Mr Freeze

http://www.tentonstudios.com/forum/index.php?topic=7621.0
Ten Ton Studio Sketch Challenge for the Weekend is Mr Freeze... Sure I should be doing some decorating, and planting stuff at the allotment, or even working on my own strip wychwolf, which is running perilously close to having no buffer... but Mr Freeze...

Pencils

Dom enjoyed himself doing a big A3 pic the other day, so I have pencilled up a Scarecrow/Batman pic for him to ink up...
He said he was going to do that tonight.... but seems to be stuck playing Banjo Kazooie instead.

Boing Boing Haggis

Boing Boing have a draw a Haggis competition, so I did a 5 minute sketch:

He slimed me

I'm trying to find a spot to use the pages of Wychwolf I did for the UK WebComix Thing flyers.
The 2 pages were set with the BrightAngel team investigating an abandoned country estate the month before the current story arc...

TEN Tons

Dom was bored the other night so I suggested we both do a sketch for the Ten Ton Studio Sketch challenge.
The challenge runs like this... a subject is picked (by the winner of the previous contest), and on Tuesday the Thread is opened to submit sketches, Thursday a POLL goes up, and the winner is picked. The winner picks the next subject, and picks one of the sketches entered as their prize.
Trouble is the Guys over there are VERY VERY good, so there's no hope of winning, BUT it's a very useful place to pick up some useful criticism.. my advice was to work on body proportions, which I fully plan to.

Weapons test

On Sunday, we sat up on the forest having our picnic lunch, and chatting about stuff, and came up with the idea of getting Dom to do some weapons tests videos, like the ones in the "Magic of Star Wars"  for the http://www.wychwolf.com site...
Dom is a master of the animation, he uses a janky old webcam, and a copy of MonkeyJam, which is free, and produces some good results...
The idea was to make some real plasticene and junk models, then add the FX in photoshop..
I sketched the Giant Killer Robot, with an eye to putting it together out of some of the robot parts I have in stock (leftovers from Robotwars days), but it ended up looking much he same as our standard giant killer robot...

Studio, then and Now.

Looking at the "Haircut" picture I posted recently, I was suddenly reminded of a photo I have of it being drawn in my studio back in 1990!
Look at the mess, and then compare it to the mess of my basement studio today... No gigantic drawing board, but instead a tiny tablet.

SuperFogeys

I picked up the news of the SuperFogeys Origin competition on the Internets...
http://www.th3rdworld.com/web-comic/The-SuperFogeys
and as I'm in a black drawing mood I thought I'd give it a go...with REAL ink and paper and stuff.
I'll fiddle about with it in photoshop, add some colour to it, and ruin it later.

Drawin' in the style of..

In my effort to add a bit more action I decided I'd have a bash at drawing one of the early scenes from the WychWolf story in another style... obviously I favour the dark grittiness of Mike Mignola, and his Hellboy.. so I sat there with my copy of Seed of Destruction, and tried to be inspired...
I'm happy with the result, although it is by no means what I thought I was going to draw...

Haircut

My Hair sneaks up on me, it's ok for weeks, then suddenly it ambushes me, and turns into some weird hedgehog effort..
I wrote about this in the original Strange Biros in 1991, I guess I should be grateful I still have hair...

Champeens

I've tried most of the filters in my old janky copy of Photoshop Elelments 4.. but still haven't found the combination I want for adding tea rings, and pin holes, finger prints and paper curls... making stuff look OLD, is tricky..
Getting there slowly...

Sidetracked

I've been listening to the Dave Gorman podcasts, from Absolute radio, and they are very enjoyable, I am very taken with the whole light hearted approach. Mr Gorman reminds me very much of a dear old fellow I used to share an office with, Danielle does the best Cheryl cole impression ever...I think, though having never heard her speak, I'm not sure how qualified I am to judge.... and Martin, well he comes from East Grinstead, as did I...
Anyway, there's been a darts theme running through the podcast, and I've been struck by the comedy implicit in Darts being taken in any way seriously, so I thought I'd add a little synchronicity to the story over at http://www.wychwolf.com, by including a darts team made up of some of the pivotal characters in the story...

Magna tone

Finally managed to bend manga studio to my will, but it's a hard task.
Managed to get some panels to show, and add some tone.. and was rather impressed by the tone painting...
So this might be the first page of "Ninjasaurs VS Pirobots", which will appear on http://www.ninjasaur.co.uk
our new sister site, which we bought on a whim the other night...

Manga Studio pain

Grr, there's little worse in life than non intuitive software, except non intuitive software, and a user guide,that seems to reference an alternative version..
I'm almost punching the screen here, I am determined to make Manga studio bend to my will, as I've seen the incredible things it can do.. but blinkin' flip it's awkward.
Panels, and panel layers... driving me insane.. I guess i should look on the you tubes, there's bound to be a hundred tutorials...
GRRR