As of this date I am 13 pages into my new comic effort titled SON OF MAN. I wanted to share a little insight here that is not on Instagram - I’ll still post there, but fuck those people! Whatever! I’m a blogger now.
My approach to making comics hasn’t changed much - I basically spend all of my prep time on character designs and set pieces, and almost none on story. I’m just setting these characters loose in a world and I’ll just be watching what happens and recording it, page by page. I hope that by working this way the story will come more from the inner, smarter part of my brain, as opposed to the outer, dumber areas that have been polished smooth with modern pop culture.
The challenge of this style of comics-making, especially with my art which is complicated, layered mess - sometimes the idea comes after a substantial amount of work has been done on the page, but if it doesn’t read right or tell a clear bit of story, it must be redone. It’s not ideal, and I’ll always try to work on bad drawing to make it better (all of my Copic markers have a Posca paint pen twin, so I can almost always correct a mistake) but it has already happened 2 times during this project. I had to start two pages completely over even though they were almost done. The problem there is that I didn’t respect the thumbnail process. In my comics, there are ambient pages, and there are story pages- and the story pages have one job.
Eventually I’ll hit a stride. In an effort to hit that stride, I have vowed to myself to not show anyone until the main character first appears.
SUPPLIES
The Deck
Here’s a list of my current art supplies for this project.
COPIC MARKERS: Acid green, Robin’s Egg Blue, Process Blue, Frost Blue, Cotton Pearl, Loquat, Golden Yellow, Apricot, Barley Beige, Sepia, Violet, Salmon Red, Cadmium Red, Tender Pink, Cool Grey #2, #4, & #6. I also have bought several empty WIDE markers and I’m filling them with color combinations to see what happens. I refill my markers with Copic refills that I buy in bulk – I have very very old markers and I almost never replace the nibs.
POSCA PAINT PENS: Red, Orange, Blue, Grey, Neon Green, Hot Pink, Medium Grey, Yellow. I have started refilling these with whatever cheap liquid acrylic paint is around. Posca’s are actually very easy to refill and right now I’m using some Molotow Liquid Acrylic. This is all just for the dots and cover-ups. If I want to do white spray with my toothbrush or blast something with canned air for an airbrush effect – I use nicer quality paint that sits on the paper better like Golden brand titanium white acrylic paint mixed with a little alcohol or water.
PENTEL FUDE TOUCH PEN: Red, Blue
MICRON PEN: #8. I’m going to get a refillable #8 technical pen soon, I think. I don’t really like cleaning them, but I’m focusing on reducing waste in my life.
TOMBOW FUDE PEN: Hard, Soft. Again, I’m seeking out ways to replace fudenosuke-style felt-tip drawing pens. They are so great, and the hard one has become my go-to. But again, I’ll let go when I find a refillable replacement. Any ideas?
MISC: 11x14 Strathmore Bristol Board, Black Sharpie, 3B pencil, 4H pencil, screen tone sheets, a toothbrush, a sable brush for ink, Higgins Black magic, canned-air dusting spray, and a copy of the King James bible.
I’m using a lot more Copic marker tones that I used to. Slowly I have folded cooler and warmer midtones into the mix to soften the edges of my main palette. They’re especially useful on faces, which are going to figure much more prominently into this book then they did in FEND. I want to learn to draw and redraw the same face from every angle – I just think the story reads so much better when you have that pinned down. I’m still learning how to do that well. I’ve even gone so far as to make some maquette heads to use as drawing reference – learned that from Bernie Wrightson.
Timeline
I do not give a fuck when I finish this book. It’s finished when I say so! I refuse to turn this project into work, and I refuse to let the deformed freaks at Instagram dictate to me the manner in which I share this work with people. Good grief! I hope you’re happy Zuck, you loser, I’m a blogger now!
Steve Albini
It’s been a few weeks now, and I’m struggling with what to say that is either helpful or cathartic, but the guy has been a fixture of my life ever since I heard about his band Shellac in high school. It was in my car cd player, waiting to start my shift at Dairy Queen –that riff started I just pumped my volume up to ten. I’m sure 7 feet away at the picnic tables the parents were lovin’ it. The title of that song, some of his earlier public antics – just a reminder that even the smartest person can be dumb as hell sometimes. But he caught himself, publicly aired his bullshit out, and apparently never acted that way again. The best apology, as we all know, is a changed behavior. Anyway I still smell that car and the cigarette that I was smoking whenever the first track of At Action Park starts playing. I didn’t know him, but he was a good friend to some of my good friends and that’s beautiful, man.
REQUIESCAT STEVE.
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Here is a list of records that I think Steve did an especially great job recording. The big ones aren’t on the list and go without saying, but here are a few that are special to me.
PHILIP ROEBUCK – ONE MAN BAND (kick drum on his back. Classic one-man band config– banjo heads must seek him out) LISTEN
SCOUT NIBLETT – KIDNAPPED BY NEPTUNE (perfect quiet/loud dynamics. Ultimate sadgirl riffs) LISTEN
DISTORTION FELIX – I’M AN ATHLETE (all you shoegazers need this record. Heavy and very hooky) LISTEN
SHADOWY MEN ON A SHADOWY PLANET – SPORT FISHIN’: THE LURE… (play this one driving at night) LISTEN
UZEDA – 4 (Steve recording my favorite drummer) LISTEN
SILKWORM – IT’LL BE COOL (just a perfect sounding indie rock record) LISTEN
HIGH ON FIRE – BLESSED BLACK WINGS (one of the best sounding metal albums of all time) LISTEN
“DOGS”- NINA NASTASIA (beautiful and funny tearjerker) LISTEN
I could just keep going and going.
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Besides the final Shellac record, Steve and some friends recorded a 7” record of baseball songs and it’s being released to benefit a friend! Please get yourself a copy of of one of Steve’s last recordings before it disappears and know that it goes to a good cause - here’s the link https://nittykitty.com/product/chin-music-7-record/