Comics on the Horizon / Been a While

To start:  Goodness, I haven't updated in like seven months.  My college experience kind of punched me in the face at the beginning of the previous semester.  I won't delve into any details, but some major snafus in the registration process resulted in my unexpected transfer to a different school.  Again, I won't get into details, but I will say that I'm much happier where I'm at now.

I'm getting back into the groove with a fairly short post here.  For one, I've given the blog a visual update with a new (and if I may say so, much nicer) background image.

So.  I've mentioned in most of my posts here Novus Imperium, an SF universe created by several friends and myself.  It's been in development in one way or another for about eight years now.  Do you know how much development can occur in eight years?  The answer is "several metric space-tons."  At this point, NI is basically a fully-formed universe, with its own defined rules and aesthetics.

There is simply so much at the ready right now that I am (very cautiously) considering doing a comic / graphic novel adaption of some of the storylines that have been tossed around over the last couple years.  Right now, I'm planning on approaching the project from a manga-influenced angle (specifically, I've been hugely influenced by the works of Shirow Masamune over the years.  Primarily his Appleseed).  When I say manga-influenced, I don't mean that in every aspect.  Naturally, it'd be in the standard western left-to-right format.  Actually, it'd be easier to show you what I mean:

You'll have to click on that for the full effect.  These are some unlettered test-panels from what may be the first page of the whole project.

I realize that most westerners simply expect color in their comics, but this is a matter of stylistic choice for me.  In reading many of the very tech-and action-heavy SF mangas by the likes of Shirow Masamune and Tsutomu Nihei, I've really come to appreciate how cool stark black-and-white work can look (there are numerous instances, in Tsutomu Nihei's Biomega especially, of panels that simply would not have nearly as much visual impact if they were in color).

Granted, this project is in its infancy.  I don't plan on going beyond that first page until I've got every part of this first story laid down on paper.

So I guess I just move ahead from here and see what happens.  At the very least, it'll be a learning experience, as I've never tried to do anything quite like this before.

Cheers!
Geoff

"In the grim darkness of the far future...

...There is only war."

I've been on a pretty serious Warhammer 40,000 kick for the last few weeks.  I've been using my various ideas and free time largely as fodder for practice with digital painting techniques.  I've been trying to familiarize myself with the "start with a bunch of dark blobs, and refine it from there" method of digital painting.  I started with this one...

 ...which turned out rather well, and prompted me to continue experimenting with digital painting techniques.  This one was followed up by a couple of quicker, rougher sketches:  A Space Marine helmet painted in the Ultramarines' colors, and an irate Ork.

Each of those took maybe a half hour to paint.  I'm particularly happy with the Ork.

The most recent of my fully digital paintings is a portrait of one of my "Stonehides" Chaper Space Marines:

This pretty well typifies the sort of dark, painterly look that I'll be trying for with most of my other WH40k character portraits.

Last up is another image of that first character (one of my original characters, Inquisitor Acolyte Scarlet Winter).  This one is somewhat more my traditional style, having been originally sketched in pencil.  I then scanned it and layed down the base colors (charcoal gray, dark metallic brown, very pale skin tone) in Photoshop.  The rest of the coloring and shading was done in MyPaint, the program I used to paint all of the above images.

With this one, I wasn't so much going for a "dark, painterly look" like my Space Marine above, but rather focusing on the interplay between light and dark tones in the image.

So yeah, I've had WH40k on the brain for a while.  On the plus side, as long as I'm doing 40k themed stuff, I can file playing Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine under "research."  It's a win-win!

Cheers, all.

The Scrapyard: Starship Design

I realize this post is a day late, but I was busy drawing, so I at least used yesterday well.

As I mentioned last week, this will be a longer post than usual, detailing a number of my incomplete and abandoned starship designs.  In middle school and early high school, I did a lot of starship designs for Novus Imperium, an original sci-fi universe created by my friends and I.  At that time, most of my designs were profile-view images, and as such, many of the ships' shapes were difficult to discern.  In the last few years, the number of ships I've designed has decreased significantly, but those I have completed are of much higher quality.  The following are several designs from the last two years which simply were never completed.

This first one is also the oldest, and is a concept for a small shuttle that would be housed on the underside of my previously designed Cirrus.  The shuttle could be deployed in or out of atmosphere, and be used to land in areas too confined for the corvette-sized Cirrus.  While this version of the design never got past the rough pencil lines, some revised version of it will likely be appearing in the future.

This is lineart for the private freighter Aubree's Bounty, originally conceived as an enormous Lego model by my close friend Kevin.  The Bounty had a rough run-in with pirates a few years back, resulting in the ship's scarred exterior and cobbled-together bridge area.  I'm particularly pleased with how the engines on this one turned out.

You might have to click on this one to see all the little details.  This was a short-lived attempt at displaying a wrecked super-freighter.  These massive ships are several kilometers long when fully laden, though only the command and engine sections are equipped with life support.  Most of the ship's length comes from the cargo spar jutting back from the command section, to which all variety of cargo containers can be attached.

Another ship inspired by Kevin.  This is the linework for a Mygean frigate, based on his "MCS Color of Water."  I tried to take general shape and feel of his original, and give it a distinct aesthetic.  In fact, that's something I've been trying to do across the board, giving each faction's ships a distinct visual look.

Based on the previous ship, I wanted to design something else of Mygean make.  This is an older, decommissioned Mygean cruiser, which has been adapted to act as the flagship of a pirate lord.  To give this a more haphazard look, I took a bit of inspiration from the Reaver ship seen in the first episode of Joss Whedon's Firefly, giving it spines, and big sheets of armor just sort of riveted onto the ship's decaying frame.

So that's what I've got this week.  If nothing else, you've at least gotten a glimpse into the sort of creative dynamic between myself and Kevin.  He is, in many ways, the "Idea Man" behind a lot of Novus Imperium.  Many of my starship designs, especially, use cleaned-up and refined versions of visual aesthetics he's established with his sketches.

As far as character development goes, I'm still stuck on the character of Reina Cloude.  I think I may just keep rolling with doing artwork of her until I'm thoroughly burned out on her design and can finally force myself to work on someone else (such as Reina's close friend/sometimes flirty romantic interest Doc Haplace,  who has received virtually no development art whatsoever).

Anyhow, there'll be more stuff up next week.

Cheers, all.

Like Section 9, But Not

Another fairly short post, as I'll be in California for the next few days, away from my lovely computer.

I've recently been doing some work on a character who plays a fairly important role in parts of the Novus Imperium storyline I've been developing, but who until now has received fairly little attention in terms of artwork: Captain Jerid Bannon.  He is a member of "Green Team," an elite group of Karic special forces operatives with police cross-training, tasked with protecting Karic from internal threats (I had initially come up with this description a couple months back.  Immediately after typing it out, I realized that if you replace "Karic" with "Japan" in that sentence I basically just described Ghost in the Shell's "Section 9."  Appropriate, since they fill similar roles).

My latest design for the good captain:

I've tried to improve on his original helmet/face designs (originals can be seen here: Link).  The new helmet especially looks more aggressive.

That's about all I've got at the moment., though readers of this blog do get a sneak-preview of this year's updated reference of my character Reina Cloude, showcasing a new digital inking style:

It's still in the middle stages, obviously.  The full reference will of course be a full-body front and back multiview, with a background.

Previous references:
2009
2010
2011

Stay tuned next Wednesday, as I'll be doing a special extra-long entry on starship design.

Until then, cheerio!

Further Explorations in Body Armor

Short post this week.

I've been expanding on some of the sketches I posted last week, both figuratively and literally, as I used blown-up versions of my sketches as the basis for this.

Just a nice, high-detail redraw of the back of Reina's armor.  I'm pretty much sold on how the upper back looks.  The hips could still use refining.  I've been doodling more ideas for the front of the armor, but the stomach section is still giving me a lot of trouble.

I'll likely have a bit more to show for next week's post.

Until then, good day, all.

Getting to Know My Spacy People

Do you know what happens when I get side-tracked?  I forget to update my blog for a month-and-a-half, that's what.  Yes, a number of factors contributed to this unplanned hiatus, chief among them being model kits, Star Wars: The Clone Wars-themed artwork, and Skyrim.

But if you're anything like me, you don't read this blog for my words, you read it for the pretty pictures, so let's get to it.

First up, a study sheet of my character Reina Cloude, set in the original universe of Novus Imperium.  You may already be somewhat familiar with her, as she's been the subject of a previous post, and she occupies the background of my blog, come to think of it.  In fact, the little icon that appears on the tab you've opened this blog in is a little painting of her eye.  She's been the focus of a whole lot of development over the last couple years.

1-  This was just me getting warmed up.  I think I'm finally starting to get a grasp on how the various shapes of her torso fit together.

2-  Similar to the above, I've drawn Reina's face more times than I care to count, but that's an essential part of the development process.  I have to give her a defined look, and I have to get acquainted with every little detail to ensure that she has a consistent appearance.

3-  Finally trying out some ideas for the back of her civilian outfit.  I wanted to give it a slightly more sci-fi feel than the previous studies and sketches I'd done.

4&5-  I've been trying to figure out her armor's design for a while now.  It's a huge challenge, trying to make the armor look substantial enough to protect her, but still keep it light-weight and flexible enough for a stealth character like Reina.  I'm liking where it's going with the back and chest, but I can't seem to work out exactly how I want the stomach section to look.  It'll get there eventually.

Next up is a character who's been in the works for as long as Reina, but who I've only in the last two years rally made a lot of progress with: Timberwolfe, an ex-military freelancer who acts as a sort of adoptive father to Reina.  He's a Saldean, and alien species created by my close friend Kevin.  Externally, Saldeans are extremely similar to Humans.  Most of the differences are internal, the details of which I'll get into at some later date.  Suffice to say, their home planet of Saldea is a high-gravity world, and Saldeans are heavily muscled to counteract this.  On a Karic-like (Earth-like, basically) world, a Saldean is likely to be able to perform "impossible" feats of strength.

1&2-  A couple of head studies.  Similar to Reina above, this was primarily just to help myself get acquainted with the various details of his face.

3-  This may be the first image I've ever drawn of Timberwolfe without him wearing a bandanna, headband, or skull-cap.  I decided to extend that scar running up from his jawline through his eyebrow, up his forehead and over into his hair.  The scars on his head and shoulder are a couple of nasty souvaniers from the mission that ended his black-ops career and resulted in his going freelance.

Alternately:  "Timberwolfe, a proud member of the Solid Snake Hair Club for Men."

4&5-  Unlike Reina, Timberwolfe's armor has fallen into place without too much trouble.  There's still plenty of room for improvement, but I'm really happy with where it's going.  I've got sort of a blend of Metal Gear Solid 4 and Mass Effect influences going on with my current armor designs.  Also worth noting: his physique.  I'm trying to have his appearance show that he is obviously very strong, but also trim enough that he can really move when he needs to; vaulting over obstacles and leaping wide gaps when he needs to.

Also, he does have a real name, I just haven't figured out what it is yet.  "Timberwolfe" is simply his old black-ops call sign.

Also Also, here's some shameless self-promotion:  I'm currently taking commissions, for information, you can check Here.

So there it is.  My apologies for neglecting my readers (all three of them).  But I'm getting back into the groove, so expect weekly updates, at least.

Cheers, all.

Tanks: Just Add Legs

I've been doing a bit of mecha sketching the last few days.  Specifically, I've been working on establishing a look for Karic's military mecha (check the "Space Punks" blog entry from a while back to get and idea of what Karic is).

First up is a design based on something I'd experimented with in Lego form a few years back:  The Riot Mech.

"In the past, Karic experimented with all manner of vehicles for riot suppression; they had used cars, trucks, and even hovering platforms, but nothing has proven quite so effective as the riot mech.  Something about it lumbering  along on four legs simply has a profound psychological effect on mobs.  Additionally, its wide, four legged frame makes it virtually impossible to overturn."


On the military side of things, I've also done a pretty detailed sketch of a Karic heavy mech.  I'd estimate it stands roughly nine meters in height.  I've left the second chaingun pod off so you can see the cab section.

The heavy mech is essentially one step heavier than Karic's main battle tanks.  The standard armament is a pair of chaingun pods attached to the mech's shoulder-mounts.  It also has a set of descent thrusters built into the legs.  Officially, these thrusters are meant to slow the mech's descent during air-drops.  Some pilots, however, have perfected the art of firing the thrusters in unison with a "jump" motion in the legs.  Because of this, skillful pilots are able to use the descent thrusters instead as jump-jets.  The heavy mech has a crew of two: a driver who sits in the "hips" section, and a gunner who occupies the head.

I'm slowly working towards a consistent aesthetic for Karic's military/paramilitary tech.  It's getting there.

Bonus!  Here's a little freighter I doodled a while back:

I may do more with that design at some point in the future.