I've been saying that I wanted to post some preliminary work for Shadrach Stone to show my process and to explain how much thought goes into every single page for me. There's a critical moment when I realize exactly how I want to compose a page after reading Stuart's script. Not exactly Transcendental Meditation but it does closely resemble a channeling of impulses, eventually resulting in a mess in my sketchbook. I want to go through the thought process for the above thumbnail sketch.If you'll note, it's page 28 (the new page 32) As you can see, things are already confusing.
First thing I do is try to figure out the panel arrangement. I do this literally the size of my thumb. In the above art this was done sort of bottom left. I make notes to myself about what I want to draw in the panels that count the most. After I'm satisfied with the composition of the gutters, I'll loosely sketch the scene a bit larger. In this particular page Shadrach is very actively horrified. For this reason I chose to compose the gutters at odd angles to shake up the action a bit. In the first panel he's running away from us, in the second towards us, simulating the distance that I want him to travel. Third, I chose to go above his shoulder, an instant sort of "sneak up on the character" angle, making his reaction more palpable at something falling. It ends with him leaping over the fallen object as it hits the ground, effectively closing out the page and hopefully building suspense for a quicker anticipation to turn the page then say, a scene where Shadrach is having coffee with a client.
Now, this is all neatly described in the script, though, Stuart is kind enough to art direct me loosely enough so I can get in on the fun. The job of the artist is to make executive decisions about what everything actually looks like and to make those descriptions as dynamic as possible.
Design of the page is very important to me. It's the part, if you do right, that might just be invisible at first glance. But, it is the lubrication that helps the pacing of the action. I try, tangentially, to have points of movement from panel to panel that line up, IE: panel 1 Shadrach's right leg sits squarely above panel 2 Shadrach's head, panel 2 Shadrach's right knee points to panel 3 Shadrach's clenched right fist and panel 4 Shadrach's right hand breaks the gutter, insinuating that Shadrach is actually leaping off the page. The process and use of focal points and perspective are age old tools that must be constantly and consistently sharpened if you want to evolve and improve as a visual artist. This is something I'll be going into more detail about in a future post.
Getting the body language right is only the first part. Your intrepid character (in this case Shadrach Stone) must be interacting with a background, otherwise he or she is floating in blank space. Unless your Jock drawing the Losers and have such a downright fucking snazzy style that you don't really need much in the vein of backgrounds then you can't get away with skimping on them. It's difficult to go into too much detail on backgrounds in the thumbnail phase, so I sort of block in shapes. However, if you'll note the right hand side of the sketch you'll see Street names which are touch points for later referencing. If you're doing a scene in an actual place that you can see pictures of or can actually go to and take pictures or draw from the spot, it'll lend more believability to the scene.
I'm not sure what the hell the scribbles are on the left with the units of measurement beside them but considering I'm drawing a book about alternate realities and parallel universes and my left eye has been twitching for a month because I'm not certain I've blinked much lately, any thing's possible.
Finally, below is half a page from the same scene above, which I'm redrawing, (never be afraid to redraw a page) from the previous content before Stuart and I signed with Penny Farthing. It's around 2 years old. Notice the way it's more designed and implied storytelling in the first panel with Shadrach running through a reverse silhouette of the Statue of Liberty's head toward an aerial view of Manhattan, as well as the high resolution vector smoke I was toying around with in the second. It was fun, but a little too jarring. The smoke is too lazy and it clashes with the stark blacks.
The inked look with realistic smoke is something I think I've had much more success with recently in the coloring phase.
Stay classy...
