Operation Desert Storm, Part 2

Often, when I do color work, I don't spend much time doing any real greyscale work but for this poster I decided it seemed appropriate. It's a good practice and usually pays off in the final color piece; it allows you to very accurately nail down your tonal work. I was taught in school that your illustrations (or photos for that matter) should always have 'black' blacks and 'white' whites, meaning that your piece should cover the complete tonal gamut. A common mistake by artists who go straight to color is to end up with a piece that's all middle tones. The results often look muddy. All this technical stuff aside, I just thought it would look good for the subject matter at hand.

I originally thought I would do most of the greyscale art with paper and pencil but convinced myself to try working digitally to see if I could replicate the look and feel of a traditional pencil drawing successfully in Photoshop.

I started with the camels because it seemed like the easiest element to experiment with. When I moved on to the burning oil wells I quickly became convinced that 'digital' was the way to go. My goal, from the day I started working digitally (ten years or more ago), was to create work that didn't look or feel like what people normally expected with digital art. I've spent a lot of time finding or creating brushes in Photoshop that don't look digital (at least to me). Hopefully I'm not the only one who thinks this.  :-)

Happy with the results I moved on to the tech, starting with the Abrams A1 tank, then on to the AH-64 Apache helicopter, the F-16 Fighting Falcon and the USS Arleigh Burke-Class Guided Missile Destroyer.

I tried to save jpegs at different points of my progress, not always when I finished an element, that way some of my nitty gritty process can be revealed.

You'll notice on that last image that there's suddenly some background there. Once the main tech stuff was finished I moved on to the American flag, the map, and the basic background texture that I wanted. I forgot to get some close ups of the destroyer; I'll get some added later.

The poster, when printed, will be 18x24 inches; not huge but a good size. My photoshop file is 18x24 inches at 450dpi. It's pretty big. This poster is the first time I've ever had a file get so large that I couldn't save it as a normal photoshop file. I had to use the large format file that photoshop has - a psb. Fun.

Next up: People.

Operation Desert Storm, Part 1

I have recently been commissioned to produce a poster commemorating the twentieth anniversary of Operation Desert Storm. That might sound odd to a lot of people, especially those who have not served or don't come from a family history of military service. I can understand that. Let me say right off the bat that I do not condone war. It is a horrible thing any way you look at it. This blog is not for debating the pluses and minuses of warfare and it's attachment to human nature however. It is a blog for art and the silly things I notice about life.

The poster is to be aimed at vets of the operation and of the first Gulf War in general. So why would someone want to celebrate such a thing? Let me explain briefly:

I am a veteran. I served with the 101st ABN DIV for four years as an infantryman. I was lucky enough to have my service years squeeze between the first Gulf War and September 11th, 2001. I did not see combat. I can, however, understand what such a thing might do to a person. It's the kind of thing we trained for constantly and if my country had called on me to go into combat I would have done so without a second thought. It was my job.

For those who did serve during Operation Desert Storm, it was surely a life-defining time for them. When someone is told that they are about to be sent overseas into a hostile environment where people you don't know will be trying to kill you, I can only assume it to be a harrowing piece of news. You fear you might never return to your family and loved ones. All the things you thought you might go on to do in your life are potentially out the window. That's a lot to deal with mentally. For those men and women to make it home alive must be an amazing thing. To say that they value their lives more than most of us can ever imaging might be an understatement. These are the types of experiences that stay with a person, burned deeply into their memories. It is something they carry around with them every single day for the rest of their lives and this is why a veteran of the experience might want something to help them honor that part of their lives. I respect that deeply; they are, all of them, brothers-in-arms.

Now, on to the ARTWORK itself. Most people, when they think of an artist sitting at home and working on art, picture something like this:

This has largely been the case historically. A nice, large drawing surface, paper, pens, pencils, inks and other supplies all around you. One light, two, three, a window to keep you from staring at a blank wall whenever you look up from the task at hand. I spend many hours at my drawing table. In todays increasingly digital world, however, this is becoming more and more of a common image:

This is my computer set-up. The monitor on the right is a Wacom Cintiq and it allows me to draw directly on it (with a stylus) as I would on a piece of paper (with a pencil). I spend more time now at this desk than I do the other one. I actually look forward to getting over to that good old fashioned drawing desk when I can. It's nice to rest my eyes from the computer screens from time to time. Yes, that's Jane Krakowski on the other screen. I was watching episodes of 30 Rock while I was working this day. And yes, those are M&Ms on the desk and yes, they are bad for you and I shouldn't eat them. They probably have something to do with me weighing more than I'd like to. I'm eating bananas now instead of M&Ms thank you. And the brownies my wife made last night.

So the first thing that happens when you get an illustration job is to get as much information as possible from the client. From there you start gathering reference and thinking about layout possibilities. It usually takes a little while for the nebulous mass that is my brain to start forming ideas. Sometimes I have to sit down and start scribbling to see if that helps. Eventually those ideas will start coming to me (most commonly when I'm on the toilet or taking a shower - two places where I don't usually have paper and pencil, or my computer for that matter) so I rush to the computer first chance I get and start laying those ideas down. You end up putting together different possibilities, passing them on to the client, and making adjustments based on their feedback. Like these:

For this poster the client wanted to loosely portray the emotional story of the soldiers that served during this time period, from the pain and fear of leaving loved ones and venturing into the unknown, through the difficulties of combat to the undeniable joy of returning home. Mixed with that are elements of technology that help represent all the branches of service involved.

An extra element for this poster is the option of a vet having their portrait inserted into the poster. It's a cool idea to allow the poster to be individualized like this but at the same time it's a huge challenge. The poster has to have room designed into it for this possible portrait and yet still feel like a balanced composition if the portrait is not added. Will my poster accomplish this? Time will tell.

So after going back and forth a little this is what we ended up with:

I'm very happy with what we've come up with and look forward to seeing how it develops. Next entry: Getting Underway.

Desert Music

LAWRENCE OF ARABIA has long been my favorite film. It was originally released in 1962 and had suffered several edits during those early years. In 1989, while I was a student in New York City, Robert Harris and James Katz set about restoring the film to it's original 216 minute glory. Lost footage was found, dialogue rerecorded for certain bits, etc... The first screening for the restored masterpiece was held at the Ziegfeld Theater on 54th St. And this is where I come in.

I was lucky enough to be taking some film classes at the time and was invited to the screening. A couple of friends and I showed up early, waited in line, then hustled down to the fifth row (give or take a couple of rows) and claimed our territory. I had no idea what I was in for. I wasn't familiar with David Lean at the time, or with T.E. Lawrence, the film's subject matter. What I witnessed over the next four hours was something of a game changer for me. I was astounded. Blown away. Moved on a deep level. Robert Harris was at the screening and answered questions for an hour or so after it was over, but I don't know if I heard a word he said. I was lost, overwhelmed by what I had seen.

As a person who has spent his career learning to tell stories well, this film is one of the greats. It is so daring and powerful in it's storytelling. Lean never wastes an inch of screen space. He holds shots for unusually long times, all to heighten the effects of the storytelling. His cuts are purposeful and sometimes startling. I could go on and on and on. If you're into storytelling, watch it. Many times.

While I haven't seen much of the world I have been fortunate enough to spend some time in Egypt during my Army years and as luck would have it I just happened to be in T.E. Lawrence's neck of the woods. I've seen some of the desert that David Lean captured on film and I can attest first hand that the film does an amazing job of capturing that desert. It is old. It is hot. The rocks have been baked by the sun for thousands and thousands of years. It is nothing but tans and browns. In the day it can be as hot as 135° Fahrenheit. It almost never rains and yet, for all that harshness, it is amazing. Awe inspiring. Like the Grand Canyon, it helps one to understand one's place in the universe.

Loving movies I naturally love movie scores. I grew up on John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith. I love them both and yet neither of them boasts the score that sits atop my favorites list. That score, if you hadn't guessed, belongs to Maurice Jarre and his amazing score for LAWRENCE OF ARABIA. I had it with me in the desert and listened to it on several occasions. The version I had on CD, the only one available at the time, was from the original recordings. It was, and is, a great CD.

99.99% of the time I prefer original recordings to re-recordings. A re-recording? Yup, a re-recording. From time to time a score will be re-recorded for one reason or another. Someone licenses the work to record and sell a body or work, or maybe the original tapes were lost or destroyed and a re-recording is the only way to present the music today. No matter how good it is though it's never the same as the original. When a composer in on site to supervise or even conduct, you get the true intent of what the composer wanted. I guess I'm a purist because that's always my preference. Every once in a blue moon, however, an exception comes along, and that's what this entire post is about.

Tadlow music, owned and headed by James Fitzpatrick, has recently created a re-recording of Maurice Jarre's score for LAWRENCE OF ARABIA and it has done nothing but confirm that this is indeed the best score I have ever encountered. It was recorded by the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra and they should be proud of what they've accomplished. Nic Raine, who used to work with Maurice Jarre, conducted, and has done a masterful job of ensuring that this new recording is as faithful to the original recording as possible. It contains the complete score for the film, orchestrated from Jarre's original composition notes.

It is amazing. Have I said that already? Who cares. I should say it a hundred times. The quality is superb, as good as any real score recording. Better than some. It is mastered with all of today's quality goodness and it is almost as moving for me to hear now, in its complete form, as it was when the screen first went dark in the Ziegfeld Theater and Jarre's Overture blasted into the dark, four and a half minutes of orchestra with no picture.

If you have ever been a fan of film music then you owe it to yourself to own this recording. You will not be disappointed.

tadlowmusic

You can also buy it here

And you should own the movie as well. I can't wait to finally get a Blu-Ray player and LAWRENCE OF ARABIA on Blu-ray. It will definitely be the first film I watch on Blu-ray. Yes, I know it's sad that I don't have one yet, but it is a time of tight budgets and it's a want, not a need, so I bide my time and remain patient. Until then, though, I have this amazing new version of the score to listen to over and over. And over.

Cleanliness Conundrum

I use a washrag when I take showers. I put the soap in it (liquid soap), lather it up, and clean myself. When I'm done I rinse it thoroughly and hang it to dry. Now, theoretically, shouldn't the washrag always be clean? It basically gets washed every single day, right? So why, if you use the rag too long, does it start to smell of funk?

You, Yourself, and your Drawing

Super busy lately. I don't like going so long without a post so I'm putting up a drawing I did yesterday or the day before (the days all blur together when all you do is work work work). It's an unused drawing; part of the freelance illustration job I'm currently working on.

I think, in the end, I'm glad this one isn't being used. It's me. I often use myself as a model (I'm the only person I know who's always available when I need someone) but rarely do I ever try to keep 'myself' in the work. Actually I usually put a lot of effort into making sure the end result doesn't look anything like me. Sometimes I succeed, sometimes I don't.

One thing you'll learn by drawing yourself a lot is all your imperfections. They jump out at you when you start changing yourself to be more 'ideal'. So the me you see here is a slightly more ideal me. Not too much in the way of changes, but a few. The biggest change is the missing goatee. And the glasses. Then there's the face being a little thinner. The eyes are in line. I could go on...

The Little Things

When you're busy working your butt off and not getting to experience normal life you have to learn to love the little things. For instance, after using Photoshop for ten years or more I discovered the other day the "sample all layers" option when using the magic wand. Holy christmas has that saved me some time when coloring pages! How I didn't see this before is beyond me. I had another flash of brilliance the other day: as I was leaning way over on my drawing desk, uncomfortable, I suddenly pondered "why the hell is this thing so low?" So I raised it. I was whistling ditty little tunes the rest of the day. It's these little things that bring so much joy if you let them.

On the other hand, Apple has finally updated their operating system to the point where it no longer recognizes my perfectly good but older large bed scanner. Just a little thing that will cost me $300 now that I have to go and buy a new scanner. Thanks Apple. How do you do a middle finger with text?

RECOVERY INCORPORATED, page 1

First page of the new comic I'm doing that will appear in STRIP magazine. The first issue hits the stands, in the UK, in November. I think this first page makes for a nice teaser.

2010 Sketchbook

I got this thing done this past spring for Chicago's C2E2 comic convention. Since then they've been sitting in my office waiting for me to get a storefront up on my website. Well, it's finally done. It wasn't even difficult. I felt slightly not-stupid for being able to figure it out and get it done, but slightly stupid for waiting so long.

So anyway, if you have any money left after SDCC, and have an interest, head on over to my website here and pick up a copy.

It's sixty pages of black and white work covering stuff done in the past ten to twelve years. The majority of the drawings have been redone this year to bring them up to my current level of skill (or lack thereof). They are mostly done with Photoshop and my Wacom Cintiq. Here are a few pages giving you an idea of what's inside. They're flying off the shelves like sleeping turtles, so hurry!

Yeah, I know. I'm not famous. I'm not even moderately famous. I am full blown unknown in the world of comics - well, in the world of everything really - but one day, when that's all different, this first volume will become invaluable. Just think about that. Granted, all of us might be long dead, but your great great great grandchildren will love you for what you've left them and they'll think of you when they're smiling to the cameras on "Antiques Road Show". And yes, for some reason I think that show will still be around then. Hopefully our frozen heads will be able to lean back, relax, and still watch it.

Tweeting

It should be obvious from my posts here that I'm not short_winded. That should make life through Twitter fairly difficult. I don't even have a clue what to say. So why am I doing it?

Hmmmmm...

I think I'll have to get back to you on that one. You can follow my confusion @luxuryninja

Generation Text

That's the name I would give the generation that includes current high school students.

I was on the train a few weeks back and noticed a teenaged girl across from me texting away. I called a friend of mine. We talked for a half hour. Yeah, that's a long phone conversation for a guy, but whatever. We were talking creative stuff. At one point I thought "that's the difference between my generation and hers: if I want to talk to someone for that length of time I'd rather just call," which I was doing. The girl, meanwhile, kept right on texting. Finally, off the phone, I started reading a magazine. I didn't pay attention to the girl while reading but when I got up to get off the train the girl was still texting. Could she have taken a break while I was reading? Yeah, but somehow I doubt it. So that's like an hour of straight texting.

A week or so later I was on the train (aaagain) with my wife and in front of us sat a couple of teenaged girls. Across from them sat three of their friends. Five girls, together, talking away. Yakkity yak yak. And texting. Texting texting texting. Nonstop. That was impressive. I watched the girls in front of me and was further impressed with their texting speed. It seemed like they were texting as fast with their thumbs as I type with all ten of my fingers (and I know how to type).

And then, as if all this weren't enough, I came to the most startling revelation after about forty five minutes: these girls? They were texting each other!!!!!! I kid you not. One of the girls would type something and another of them, across the aisle, would laugh and say "yeah" or something. That blew me away. Sitting together on the train yakking it up isn't enough? Apparently not. Wow. So is this generation just that ADD or or they just that adept at multi-tasking?

And why is it always the girls that I see texting so much? Do the guys do it too? To that extent?

Manga Studio 4 EX

I picked this up recently because it was on sale for a very good price. I've been using Photoshop since sometime around 1997. I'm used to it. I know ten ways to do anything I need to do. Why try something else? Well, it's good to keep your brain sharp and up to date with what's going on in the digital art world. It's also good to constantly experiment; good for your art and, hopefully, good for your productivity.

It's been a slow process but I can say at this point that Manga Studio is worth every penny.

It's not a perfect program by a long shot. Worst part about it to date: the manual. Ugh. It takes some significant brain power to understand what their intentions are. They leave stuff out and half of it's labelled wrong. "New Special Ruler: Speed Lines"!? No such thing, but there it is in the manual. "New Special Ruler: Radial Lines"? Yes, but you have to figure that out. And the fact that you have to create a new Ruler layer, then select the type of ruler you want to create, then click on the layer you want to draw on? It's mentioned once, way earlier in the chapter, then never repeated. It should be repeated for each set of ruler layer instructions, for boneheads like me.

I know, I know, gobbledygook.  :-)

Yes, I still do a lot of my comic work in Photoshop (under drawings,  sometimes"inking", putting together pages) but I'm starting to do more and more in Manga Studio. It's so efficient. Panel borders, word balloons and captions, and now, as of tonight: speed lines! These tasks are all tasks that have traditionally taken a fair amount of time in either Photoshop or on an actually piece of paper. With MS I cut these tasks down to minutes instead of hours, and for a guy who's slower than he should be, that's a significant change. Worth blabbing about for a minute? Obviously.

Okay, I said I'd post art next time so here's a sneak page from Recovery Incorporated.

Through the Wormhole

I've got a couple of funny stories to relate but I wanted to post new artwork before doing that. All three have been put behind the need to say "I love this new series - Through the Wormhole - with Morgan Freeman." Can't help it. I'm a super geek. I draw stuff and love science. I loved Cosmos as a kid and I think this is the next generation of it, exploring the universe and how/why it is the way it is. Science has come a long way since Cosmos originally aired (late 70's, early 80's?) and this show is really up to date with current theories and the work scientists are doing to gain further understanding of our world.

The official website is here and you can watch the first episode, if you like, on youtube. I don't know if it will stay up on youtube (different channels have different attitudes about having their material there), but if the link's still good, you can start watching it here.

Okay, I'll post some new artwork next. Then relate more weird stories from life on a commuter train (which I don't even take regularly anymore but have been on a lot recently for one reason or another).

Press

Not sure how long this will stay the headline, but the first press is finally out for a magazine I'll be a part of. It's called Strip Magazine (no, it's not a sex thing - think "comic" strip) and the first issue will be hitting the English market in November. That's English as in England, not all places where English is spoken predominantly (too bad). Click  here to see the article.

My story, created and written by me and my buddy Dean, is called RECOVERY INCORPORATED. Mia Raven is the main character and I'll leave it at that. I lie. I can't help it. It's an action packed kind of story. How's that? More? Okay. She's an American immigrant from Portugal with a troubled past and an addiction to risk taking. Here's some character studies I did of her.

Note to Commuters

This is mainly aimed at guys, but if there's any women out there doing this, you're included.

You're on the train, you forgot to bring along things to keep you occupied, and you're bored stiff. Because of this you can't seem to ignore the booger lodged up your left nostril. You try but it is a powerful thing and compels you to get it. It's okay. It happens to the best of us. Get it. Don't, however, forget this fifteen minutes later when you're still bored and you look at your fingernails and think "huh, I really should trim those," because when your fingertips go in your mouth and the biting begins, well that just crosses a line.

Either one is less than ideal when in public, but we're all human. It happens. But combining the two, specifically in that order? That's a no-go, as we used to say in the army. Just sayin'. People are watching. ;-)

Otherwise, happy commuting!

Sketch Cards

After C2E2 this year I decided to start doing a sketch card a day. The daily bit lasted a whopping three weeks. I'm not the fastest artist in the world so sometimes I really have to buckle down and work on actual work without distractions. I like doing the sketch cards though so will try to keep up with it the best I can.

The reason? During C2E2 I was asked to do a few commission sketches and I hadn't drawn openly in public like that since college. I work quietly in my office, often digitally or on marker paper where I can redraw things over and over (using multiple sheets of paper or layers in Photoshop) until they're 'right' to my eye. These methods allow me to redraw and edit very easily. Sitting in McCormick Place and drawing 'one shot/one kill' was waaaay more stressful than it should have been and I was disappointed in the results. I said to myself, "self, that's not going to happen again."

So that's the reason. To try and stay true to the 'working live' conditions I set up a couple of simple rules for myself: have no idea what I'm going to do before sitting down to do it and then finishing it in 45 minutes or less. So for better or worse, these are my results so far.

Easy Come, Not So Easy Go explained

More pages from The CORPS!

Jobs come and go. It's a part of life. This one wasn't so easy to let go, unfortunately, because of the 'not getting paid' part. That's hard. So there, now my stupid title has been explained. Not that anyone was wondering. It was bugging me, I admit it.

Design A Character

I love coming across new things, especially fun ones. I found this group over on DeviantArt called "Design A Character", link ,and thought "this should be good, fun practice". The first challenge in progress since joining the group (earlier today) is called "Drop In". You take a picture and add a character that would seem to fit.

I went to a website where I knew there would be interesting pictures, link , picked the first picture of interest I came across, and this is what my brain produced. Fun, and not overly time consuming.

Easy Come, Not so Easy Go

So way back when I posted pages for a comic I was working on with Rick Remender. Devil's Due was the publisher. The book: The CORPS! (pronounced "core"). It was a G.I. Joe kinda thing. I got an issue and a half done and the book got cancelled due to DD's money problems. I have yet to be paid for most of the work. That money's pretty much gone now, as is Devil's Due it seems. Oh well. Such is life.

Since I'm pretty sure these pages will never be published I'm sharing a few of them here that I can still stand to look at. That's how it goes with most of us artsy fartsies - we rarely like our own work. So here are a few pages from issue 1. I'll post some pages from issue 2 next time around.

Okay, so I made a small reference there to farts but it was really by the way side, therefore I'm considering this a fart-free post. :-)

Patience with the Elderly

So when we're young it seems we are constantly annoyed by older people slowing us down. That was me anyways. As I've grown older though, I realize that I will one day be one of these people and they're doing the best they can. How arrogant I was to think everyone was out to get in my way.

So I'm walking out of the grocery store the other day and I get behind an elderly fellow, easily in his nineties, and he's slower than molasses in January. I don't get frustrated though. See? I'm a grown up now. Good for me. The old man peddles along, holding onto his shopping cart for dear life. He raises a shaky hand and waves to an employee he recognizes outside, dutifully watering plants. I think "how nice. What a nice fellow." Again I'm proud of myself for my maturity. I pat myself on the back once more for my personal growth.

Then, after a full minute of patience, the old man lets one rip. FRRAAAAPP! Loud, full-bodied, and full of stink. He doesn't flinch. I'm not sure he even knew he did it, but I sure knew. And that's the thanks I get for being more mature.

No, not all of my posts are about farting. I can't help it if my life revolves around such things. It just happens - there's no reasonable explanation for it. I'll see if I can't post on a different subject matter next time.

Overheard on the train

The METRA commuter trains to be specific.

A young father holds up his infant son and says the following between spurts of giving the child rasberries (putting lips to stomach and blowing):

"Are you gassy like daddy? Are you gassy like daddy!?"

Mixed in were other great lines like "Did you fart? Did you fart!?" and "Did you drop a duce? Did my boy drop a duce!?"

Truth. I Swear.