Posts Tagged ‘Warren Ellis’

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More Concept Art from “Distance” by Warren Ellis.

by Colleen Doran on December 30th, 2011
Posted In: Blog, Colleen's Work

Once again, thanks to Warren Ellis for allowing me to put these concept sketches from our project “Distance” on the internet. Scroll down to the previous post for more details and drawings. These are circa 2000-2001.

A major problem on this project was my complete lack of digital skills. I did not even know how to use the Paint Bucket tool in Photoshop, nor how to properly scan and deliver my original art. Comedies of errors.

Some more costume designs for Jack Ho.

Really, I could do this all day:


Alien costume designs. I loved doing these. These aliens were from a world covered with fine silver sands and the idea was that they would wear a variety of veiled garments. These sketches show how the veils might be raised, lowered, and used as architectural elements for the costume.

More aliens. Quite like the first garment.

Jack had to wear a veil, too. The funky item in the lower left is an alien kettle.

Marker color guides for an animated shot of Jack. This scene from “Distance” is the only time I’ve animated anything. The staff had no luck capturing the look of my art, so I was asked to come in and give it a go myself. Here are a few frames.

The inked cel.

Penciled cel set up sketch.

Inked final.

Color sketch.

Color sketches of background elements.

City designs.


Spaceship doodles.

More later.

c

PS: Have you ordered this?

It’s an imperative. Ask for it at your local bookstore, or use the handy button below.

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Warren Ellis: “Distance” Unseen. With Special, Totally Unauthorized Appearance by George Takei

by Colleen Doran on December 27th, 2011
Posted In: Blog, Colleen's Work

With the kind permission of Warren Ellis, I posted a number of concept art pieces I did for a KIA animated series written by Warren entitled “Distance”. That was years ago on my old blog, which no one ever read (it’s down now). So few saw it. Now there are thousands more of you, and I’m reposting this for your edification.

“Distance” was commissioned by fledgling internet comics/animation entrepreneurs Pipe Studios, doing the internet stuff way before their time. And not making much money at it, so almost everything got shut down. One of their fledgling projects was ArtBomb, a webcomics site which published my first web story, also by Warren Ellis, entitled “Super Idol”. This was eleven years ago. Holy cow.

Anyway, “Distance” got optioned by Sony (I think,) but it all died on the vine in 2001. I spent about six months doing designs for it. Here are some of the sketches. I will post more later.

This science fiction tale, the exact nature of which I cannot remember, had a lead based more or less on actor George Takei. His name was Jack Ho.

We did an awful lot of running about to nail the look of this fellow.

With varying degrees of success.

Since the animation was going to be fairly primitive, I had to whittle Ho’s face down to fit the limits of the technique.

While we started referencing George Takei as a model, we later abandoned the idea, not sure if we could get a license from the actor.

Quite a bit of fiddling around going on, eh? In the end, I started tweaking Jack Ho more along the lines of actor Sanada Hiroyuki.

Final turnarounds.


There’s lots more to see of the “Distance” concept art, so tune in again later this week.

c

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Unpublished Sandman and Orbiter Art Now Available UPDATED

by Colleen Doran on August 26th, 2011
Posted In: Blog, Colleen's Work, Culture, Comics, DC Comics, Culture, Comics, DC Comics, Sandman

Two more unpublished pieces added to my ebay store. Previous (and now sold) sketches can be seen here.

Another page of Sandman sketches. I tucked these away ages ago thinking no one would have any interest in my scribbles. Ha and ha. I did not use much of this in the final Sandman Gallery piece for which it was intended, but here you can see the Morpheus and Orpheus piece I did years later for the Sandman 20th anniversary exhibit.

I went for an Gustave Moreau homage.

And these sketches were buried in the back of a file at DC Comics for some years. I think I got them back a year or so ago. The original character sketch for John Cost, the astronaut hero of the Orbiter graphic novel I drew for the delightful Warren Ellis.

EDIT: Most of this came from a huge pile of what looked like blank drawing paper. And wasn’t. In there I also found all the prelims, layouts, and unfinished pages for the Technique miniseries I worked on for Milestone, under Dwayne McDuffie and Matt Wayne. None of the work was ever published. I sold the lot to a devoted collector, while it probably would have gone for better prices at auction. C’est la vie.

I will try to find the time to post some of the other finds, and I will definitely be making more art available for sale in bits and pieces. I also found all the unpublished Marvel Comics Fallen Angels II cover prelims. Never seen anywhere.

As noted before, my last auctions will go up in late September, and then no more book sales or art sales either on my website or ebay for six months. Thank you for your kind patronage.

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Warren Ellis’s RED

by Colleen Doran on October 13th, 2010
Posted In: Blog, Culture, Film and Television

A couple of weeks ago, a bunch of retired CIA and FBI agents, as well as a slew of old cops, showed up at my parent’s farm for a party. A few mentioned how much they are looking forward to seeing Warren Ellis’s Red. I know my dad is dying to see it.

Old gun-toting dudes never die, they just renew their license to carry.

That lovely fellow who was at the Bay of Pigs brought us a nice stained glass window pane he made all by himself. It’s good he has new hobbies that don’t make things explode.

Pinched from The Beat. Warren says:

There is a small, snivelling and flinching part of me that would rather not have his name inextricably linked with The Last Comic Book Movie Flop Of 2010. But, you know, I am today pretty much at peace with the whole thing. I’ve met fine people and I’ve learned many useful things, and that is the most you can ask of any walk.

Reviews are coming in. This from The Huffington Post:

And yet one should never underestimate the pleasures to be had from an action film written by and starring professionals, who know what they’re doing and don’t miss a trick. It’s not that Red is a breakthrough or a game-changer in any way — it’s just a highly enjoyable comic action-thriller with a sense of humor about itself.

OK, I’m in.

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Art and Lit and Comics Links: JK Rowling, Jane Austen, Spider-Man, Orbiter team up.

by Colleen Doran on August 31st, 2010
Posted In: Blog, Culture, Literature, Children's, Colleen's Work, Culture, Comics, Culture, Comics, Comics History, Culture, Culture, Literature, Fantasy, Culture, Literature

i09 lists Orbiter among the top SF graphic novels guaranteed to get you hooked for life. Warren Ellis wrote it, and I drew it.

If you are interested in picking up a copy of this fine tome, try to get the first printing. Far better quality paper.

JK Rowling donates 10 million pounds to new multiple sclerosis research center.

The world-famous children’s writer made the generous donation in memory of her mother Anne, who suffered from the degenerative condition and died in 1990 at the age of 45.

Can the iPad Save Spider-Man?

Single issues regularly topped a million in sales during the Depression; last year, the top 300 comics sold in the United States combined added up to less than 75 million copies. Hard-core collectors may still flock to dedicated comic shops, but even the comic-book movie craze hasn’t drawn mainstream fans to the oft-impenetrably serialized monthlies. And while more sophisticated, complex graphic novels have charged into bookstores, it still can’t compare to the widespread accessibility comics enjoyed during their old newsstand days.


Does Peter Parker Have a Moral Responsibility to be Spider-Man?

If we were consequentialists and thought that the rightness and wrongness of actions depends entirely on the good or bad outcomes produced, we would believe that Peter is morally obligated to be Spider-Man, at least on the assumption that being a superhero produces more overall good than being a good scientist, boyfriend, etc. As appealing as consequentialism might seem at first blush, it’s riddled with problems.

Jane Austen had punctuation issues.

“Austen hardly punctuates at all, so what you get is a much more urgent form of language, which becomes more restrained when it is edited,” he said.

“There tends to be an awful lot of clauses and sub-clauses. There is the odd comma, but they aren’t always in the most rational places. There are no paragraphs.”

I used to get a ten-point deduction for every comma splice.

Jane Austen and her homies fight it out.

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