaround time for newspaper-based work. Besides, I worked at a newspaper for four years in my early days, I'm used to the pace. So I hunkered down and got to work.

The story runs today and you can see the final cover at their site. I'm posting the roughs and inks, and the final without type, too.