Darth Vader 03

Do you want to know how he got those scars?  Unfortunately, you'll have to watch a shitty movie to find out.

7 days...

Supe du Jour II: The Man of Twomorrow

Day two of my Superman sketch-a-day was a no-brainer: Two-Face. My Harvey Dent will always be Billy Dee Williams.

I'm kind of surprised nobody's done this gettup for ol' Dent Head.

8 days...

Revenge of the 5th

"You think you're so damn clever!"

Happy Cinco de Maulo!

33 days...

May the 4th be with you.

Happy Star Wars Day! I got you a Batman.

34 days...

Happy Birthday Jack Nicholson!

76 years young and still smiling! Here's my tribute to the greatest of Jack's performances:

"I always smoke after."

"You mean to tell me you've never even TRIED it? Oh c'mon, Bats, one eensy-weensy pull of the trigger!"

"If you gotta go, go with a smile."

 A criminal profile.

45 days...

heh

I don't think the Joker cackles maniacally at everything. Sometimes, the occasion calls for a tasteful chuckle.

57 days...

Nightwing

Bobby, Everett, and I were talking Nightwing, and I thought it would be fun to take my crack at designing the character.

What would Nightwing's tagline be: "World's Second Greatest Detective" or "The Man Wonder"?

Everett's take:

Bobby's take:

Bobby: "Nightwing IS my favorite character. Messing with a Perez design is sacred ground."

Me: "You're right. How do you improve upon perfection?"

4 days...

Fratman

My buddy Chris Palmer invited me to contribute to his new blog, Batman Tag You're It, a collection of Batman fanart where each artist tags the next for each consecutive submission.

Since I've been either animating and storyboarding on Monsters University for the past year, I'm in a very collegiate state of mind. Plus, with his Olympic level strength and stamina, Batman would be amazing at keg stands.

16 days...

Happy Halloween!

And Happy Hauntukkah to my BOO!ish friends! My ghoulfiend Heather's birthday is October 29th, and we both love Halloween, so this gave me the perfect excuse to paint something spooky for the bewitching young lady.

Here we are with our Jacques-O-Lantern and Drac-O-Lantern. Drac seems to be suffering a severe allergic reaction to that garlic.

 

Poison Ivy's got a brand new sidekick, and he seems to have some sort of fungal infection.

Anyone can pull off a cool Batman costume, but it takes a real man to rock a Robin. Of course, it doesn't hurt to have a stone-cold fox of a Poison Ivy.

 "Holy venus fly traps, Batman!" 

Hope you guys had as much horribly haunting fun as we did this Halloween! Now time to dust off those ugly Christmas sweaters...

0 days...HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Dance with the Devil in the Pale Moonlight

Getting excited for Snyder and Capullo's take on the Joker. 

My favorite interpretation of the character has always been Bruce Timm's Joker performed by Mark Hamill. Just the right balance of folly and genuine menace.

5 days...

Shark Week!

Because there's no spray repellent for AWESOME.

0 days...HAPPY SHARK WEEK!

The Children's Creativity Museum

Last Saturday, I taught a storyboarding class for kids at the Children's Creativity Museum, nestled in San Francisco's Yerba Buena Gardens.

We started the class with a few improv games outside to get everyone's creative juices flowing. Apparently kids dig playing outside--who knew!

When we came back inside, I explained story structure (using the most important film in cinema history as an example). We also discussed protagonists and antagonists, and why it's important to have contrast in those characters.

The children did an excellent job pretending to listen.

I told CCM that the class would be best suited for ages ten and up. Eight year old Allison weaseled her way in, and ended up being the best student in the class. Here Allison is explaining to me the components of a storyboard.

The kids came up to the whiteboard one at a time and created the hero of our own story, the bank-robber George "The Muscle Man" Jefferson. I created his antagonist, Det. Jimmy.

Using the formula I'd taught them at the beginning of class, we brainstormed the first act of a story. The students then had to storyboard acts two and three and pitch them to the class in groups.

I thumbnailed out my own version of the story on the whiteboard, to show them how to pitch.

Then the students went to work pitching their own boards.

My braintrust (the CCM faculty) chose their favorite pitch, and I drew pictures of George "Muscle Man" Jefferson and Det. Jimmy for the winning team.

In the end, everyone lived happily ever after!

If you're interested in visiting CCM, check out their website, Creativity.org. Ask for Heather, she's the best!

6 days...

Bane Teaser

Boba Fett, Dr. Doom, Cobra Commander, Michael Myers, Blank, Sauron. Masked mystery villains are a staple of genre fiction. Is the character protecting their identity? Are they deformed? Do they need the mask to survive? And most importantly, what the heck is under there? Here are a few of my theories for the latest masked mystery villain, Bane.

Or maybe the mask just to prevents him from biting his nails.

13 days...

Wrapped in an E. Nygma

Some Riddler sketches made while standing in line for The Dark Knight. Highlight the white font next to "Answer:" to reveal the solution. 

Answer: Coffee

Answer: A dinosaur (on one side of their scales is a feather, on the other side is the rest of the dinosaur!)

Answer: The Star Wars trilogy (that's not The One Ring, it's from the "Look, sir, droids!" moment in A New Hope)

3 days...

No Pain, No Bane

In our excitement for the upcoming Batman movie, my friend Jeff and I decided to do a collaborative Batman vs Bane sketch. Jeff drew Batman first, and I added Bane. 

I figured Batman, being the clever fellow he is, would defeat Bane by taking advantage of his RSI wrist brace.

7 days...

Batman Warm-Up Sketches

I finally translated what Bane's been saying this whole time!

Sketching on the iPad with Everett over coffee, and getting stoked for Comic Con. We made a wager on whether Avengers or Dark Knight Rises will make more money this Summer. The loser has to draw their superhero getting the superhero serum kicked out of them by the other guy's hero, similar to last Summer's Thor/Captain America drawing bet.

With Dark Knight's opening weekend already selling out and tickets going for $100+ on eBay, I told Ev he could go ahead and get started on my drawing.

15 days...

Lunchtime Doodles

Here's small insight into the very serious topics addressed during our lunchtime conversations at work. Like Batman's profile and how to fix an eviscerated GI Joe.

I think the biggest GI Joe tragedy is that they could never throw the grenades that were molded onto their torso. On the plus side, wherever Snowjob goes, he's always ready for a tennis match!

3 days...

The Not-So-Dark Knight

Experimenting with every-color pencils. I was aaaalmost able to control which color was coming out.

11 days...

Biff! Pow! Sketch!

More doodles of Batman characters. Surprise, surprise. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about the latest Chades Challenge (Angry Harpies). I'll be posting the feathery monstrosities this Friday!

26 days...

Bane Process

Based on the poll to the right, you guys would like to see more detailing the process of an illustration, so I'll start with last week's Bane! 

These first few exploratory sketches are always the most fun, messing around with the character's proportions, poses, and costume.

I wanted to be truer to the comic Bane's mask than the movie, but also wanted to steer clear of the luchador territory. Early on, I had the idea of putting the bat symbol on his face to show how obsessed he is with killing Batman.

Nobody wants to see a static character pose, so I figured I'd reimagine the classic Knightfall cover. I figured unmasking Batman while you paralyze him adds just the right amount of insult to injury. For pencils, I always keep it super loose and just try to capture the energy and weight of the characters.

When I got to inking, I altered Batman's pose to be a little more active. I tore up his costume a bit, to give some history to the scene. I've never been a fan of all the loose piping most Banes have. 99% of the time, Batman defeats Bane by snipping his venom-tubes, so my Bane keeps his cropped close to his costume.

The Batman design is a nod to Burton's design (my personal favorite). Bane was fun to mess around with. I like the militaristic feel they're giving him in the film, so I went with mottled green. I'm not sure why they're fighting in a sandstorm; maybe I've still got Ghost Protocol on the mind.

Things are getting busy on Brave, so Chades Challenges might not make it past the pencil stage for a while, but I shall endeavor to continue posting! Happy Monday everyone!

48 days...