Posts Tagged ‘Comics’

I remember getting the Mad Magazine. I enjoyed all it had to offer from the cover of Alfred E. Neumann incorporated into the pop cover, to the fold up in back. It was and still is a great magazine.

One thing that I enjoyed more was the comics. Spy vs. Spy, Don Martin (He has a Shrine, you know), but just as important was Al Jaffee. He brought a lot of sarcasm to his strips with “Snappy Answers for Stupid Questions”. For instance, you might see someone at the computer and another ask the question:

“Are you on Dorkazine.com”

The reply would be a trifecta – like:

“No, I am on ebay buying an expensive car”

“No, my pants are on fire and I am looking online for the proceedure to ‘Stop, Drop and Roll’”

“No, I thought this was the microwave. Hopefully my Burrito is done…”

On a daily basis, Bitstrips offers a remix challenge: Write a good caption to the bitstrips comic. It was a street bum with piles of money. This inspired me to do an Al Jaffee tribute. So enjoy this Snappy answer to a stupid question.

Last week I took 8 hours of my time, and built a superman from the moon! You go ahead, scratch your head, and say ‘What?!’

Bitstrips, my favorite website/ social network site, is a great place to stretch one’s creative muscle. The mediums are almost limitless. The imagination is the key!

My experience in digital drawing comes from good ol’ CorelDraw. This program is great for making superior clipart. I took this knowledge, and applied it to the tools available on Bitstrips.

My first character creation was Jeff Smith’s ‘Bone’. A simple Black and white image, set on a colerful background. I was then challenged by another ‘Bitstripper’, and created Stan Sakai’s Usagi Yojimbo (rabbit bodyguard). The result was what the character would look like, were he on Cartoon Network.

So, with this success, I was ready to try my hand at a character I had attempted once before, and threw away in frustration.

Superman, the first of the Golden Age heroes, and a staple of American culture. I knew my take on this icon could not be from just one time period. I wanted it to be classic, yet stylized. The accompanying photo shows my progress, the use of the moon prop, which is perfect because it has no border, and is almost colorless.

The comic builder lets you add whatever color you want. The key is to start with the black, then build out and up, quite the opposite of painting with oil and canvas.

The end result was better than I expected. The chiseled face, slightly overdone, the overbuilt muscles, the askew symbol, all made for an amazing visual. The hands were the hardest part, as were the legs, which I eventually gave up on.

The part I was most apprehensive about was the chains. I am still not 100% happy with them, but they did turn out beter than I hoped.

My hope is to continue on this path. Batman is next.

Superman