process

Today I want to talk a little about my process (if you can really call it that).  I'm not  saying this is the way one should work. This is merely how I work.

It all starts off in one of my many sketchbooks (See image for example).

I have somewhere around 8 sketchbooks. They all have different bindings, different paper types, and different page sizes. This is important for me because I find that some days I draw much better in one kind of sketchbook than another. I don't know why that is. For example, yesterday I just could not work out a panel in my 10" x 12' book. So I grabbed my 7" x 10" recycled paper sketchbook (see image) and bam! The panel came together.

I begin with a general idea of the page layout. Then I sketch each panel out. My drawings tend to be very rough at this stage. Sometimes I will dedicated one page to a panel. Sometimes I will bang out a whole page on a tiny note-pad, and sometimes I will go through half of a sketchbook trying to get one action pose just right. There is not really a cohesive system for this. I will often have each panel for a page in a different book. I am in no way organized. But I can somehow remember where I drew each thing. My biggest problem is that sometimes I lose track of the sketchbook itself. It will typically appear right in front of my face 3 hours later and I am left to ponder how I could have missed it. (I do not recommend working this way. I hear organizational skills are a good thing to have).  The image below is a prime example of just how rough my pages can be. This a small note-pad.

I then scan everything into my computer at 72 dpi. I bring those images into a 300dpi Photoshop file and re-arrange each panel until I am satisfied with the layout. Sometimes this will match what I originally had in mind. Sometimes it becomes its own thing. 

I then create a finished drawing of the entire page. This is the point at which I will grab any photo reference that I might need. I have found that my work gets very stiff I start out with reference. I try to figure things out for myself first. If I really cannot figure it out, or I do not have knowledge about it, I look it up. For example, I do not have enough knowledge about cars to just pull a corvette out of my ass and throw it on paper. I would never try. I would draw a car-like thing as a place holder, and then pull reference and re-draw the car like thing as a corvette. I am fairly comfortable drawing things I am familiar with without reference. (Illustrators tend to have very strong feelings about use of photo reference. I feel stifled by it, so I try to avoid using it. I would rather try to logic it out or look around and draw from life. I do this frequently with hands. I will sketch a sketch of my own hand before I will look up hand images on google. That being said if you like photo reference, use it! Use whatever tools will maximize the quality of your work.)


To finish a page, I paint it digitally, throw in some texture, and drop in the dialogue and sound effects.  Here are two examples of a finished piece. PLEASE NOTE: These images are not from the comic. These are just two examples of my work.