Beneath The Dark Crystal Variant Cover #6

Here is my sixth variant cover for Archaia's Beneath the Dark Crystal series!

To view my past Dark Crystal covers click here. 

This cover features UrAc the Mystic Scribe and skekOk the Skeksis Scroll Keeper. Like my other covers these two are the counterparts of each other and paired together facing opposite directions. To the left you can see the finished artwork for the cover, but below I'll walk through the steps I took to to get there.



On separate sheets of copy paper I drew UrAc the Mystic and skekOk the Skeksis. I was fortunate to have some great reference from Henson for both, though there's always a part you'd like to be able to see or tough on the real puppet that the photo just doesn't provide the information for––so I just interpreted it all as best as I could. I tried to get their props mimicking each other a bit, the staff for the Mystic and the scrolls for the Skeksis. On a third piece of paper I copied an existing Froud pattern found in the art book of the Dark Crystal as the background. Once I had those drawings finished, I scanned them all, and with each part on a different layer, I tinted them different colors. The color tints for the pencils helps me see where a character ends and the next begins or what are the finicky background details.

Once the layout was approved by Archaia and Henson, it was time to move on to inking the cover. I printed the above layout out onto copy paper (two sheets I had to tape together for the full image). That printout was then taped to the back of a sheet of Strathmore 300 series bristol board. On my Huion lightpad I could see through the surface of the bristol to the printout below and use it as a guide as I inked with Copic Multiliners (the 0.7 & 0.3 nibs mainly). As ever with these Dark Crystal covers, texture is so much about how I try to honor the practical costuming and puppet building of the Henson Creature Shop. Little stippling, line weight decisions, and differences in hatching helps me create those fabrics and materials.

With the inks completed, I could move on to the coloring stage. The first step of which is the less-fun part: Flatting. Flatting is essentially a professional version of 'coloring within the lines'. No shading details are done, just flat (hence the name) colors are established. Which parts of the image are which colors.

Some of the color choice decisions are based on the photo reference I have, but I'm also eyeballing those colors and then making alterations that suit the illustration. In this stage I also establish the color holds (the areas that I want the ink to print as a color other than black) for the background Froudian circle pattern.


The final step for this cover was to render the colors adding shading, texture, and highlights. I use the dodge and burn tools in Photoshop to do that, with a stock textured brush to help emulate the look of something a little more natural and less airbrush-digital-slick.

Overtop of the whole piece I added in another Froudian design (one that I inked back when I was inking the cover itself) as a ghostly overlay on the entire piece.

Read more ...

TMNT Macro Series Collection Cover

After I turned in my last TMNT Macro series cover (Raphael), editor Bobby Curnow asked if I'd be up for doing one more so that the trade collection had new artwork. In the past the trades collecting my Micro Series' & Turtles in Time runs reused work from those covers. So this was a nice treat to get to put all the turtles together as a tidy bow to end this run.

To the left you can see the finished cover art, but below I'll go through the steps and stages from sketch to finished colors:




Sketches:
As usual, I like drawing characters separately on copy paper to help me work out poses, and rework details by overlaying more sheets while working on a lightpad. I also find it hard to compose an arangemet of the Turtles where each gets a fair representation in terms of scale and face-time AND there are no odd tangents with each other OR their weapons.

So over the corse of several sheets for the four turtles and a photo referenced study of the City Hall subway platform in NYC, I had what I needed to assemble something to show Bobby.

Layout:
Since each turtle was separately drawn and scanned, I could easily move, shift, resize, rotate, and tint them to help figure out the puzzle of a layout where, as I said above, there were no tangents. In this stage I did have to make an alteration to Leo's sword because it was always covering part of Mike's face until I changed it, I realized I never finished drawing one of Raph's legs, and was able to swap in a mirror of one of Leo's, and came up with a pile of garbage to justify why/how Don was standing up higher than the rest.

I picked the abandoned City Hall platform not because of it being an homage in the 2nd live action movie, but because I'm fascinated by it architecturally, and love the idea of the turtles exploring abandoned spaces in NYC as potential temporary lairs/hangouts/hide-outs.

The layout it pretty fully realized as an image. I go overboard on many work-for-hire layouts so that the editors and licensors can clearly see what I'm going for without having to do much interpreting and guesswork about the intent for the final art.

Inks:
Once the layout stage was approved, I was able to move on to the inks. I printed out the digitally composited layout sketches on copy paper, and then taped that to the back of a sheet of 300 series bristol. On my Huion lightpad, I can see through the surface of the bristol to the printout below to use as a guide instead of traditional pencils.

For pens I used Copic Multiliner SPs...mostly the 0.7 nib, but I used some much finer sizes around the eyes.

Flats:
When the inks were approved, I moved on to the boring bit of coloring known as flatting. This is where you digitally color in the lines establishing base colors for everything with a hard edged brush. The flat colors makes it easier when you do go to render the final colors to isolate areas so you can shade and texture them accordingly.

Now's also a good moment to mention that each turtle has some carry-over item from my individual Macro Series cover of them: Leo's hooded poncho, Raph's shuriken bandolier, Don's welding goggles, and Mike's bindle bandanna tied around his arm.


Final Colors:
Here again you can see the final colors for the piece. I rendered all the characters and most of the background using the dodge and burn tools in Photoshop with a textured brush.

The tile details as well as the spot outlines on Mike's bindle bandanna were given a color hold, and area of the inks I wanted to be a painted color and not black. The lights were given some extra layers to help with the glow effect.

The TMNT Macro series Trade will be available in June of 2019.



Here's a link to all my past TMNT covers: https://davidpetersen.blogspot.com/search/label/TMNT

Read more ...

Beneath the Dark Crystal Variant Cover #5

Here is my fifth variant cover for Archaia's Beneath the Dark Crystal series!

To view my past Dark Crystal covers click here.


This cover features UrYod the Mystic Numerologist and skekShod the Skeksis Treasurer. Like my other covers they are the counterparts to each other and paired together facing opposite each other. To the left you can see the finished artwork for the cover, but below I'll walk through the steps to get there.



I started creating the layout by drawing the Skeksis and Mystic each on separate sheets of copy paper.  Henson and Archaia provided me with a great set of reference photos of the puppets and their costumes from the original production that help when trying to decipher detail upon detail of a the character's garments, props, or anatomy. I tried to get these two to act a bit more, suing their hands to each hold items significant to them (the Skeksis holds a dagger and a purse, the mystic: a rope-abacus stone). I scanned the drawings into Photoshop and was able to tint, resize, and manipulate them into a layout I liked. The background circle design is based on a Brian Froud painting from the book "The World of the Dark Crystal", but simplified and drawn in my line.

Once I got the approval from Archaia and Henson for the layout, I printed it out and taped it to the back of a sheet of Strathmore 300 series bristol. On my light pad (I use a a3 sized Huion) I can see through the surface of the bristol to the printout below and ink using it as a guide. I inked this with Copic Multiliners, specifically the 0.7 & 0.3 nibs.

My main focus when inking these Dark Crystal characters is to get the textures right. To give them a look of being physical things with wear and tear, with wrinkles and grime. It's important that the parts of each character's costume also reads as layered and detailed and textured as the real puppets were...though I'm certainly having to interpret color and tone and texture into some type of little line styles.


The inks were approved, and I scanned the original artwork into Photoshop to start the coloring process. This step, known as 'flatting' is where flat colors are added to establish the various color areas. Mapping out what parts are what colors. While I have some reference to start with, I'm still eyeballing these colors and making a lot of decisions on my own.

At this stage I also added the color hold (an area where I want the inks to be a color other than black) on the circle pattern behind the characters.





The last step is to render the colors using the dodge and burn tools. I use a textured brush that comes stock with Photoshop when I'm doing this to help emulate the look of something a little more natural and less airbrush-slick.

I also added in a Froud-ian design (one that I inked back when I was inking the cover itself) as a ghostly overly over the entire piece.

The final order cut off (for your local comic book store to order one for you) is Nov. 19th. The issue is in stores and on-sale December 12th!

5 down...7 to go....


2019 Appearances TBA

Read more ...

TMNT Macro Series Raphael Cover Process

My final TMNT Macro Series cover for IDW is Raphael. This marks my 17th Turtles cover for IDW, and it has been a pleasure to do them all. My first TMNT cover was of Raphael, so to end this round with him feels a bit full-circle.

To see my past TMNT covers click here.

The finished art for the Raphael cover is on the left, but below I'll walk through the steps to create this cover piece.



Layouts/Pencils:
As with the other Macro Series covers, editor Bobby Curnow provided me an outline of the events of the issue, but also gave me free reign to do something 'classic'. Part of the Raph story takes place in Central Park. And since the other 3 covers in this series have their locations as a main element in the composition, picking the right Central Park monument was key. I toyed with The Dairy, The Carousel, Belvedere Castle, and Columbus Circle monument...but opted for the juxtaposition of the Angel of the Waters atop the Bethesda Fountain.

Raph was drawn on copy paper (2 sheets, I redrew one arm and his sai) and the Angel of the Waters was drawn from a reference photo. All of these drawings were scanned into photoshop composited (with some digital pigeons, & ninja stars along with some stock photo trees) and then quickly painted to help me 'see' the final composition and to make it easier for the editor and Nickelodeon understand what I was doing.

Inks:
I printed out the above layout and taped it to the back of a sheet of Strathmore 300 series bristol. On my light pad, I was able to see through the bristol surface to the printout, and I used that as a guide to ink from. I used Copic Multiliner pens...mostly the 0.7 nib.

Translating the texture of the shading on the statue was the tough part. Knowing how far to go. I like the soft nature of my pencil version more than the inked one...but sometimes, that happens.



Color Flats:
Once the inks were finished I scanned the original artwork to start the coloring process. This step is called 'flatting' where you digitally paint in the colors (could be the final palate, could be made up colors) to establish what areas are different colors from one another. Raph's skin is different from his front shell, and that's different from the sky, or the pigeons, or the statue, or his pads or arm wraps.

In this step I also added color holds (areas I wanted the ink work to be a color and not black) to the moon's outline, the stars, and the trees.


Color:
The final step was to render all the color. I did this step live over on my Twitch channel. I do all of the highlighting, shading and texture using the dodge and burn tools in Photoshop and a stock brush. 

I did add some more color holds on Raph's cuts and also some glowy bits on the edges of the statue & pigeons in front of the moon.

...oh...and I just found out, I'm doing another cover for this series...the trade!


2019 Appearances TBA

Read more ...

Beneath the Dark Crystal Variant Cover #4

I have been hired by Archaia to do a run of 12 variant covers for the Dark Crystal comic series: Beneath the Dark Crystal. This is my fourth cover of the series where I feature a pair of the yin and yang Mystics & Skeksis.

To see my previous Dark Crystal covers click here.

To the left you can see the finished cover art of UrTih the Mystic Alchemist and skekTek the Skeksis Scientist. Below I'll go step-by-step through the process of creating the piece.



I started with pencil drawings on copy paper. I like using copy paper to draw composition elements because I'm not precious about it...if I don't like the way a drawing is turning out, I don't have to erase, or try to salvage it if I don't want to, I can ball it, bin it and start again. It also helps that I draw the characters separately. For the figures, I do utilize a lot of turn-around reference photos Henson provided me of the Skeksis and Mystics. This is an invaluable resource since the puppets are detail on top of details. For the background pattern and the celestial design, I directly referenced Brian Froud artwork from the book "The World of the Dark Crystal".

With drawings of the characters and background & design, I scanned those in and started arranging and re-sizing them in Photoshop. Because each drawing is separate from the others, it makes this process easier. I tint them different colors to also help me visualize the forms and figure out where the lines from one thing end and the next begin.

I've been alternating which direction the figures faced on each cover, so I placed skekTek on a cover where he'd face the right so I could show off his bionic eye and arm. In studying his photos, I think I figured out that part of his costume are Skeksis carapace and a stretched Landstrider hide.


Once my Archaia editor Cam and Henson approved the layout, I was able to start inking the final artwork. I printed out the above layout and taped it to the back of a sheet of Strathmore 300 series bristol.

On my light pad I can see through the bristol's surface to the printout and use it like a pencil guide as I ink. When it comes to the ink, I use Copic Multiliners. Most of this was done with the 0.7 nib, though lots of facial details were done using a 0.3.

Texture and line quality is always my focus when I'm inking. Trying to get the various surfaces to read differently, but also leaving room for color to do some of that work.

The first step in the coloring process is to add in all flat colors...no rendering or texture. This is to help establish what areas are the same or different colors. Making sure the Skeksis skin is a different color than the Mystic's, or that the different parts of their costuming are the appropriate colors. It's like coloring within the lines as a professional.

In this step I also establish the color hold on the background pattern.





The final step is to render the color by adding light, shadow, and texture to the figures. I do all of that work in Photoshop with the dodge and burn tools using a textured brush.

4 down 8 to go....



2019 Appearances TBA

Read more ...

TMNT Macro Series Leonardo Cover Process

This is my third Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Macro series cover for IDW, and it features Leonardo. Originally the order of the turtles' macro series was different, and Leo was last, but a scheduling switch at the publisher gets Leo ahead of Raph.

You can see my previous TMNT covers here.

To the left is the finished art for the cover, and below in this blogpost, I'll go through the various steps to create the final piece.




Layout/Pencils:
The first step was to come up with what the cover was going to be about. In the issue, Leo does have a battle in the woods, and though my version isn't as it happens in the issue, it felt like a way to explore Leo in a more aggressive posture while also paying homage to some old Eastman & Laird drawn story notes.

I drew Leo on a sheet of copy paper (or actually a few that I cobbled together digitally taking the parts I liked from different sheets) in a birch tree forest. He's wearing the hooded garment he wears in issue #11 of the original Mirage TMNT series. I also opted to have him wounded, paying homage to the moment in that same Mirage Run when Leo is almost killed by the foot clan (in the 1990 movie, it's Raph instead of Leo...an odd coincidence considering the issue order swap here)

The color, snow and breath were digitally done to help me see the piece as a layout, but also for my editor Bobby as well as the license holders, Nickelodeon so everyone understood what the final art was going to resemble.

Inks:
With the layout approved, I started inking the cover. I printed out the above digital composite layout and taped that to the back of a sheet of Strathmore 300 series bristol. On my lightpad I'm able to see through the surface of the bristol down to the printout to use as a pencils guide as I ink. For pens I used Copic Multiliners (my pens of choice). Here I used mostly a 0.7 other than a few details where I went down to a 0.3 nib.

Texture and hatching is very important to me, and I focused it here on the gear Leo is wearing as well as all those birch trees.


Color Flats:
Once the inks were approved I could start on the coloring process. The first step of that is to 'flat' the piece by adding flat colors to establish the color areas...that Leo's hood is a different color than his bandanna, or his forearm wraps, or the sky, etc. I happened to use colors very close to my final piece, but I could have used any colors at this stage, purple skin, orange bandana, navy sky...it's just all about coloring within the lines so that it's easy to re-isolate those areas again when rendering.

In this step I also defined all the color holds, areas I wanted the inkwork to be a color other than black: The snow & the blood.



Colors:
The final step is to do all of that rendering. Adding light and shadow and texture. I do this with the dodge and burn tools in Photoshop and a stock brush.

For the falling snow I pulled out my rarely used Wacom tablet to paint in some digital snow. In Mouse Guard I've always inked dots on a separate sheet of paper, but I find that creates something a bit too graphic and hard edged. Painting digitally, I was also able to add in the breath coming out of Leo's mouth.




2018 Appearances:
Baltimore Comic Con: Sept. 28-30
New York Comic Con: Oct. 4-7

Read more ...

Beneath the Dark Crystal Variant Cover #3

This is my third variant cover for the new Dark Crystal series from Archaia titled "Beneath the Dark Crystal".

You can view my past two covers here.

This cover features UrIm the healer (mystic) and skekUng the Garthim Master (Skeksis). To the left you can see the finished cover art and below I go step by step to show how I created the piece.





I started with pencil drawings on copy paper. I am fortunate enough to have several folders of reference photos from various angles of the Mystics and Skeksis from Henson. Those are invaluable as I'm drawing the figures and trying to decipher details of their clothing and anatomy.

For the background image as well as the overlayed ghostly design, I am using existing Brian Froud imagery from the Art Of The Dark Crystal book and then recreating it in my linework.



I scan each piece of paper to create the layout to submit for approval. Having the drawings all scanned separately allows me to color tint each figure and then independently move them around until I like the placement of the characters in relationship to the background and the pattern overlay.

The Garthim Master's head needed a little adjustment too. So in this step I was able to cut it and rotate it to where it looked better. Speaking of the Garthim Master, I think not only is most of his armor made of Garthim carapace, but that the 'webbing' on his back is actually a female Gelfling's wing fragment.




Once the above layout was approved I was able to ink the piece. I printed out the layout and taped it to the back of a sheet of Strathmore 300 series bristol. On my lightpad, I can see through the surface of the bristol and use the printout as a pencil guide to ink from. For pens I prefer to use Copic Multiliners. I mostly use the 0.7 nib, but there were certainly spots on their faces where I used a smaller 0.3 nib.

As the Dark Crystal characters demand, so much of the work is in the inking of textures. Some of their costume fabrics don't literally translate to linework, so I have to create patterns and texture to imply the same feel from the puppets to the drawing.

I also inked the overlay pattern on a separate sheet of Strathmore bristol. While the linework here is black, I used photoshop tricks and techniques to make it lighter and ghostly in the final art.



With the inks completed I scanned in the original and started flatting the color in Photoshop. Flatting is the process of establishing color areas: that the Skeksis skin is a different color than the background or than the armor, or the mystic's hair or sleeves. It's basically digital professional coloring within the lines.

In this step I also established all the color holds, the areas I didn't want the linework to be black, but instead a color: The background design and the Mystic's sleeve pattern




The last step was to render all the color and to add color texture. I do all of that in Photoshop using the Dodge and Burn tools with a stock textured brush.

So, that's 3 down and 9 more to go!!!


2018 Appearances:
Baltimore Comic Con: Sept. 28-30
New York Comic Con: Oct. 4-7

Read more ...

Baltimore Yearbook: Strangers In Paradise

As an annual tradition at the Baltimore Comic Con the organizers put together a 'Yearbook' typically celebrating a creator owned comic property that the guests of the show pay homage to with a piece of artwork. This year (the seventh year of the tradition) The work of Terry Moore (Strangers in Paradise, Echo, Rachel Rising, and Motor Girl) is the theme.

To the left you can see my finished piece of the main Strangers in Paradise characters playing the Mouse Guard board game Swords & Strongholds.
Below I'll walk though the steps to create the piece.

So, you may be as surprised as I was about the piece being human women. No animals in clothes, no creatures, no craggy dwarves...but pretty (I hope) ladies. I wanted to do Terry's characters justice and as they appear in his works...and I wanted to stretch my wings a bit and force myself out of my comfort zone....but again, I don't normally draw stuff like this...so I looked up reference. I had an idea to exemplify the romantic & friendship tension between the characters by having them play a board game or cards...I searched for 'women playing chess' and found this stock photo.


I then reoriented the image so it fit the book's dimensions. On my lightpad I worked out the anatomy basing it on a printout of the stock photo...but I needed it to look right in my type of linework as well as for the features & clothes to look like Katchoo & Francine. And to add in a bit of that Mouse Guard feel, I replaced the chess bits with Swords and Strongholds (and filled in some negative space with the cards strewn around).

The Swords and strongholds bits look like finished artwork because I was able to paste in my digital files for the cards as well as the diagram from the instructions sheet for the game.



With a layout drawn and digitally composited together of Mouse Guard gaming components, it was time to start inking.

I printed out the above layout and then taped that printout to the back of a sheet of Strathmore 300 series bristol. On my lightpad I can see through the surface of the bristol to the printout to use as a 'pencils' guide to ink from. I used Copic Multiliner pens (the 0.7 nib mostly) and added all the lineweight and texture I could to make the piece as 'David Petersen' as possible.

Note: I did ink all the cards and board by hand instead of just digitally paste them in...this way the original art is complete (and will be up for auction at the convention) and the line quality/scale matches the rest of the piece, instead of looking like it was resized and digitally added.


Once the inks were finished I scanned in the original art and started the coloring process by painting in flat colors.

These flat colors help in the next step when I needed to isolate one area (like the floor or Francine's dress) and render it with light and shadow independently of the other areas. So, the flatting stage is basically digitally coloring inside the lines.

I also established all the color holds here (areas where I wanted the lineart to be a color other than black) on Francine's dress & necklace, Katchoo's nose, and all the cards.


The last step was to render the color fully and add shadow, highlight, and texture. I use Photoshop's Dodge and Burn tools with a stock textured brush to achieve this.

The finished piece (seen to the right) will be one of many artist homages to Terry's work. The Baltimore Comic Con Yearbook will be for sale at the convention (and usually online from the convention afterwards) and as I mentioned above, the original art will be auctioned off on the Saturday of the convention.

For more info about the 2018 Baltimore Comic Con Yearbook:
http://baltimorecomiccon.com/baltimore-comic-con-yearbook/

2018 Appearances:
Baltimore Comic Con: Sept. 28-30
New York Comic Con: Oct. 4-7

Read more ...

TMNT Macro Series Michelangelo Cover Process

I have done the cover for the upcoming TMNT Macro Series issue for Michelangelo issue from IDW. I was lucky enough to be asked by series editor Bobby Curnow to do covers for the 4 issue series (this being the second of which).

I've done several TMNT covers in the past and You can click here for all my past TMNT covers and the process to create them

You can see my finished cover art to the left, but below I'll walk through the steps to create the art.



Layout/Pencils:
Bobby gave me some leeway when it came to the visuals for these covers. I didn't have to do something specifically from the events of the issue and I could do something more 'classic'. After reading the outline, I decided to play on some themes rather than a literal illustration of a moment. The issue deals with Michelangelo struggling with the idea of 'home' in some ways, and wistfully idealizing his 'youth'. So I tried to do a layout that had the nostalgic feeling a Rockwell painting evokes. I wanted to have Mike on the farm, but not rely on the farmhouse architecture as visually interesting enough, and I thought of a windmill...



For the windmill, I used Google Sketch-up's library to find an already built digital model of a pump wind mill. Every photo I'd find of the type of windmill I was looking for was taken from ground level, and didn't have the details or angle I needed, so the model would be a perfect way to set the position just how I wanted it. While I was there, I also found a farmhouse model to use the geometry for. I redrew each of these elements on a light pad adding or omitting details and getting a feel for them in my own line.

I then discovered that the person who modeled the mill, didn't set up the linkage properly, and that mill wouldn't be able to spin completely around before getting hung up on itself. I had to redesign the mill's works as I was redrawing it.


Inks:
Once the above layout was composited together with my drawing of Mike, the mill, and the house (and with some added color to help myself and the editor and license holder visualize what I was aiming for in the final art), I started to ink the piece. The layout was printed out and taped to the back of a sheet of Strathmore 300 series bristol. On a lightpad, I inked the cover with Copic Multiliners (I used the 0.7 nib mainly). On the lightpad I can see through the surface of the bristol to the printed layout and use that as a guide to ink from. This also makes the final art cleaner and with no need to erase or digitally sweep away blue-line.

Color Flats:
After I finished the inks, I scanned them at 400 resolution on my flatbed scanner. After a little tweaking to adjust the levels of the white and black areas, I did the flats for the coloring process. Flatting is adding in flat un-rendered, un-textured color. It's about establishing color areas, that Mike's skin is a different color than his shell or the sky, and where all of those areas start and stop.

I also added in the color holds at this stage. These are areas where I painted the linework as a color rather than black. Doing this helped add depth with the house, the trees, the geese, and the clouds as well as some lighting & design effects with the patch on his bag, the polka-dots on his bindle sack, and the non-brand cola bottle.


Colors: 
Here again are the final colors for the cover. To render all the tones I use the dodge and burn tools in Photoshop with a stock textured brush to get that pebbled look.

Oh, I forgot to mention the significance of the patch on the bag. I started out by wanting to give Mike more than just a bindle while he contemplates a life on the road or running away, and I added in that old army backpack similar to one my Dad bought for the camping excursions of his youth. That bag was still around when I was a kid, and a collapsible shovel was also inside it, so I drew it in here...and then I thought I'd add a patch of some group, and decided on the New York National Guard, thinking that wherever Mike got this, from the farmhouse, one of April or Casey's relatives, or somewhere in the city...the NY branch of the civilian soldiers.

2018 Appearances:

Baltimore Comic Con: Sept. 28-30
New York Comic Con: Oct. 4-7

Read more ...