Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Sunday Sunday

After decades of wanting to break into the newspaper strip side of the comics biz, it still seems surprising to me that I now draw two syndicated features. Here are the latest Sunday pages.



As an extra -- here's the Phantom strip in "blue pencil" form before inking. I boosted the blue a bit so you can see it better -- on the actual print out the blue is a little lighter than this.

Saturday, February 22, 2014

Rex Morgan Daily Strips -- Week Eight

It's time for another week of gray-toned Rex Morgan strips. These run in newspapers that have the good taste not to slop color all over their daily strips. I do think the tones add a mood to the Buck/Doris sequence that is missing in the color version. 


Monday, February 17, 2014

Rex Morgan -- Week Seven -- plus Rex and Phantom Sunday strips!


Okay, I'm a few days late with these -- Week Seven of my Rex Morgan strips.  Sunday Rex and Phantom below.


Twin Cities folks will recognize the museum I used as my model in the this Rex Morgan Sunday -- couldn't resist the tip o' the hat -- and including my favorite Barye sculpture in the background of panel four.

More with the 5th Phantom below!


Monday, February 10, 2014

Skipped Sundays

A reader tells me I skipped these two Sunday pages. I haven't gone back through my posts to double check that -- but here they are just in case.



Sunday, February 9, 2014

Sunday Sunday....

Phantom and Rex Morgan Sunday strips. Bonus addition -- work in progress shot of the Rex Sunday.




Saturday, February 8, 2014

Rex Morgan dailies Week Six


Here are the toned B&W dailies for my sixth week of Rex Morgan. I don't have much to say about this week -- just business as usual. 


Sunday, February 2, 2014

Sunday overload!

I've had multiple requests to continue posting the Sunday pages for my comic strips here. You can always read them at the Comics Kingdom site -- and I encourage you to do so -- and leave a positive message in the comments section, please -- but I'll cave and post them here, since so many have asked. Here's a "catch up" post with both Phantom and Rex Morgan strips.



Here's a bonus -- my "blue pencil" version of the 1-19 Sunday before inking.

Here are the last three Rex Morgan Sundays. Becka's hair do is frustratingly inconsistent from strip to strip. Drawn out of my head on 1-19 -- and then referenced from previous strips on 1-26 -- leaning quite hard on Graham Nolan's version. Later on I've settled on something sort of in-between. Sigh... more results of tight deadlines and not nearly enough time (I was also fighting deadline on a Tarzan comic book story at the time -- and being sick, too -- typical freelancer fun!) 

 She seems to have been wearing that same top (or a similar design) for a dozen years now.  I'm torn between shaking it up and giving her a different outfit now and then -- or just buying into the fact that it's a comic strip, and this is her "costume," much like Orphan Annie's red dress....




Saturday, February 1, 2014

B&W Rex Morgan Week Five

It's Saturday, so that means it's time for Week Five of my B&W Rex Morgan strips. By this point, I feel I'm starting to get comfortable drawing Rex himself, particularly in Monday's strip. I liked the image of him in the second panel so much, I used it as promo art when I announced I was going to be drawing the strip. There's still a little variance in his look in the later dailies here -- but the Rex in this Monday strip is my "on model" version from here on.

Drawing Buck has given me fits. Try as I might, I can't match Graham's character design -- so I've just gone my own way with the poor guy. Mostly, it's me with a few pounds added, curly hair and a hang-dog expression. Yes, I do pose for a lot of these figures -- well, the male ones -- I'm certainly the wrong body type to pose as Becka or June! A quick "Photo Booth" pic helps check drapery, pose, expression, etc., and I'm my most affordable, most available model. I just have to slim myself down and handsome myself up when I'm posing as Rex!