Pen Brush Practice

More Pen Brush Practice.

Brush Pen

Yesterday I got my Pentel Pocket Brush Pen in the mail. Having never used one before I was super excited to finally have a chance to try it out. Have to say it was pretty awesome. I have a shaky hand and with a brush my line tends to waiver quite a bit but the pen calmed that down a good amount. After fooling around in my sketch book I attacked some of these figures I had sketched up for a comic I'll be working on in the near future.

Cartoons

I have a pretty stupid sense of humor and I've been doing these cartoons recently. I like them a lot, hope you do too.

Turtle Surfing

Lately I've been doing these short cartoons. Colored this one in.

The Watchers

I've been working on this in my spare time the past few weeks. Figured the life of a Lookout must be a pretty boring one.

Logan

Quick ink practice sketch I decided to color in.

Matt's Monsters

Here's another page from Matt's Monsters. It's one of my favorite pages despite being a tough one to work on. More than halfway done on the inside pages. Onto the next one.

Shark Week

I did it. Once again I have survived the beach. As always my family took a trip down to Duck, NC with additional family and family friends for the week. I went along with them for five days along with my girlfriend who absolutely loves the beach. The people that know me know I can't stand the beach. It's sunny and sandy and sticky and sweaty and salty and hot. I am also terrified of sharks.

Something about a creature twice my size moving through an environment I can't move well in and can't see in ripping through my flesh and bones and dragging me further into the water then releasing me in time for me to swim to shore and bleed to death in the hot sun and sand scares the shit out of me, I don't know maybe I'm weird. I spend my time in the water and on the beach fervently on the look out for these beast.

Of course shark week always falls on the week we go to the beach and being an animal lover I love watching so that I can learn all I can about these incredible animals so I can use the knowledge acquired through these shows to fight off an inevitable attack one day.

As a tribute to these creatures that frighten and amaze me I did a little wash of a great white emphasizing the streamlined strength and size of the beast. I drew the pencil on bristol which really isn't great for washes but I enjoyed doing it.

What to do with Crack

With the end of my work for Fables for Japan I'm now returning to work on Matt's Monsters and working on Charlie Ironpaw. The tight deadline I had for Fables and the extra push I had to do towards the end to complete my project on time brought home a fact I've been thinking about for quite sometime: My inking process takes way too long.

I've been inking pretty much the same way since High School. Basically I trace my pencils with a #3 micron pen, then erase the pencil, then trace over the now slightly faded ink with a #5 micron adding some line weight in the process. So essentially, I draw my drawing 3 times.

This is simply not time effective and since I'm primarily working on Matt's Monsters I decided it would be a good time to practice some brush and ink work when I can find time so that I'm ready to ink my comics when the time comes.

I have tried inking in the past but have failed due to lack of trust in myself and my impatience with the lack of control that comes with inexperienced brush work. My big attraction to the microns is that you can be so precise with them while brush work is often spontaneous. Never wanting to give one of my nicer pencil drawings up to the brush I would just go through the time draining micron process.

Over time I've come to appreciate the spontaneity that comes with brush work and it's elegance and flow that I see in other, more experienced artists work. I decided that it's about time for me to see if I can get it to work for me.

I have also decided that I need more practice drawing comic book poses referencing some of my favorite artists. The underneath drawing is a pose I ripped from Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba's Umbrella Academy Apocalypse Suite page... you know the book doesn't list pages but its on the third page of the third chapter. I inked this practice piece with a #1 round brush and black acrylic artist's ink.

For the most part I think it's a good start. I was able to control the brush for the most part and it was certainly quicker than the micron process despite how slowly I had to move to maintain control. I think it's lacking a real style but I imagine that will come as I get more comfortable with the brush. There were also minor details I struggled with and some shaky lines where I got nervous (his nose). The brush is also pretty old and I should really upgrade the ink but it's silly to think that materials would really improve my skills all that much. Once I get more practice and more comfortable then I can upgrade, after all there's no point in buying a Ferrari if you can't drive stick.
I colored it in quickly just because. While coloring it in I struggled to find a reason why I chose Crack as my onomatopoeia, especially in the place I originally put it. I moved it to somewhere that made at least a little bit of sense but whatever. Some good practice but I definitely need some more. When I can find time from Matt's Monsters that is.

Page 1 Final

And here's the first page all colored and textured up. I'm know putting the final touches on the rest of the pages and will be finished tomorrow. I had a lot of fun working on this and learned a lot of new things. I'm excited to see what the other artists have come up with. I'll let you all know when the book is out and ready to download to your ipads, nooks, computers and whatever else you may have, all to benefit the Red Cross' Japanese relief efforts.