24 Hour Comic Day

Today at 10a,m I will be participating in 24hr Comic Day. For those that don't know, its an event held all over the world in different locations (Spokane, Washington location is at Merlyns on W Main). Every artist involved will attempt to draw one 24 page comic in 24 hours. Its pretty daunting considering that most comic pages are drawn in an 8 hour period.
I'm packing up my goods tonight. Not only do I need my art supplies and paper, but also references, mp3 player, movies, and also lots of food. It will be fun.

BTW, random story: I went to the store to buy some Jarritos and some freshly made churros. While driving home, a highschool idiot runs out into the middle of the road and I step on the brakes. Jarritos go flying, shatter, and ruin my churros in the process. Next time I'm just running over the kid, we need less idiots and more churros in this world.

Final Note: 24hr Comic Book Challenge! Asi que ya lo saben, la cita es esta 3 de Octubre a las 10 am y no paramos hasta el 4 de Octubre a las 10 am (Merlyns W 19 Main, Spokane). Estan listos para el reto?

Spokane Street Fair!

Members of the Spokane Comicsmiths' Guild will be at Merlyn's tomorrow (Saturday the 12th) after 3pm as part of the Sustainable September Main Street Fair!

We'll be drawing free sketches for kids between 4-6 and taking sketch commissions for others. There should also be a variety of prints and original artwork for sale as well. If you're a Spokane local, swing by and say Hi, meet the Guild and pick up some art!

In addition to the Guild, Merlyn's will also be host to local members of the 501st Legion from 2-4pm. Get photos of yourself with stormtroopers and more of the Galactic Empire's finest!

The Street Fair will also feature live music, entertainment, sustainability info, kids activities, bike tune-ups, food and fun! In the street - 0 block of West Main, 3-8pm.

Sick Blog

So I've been sick for the last few days. Horrible allergies, then a cold, and now I believe its turned into a sinus infection. I keep drinking juice, gatorade, and hot tea to keep myself hydrated. Its not fun. Yesterday I slept almost the entire time. As soon as I'm done writing this, its back to bed again. I hate sinus pressure!!!

Anyway, I've been unable to draw the last few weeks. Perhaps its due to the oncoming sickness. But I can't draw anything worthwhile, all the poses and gestures look stiff and ridiculous. Right now, I'm just drawing quick gestures in a cheap sketch book, hoping to break this funk.

Well, back to bed. I'll probably take a shower first. Steam is a big help. BTW, I've been reading Arturo Perez-Reverte's Capitan Alatriste. Its quite good! It reminds me of Isabel Allende's Zorro and Alexandre Dumas' Count of Monte Cristo.

Back to the dungeon...

Daily Sketches 7/27/09

Trying to keep up with my daily sketches, I scanned these in this morning. Random doodles while watching tv:

I have a fairy tale that maybe I'd like to illustrate, its very hard to draw several different looking wizards. I think I may have to dress them in different cultural clothing, maybe make one rotund, another spindly thin, etc.


A robot. I don't like the hand, but the rest is okay. I'm not big on drawing robots, mainly because I'm not good at coming up with gears and mechanism stuff to get it to look robotic.

I'm thinking of drawing a whole bunch during the week, then on the weekend scanning a once a week post with all the daily sketches for the week. It might be easier for me to do than just drawing, scanning, updating the blog, etc.

Daily Sketch

I am alive an well, those of you who are my friends on Myspace, Facebook, and the real world know this. I just don't scan much, I'm working on some stuff and I'd prefer to post the final product.

Here's a sketch though, did last week while watching Avatar The Last Airbender:



It took about 5 tries to actually get a decent sketch of my favorite hero, Zorro. Copic brush pens and Faber-Castell multiliners.

I should be updating soon, I'm working on a couple paintings and a comic, so more artwork is in the works. I'll try to keep my daily sketch more regular as well.

Spokane ComiCon TODAY!!

Everyone needs to head to the Spokane ComiCon at Spokane Falls Community College today and attend. It starts at 10am, and there are prizes for first attendees, costume contests, auctions, all sorts of goodies. I'll be there selling my paintings, comics, sketches, and more.

Come by and say hi!!!

For more info: http://www.spokanecomicon.com/

Spokane ComiCon, Free Comic Day, More Work, Sketchbook!

I'm compiling some entries from my deviantArt page here, so here goes:

Everything is going to plan for the Spokane ComiCon. I have 100 (yes that's right, 100) sketchbooks made up for the event. Here's the cover:




I'm expecting to have a lot of extras, I know I'll be handing them out to friends and family, as well as selling extras here and there. I'll also have Solar Flares 24Hour comic available as well, both in Spanish and English. If anyone wants either book after May 30th, you can email me or post here. I'll let you know the details.

I'm planning on having a couple portfolios of my art on display, some 6"x6" sketches on display to entice people to buy $5.00 small sketches. I'm also thinking of doing a $5.00 deal for a book and a sketch inside the book. I'll also have a mini easel on the table displaying some smaller paintings, and a big easel behind displaying my big pieces. I'll be rotating pieces throughout the day.

I'm also going to sift through my work to see if there are any pages worth making prints of.
I hope to see lots of people, stop by and say hi!


During Free Comic Book Day, our group ran into some issues with references when drawing sketches for the kids. Fortunately we were in a gaming/comic shop, so there were some references to be found. But in light of this, I decided to run out to the store and pic up a 2gb microSD card for my phone. Its soul purpose is to be filled with reference images of super heroes, video game characters, manga, movies, tv, whatever. With this, I can thumb through and have references on demand!

But here's the tricky part, what are some of the most beloved characters that I should put on the card?

If you have the time, give me a top ten of your favorite all time characters. With a decent list, I have a direction for character choices. Thanks!


Lastly, I wanted to share a colored piece I just finished (or think I finished, I'm debating on some minor things):


I'm thinking of maybe turning the mountain lineart into color just to give a depth feeling. I'm also thinking of changing the lineart of the etching on the rock into a darker grey instead of the black lines to make it less prominent. Lastly, thinking of changing some of the detail lineart on the tree into a darker brown for a similar reason as the rock. If you have any opinions, let me know!

Robin Comic Page

Its been a while since I've updated. Last week of school was hectic, work has been keeping me too busy, hanging out with new and old friends, and I've been constantly working on art.

Finally, after a month, I was able to finish this with my friend

He wanted to ink something of mine, so I did a quick mockup page of a Robin story I made up. This is the first collab project I have ever done, it was a lot of fun. It was liberating to give my pencils over to a friend whom I trust. It was also refreshing to see what he did with my pencils!


In other art related news, I'm not sure if I will be able to get my Little Red Riding Hood comic done by the comic convention, but I will definitely have pages to show in my portfolio from it, as well as some pages in my sketchbook that I will be selling. Busy busy busy. I'll probably be working on some paintings very soon. I've been wanting to paint more, but its been a push pull between comics and painting.

Well, I have some more work to get done. If I'm lucky, I'll post within a day, with a page from Little Red Riding Hood.

Daily Sketches - 2/14/09

Wow, I haven't posted any daily sketches in a LONG time... I've been drawing, painting, and doing all sorts of other shenanigans, yet I haven't really had time to share.. so this is a good opportunity to get back to that business again :)

First, a recent acrylic painting:

11" x 14" - Acrylic on Masonite. This was a Valentine's gift for a great friend of mine, I think she loved it, at least I hope so :) Its her favorite character, Harley Quinn, from Batman. This was a lot of fun to do, because I put down the brush and paint for a couple month hiatus because of school and my current work on my Little Red Riding comic. This reinvigorated me to do some painting again, I'm planning on at least some small paintings like this, and maybe a large one or two that will be ready for the Spokane ComiCon on May 30th... BTW, I need to buy a booth for Artist's Alley soon.

The daily sketches from today:

Today at work was slow, real slow... and a real blessing. I spent all my breaks and other free time doodling these. I might do a portrait of Joker similar to the sketch above, as a small 11x14 painting like the Harley one. Also, I want to do a 16x20 painting of Batgirl there. I love the action of her fist fighting, it looks exciting and vivid. I think fans would appreciate them at the con and buy the paintings.

Lastly, I went to a curiosity shop and picked up a bunch of old 50s - 70s comics. They really inspired me for my upcoming Little Red Riding Hood comics and Solar Flares volume 1. The old comics have ridiculously stupid ads inside, and I've decided to mimic them and make my own. Here's one that I put together last night:

It mimics another Growth exercise program that was in the comics, I took a lot of the wording straight from the comic; it was too good to change! Lastly, if you reread it as those "special" enlargement ads we see today, this advertisement is even more hilarious..

So, that's a mighty blog entry, I hope it satisfies my few readers. Its time to get back to drawing.

I LOVE Magnus Robot Fighter

So today I came across an obscure comic while browsing. Its called Magnus Robot Fighter 4000ad, printed by Gold Key Comics. First thing that drew me was the painted covers, very pulp magazine like on the cover. Second, its a Flash Gordon type guy beating up robots! I love it! I have an affinity for '50s era robots too, so this is my thing. Now I have a an urge to find as many of these as possible, Magnus is amazing! I'll definitely be looking out for other issues or collections at comic cons, etc.

If I had the opportunity to get the rights, I so totally would. I just get so giddy with golden age heroes, pulp heroes, and the like. There's a sort of awesome charm to them that is hard to find in today's comics. Is it the art style? The stories? The smell of the old comics? A time I long for yet never experienced? I don't know what draws me to this stuff so much, but it definitely gets me excited to draw something. It also gave me some ideas for a future Solar Flares comic. Perhaps Francisco needs to battle robots at some point!

Spreading my comic to friends and strangers alike

So, I've been reading about zines for quite some time, but as far as I can tell, they are near impossible to find around town. The reason I got onto a zine kick was because of last year's 24 Hour Comic Day. I wanted to print my comic, and then I started reading online about mini comics and the zine subculture. I want to get into that, and share my comics on a more peer to peer basis.

I personally believe my printed 24hr comic looks really cool. Yes, some of the art is cheesy, but that's due to time constraints. I'm talking about the overall package. Its manga sized, 5"x7.5", full bleed, and strict black and white. The cover is #90 cardstock, and the inside pages are 24# paper (a little thicker than generic printer paper), double sided, and saddlestitched. I figure if my rush job 24 hour comic looks this nice, imagine actually spending the time to make a nice comic, utilizing screentones and grayscale effects, more time on the layout and design, everything!

This idea is really kickstarting my engines on getting comics out there. It wasn't expensive either. Honestly, if I buy the cardstock and heavier paper and have a print shop print on that, I think I could get even a better deal.

So, getting back to spreading my comics. With my 24hr comic, I have sent it to friends all over the world (seriously), and even to some zine places, and zine fans, in hopes of catching someone's eye. Some strangers out there will be getting a random mini comic in the mail, and I hope they enjoy this random surprise.

I'm thinking if I pursue this, I'd like to offer these comics on my website for sale via paypal. I have tons of ideas, and now I have proof that a nice looking comic can be made from home, so there is nothing stopping me from making my art. NOTHING! :D

I have several one shot stories that I'd like to render into a mini comic, as well as several longer stories. This practice could also help me build a portfolio to attract the eye of a real publisher... Hmm.. This also means that I'll have some comics to hustle at next years Spokane ComiCon.

All Spanish Today

He estado trabajando en varias pinturas en los ultimos meses. Quiero tener otra exhibición de arte pronto. Invitaré a todos mis amigos y familia de nuevo. Se siente bien tener amigos cercanos que vengan a apoyar mis intereses.
Hablé con el dueño de "The Missing Piece Tatto" y le gustaría llevar algunas de mis pinturas. Su taller tiene muchas pinturas, muchas de éstas vendidas. Me gustaría vender algunos de mi trabajos y posiblemente conseguir algún reconocimiento.
Este año venderé libros de dibujos, pinturas y dibujos de comisión en la Segunda Convencion Anual de cómics. Algunas de mis amistades han conseguido beneficiarse de ello y han hecho conecciones. Con mis nuevas pinturas, y un portafolio mas grande, me gustaría ver si puedo encontrar trabajo pintando portadas para compañías de cómics independientes. Oni Press y Blue Water Productions son bastante grandes y no lejos de Spokane.

Just practing my Spanish for a change.

Robin in the style of Damion Scott

Sorry I've been so sluggish with the Joker tutorial. I was sick last week, and this week catching up on bills, just lots of stuff going on so I haven't been able to photograph anything new.

I just realized I have been rusty at drawing since Ive been painting Joker for so long. So, to prepare for the 24 Hour Comic Day I will be participating in again, I am filling a sketch book with tons of fun gestures. I want to really make something cool this time.

I've been liking Damion Scott's art a lot, especially his work in Robin: To Kill A Bird. So to try to learn some techniques from him, I drew the same Robin he did as a cover in the back, but with a bit of my style to it. I like his animated feel to it, he's not worrying about rendering everything to infinity like Jim Lee.

The sketch was probably 15 minutes at the most.

The Joker - Daily Sketch

I'm really wimping out on these daily sketches! I haven't had enough time to put into something really cool. I spent about 15 minutes at work, and came up with this Joker:

It could be better, but the little sketchbook I have is so small, I get timid about drawing full bodies because there is little room for detail. I need to get over my stupid ocds about drawing, and just draw til my pencil falls off the page.
Anyway, my Joker is taking a lot from the cartoon series, then I also added the Chelsea smile, just like from the newest movie, which I saw again!!! Just as amazing on round two.

Other than my daily sketch, I bought I new t-shirt today. Its a Comic Book Shop t-shirt, but it has the Danzig logo on it, pretty impressive stuff. The CBS shirt was $8.00, if I were to buy the Danzig shirt at Hot Topic, it would have been $25.00, the CBS shirt could not be passed up.
I also went to the annual Baroque festival in Riverfront Park yesterday... For some reason, many women were confusing baroque with Civil War southern belle. What the hell?! They needed to be beaten, but not as badly as the people trying to do an accent, announcing the events on the mic. They were speaking softly, or gently, hard to describe, but in their mind that equates to a European 17th century accent. It sounded a little closer to gay than baroque to me, but I never lived in the 17th century so what do I know?

Oh, I also bought a few used books a couple days ago from abebooks.com, for those that don't know, its a network of used bookstores across the globe, and you can find anything you want at great deals. I picked up two Burne Hogarth books (Dynamic Figure Drawing, Dynamic Anatomy), Drawing a Likeness, and Drawing Animals. Hoping these might add to my arsenaul of art skills.
Well, that's about it for today. I'm seriously trying to put together some nicer stuff for a daily sketch, just you wait!

Dark Knight and THREE Daily Sketches

I saw The Dark Knight today, it was the best movie this summer! I was kind of grumpy that people were suspecting Heath Ledger to be receiving awards for his role before the movie was released, but now I say he deserves everything he can obtain for that role. I feel bad for his passing because he deserves the hype. The film was phenomenal, the movie is like a great crime drama plus Batman... Amazing, watch it again and again!

Secondly, at work I put together a couple daily sketches. First two about 30 minutes each, the last about an hour and a half.


This is some crazy dude staring in the sky while smoking. I was thinking of awful office jobs while drawing this.



Someone said something about Dead Pool, so I drew a shaved headed zombie with goggles and a gun.. makes sense, right?


Lastly, I tried imitating Mystique's pose from an X-Men cover by Humberto Ramos, from memory. I did pretty well if i do say so myself. The arms are slightly funky, but the overall piece contains a sense of attitude.

Its hard to put together daily sketches, since some days I don't sketch at work or home due to just being busy. So I feel these three made up for some missed days. Also, I'm trying to work my way up to longer sketches. Its just hard, because most of my free time is only during my breaks at work, so I'm just drawing on my little pocket sketchbook which is hard to render details on.

Daily Sketch, and some thoughts

So I sat myself down at a local cafe for close to an hour today to draw a friend's character my own way. By actually noting start and end times for the drawing session, I realized I am the sloth of illustration. This is what I came up with:



I think a lot of it has to do with confidence with pencil strokes and the capability to move on.. I spend a lot of time loosely sketching, erasing, redrawing, erasing, redrawing.. I also noticed certain things I hate to draw, namely foreshortened limbs (the hand and arm coming up front), bars of a bird cage (I think in part because I had no reference to a bird cage), and female clothing. I think I grew too comfortable with comic book women who just wear lycra.

How does one speed up their drawing? Is it by just drawing religiously, or forcing to move faster?

Daily Doodle for Tuesday July 15

So, to honor my word about trying to do daily sketches, I have uploaded my first sketch for the blog project. I did this while on break at work. Its no 90 minute sketch, but it is a start!

Tried to draw someone, I did it from memory, so likeness went out the window, in my opinion!!

My left arm has a "driver's tan"

I started listening to Sidebar Nation, a really great podcast that interviews some great people in the comic world. I love to hear the artists' ups and downs, gems of knowledge, how they broke in, and how they work. Its really inspiring!
For those who know, I'm trying to put together a couple comics, so I'm trying to collect as much information I can. I thought I could draw, but a pinup or portrait is so different than telling a story through sequential art. I'm fighting to find my voice in telling a story, so to practice, I'm going to try to share 90 minute sketches when I have time. One of the artists on Sidebar Nation, Eric Canete, actually is doing this daily, and he feels its a great exercise.
As a second exercise, I bought a sketchbook small enough to fit in my cargo pockets of my scrubs. This way I can sketch on my downtime at work. Usually just on my breaks and lunch since we are so busy, but its added minutes to my drawing.

Anyway, these are just some thoughts after going for a long hot walk with my dog. I'll be hitting the sketchbook momentarily!