The final week of the class was spent working on french curves, linework with straight edges (lost that pice), and most likely something which quite possibly I put into week six by accident...  here is my French Curve practice.



...But the biggest part of the last week was when Ty gave us our full pages to work on.

We had the choice of two pages to work on but I managed to weasel him into giving me both pages to work on.  I inked through part of the first page without issue in class and finished the rest after class.


And when I finished that, I started on the second page. I have yet to complete it.



All thing said, I learned a LOT in that class. I'd recommend anyone in the Toronto to take it.

Comic Book Bootcamp

Week Six focused mainly on correcting mistakes with whites and on adding greys to a page in a greyscale comic. It has become really popular among indy artists who save printing costs by staying in black and white.




After adding the greys, we started using white paint and whiteout markers to correct mistakes.



 I didn't get very far on this page because Ty introduced a challenge I couldn't turn down.  And "What," might you ask, "Is the challenge you couldn't turn down?"

This sweet little number.  We were given pencils and were expected to ink them.  So I did. I inked the shit out of this guy.  AND, I'm not done yet. This is just the beginning. I'll post the finished piece when I finish it.

Yeah, I know. I've been super busy. I've actually started Ty's next block of classes, Heads and Hands.  SO, here is a recap of the rest of what I learned in the class.

I finished the rest of my homework before class 5. This was the day I was on the eve of being deathly ill. I hardly lasted the night.

First off, though, is the Swamp Thing I did. It's sort of a recap of texture, plants, water, and deadweight lines.



In class 5, we started with a smoke study.  I LOVE doing smoke. It gives me a happy.

After smoke came metal

And after metal was leather, which I didn't finish because I was starting to feel like I was going to die.



 I'll post a Ghost Rider piece when I actually do the work. I need some practice in that area.


After a bit of a breather, we quickly went over how to repurpose blacks on a page when the penciller asks for too much.

And the last thing we did before I threw in the towel was ink pictures in different styles.  The one on the left, even if it wasn't finished, would look a lot more appealing. It pops because the human eye recognises shape before detail. Cool, eh?

I finished four of my homework assignments and still have one left. I'll probably bang it out tomorrow.

Here's what I've done so far.


First, I finished off the water on the one half of the image. I feel like I was finally getting the hang of it.



Rubble exercise. Above is the rough rubble, below is my finished rubble.

I finished the Rogue piece. What's not to love about Rogue in shredded loincloth clothing and dinosaurs prowling the background? It was an exercise for foliage and rocks, mostly, but I decided to ink the whole thing for practice.


This is another rocks and rubble exercise. Again, I inked the whole thing because I wanted the practice.



Hoping to add one more inked piece tomorrow. I'm looking forward to doing it!

Here is the continuation of the last post.  Consider class four as the textures class. Well, textures part one, that is. We actually had so much to cover that we didn't get to finish all the textures that Ty had in mind for us.  This class basically covered natural textures such as foliage, rock, water, and fire. Smoke was the one that we didn't have the opportunity to try.

I also have a LOT of homework for this class that I didn't actually do yet. I know, bad jupe. I'll be asking my neighbours later if I can borrow their table and work in quiet without two wild kids climbing all over me as I do it. Plus, they have a clean dining room table whereas mine looks like Armageddon.

Anyway, here we go. Week Four.


First up was water textures. I had a lot of trouble with this and will be working on them a lot more in my homework. It's starting to come around but I have a long way to go.


And here is the water exercise. The person who did the penciling had no idea how to draw water, so it was up to us to make it look like water and to NOT trace what he did, originally.

Next up is the foliage texture. If you look at the top of the page, you'll see a bit more water practice.  Foliage was really easy for me. I picked it up without much problem at all. There are two kinds of pine trees: one is alive and one is dying. It's kind of cool learning how to do both, We learned leaves, conifers, deciduous, grass, flowers, plants, etc. It's neat how you do all of them individually.


After foliage was rocks. My buddy, Greg, is really good at rocks. I was good at some, but not others. I need more practice and have yet to do the rocks homework. I wish I had a picture of Greg's rocks. They were awesome.

Here are my less awesome rocks and rubble and mountains.


Finally, we learned fire. We didn't have a lot of time for fire, but that's okay. Here's the jist of it.


Lastly, we were given a few assignments to work on. Here is the one that I started. It's Rogue in a loincloth with a dinosaur in the background. She's in the jungle, and there are plenty of rocks and water and foliage to work on. When I finish the homework part, I'll likely ink Rogue and the dinosaur, too, because it's MFing Rogue and a dinosaur, right?


Stay tuned in. I'll have Week Five coming up this week, as well as some of my homework.

I've been really bad about updating this. I've been extraordinarily busy and was working on a buttload of commissions, so posting to the class blog sort of hit the backburner.

This is a sample of a few things I've done. First off, I'll start with Class #3


Class Three was the introduction of the crow quill and the needle quill, but before we hit those two instruments, we practiced textures of things.  The first picture is the apple exercise.  The first two apples appear as though they're cratered and that is because I was fucking up the concrete texture.  It was the one that I just couldn't handle.

Take a look at the pictures and try to guess what they are. The answer to what each picture is will be below the following image.



Concrete, concrete, fur, hair on skin, wood, sand, and concrete again.



Next up is an exercise we did in which the image needed a different texture for every item so you can distinguish what it is by looking just at that specific area.  We used different tools: dry brushes, markers, brushes, and were taught about toothbrushes and other items.  This exercise was also a way to show us how inking isn't tracing. The original sketch, as you can see above the inked portion, was a very rough image. It was up to us to make it interesting.



This is getting used to using a crow quill. The lines are fairly thick because the quill itself was fairly thick. It handles just like a pencil and was actually a great deal of fun to use.



Here is an exercise using the needle quill which gives you much, much finer lines. Again, it handles just like a pencil.



This is a mixed media exercise where we were to use the quill and the marker and the brush to ink Marilyn Monroe and Captain America.




That about sums it up for Week 3. Week 4 is up next in its own post.

Last night was the second of seven comic inking classes taught by Ty Templeton and it didn't disappoint.

We started off with marker, working on lines of weight and light.

Here's the worksheet of a Clark Kent which I didn't get to finish:

Here are two pieces I finished shading with stipples and lines.  Enjoy!

The first class started well enough. We started off by using markers, as they're the easiest, I guess you could say. My husband bought me a full set of Microns for Christmas, plus a case, so I was all set. I packed up with my pencils, markers, and a new notebook, and headed in.

Greg and I arrived early, as I like to do, and parked our butts in the front row. I don't like sitting in the back and prefer to be up front if and when Ty decides to demonstrate something to the class on the desk rather than the board.

We began to learn our comfortable curves by drawing a lot of arches, then we practiced on a series of curves: letters U and S, specifically, or rather, shapes that resemble those letters. More like arches and paths, I suppose.

From those exercises, we were given a Simpsons practice sheet (not pictured) to practice our comfortable curves on.

Onward from there, where Ty spoke of foreground, middleground, and background lines. This was a bit of review from the penciling class, but the medium was a bit different so I was happy for the refresh.  We were to ink a set of vines to indicate what is in the foreground, middleground, and background.  Here's what I did:

Back in the fall of 2013 I decided that I wanted to really restart my art. It had been years since I was drawing frequently and consistently so taking a few classes to jumpstart myself and get the engine running seemed like a really good idea.