Original Drawing Archives - Page 2 of 2

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.

24 Hour Comics Day 2009 – Santa Fe, Part 1

*Ralph Contreras drawing a 24-hour comic page*

24-Hour Comics Day 2009 – Santa Fe, Part 1

This year I participated in 24-Hour Comics Day again. It was held from October Saturday the 3rd to the 4th. I had such a blast with it last year that there was no question I would do it again. The goal is to create 24 comic pages in 24 hours. It’s a very challenging exercise. You come to the table with no idea of what you are going to write and draw, and from there you create a 24-page story.

Last year there was a place to participate in 24 Hour Comic in Santa Fe NM (that’s where I live right now), but this year the closest place was in Albuquerque, NM. I decided to stay home and work on the 24-hour comic on my drawing table. I was committed to participating no matter where I did it.

The first few hours were tough, the year before I created my 24-hour comic with the help of my girlfriend as my inker. This year I was working completely solo. I was finding it hard to find a fast rhythm. I was really digging what I was coming up with, but I was just a little slower than I originally wanted to be.

My girlfriend helped me out by updating my Twitter, Facebook & Flickr pages. One of the Twitter updates caught the attention of the group in Albuquerque. They were updating their blog dedicated to the 24-Hour comic and told me to send them some photos of my stuff. You can check out the 1st of 2 posts showing my work progress during the event. 24 hours from the New Mexico blog (Hour 13 1/2 from New Mexico). What was cool is the blog post was picked up by the Official Nation 24-Hour Comic Book Blog too. – (Hour 13 1/2 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 – Enchantress (Marvel)

The Enchantress drawing by Ralph Contreras

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge – Enchantress (Marvel)

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge! Here’s the 3rd quick 30-minute daily sketch. This drawing was done on Wednesday, October 7th of Amora The Enchantress from Marvel Comics.

This sketch was very challenging for me. It took me a little longer than my allowed 30 minutes, about 45. I started with a real rough sketch using an H2 drafting pencil. I was trying to give her a soft look, but I think she actually looks a little stiff. This is why I’m doing this daily exercise. To help me get a loose and softer drawing style. I find that there is stiffness in my illustrations sometimes when I work on them too much.

The enchantress was one of the first female characters I read in comics. The second comic I ever read was Marvel Super Heroes: Secret Wars, but it was the 1st series I actively read. I remember hitting all the gas stations looking for the latest issue. So it was fun drawing a character I’ve been familiar with most of my comic reading and drawing life.

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 – The Maxx

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge – The Maxx

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge! Here’s the 2nd quick 30-minute daily sketch. This drawing was done on Tuesday, October 6th. The Maxx by Sam Kieth was suggested by my friend Carlos Parra via his Twitter account @carlosparra

This was a fun character to draw. I knew I wanted to make him big and exaggerated. That’s the way I remembered him. Never drawing the Maxx before I was very excited to have fun with this. I was able to get the sketch done in 35 minutes. I used an H2 drafting pencil. I think I had better control of it than the HB I used for the last quick sketch.

I remember when I had my comic book store, The Maxx Comic was always a very popular character. I literally could not keep the comics in stock. This was years after its publication too. I think it was so popular because of Maxx, MTV Cartoon. Which was great because it brought the character and comics to a more mainstream audience.

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 – Manhunter IV (Marc Shaw)

The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge – Manhunter IV (Marc Shaw)

Last night I drew the 1st in a series of quick 30-minute daily sketches. I’m calling them The Daily Comic Sketch Challenge. After asking for suggestions on Twitter and DeviantArt the first drawing is The Manhunter IV (Marc Shaw).

I had fun with this drawing. I’ve never really read any comic with this Manhunter, but the costume design is very cool. I actually took a little longer than 30 minutes, I think I took about 45. I used an HB drafting pencil, Only sharpening it once. With this drawing, I tried to be quick, but not lose detail. I also tried to use shadow and reflection of light. Thanks to @BlaqueSaber on Twitter for the great suggestion!

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.

Twitter Contest – Original Captain Marvel Drawing – By Comic Book Artist Eric Merced

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.