The Sentry

Here's a few sketches from a fun comic project I'm working on that I'm pretty excited about. Its for a new mini-series featuring the Marvel Super-hero, the Sentry! I was asked to ink the cover to issue #1, which was drawn by dashing Dave Bullock, and that lead to me drawing a 10 page story for issue #2. When I got the script by the talented Paul Tobin, I almost flipped out, as it featured pretty much everything and everyone I'd ever wanted to draw in a super-hero story! I'll spare you the details, but suffice to say that I'm drawing it right now, and I'm really jazzed about working on it.

Above are a few of my warm-up sketches of the Sentry, and below is the inked cover to issue #1, penciled by Dave Bullock and inked by yours truely.

T.S. Eliot

This one's a commission request I did last weekend during the Paradise Comic Con. The owner of this piece is Steven Gettis, who has amassed an amazing collection of drawings of literary figures by illustrators. He also owns another piece by me, from my very very early years so its hilarious to see the evolution of my artwork.

His collection really is incredible, and you can see why being given the freedom to draw whatever author or character the illustrator wanted inspired the very best work from the artists. I know it was a pleasure for me to draw my piece.

Papercut: "Waiting." (part 5)

Wow...long time between posts! Sorry about the delays in updating my blog, folks. All I can say is the usual -- deadlines, deadlines, deadlines, blah blah blah. I know its summer, but dang if I ain't retardedly busy lately. Its kinda sad, really -- every summer I tell myself "this is the year I'm finally gonna try and work less in the summer and get out more", and every summer I end up parked behind my drawing table, working feverishly away and watching the beautiful weather pass by in front of my window.

Since my last post, I've been busy with a lot of illustration assignments and events. I attended the 2008 National Magazine Awards, where my short comic "Stars" won the silver medal in the "words and pictures" category. The event was held at the swanky Carlu in Toronto, and was a swell time for me and my wife. I also made an appearance at the Paradise Toronto Comiccon last weekend, where I got to meet up with a lot of great comic fans and did a bunch of sketches too.

Apart from that, I've also finished up the conclusion of my latest comic story for my webcomic, Papercut. It's a 29 pager in total, and you can read it online from the beginning here. The page at the top of this post is from the conclusion of the story.

Now I've got to get back to the drawing board, but I'll be back soon to post more stuff on here -- honest!

Doctor Fate meets Doctor Strange

Ok, I drew this for a commission that was really, really late. I was asked to draw Doctor Fate, and threw in Doctor Strange as well, 'cause I thought they'd make a cool combo. I grew up reading those Ditko Dr Strange comics (and need I say I loved them?), but I never really read anything with Doctor Fate until about a year ago when my buddy, Steve Manale, pointed out the original golden age stories featuring the bell-headed guy. Steve is rarely wrong about his comic recommendations and he was certainly on the money in this case. The original Doctor Fate stories from the 1940's by Gardner Fox and Howard Sherman are pure gold.

Fox was apparently just a teen when he wrote them, and hadn't yet descended into the lower circles of demented hackery he'd hit by the time he got to the silver age DC heroes in the 1960's (I swear, that man's later work is unreadable). He filled those early stories with a kind of schoolboy-meets-lovecraft vibe that's really charming in its primitivism. And Howard Sherman's art was my kind of crazy -- bizarre and yet possessing a strange logic and accidental beauty all its own. The stuff just crackles with the raw energy found in the best golden-age comics.

Anyway, for those interested, you can check out the Doctor Fate Archives hardcover collection from DC and see for yourself. And if you want to check out my rough pencil sketch for this drawing, you can do so by pointing your eyes just a little lower.

The Last Son of Krypton

Here's another superhero themed drawing, this one of the first (and most famous) superhero: Superman!

I drew this one up as my contribution to the upcoming "Visions of an Icon" art exhibition, which will feature tons of drawings of Kal-El (that's his Kryptonian name -- I know this because I'm geeky) by canadian illustrators and comic artists. All the drawings in the show, including mine, will be auctioned off as a fundraiser for the Shuster Awards -- the canadian comic creator awards named after Superman co-creator Joe Shuster.

I have to admit this one was pretty quick and fun to draw -- I drew the thumbnail sketch shown below really quickly, like in 20 minutes or so, and did only the most minor tweaks to it on the way to the final art. The biggest change was that I went with green as my tone-colour -- mainly because my wife noted that green fit the krypton/kryptonite connection.

Mind you, I do have a tendency to go with green anyway...

Incidentally, I got the inspiration for the composition of this drawing from a non-superman related source. There's a very famous Will Eisner Spirit story called, I think, "the Visitor" or something like that, with a great splash page featuring a portrait of the Spirit framed inside a planet. I remember seeing that page when I was about 14 or 15 years old and staring at it for a long time, just absorbed in the beauty and mood of that piece. I was thinking again of that splash page and the kind of atmosphere it evoked when I came up with the thumbnail.

Papercut: "Waiting." (part 3)

Part 3 of my story "waiting" is now online at my webcomic Papercut. As frequent visitors to my blog might know, Papercut is part of the Transmission-X group of webcomics, all created and owned by a talented group of Toronto based cartoonists. Well, except Karl Kershl's Abominable Charles Christopher -- Karl moved away to Montreal a few months back, and we sorely miss him.

Anyway, I hope you'll check out the site and read the story for yourselves. For those interested, and in keeping with my regular posting trend, you can examine the process from thumbnail to finished art for the page below:

The Incredible Hulk (and Rick Jones)

I drew this up for a toronto comic-con, and the assigned theme was (duh!) the Incredible Hulk.  A few of us Toronto comic artists were doing Hulk images for it, kinda like a "Hulk thru the years" thing, and I chose to draw original Jack Kirby designed Hulk.  The final artwork is meant to fit on a badge, so it'll be printed really really small, like 2" x 2" or so.  And of course, my usual green-toned drawing style was a natural fit for the subject.

Now, for something that's so small, I actually went through a bit of a process coming up with the final art.  A failed thumbnail, a couple of revisions and a helpful critique from fellow artist Ron Salas were all part of the journey to the finished piece.  But even though it might look like it was labour intensive, the whole thing took probably about 3 or 4 hours in total.  If you're interested in the process, you can check out my various sketches below:

Taddle Creek magazine cover

Taddle Creek is a local literary magazine which was kind enough to run one of my comics years ago as their very first comic feature.  Since then, I've drawn a few other comics for them, and have always enjoyed the experience.  A couple of months ago the editor, Conan Tobias, approached me with the idea of having me do a cover for them which was very flattering.  I always like the freedom Conan gives me to do whatever I want, and this case was no different.  So, of course, I had a great time working on this image.  

The concept was easy enough, and came to me in an inspired moment, and I knocked out a sketch and colour rough over the course of a couple hours.  The final itself also came together nicely, without any real problems.   I usually prefer to work on drawings with this kind of vibe really late at night, while listening to music on my headphones.  I like it when my whole downtown neighbourhood is quiet and I can just lose track of time while drawing. 

For those who are interested, you can check out some steps of my process toward the final below.  I actually did a really quick marker drawing before the thumbnail pencil, but it was so dodgy I decided to not even scan it.  The colour rough was what made the whole thing work for me.  Once I drew that one, I knew the final piece would work out fine.

Papercut: "Waiting." (part 2)

My latest installment of my webcomic Papercut is now online at Transmission-x. It's the second part of "Waiting", a 30 page story, which I'm serializing over the course of a few months. I was actually quite late with this update, as I meant to post it last month, but due to illness and deadlines, I was very delayed and it had to wait until just a few days ago. Hopefully, some of you will visit the site and check it out.

And, of course, if you're interested, you can check out the process from rough thumbnail to final art for the page below.

Also, in related news, Papercut has been nominated for a Shuster Award (the award for Canadian comics creators). It's been nominated under the "outstanding webcomic" category, along with fellow Transmission-X creators Cameron Stewart (for Sin Titulo), Karl Kershl (for the Abominable Charles Christopher), Ramon Perez (for both Kukuburi and Butternut Squash co-written by Rob Coughler) and Scott Hepburn (for The Port). The other nominees in the category are Gisele Lagace (for Penny and Aggie), Scott Ransoomer (for Vg Cats) and Ryan Shomer and Lar De Souza (for Least I Could Do).  

All of those are great comics, but I find it particularly flattering that of the 8 nominees, 5 of them are from our own Transmission-X collective!

Illustration Work: Karnhuset (part 5)

Here's another in a series of portraits I drew for the swedish agency, Karnhuset. Like the others, this one is a portrait of one of their employees, and I was again asked to try and draw the person engaged in a favourite hobby. In this case, it was (duh) golfing. I enjoyed the opportunity to try and capture some motion and life in the pose, and it was a fun assignment (much like the other ones). You can also check out my preliminary pencil and colour rough below, drawn before I had a good grasp of the likeness needed for the portrait.

If you're interested in my other illustrations drawn for Karnhuset. you can check them out here, here, here and here.

Justice League: the New Frontier Special

Here's a couple of pages of from an inking job I did for the Justice League: New Frontier Special comic that came out recently. They're from a 7 page backup story starring Robin and Kid Flash (two of my fav original Teen Titans). The entire comic was written by the maestro of the New Frontier, Darwyn Cooke, and this particular story was pencilled by none other than the director of the recently released animated feature film version of the New Frontier, "Dashing" Dave Bullock. Darwyn also drew the main story for the comic, while fellow Torontian J. Bone did the art chores on another fabulous backup story, featuring Wonder Woman (J. was BORN to draw Wonder Woman, I swear).

The entire comic is a treat to read but, honestly, my part in it is, like, infintesimal. I was after all, only the inker on a short 7 pager. However, it was an absolute joy to work with all the above mentioned talents. Darwyn, J. and I have known each other for a while now, but I only met Dave last year at the San Diego Comic Con (the biggest frikkin comic con thing you will ever see in your lifetime) . Meeting and hanging out with him was one of the highlights of that event -- apart from being incredibly talented, Dave is just a cool guy. The fact that he bears a passing resemblance to Jack Kirby made it all extra perfect, and I was hoping we'd get the chance to work together someday when we met.

Dave's art for this story was beautiful, and really made my job very easy to do. I don't get the chance to ink other people's work much, but when I do, my philosophy is to try and ink it "as if the penciller inked it himself" -- that is, I try not to put much of my own style into the art. Hence, I feel like I can only ink people who are in the same kind of artistic headspace as me. So, for this job, all the credit has to go to Dave for the art, since he provided such great pencils that made it very clear what I should do on each page.

Watching movies and drawing...

...is actually one of my favourite artistic exercises. I'm the kind of guy who gets fidgety if I just sit and watch a movie, so I like to doodle sometimes while a movie is on. Especially if its an old black and white one from the 1930's to the 1950's. I really enjoy studying films from that era, especially the noir ones, for their incredible staging and lighting design. Because the films were black and white, the cinematographers and lighting designers really had to plan their shots for maximum effectiveness and emotional impact. Hence, when I watch certain films from that period, I'm often very impressed with how they balance blacks and problem solve things like a white dress against a white wall. Studying that stuff really helps me out with my own artistic process.

Anyway, the doodles above were drawn while watching a certain film from that period. I drew them really quickly, usually just straight up in ink and often not even bothering to pause the movie, so there was no attempt at capturing likenesses or such. I really just wanted to jot down the lighting and shot ideas that I thought were interesting as quickly as pssible.

CONTEST ALERT:
Now, to make it all very interesting, I'm going to turn this into a little contest. The first person who can guess what film these drawings are from, will win an original drawing and a goody-pack of comics and anthology books from me. Just post your guess in the comments section and the first one to get it right, I'll declare as the winner. In case of a tie or something weird, I'll do drawings for all the winners...or work out something else to everyone's satisfaction. Honest. The only clue I'll offer here here is that the film is pretty damn famous -- and justifiably so -- the lighting design is just the best I've ever seen in black and white.

Geez, I really hope someone doesn't guess it correctly in the first post or something... guess we'll have to see how this goes!

No, really, I'm on the mend!

My sincerest thanks to everyone for all the nice comments and well-wishes. I'm really feeling a whole lot better since I was released from the hospital, and getting back to my old self. I didn't eat or do much except sleep and writhe in pain for the 3 weeks or so I was sick, so I'm a bit weak and trying to ease into my daily routine, but one of the things I wanted to do right away was try and get back to drawing.

After such a long layoff, I was quite rusty when I got back to the studio, so I spent some time over the last few days doodling and getting my chops back. I always find that I lose the finer control I need for inking clean lines or drawing things like curves after a few days away from the board. And after such an extended layoff like this one, it took a few hours of doodling and doing some practice inking to get the kinks out. As an excerise, I drew the doodle above, which pretty much sums up my feelings about my hospital stay. Hope you like it -- and I sincerely hope you never go through such an illness!

BTW, for an example of the kind of 'practice inking' I do to get the barnacles off my drawing hand, you can check out the sheet below. Its kind of like doing drills or noodling with the guitar. I usually do something like it, with the initial lines looking sloppy and rough. But by the time I fill up the page, I usually have all my fine control back. I did this one while watching a basketball game this afternoon and believe me, when I started I was cursing myself for how shaky my hand was. Luckily it all worked out by the end, and my team even won the game. Hurrays!

What I've been up to lately...

...is being sick and at the hospital! So for those who've dropped by this blog and have been all "WTF? Man, Cho is slow with the updates!", I apologize and have a good excuse -- complete with a note from the doctors. I've spent the last 2 to 3 weeks being sick with a bad intestinal infection that required a couple of trips to the emergency ward and a week and a half stay at the hospital. It was an illness that was so painful at times it brought to mind the title of that Sho Kasugi classic, Pray for Death.

Anyway, I've since been discharged to complete the rest of my recovery at home, and I gotta say I'm feeling a whole lot better. I haven't done a line of drawing in the last 3 weeks, but I'm hoping to get back into the studio and ease into some artwork over the next few days. So more updates on this blog will be up shortly, but for now I hope you'll understand why there weren't any replies to emails or posts in the last little while.

In the meantime however, here's an illustration I did shortly before I was incapacitated -- this one was done for the fine Canadian Business magazine. The subject of the article was about an investment instructor who taught students using anecdotes from chinese philosophy. Esoteric, I know.. but it lent itself to a fun assignment to draw!

Papercut: "Waiting."

My new story for my webcomic, Papercut, is now online. It's the first part of a 29 page story called 'Waiting.", and it'll be serialized over the next few months on the site. I posted the first page of it here on this blog before, but now you can read 7 pages from it on transmission-x (the home of Papercut and other fine webcomics). The sketch to the left is of the protagonist of the story, David Rhee, and I drew it a while ago while trying to figure out the character design. Hopefully, some of you will visit the site to read the story and give me your feedback.

And for those who are interested in my process, you can check out the progression from thumbnail to final art of another page of the story below.

Pen and Ink Portraits - NBA Basketball Players

Here's another one in my series of portraits of NBA basketball players, again drawn in my old-school pen and ink mode. Since the last few were of NBA big-men, I thought I'd take a stab at a cool "little guy" so I chose Chris Paul, the ultra-talented point guard for the New Orleans Hornets (I always want to call them the Charlotte Hornets, but that just shows my age). I've dug his game since he first came into the league and he's playing better than ever these days.

I started this one with the idea I'd get it done fairly quickly, during an evening off, but then it all got away from me. The pencil study/underdrawing was easy enough, and I drew that up in a half-hour or so, but then when I went to render it out with my pens, I ran into a bunch of problems and actually ended up drawing it three times! First, I was half-way through an attempt when my trusty Hunt 108 pen-nib started acting up on me (they just don't make pens like they used to!) and getting all clogged up. It ended up scraping paper and putting down very 'globby' lines, so I had to scrap that drawing and start over. Then, on my second attempt with a new nib, the nib actually split on me leaving a huge ink blob right in the centre of the drawing. Now, unfortunately, pen and ink is a medium where you get no room for error, so I had to throw that drawing away and start over again. I was so upset I had to take a break and play some videogames -- the kind where you shoot people with very large guns. The third time was the charm though, and I was able to finally finish the portrait.

Like all the other NBA basketball portraits I've done, this one was also referenced from an issue of Slam! magazine, and you can check out my pencil study for it below. If you want to see my other pen and ink portraits of ball players that I've posted on my blog, you can see them here, here, here and here.

make with the funny!

In between a busy schedule of illustration assignments, I've been drawing some webcomics lately, which I thought I'd share a bit of info about here. The first is for my regular monthly webcomic, Papercut, featured on Transmission-x. I thought I'd take a break from drawing 'serious' stories this time and present another installment of The Lonely Monkey. It's a strip I draw as a comedic interlude every few months, and I try to draw up a special intro for each installment .This month I thought it'd be fun to do a photo-comic (or fumetti, if you want to get all technical) -- which you can check out below. And if you like it, you can check out the rest of the strip on Papercut.


Also, my good buddy Ramon Perez asked me to draw a guest-strip for his insanely popular webcomic, Butternut Squash, which I was more than happy to do (Ramon is a classy guy as well as being ridiculously talented). It's online right now, but you can also see the strip below. Many of the other guest-artists who know Ramon drew some hilarious strips taking their shots at him and co-creator Rob Coughler, but as it was pointed out by another friend, my strip seems more a parody of my own comics than of Ramon and Rob.


Finally, I thought it'd be interesting to post this little-seen pin-up of Ramon and Rob for the collected edition of their strips that came out a couple of years ago. And since this is my sketchblog, you can check out my pencil rough for the pinup below as well!

Happy New Year!

Happy 2008, everyone! I'm finally back in my studio after a nice holiday layoff, and drew up this quick batch of sketches as a warm-up to get the kinks out before settling down to work. I have no idea why I chose the theme -- it just struck me as kinda funny.

Hope you like 'em!

Cho-stuff for sale!

Thanks to the fine folks at glarkware.com, I've set up an online shop where you can now purchase clothing like hoodies and t-shirts featuring artwork by me! I've been wanting to do this for a while now and was looking for a way to deliver a really high-quality product. I thought about doing it through sites like cafepress, but wasn't blown away by the quality of the final items. However when Glarkware wanted to join forces with me, I was thrilled -- their items are really first rate. All the shirts are from American Apparel and feature silk-screened artwork for maximum durability and quality. There's 5 items online currently, with more items hopefully on the way.

Check it out for yourself if you're looking for a way to spend all the loot you got from granny this christmas!

Transmission-X: Papercut - "Trinity" Part 2

My new Papercut webcomic for Transmission-x is now complete and online. It's the 2nd part of "Trinity", a historical comic story about the creation and testing of the first atomic bomb. This one ended up a bit longer than I originally planned -- it was set to be about 7 pages, but ended up coming in at 9. Usually, I like to keep my Transmission-x stories self contained and about 4-6 pages in length, but there was so much interesting information I found out during research that the story ended up being a 2 parter and running at 14 pages total. Still, it was definitely fun to write and draw, and I enjoyed the opportunity to visit a subject that I've been obsessed with since I was a teenager. You can see 2 pages of it above, minus the captions and balloons -- to read it, you'll just have to visit the site and check it out for yourself.

And, of course, since this is my sketchblog, I thought I'd share some of the process I went about in creating the comic. So you can check out the complete thumbnail artwork I did for the story below.

Now Magazine Cover

Here's a cover I did for this week's Now Magazine. Now is a venerable free weekly Toronto paper, one which I've picked up since college. Back then, I read it to see the art-show and concert listings, now I read it for the news articles. For this issue, they wanted to do a cover story on the 60th anniversary of the Horseshoe Tavern (a fantastic local concert venue) and they asked me for an image featuring the facade and some of the great acts that have played there over the years. At the top of their list of musicians was the legendary Stompin' Tom Connors. They gave me some latitude to pick the rest of the acts from a list, so of course I jumped at the opportunity to add the Ramones -- one of my all time fav bands!

Anyway, it all came together fairly quickly, due to the tight deadlines, and I was happy with how it turned out. I've never been too comfortable at drawing likenesses, but any chance to draw the Ramones is one I gotta jump at! For the record, the famous figures are (l to r) Loretta Lynn, Mick Jagger, Stompin' Tom and Johnny and Joey Ramone (rest in peace, guys).

You can see for yourself below the various steps I took to arrive at the final image.

Various Portrait sketches

These are a bunch of portraits and headshots I drew a while ago, while I was goofing around. The ones with the ziptone were done as an homage to the double-lighting thing that Wally Wood used to do so well in pen and ink. I used to look at his stuff for hours, trying to figure out how he did that! In an extra geeky note, I actually made the ziptone myself, with my computer and some transparent sticker paper...something I'll never do again! Its absolutely pointless in this day and age to sit there cutting and triming tone when you got a perfectly good version of photoshop nearby.

As for the big pen and ink drawing, its another in my series of portraits of nba basketball players. This time the model is big Ben Wallace, currently playing for the (sadly underachieving) Chicago Bulls. I drew this one a while ago too, but never got around to posting it, so I thought itd be good to do so now. If you're a b-ball junkie like me, you can check out my other pen and ink portraits of Amare Stoudemire, Chris Bosh, Lebron James, Kobe (ugg! I hate that dude, don't know why I ever drew him!) and Kevin Garnett posted earlier in my blog.

Kellogg School of Management (pt 2)

Two more drawings from the recent series of illustrations done for the Kellogg School of Management. See the previous post for more info.

Kellogg School of Management (pt 1)

Well, as I mentioned in a previous post, I've been busy busy busy lately, both with illustration assignments and with trying to write and draw some new comics. These two illos are part of the illustration assignment category. They were part of a campaign of 6 images drawn for the Kellogg School of Management which, shockingly, has nothing to do with corn flakes but everything to do with turning out top economic wizards. They were produced for the DDB & Downtown Partners agencies, based in Chicago, and art-directed by the exceptionally-easy-to-get-along-with Scott Drey (I call him Dr. Dre, but I'm geeky like that).

Anyway, I'll try and post a few more drawings from this assignment a little later, but for now you can see what kind of work I've been up while I was away from my blog!

A Quick Little Portrait

This is a commissioned portrait I did recently. The client sent me a very nice photo of her parents, and which I used as the basis for the two-colour painting. I was really inspired by the reference photo, since it had such a great retro-1950's feel to it. Honestly, it looked like it was right out of a car-ad or catalog from that era. I tried my best to keep that feel, and only changed up a few minor details in the background. All in all, this one was one of the quickest and most enjoyable commissions I've ever done.

You can also see the original pencil sketch I did for it below -- the only thing I modified from it during inking was the shadows on the man's coat. which I blacked out just to unify the blacks a bit more and help move the eye around.

Transmission-X: Papercut - "Trinity"

My new story for my webcomic Papercut is online now (check it out at transmission-x!), and its a bit of a departure for me. Its a non-fiction historical piece (something I don't usually write) and its also a two-parter. I originally planned Papercut to only feature self-contained, complete stories each month, but when I finished writing and thumbnailing this one, it came in 12 pages, which is a bit long for a webcomic. I personally prefer shorter length comics on the web, and would rather read longer stories on paper, and not on a monitor, so I thought I'd split this one up over two months.

The page above is the first page of the comic and, even without the lettering in place, you might be able to discern just what its about. And since I like to show sketches and process on this blog, you can check out page 3 below, and see how I go from thumbnail to finished art.