Santa Senses Jingling!

Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb!

Can Ryan Reynold's latest superhero flick make up for his previous comic book flop? (Apparently yes).

I am Iron Man!

Avenging Advent Sketch!

Cedar Point Caricatures: August Edition

By the end of the summer I had really gotten comfortable in my position at the park and relished being able to draw caricatures with wild pop culture themed bodies!

Survey Corps from Attack on Titan

Anna and Kristoff from Frozen (with Olaf and Sven)

Raptor Trainer from Jurassic World

Rick and Morty

Ghostbuster and The Silver Surfer

Ducky Momo No More!

After listening to this inspiring interview with storyboard artist Aliki Theofilopoulos Grafft, I'd been binge watching episodes of "Phineas and Ferb" and was surprised how it was still producing quality material after all this time!

Then I found out that the show was going into indefinite hiatus.

It got be to thinking about how the characters in the show itself might feel about losing cartoon characters that had brought them such joy as well. Hence this shot of Candace and her beloved Ducky Momo parting ways in homage to the cover of Amazing Spider-Man #50.

Hm... Let's see if I can end this on a happier note.

MCC Weekly 3: Dr. Strange

I thought it would be funny to show a character struggling with the added alliterative appeal that crops up all over the place in the Marvel Universe. Hence we have Doctor Strange spitting all over himself trying to handle this tongue twister of a spell.

Sketch ya' later!

Go Big or Go Home! ("Big Hero 6" Review)

The Geek Fallout Crew reviews Disney's "Big Hero 6"!

Join Brian Farrell, Chris Giada, Derek Ash and myself as we talk about this animated adaptation and discuss what other comics should be turned into movies and TV shows.

Leave a comment and let us know what you thought of Big Hero Six and what comic you want to see adapted next! 

Marvel Day at Barnes & Noble

Doctor Who Plushies I had mentioned on Geek Fallout

Much like the Batman Birthday last month, Barnes & Noble had a Marvel Day celebration that coincided with the premiere of Guardians of the Galaxy. So a group of us from the Michigan Comics Collective set up to do some more sketches for the customers.

Hulk Mad because he not drawn with nipples!

Hulk for Xander

This drawing is suspiciously similar to one I did for my very first sketch day. 

Elsa and Olaf for Kenzie

Caroline with Venom

Crystal with The Hulk

Neena with Ms. Marvel

She-Hulk for Bethany

Lisa with Iron Man

Ashley with Captain America

Come back next weekend to see my sketches for Barnes & Noble's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Premiere Party! 

Comic Book Memories (A League of Extraordinary Bloggers Post!)

It's undeniable that comics have had an influence on my work. Growing up I learned to draw by copying the comics I saw in the newspaper like Peanuts, Garfield and Foxtrot among others. My entry into actual "comic books" came about in 1999 when I entered a contest in Clubhouse Magazine to design an original superhero. I cobbled together some general sense of what I superhero was supposed to look like based on my rudimentary knowledge of pop culture at the time. Cape, Tights, Helmets and some kind of power that made him super. Thus was the origin of Maximum Max! who was declared one of the contest's two winners and featured on the front cover of the magazine the following year.

This unexpected victory led me to take an interest in learning about existing comic book superheroes. Comics weren't circulating in the public library then quite like they are today. Instead what we had was the non-fiction section dealing with humanities, which up until that time was for me just a collection of really tall shelves filled with books that didn't have covers. The contents of this section of the library were small but very fruitful at this time in my life. The influential volumes in this department included Stan Lee presents "Bring on the Bad Guys!", Jules Feiffer's "The Great Comic Book Heroes" and "Superman Through the Ages". I sight Bring on the Bad Guys as having the most lasting impact for introducing me to Marvel's vast array of costumed characters and more importantly, Stan Lee's corny carnival huckster style of narration, which provided me with a verbose vocabulary but an affable affinity for added alliterative appeal!

                     

 

Around this time when the 2000s were upon us, comics were slowly re-entering the public conscious  especially in the wake of the first X-Men movie and there was a big push to get comics by way of "graphic novels" into the hands of kids through the public library. It was something of a slow process getting the latest stuff to our neck of the woods, but I learned I could use the computer catalog to place reserves on paperback collections from other libraries that were ahead of the curve.

The volumes I consumed the most was Marvel's "Essential" line of reprints. Each book contained about twenty issues of a respective series from their very start in the 1960s. I put these on reverse in droves at the library, emptying out whole quarter rolls to pay for the fifty cent inter-library loans and rushing home to make sure I could finish each set before they would be due in a months time. I must have read every Silver Age Marvel title to ever be printed.  My favorite series was easily The Fantastic Four. Their personalities really bounced off of one another made some great banter. Then there were their adventures! It was never a case of what bad guy they were going to fight this issue or what crime they were going to solver, these people could go from scouting the surface of the moon in one issue, to a quest to bottom of the ocean to navigating a universe so small that it fit on the head of pin in the following month.

Around the time I was wrapping up middle school, I had just about drained Michigan's collection of superhero comics dry, and while scouring the computer systems for new material at other branches I discovered that I had somehow overlooked some graphic novels at my own library that were shelved with the rest of the adult fiction. I had known of Will Eisner and his classic creation "The Spirit" from Feiffer's "Great Comic Book Heroes", but his original slice of life/historical fiction graphic novels "The Contract with God" and "To the Heart of the Storm" changed my whole way of thinking about comic book storytelling, specifically what could be a subject and how it could be told. Eisner died less than a year after I discovered these books and I'm grateful to have a small taste of the impact that would be lost to the world.

Also check out these other cool contributors and their connection with comics:

* http://calvinscanadiancaveofcool.blogspot.ca/2013/04/league-of-extraordinary-bloggers-comic.html

* http://goodwillhunting4geeks.blogspot.ca/2013/04/league-post-comic-books.html

* http://monstercafesaltillo.blogspot.mx/2013/04/league-assignment-comic-books.html

Lyra Walters as the Yellow Power Ranger

This is my entry for the Halloween Bash Contest for Superhero Cocoa featuring Lyra Walters, The Savage She-Hulk, (not to be confused with Jennifer Walters, the Sensational She-Hulk) as The Mighty Morphin' Yellow Power Ranger.

   

Here is a glimpse at my process, starting with the rough pencils to finished the inks. 

I started out with a sketch, were you can see I was emphasizing the plainer structure of the figure. The second sketch I flipped around because I thought it made for a better pose and tried to build up her muscles (she is a She-Hulk after all) However, by the time I got to start applying the inks, I de-emphasized her six-pack abdomen because I didn't want her to look like the stereotypical "spray paint spandex" of superhero comics, instead trying to go for something that actually resembled cloth. Though I did increase the size of her bicep just to remind you of her super strength.

Its kinda fun to look back on how this all came together and I'd be interested to see if any of the commenters have an opinion on what I should have kept or if I should have lost certain things or now that you can see were I'm coming from, perhaps I should have gone in a different direction. 

Give me your thoughts people!

MODOK Facepalm

My own twisted take on a classic de-motivational poster, this one starring Marvel Comic's favorite Cephalothorax, M.O.D.O.K. (Mental Organism Designed Only for Killing!) Yet another instance of my trademark juxapostions of two oddball elements from popular culture.

It was quite a challenge figuring out how to get his tiny little twig arms to work let me tell you!

For those of you unfamilar with MODOK, heres a quick glimpse of him in action:

Fantastic Four: Fashion Forward Final!

Hey Guys! Thank you to everyone who contributed their suggestions towards my entry for Project Rooftop's Fantastic Four: Fashion Forward contest. So low and behold, here is my new look for Marvel's Cosmic Quartet:

A big thank you goes out to Brian Kane for his invaluable suggestion about altering the logo. I was quite proud of my design which used the letter "F" turned on its side to create the number "4" as well, but his  recommendation of intersecting the two, opened all sorts of possibilities with positive and negative space, not to mention made the whole thing more compact. Not to mention it kind of looks like a cross between the Facebook "F" (with the white character in a blue box) and the Apple Logo with a piece removed from the whole and repositioned on top.

This was a lot of fun for me, and hope you enjoy as well.

Yes. I can illustrate for you. I'm a traditional illustrator and can help you achieve your goals through art. Learn how to work with me at www.erikjohnsonillustrator.com 

Captain Marvel

An entry for Project Rooftop's Fan Art Friday celebrating Carol Danvers' new moniker of "Captain Marvel" and change into a far more practical costume. It was a good opportunity to try and turn something around fast like this. Often I tend to go "long haul" with my compositions. Next time I try something like this, I'd like to work at including some kind of background.