rough stuff #1

JOH

N BYRNE

ALA

N DAVIS

GEORGE PÉREZ

GARCÍA-LOPÉZ

ARTHUR ADAMS

WALTER SIMONSON

KEVIN

NOWLAN

FeaturingBRUCE TIMM!BRUCE TIMM!

P R E S E N T S

N o . 1S u m m e r 2 0 0 6

$ 6 . 9 5

C e l e b r a t i n gt h e A R T

o f C r e a t i n gC o m i c s !

Batgirl, Elasti-Girl, Superman, Batman, Starfire, Orion TM & ©2006 DC Comics. Jonni Future, Jack B. Quick TM & ©2006 America’s Best Comics, LLC.

JULY 2006 • ROUGH STUFF 1

Volume 1, Number 1July 2006

Celebrating the ART of Creating Comics!

EDITORBob McLeod

PUBLISHERJohn Morrow

DESIGNERMichael Kronenberg

PROOFREADERSJohn Morrow and Eric Nolen-Weathington

COVER ARTISTBruce Timm

COVER COLORISTBruce Timm

SPECIAL THANKSAlan DavisGeorge PérezBruce TimmKevin NowlanJosé Luis García-LópezArthur AdamsJohn ByrneWalter SimonsonEric Nolen-WeathingtonDavid HamiltonKen SteacyMichael Eury

ROUGH STUFF™ is published quarterly byTwoMorrows Publishing, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive,Raleigh, NC 27614. Bob McLeod, Editor. JohnMorrow, Publisher. Editorial Office: ROUGH STUFF,c/o Bob McLeod, Editor, P.O. Box 63, Emmaus, PA18049, e-mail: [email protected]. Four-issuesubscriptions: $24 Standard US, $36 First Class US,$44 Canada, $48 Surface International, $64 AirmailInternational. Please send subscription orders andfunds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial office.Central cover art by Bruce Timm. Batgirl, MarkMoonrider, Superman, Batman, Starfire, Orion TM& ©2006 DC Comics. Jonni Future, Jack B. QuickTM& ©2006 America’s Best Comics, LLC. All RightsReserved. All characters are © their respective com-panies. All material © their creators unless other-wise noted. All editorial matter © 2006 Bob McLeodand TwoMorrows Publishing. ROUGH STUFF is aTM of TwoMorrows Publishing. Printed in Canada.FIRST PRINTING.

FEATURED ARTISTS3 Bruce Timm

20 Alan Davis

30 Arthur Adams

40 Walter Simonson

52 John Byrne

80 George Pérez

88 José Luis García-López

ROUGH STUFF INTERVIEW62 Kevin Nowlan

ROUGH STUFF FEATURE16 Tight Pencils: The Answer or The Problem?

Bob McLeod

ROUGH STUFF DEPARTMENTS2 Scribblings From The Editor

Bob McLeod

79 Pre-Pro

A look at the art of the pros, before they were pros.

98 Cover Stories

Walter Simonson and Kevin Nowlan reveal the process they go throughwhen creating a cover.

102 Rough Critique

Editor Bob McLeod critiques a would be artist’s sample page.


BRUCE TIMMBruce Timm brings a lot of style to

whatever he does. The Kirby influence

is obvious, but he gives it a unique

twist, and takes it in new directions.

With amazing design and brevity, he gets right down to the

essence of good cartooning. We knew he could draw those

cute sexy babes, but look what else he can do!

BRUCE TIMM: These I remember well—my first batch of

joker designs for the animated Batman. I was still

trying to nail down an overall design look for the show,

and these are too extreme and cartoony, didn’t really

care for any of ‘em. Ultimately, I had Kevin Nowlan

take a shot at him, and ended up basing the final

design on one of his.

Joker TM & ©2006 DC Comics

F E A T U R E D A R T I S T

4 ROUGH STUFF • JULY 2006

BRUCE TIMM: I used to

always make a point of

sending drawings for the

San Diego Comic-con

program book, and this was

intended for that purpose

(one of the themes that year

was “Flash Gordon’s such-

and-such anniversary”)—

but I didn’t like it enough to

do a tighter clean-up.


BRUCE TIMM: One of many

many self-rejected cover ideas

for TwoMorrows’ Modern

Masters book. It’s a decent

enough pose, but I didn’t like it

enough to pursue further.


TIGHT PENCILSThe Answer or the Problem?

By Bob McLeod

In the 1990s, comic book pencil art made somewhat of a dramatic change that perhaps many fans are unaware of, and

that change has had some very serious repercussions. There have always been many different styles of penciling; every-

thing from the bare bones openness of, for example, a Gil Kane Conan page to the densely rendered Conan pages of

Barry Smith’s “Red Nails.” Some pencilers have always been sketchy and rough, like Bill Sienkiewicz, and some very

clean, like Jack Kirby. But prior to the ’90s, even the tightest pencils usually gave the inker some room to interpret and

put in their own style. Many of today’s pencils are printed without even being inked, and many jobs that are inked are virtually

traced (sorry, inkers, I know how grating the dreaded ‘T’ word is...). This is not because the inker is necessarily less skilled,

because many inkers working today are extremely talented. But in many cases, the pencils are so “tight” there is nothing much

left for the inker to do except trace.

HOBGOBLIN #3, PAGE 1

Looser pencils allowthe inker to be spon-taneous withlinework and con-tribute more of hisown style to the art,creating art thatcombines the bestskills of both artists.Art by Ron Frenz.


On a page of comic art, thereare several things which needto be done to make the artconvincing and complete. First,the panel shapes need to bedesigned, and arranged on the

page. Then, the figures and backgrounds within the pan-els need to be drawn in a dramatic composition. Next,details, blacks, and lighting are added; and lastly, a ren-dering style is applied. Before computer coloring, thelighting and blacks and rendering had to be done in eitherthe pencils or the inks, to keep the art from looking tooflat. Today, with the gradated color tones possible, somestyles leave all of that up to the colorist, and that can befine... or not.

Before, a job could be weakened or strengthened bythe quality of the inking and coloring. Today, because thepencils are so tight, the inking seems to be much less rel-evant, and jobs depend much more on the ability of thecolorist. Again, there’s nothing inherently wrong with that,except that as pencilers are adapting to this new situa-tion, the overall look of the art has changed in a way that Ipersonally feel is not at all a move in the right direction.The inker’s job on many current books has radicallychanged from a dramatic artistic collaboration to simplycovering pencils with skillfully clean ink lines.

Breaking the art chores up among several people hasalways been a tricky proposition. Due to the monthlydeadline, it’s just not possible for one person to pencil,ink, and color a 22-page comic. So the system of havinga different artist handle each of these steps began. Butinkers and colorists have their own styles and opinions,and the art can mutate quite a bit after it leaves the pen-ciler’s hands.

This can lead to wonderful collaborations like Kirbyand Sinnott, Colan and Palmer, Miller and Janson, andByrne and Austin, just to name a few. But it can also leadto disasters, like the inker erasing backgrounds, or makingsilhouettes out of detailed backgrounds, in order to meetthe deadline. The colorist can put a dark purple over anarea the inker spent an hour delicately rendering.

As a result, some pencilers try to ink their own work, usu-ally causing them to be unable to maintain a monthly sched-ule. Some inkers have tried to color their own work as well.But other pencilers decided the answer was to “bullet-proof” their pencils, and started making their pencils tighterand tighter, so that in case they got an incompetent inker, allhe would have to do is “trace” what was there.

At the same time, a generation of pencilers grew upadmiring the detailed rendering of the inkers of the ’70sand ’80s. Not really understanding what the inker’s job

was, exactly, they assumed that the inkers were just fol-lowing the pencils, and they started incorporating render-ing details into their pencils which had previously beenprimarily the domain of the inker. Suddenly, inkers are nowexpected to copy each little dash and dot and scribbleeffect in the pencils, rather than applying their own set ofrendering techniques. Each long, wavy curl of hair is nowdrawn to perfection in the pencils, and the inker often hasto get out his french curve to laboriously trace those long,sweeping lines, rather than create his own hair patternswith quick, natural strokes.

This causes many problems. Artistically, it’s much easierto do flashy rendering techniques with a crowquill point or abrush than a pencil. Very often, the finished art now looksoverly controlled and stilted. There’s no longer much art thatlooks “loose” and spontaneous. In the past, there were sev-

ALFREDO ALCALA

This was a simpleoutline in Buscema’spencil breakdown.All the linework wasdone in the inking byAlcala.

ALAN DAVISAlan Davis’s excellent figure drawing

and visual storytelling are always a

pleasure. Whatever series he takes on,

he raises to a new level of quality.

Here’s an assortment of images from various projects for

your viewing pleasure.


ALAN DAVIS:

Braintrust cover rough: Braintrust was published in Italy

by creator Stefano Sacco (Unicorn). The brief Stefano gave

me was for a traditional “heroes leaping out at the reader”

image which could be used as a cover and a limited edition

poster. I drew the rough in pencil on a sheet of A4 photo-

copy paper.



ALAN DAVIS: Lenz

design: Lenz was

the ClanDestine’s

first major

opponent. I seem

to recall that I

scribbled the rough

design down on a

sheet of notepaper

while on holiday

somewhere and

tightened it up

slightly when

Marvel UK began

looking for material

to pad out the

ClanDestine

issue #0.

ALAN

DAVIS


ALAN DAVIS:

Excalibur rough:

This was drawn on

a sheet of A3 pho-

tocopy paper to be

lightboxed/traced

onto Marvel paper

stock. I had drawn

a thumbnail (which

no longer exists)

with a completely

different layout but

when I enlarged

that image I

decide it looked

too dynamic for

the romantic

intention of the

scene—so I

decided to go for

something far

simpler.

Excalibur TM &

©2006 Marvel

Characters, Inc.

ALAN

DAVIS


ARTHUR ADAMSArt Adams’ art always looks like it was

so much fun to draw. It appeals to fans

and pros alike mainly for that simple

reason, I think. His forms have great

weight, with wonderful lighting and blacks, and an incredi-

ble amount of purposeful detail. But he knows comics are

all about exaggerating reality, and he never fails to enter-

tain. Here’s just a small sampling of his amazing versatility.


ARTHUR ADAMS:

JLA Armageddon: I used to do fairly tight

layouts at about 1⁄ 4 page size. I also used to get

a lot more work done, didn’t I? Maybe I should

reconsider my current working methods?

Superman, Flash, Wonder Woman and

Martian Manhunter, TM & ©2006 DC Comics


ARTH

URAD

AMS


ARTHUR ADAMS:

Smart Hulk: Well you know what they say about

guys with big hands and big feet.

They say they need big gloves and big

shoes. Right?

I think when Toybiz made these toys they

actually did add the big gun (ripped off from

a Dale Keown comic). However they did

make it about 1⁄8 the size I’d intended.

Oh well.

Hulk TM & ©2006 Marvel

Characters, Inc.


Walt Simonson brought Kirby dynam-

ics to a new level on Thor and his

many other series. He’s one of the

most intelligent artists I know, and it

comes through in his art. With great

design and abundant energy, his comic

art is always exciting to see. Take a

look and see if you don’t agree!

F E A T U R E D A R T I S T WALTER SIMONSON: Back about 1986 when I was work-

ing for Marvel, the company commissioned me to do five

pencil drawings to be given away as promotional prizes

at an ABA convention in Washington, DC that year. This

was one of the drawings I did. I think Marvel also

commissioned five drawings from Moebius as well.

Captain America TM & ©2006 Marvel Characters, Inc.

WALTE

RSIM

ONSO

NWALTER SIMONSON


WALTER SIMONSON: I’ve always loved Jack Kirby’s Fourth World characters. Todd Dezago was writing Impulse a few years ago and

asked if I’d be interested in drawing some pages for a couple of issues that involved Kalibak. Todd wrote them, I penciled them, and

we got Scott Williams to ink them. Beautifully, I might add.

Kalibak and Mister Miracle TM & ©2006 DC Comics

WALTE

RSIM

ONSO

N


WALTER SIMONSON:

My first issue of

Orion and the first

time I drew Orion and

Kalibak meeting. I

wanted power but I

also wanted to show

an equivalency of the

characters as they

are the two sons of

Darkseid—hence the

two equal-sized

panel portraits in the

center of the page.

Kalibak and Orion

TM & ©2006 DC

Comics

WALTE

RSIM

ONSO

N


JOHN BYRNEJohn Byrne totally revitalized and re-

energized the Superman franchise in

the ’80s. His characters had so much

personality, and you could tell he was a

real Superman fan himself. His enthusiasm was infectious,

and just as he had done with Marvel’s X-Men, he made

Superman his own, and set the standard for all future

artists. Here we revisit some of those pages in their little-

seen pencil form.

F E A T U R E D A R T I S T JOHN BYRNE:

Action Comics #584, page 5:

Moving to DC “full time” for

the first time was a process

of discovery. Finding out

what the “language” was

“over there.” One of the first

things I learned was that

every inker seemed to have

a different way of interpret-

ing breakdowns—which is

what I consider this particu-

lar image to be. So, some-

times I got finished looking pages, sometimes pages that look

like they belonged more properly in coloring books. Sure was fun

drawing Superman, though!

Superman,

TM & ©2006

DC Comics


JOHN BYRNE:

Superman #1,

page 20: One of

the greatest time-

savers that occurred

to me fairly early

on in my career—

fortunately!—was

that not every-

thing needs to be

addressed in

detail in the initial

rough layouts. So,

when I draw build-

ings collapsing

or piles of rubble, I

find it is so much

more efficient to

define the

outline of the form

and then simply

start “scribbling”,

letting the shapes

and masses define

themselves, rather

than trying to

“control” what

should, after all,

look like a random

mess!Superman, TM &

©2006 DC Comics

JOHNB

YRNE


JOHN BYRNE:

Man of Steel #3,

page 5:

When I was about

11 years old, my

parents bought me

a Jon Gnagy

LearnTo Draw

kit, based on the

popular TV show

of the time. Sitting

in the back seat of

my Dad’s old

Plymouth, reading

through the “man-

ual” while my

parents continued

their shopping, I

came to the chap-

ter on perspective

and vanishing

points. Looking out

the window of the

car, I actually saw

these things, con-

sciously, for the

first time. It was

almost a religious

experience. I’ve

been in love with

perspective ever

since.

Superman, TM &

©2006 DC Comics

JOHNB

YRNE


INTERVIEW

KEVIN NOWLAN

KEVIN NOWLAN: Born in Nebraska, 1958. Youngest ofsix. Started drawing comics in 1982. My first professionaljob was penciling a Dr. Strange fill-in for Al Milgrom.

The Jack B. Quick stories that I did with AlanMoore are the highlight of my career so far.They’re funny, very original and I wasallowed to pencil, ink, letter andsometimes color them myself.[Now how many of you wouldhave guessed that? -Bob]

Other highlights wouldbe the Man-Bat SecretOrigin story and theOutsiders Annual.

I’m working on acouple of coversright now and I’mdrawing a shortGoon story for DarkHorse. I’m also drawingshort origin stories forElongated Man and AdamStrange that will appear inDC’s 52 series.

BOB MCLEOD: Kevin, thank you so much for thisinterview. No one in my family seems to knowwhere my art talent came from. Are you the firstartist in your family, and were your early artistic

efforts encouraged?KEVIN NOWLAN: No, I’m not the first. I hada great uncle who was a landscape painterand print maker. He was very talented and bysheer coincidence, I was named after him.

Most of my siblings drew and painted butI’m the only one who made a career out of

it. I was always encouraged. My parentswere very supportive.

MCLEOD: It’s always fascinating tome when the last kid in a family

makes a bigger splash than all theothers before him. Do you think

your birth order had anything todo with your art?NOWLAN: I didn’t make a biggersplash than all the others beforeme. My brother is very talented inmany areas, including art. He justdidn’t focus on one specific skill like

I did. I have very talented siblings.

Kevin Nowlan is one of my favorite comic book artists, and he’s been a fan favorite since he

first got published. His style has also been very influential on many of the artists working in

comics today. I’ve unfortunately never had the pleasure of meeting Kevin in person, but I dis-

covered in this interview that he and I have a lot in common in how we regard our comic book art. This interview

was conducted via e-mail. I’ve never interviewed anyone before, and I’m hoping I’ll sound a bit more coherent this

way. I asked Kevin to give me a brief bio so I could introduce him, and he did it so succinctly I’ll let him tell it:

By Bob McLeod

KEVIN NOWLAN:I don’t remember if I

ever inked this or not

but I think it needs

more shadows on the

figure to give it some

additional drama.

That’s one of the nice

things about drawing

Batman; it’s hard to

overwork the shad-

ows. As Wally Wood

said, “When in doubt,

black it out.”

KEVIN NOWLAN:Batgirl pin-up pencils: I was try-

ing to put a little more depth into

this figure by twisting the pose and

lowering the point of view. I left a

few details for the inking stage but

most of the information is there.

Batgirl pin-up inks: The double-

lit shadows are easier than they

look, even if you’re drawing some-

thing without photo reference like I

did here. You just need to deal with

one light source at a time and keep

them far enough apart so that you

get some interesting black shadows

in the middle of the object. They’re

handy when you want to define the

edge of a dark object against a dark

background.

Batman and Batgirl TM &

©2006 DC Comics


Watching my brother draw race cars and monsters whenI was a little kid probably inspired me quite a bit.

MCLEOD: What formal art training have you had, if any?NOWLAN: I went to a trade school that taught design and aminimal amount of illustration. They told us we were wastingour time trying to draw and that none of uswould get paid for doing drawings. I wish I’dhad a chance to attend the Joe Kubert schoolor apprentice with an established comic artist.I had to pick everything up so haphazardlyand I still feel there are things I haven’tlearned to do correctly.

MCLEOD: Do you think formal training isimportant for comic art? If you had it to doover, would you get a degree in art some-where, or go to the Kubert School? I had alittle formal training, but I’m also mostly self-taught. I really wish I had taken somepainting classes along the way.NOWLAN: Yes. I wish someone hadpushed me in that direction. I really couldhave used some formal education.

MCLEOD: What drew you todoing comic art, as opposed to,say, commercial art or fine art oranimation? I knew from the ageof five that I wanted to be a car-toonist of some sort, but everyone

tells me that’s uncommon. When did you decide oncomics as a profession?NOWLAN: I’d always wanted to draw comic books, orcomic strips or animation or anything that could be con-sidered “cartooning.” After I graduated from the tradeschool I worked in a printing shop for about four yearsdoing paste-up and logo designs. I rarely got to do any

illustrations, so it was starting to look like thoseinstructors were right. Out of frus-

tration I began working oncomic book samples that I

hoped would land me ajob at Marvel and

DC. The moretedious


KEVIN NOWLAN:I really enjoy doing

pieces like this. It’s

the kind of drawing

you never get to do in

a story or even on a

cover. A few years

ago I started to figure

out how to draw

Batman’s cape so that

it has that leathery

batwing look. This

wide layout gave me

plenty of room to play

around with it.

Not much difference

between the pencils

and the inks here. I

think I like the con-

trast between the

heavily rendered

Batman and the

lighter approach on

Batgirl and Robin. I

believe most of the

inks are pen but

there’s a little brush-

work on the right

side of the cape.


PRE-PRO

Starting out this issue is a fantastic coloring book page done by thisissue’s interview guest Kevin Nowlan, way back in 1978 when he wasabout 20 years old.

Next up are these comic strips drawn by none other than Alan Davis. Ithink the characters in the strip are speechless at how well he was drawingeven back then! Alan comments:

“This a comic strip I drew in my late teens and in a style that was obvi-ously inspired by the fantastic work of Frank Bellamy on Garth. It wasdrawn purely for fun; I never planned to get into comics. The original isdrawn on a sheet of A4 paper (at print size, I didn’t know about working forreduction) with Rotringpens and felt tips—although the term orig-inal may not be accu-rate since I drew andredrew the stripscountless times tracingeach draft from a mixof previous versions—which was fairly easysince I drew/inked ontyping paper.”

And just to showthat I wouldn’t ask ourguests to do anything Iwouldn’t do, here’s avintage zipatone feastby me circa 1973,when I was working inthe production dept. atMarvel.

— Bob McLeod

H ave you ever wondered how your favorite pro’s art lookedback before he turned pro? Back when he was just sitting athome dreaming about becoming a comic book artist? Howwould his early efforts compare with yours? Well, each

issue we’re going to show you some examples of just that! The fol-lowing art was contributed by some of our featured artists. It wasdone by them before they started working in comics professionally.But it’s easy to see they’d soon be ready for the big time!


GEORGE PEREZGeorge Pérez is a perennial fan favorite.

What Byrne did for Superman, Pérez did

for Wonder Woman and the Titans,

bringing new energy and life to those

series. He’s always been one of the hardest working artists

in comics, and revels in accepting the most challenging

assignments.


GEORGE PÉREZ:

Donna Troy rough:

I usually dislike

doing cover

sketches since I

usually do a lot of

changes as I go

along. This one

was pretty straight-

forward, but I

added one more

Donna Troy figure

(when she was a

Darkstar) and elim-

inated the ques-

tion-mark borders.

Wonder Girl TM &

©2006 DC Comics

GEORGE PEREZ:

Batman:

This sketch is actu-

ally drawn in ball-

point pen. I drew it

while I was in a

hospital bed and it

is inscribed to one

of the nurses.

Batman TM &

©2006 DC Comics

´

´

´


GEORGE PEREZ:

Avengers, Vol. 3,

Issue 1, page 13:

This return to The

Avengers was an

important thing for

me as I was work-

ing to revitalize my

career. I penciled

this issue extreme-

ly tight, although I

didn’t fill in all the

blacks, as I’m oft

prone to, even

when I know it’s

unnecessary.

The Avengers TM &

©2006 Marvel

Characters, Inc.

GEOR

GEPE

REZ

´

´


GEORGE PEREZ:

AVENGERS/JLA #2,

page 23:

I actually started

this page at a

dance studio as I

waited for my wife.

When I got home I

realized that Cap

looked too small

and that Batman

was too high up on

the page and might

get cropped. I

copied the entire

page to a new

board with a light-

box and changed

Batman’s posture

so that he’d be

more reactive to

Ben Grimm’s unex-

pected appear-

ance. I also

changed Ben’s

trunks to pants

once correct refer-

ence was provided.

I also added

Johnny Storm to

the panels with

Reed and Sue and

erased Cap from

panel 5.

All characters

©2006 DC Comics

and TM & ©2006

Marvel

Characters, Inc.

´


José Luis García Lopéz has as many

skills as he has names. His art is clas-

sic and current at the same time, mak-

ing him the perfect choice for DC’s

style guides. Many a die-hard Marvel

fan has crossed over to sample his

wares on Batman and other projects. His drawing is so

good, many people fail to notice what an expert inker he is.

He’s a class act all around.


JOSE LUIS GARCÍA-LOPEZJOSE LUIS GARCÍA-LOPEZ:

Road to Perdition: Great time

working with Max A. Collins. My

only regret is that I didn’t have

enough time to do the finishes also.

´ ´´´ ´ ´


JOSEL

UISGA

RCIA-

LOPE

Z´

´´


JOSE LUIS GARCÍA-LOPEZ:

Those funny

Batman characters

were great to do. It

was like the play of

ying and yang with

the more somber

Batman.

Superman, Joker,

Prankster TM &

©2006 DC Comics

JOSEL

UISGA

RCIA-

LOPE

Z´

´´

´ ´´


COVER STORIES

W hat happens

between the

initial layout

of a cover, and the fin-

ished, printed piece?

Usually a lot of changes—

some brought about by

the pencil artist, some by

the inker (assuming

they’re not the same

person as the penciler),

and some at the request

of an editor or publisher.

We asked a couple of

this issue’s pros to give

us a little insight into

these classic covers.


WALT SIMONSON:

Cyberforce: Cover

for Cyberforce #0

for Top Cow. I wrote

and drew the issue

based on ideas from

Mark Silverstri and

David Wohl. The

whole issue was my

version of an Image

comic of the time,

full of overwhelm-

ingly large images

on each page and a

few small inset

panels to carry the

story. And a lot of

rendering. The

cover shows the

large image and

rendering approach

fairly well.


ROUGH CRITIQUE

I f you’re serious about improving your penciling, sendus a sample page and I’ll publish and critique onepage per issue by our readers. Many beginnersstruggle with the same problems, and I think it’s

often very helpful to see a critique of someone else. KeithGrachow sent me this very nice Fantastic Four sample pageand bravely consented to having it published in our first issue.

Keith, I really like your sample very much in some areas, butnot so much in other areas. I’ll begin with what I like. It’s rare thatI see a sample page with so many backgrounds, and that’s vitalto creating a professional level page. Backgrounds require aknowledge of perspective and set design that most beginnerslack, and don’t spend nearly enough effort on. Your panel layoutis easy to follow, and your storytelling is clear even without ascript. These are not minor accomplishments. I also really likethe personality you’re giving your actors. Yes, I said actors. Thecharacters in a comic book need to be good actors to tell aninteresting story, and it’s up to the penciler to keep them frombeing too wooden. I also like the way you’re moving the camera,and varying the distance with close-ups and long shots. I likethat you’ve attempted some dramatic lighting, with the castshadow in panel 2.

Now for what I don’t like so much. Comics are first and fore-most about people. You simply must study anatomy more andimprove your figure drawing. You show a nice, natural feel forfigures, but you still don’t really know the basic muscle groupsand how the figure moves. In pnl. 2, Franklin’s pose is awkward.It often helps to get into the pose yourself and see what feelsnatural. You’ve also drawn his legs too long for his body. It’s alsoalways a good idea to consider the silhouette shape of your fig-ures. Your Torch in pnl.1 has an awkward shape with his armparallel to and equal in size to his leg. Contrast it with my Torchfigure’s silhouette. The Torch’s hands in pnl.4 are too exaggerat-ed. The distance between them is not sufficient for them to varyin size so much. There are times when you’ll want to exaggeratethe foreshortening like this to make a more dynamic pose, butdon’t do it on small figures like this.

When drawing established characters like the FF, you needto be able to draw them similar to the way we’re used to seeingthem. That face on the Torch in pnl. 1 is just not Johnny Storm.That’s not his nose. Franklin is OK, but inconsistent from panelto panel. A better understanding of the skull and facial featureswill enable you to keep your faces looking more consistently likethe same person. I know from experience that the Thing is a bitof a pain to draw, but you do have to take the time to draw allthose bricks, and there’s a certain interlocking way of drawingthem, if you want to do them properly. And the Thing’s anatomyis not based on a normal human’s, as you’re attempting. He’smuch more rounded in every body part, and has no neck. Heonly has three fingers, with much bigger feet and hands.

When you draw a figure throwing a punch, you want to havehim put his whole body into the punch, so have him leaning for-ward much more. The figure being punched needs to be

By Bob McLeod