Comic Archives - Page 2 of 4

The Hunter – Character Design – From Sketches to Final Ink – Part 3

A few months ago I was looking through some of my old drawings. Ones I did while I was a kid up to when I was in college. I found my original sketches for a character named “The Hunter”. I had redesigned his history and biography a few years ago, so I decide to redesign his look too.

For the past year, I’ve been digitally inking my pencils. I usually use Adobe Illustrator using vector points. I like using the pen tool to create crisp sharp/smooth lines. But for this inking, I wanted to go old school and use a real brush and pen. A process I do not use very often. I had a real blast inking it by hand!I didn’t want to lose my pencils so I scanned the original and reprinted them on card stock. I used Adobe Photoshop to replace the original black lines with blue lines. This way it would be easier for me to ink them.

Here are my final inks of “The Hunter” I had a real blast with this piece. I started with very rough sketches to tight pencils and finally to a finished inked piece. In my next blog post (that’s right I have one more to go) I’ll show you what I did to vectorize my final inks so I can print them at any size without losing the quality of the inks. – Shazam!

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

The Hunter – Character Design – From Sketches to Final Ink – Part 2

Hunter-Pencils — The Hunter by Ralph Contreras

The Hunter – Character Design – From Sketches to Final Ink – Part 2

While looking through some of my drawings from ten years ago I found a character design I did for “The Hunter”. From that original sketch, I redesigned his look and biography. The newer design sketches were a little rough, but they were intentionally quick to get my thoughts down on paper.

Once I had the look for The Hunter down, then I could start having fun. I decided to draw him in an action pose, jumping at a target with his gun and sword ready for battle. I tried playing with shadows, perspective, and highlights. I’ve been refining these elements in my drawings. They have been helpful in me finding my own comic book art style.

Hunter-Blue-Pencils — The Hunter Blue Pencils by Ralph Contreras

Now that I’ve got an awesome action pose drawing I was ready to ink it. I’ve been digitally inking my pencils for the past year. For this drawing, I wanted to go old school and ink with real ink, but I didn’t want to lose my original pencils. So I scanned the drawing and turned the pencil lines blue in Adobe Photoshop (being the crafty graphic designer I am). I then printed the pencils on card stock paper and was ready to ink traditionally.

Right on! My next post will show the cool inking of this Pin-up. So keep an eye out.
-Shazam!

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

The Hunter – Character Design – From Sketches to Final Ink – Part 1

The Hunter – Character Design – From Sketches to Final Ink – Part 1

I was going through some of my old sketches the other day. I have a personal treasury of character designs and comic book drawings. Back in the day, I would love to come up with new characters. It seems I don’t draw as much now as I did back then (and I draw a lot now). I’d draw and come up with a new character every day.

On one of my inspirational days, I can up with a character named Nemcromn. You can check out some redesign sketches I’ve done of him in a previous post, Nemcromn Character Design Sketches On that day I came up with both Nemcromn and his main adversary “The Hunter”. Here are the initial drawings of “The Hunter”. I had just seen the movie Blade and was really into Brom art at the time. I think his design is very much inspired by both.

The original design of The Hunter was done sometime between 1998-1999. Ten years later in 2009 I found my sketch and decided to change it up a bit. I redesigned Nemcromn and wrote a new extensive biography for him and gave him a new adversary “The Radiant Guardian”. I decided to change “The Hunter” too. He was now an assassin/hunter who now works for Nemcromn. The Hunter and a new character I came up with, named the Grimm Creeper would now be Nemcromn’s most deadly assassins always trying to outdo each other in his favor. You can check out Grimm Creeper’s original and resign on a previous post Grimm Creeper, Hand Scythe Weapons

With the redesign, I made him a little bulkier. These are quick sketches to get the feel and general look of The Hunter. My drawing style has changed in 10 years when drawing a quick idea sketch I want to get his look down. These drawings look a little rough, what I’m trying to do is get my ideas down on paper before I lose them. I’m not as concerned about making them look perfect on these initial drawings, that will come later when I draw him in a pinup of some sequential pages.

In my next post I’ll be showing a Pin-Up drawing I did of “The Hunter”. This will be a more defined drawing. So keep an eye out.

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

I Conquered the 30 Characters Challenge!

I Conquered the 30 Characters Challenge!

In the month of November 2009, Tyler James created an awesome opportunity for creative minds to unite. He put forth the challenge of creating 30 characters in 30 days, 30Characters.wordpress.com. I of course answered the call. It was also answered by over 25 other artists.

Here are my 30 Original Characters.

Every day for a month I’d set down and try to come up with a new character. It was a really fun challenge. I don’t think I’ve drawn so many characters since I was a kid.

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

30 Characters 30 Days – Day 2 – Beta-A.T.E.S 005

30 Characters Challenge 2009 – #2 Beta-A.T.E.S 005

Real Name: Beta – All Terrain Environmental Suit version 5
Aliases: Beta-A.T.E.S 005
Occupation: All Terrain Environmental Suit
Group Affiliation: None
Height: 6′ 2″
Weight: 325 pounds
Eyes: none
Hair: none

Known Powers: Mining Tools
Special Skills: None
Weapons: Mining Tools

History:
The Beta-A.T.E.S 005 is the 5th generation All Terrain Environmental Suit. The suit is designed to be used in space, asteroid mining, deep sea exploration, and any extreme environment.

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

30 Characters 30 Days – Day 1 – Burn

30 Characters Challenge 2009 – #1 Burn

Real Name: Jason Eagleson
Aliases: Firebug
Occupation: Costume Criminal
Group Affiliation: The Holidays
Height: 6′ 1″
Weight: 189 pounds
Eyes: Green
Hair: Brown

Known Powers: None
Special Skills: Arsonist
Weapons: Flamethrower Suit

History:
As a child, Jason loved playing with fires and matches. He would light up trash cans, weeds, his toys, and anything he thought might make that wonderful pop sound he loved. At the age of 17, Jason was well known for setting fires, so when the local church burnt down and took half his neighborhood Jason was the prime suspect. He didn’t start the fire though, it was the local bully Alex Masterson and his little gang. They knew that they could burn down the church for a laugh and blame it on Jason, and that’s exactly what they did. Jason was arrested and with the witnesses of Alex and his friends was sentenced to 10 years in jail.

Jason’s life in jail was hard, and there was nothing he could burn. Jason was able to work in the prison cafeteria. He thought to be finely found his way to play with the flames again, lighting the burners on the stove. On his first shift that’s exactly what he did. He played, and he started a fire that burnt the kitchen, the prison, the other inmates, and himself. In the chaos, a badly burn Jason escaped the prison with a few other inmates.

One of the other escaped inmates was James Barton a.k.a Acid-Trail. James had connections with Boss Holiday, a very well-known crime boss who specialized in costumed criminals. James helped a badly burn Jason by taking him to one of Holiday’s safe houses. Holiday’s people tended to Jason’s wounds and helped him recuperate. The only condition for the help was Jason would now work for Boss Holiday when he was well.

Jason Eagleson was given a fire-creating flamethrower suit, on this day Burn was born. Burn is now one of Boss Holiday’s most loyal generals in his small army of costumed criminals.

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge – Dee Dee Twins (Batman Beyond)

Dee Dee Twins drawing by Ralph Contreras

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge – Dee Dee Twins (Batman Beyond)

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge! Here’s the 5th quick 30-minute daily sketch. This drawing was done on Monday, October 12th of the Dee Dee Twins from DC’s Batman Beyond! I took a little longer than the allowed 30 minutes. Probably about 45, but there are two characters.

So for this drawing, I decided to do the Dee Dee twins. They are fun and full of energy. so I drew them jumping toward us. I used my H2 drafting pencil and started with light lines, then added more defined lines. The drawing came out a little stiff again. It might be the way I approach drawing females. This exercise has defiantly shown me that I do approach my drawing in different ways. I’ve decided that I’m going to practice a very quick gesture drawing every day of the female form. Like the beginning warm-up, I did in figure drawing class back in college.

The Dee Dee Twins haven’t been in any comic books, they have appeared in the Batman Beyond – Return of the Joker DVD and a two-part story in the Justice League Unlimited cartoon. Turns out they are actually Harley Quinn’s future granddaughters.

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

24 Hour Comics Day 2009 – Santa Fe, NM

24 Hour Comics Day 2009 – Santa Fe, NM

This year I participated in the annual 24-Hour Comic. The challenge is to create 24 pages of a comic book within 24 hours. This was the second time I’ve done it. I really had a great time doing it too. At times it felt like I wasn’t going to finish, but I did…..with 3 minutes to spare (WhaZa!). It has been a very popular and fun exercise for both writers and artists. The idea is to come up with no preconceived notions of what you’re going to create, and make a 24-page comic!

So here it is, my 24-Hour Comic entitled “infiltration” written, penciled, and inked by me Ralph Contreras in 24 hours and 57 minutes on October 3rd to 4th, for the 2009 24-Hour Comics Day! I did my pages with widescreen panels, I think it adds a significant element to the storytelling.

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

24 Hour Comics Day 2009 – Santa Fe, Part 2

Ralph Contreras inking a 24-hour comic page

24 Hour Comics Day 2009 – Santa Fe, Part 2

The Half-Way Point!
Participating in 24-Hour Comics Day. Here I am 12 hours into the challenge. Not as far ahead as I had planned. But still having fun. I originally planned to have the comic done within the 1st 12 hours. I’m actually on pages 6 and 7 at this point. Not even the halfway mark. I honestly didn’t think I would finish, but I knew I wasn’t going to give up. (I did finish the 24-hour comic, at exactly 11:57 am…. with 3 minutes to spare. Shazam!)

As I started to fall back on the pages and the time was moving forward, I thought what can I do to catch up and finish? I decided to work on pages very similar to Marvel Comics’ new format of widescreen comics. That’s where you place your panels stretched out through 2 pages. Like several widescreen shots. Marvel’s title Dark Avengers is very well known for this.

Once I decided to use this technique I was able to catch up. It gave me a great opportunity to create some very dynamic angle shots. Once I gained my confidence that I could finish the comic the story just flowed out of me. It’s full of action and fight scenes. It was really a fun comic to do. The story ends up with soldiers, ninjas, villains, and even a giant monster.

My progress was posted on a few sites during the event. On both the local and national 24 Hour comic blog sites. Here are the links to these sites. 24 hours from New Mexico Blog – Hours 14 through 18 from New Mexico Official Nation 24-Hour Comic Book Blog – Hours 14 through 18 from New Mexico

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge – Modok

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge – Modok

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge! Here’s the 4th quick 30-minute daily sketch. This drawing was done on Friday, October 9th of Modok (Mobile Organism Designed Only for Killing) from Marvel Comics. I took one day off the challenge, but came back with a really fun sketch!

The last sketch I did of the Enchantress didn’t come out as well as I’d hoped, she came out a little too stiff. So for this one, I decided not to get to stressed and just had fun with it. This was actually the sketch I’d been looking forward to drawing the most. I worked with an H2 drafting pencil and a simple eraser. Started off with very loose lines and added details along the way. To be honest, this drawing took a little longer than 30 minutes, it took me about 45. But I think that’s ok. My goal with this exercise is to help in speeding my drawing but also to loosen up.

When I started reading comics it was Marvel comics. So I totally knew and have read comics with Modok. Modok’s just a supergiant head on a hover chair, that’s fun and cool. I didn’t realize there was such a fanbase for the character. I found numerous websites dedicated to him and Marvel Comics even has an official Modok blog. When Marvel created a new Super-Villain Team-Up limited series, Modok was the main character. I had lots of fun with this drawing and I think it shows. – Shazam

This blog post was originally published on my former website, Comic Book Graphic Design and has now been migrated here to RSC Arts, Artist Blog.