We All Scream For Ice Cream!

Today is another sketch from the Conventionless Convention Sketch auction. Well, a modified one for the blog. Our messy ice cream girl didn't have her bikini top in the original. Thanks to Raamya for the commission. As always, this is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.
Today's Legion couple is Karate Kid (Val Armorr) and Princess Projectra. For the background I created a split image of 30th Century Japan (Where Val grew up) and Orando, Jeckie's home world that is still in it's medieval age. This was done in ink, watercolor and gouache on 11" x 17" illustration board.

Cheetah Again! (And revisited)

Above is the second commissioned piece featuring Cheetah getting the magic lasso treatment from an off-stage woman of wonder. And below is the redrawn and re-inked Cheetah from yesterday. I completely vegged out and forgot the ears on that one. I had drawn them in the pencil version but after several martinis with martini chasers, I inked right over them without a second thought. Gordon was great about it but I felt I didn't do the job right and I told him I would redo it. Both pieces are ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board. Thanks again Gordon for the commissions!
And I was only kidding about the martinis. I only drink Absolut Citron Vodka on the rocks when I ink. :)

Cheetah!

Cheetah has been on the wrong end of a amazonian right hook in this piece. Crime doesn't pay girl! Thanks to Gordon for this commission. This is inked on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Sketchbook Saturday

I spent today going over the sketch list and trying out some poses. I knocked out the first two finished pieces pretty quickly this week and then had to dive into some other work. But today I leisurely worked up some ideas for the rest. With the exception of a trip to Tampa for an Art Show, and some work on my new website design, it was a Sketchbook Saturday.
Today's Legion Couple is Cosmic Boy (Rokk Krinn) and Night Girl (Lydda Jath). While Night Girl wasn't an official member of the Legion, she is Cosmic Boy's girlfriend and a founding member of the Legion of Substitute Heroes. The costume for her is the redesign by Mike Grell. If you wonder how she never fell out of that outfit, imagine how Cosmic Boy dealt with the redesign that Mike Grell did on his costume: Take all the pink areas and make them flesh and there you have it. I guess the black areas were magnetic.

Get Us Out From Under, Wonder Woman!

Above is the finished Wonder Woman pin-up I am donating to Wonder Woman Day 3. This was finished in watercolor. Gotta pack it up and ship it out tomorrow!
And here we have the next Legion Couples painting from 2000 featuring Ultra-Boy (Jo-Nah) and Phantom Girl(Tinya Wazzo). Of all the Legion couples, these two seemed to have a "real" relationship. I can't figure out why. I guess because the two of them would love and fight with each other but when the chips were down, they would always be there for the other. Even if it meant going against the rest of the Legion. They just seemed "real". For each of the pieces I did a monochromatic background depicting Legion related history. This piece features a scene from Ultra-Boy's origin. Jo-Nah (Jonah) and his space ship was swallowed by space creature (whale). But he was saved when a Science Police cruiser blasted the creature open. Somehow Jo gained his ultra powers from the creature. I kid you not. :)

In Her Satin Tights, Fighting For Our Rights...

And the old red, white, and blue! The inked Wonder Woman I have posted is going to be painted and donated for Wonder Woman Day III, October 26, 2008. The money raised from all the auctioned items support domestic violence shelters. Here is the link for more information. I will post the finished piece tomorrow. I was shooting for the 1970s Wonder Woman here. The one who put herself through twelve trials to prove to herself, and others that she was worthy of rejoining the Justice League of America. A happier Wonder Woman, if you will. Of course, I haven't read a Wonder Woman comic in years so she might be a happy go-lucky Amazon, for all I know. :) Everyone should check out the items up for auction. A good cause and some great stuff to bid on.

Below is our next installment of the commissioned Legion Couples I did some years back. This one features Mon-El and Shadow Lass. When Shady joined the Legion she was interested in Brainiac 5. Then moved on to be interested in Superboy, or so Duo Damsel thought. Then on to Mon-El. The girl likes powerful guys. The background is the main building at Legion Headquarters.

Lightning Lad - Legion of Super-Heroes

We have another Legionnaire for Roland today. Garth Ranzz, Lightning Lad. Lightning Lad had one of the coolest costume anywhere. Designed by Dave Cockrum during his run on the Legion in the 1970s. Thanks again Roland! This is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Paper.

And below we have something special that I thought I would share. This is just one of several painted commissions I did for my friend Tom Fleming, owner of Fanfare-se.com I met Tom through eBay and he probably has a larger collection of my artwork than I do. We became friends and our families would spend Thanksgiving weekend together at Mid-Ohio Con. Now they come down here and spend their family vacation with us. Always a lot of fun!

Back in 1999 or 2000, Tom had an idea to commission from me a series of paintings of the Legion couples. This one with Lightning Lad and Saturn Girl was one of the earliest ones, dated 2000. This was inked and them painted in gouache and watercolor on 11" x 17" Strathmore Illustration Board. These were a blast to work on. I will share them all, one at a time if there is any interest. Most have not been seen. They won't take the place of posting new work, they will just a little bonus post. :)

Saturn Girl - Legion of Super-Heroes

This is the first of the new batch of Conventionless Convention Sketches. Saturn Girl is one of the founding members of the Legion. Thanks to Roland for this commission! I had fun with this one. Have I mentioned I am a big Legion fan?

This was done in ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Batwoman

Just a pencil drawing today. I've been having fun rendering with pencils lately. For those interested, the Supergirl piece from yesterday is on eBay. You can find it here. I will be putting Batwoman up as well later today. Tomorrow I start digging into the fresh batch of Conventionless Convention Sketches. Should be fun! :)

This piece is done in graphite on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Supergirl Fun With A Pencil

Today's title is a variation on the title of the Andrew Loomis' book FUN WITH A PENCIL. If you don't know who Andrew Loomis is, go here. Go ahead, I'll wait. : )

Welcome back. Now you are in the know. When I started working on this piece I decided to just stay with pencil only. Building up the tones, pulling the white out of the grays and getting my hands covered in graphite is fun. It's much easier to deal with pencil smears compared to ink smears.

This was done using a HB and 2B lead in two mechanical pencils. Blending is done with paper towels and a blending stump. All this on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

I hope everyone had a good weekend. 

Just another Sketchbook Saturday

Just time for some sketchbook sketching today. Sat outside in the lanai this morning with my coffee, sketchbook, English Bulldog, Pug and two cats all wanting attention. But when they got bored with me, I was able to doodle a little. Nobody else was awake yet so it was pretty quiet. But this is it for today. It's Deena's birthday so I will be grilling some steaks shortly, opening up some good wine to go with it and probably having a little birthday cake and ice cream.

Sketchbook Friday

It was a full day in the Labs so all I managed was some sketchbook time. After all the pin-ups I thought this would be a welcome break. ;) Happy Friday everyone. Have a nice weekend. I'll be here when you get back!

Stormy - Sketch #18

Royce asked for something along the lines of a Gil Elvgren pin-up. Well, Elvgren is a master and me...well...I just slap ink on paper. But being big fan of Elvgren's work I wanted to try my hand at one of those peek-a-boo type pin-ups. A windy day and a lost running wild umbrella makes for a slightly embarrassing moment for our girl here. Thanks again Royce! This is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Cherry Blossoms - Sketch #17

This was done for Brandon. He liked my May Flowers post way back on May 1st. So he requested something along the same lines but with cherry blossoms. I liked the idea and here we are. Thanks again for the fun request Brandon. This is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Waiting on a wave - Sketch #16

This little surfer girl was requested by Royce and I was more than happy to do it. I love doing beach/tropical subjects and this fits the bill. Thanks Royce!

This piece is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Phantom Kitty Girl - Sketches #14 & 15

Today we have my entry into Michael's "Common Elements" theme. He has a really cool collection of artwork that features characters that some type of commonality. He asked me for X-Man Kitty (Shadowcat) Pryde and Legionnaire Tinya (Phantom Girl) Wazzo. Pretty scary I knew Phantom Girls name without looking it up. Both characters possess the ability to become intangible and pass through solid objects. Fun stuff! Thanks again Michael! This piece is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Wonder Twin Powers Activate! - Sketches 12 & 13

It's the Wonder Twins! Friends of the Super-Friends! This is actually done on two boards that are divided vertically through their power burst. So they can be framed alone or together. This was a cool one to work out. Thanks to Alex for the commissions! This is also ink on 2 pieces of 11" x 17 Canson Bristol Board.

By the way, there are still spots open on my ebay sketch list. You can check it out here.

Dirty Pair (Part Two) - Sketch #11

Here is the second of the Dirty Pair for Jose. Both pieces match up nicely if they are in a portfolio or hanging on a wall. I had fun with both of the Dirty Pair pieces. Thanks again Jose! Ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Girls Finest - Sketches #9 & #10

For today we have the female Worlds Finest team of Supergirl and Batgirl. This commission comes from Brian who has had to wait a long time since his Scarecrow and Poison Ivy pieces were done. Thanks for the commissions and for your patience Brian! This piece represents the 70s versions of Supergirl and Batgirl. I even pulled out the Showcase Presents Batgirl trade paperback to make sure I did her costume as it was done at that time. This was done in ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

My schedule has opened up because a couple of projects got pushed off. I'm halfway done with the sketch list I have right now and by the end of the weekend, I should be close to done. So with all this free time I didn't think I would have, I am going to run another sketch auction on eBay starting tonight. I got enough emails from people who missed the last one to make me think someone out there might still be interested. I had thought about just doing some sketches and put them up for auction but I never know what to draw. It's always more fun to hear the requests for sketches. So if anyone is interested in getting on the list here is another chance to do so. Here is the auction. Thanks!

Witchy and blushing friend - Color

Here is the last of the Halloween images I am doing for CILM. Time to start on Christmas images. :) Didn't get done with the "two" sketch pieces I was planning to finish, but I did get them penciled so that will be inked tomorrow. It's a combined image of two characters so it took a bit longer to work out the composition. No worries though, we are still on track with all the sketches.

This piece, like all the previous Halloween images were colored in Photoshop.

Devil Girl and Pal

Here is the second piece for the day. Another Halloween pin-up for my next batch of art from CILM. I am going to look into a few on-line print on demand companies that do posters and prints. I've seen a few but have no experience with them. I would love to hear from anyone that has purchased prints or posters from such a company. Anyway, I hope everyone enjoys the double treat today.

A Gathering Of Cats

Another finished piece for my Halloween package from CILM. Two more to color. This could be a multi-post weekend. I am planning on doing at least two more sketch auction pin-ups and the two remaining Halloween pin-ups. Stay tuned!

Dirty Pair (Part One) - Sketch #8

This is the first of a (Dirty) Pair I am doing for Jose. I have never drawn the characters before so it was a challenge finding the right outfit for them. I liked this one so I went with it. And of course she's done in the "Gonzo" style instead of the anime look. Over all I think it came out pretty nice. And it was really fun! This is another ink piece on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board. Thanks again Jose!

Melody of the Pussycats - Sketch #7

Here is the drummer of the famed rock band Josie and the Pussycats enjoying the day after a late gig. Thanks to Gary for this second Josie/beach related commission. If you search back in the blog, you will notice this one matches up with that one. This is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

In other news, it looks like Hurricane Ike is heading straight for Houston. I know of a few people who visit this blog that are in the Houston area. To all of you in the path of this huge storm, stay safe and good luck.

Shrinking Violet - Sketch #6

Deadlines and commitments. The day was filled with both. But a milestone has passed successfully and a sketch was done. So all in all a good day. Today it's another Legionnaire. I won't go into my Legion fixation again, but I do love drawing Legionnaires. This is the first time I have drawn this particular version of Violet so that added to the fun. And I like the simplicity of the costume. Don't be fooled, sometimes the simpler the costume, the easier to mess it up. Thanks to Roland for both Legion commissions, this one and Timber Wolf! This is inked on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board. Happy Wednesday everyone!

White Queen - Sketch #5

Full day at the Labs today fighting gangs and gang violence. And I got the White Queen finished. Thanks for the commission Chris! This is ink on 11" x  17" Canson Bristol Board.

Sketchbook Tuesday!

Though technically this were done on a sheet of 11" x 17" copy paper, I am still gonna call this sketchbook material.

I have been spending the better part of the day fine tuning things for a deadline on Wednesday. I am in the Labs tomorrow all day so I lose that day for working towards the deadline. Because the project I am working on is one of those really large 3' x 5' illustrations, I've had a piece of paper next to me to scribble on every time I have to wait for my computer to save the 500mb file I am working on.

Sketching out an Emma Frost pin-up today and the above is all that got done. Emma is looking FINE, by the way. I thought I would share the above because it does relate to the commissioned pieces I am working on. I am doing a Supergirl/Batgirl combo piece and here I am trying to work out an agreeable composition. I'm trying to create a fun piece that reflects the characters as they were in the early 1970s while staying away from a static pose for the girls. I don't know if any of these poses will make the cut, but I have to get through them to find the gem. I know this isn't the most exciting post, but it does show I don't just crank the pin-ups out without giving some thought to them. :)

Supergirl - Sketch #4

You can never go wrong with asking me to draw Supergirl. Always a favorite. Thanks Chris for the commission! This is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

In addition to doing this piece, I also did 8 spot illustrations for another job. Pretty full day. That's not including the trip to Lowes to pick up pavers for the new walkway to the front door. Whew! Yes, a full day indeed. Back to the grind tomorrow gang!

Timber Wolf - Sketch #3

It's no secret I am a fan of the Legion of Super-Heroes. And Brin Londo, Timber Wolf, is one of my favorites. So when a request for a couple of Legionnaires made the list, I was happy. Today consisted of almost 12 hours of illustration work (deadline looming). When I put that away for the day, I drew this. Thanks Roland, for the commission and for a chance to visit an old friend.

This was done in ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

She Gives Me Fever!

Looks like one of our pumpkins is under the weather. Or just faking it. Can you blame him?This is a series of Halloween nurse ideas I am playing with. After the full day I had at the Labs today, this is all that is left. Actually, no, that's not right either. I do have about 9 spot illustrations I have to rough this this weekend for a presentation on Wednesday. So I will be drawing late into the night and weekend. Have no fear though, I will be working on the sketch list as well. Need to throw some fun drawing in with the work drawing. :) Happy Friday everyone!

Heeeere kitty, kitty, kitty!

Another image for the CILM Halloween Package. I thought I would show the original sketch from my sketchbook. I scanned it, enlarged it, and transfered the drawing to the final board. A few tweeks, some black cats and black kitten, some ink and ta-da! Still need to color her though.

The sketch list just sold out. Thanks to everyone who purchased one (or two or three). I thought I would share my list of characters to draw as it is right now.

Scarecrow (done)

Poison Ivy (done)

Supergirl (70s version) with Batgirl (Barbara Gordon)

Melody (Josie & The Pussycats)

Kitty Pryde with Phantom Girl (Legion of Super-Heroes - 70s bell bottom costume)

The Dirty Pair (might be together)

Wonder Twins (might be together)

White Queen

Supergirl (current version)

Pin-up girl with cherry blossoms

Still waiting to hear what the remaining six requests will be but this is a pretty nice mix. Several characters I have never drawn before. Thanks again everyone!

You're gonna need an ocean of calamine lotion!

Another Batman Family character today. I always enjoy drawing Poison Ivy and this time was no exception. This is for Brian and is inked on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board. Thanks again Brian!

For anyone interested I have put the remaining slots for sketches up on eBay.

The Scarecrow!

First up of the sketches I am doing is The Scarecrow. This is a character I have never drawn before but I got really inspired and had fun doing this. Thanks Brian for the commission!

This was done in ink on 11"x 17" Canson Bristol Board.

Conventionless, Convention Sketches - The Sequel

After looking over my September schedule I found I have room for more sketch requests. The last time went so well and I had such a good time doing them. The variety of requests were great and it seems everyone was happy with their artwork. So here we go again. The only difference this time I am offering the sketches here first instead of listing it on eBay. Here is the official description for the sketches:

CONVENTIONLESS, CONVENTION SKETCHES: I am taking 20 requests for sketches for the month of September. The price is $50.00 (plus shipping, insurance, etc.) for a single character/no background, inked on 11" x 17" Bristol Board. See above art for examples. You may have to supply references if I am not familiar with the character(s) you are requesting.

Artwork will be shipped out every Friday and all artwork will be completed by September 30. When your request is completed, I will email the image to you and post it to this blog. Please add the following for shipping and insurance costs: 10.00/one request, $15.00/2-3 requests, $20.00/4 requests. PayPal and personal checks will be accepted. Checks will have to clear my bank before artwork is started. My PayPal account is gene_gonzales@mac.com. If you have any questions please contact me before you send any money. Thanks!

ZOMBIE PROOF - Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide

A break from the Halloween pin-ups today. I finished the last of the art for the 39th Edition of the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide today. There are several pages that we have updated for this edition. One page explains the grading scale and we always feature a comic character explaining it. Past editions featured Shi, Painkiller Jane, McCandless & Co. and this one features the lead character from ZOMBIE PROOF, from Moonstone. I started and finished this piece today. I thought I would share both the inked version and the color version. The original artwork is ink on 11" x 17" Canson Bristol Board. Color in Photoshop.