More from the vaults now on sale in my ebay store. I will try to post one piece from each major project per week until the end of September. Then all my art and book sales MUST END until March 2012.
In addition to some nifty unpublished Sandman sketches, I’ve got this near 15 year-old cover sketch, unused, for an issue of Valor, a Legion of Superheroes series I used to draw for DC Comics.
To purchase any of these pieces, click this link to my ebay shop.
First, this page of preliminary sketches for The Sandman Gallery, circa 1994. Alas, I think the sketches are more interesting than the final painting.
This is drawn on DC Comics paper and is in excellent condition.
A classical study of a Greek youth. Quite like this.
Here’s two very nice Artist Proof sketch cards from Marvel Masterpieces II and Star Wars Clone Wars. Storm and Padme.
An unused prelim sketch for a base card for the Star Wars series for Topps. Here’s the one that was actually used for this project.
I also have unpublished A Distant Soil art and other goodies in my shop.
As annoying as ebay can be, it’s much easier to sell art there than here at my website. So far, all transactions have been very smooth, and I must say, all the buyers have been super-nice.
All of my auctions must be completed and shipped by the first week of October. I will be closing ALL my art and book sales until next year. I will be out of the country for over a month, and will be unable to process any orders during the holidays. If you want to buy books or art, please do so over the next few weeks.
All ebay sales must end, and my website sales must be shut down until March 2012, or later. So please, if you want to purchase books or art, especially for the holidays, please do so as soon as possible. I must make sure that everything has been processed and received by customers before I leave.
Naturally, I also need to make some good sales to make up for the fact that I will be doing no mail order for a good six months. Even though I have plenty of assignments, the loss of mail order will be quite a hit.
Take advantage of the sales and get books while you can. I am very happy to sign any books you order direct from me, too.
HERE IS MY BOOK SHOP. Order limited edition hardcovers and other books direct from me.
AND HERE IS MY EBAY STORE where you can find the above art for sale. I’ll be adding more pieces in the coming weeks, but then all my art and books go off the market for about six months.
For the background of Reign of the Zodiac, check out this previous post for story and more unpublished art.
Reign of the Zodiac, drawn by me, and written by Keith Giffen.
As you see, we put a lot of thought and background work into this gig, but things don’t always work out as we would like. The book got canned despite our best efforts.
Here’s another scan of my pencils for a double page spread. As I wrote before, large portions of Zodiac were inked by me, including most of issue #8. I got to keep all the art I inked, and Bob Wiacek got the page rate and credit.
The series was supposed to last 72 issues, with each eight issue story arc featuring a conflict between two houses of the Zodiac. I did a good deal of ghost writing on the final issue, because Keith was so despondent over the series getting the axe he had trouble bringing the book home. I take the hit for my clumsy job trying to tie the book up. Keith had the most incredible plans for this project!
One of our plans was to create Tarot cards and Zodiac themed items to tie in with the series. Here’s some sketches I did for these cards. Alas, my old scanner was very poor quality, as you see.
My final pencils were very tight. Nowadays, I suppose we could just scan and print from this.
In this scene, Romeo and Juliet lovers from the Zodiac world Eidelon step through a mirror into the basement vault of the Vatican archives.
A page of icon designs. At the same time, I was hired by a British magazine to do Zodiac icons and designs. However, the magazine had no idea that I didn’t have any digital skills, and when they asked me to do my colors “in layers” I had no idea what the heck they were talking about. After producing some thousands of dollars of work for them, I had to quit the job, but decided not to invoice for it so I could keep all rights to the work.
More costume sketches:
I was to do ten issues a year, but finding someone who could (or would) draw the clothes and sets as I designed them was a bit of a challenge. This was not the kind of job for someone who wants to crank out a monthly comic and collect a check.
I’m posting pages from this and other works on ebay for sale over the next few weeks. Here’s my shop. All my art will go back off the market after this series of sales.
I have lots more to show you. Be back soon.
I only have one more set of sketches after this (I think,) and these doodles are now up on ebay.
Previous Wonder Woman concept sketches are HERE and HERE. And the story behind it all is HERE.
Thanks for dropping by to have a look! Don’t forget to check out the webcomic.
Every artist has a list of heartbreaker projects, and Reign of the Zodiac is one of mine. Keith Giffen approached me nearly ten years ago and asked me to do the art and all visual development on the most ambitious and well-planned high fantasy concept I had heard in years.
The story of the twelve warring Houses of the Zodiac was a dream project for someone like me who delights in world building. With the exception of A Distant Soil and the upcoming Gone to Amerikay, I have never been able to put this much intense effort into research and design. Keith Giffen was incredibly supportive and gave my imagination free reign. No pun intended.
Here’s a look at my pencil art for a huge double page spread of a “between worlds” area called The Brace.
Unfortunately, it was such a complex concept, which featured dialogue in a unique syntax, that readers found it hard to follow. It made perfect sense read in a great chunk, but was confusing once a month. Even though we had solid Vertigo level numbers, for some reason, DC made the book a house title, and for house DC, it did not do so well, getting canned at 11,000 copies. I still think it would make an outstanding tv series.
I kept all of my concept sketches and made copies of all of my pencil art. Bob Wiacek did a wonderful job as inker, but within a couple of issues, I began ghost inking chunks of the art. My pencils were so meticulous, it seemed ridiculous to have an inker at all, because I can draw faster in ink than I can in pencil. By the final issue, #8, I was ghosting almost the entire book, with Wiacek getting credit and full page rate, and me getting all original art. All in all, a good compromise.
A delight and challenge of the project was creating 12 distinct cultures for each house. There were no costumes in the book, and a character might change clothes several times an issue. They had to be distinctive enough as individuals that even without standard comic book visual cues, they could be recognized by the reader. And each House of the Zodiac and all it’s accompanying cultural design work had to be recognizable on sight.
So, tricky.
Here are my pencils for a party scene where we first see the Houses of the Zodiac together.
I posted some of this material years ago, but my old blog didn’t have many readers. I hope all the new folks will enjoy this peek.
Here’s a look at some of the concept art sketches for the project.
Our goal was to try to reference world cultures not normally represented in comics. The only rule was no Japanese influences, if possible. It had become cliched default for foreign even ten years ago, and so it was out.
Some of the handwriting in the margins is Keith’s as he tags the designs to suit the personality of each house based on their standard traits.
I’ll post more art from this project shortly. I hope you enjoy what you see! Thanks.
My humble art shop awaits your kind patronage…
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