Michel FiffeDr. Doom was created by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee. This is yet another Kirby design that I never even attempted to draw. Not a single doodle, not a sample page, nothing. And now? I’m afraid I have to give everything up and dedicate my life to Victor Von Doom.
You saw that right: final, pencil, prelim. Next: 500 Doom comics.
GALACTUS was created by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee. This is my first time drawing this iconic Fantastic Four character. Drawing this quintessential Kirby design — drawing any of his creations, really — is a true privilege.
Above: the final piece. Below: as tight a pencil drawing as I can do and its preliminary sketch.
I drew some pages in Captain Victory and the Galactic Rangers #2 – in stores September 2014!
This is a new take on a Jack Kirby creation, published by Dynamite Entertainment, spearheaded & conceived by Joe Casey, and drawn by Nathan Fox and a slew of cartoonists, myself included, and colored by Brad Simpson.
Adam McGovern interviewed me for the Jack Kirby Collector #63 about my involvement in the project.
Joe Casey has a couple of interviews himself on the subject, full of awesome preview pages. He even went down the roll call!
It was a pleasure to be part of this great project, to work with people I like and respect, and to get a chance to directly honor the King of Comics.
JACK KIRBY FOREVER!
Copra #16 exists — it is HERE! Who does it feature? This preview might give you a clue.
I’ll admit that this was one of the most difficult issues to produce. I basically knew what the story was, what the dialogue lines and general staging would be, but… I didn’t really know until I started to actually work on it. It was very odd. The process probably didn’t help: I wanted to invoke a little bit of Jack Kirby in this chapter (being that Guthie is based on one of his creations). I’ve been running on a Kirby influence in a spontaneous, gut level, get-it-done kind of way, but this time I wanted to try it a little differently.
I’ve heard of Jack drawing a page by starting at the top left hand corner and continuing down to the lower right hand corner until the page was complete. The drawing sounded like it was more stream of consciousness and less obviously calculated. The planning was all in Jack’s head.
So in the spirit of that anecdote, I decided to forego any layouts whatsoever. I also didn’t break up the stages into workload batches the way I usually do. This meant that I woke up with two blank pages staring at me, equipped with only a vague notion of what I wanted to do. By the end of the day, my aim was to have two complete pages, fully colored and ready to scan.
Wake up, coffee, write, lay out, podcast, pencil, lunch, ink, coffee, walk dog, more ink, more podcasts, dinner, question life choices, stretch legs, more ink, color, pass out, repeat next day.
Sometimes I nailed it, sometimes I was too wiped out to even erase a page. This issue kicked my ass, but I’m really happy with the results. You’ll like it.
And of course, it’s about Guthie, whom last we saw crashing and falling through a window in some far off world. Looks like she survived and when you read the issue, you’ll know how.
So anyway, this thing exists. Bless Bergen Street Comics for furnishing the proof.
It will made available sometime in August/September. I will write all release dates and order codes with blood clouds in the sky and then you will know. You will finally know.
Baltimore Comic-Con is the show I’ll be attending September 5th-7th, but we got a while before that happens. I still gotta put out another issue.
Recently, we all celebrated George O’Connor’s birthday by fooling him into thinking the topic of the day was “unicorns”, while actually drawing something more directly related to him. I opted for his favorite Olympian god Hermes!
Earlier in the week, Drawbridge came up with J.M. DeMatteis Day, in which we all depicted some of our favorite DeMatteis characters. I drew J’onn J’onzz, the Martian Manhunter in his natural state, inspired by the mini series of the same name that J.M. did with Mark Badger for DC Comics. Whatever results from their fantastic collaborations, it comes highly recommended (see Gargoyle and Greenberg the Vampire). I also threw in some Oreos (J’onzz’ favorite) as a tip o’ the hat to DeMatteis’ run on Justice League, and some Dostoevsky (one of J.M.’s favorite). Huzzah!
Also, we all drew characters from the comic, LOVIATHAN, in celebration of its creator Mike Cavallaro’s birthday. I drew Queen Aine, who has a head piece that rivals Jack Kirby’s Maximus the Mad.
On an unrelated note, a couple of weeks ago, The Comics Reporter had their weekly “Five for Friday” ask their readers to “Name Five Members Of A Rogues Gallery NOT Batman’s, Dick Tracy’s Or Spider-Man’s And Don’t Identify The Hero.” I submitted my Top 5 villains as:
1) Ammo
2) Bullet
3) Bushwacker
4) Wildboys
5) Typhoid Mary
In closing, I’d like to show you my drawing of those villains, a sort of warm up sketch I did before that list was asked for. It was meant to be!
But enough warming up. It’s time to go to work.
I was talking about comic book inkers with George O’Connor a couple of weeks ago and during our conversation, I realized that I’ve never inked anyone before. I’ve never been inked either, which is fine because I wouldn’t wish my sloppy pencil work on my worst enemy*. I’m still fascinated by the old school assembly line process, so George and I agreed to swap drawings for each to work on.
My first Kamandi drawing for his greatest fan’s birthday, Nikki B a.k.a. NUB a.k.a. Nick Bertozzi (I dated it the day I drew it, a few days ago).
Kamandi is,of course, a Jack Kirby character. His comics are fun; read ’em!
