Original Captain Marvel Drawing By Comic Book Artist Eric Merced
I’ve been very active on Twitter for the past few months. I’ve actually maxed out the number of people I can follow (which is 2001). I would say that about 80% of the people I follow are comic book artists, writers, and fellow fans. Well, a few weeks ago I saw a contest for an original drawing from comic book artist Eric Merced through his Twitter account @eric_merced. “1st and 5th to tweet a character for me to draw on live stream…” I tweeted my favorite character Captain Marvel and was the 1st to enter and win the contest!
The cool thing about the live stream was I got to see him draw it live. Eric Merced talked about why he liked the character of Captain Marvel while he sketched him out. It was really interesting to see the process he used when going from sketching to drawing and finally to inking. He also had a question/answer session with other people watching via a chat widget. The original drawing is 7″ x 5″ and he gave it to me, which was very awesome of him!
As a fun added pulse the mailer that the drawing came in had a cool drawing of Captain Marvel too. Thanks, Eric Merced for an awesome original drawing! 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.
Digital Inking with Illustrator Vector Anchor Points
I’ve received several requests to show the steps I used to create my digital inking of the Fantastic Four pin-up I did of artist Ariel Padilla’s pencils. I was looking for some art to ink and found the pencils on his DeviantArt page. This was a practice exercise I gave myself in the inking process of comic book art using Adobe Illustrator. I’ve been a graphic designer for over 9 years but this was the first time I used my design knowledge for comic book inking.
For this self-assignment, I decided to use Adobe Illustrator for inking the pin-up. I had used photoshop for a previous piece earlier I did of Batman 2.0, a character redesign. I had fun with that illustration but this time I wanted to do this digital inking in vector format. Why choose vector verse bitmap? Well, a vector image is made up of anchor points that are connected by paths (lines) that connect them. A vector image can be re-sized without loss of quality to the illustration. So basically you can re-size the image as small or as large as you’d like without pixelation, it will keep its sharpness no matter the size. Which is really neat.
Points & Paths: Example 2
For this illustration, I choose to use my anchor points to create only straight paths (lines). I didn’t use any curved lines. The cool thing about using anchor points and paths is that you can make curved paths, resulting in fewer points This is shown in Points & Paths: Example 2. So why didn’t I use curve paths? Well, honestly it was a self-exercise to see if I could do it. I wanted to create curved lines through straight lines. I found it to be a fun challenge.
I did not create lines or outlines of the original pencils. What I did was look at each line as a shape. I could have easily used the brush tool in Illustrator, but I found I actually had more control over what I wanted to achieve by using the pen tool.
Points & Paths: Example 3
With the technique, I like to use anchor points and paths I am able to get a type of jagged smooth shape. The strength of anchor points is you can use as many or as few points as you’d like to create your lines or shapes. I’ve illustrated this in Points & Paths: Example 3.
Points & Paths: Example 4
After I created the shape from the pencils, I colored it in black. I’ve shown this in Points & Paths: Example 4. As you can see it’s a piece of a puzzle that makes up the inking. These shapes help to create the feel I was looking for when digitally inking this drawing. This technique really works well when inking the Thing’s rocky skin.
Points & Paths: Example 5
I have included more examples of the anchor points and paths technique I use in inking these pencils. In Points & Paths: Example 5, we see how the wavy fire on Human Torch can be created without using curved lines. Every anchor point in the flames helps to create the illusion of line weight, depth, and movement.
Points & Paths: Example 6
In Points & Paths: Example 6, I’ve shown how I created what looks to be a line on the Invisible Woman’s arm. It is actually a curved shape created with paths. It is a shape that includes the bottom line of her arm and the shadows around her neck. You can see her hands and the background is already colored in.
Although this technique might not seem to be the most efficient, it allows for a lot of control. Looking at each line as a shape helped me to create a type of line work I would not have achieved otherwise.
This was my first comic book digital inking using Adobe Illustrator with the anchor points and paths technique. I have done a few more since this one. Although I have used curved lines in those illustrations. This was a fun self-exercise in learning to digitally ink the work of someone else. I am very happy with the way this illustration came out, and I’ll continue to use Adobe Illustrator to digitally ink comic book pencils.
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.
Vader’s Fist – The 501st Legion – Digitally Inked in Adobe Illustrator
A few months ago I decided to draw Vader’s Fist, the 501st Legion. I’m a huge Star Wars fan and wanted to draw something cool. I usually draw comic book characters but I think it was a fun change to draw some sci-fi stuff. The 501st Legion is cool because they are in the prequels, the original trilogy, and the extended universe. They are the highest and most elite Stormtroopers in the Empire. First starting off as the best clone troopers then as Darth Vader’s personal squad. Check out this article at Wookipedia to learn more about them.
This is the final digital inking of my original 11″x17″ drawing. I used my graphic design skills in adobe illustrator to ink the 501. The original drawing was done with an HB woodless pencil. I posted it in an earlier blog post, Vader’s Fist – The 501st Legion – Pencil Drawing. Check it out if you’d like. What’s really cool is if you do a Google image search for “Vader’s Fist” the original pencils show up on page one.
501st from Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith
For this digital inking, I decided to use Adobe Illustrator. I’ve done inking in Adobe Photoshop before, but I find that I really like the way my digital inks look in illustrator. In illustrator your inking is in vector, this allows you to enlarge the image with no pixelation. So if I really wanted to I could make a print the size of a building and it would look awesome and sharp.
Example of anchor points
The tool I like to use in illustrator is the pen tool. I do have a Wacom table, but I feel I have more control with the mouse and pen tool. It lets me create a smooth/jagged line in my piece. I work with anchor points to create curved lines, straight lines, and solid shapes. There was some line work where I did use the brush tool with my Wacom tablet, but most of this digital inking was done with the pen tool.
I’ve very happy with the way this digital inking came out. Ever since I moved to Santa Fe last year, I’ve felt a real recharge in my artwork. The penciling and inking of Vader’s Fist, the 501st Legion is a great example of this. I had a real blast inking it. 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.
Here are my digital inks of Thor, the God of Thunder. He’s one of Marvel Comics’ main characters. A founding member of the Avengers and actually in the very first comic book I ever read. This is the new costume he’s wearing in his new monthly title.
This was a pencil drawing of Thor I did last week. It was a quick drawing using an HB woodless Ebony pencil. I traditionally use an H6 pencil for light-tight penciling. For this, I actually was able to achieve good detail with the softer lead. It’s good to get out of your comfort zone and try different drawing tools.
I inked this drawing digitally using Adobe Illustrator. I didn’t do it in one sitting. I took my time and did it in small spurts during the week. (Usually watching a Netflix movie on the side). I’ve only just recently started inking my drawings on the computer, which is ironic because being a Graphic Designer for over 10 years you’d think I would have done it years ago.
I like using Adobe Illustrator for inking, I know a lot of people use photoshop which is a great software too. The reason I use illustrator is that I like saving my inks as a vector images. Vector images are great because there are no worries about pixelation. They are always super high resolution even if it’s reduced or enlarged.
For this inking, I only used the pen tool with my mouse or Wacom tablet. It helps to give me the look I want to achieve. I like the sharp edges and thick to-thin lines I get with it. There’s an amount of control I feel I have with the pen tool. I think in my next digital inking I will use only the bush tool. Like I said earlier it’s always good to try different tools. I plan on coloring these inks in the near future using Photoshop.
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.
Here is a digitally inked Pinup of an awesome penciled piece of the Fantastic Four by artist Ariel Padilla. I found the pencils on his DeviantArtpage and I knew I had to ink it. I used Adobe Illustrator so I could create a vector image. This way it can be reduced or enlarged with no pixelation of the image. This is actually my second piece digitally inked but the first I’ve done in Illustrator. My Batman 2.0 character redesign was my first digitally inked piece but for that I used Photoshop. I have used Illustrator in the past to create illustrations, logos, advertisements, and marketing but this was the first time I incorporated my graphic design skills into inking.
I have a Wacom tablet but for this digital inking, I used only my mouse and the pen tool. So basically the piece is all straight vector anchor points. This illustration took about 5 hours, which is longer than I thought it would, but it was fun and a nice practice piece. On my next Illustrator ink, I plan on using the Wacom tablet and the brush tool. Right now it is all about having fun and learning to use the tools I use in my graphic design work in my comic book artwork. My next step will be to create flats for these inks and maybe color them too.
Original Pencils of Fantastic Four by Ariel Padilla
