Creating a Graphic Novel : Art – Food – Photography

Previous featured artist Dion Hamill has an amazing Wonder Woman ACEO currently on eBay. It’s a great opportunity to own a piece of Dion’s work. Click on the picture for your chance to bid on this work. Remember to bid high and bid often. (Make sure you check out the other auctions that are currently on offer too.)

A mixed bag of a post with a new drawing by featured artist Mike Crichlow. I think it’s a very cool piece, especially love the expression on her face!

I haven’t been posting up as much as I would have liked with a lot of my time taken up with the Australian Open. The finals are over with an incredible match between Andy Murray and Roger Federer with Fedex taking it out in 3 exciting sets!

On a website related news, Sigmatestudio was hit with over 600+ spam comments today which was extremely frustrating! I moderate all comments and expect the odd spam comment but never this many! I never got around to activate the askimet plugin (anti-spam) but as soon as I cleared out the junk comments, it was activated! Hopefully it won’t catch any legitamate comments but please email me at sigmatestudio [at] sigmatestudio.com if you comment doesn’t appear after a couple of days.

Been a while since the last food post and I thought it would be a great opportunity to test out my new Canon G11. Whilst not as sharp as a 40D SLR, it still can create some crisp images even in the below low light conditions with the aperture opened to 2.8. Anyway . . this is a little North shore place in Sydney which has the most delicious gyoza, I think ginger is the key to giving these japanese dumplings that extra zest.

Gyoza Serving :

What’s inside :

I didn’t get the opportunity to showcase all of Pasquale‘s amazing work last time. Both these pieces have an amazing style, although I’m more partial to the Princess Leia piece even compared with his previous Zatanna work.

On another note altogether, wishing everyone a very happy Australia Day on the 26 Jan 2010. For those not from the land down under, it’s a celebration of the first fleet’s arrival at Sydney Cove. (See you can learn a little history from this site!) Hope you have a great day and make sure to fire up the barbeque.

Phoenix (Jean Grey) :

Princess Leia :

It’s been a great day in the mailbox for me, first Frankie’s amazing present to my Threadless T-Shirts! I love the fantastic envelope it comes in. The below are photos of the actual shirts themselves so excuse any wrinkles. The ET Phone Home design is especially cute, so if you see someone wearing one of the below designs . . it could very well be me! (Be sure to say “Hi”)

I’ve received some extraordinary parcels from Frank Kadar and Troy Parke. Yesterday from previous featured artist Frankie Washington, the original Wonder Woman sketch and Marooned on Mogo arrived! I definitely count myself lucky to own an original Wonder Woman sketch from a fantastic art, just need to frame and get this one on the wall. Huge thanks to Frankie for such a fantastic gift.

Parcel :

Wonder Woman :

Marooned on Mogo :

Previous featured artist Dion Hamill (who also did an amazing Star Wars step by step guide) is sharing his experience on another project. This one is a children’s book called “Fox and Tiger”.

Final Image :

Dion Hamill – Guest Post
I also enjoy technical challenges, like how to solve an illustration problem quickly but still with quality. A few months ago working on a children’s book titled “Fox and Tiger” the brief required the two lead characters Fox and Tiger to be walking through various scenes in China with distinctive characters to the region surrounding them. It goes to the publisher who approves all the images, the designer gets back to me and then I get started on the final colour art with the clock ticking down to the deadline (which always seems too short).After completing the final art, sending it in way ahead of schedule I sit back to relax with a martini.

That’s when I get the call, the publisher wants to change all the supporting characters to different animals. I generally work on illustration board with gouache and I really didn’t want to paint over the original art or completely repaint the image. So after first doing some sketches of the new animals to be portrayed in the images I paste them in using photoshop over the original art.

Once this is approved I then paint the new animals on a separate illustration board using the same materials and medium. Then I scan them in and merge the new animals on top of the old art in photoshop. Finally I paint over the surrounding background in photoshop using the various tools, trying to emulate my “old fashioned” painting style so the artwork looks seamless. Overall it took about a day to complete all 8 pages and I still got the work in on time and with quality.

Its not exactly breaking new ground but I was quite pleased with myself, as I’d never used the Photoshop program before. So I’d challenged myself to find a solution and learnt some new techniques along the way and doing that keeps being a freelancer fresh and exciting.

A great Zatanna showcase by Pasquale Qualano, I think the rabbit was a very cute touch. Checking through previous posts, it seems like Zatanna is one of the favourite characters to be done. How do you think this piece compares to the previous artists’ representations?

• Zatanna by Dion Hamill
• Zatanna by Dean Juliette

For Christmas, I managed to sneak in one of Pasquale’s artwork. Now I have the opportunity of posting up more, showcasing his works on The One. His preliminary sketch is brilliant, capturing the movement of the horse as the rider pulls back on the reins. The final colours are muted but excellent.

Preliminary Sketch :

Detailed Sketch :

Final :

Faras is the lead character in The One.

Faras Sketch:

Pasquale’s showcase wouldn’t be completed without showing off a fantastic cover and an interior page. The sequential piece doesn’t need words to convey what’s happening which is a very high compliment to the artist!

One Cover:

One Page 32:

Thanks for letting put up some of your work. So where are you from?

I was born in Torre del Greco (Naples) on April 16th, 1974 and still in the province of Campania. I started training myself in the world of professional at 19 in the parent’s sculpture workshop, firstly with drawings and sculptures.

How would you describe your artwork?

I am a comic artist and a sculptor. That means it’s my job to interpret the script into drawings and like any other sculptor, I work on models as well as cooperate with other italian artists for Napoletan crib.

I’ve studied in a High school of Art and I obtained my diploma in sculpture ,graphic designer and drawing. I am self-taught in the art of comics but during the life drawing I’ve know many excellent Italian artists, who helped me to improve and steer me in the right direction.

Who would have most influenced your work?

The old masters John Buscema and Frank Frazetta. The newer artist I like a lot are Adam hughes, Chris Bachalo, J Scott Campbell ,Terry Dodson and Mark Silvestri.

What works do you currently have published?

So far 2 issues of She-Hulk (Marvel) #35 and #36. In 2005 I started a long collaboration with GG Studio as a conceptual artist. Today I still work with for GG Studio Publishing for charcter ,cover artist and penciler. I am also the penciller for “The One” as you can see above which is a fantasy comic. Oh and of course . . . four illustration for Italian soccer advertising for National Tabloid.

Again thanks for your time and wish you all the best in your works. Pasquale was kind enough to provide a lot of more artwork but rather than clutter up his interview I’m saving that for another post, so keep watching this space!

For more his work :
http://pasquale-qualano.blogspot.com/
http://qualano.deviantart.com/

For commissions or to contact Pasquale email :
info [at] qualanoart.com

An amazing showcase by Michael Bridges. The pencil work is fantastic especially the tonal work and the shading. As a bonus, there’s also video of the Michael doing the sketch. Be sure to check it out.

Video Link :
Step by Step Video

Also if you are interested to purchase one of Michael’s commissions click here. There’s additional samples of his artwork there as well. It’s fantastic stuff and you won’t be disappointed.