This week’s letter was “R”, and the first thing that popped into my head was “revenant”. Those with a sharp eye might remember a cover I did a couple of years ago, for Brian Keene’s book A Gathering of Crows. That book featured a number of stylized revenants, and I thought this would be a good time to revisit that creature.

In this case, I’ve reverted back to the traditional idea of a revenant. It’s an undead creature, but unlike the wandering zombie this one has a purpose. A revenant seeks revenge, and comes back looking for it. So, I created an image of a very torn up revenant, finally getting his revenge.

Here is The Revenant, 9″ x 12″ ink on 140 lb. Cold Press. Click on the image for a larger version, and keep reading after the image too.

When I was getting started on it, I decided to try something else differently. I took pictures as I went, and posted the progress on my social media sites. That worked out pretty well, it gave me quick, periodic breaks, and garnered some attention.

Below is my step by step creation of the art, from (nearly) blank page through the final Photoshop adjustments. If that’s not your schtick, then thanks for checking out the art, and let me know what you think of it either below or on my social networks.

Those of you who decided to stay? Here we go.

In this first progress shot, you can see the sketch that I’m working off of. It’s done with a 2H pencil, very lightly. Sometimes I just pencil the general framework of where I’m heading. Other times, like this one, I add a little more detail to keep me on track. The inks are done with Micron Pens, mostly 02, but also 03, 05, 08, and a flat 3.

Next, it’s a matter of picking a place to start adding the finer details. In this case, I started with the teeth, and began to work around the image. So it goes from this…

…to this…

…to this…

…in an hour or two. Or, as was this case, a few hours, since I was also working on computer maintenance. Here’s a closer look at the face area:

Finally, with the interior of the hand, I’m more or less done with the crosshatching of the lines. I may do back and darken areas here and there, but for the most part I call it done:

Without the black background, the interior of the hand (and a few other spots) look a little out of place. It doesn’t help that in this photo, the light is coming from a different spot than it is in the image I’m creating. So, I lay down an initial layer of black ink using a brush.

On a smaller ink, such as the 5″ x 7″ size I often do, I usually use a PITT pen brush for this bottom layer. But, I don’t really feel like blowing through an entire pen brush on this larger size, so dipped ink with a brush it is.

Why an “initial” layer and not just the final background? The Cold Press watercolor stock that I use, which I love, sucks in ink like there’s no tomorrow. Which is great, because I tend to use a lot of ink. When I tried Bristol stock years ago, I never liked it because I smeared it all the time. That doesn’t happen with the Cold Press.

The black is similar to an undercoating that you’d do if you were doing a painting with oils or acrylics. You can see, though, that it isn’t going to work like it is. Thus, it’s only an “initial” or base layer.

One thing I will mention though, if this is going straight into the computer, into Photoshop (or whatever), you may not need a top layer of ink. Photoshop should be able to make the darker areas perfectly black with little trouble, and off you go into digital land. Myself, I prefer to completely finish the ink, so that it looks great as a standalone, traditional ink work.

So, after that layer of ink dries, I add the top (and normally final) layer of ink. Notice though in the next picture how the ink looks. To the left of the arm is the final layer, and to the right the original, base layer. The final layer looks decidedly darker, far smoother, and much more consistent.

Here’s the final “ink” version, with it’s final layer completed.

Now, after it dries for awhile, I pick up children from school, and so on, it’s ready to scan in. Sadly, being of very little money, I have a smaller scanner. Which, I can’t complain, I do have a scanner, and does a great job. It’s just standard letter size, though, which means some trickery is often involved.

The first thing to do is to go forward, and throw it on the scanner. I scan it in two parts, so in Photoshop I get this:

From here I do two things. First, I pick one or the other, and double its canvas size. Just make sure you’ve already put it on its own layer. Also, when you enlarge the canvas, keep the current part to the left (or right, however you chose it). Once there, the second step is just to use Photoshop’s (CS3) Layer Auto-Align feature. That compares parts of each side (good thing the scans overlapped), and puts them together as if they are one photo:

You may or may not have to fiddle with a few spots along the line that the scans were combined, it differs a bit each time you do it. In this case, I had to make a minor edit at the top and the bottom of the combined line, which used to be in between the face and hand about halfway (already fixed it before the screenshot).

Being the way I am, at this point I save this file and leave it alone. I keep it as an “original scan” file, and resave it to a new file for the final version. That way, if I need to go back for any reason and I’ve screwed up the other one, I have this original scan to work with. If I sell the original art (crossed fingers, want to buy it?), I at least have a good, high res scan to work with.

The first thing I do in the new file is open up Photoshop’s “File Info” screen. This screen allows me to add my name, the piece’s title, keywords, and most importantly, copyright information. The File Info screen is great for that, and the information you put here is saved in every iteration of the file past here. It doesn’t matter if it goes to Tif, or Jpeg, or whatever, the information is saved in the EXIF data of the file itself.

I think it’s a smart thing to do, to mark it with your copyright within the file itself. Sure, there are ways around it, just like someone can crop off my visual copyright reference on the the work itself. But it’s an easy thing to put in there, so I do.

Next, I use an adjustment layer, Curves, to adjust the contrast of the art. That smooths out the black areas considerably, and brightens any leftover grays from the paper itself.

One disadvantage of using Cold Press, over a smoother paper, is that it has a texture to it. That’s great when you are working with it, but when scanning it in that can cause issues. Using Curves is sort of a quick-and-dirty method, and works fine to get rid of much of that for the web. For print, though, I would probably go into a lot more detail with it. That might mean using the Unsharp Mask, or Levels, or even converting to one color through Photoshop’s Bitmap features. It may even mean a little manual touchup here and there.

In this case though, Curves works just fine. Most of the time it’s just dealing with the extents of the curve too, though occasionally I might toy with grays as well:

After this step, I just add my copyright into the file. I keep my copyright line in a separate Photoshop file, saved as a Smart Object, and I just pop it in there where I think it works best. I want to keep it subtle, so I drop the opacity some.

That’s it, now we save to Jpeg, put it at the top of a blog post, and write a horrifically long article about it. Thanks for sticking with me.

The idea behind my articles for Apex has always been the “life as an artist” style articles. What I see as an artist in the publication industry, how I myself am treated as an artist, and overall what it’s like to live as I do.

Collected in the ebook are the first two years of the articles, along with a couple that I didn’t send in but still needed a nice, cozy home. They are collected chronologically, so they might slightly jump around a little as far as topic.

There is a running list of my articles on my Publications/Shows page, but here are some of them. That should give you a decent idea of what is in the book:

• My God, What a Stupid Looking Cover
  Awful book covers, so many good artists that you shouldn’t do that
• WTF? Really? You can’t just tell me who the artist is?
  posting a great cover online and never giving credit to the artist
• Sure you can steal from me! Art? Sure! First born? Why not?
  Using my art for other things without my permission
• Why the hell would I help you? You’ll steal all my ideas!
  it’s ok to help others, to tell them all about your process
• Here at the end of all things
  Arrogance and being good to others instead of an “artiste”
• Life, liberty, and the pursuit of—Hey! Why aren’t you mowing the lawn?
  Balancing creativity with real life, using life as a source of art

There are quite a few more articles, and I’ve added images throughout the ebook as well.

If you want a taste first, check out my current articles on the Apex website here. Two of them (currently) are in the ebook, and new ones show up there monthly.

I’m also interested in any opinions you have on the book, good, bad, or indifferent. Find me at my social networks (up in the header there), and let me have it.

As a creature, a qilin is (from Wikipedia and others) a creature that’s described in a few different ways. Among them is a description of a beast with horns/antlers, more of a dragon’s head, and taller like a deer or giraffe even.

I thought it would be a good challenge to try and do this one a little differently than the creepy Peg Powler I created earlier (here). The Peg Powler relies on a lots of dark texture, and a sense of being in her environment. But I thought the qilin should stand on it’s own, and have more stylized, textured features.

As always, let me know what you think. It’s 5″ x 7″, ink and ink wash on 140 lb. Cold Press. Click on the image for a larger version if you’d like.

Here is Q is for Qilin:

I had a few “P” choices to pick from, but this one stood out quite a bit. The Peg Powler (I know, it sounds like a suburban realtor) is quite a creepy creature. It’s a take on the “old hag” stories that have been around in mythology. This old hag creeps up, from under the water, to the side of the river bank, grabs a victim (usually a child) by the ankles, and pulls them under to their doom.

Aside from staying away from river banks for awhile, I also decided to create an ink of her. It’s below, and hopefully it comes across with a certain creepiness.

Here it is, it’s ink and ink wash on 5″ x 7″ 140 lb. Cold Press. Click on the image for a larger version of P is for Peg Powler:

Any time you have an ink idea with texture though, it complicates things. You only get black lines (unless you are doing a wash or something), so those black lines have to represent both the texture and the shadows. That can be tricky, and it takes a little more thought as it is being worked out.

In the case of the tortoise, there are obvious plate-like areas around the head (and on the shell, of course). Those give way to more of a textured, cracked look of a loose, yet tough, hide.

Whether I made it come across correctly or not, I leave to you fine folks. Here’s the ink, 5″ x 7″ on 140 lb. Cold Press. Click on the image below for a larger version.

I call it Tortoise Moment:

If you’ve seen The Ring (or Ringu), even maybe The Grudge, you probably have a pretty good idea what a onryō is. An onryō is a vengeful ghost, seeking retribution for some wrong that happened to it during life.

The most famous onryō is probably Oiwa, from the Japanese ghost story Yotsuya Kaidan. Oiwa, before she dies, was given a poison creme that left her face, especially her left eye, drooped down. Eagle-eyed viewers of Ringu will notice that the ghostly character looks much like that.

I’ve chosen this visage of the onryō for my ink, 5″ x 7″ on 140 lb. Cold Press. I liked the idea that the face could have a lot of texture, and have a lot of horror within. I thought showing the ghost at the moment of the big reveal would be nice, and give me the opportunity to up the horror some. It was fun to try, and perhaps it would be one to expand into a larger ink.

Here is O is for Onryō, let me know what you think. Click on the image for a larger version.

Now, night terrors are the worst thing in all the world. Frightening, to the point that getting a night terror affects you for many days after. If you haven’t had one, then good for you. If you have, you have my sympathies. I’ve endured them all of my life.

A night terror (also called “sleep paralysis”)  is when you wake up, but you aren’t fully awake yet. Usually in the middle of the night, you are seemingly startled awake, with the horrifying feeling that someone or something is just outside of your vision, waiting there in the dark. On top of that, you are completely paralyzed, unable to defend yourself or anyone else until you are finally able to move again.

Simply terrifying.

So when it came to creating a nightgaunt, I didn’t want it show as much as some of the other Alphabeasts I’ve done. You never get to see what was waiting in the shadows when you get a night terror, so I wanted to keep it as just a hint of something evil here.

Let me know what you think, as always. This is, like the other Alphabeasts, 5″ x 7″ on 140 lb. Cold Press. It is ink with ink wash, and just click on the image for a larger version.

Here’s N is for Nightgaunt:

I’ve also wanted, for some time, to try my hand at another fossil piece. I had created an ink of a dinosaur previously (see it here), and I thought a painting of one would be fun. I decided to try working from a photo of a Hadrosaur skull/fossil that I had, but combining it with the more abstract, or loose, painting style.

Below is the final version, I call it Hadrosaur-ish. It’s 8″x 10″ acrylic, on canvas. As always, let me know what you think of it. Click on it too for a larger version.

Since then, I’ve wanted to create a different mummy, one that didn’t rely on any photos at all. I’m getting confident with my ink work again, so I wanted to abandon the photo reference and just create something new. All of the Alphabeasts that I’ve done (see them all here, updated each week) have not been based on photos, other than general references for things like snakes and frogs.

Along with putting aside the photo reference, I’ve been trying with a few of them to back away from just the head/face area, and show more of the creatures. Sometimes, as with A is for Algul, I just really liked the contrast and the look of the closeup. But I’m trying to expand the ink ideas to show more, not only of the creature but of the environment it’s in.

With this mummy ink (below, if you want to skip my rambling), I don’t get into the environment. But I do try to show more of the creature, and try having her (yes, “her”) in a silent and yet threatening pose.

Here it is, let me know what you think. It’s 5″ x 7″ on 140 lb. Cold Press, as the other Alphabeasts have been. Click on the image for a larger version.

M is for Mummy:

As is often the case, I like to toy around with digital versions as well. Sometimes it’s just a quick tour into Photoshop, and I end up abandoning it. But with the mummy here, the digital version actually came out nicely.

Here’s the digital color version, I call it Mummy Afire.

The ink is of a Lampade, from Greek mythology. Lampades were companions of the goddess Hecate, and were nymphs of the underworld. They held torches, the light of which could turn someone mad.

I took a little liberty with the “torch” idea, preferring a more magical idea. The first challenge of the piece, with a torch, is how the light plays off of everything. That meant lots of back and forth, even stepping back from the table slightly to get a good look at it.

The real challenge though was creating a female figure, which I don’t have enough practice at. There’s a certain sensuality that needs to be retained, even with a nymph of the underworld.

I chose to make the face skeletal, but I wanted the body to be far more traditional and less horrific. The nymphs were known for their beauty, even those of the underworld, and if I wasn’t going to show that in the face then I needed to show it in the body.

Whether I succeeded or not, fair reader, is up to you. Let me know what you think, as always.

Here is L is for Lampades, 5″ x 7″ on 140 lb. Cold Press. Click the image for a larger version.