Another Weapon of Choice

I'm running low on special black ink for my Copic sketch marker work horse.

Going to have to order more online, which means a slight delay in posting the first 6 pages. In hindsight I should have ordered it sooner.

In the meantime here is another weapon of choice post.

I like coffee. I like it a lot.


This thing makes my brain as a sharp as a knife! An old school Salton espresso machine found at Value Village for $8. Weeks later newer models from other manufacturers showed up on shelves. But I was happy with my purchase since the quality didn't seem as good for a higher price.

She's not the prettiest thing around, but if you like coffee, there is only one way to drink it and she does a good job. The press doesn't even compare. As for drip? Are you crazy? Get that crap away from me.

Fooling With Styles

So...
I'm developing a graphic novel and at this current point in time I've produced 3 pages.

You'll be able to read it here. Free.

It will most likely be considered a horror book, but I hope that it comes across more as a study of a man.

I was recently very inspired by the works of Yoshihiro Tatsumi and his inspiring ink work. I've pretty much decided that I want to go in the same direction with my own book.

There is something deeply traditional in reading black and white ink work on paper that I feel can really make the reader connect more deeply with a book.

I think it was something I loved about Jeff Smith's Bone and Jim Woodring's Frank too. There is just this sort of simple graphic appeal to the contrast between black ink on paper.

That's not to say that I am not inspired by colour works though. Ben Templesmith's art is very moving too.

Below I sort of did a quick monochromatic experimentation with his work as inspiration to test the waters.

What do you think?

My Weapons of Choice

So I thought I'd start things off by showing you what I have been using to make comics with recently.

I've tried quite a few things over the last few years and read about what others are into using.

For me though, this seems to work best for now.

The 3H is used for roughing in the page and figuring out the details.

The Chinese brushes are for any wet ink work I plan on doing. Or maybe if I plan on doing watercolour for illustration purposes.

The Copic Sketch marker is my true work horse, I guess. Pretty much 85% of the line work I do is currently done with it. I love the variable widths I can get with the brush tip. The Copic marker is for borders and any sort of detailing I want to do with less variable width.

The Marsmatic700 is for text and fine details. The Uniballer is for fine details and cross-hatching. I am probably going to replace it with a finer pen tip for the Marsmatic.

And for filling in black areas, I've decided to stick with my Pilot Super Color markers that I use in my fine art work. They stink and it might not be the best for my head, but I love how utilitarian they are.

I'm happy with these right now.