East Coast Comicon!

Make sure you stop by East Coast Comicon at the Meadowlands Expo Center in New Jersey and come see Myself and writer/creator Michael Sarrao at table 712!

We will be talking about the new Unmasked kickstarter coming up!

STAR WARS: Tales From the Far, Far, Away.

Back in December writers Tim Daniel and Michael Moreci pooled together a team of artists who were not only talented but giant Star Wars fans to create a "fanthology" that we made available to download for FREE online. This was a labor of love. We love the characters, the stories, the entire franchise and wanted so badly to take part so we decided to do just that. This was the end result. Within a few days we reached over 20k downloads, overloaded three separate servers that we had the link attached to and garnered stellar reviews from numerous comic news sites. I recently spoke to Tim and it looks like we will be tackling another anthology later in the year so be on the look out for the press release.

In the meantime, in case you missed it the first go around, here is the link to download Star Wars: Tales From the Far, Far, Away Vol 2! Tim and I worked on the 15 page story titled ' The Pledge'. Enjoy!

https://m.box.com/shared_item/https%3A%2F%2Fapp.box.com%2Fs%2F9couy2g05hir5ij5lazl7cmgp12aiuui

Walking Dead Commission

I love doing commissions where I have free reign. I was told to draw a bunch of members of TWD cast, who and what they were doing was completely up to me.

THOR: RAGNAROK!

OK, how freakin' sweet was that trailer for Thor: Ragnarok?! It seems they are giving it the Guardians of the Galaxy treatment, which is totally a good thing. I had to draw the scene from the trailer that everyone is talking about but I figured this time around I would show you guys a step by step of my process as well as which tools I use.

First up we have the tools: A non photo blue Prisma Color Col-erase pencil. Basic mechanical pencil. Pentel Sign Pen. Faber-Castell marker pen small. Raphael Kolinsky Brush size 1. Speedball black ink. Kuretake marker brush #33. Kneaded eraser.

I use the non photo blue pencil for the roughs. I follow up with the basic mechanical pencil to get down the fine lines. I keep this very simple, little to no shading. It conserves time and the fine lines makes it easier to ink over later. Sometime ink doesn't glide over the non photo blue easily. 

Next step is the marker pens. I discovered the Pentel Sign Pen at Michaels and i really love the varying depth on the line I can get. The tip stays intact and the ink lasts a long time. I use the Faber-castell small for the really fine stuff. Again, I keep this step to a minimum to conserve time.

The meat and potatoes. At this point I begin to use the brush and ink. This is where the majority of the piece is completed. Eve though I plan out where the light source is and where the shadows will drop at the very beginning layout stages I don't actually apply it to the paper until this step. Again it conserves time not having to do it twice and time is money. 

I continue on with the brush and ink and as you can see, I work from left to right to avoid messy smudging. 

Once the brush work is completed I use the Brush marker for the motion lines. Its faster and a more comfortable feel for me. Then I erase the underlying pencils and its off to the scanner...

The final scan and clean up in photoshop. 

Total time on this piece: 2 hours.

Archie and the Gang!

I've really been enjoying the new line of Archie comics since the reboot by Mark Waid and Fiona Staples. I highly recommend it. A nice highlight as well was is the Jughead: The Hunger oneshot written by Frank Tieri. Definitely go check it out. I've even been tuning into the Riverdale series on The CW and it has quickly become guilty pleasure viewing for my wife and I. Here is a little bit of fan art I did to pay homage to both the new comic and television series.

The Rocketeer turns 35!

This month marks the 35th anniversary of The Rocketeer's publication debut. I have to admit, since I was only about 5 months old when it was released in April of 1982, I didn't discover the character until the Disney film almost a decade later. By ten years old I was already immersed in the world of pulp heroes and the characters influenced by the genre ( Indiana Jones, The Shadow, The Phantom etc.). It was safe to say I was completely blown away when Cliff donned that rocket pack and took off for the skies. The very next day I was in the comic shop asking about the Rocketeer. Thank goodness they introduced me to the books and the art of Dave Stevens. The Rocketeer has been my favorite comics character ever since. Here is a recent piece of fan art I drew up commemorating the anniversary as well as a handful of times I've drawn the character on previous occasions.

The Walking Dead

Now that this season of The Walking Dead is wrapped I felt it fitting to post some commissions I did recently related to the show. I got to meet actor Khary Payton (King Ezekiel) at a con last year. He was a very righteous dude so I gifted him with the King Ezekiel piece you see here. 

What am I currently working on?

I have a handful of things in the works this year (thank goodness for comebacks)!

First up is the Unmasked Volume 2 Kickstarter which will be launching later this month. Back in 2012, writer/creator Michael Sarrao and I funded a successful KS campaign for volume 1: The New Age Heroes. This installment went on to be sold digitally through the graphic.Ly app and saw weekly syndication on the USAToday.com website. Mike also ran another successful KS for the one shot, Unmasked:Signal, with artist Tony Gregori, which bridged the gap between Volumes 1 and 2. For this second volume we brought on a super talented colorist in Paul Little. Hey are a couple of sample pages from Volume 2. Be sure to check back here as well as our Facebook, instagram or twitter pages for the Kickstarter announcement.

Next up- the return of ZOMBIE SAMA with writer/creator Billy Tucci. ZS was my first published book back in 2006. At the time Billy and I felt we didn't get the opportunity to tell the larger story we intended so after over a decade we are finally going to tackle this wonderful story again. This time around the one shot will feature an alternate beginning and ending and all brand new art by yours truly! Be on the lookout for the Kickstarter campaign later this summer as everyone's favorite sushi delivery boy returns! Here is some teaser art, colored by Paul Little.

Third we have a book that is very dear to me. I always stress that you have to write the book you would want to read and just hope everyone else jumps on board. If you are genuine about the story you are telling then the readers will appreciate that. For me, THIS is that story. I can't reveal too much now because it is in the early stages of development but I can say how happy I am to have writer Vito Delsante (Stray) joining me on this journey. Here is a sneak peek at some teaser art. More to come!

There are a few other projects in the works, including a short for one of Vito Delsante's books, an issue or two of writer David Crownson's recent Kickstarter success, Harriet Tubman: Demon Slayer and later in the year, a return to the fanthology world of Star Wars: Tales From the Far, Far, Away with writer Tim Daniel! Stay tuned!