Photoshop Babble-On

I've been a fan of Kevin Smith's work since I first saw "Mallrats" on VHS that was rented from a "Mom and Pop" video store.  As almost all those things went with the dinosaurs, you can see I've been a fan for a long time.  Anywho, since I am a fan, I of course listen to the Smodcast Network.  And my favorite show on that network is Hollywood Babble-On.

For those not in the know, Hollywood Babble-On is a weekly show where Kevin Smith and Raplh Garman discuss the coming and goings in Hollyweird and some popular arts.  Ralph Garman is known as the man of a million voices.  Where as Kevin Smith only has ONE.  He does a pretty good impression of Bane from "Dark Knight Rises".  Another segment on the show is called "Kev-IN", where Kevin Smith is Photoshop'd into movies or places.  So I thought I'd Photoshop Kevin into "Dark Knight Rises", possibly as Bane.  But I had a very hard time finding a decent pic from Dark Knight Rises, that would mesh with pics I could find of Kevin Smith.

But I still wanted to slap the Bane mask on Kevin Smith's face.  The poster for Hollywood Babble-On features a James Bond'esque look with Ralph Garman as 007, and Kevin Smith as Jaws from "The Spy Who Loved Me".  But that picture made for a pretty good Bane facial expression.  So I found a picture of Bane, cut out the mask, slapped it on Kevin Smith, and tweaked some things here and there, and got the above picture.  Took me less than an hour, but I really kind dug then end result.  So here it is.

UPDATE: Was listening to the February 24, 2013 (5 months after I posted this and e-mailed them a copy of the above image.) episode of Hollywood Babble-On and they mentioned they had a KevIN from Dark Knight Rises... and instead of being my piece that you see above...  they had this...

What the fuck is this?  It's a pretty bad Photoshop job.  I mean, the glasses alone ruin the whole thing...  Whatevs...  It was quickly glossed over, and Kevin had no desire to do a Bane-imitation to it.  I still think mine's better.  Am I being childish about this?  Yes.  Yes, I am.

Comic-Con 2012!!! It's finally here!

So Comic-Con has once again returned to my native town of San Diego.  And I am once again attending.  Did I get a table?  No.  Do I have money this time?  YES!

Anywho, I wanted to spruce up my Facebook page for this year's Con.  Previous years, I had always just thrown up the Comic-Con logo as my profile pic, but this year, I opted to get a little more creative, as I am the creative type.  So I made the above left one for me.

My girlfriend saw it, and asked me to make one for her, so I drew the one on the right.   I think they turned out kinda cool.  If I had thought of it sooner, I might made them for all my friends that will aslo be at the Con this year.  But alas, it was a last minute idea.

Off to the Con!  BTW, the below video is AMAZING and sums up the San Diego Comic-Con experience very nicely!  Thanks to the folks at "How It Should Have Ended"!

Commission for Father's Day

A friend of mine liked the drawing I did for my Facebook profile...  And she thought it'd make an awesome Father's Day gift to have her husband and their young boy dressed up like the dynamic duo.  So, after specifics were worked out, the above art was created.  And everybody was happy.

While working on this piece, I was falling behind in my timeline... and was looking for a place to save some time... I usually draw in pencil, and lately I've been hand inking.  After I scan the image, I adjust the brightness and contrast levels to get the dark blacks, and then color in Photoshop.  But, I didn't want to do that inking process with this piece... (mainly cuz the clean up is a time consuming bitch, and can lead to an "unclean" look) and took myself to YouTube to learn some new techniques in the land of digital inking...  I stumbled upon the below video and fiddled with that technique and applied it to the above art.  It turned out pretty well, I might of fine tuned it a bit more, but again, time was an issue.  So anybody wanna try it, here's the video.

Comic-Con 2012 Souvenir Book Submission

San Diego Comic-Con 2012 is less than 3 months away?  Really?  Holy crap, I gotta save up some money!  Anywho, just like every year, they give you a bunch of free stuff when you get there.  Among the things they give you, is the annual "Souvenir Book".  Some peeps collect these things (my former roommate, for one), and some flip through it mindlessly while waiting for something at Con.  But, 130,000+ people get the book.

The book takes submissions for art and articles, this year's themes include the 100th Anniversary of Tarzan, and John Carter of Mars.  Tarzan might of been fun, but I thought I'd keep my distance from John Carter.  There's also the 75th Anniversary of Prince Valiant (I hated that comic strip).  The 50th Anniversary of many of Marvel's greatest heroes including Spider-Man, Hulk and Iron-Man.  This could have been fun, but with the Avengers coming out I figured this would have been the over saturated category for submissions this year  Also, I did Marvel for last year's Souvenir Book.  So I would like to do something different.  That pretty much left me with the 20th Anniversary of Image Comics.


Image was just starting, and Spawn was among the first comics I started to read when I really began to get into comics.  I don't know if it was because I particularly cared for the character, or story.  But everybody was saying it was "THE hot book".  A lot of the early Image titles have since fallen off, and Image as a company has grown to be the destination for creator-owned properties.  Spawn?  He's still kickin it 20 years later.  Since it was there at the infancy of my comic indoctrination, it is apart of me.  And made sense to be my submission this year.  Though I did have an itch to do some Walking Dead art, but decided to stick with my comic roots.

Originally I wanted to do something that honored the core of Image when it began, and having a tribute of sorts to the key founding comics.  The problem is some of those properties are no longer with Image (Jim Lee's branch for one, is now owned by DC), and I wasn't sure if that would work with Comic-Cons rules of not mixing properties.  The Wild C.A.T.s were with Image, but now they're under DC.  Don't want to disqualify myself cuz I'm not sure how the legal umbrella is constructed.  So again, it came back to Spawn.

I did take a while to START this piece, and there was some crunch-time towards the end.  Sadly, my original "concept" did not pan out, and at the zero hour, there wasn't much I could do to work it in.  My original plan was to have the Image comics logo running down the center of the image.  Everything inside in the logo was gonna be in COLOR, and everything outside the logo was gonna be Black and White.  This didn't work because Spawn is mostly... BLACK (with shades of grey).  And while I did ad some blue to the greys of his body, it still was too close to grey that it didn't really work with the black and white concept I had.  So the end result is a pretty basic pin-up of the demonic-powered hero.  Which I'm fine with.  Just note to self, I need to start sooner next year, so if a problem comes up... I can draw something else.

Anywho, much like last year, I did not know if my art would be lucky enough to get published.  And I did not know until I got to Comic-Con and flipped through the book myself.  So... that will probably be the case this year I'm assuming.  So until July 11th, I can only wait...

I'M BATMAN!

I'M BATMAN!

After a brief artistic hiatus... I decided to pick up a pencil and tackle some art.  I've always liked the Batman.  And since I'll never be as wealthy or as fit as Batman, this is probably the closest I'll ever come to being the Dark Knight.  Short of trying on a Halloween costume (but again, would want to get more fit).

Anywho, I drew this up in 2 hours, cuz I wanted something new and different for my Facebook profile picture.  And I thought it be a quick and fun drawing exercise to ease myself into the groove of drawing after a month long absence from drawing anything beyond random work doodling.  Turned out to get a bit more involved... but I like the end result.

Coincidentally enough, I drew this up on the same day that Adam West (1960's TV Batman) got his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame!

Valentine's Commission: Colonial Cassie

Hey all, this blog needed an update... so here's a new piece.  One of my co-workers saw the pirate piece I did for another co-worker.  And commissioned me to do something similar.  The above art is what came of it.  Her and her man are into the simpler life of colonial times, it's their thing, so she wanted me to draw them in that era.  It was for Valentine's Day, for her man. 

This was a bit of a challenge, as I tend to lean more towards a comic-book/sci-fi/fantasy/cartoony kinda vibe, and i was like "Colonial times?  What?"  But I think it worked out.  And it was good to draw something besides spandex-clad, superheroes.  But I like the end result.