For Sure, There Is No Place Like Home

After finishing my last major sketchbook in July, I've been jumping around between sketchbooks trying to do something new. I normally always get the same recycled brown sketchbook every time and I thought it was about time I took on a new challenge. Problem is, it wasn't fun and I actually felt less and less like drawing. The books didn't accept the sorts of media I enjoyed using so I abandoned the idea a few weeks ago and picked up a new familiar brown sketchbook. If I can't enjoy the work I'm doing, what's the point? So it's good to be back and now drawing can be fun again. Here are a few pages I did over the weekend, at APE and at a coffee shop right before Halloween. Man, am I rusty.

Above: The woman in the upper right got overworked... went a little overboard on the guoache trying to capture the wierd reflected light. Also, my tube of gouache is almost totally dried out and I'm too cheap to get another so it's hard to handle the white. But I really like how the old man seated with his coffee turned out.

Below (2 pages): Really quick sketches done at APE.

Speaking of APE, I had a great time! I got to meet so many awesome artists, hang out with friends, look at all kinds of incredible merchandise I couldn't afford, and just be generally and awesomely inspired. I still have some leftover books if people would like to buy them. I've never sold anything online before... I guess do Paypal? I don't know. I'll figure it out in the next post. If anyone would like a copy of the mini-comic, shoot me an email. I'll even do a sketch in it. Thanks!

Here is the final cover design for the comic. I was actually disappointed in it but considering how short on time I was, I think it came out alright. I was kinda under the gun to get the book off to the printer in time.

And here are a few pages of doodles done in preparation for the cover, trying to figure out a good pose. I was pretty set on doing something actiony but willing to explore a bit. Of course, drawing cover poses quickly degraded into just drawing random shit that would, under no circumstances, actually make it to the cover but it's always fun to indulge that impulse. So yeah, funny noodley figures.

Below: And here is the pose that I went with. I actually just scanned this, blew it up to 200%, cranked up the opacity to 15% to make it super light, printed it, and drew right over it. It was pretty much good to go, as is.

The Book Bin #1

I spend a lot of time at the thrift store. I always have. There are just too many wierdly awesome things there from old childhood toys and creepy ceramic figurines to tacky clothes and old VHS tapes. My parents bought most of my clothes and toys from the thrift store when I was growing up and I guess I just never outgrew it. Aside from clothes, books are one of my absolute favorite things to buy thrifted. You never know what kind of gorgeous or completely off-the-wall vintage book you're going to find there and I've built up a sizable collection over the years with nothing but spare change! It's a resource few artists tap but I highly recommend giving it a shot.

Here are some illustrations from a book I found last month, that I've been meaning to scan and share. The book is "Debbie's Visit to the Countryside" by Gilbert Delahaye, illustrated by Marcel Marlier, 1980. It was so beautifully rendered, I couldn't resist. I have other books I'd like to share in the coming weeks, as well.

Also, when you see a book with a cover as awesome as this one, you DO NOT leave it on the shelf:

I leave you with the final page of "The Superstars of Rock". The caption reads, "Shakin' Stevens - Britain's most exciting rock performer."

Update on the comic: The comic is finished. I did the cover this weekend so now I just have to lay the book out in InDesign tomorrow and see about getting it printed/assembled. I realize I'm cutting it close (APE is less than a week away!) but not to worry, guys. The drawing above is the one I used on the cover. The actual cover looks nothing like that, though... the drawing just looked totally boring on plain white so I fixed it up all parchment-like. I'll post pictures of the book later this week when I get it from the printer.

Here are some old sketchbook pages from September. P.S., I got a new sketchbook (which is actually my old usual sketchbook) so expect to start seeing a lot more sketchbook love in the next couple weeks.



And here are some drawings I did at a restaurant on Friday:

The Need for Speed

So that's my first digital speed paint ever. I could've done worse, I suppose. I got tired of toning the comic and was just about ready to go to bed when I decided to mess around with all the new Photoshop brushes I made or downloaded recently. Since I was coming fresh off the comic, here is yet another Jack piece.

I swear that once I'm finished with the mini-comic I'll start posting stuff that doesn't feature Jack! On the topic of the comic: I just FINALLY finished toning all the pages. I just have to place all the text now and then do a cover. Not to mention, find out exactly how I'm going to get this sucker printed and assembled for APE...

Hella Excerpts

More previews from my upcoming mini-comic, "Hella Days". No text yet, as you can see, and I was careful to choose non-spoiler panels. This comic has been an interesting experiment for me. Normally I would ink this traditionally but I decided to try more of a vector look this time around. It's kinda "vector deluxe"... it's been really difficult for me to try to do something with full grayscale but no rendering. I have a tendency to render the hell out of almost everything. As usual, some of these panels will undergo minor repairs before print but they're pretty much good to go, as is. "Hella Days" will be available at APE (Alternative Press Expo) in San Francisco next month. More information to come on that later.

Non Sequitur II

Thought I'd throw down a progress report on the comic. I posted the ruffs to a handful of panels from pages 3-5 a few weeks ago so here they are toned. It's likely that they will change a bit when I do final adjustments to all the pages but I'm tagging these "final versions". Well, final with the exception of text, anyway. The first panel breaks my heart a bit, truly. The fourth panel was a lot of fun to do... that ice cream man is really pushing his luck, if you ask me. Jack looks like she's about to dismantle the guy. BTW, his name is Sonny.

I'll definitely be posting more work from the comic sometime in the next 2 weeks. I'm on tones right now. It's nice to be hitting that phase of production where I finally feel like I'm making progress because I can actually see things being completed now.

Slim Pickings

Most of the stuff I've been working on lately I either can't show or shouldn't show but here's a little bit of what I've done on the side recently. Drawings done in my way-too-tiny sketchbook that hates wet media:

I just got a new sketchbook not long ago so hopefully I'll be more motivated to sketch in public again soon.

These drawings below are warm-up gestures. I dunno... they're kinda funny and have a strange life to them so I'll share some that I've done over the past 2 weeks. People always take an unusual interest in them whenever they come across them.

And here are some I did on a used envelope: