Week 6: The Crow..final

I wanted to experiment with this one...especially after picking fellow monster, Craigs brain during Art Club. This is pen and ink, masking fluid, ink washes and a bit of white acrylic and white paint marker. The background however was an experiment. Craig had mentioned working with bleach..so I did attempt it here. I had splashed and brushed the bleach on..but it did not seem to have any affect on the inks. That was until I took a sanding block to it....this was the end result.
I chose a background story for the character. After seeing numerous times in the news of young kids getting killed for sports jackets and tennis shoes. So I combined that premise of story along with my love for Forrest Whitaker in Ghost Dog. If you head to my blog...http://www.chelzostudios.com/..you can check the sketches.

The Crow

I've always loved crows...always. Then came this comic..The Crow, which eventually lead me to doing some background stuff on how the animal is viewed in other cultures...legends and religions. That being said I went on Mr. O'Barrs premise and envisioned the character as a instrument of vengeance. But alas..I ran short of time this week with finishing a commission..(Which can be viewed on my blog...end of shameless plug..starting Tuesday...okay now end of shameless plug.) So here's a sneak peek at my piece...I'm looking to experiment with a couple of things on this one..so for now you'll just have to be satisfied with a small clipping of it. How can I know when this happens, you ask? Subscribe to our blog here at RBMC. Simple.

Week 6: My Valentine Has Hollow Eyes (kinda)

Ever wonder how artists work, do you get excited to learn about the process behind all the masterpieces you see week after week here at the RBMC?!  Well then fine sir, or madam have I got a treat in store for you! 

You see, I'm building a new wheelhouse and figuring out this little known industry standard of a program called "Adobe Illustrator".  Now once or twice, I've hit some buttons and swore some words at this fantastic program to make pictures, but I've never really tried to learn it, to understand it's  native language. 

And you know what pals?  It's hard.  It's harder and more complicated than a fella like me expected it to be when I decided to buckle down an learn for this weeks piece.  

But my loss is your win, friends, and you get to see my original pencil art complete with crow overlay from my sketchbook and drafting tape to hold together two pieces of bristol board because I drew too big.  Boy howdy, are you lucky!

In the meantime, why don't you click on that little box to the side that says "followers" and saunter on back next week to see if I've figured out this pesky program.  

 

 

Thanks for stopping, and I'll keep pluggin away in the meantime.

Week 6: Kid Crow

.... cause every super hero needs a child side-kick, right?

Week 6: Vengeance With An Ax

Just a quickie this week.

To me, the most interesting thing about the Crow is that its a spirit that embodies a person to exact revenge and that the deceased person's occupation/lifestyle informs how they look.  Admittedly, most of my knowledge of the Crow comes from the movie, so I started there and tried to go as far in the other direction as I could.  Getting away from more gaunt, rock star look, I tried to find a bulkier build and more "blue collar" profession to start with.  I leaned towards a lumber jack because I still thought that would be scary as shit coming at you through the city or forest.

When I started with the rest of the Rust Belt Monster Collective, I knew that I wanted to strengthen my digital work flow as well as try as many different "looks" and techiques as I could.  I tweaked my Cintiq settings to try and get more of a sloppy, brushed look and kept the clean-up to a minimum.  I knew from the beginning that I would stay black and white, but added the halftone values later to try and give it a more "indie" vibe.

See some of the process over at my blog: still-reaching.blogspot.com
Twitter: NeedYourDisease

Tim, W6: Back from the dead to kick in your head!

Hey look who is on time this week!

I really love "the Crow", what a cool character and a cool concept. When I was a kid I thought the (1st) movie was awesome, and then when I was in college, I finally got the chance to read the original comics and holy shit did those kick ass!

 I love imagining other characters who have been risen from the grave to avenge the wrongs inflicted on them. Here is my "Golden Age" 1940's comic book  superhero version of the Crow, who came back to punch crime in the face!  With him I wanted to leave out the traditional "Crow" design elements (the theatrical tragic face paint) that are used for most versions of the Crow, I have always felt that those where unique to James O'Barr's original Crow, and the other characters who return from the grave have other influences in their lives that drive the look of their Crow's persona.

This was such a fun topic for me, I came up with at least two other concepts for alternate Crows that hopeful I'll get the chance to finish soon (it was so hard not to finish my "Crow-nan the Barbarian" Crow for this week).

Most of this was done digitally, which I'm not thrilled with, as I found that I really prefer to layout and design the whole piece on paper, and then color it in photoshop, but, the small part that I drew in ink, is here if you feel the need to check it out timswitalski.blogspot.com

Hey, for a bigger version go to Tim's deviantART page and press the download button in the top left corner.

Week 6: Craig's Crow

I know just enough about this character to get me in trouble with people who really know him. I must admit that most of my knowledge comes from the Jason Lee movie peppered with some art I've seen over the years. Happily researching The Crow and doing the piece has turned me into an admirer. I think the Crow taps into the same vein that appreciates other justice bringers like Batman or Ghost Rider while allowing you to empathize with a truly pained character. Sure it's all sorts of Goth and Emo but it's good Goth and Emo.
I've learned a lot with this piece. Friskett will resist bleach, you can use a hair dryer when your toned paper is being bleached and xylene transfer does not work on cold press, toned paper that well. Perhaps the easiest thing to learn is that the combined smells of Clorox and Xylene gives you a pretty good headache. My intention is this was to be all traditional, mixed media but once the transfer didn't take it quickly got thrown into Photoshop. So it's a pencil drawing on top of a bleached toned paper moon with the rest of the colors in Photoshop. If you would like to see the drawing before anything happened to it check it out here.

WEEK 6 : THE CROW

 If I were to single out any book responsible for getting me involved and interested again in creating comics, James O'Barrs The Crow sits at the top of the heap. If all you're familiar with is the watered down Hollywood version, blessed by the performance of Brandon Lee, then I highly recommend it. A quick bit of history...The Crow was first published in "81" lost in the flood of books being produced during the glutton of black and white independent comics. It wasn't until "92" that Tundra collected the completed version in 3 volumes. This is not a kid friendly comic.
 The story was written by O'Barr after the tragic death of his fiance, killed in a car crash by a drunk driver, and fueled reportedly by a story he had read in the news of a couple killed over $20.00. I had read that O'Barr had hoped that writing the story would be cathartic in helping him cope with the grief...but only made him angrier and more resentful. And if this is true, that anger bleeds from the pages. Gone is all the Hollywood subplots of the buddy cop, the child skateboarder and the Devils Night evil landlord. It's a plain tragic story of a young couple just beginning to start their life together and end being at the wrong place at the wrong time. The character of Erik Draven brought back from the dead by the crow to avenge their death and set things right. It is heart wrenching at times, violent, angry..and beautiful. The artwork is rough at the beginning, as James finds his legs in telling his story, but the prose grabs you..shakes you. Many stories have been told of other characters brought back by the black bird. A native american brought back years later to avenge the slaughter of himself and his family at the hands of confederates. A murdered mother avenging the death of her unborn child.... But it's O'barrs story that taught me the importance of emotional content, how important it is to pour yourself into every piece...every bit of art that you do. So this week our challenge will be to create our own versions.