Fuck yeah.
Blue Beetle by Mike Norton
This’n’s a bit different. There’s an awesome comic artist by the name of Mike Norton whose work you can find at www.ihatemike.com. Mike and I both have a love for Blue Beetle, and while doing a random google search for Blue Beetle art, I stumbled upon this con-sketch Mike had done for someone:
I thought it was awesome. And then I got a real “bug” up my ass to “finish” the drawing. Using Adobe Illustrator, I did. By no means am I taking credit for Mike’s work, I just wanted to do something fun with a drawing of my favorite comic character of all-time, by one of my favorite comic artists.
Read Green Arrow/Black Canary. It’s good. Visit Mike’s blog for more arty goodness. Listen to the Crankcast for random hilarity.
Magneto
Wanted to try a more traditional pen and ink illustrative style, with shadows and highlights, midtones, etc. Took a long time, especially for an impatient spastic like me. I did a lot of this while watching The Departed. Good film. Don’t know why it took so long to watch it. I even really liked Leonardo DiCaprio in it.
Hulks
I drew the original about two years ago, and thought I had lost it. Since I’ve recently discovered it again, I decided to colorize it. Then I decided the Variant Hulks needed representing. Dunno why. It was a time killer. I’m so alone.
Li’l Avengers
A joke of a take on the whole “Young Avengers” thing. Done entirely in Illustrator. I enjoy how cute they turned out.
Jack Staff
There’s not a lot to say about this other than I have wanted to draw at least one picture of Jack Staff for the longest time, and every time I do I fuck it up, because it’s nowhere near the level of Paul Grist’s work. Jack Staff is my favorite comic currently published. Period. No argument. If had to drop all but one book, Jack Staff would be the one I keep. It’s really a shame this book doesn’t get a lot of buzz, it is consistently the best book on the stands. I really hope that it’s move to a long needed regular schedule ups the profile on it. Paul Grist does amazing work, and my little crapfest above does nothing to pay tribute to his talent. Go read.
Hoary Hosts
Another character that holds a strange (no pun intended) appeal to me. I don’t know what it is I like about Dr. Strange, I’ve not read that many of his comics. In fact, I can only think of the Tony Harris mini from the early Marvel Knights days, and the more recent Brian K. Vaughn series. And I really only liked the BKV book. Weird. Or Strange.
I ain’t got no clever title. It’s Blue Devil, bitches.
I’ve always had an inexplicable fondness for the Blue Devil. I guess I’ve always been more of a fan of B-Z list characters than I am the Big Name guys. I participated in a redesign contest a few months back, in which B.D. was one of the options. The contest never officially ended, and I’m pretty sure it never will. Damn internet kerfuffles. Anyhoo, this was my Blue Devil entry.
Brainiac likes short shorts
I don’t know what Brianiac really looks like, so I made a no-reference guess based on my memory of Superfriends. It’s sort of my “default” when I think Brainiac. That, or James Marsters. Or the Timm version. Or the tentacled skull robot latched onto Luthor’s head.
The stranger thing about this piece is that I rarely – if ever – work in color. But when I do it’s Photoshop or Illustrator all the way. This was done in color pencil, and as I was working on it – sort of in an out-of-body experience kinda way – I realized that this is the first piece of art I’ve hand colored in over 10 years.
Made me feel old.
And depressed.
But that’s just like shooting fish in a barrel.
In Brightest Day, In Blackest… oooh Pizza!
Self portrait of the artist as a Green Lantern. Fuck you Hal Jordan.