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(From "Master Comics" number 56, 1944.)
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Posted in Daily Random Panel
I also screen-cast this one. It's kind of long, if anyone knows of an easy way to re-record movies at double speed or something, please let me know. I'm ignernt. I tried figuring out iMovie, but for a design-oriented company, some of Apple's software interfaces are confusing at best, incomprehensible and frustrating at worst.
This one proceeds the same way all my illustrations do. First you lay down some basic sketch lines so you know in general how the drawing is supposed to look and where things go. I then make a new layer, turn the old one either gray or turn on "onion skin" mode for it, then draw on top of it with darker lines. If I were doing this by hand I'd just use very light pencil strokes to start, then get firmer and firmer til the drawing took shape.
I remember when I was a kid, sitting and watching my brothers Jimmy and Johnny sketch. I was mesmerized. Sometimes they'd let me request a particular subject, but really it didn't matter, I just was fascinated by the whole process of starting with a blank page and ending up with something awesome looking. It was like a kind of magic, and that it was my own brothers doing it just added to the whole thing.
Jimmy ended up becoming a dentist, and though he continued to have a passing interest in comics I don't think he kept up with the sketching. Johnny's a geologist, and around high school I think it was, ended up turning his creative energies to music instead of visual art. He's not only darn good, but his kids are amazingly talented musicians as well.
So I guess it fell to me to uphold the family honor in the visual arts. You can in part blame them for my love of drawing, and in part my dad for bringing home comics from time to time. But mostly, you can blame Superman. Punk.
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Posted in Sketch of the Day
(From "Master Comics" number 56, 1944.)
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Posted in Daily Random Panel
I'm going to try something new this year and do a "Sketch of the Day", with just a hopefully quick drawing of whatever. Several other, much more accomplished, comics artists are trying it out and I thought I might as well to try and get the ol' juices flowing. Here's the first one.
Would you be interested in me doing a video capture of the actual drawing process on these?
Comments Off on SOD.014
Posted in Sketch of the Day
For those of you who use Facebook, I've created a HeroMachine Fan Page so you can get your bloggy goodness there instead of checking the site if you prefer. It's also a way of getting the information via Facebook without having to Friend me, and thus being subjected to my non-HeroMachine idiocy.
Anything posted here automatically gets reposted to the Fan page (except comments). I'm also slowly adding in image archives of all submissions to all the Character Contests, which will be kind of cool to see.
Anyway, check it out if you're a Facebooker:
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Posted in Meta
(From "Master Comics" number 56, 1944.)
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Posted in Daily Random Panel
With thanks to Nathan for sending this in, Neil Gaiman apparently did a riff on "Worst Comic Book Characters of All Time" for what I assume is a Canadian comedy show, and the intros for each entry have HeroMachine 2 character illustrations! Check it out:
via videosift.com
Methinks I might turn this into a contest for next time, as I am sure you guys could come up with characters even worse than these if you put your minds to it!
This has been an interesting few months, first the incomparably awesome Michael Chabon mentioned that his kids use HeroMachine, and now it's a sideline in a Neil Gaiman comedy hour. Granted, I doubt Gaiman had any clue they were even doing visuals for the bit, much less where they came from, but still -- he's at least ten kinds of legendary, so to be in the same segment (even accidentally) is pretty cool.
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Posted in Randomosity
I think, if you're going to have a super-power that involves exploding things, that you should carry that theme through to the absolute extreme. Name, costume, effects, everything should be an assault on the senses so violent that you are forced to cover your eyes and look away in horror at the resulting carnage.
You know, like "Boom Boom", aka "Boomer", aka "Time Bomb" aka "A lame character by any other name is still lame":
Tell me you can look at that costume in those colors and not think something blew up. I dare you.
Note how thoroughly this to-the-max redesign pounds the metaphor home. From the hair that looks like it is currently in the midst of a nuclear blast to the bomb-shelter high collar to the massive eye protection, they don't miss a beat. But in case the reader is dumber than a sack of hammers, they also threw in some explosion logos on her boobs (because let's be honest, that's immediately where most fan-boys' eyes go), arms, and leg strap thingie.
And just in case that wasn't overkill enough, they also wrote her name down her leg. Which, honestly, was a great idea, because given the artistic team on X-Men at that time, it could be really hard to tell one character from another. This approach narrowly beat out the other idea of having them toting little name-signs a la Wile E. Coyote.
Without a doubt, though, what really brings this baby home is the color scheme. I can't remember the last time I saw such an ... innovative use of neon pink, day-glo yellow, and radiation orange.
No, wait, yes I can -- I suddenly realized where James Cameron got the color scheme for Pandora's jungles. Well done, sir.
My only criticism of this otherwise stellar outfit is that they made her keep her headgear retainer on. That's just cruel. We understand that dental work is a delicate thing and that teens often struggle with it, but come on, she's a crime fighter! Let the poor girl leave the acne cream and external dentifrice at home already.
(Character and image © Marvel Comcis, Inc.)
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Posted in Bad Super Costumes
I went ahead and posted these twelve new complete bodies in the Body slot called "MaleAlternate" for the HeroMachine 3 Alpha:
If you are having trouble seeing the preview, they are a banded metal regular guy; big hulking monster muscle guy; lobster guy; rocky earth elemental type; stylized dwarf; the guy who used to be in Male Toons (that set is now gone); regular guy with no interior muscle lines; thin adolescent body; fat bastard; gorilla man; lizard man; and hairy regular guy.
This is an interim release, as I wanted to get your feedback mid-stream as to whether these are worthwhile or not. In the meantime I'll be doing these same twelve without the hands or feet, then breaking out the arms and legs separately as well. Depending on the size of the file, I may then add some additional limbs that aren't part of these twelve bodies at the end (like the merman tail, the ghost tails, etc.), or those may be put into a separate set, I haven't decided for sure yet.
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Posted in HeroMachine 3, Previews
Three middle-aged nerds (including yours truly!) review all of the MCU movies in chronological order. Short, funny, and full of good vibes, check it out and let us know what you think!
Nerdmudgeon.com