Defenders 133: cover pencils & inks

I was asked to create a bit of a "Will Eisner" effect on this cover and as you can see, I failed miserably.  I switched to inking with a brush, hoping that it would get me part of the way there. Unfortunately, the weird, elongated figures really got the best of me.  Well, it was more than 25 years ago and I was still learning.  The orange crayon effect was contributed by my oldest offspring a few years later when she found my only copy or the pencils.  I think she was trying to correct my composition... or maybe the bad proportions.  Anyway, she was barely two but even she knew that this cover really needed some help.  Editor Carl Potts must have agreed.  It looks like he performed some desperately needed cosmetic surgery on Valkyrie's features.  

Three more letter column designs

Strange Tales letters page header

This is a pencil layout on tracing paper for the letters column in Strange Tales.  I'm guessing it was done around 1985 or '86.  It's too bad that most comics don't have letters pages anymore.  When I was a kid, that was always the first thing I read when I picked up a new book.

Strange Tales #18: page one

Script by Terry Austin, pencils by Dan Lawlis.  I did the inks and colors.  But I didn't know I was going to do the colors until after I finished the inks so there's a lot of Zip-a-tone throughout.  I was trying to make the art colorist-proof.  Edits by Carl Potts who didn't want to change "lay" to "lie" when I pointed it out to him.  Hi Carl!

Alpha Flight #45 cover art: Brigman pencils & Nowlan inks

This looks like the kind of cover I'd agreed to ink after just the briefest of phone conversations.  A big, hairy monster crawling out of a grave.  Cool... I like the evil grin that June put on his face and the way the colorist made it – and his eyes – blood red.

Alpha Flight #52 cover art

Here's the cover for the very next issue.  This time I was handling pencils, inks and colors, most likely from a sketch by Carl Potts.  We used to call these "poster shots", no specific situation or setting, just a generic shot of the heroes.  I was really relieved when I saw how the colors printed.  I tried to get some modeling into the figures with flat color and white highlights but with the old coloring system we wouldn't actually see the colors until they were printed.

Alpha Flight #51 cover art: Barta pencils & Nowlan inks

This is the first (and last!) time I worked directly with my old buddy Hilary Barta.  I love the way he worked out the shadow patterns, especially on Wendigo.  By the way, Hil and I have differing memories of this piece.  A couple of years ago I commented that I inked it fairly straight and Hilary said, "I think you changed it more than you realize."  

I don't know who did the colors but they really overdid the knockout on the soldier in foreground. And the pink tint on Wendigo is an interesting choice.  Inside the book his shadows are light blue.

Strange Tales #16: Cover art

This cover was fun; a big, grotesque monster and two helpless heroes.  My editor, Carl Potts, sent me a sketch with notations.  From there, I did the pencils, inks and colors.  It got weirder every step of the way. My copy of the inks is a little light so I'm also showing a scan of the original art.

Defenders 128: A second shot at the cover art

I always liked the lighting and layout for this one (editor Carl Potts did the sketch) but hated the way I inked it. At the time, I was fumbling around, looking for a "style". I even tried imitating the loose pen and ink approach of an Iowa artist named Gary Kelley.

So I was very happy a couple of years ago when I was asked to recreate the piece for a collector. If nothing else, it shows that I've learned to ink a little better in the intervening years.