SWEENEY TODD PAGE 50 INKS
























Here's the inks for page 50. Quite happy with the end result here. You can see that i fixed all the stuff that i mentioned was wrong with the pencils in my last post.

I've been using a pen-nib tool for the last few months and got some really nice and loose lines with it on this page (see background characters). Feel like i'm finally getting the hang of it. I also got some nice variation of lines with my brush-pen. I found that when i started using the brush pen, i did a LOT of drybrush. A month or so back, i seemed to barely use any dry-brush and started inking a lot more slickly. Nice to be able to do, but i'm not really interested in slick inking ('slinking'...?). I want messy pages, with lots of texture, so i'm trying to balance the 'slick' with some very gestural lines, and some splatter here and there. It seems to be balancing well in this page, and with most of the pages i've done this week.

Hopefully you all agree.

Dec.

SWEENEY TODD PAGE 50 PENCILS
























Here's the pencils to page 50 of Sweeney Todd. I posted the layouts to this page earlier in the week as well as a detail from one of the panels. You can see that i stuck extremely close to the composition of the layout. I realised in panel 2 however, the the width of the street was a little too narrow (i remember really wanting to have a solid black on the right of the panel to help separate it from the rather large first panel), so i widened it a bit. Because i did so, it was pointed out to me by fellow comics artist Stephen Thompson, that it looked like the barbers pole was coming out of one of the characters' head. In trying to fix one problem, i had created another, so i would have to fix that in the inks. I also had stubble on the wrong character, so that had to be fixed. There was a couple of things my editor suggested i fix up too, so it was no big deal. I'll post the inks pretty soon. Tomorrow maybe. Or later, i dunno, i can't see into the future now, can i?

Dec.

DUBLIN COMICS JAM

























The Dublin Comics Jam blog has an update of its pub-drawing antics. I pitched in myself this month. Here's a jam piece by myself, the uber-talented Chris Judge, Barry Hughes, Phil Barrett ....and i'm not sure who did the small figure.

Oh, and Bob Byrne.

Check the blog to see this months and previous months craziness.

Dec

LOST PANEL
























This is a panel lost to the ages. I originally added it into a Sweeney Todd page of my own accord, just to add another beat to the storytelling, but it ended up cluttering up the page a bit, so it had to go. Shame; i liked the drawing and was looking forward to inking it. Ah well, what can one do....?

....well, i guess one can scan it and post it on their blog....

Dec.

SWEENEY TODD PAGE 50 LAYOUTS
























Quite busy with Sweeney Todd at the moment, but here's a layout for one of the pages i'm working on. It was a pretty straight page script-wise, but i really wanted to come up with a more interesting layout design. I've also gone back to doing smaller layouts, with an added greytone to make it clearer. I was doing bigger, more laboured layouts in pencil, but by the time i worked on the actual page, it felt like i was pencilling it twice. I'd get tired of all the pencilling and the pages srarted to feel more dull as a result. Much happier with this approach. I'll post the pencils in a couple of days.

Dec.

STREET SPIRIT
















Part of a new Sweeney Todd panel. I'm really trying to make sure all the characters in the book look different to each other. It's really easy to revert to generic faces when you're drawing out of your head all the time, so with this shot of a London street, i really tried to make all the various background figures distinct and interesting.

Dec.

BACK IN ACTION
























Hey all, i'm back from a great time in NY. Really did have a blast and feel really artistically charged from seeing so much great work from so many talented artists. Unfortunately, I'm also slightly depressed at how good all that work was and am trying to get over jet-lag, and also have ton of work to get done in the next couple of weeks. Not sure if i'll be able to post much as a result, so in the meantime, feel free to check out my newly-updated RiseCreatives webpage (with images like the above coloured page from Tim Skinner). I've also started a DeviantArt site ...cuz i'm a whore.

Dec.

NEW YORK BOUND
























Greetings all. Off to New York in the morning so i thought i'd post something decent to keep ye going for the week or so i'm gone. It's a test page for something that never went ahead, but i was pretty happy with thew actual page; got a chance to go all messy with it.

Hope ye like. Catch ye later.

Dec.

FUTUREQUAKE
























Been really busy this month so i didn't get to work on the Futurequake cover idea that i posted a while back. However, i did have a piece i was quite happy with from a War Heroes competition, and what wasn't going to get used that was similar in subject matter. I was pretty lucky in that regard as i didn't have to disappoint the good folks at FutureQuake, so with a little reworking, everyone was happy.

Dec.

ACTION!












Yet another pencilled panel from Sweeney Todd. I'll post a full, inked page soon; i pwomise.

Dec.

A SWIFT KICK UP THE ARSE











I just had to give myself one of these. Soooooooo much work to do.....

Dec.

MORE SWEENEY TODD PENCILS AND AWARD NOMINATION...?
























Ugh. It's annoying when i'm getting lots done but can't really show anything. Here's another pencilled Sweeney Todd panel in the meantime. I like drawing him in the hat and cape. It's like drawing Batman.

Oh, and check this out; seems this blog has been nominated for an Irish Blog Award?














I didn't even know there was such a thing, never mind how my blog got nominated. It's in the category of 'Best Blog of a Business' . See the list of nominations here.

Dec.

BUSY BUSY BUSY








Here's a panel from something i'm working on. Not Sweeney Todd, obviously. Then again, did they have 'iron birds' in Ye Olden times....?

Dec.

FRANKENSTEIN QUICK TEXT SECOND PRINTING
























From the Classical Comics news page;

"Frankenstein Quick Text to go into 2nd edition.
Only three months since it was first printed, sales have exceeded our estimates and we're having to reprint the Quick Text version of Frankenstein!"

Great stuff. I have no idea what the actual numbers are or anything, but the fact that the quick text has to be reprinted only 3 months after it was published is great.

Congrats to all the team!

Dec.

SWEENEY TODD PENCILS


















A pencilled panel from Sweeney Todd.

Dec.

'REAPER' SKETCHES



















Did these sketches last night.

Dec.

NEXT STOP: NEW YORK



Everything (nearly) in order for the New York Comic Con next month. Lotsa work to do between now and then. Had better get to it.....



















Dec.

PENCILS vs INKS
















There's a very worn-out joke that implies 'inkers are tracers'. Anyone who has any appreciation for the art-form knows that is absolutely not the case. However, i don't really ink over my pencils in the traditional style. I really like interpreting pencil lines into interesting ink lines and the artists i gravitate to more are those who really excel at that approach. Instead of posting just the inked version of the page, i thought i'd concentrate on one specific panel from Sweeney Todd to show how i've taken my pencils and interpreted them in ink. I changed some lines, i added others. I kept solid blacks, i broke up solid blacks. I made sure i played around with the image rather than strictly tighten it up. The panel is hardly radically different after inking but i would like to think that the end result is more interesting than if i had slickly inked every pencilled line.

I quess ye can be the judge of that.

Dec.

FUTUREQUAKE COVER SKETCH
























This is a rough to a cover the good folks at FutureQuake asked me to do. Should have the final art soon, but i like this quick sketch as is.

Dec.

THE WIRE: OMAR


















Been watching a lot of post-Christmas DVDs in the last few days and started to feel guilty, so i thought i'd use them as an excuse to draw something. I'm a big fan of the TV series The Wire. This is one of my favourite characters, Omar Little. Loved this moment from one episode, so i just thought i'd do a drawing of it. I've long wanted to do a proper piece for this series, along with Six Feet Under, but haven't found the time. Small pieces like this and the Angel drawings i did before may be the answer. I may do more of these.

Dec.