color pencil / pooh & co

from "The Art of Winnie the Pooh" book, published by Disney Editions

He kept the house... she took his heart--

The Ol' Salt...

just taking some new felt pens for a test drive.

"Nostril-Dumbass Strikes Again!..."

trouble in toontown...

Too many things going on at once.

Doomworld...

Post-apocalyptic comic book concept from the early '80s.
(pencil & felt pen on Neenah bond paper, unpublished)

some silly sketches...

'nuff said.

101st post...

I thought it might be a good time to share a few pieces from the flat files...

The Hagar the Horrible art was created for in-store marketing.
That's my coloring on the strip, and my figure drawing of Hagar at the bottom of the pages--my lettering too.
And a very nice note of appreciation, from Chris Browne follows it.

The Popeye art was a different story, this art was featured on billboards, bus stops, subway ads and print ads, all over the country. Created when I worked at GEM Studio for the second time in the late '80s. It was a thrill to work on the "Old Sailor"-- especially since he was the first image I'd ever drawn as a child. My only regret is that I didn't handle him better. Looking at it now I can see the inconsistent linework and the poor color choices, but I'm still very glad and grateful that I had the chance to do the assignment.

making comics...

Here's a peek at how I put a story together. This one started with a sketch of an older man's head, but I ran out of paper at the bottom and decided to put him in the ground up to his nose. Then I added his house in the background, with his wife talking on the telephone.
This led me to wonder how he got into this situation, so I drew a rough storyboard to flesh it out. I tried to keep the pencils loose and only draw what was necessary to the story. I did get a little heavier handed than I intended in some spots on the backgrounds, but it's a challenge to try and keep it simple and basic.
I'm still working on the figures, and tweaking the dialogue, but I thought it might be interesting to show the story in progress.

I should have the final inks and color done by next week. Maybe.

(images above are all intentionally 'lo-res' and crappy...
I don't want to give too much away)

a "Shadownose" Gallery...

Here are a few concepts and situations
I've had dancing in my head
for the last two decades...

he's had enough...

this is the opening panel of a two page strip that I'm working on, more to come.

for Hutch--

Hutch has a cool Wolverine sketch on his blog (go see it) and he got me thinkin' about Logan. I've had this unfinished sketch from the early '90s sitting around the studio for the last couple of weeks, so I finished it off and I'm posting it for my buddy, Eric "Hutch" Hutchison.

what the--?

Here's a recent inking sample. Nowadays I'll reach for a brush instead of a pen, much nicer flow and it's a lot more fun.

'Nose Noir...

The blueline sketch is new. The rest of them were inked twenty years ago...

First published editorial piece, 1977...

I was searching for a lousy ballpoint pen illustration of "Superboy" from 1963 that I was telling my friends at work about since we were on the subject of early crap we'd all produced, when I came across this "gem".

This is the first editorial illustration I ever had published. I was in my 20's, and I wanted to be a musician. So to make ends meet I took a job doing layouts for a local newspaper publisher. The job was undemanding and it paid enough to fund my slack-ass lifestyle until my band was signed to a record label and the grammy awards started rolling in.
That was the plan.

One night while I was laying out a page my publisher asked me to do an illustration for an article. A front page article! Their freelance editorial Illustrator was unavailable. I'm guessing the last check they gave her "bounced". They were notorious for handing out rubber checks. I tried to act like it was no big deal and sat at a reporter's desk, sweating my then-skinny ass off- and knocked this "beauty" out in twenty minutes. I can still remember doing it- thirty years later! I did the under drawings with a non-photo blue marker pen, and by some miracle I found an unclogged, full rapidograph, and I was on my way!

A day or two later I got to see the printed article and I was "hooked".

It's true: You never forget your first time.

Something old--something new...

I've always loved Comic Books. This is a concept I've been kicking around for a couple of decades. I think I've finally found an approach for the art style...and this isn't it. But I wanted to share these images with you anyway.