Ink Stains and White

This weeks Comic Curve was going to be about something else, but today I just want to focus on how fun it is to ink.  I watched a great video on inking by Francis Vallejo  that was really inspiring.  He used a reference of a woman in a kimono and talked through his inking process of said woman using a nib, brush, and then an ink wash.  I learned quite a bit from the video, but the coolest thing was just to watch a better artist than I work through their process.

The video came at an opportune time, as I am close to behind on my summer schedule for Awful Lot and needed to get a page inked tonight.  I've been working on my inking in Awful a lot, and seeing a pro was a real kick in the pants to get even better with my work.

I also finally finished a character sketch of Shock Watson I did for another aspiring comic creator Neil Cambre.  You can check out his webcomic here.  I tried a few things with low levels of success, but I had a great time working with someone elses character and just trying a big pin up style picture. 

My biggest problem with inking the Watson picture was thinking of how the lightning from his hand would effect the shadows on his body.  I'm a complete noob at lighting, I think the legs work ok, the arms are super wonky, and the helmet works decently well.  The torso doesn't look too bad to me either but there I used the blacks more for definition than a true cast shadow.  Maybe that should be my focus when spotting blacks starting out.  Or maybe I should address the acknowledged lighting problem.

There's always a dozen new things to work on.  Until next time.

-Jon O