I am a comic book artist. Well, I will be. I mean, I am, if you count drawing comics and comic characters without ever having anything published. If I need to have something published to fit that bill, then I’ll be a comic book artist reeeeal soon. More info on that in a minute. 🙂
I like doing different contests from time to time, and I also like sharing my methods. Even as much as a newb as I am at this stuff, I get people asking to share and compare techniques. So I’ll start with this post detailing the creation of my entry for Projectrooftop.com’s Shadowman Redesign contest. If you want to enter, details are right here…
[button link=“The URL of the button” variation=”blue”]SHADOWMAN REDESIGN[/button]
Sketching out the idea is always a fun part of the creation process. Sometimes I wish I could leave something in it’s raw, “scribbly” pencil form. But alas, people want finished inks these days. Your basic stuff. A menacing pose, a menacing look…you can wrap just about any character around those pieces of frameworks.
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I Decided to do a body and a close-up face rendition. Again…menacing look. 🙂 The costume I created is actually Shadowman’s logo spread across his chest and arms. Went with a “body armor” look.
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Started adding the color. Copic markers Blacl 100 and Warm Gray #5 for the two shades and highlights, and you might notice some white lines in there to make it pop. Those are from some white Gelly-Roll pens. Thanks to Hound Comics artist Sajad Shah (follow him on Twitter @Sajad_Shah) for sharing that technique. Gotta know what type of colors and inks they work well with, but when they work, they work great!
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Almost finished. Decided to try a “flaming hair” thing. It ended up looking more like a “symbiote hair” thing, but I assure you, this man’s head is on fire. I intentionally used a low, rippling flame instead of full-on Ghost Rider. Kinda like when they drop a match on a pool of gasoline in the movies, and it just runs like water, rippling across the surface. Notice I did the “ribbing” in the armor, and did the shading with the gray in separate patches, instead of one large fill-in.
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Here is what I used for the piece. Micron and Copic pens of different girth, the black and gray Copics I mentioned before, and a Gelly Roll pen. And yes, I went cheap with some Sharpie love in there too.
So…the published book thing I mentioned earlier? 
Be looking for issue #1 of Earthruler to be out soon. Written by Darrin O’Toole, (@Darrinotoole on Twitter) author of the awesome sci-fi comic Tales from the Void (click the pic to buy a copy). I’m gonna squee like a 13 year old girl at a Justin Bieber concert when it hits shelves.
‘Til next time, peeps!!
