adamwarren

WORK STAGES (sorta) on a 2006 superheroic card illo!

Emergency post time, folks, as I still haven't scanned any of the originals from my latest and, alas, ill-fated test pages drawn for The Chaste and the Chained. So, I hastily rummaged through an odds & ends folder and found this trading card illo I drew for Upper Deck's Marvel series back in 2006, this time featuring the Inhuman's Crystal letting loose with her elemental (I think?) powers.

The fine colors on the piece were provided by the talented lads of c...

PSM "Endpage" cartoon from 2005 re: Playstations in the far-future year 2026!

From the bygone year 2005, here's another "Endpage" cartoon I wrote and drew for the sadly defunct videogame magazine PSM, this time whimsically predicting the state of Sony Playstation technology in the distant, far-future, nigh-science-fictional year of 2026:

Yes, dear Patrons, that's Emp and a partially visible Thugboy in the background of panel 6. Golly!

And ...

LIFE DRAWINGS FROM PHOTOREFERENCE #186: From 2019, another set drawn in Procreate!

From my 2019 era of experimentation in the iPad art app Procreate, here's a sketch set derived from a mix of random photoreference. At this point I was still using Procreate's admittedly "mushy-looking" Medium Airbrush to get something onto the g-d tablet:

Ehh, no idea who the heck Rain Mikamura might be, but the cosplay photo was good ref. (I could of course look up the ...

DISTRESSED DAMSELS: WORK STAGES on a recent EMPOWERED & NINJETTE commission!

Behold the complete Work Stages on a recent damsel-in-distress commission done in my old Con Sketch two-color format--but produced much, much more slowly than the pieces I used to crank out at conventions, alas.

A close-up on the initial rough, after being tweaked in Photoshop a bit:

And here's the original rough at its "native ...

VINTAGE CON SKETCHES: A trio of varied OC (Original Character) commissions from 2002!

Yeahp, here are a trio of OC (Original Character) commissions drawn in the summer of 2002, as recently scanned from pretty decent photocopies of original art penciled on linen-finish cardstock.

First off, a very specific request featuring a male angel pretty overtly based on some of the Seraphim designs from Kazushi Hagiwara's manga Bastard!!, which was still a big influence on mon oeuvre back then:

2023-07-03 13:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post

FAILED-PROJECT FRIDAY: An ill-fated all-ages comic pitch from 2007, part 2!

[Here's a link to part 1 of this two-part post, folks.]

So! A few years after 2005's miniseries Iron Man: Hypervelocity, I was given an opportunity to pitch for a four-issue arc of Marvel's all-ages title Iron Man Adventures. As was usual then and now for my sporadic brushes with the mainstream, nothing came of the...

2006 "Endpager" cartoon for PSM re: "Videogame-Frustration Olympic Events"

From those halcyon days when I wrote and drew a B&W "Endpage" cartoon feature for the Playstation videogame magazine PSM, here's a still-relevant topic as first addressed in the initial rough I sent to the editor:

Note that panel 2 is, of course, referring to the 2023-06-28 13:00:09 +0000 UTC View Post

DISTRESSED DAMSELS: "THE TROUBLE WITH EMERALD," part 2!

[Link to our previous installment in this series]

Note that I just changed the title of this goofy little pseudo-story effort to The Trouble with Emerald from the previous We Have an Emerald Problem, as I found the former a tad punchier.

So!

I've been trying to think of something to do with the various ...

Opening scene update from THE CHASTE AND THE CHAINED (with bonus Elf undie designs)!

Behold, the final rough—okay, "rough," as this image is srsly far too detailed for this particular Work Stage—for the excessively ambitious double-page spread of pages 2 & 3 from fantasy test project The Chaste and the Chained:

Drew this "rough" in the PC version of Clip Studio Paint via the ol' Wacom Cintiq, before embarking on attemp...

LIFE DRAWINGS FROM PHOTOREFERENCE (well, sorta) #186: More Procreate cosplay sketch sets from 2019!

Had planned to post an update on The Chaste and the Chained today but am running waaaaay behind this morning, so 'tis time to put up the only prepared content in my Drafts folder!

From my 2019 era of experimentation in the iPad art app Procreate, here's a pair of sketch sets derived from assorted photos of cosplayers rocking outfits based on early sets of Patron art requests. I doubled up on the posted sets here because, TBH, ...

DISTRESSED DAMSELS: "We Have an EMERALD Problem," pt.1!

So!

I've been trying to think of something to do with the various DiD sketch sets I have kicking around that feature backup superheroine Emerald, who appears as basically a dark-haired, maskless variation on Emp's tattered-suit design (and modern-era  physique) from Empowered. Technically, the character predates Emp as a DiD commission subject by quite some time, but that's another story I'll address at a later date (well...

FAILED-PROJECT FRIDAY: An ill-fated all-ages comic pitch from 2007, part 1!

So! A few years after 2005's miniseries Iron Man: Hypervelocity, I was given an opportunity to pitch for a four-issue arc of Marvel's all-ages title Iron Man Adventures. As was usual then and now for my sporadic brushes with the mainstream, nothing came of the proposal; alas, I no longer recall which writer actually wound up with the gig. (Fred Van Lente, maybe?)

Note #1: I'm not sure if the pitch required the clarifying "moral" riffs ...

VINTAGE CON SKETCHES: A mixed bag of oddities from 1999-2000!

Combing through a dwindling binder of photocopied commissions from the linen-finish heyday of 1999-2002, I dug up a few pieces you prrrrrrobably haven't yet seen.

First off, a scandalously "flashy" illo derived from 1998's miniseries Gen13: Magical Drama Queen Roxy, with the titular heroine unleashing an apparently magical panchira effect:

2023-06-14 13:00:10 +0000 UTC View Post

2007 PSM SWIMSUIT ILLO, featuring the ladies (and nekkid hero) from the PS2's MAXIMO: GHOSTS TO GLORY!

Recently dug up a high-res printout of the illo above, which I drew and my bud Ryan Kinnaird colored as part of the 2007 "Summer Swimsuit" feature for the sadly defunct videogame magazine PSM. This piece apparently stars the cast of the Playstation 2 game Maximo: Ghosts to Glory from Capcom which, for good or ill, I never played:

2023-06-12 13:00:09 +0000 UTC View Post

DISTRESSED DAMSELS: Developmental sketch sets of ROSE vs. BOND, kinda-sorta photoreferenced!

So! 

Last month's kinda-sorta commissioned illo pitting hapless SF heroines Rose & Lily against the Sean Connery iteration of James Bond proved shockingly difficult to work up, as you can see from these developmental sketch sets of Rose vs. a largely unseen Bond:

2023-06-09 13:50:46 +0000 UTC View Post

WORK STAGES on gritty, grimy & crime-y trading card art from 2004!

As I desperately flail about for a Wednesday post, here's a li'l something from one of my "MISCELLANEOUS" hard drive folders. This time, here are some Work Stages on a pair of Marvel-related trading cards I drew back in 2004, looks like.

First up, the final version of a Punisher card, featuring colors by my bud Ryan Kinnaird:

Note that o...

VINTAGE CON SKETCHES: '92-'94 BUBBLEGUM CRISIS commissions ahoy!

Behold, fresh off the scanner, here are a quartet of Bubblegum Crisis-related con sketches from the thrilling yesteryears of 1992 through 1994. I scanned these from rather crappy photocopies, so the repro quality is rather less than ideal; nonetheless, I think you can just barely make out that all of 'em were, I believe, drawn on the linen-finish paper I favored for con sketches back in the day.

The first piece, clearly commissioned at A-Kon in Texas, ...

LIFE DRAWINGS FROM PHOTOREFERENCE #185: From 2019, a Magik-al cosplay set drawn in Procreate!

From my 2019 era of experimentation in the iPad art app Procreate, here's a sketch set derived from assorted photos of cosplayers rocking outfits based on Magik from the X-Men, New Mutants, etc. At this point I was still using Procreate's admittedly "mushy-looking" Medium Airbrush to get something onto the g-d tablet:

Overall, a pretty solid set, even given th...

Early WORK STAGES on opening double-page spread from THE CHASTE AND THE CHAINED!

And lo, our concluding post for May will be a li'l work-in-progress dealie for the opening double-page spread—that is, pages 2 & 3—from the first story I'm working up for fantasy test comic The Chaste and the Chained.

Early on, my first take on this scene was a single-page "splash," but I had trouble with the captured Elf Mage's pose, as you can see from the Clip Studio Paint tweaks on her figure where I was scaling and/or correcting various elements: 2023-05-31 13:29:47 +0000 UTC View Post

WORK STAGES on a semi-recent comic, pt. 5!

[Our previous post in this series can be seen here.]

In a desperate bid for a recurring feature to fill up M/W/F slots on this here Patreon, here are (most of) the Work Stages on the final two pages of a 10-page story I wrote and drew as a backup feature for a 2016 Deadpool Annual; this includes fine coloring by my...

A "too close for comfort" illo from THE CHASTE AND THE CHAINED, based on a Patron art request!

So, here's an illo from fantasy-comic test project The Chaste and the Chained based on a fun art request from a $20-tier Patron, the concept being that the horny (and kinky) Elf Mage and the struggling-with-chastity Human Paladin have somehow—somehow!—wound up squeezed together in close quarters:

The lettering isn't what I would use in an actual c...

LIFE DRAWINGS FROM PHOTOREFERENCE #184: Another brand-new Clip Studio Paint sketch set, hot (well, warm, maybe) off the iPad!

In an ongoing attempt to mix things up with the new(-ish) era of digital-art Life Drawing posts, here's another brand new sketch set drawn in Clip Studio Paint (iOS version) from random photoreference, as opposed to the 2019 artwork seen in our  previous installment. Yay?

An undistingui...

DISTRESSED DAMSELS: A bedamseled ROSE added (with some difficulty) to earlier Connery sketch!

Last week, I posted another Life Drawing image of Sean Connery from an especially striking James Bond photo of yore. Wellp, as a further Clip Studio Paint experiment intended to fill out another Distressed Damsels slot, I expanded the canvas a tacked on a new CSP layer attempting to add an image of a bedamseled Rose to the portrait.

Wellp, m...