C.H.A.Challenge

Mighty Avengers, Astonishing X-Men, Justice League of America

2007-05-30T21:23:00.001-07:00

High School Flashback: Ranma 1/2 & Batman

2007-05-09T17:56:00.000-07:00

I was at my parents for some BBQ action and was rummaging through my old junk and found this. I think I did this in high school (my memory's blurry).

Concept's an East meets West thing and I put Ranma and Batman together because of the martial arts background of each property, and Batman had a cat-based villain which I thought would be funny with Ranma's fear of cats. I wanted to do more pin-ups with the concept, but like many of my project I didn't follow through. :P

Rough Day

2007-04-23T16:26:00.000-07:00

First try with a Wacom tablet. Freestyled it and this came up.

Total to date...

2007-04-21T08:40:00.000-07:00

I've been quiet for a bit, so I decided to post a one-sheet to show that I have been busy. :P

What's that? An update from Chris?

2007-04-14T03:52:00.000-07:00

I don't exactly know who I'm writing to here as Harold and I are the only two people who actually read this and he knows full well that I haven't posted anything since like Christmas time. Anyway...

These are a couple head studies for a character I'm developing based on a a short interview in the Paris review. I'm still committed to the project but it's taking its sweet time to come together. I'm trying to create a system of construction rules for the character so I can draw him consistently from panel to panel. Color is splashed in quickly to give a sense of the mood I'm looking for.

Teen Titans! GO!

2007-03-24T10:22:00.000-07:00

Request: Beast and Iceman!

2007-03-18T17:17:00.000-07:00

First Request.... Tomar Re!

2007-03-13T18:41:00.000-07:00

This one's for you Chris! I usually post things in sets, but with requests I'll post them as they come.

I don't know much about Tomar Re except he's the fish-looking dude from the Green Lantern Corps . And has a rad-looking mohawk.

Birds of Prey

2007-03-06T18:52:00.000-08:00

It's been awhile since I posted something. Not for the lack of trying, I was going to bank them for one big giant post. Oh well.

I'm debating whether or not to move my project to another site, 'cause I can picture this being very sizable, and it feels like I'm hogging the blog. :P

Nextwave!!

2007-02-25T22:58:00.000-08:00

7 Soldiers of Victory

2007-02-18T18:36:00.000-08:00

Iron Fist and Luke Cage!

2007-02-15T22:26:00.000-08:00

I dispensed with the 'Wave' prefix because could foresee it getting tiresome.

Wave 4: Hal Jordan, John Stewart, Ion, and Guy Gardner

2007-02-13T20:52:00.000-08:00

Note: To save reality space I decided to upload the images as small.

Wave 3: Silver Surfer, Dr. Strange, Namor, and the Hulk

2007-02-12T22:28:00.000-08:00

Wave 2: Mr. Fantastic, Invisible Woman, Human Torch, and the Thing - the Fantastic Four!

2007-02-09T06:30:00.000-08:00

Wave 1: Nightwing, Robin, Batman

2007-02-08T19:43:00.000-08:00

Inking: Robin!

2007-02-07T11:41:00.000-08:00

Hey! So here's my attempt at inking using Freehand and colouring's done in Photoshop. I found a setting I kinda dig, so I'm gonna continue with that.

Sketching: Bat Family and the Fantastic Four

2007-02-05T16:40:00.000-08:00

To expedite my goal of drawing every single superhero created I decided to keep my sketches to straight-forward profile shots. It may not be exciting, but I gotta start somewhere.

Originally I wanted to ink it digitally, but I'm not happy with the results quite yet, so I'm gonna continue playing around with it. Oh, and to show how cheap I am, I'm using an old binder from college as a drawing board. I'm guessing that's why some of them look slanted.

Superman!

2007-01-15T04:32:00.000-08:00

I finished this Supeman pic before Christmas but was too busy to post it. So here it is...

Wildcat, Huntress, and Power Girl

2006-12-18T19:00:00.000-08:00

Starting off with Wildcat and the old-school Huntress. I've kept these sketches to just portraits just so I can get a sense of the characters before I go buckwild of them.

Wildcat to me should look rugged and thuggish, always ready for a fight. The heavy brow gives him a cro-magnon brutality-type quality, but the small iris lends a sense of focus and sharpness which Wildacat has. Also, Wildcat's ears were always drawn sagging, which I feel made him look pathetic, so I made them smaller and a bit perky.

Now with the modern-day Huntress and Power Girl. I've always like this duo purely on the concept of the next generation of the World's Finest and they happen to be women.

I gave Huntress wider cheekbones to suggest feline qualities inherited from her mother and narrow eyes to suggest the mystery of her father. I gave her bangs, because they felt more broody. With Power Girl she needed to be wide-eyed and optimistic, but not naive. She's usually seen sporting a bob cut, but I felt it looked too cute on her. So I gave her a slightly spikey cut which feels fresh, empowering, and had a certain energy I was looking for. And for kicks I gave her a clef chin. It runs in the Superman family. :P

My new inking technique is unstopable!

2006-12-15T04:22:00.000-08:00

So I bought the new Brian Bolland career retrospective and his switch to doing his art completely digitally has inspired me to stop messing about with brushes and ink and use what I know best. Bezier curves! I inked this Spidey drawing completely digitally... first in Freehand and later with some touchups in Photoshop. I think this is the look I've been searching for. Click to the image to see the full size smoothness!

Stargirl

2006-12-12T13:29:00.000-08:00

Inspired by Justice Society of America #1 that just came out, I started with Stargirl my fave JSAer.

Feels like I cheated with her a bit. Hand looks a bit wonky to me, and I just hid her feet, so I wouldn't have to drawn them. :P

Brainiac take 2

2006-12-07T07:10:00.000-08:00

I re-inked Brainiac, giving him a more sinister face. I combined what I liked about the old drawing and the new one to create a frankensteinian inked layer. I kinda like how it turned out overall. I dropped in some quick colors to make it look more distinct from the previous post. I plan on doing a proper color job over the next couple days.

Brainiac inked and greytoned!

2006-11-29T08:38:00.000-08:00

I spent some time inking my Brainiac pencils this weekend. Tried two versions: one with a crowquil and one with a brush (gotta love light tables!. I haven't had a chance to scan the brush inked drawing yet. It was a good excercise but I'm not getting what I want with either technique...

Lil Red

2006-11-22T18:15:00.000-08:00

I've been reading Fables lately, so I was inspired to do my version of Little Red Riding Hood.

I didn't like how the clogs turned out. Feels a like the least amount of attention was given to it (which is true :P). I'll be coming back to this one I think. I want to add the Wolf and scary scary trees.

Kandor so far

2006-11-22T07:15:00.000-08:00

I've been a busy bee. Between the Brainiac and Superman studies I've been learning SketchUp and using it to model Kandor. It's about half modeled so far. From here I'll either print it out and trace in ink on the light table or trace it in Freehand.

Superman sketch

2006-11-22T07:10:00.000-08:00

This here is a sketch of the soon to be tiny Superman for my Brainiac illustration. Not sure this will be final but it points in the direction I'm going...

Brainiac comp... now with hands and torso!

2006-11-22T07:06:00.000-08:00

I slopped this together from separate drawings (no, really!) in PShop. From here, I'll get it on the light table, redraw and refine.

Squirl Girl inked

2006-11-17T06:38:00.000-08:00

A quick attempt at inking Harold's Squirl Girl drawing. It's gonna take some time to get good at this!

Brainiac!

2006-11-16T05:24:00.000-08:00

Here's my first prelim of Brainiac and a quick color test 'cause Brainiac just isn't Brainiac 'til he's green.

I heart Squirrel Girl!!

2006-11-14T17:13:00.000-08:00

Newest member of the equally lame Great Lakes Avengers, Squirrel Girl and her trusted sidekick Tippy-Toe have somehow sneaked into my great nerdy heart.

Pretty happy with the sketch. Turned out more anime-ish than I thought it would, but somehow I think it fitted the character. Inked and colour version to come once inspiration hits me again.

Martian Manhunter

2006-11-08T20:22:00.000-08:00

I was trying to combine J'onn's classic look with his current pissed off attitude. One of the reasons he's pissed is he can see your perverted thoughts with his big Martian eyes.

The Batman

2006-11-05T13:21:00.000-08:00

I didn't spend too much time with it, I just wanted to get something up. Still haven't gotten proper tools. I've been too busy/lazy if that could be believed.

Some sketched for my next project.

2006-11-02T07:31:00.000-08:00

Some possible ideas for my next illustration. I'm going to continue to do quick thumbnails for the next week or so.

A feeble update...

2006-11-02T07:26:00.000-08:00

I've been working on printing my inspiration folder. It's organized by artist and collected in an easy to flip through binder.

Final Spider-Man... for now

2006-10-29T17:46:00.000-08:00

Ok, time to put this one to bed. I never meant this to be more than a character study to practice figure drawing and I got a bit carried away. Lessons learned since my last post: I need to create my own Photoshop brushes to do clouds 'cause the built in ones don't have the resolution for print. Also, I hate drawing generic buildings for backgrounds. My next project will be composed from the start and the background should be just as fun to work on as the characters.

Captain America!!

2006-10-25T22:30:00.000-07:00

I seem to have fallen upon a pattern of my characters facing left. Hmmm....

Frankenstein

2006-10-25T10:36:00.000-07:00

I wanted to post my Captain America sketch next, but I didn't get a chance to work on it. So I posted this instead! I want to do a Halloween theme for next week, so expect more later.

As usual, I sketch loosely so I re-drew this one for a cleaner line, and is easier to work with when colouring in Photoshop.

Hulk

2006-10-23T20:23:00.000-07:00

This past weekend I did a handful of sketches, but for now I'm just gonna post the Hulk 'cause I'm too lazy to post the rest. :P

At this moment I don't have any inking tools, so I just took my pencil sketches into Photoshop and see what I can do with it. I think I'll be revisiting this piece later on when I get my brushes or redraw it with cleaner lines.

Didn't think it turned out too bad. Hulk turned out a bit more cartoonish than I wanted, but I think the loose sketch lines help offset that. I wanted Hulk to look more sad, than angry about defending himself from unknown assailants (most likely puny humans).

First attempt at coloring

2006-10-19T08:46:00.000-07:00

This is the fun part... it really starts to come together when you add color. I also added the webs and spider symbol.

Inking is hard!

2006-10-18T07:53:00.000-07:00

I inked a drawing for the first time in 8 years or so last night and I had forgotten exactly how difficult it is. I wasn't too happy with what I did last night so I tried again this morning with better results, which I've posted here. My next step will be to clean it up a bit in Photoshop and then work on the background.

Composition rough

2006-10-17T07:36:00.000-07:00

And while I'm at it here is a quick mock-up I did in Photoshop showing the basic composition of the final illustration. Pretty much standard cover fare but this excerise was more about brushing the dust off my drawing skills after too many years of neglect than pushing any boundries.

Final Spidey Pencils

2006-10-17T07:34:00.000-07:00

My lightbox arrived yesterday so I was able to tranfer the sketches from my previous posts to bristol board. The pencils are a little more refined and ready for adventures in inking!

'Cause I have no sketches to upload...

2006-10-16T18:41:00.000-07:00

My "studio" set-up. Now I just need a Mac...

Pooh!

2006-10-02T21:28:00.000-07:00

Just came back from my trip to Orlando with my brother, and as many people do when vacationing down there, visited Disney World! The experience found a love for Disney I've never thought I had. I'm on a total Disney kick right now, so you'll be seeing more Disney skeches from me. hehe

One of the things we did was checked out the Magic of Disney Animation. There they talk about the process of creating a Disney character, and at the end you get to take a 10-minute class on how to draw a Disney character. Appropriately enough, the character we got to draw was Winnie the Pooh! So here's my 10-minute sketch of good ol' Pooh. Behold the magic!

OMG another sketch for reals!

2006-09-29T12:58:00.000-07:00

Here's another! I had a busy week. My plan is to transfer both of these to bristol board and play with some inking techniques.

Spidey sketchs for reals!

2006-09-29T12:49:00.000-07:00

Ok, now I'm actually doing something!

2006-09-25T08:28:00.000-07:00

I stocked up on supplies (guache, graphite, paper and brushes) but I didn't get chance to do any sketching this weekend. This sribble was from last week and was more a quick figure study than a Spidey drawing.

Spidey

2006-09-24T20:37:00.000-07:00

First one out! Okay, my drawing muscles are a bit out of shape, so I just kept to rough sketches instead of a finished illustration. Not too bad for a first one, but Spidey's left is bigger than his right.

This was done with a black ball-point pen, because that's what I primarily use when I'm doodling at work. :P

2006-09-22T13:38:00.000-07:00

Ok, we're live!

2006-09-22T13:31:00.000-07:00

Now I need to figure out how to add extra users. Also, how to draw.