New T.O.T story- process

Just last night I completed my new 10 page story which I've gotten word will be posted this Sunday on the Talesofthe website. So I figured why not put up the process, as it is a completely new one incorporating both digital and traditional mediums.

These days I find I much easier to rough things up in manga studio- it must be the eco-warrior inside me that doesn't like to waste pages. That and the quick and easy edit-ability of it.

Once I have the roughs I convert them to blue then "ink" them on another layer, fleshing it out as I go along and using photo reference where needed, to make sure anatomy and proportions are correct.

When I started this projected, Holly bought me me first Bristol board, and after using it I loved how clean the pencils came out on it. I knew from speaking with the Titan talent scout at 2D that I would have a better chance of getting work from a pencilled portfolio than an inked one, so this was a good opportunity to get a bit of practise doing some tight pencils. I light boxed the outline from the above rough, again adding more detail and tidying as I went, then I shaded her and scanned her in. Unfortunately there was a snag in the road....

....they scanned terribly!! I was so dissappointed when I seen them come out like this. Luckily this is the digital age! Using some level adjustments and going round on a layer set behind the pencils I blocked in some greys to blend the pencils, I starting to feel a bit happier with it but something was still mucky about it....

...into illustrator with it, for dialogue and a great wee filter I just found- trace/color 6. It really tidied it up this filter and smoothed it out. Below is the finished article.

Make sure to check by T.O.T on Sunday for the complete story.

hmmmm....

.... I don't know what style this would fall under, I didnt even know what I set out to draw but 10 minutes later this was looking at me. I like it.

A few Bats later...

A bit of tattoo designing......

So I done a tattoo for Tony, must be a good few months back now. It was on his forearm and now he's getting one done on the inside of his forearm, so he told me roughly want he wanted and I went a bit mad on it. The brief was a boy playing drums with a psychedelic back ground and sound waves, soooo firstly I digitally roughed up a drummer.........

....then I tidied it up a bit.......

....once I had this I moved on the background. I firstly made a rough outline of my arm to give me an approx finished size. Then I quickly traced the outline of the drummer and went mad on the swirly ideas. I done this by hand as it allowed more freedom than digital....

....I then scanned this in and dropped in the drummer and removed the guitar player on the wing-thing to give an idea of the finished look. This is what I  would call an elaborate sketch as I would really need to tidy it up and define it more, but am pleased with its strangeness, but its toes decision not mine so I'll post any edits made along the process.

 

Hunter redesigns....

Previously mentioned, there would be some development work and here she blows, well begins rather. This is the first piece I've done for this new personal project, Danny was back there for awhile and we got the brain jam we needed for us to see our next move. We've done two 4 pagers, and a 12 pager so it's time to stretch out to 23-32. I'm quite looking forward to the challenge! We are actually returning to use a character created for the CADI course, to give it the finish that it deserves. Its being completely revamped, quite simply-without sounding too big headed- because we're better story tellers now than 2 years ago. Below is some new designs for the main character- Matthew Thompson, "Hunter". The face will not be getting used, I was just warming up to the bristol board......

And below a work in progress Daredevil, I've never drawn him before... !

Crimbo horror roughs...

I've started working on my next story for Tales of the and it will be a Christmas horror theme all through December. Found it quite hard at the beginning to come up with a crimbo horror, I kept trying to include Santa or elves or anything else that's directly Christmassy but then I decided that I should just set it at Christmas and let the visuals make it feel like Christmas. So heres the roughs for my first page, im doing the roughs digitally but am hoping to pencil it up as I just got some swanky bristol board thats calling out to be used...