Harley Quinn- Painted

Just finished up painting Javier Avilas Harley Quinn.  I've been picking away at it in short bursts for a month or two.  Here's the process as I remember it.

 So here are Javi's pencils he gave me.  It's a pretty sweet, good girl pose for a lady maniac.

I dropped the flats in under his pencils and over a seperate purple background to get started.  She's the Jokers girlfriend, I figured purples a good way to go.

Here I got a little too excited and put in a delightful bloody-as-hell layer on top of the flats.  Usually I'd wait until toward the end of piece to put in texture and detail like this, but what can I say...

So here's where the piece really starts to move in the right direction.  Javier had no background in his pencils.  Between the last stage and this one, I had a few weeks where I was doing other things and this piece floated around in the back of my head.  I was considering putting in a prison background considering Harleys origins in Arkham and where she is now with the Suicide Squad and their connection to Belle Reve.

Then I thought, why would she be posing in this way inside either of those two places?  All I really wanted out of those two locations was the kind of lines/ patterns that prison bars make.  So I shot a photo of the unfinished part of our house where the furnace is.  The window adds a nice light source, and the exposed beams gave me my pattern.

I've also started adding highlights and shadows each in seperate layers.  

In next bit here I start manipulating the background to set it into Harleys space a bit more.  I boost the contrast, knock down the overall brightness, and start to add lighting effects around her and objects in the room.

The blood is back, but was really out of hand, so I start chipping away at it.  I cut parts out, knock other bits down and start integrating it more with her so it looks like it's on her skin and in her clothing, and not just a layer dropped into photoshop.

 At this point I've also got a seperate layer for Harleys face makeup and other textures such as her skin and the corset.  I'm refining the highlights and shadows further and have added more reflective bits to the metal objects in the piece.

Blood splatter hits the wall after I realized the piece still needs a stronger narrative for this type of casual pose to work.  I continue to work the shadows so the backlighting rings true.  I've also dropped a couple of photo textures I've got into the piece to bring it together. 

By this stage I've gone a little too far with certain parts and start to bring them back.  I lighten bits where the shadows have flattened things out, and darken areas where the highlights have encroached into darker areas. Often I'll turn one layer off when working the other so I can see what I'm doing more clearly and inadvertently overlap the two. 

Some of the pencil layer is too dark for where the light shines around the edges of Harleys form.  I created a seperate pencil layer and turn it white to increase the dimensionality of her figure.

I drop our signatures back in and I'm done.  Awesome.  Make sure to check out more of Javiers work here: http://hanzozuken.deviantart.com/

Pheonix Jones— Fight Scene!

Unbelievable.

I'm working late on some last illustrations for the Heroes In The Night book.  I hit up facebook for a quick second where Tea has posted a link to video of Phoenix Jones mixing it up in Seattle yet again.

Stan Lee really started some shit.

Teas Post.

The page I'm working on is part of a short comic starring Thanatos, one of Vancouvers RLSHs.

Entomo, In Progress

Here's a little in-progress peak at the Entomo piece from the Heroes in the Night book.  I probably can't post the full work until after the release, so until then, enjoy the bugs!

Entomo, Thumbnails

A very early look at an illustration I am doing for the Heroes in the Night book. 

Entomo, the Insect Man.

Sharing The Load— Currents Comics Issue center spread, in progress

 The progression after pencils for this months strip(s).

The Joker— Digital Painting, Progression

I picked at this one in between a few other things over the last three weeks or so.  I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out...for now.

For the last stage, I really wanted to sharpen his nose back up, and get rid of that super vampiric tooth.  I also boosted the contrast, stuck in the tongue and separated the hairs in his eyebrows and on his head a bit more.

The Clown Prince of Crime, baby.

Recovery Unit 2, In Prog 5

 To see the first eight finished pages, head here: http://www.behance.net/gallery/Recovery-Unit-Sequential/4969985

Recovery Unit 2, In Prog 4

 For the first eight finished pages head here: http://www.behance.net/gallery/Recovery-Unit-Sequential/4969985

What the Fridge has to Say

I cleaned out my toolbox today, and found a bunch of buttons. 

Record Dump

My grandparents joint 80th birthday party was on Saturday at my parents house.  It was a good time and a lot of family I haven't seen in a long time were there, including all the aunts and uncles on my moms side.

My Uncle Ray is a huge record collector and he recently moved to Washington from Minnesota.  His home was recently sold, so he brought down a massive selection for anyone who wanted to pick through them.  My Uncle Bob grabbed a few, but most of them went to ME.  This is awesome.

I may need to start a new blog just for Uncle Rays Records...

Real TV Power

I'm finally in a Nielsen family!

The Brow: Dick Tracy's Rogues Continued

I think this litte sketchbook is now reserved for Dick.  The Brow is #2 in my mind of the great Dick Tracy villains.  I'm not a super Tracy geek, but those crooks all have such great design to them.  So memorable. 

 

Flattop

Went to Nessun Dorma this evening to try and take the edge off of ALL the COFFEE I had today...and the rain slick streets inspired me along the way to bust out a Flattop sketch. Forgot he rocks the bow tie, but for being drawn in the half-light of the bar, I'm pretty okay with this one.  

Alright.

Booze, Broads and Bullets

I started rereading this volume of Sin City while my computer ran it's back up.  Marv snuck out of my hands a few minutes later.

The Amazing Bag-Man

Had to do something for fun to unwind.  Hence, the Amazing Bag-Man. 

I was just planning to do a quick sketch, but now I'm thinkin' this may be worthy of returning to and finishing it off.

Dig the stirrups.

Recovery Unit- In Progress

Food, Family and Books in Lafayette

On Sunday, Court and I headed down to Lafayette, IN to visit with her family for a bit.  Her twin brother is headed to the Navy in a week and it was our last chance to see him for a while.  I rented a tiny car from Hertz and we took off from suburban Wisconsin where we had been at my own brothers graduation party.  We got in late, so we ate a sausage, had some Great Lakes Seasonal Pumpkin Spirits with ginger beer and went up to bed.  I finished reading DMZ vol. 2 before passing out for the night.

In the morning, we went to Tick Tock for breakfast with her mom, two brothers and a set of grandparents.  There were a lot of older guys wearing their best best flannel in this place.  After that we headed back to her Moms before Courtney, Caleb and I headed downtown.


We checked out Robots & Rogues on Main Street in Lafayette.  This is an awesome little new and used book store focusing on sci-fi, fantasy, mystery and horror.  Oh, I did also notice one copy of The Secret in there pushed into the corner, so, you know.  There's that.


Inside I found a copy of the Jack Kirbys Fourth World Omnibus vol. 1 for SUPER cheap.  It came out of the Tippecanoe public library, but is in really great shape.  I also found Heretics of Dune in a paperback edition I've never seen before.  SWEET.

After that we walked across the street and got some flavored soda from McCord Candies.  Headed over a few blocks to Crossroads Cigars smoke shop, and then back the other way for a few beers in Chumleys.  There was trio of people taking photos of some platters for a news source across the dining area and twin TVs above the bar set to CNN and Fox news.  The place has (according to them) 50 beers on tap and 100 bottles.  That's alright with me.  They even had Brooklyn Lager, a tasty beer I hadn't had since I left New York. 

Later on we had dinner at Poblanos, a Mexican joint in a strip mall.  It was okay, and domestic beers were $.99.  I also heard some UNTOLD TALES of HIGH SCHOOL DIVING as told by Court and Caleb.  On the way back, we stopped and picked up some Mickeys 40s.  REAL 40's, too, not those 32 oz things you see all over the place now.  Her dad met up with us at the house to hang out for a bit.  We talked mini-bikes while Cole watched some Duck Dynasty.



The next day:
We started out getting some breakfast with the boys and Courts parents at Shellies Cafe. Awesome biscuits.  Then it was across town to her Dads place where he showed off his massive vintage bicycle collection, and a rusting 1970 Dodge Coronet RT.

After that we headed toward Purdue to Vons books.  We dove down into the claustrophobic basement, where I found the last of the (original) Dune books, Chapterhouse: Dune.  It was the same type of edition as I found at R & Rs so I had to pick it up.

I also grabbed issues 6—9 of the new Suicide Squad comics and read them as soon as we got back to Courtney's house.  I am caught up and can now read reviews and other spoiler-iffic content on the latest Suicide Squad.



I drew a bit of Recovery Unit while Courts Mom prepared burgers for dinner.  We said our goodbyes and hit the road.  Hard.  I did between 80 and 90 the whole way back save for construction areas and toll booths.

It was a good trip.