I thought I'd do a post about my process for coming up with the new cover for our
Braids Of The Gorgon pitch. A visual diary, of sorts. I know I dig these kinds of things when I see them on other artists' blogs. Are you seated comfortably? Then we shall begin...
Step 1.
This is the first ink sketch I did as I started to get a sense of what I wanted on the cover. I did a loose drawing in pencil and then just let the pen and brush do the rest of the drawing. I was pretty happy with this, hand/temple roof tangents aside. I did up some simple colours for it and shipped it off to James and Ken for their reactions.
Step 2.
One of the things that James suggested I change was the placement of our resident Gorgon and place her behind the temple. I did a few quick sketches to see how that would look and thought it was an interesting idea.
Step 3.
I felt the emphasis was too much on the architecture (something I love to draw) and made it smaller and had the Gorgon more prominent and more "gorgon-like". I decided that a logo placed on the bottom of the cover was probably not the best place to have it. Instead, I pushed the whole image down and left more room at the top for the logo. I was also flirting with the idea of adding some figures, like Damara and Perseus, in the foreground but decided that it was looking forced and taking away from the narrative of the image.
Step 4.
I then picked up my brush, grabbed my cup of ink and did this. No pencil drawing, just ink and all the happy mistakes that can happen. I dug this drawing and sent it off to the Braids crew (Ken and James). I waited breathlessly to hear their reaction. Well, maybe not
breathlessly...
Step 5.
It was suggested that I try and open the Gorgon up for a tad more detail and to maybe put a hand coming forward to give it more tension. All great suggestions, so off I went to my drawing table and redrew the image. Again, no pencil drawing first. All ink, baby! I was jazzed with this and decided to throw some colour over it.
Step 6.
With colour applied and the
Braids logo (designed by
Avi Goldberg) in place, I sent this off to Ken and James. And, what do you know? They liked it as it was! Cover complete!
Hope you dug that! See you on Friday!
Labels: art, Braids of the Gorgon, colour, comics, cover, James Powell, Ken faggio
This the cover to the Ape Entertainment UFO Anthology. The colours were done by the talented Osmarco Valladao. The launch date of the online anthology was October 31 and it gets updated with a new page every Thursday and Sunday. There has been one full story posted and another one has just begun. Go check it all out here!
