YouTube Clip Of The Day: John Daker Sings

I wish there was a shot of him looking straight down the camera at the end, but it's still gold.

Comictwart DC Love

I know I've mentioned these guys before, but I just had to share a couple of this weeks pics, because they are so sweet. With the whole DC relaunch hype in the air, the guys decide to do their own DC tributes.
This first one is by Declan Shelvy, see original post here.



The next one is by Tom Fowler, one of my favourite artists on the blog. Check his original post here.


It's a site worth checking out, so do yourself a favour and head over to ComicTwart.

Hungerstrike-Temple Of The Dog

I knew this song from some early Pearl Jam bootlegs, but didn't know where it was from. On the live track you could hear Eddie say, "We played that for Chris, he'll be real proud." Obviously that's Chris Cornell, but I didn't know that at the time. I never got into Soundgarden, so never paid much attention. I knew Temple of the Dog was the precursor to Pearl Jam, but never realised that Eddie Vedder actually sang on the track until I saw the Pearl Jam Twenty film and they featured this film clip in it. I since bought the album, and am quite enjoying it. I never really heard too much Soundgarden that interested me, except for Black Hole Sun, but I'm starting to wonder if maybe I should give them more of a listen. Anyway, I like this song.

Batman/Darth Vader Mash-Up

Original Source:http://residentsoftherabbithole.tumblr.com/post/10461192139

Superman In A Photobooth

Original Source Unknown

"BIRDKILLER" Work In Progress 5

Not too much has changed. I put the white borders in, but my eye was off so now it's at angle. Also, it seems some paint got lifted up or something in the process, so there's a speckling of white in my green now in certain places. I don't want to use tape for that very reason, but it seemed to happen anyway.
One more thing to fix.


I worked mostly on the figure, and I'm pretty happy with it. The shirt in particular. The face is an ongoing battle, trying to work at that size with paint on this surface is a challenge, but I think I'll get what I'm after, though I may have to ask Richard to pose again, but just focus on his face. The next challenge is to paint a couple of birds hanging around his wait, as if strung up to his belt.
Then I need to remember to put the panel with bird skull in it back in. So a little way to go still.


Thanks for the comment Brad, wasn't sure if anyone was paying attention.

Return Of The Jedi: Panel Of The Week

"BIRDKILLER" Work In Progress 4

So I did what I had to do, and abandoned representation in the background, and I'm much more happy with it now.
I felt I needed something more in the lower section of the painting though, so have gone for the dribble effect, bleeding out from the rocks. The plan is still to have a clearly defined white line separating them and bordering the whole painting, so that brown has probably gone too far down on the left there, but I plan to bring in some blue dribble as well, so I'm hoping to mask that somewhat when I do that.
I would have taken a better photo, but the camera battery ran out so I had to settle for the lighting in this one, and I wanted to try rescue the figure from the background, so didn't want to wait any longer.
Thanks for all your feedback and comments, it's been................................................

"BIRDKILLER" Work In Progress 3

I find the process of painting is a constant process of rescue and restoration. I have something I like, that I'm happy with, but then as the rest of the painting is dragged kicking and screaming to a place I want it to be, the parts i'm happy with invariably get "damaged", they're the collateral damage of the rest of the painting. The central figure is the victim as I struggle with the background, he is covered in paint as I try to get consistency or clarity around him, and he bears the brunt of my frustrations and scorched earth policy in applying paint to the background. But this seems to be my method, I get my figure where I want them, then rescue them from the background as it overtakes them.




I'm happy with my hand, and I'm happy with my figure and composition, the idea of what I'm trying to accomplish. It's just I picked the wrong idea to explore the painting method I want to explore with this painting, so I struggle with the background. I think I may get a larger paintbrish. The clouds seem more like mountain tops, and I think I need to abandon representation.
But it's been fun.
What have you been doing?

"BIRDKILLER" Work In Progress 2

Return Of The Jedi: Panel Of The Week

"BIRDKILLER" Work In Progress

Inspired by a post Richard made concerning the saying "killing 2 birds with 1 stone", I bring you the latest in my line of unfinished works.


"BIRDKILLER" (W.I.P.)


"BIRDKILLER" (Detail)

Return Of The Jedi: Panel Of The Week

Comic Review For Release Date 31/9/11: The New DC-Justice League #1

So I’m a bit behind on my regular schedule of comic book reviews, but I’m going to skip roughly the last months worth of comics I haven’t read yet, because I want to concentrate on something new, something that came out this week, and I feel is pretty important. This week, DC Comics only put out two comics, Flashpoint #5, the end of their event, and in effect, then end of the old DC Universe; and Justice League #1, the start of the new DC Universe. I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, but DC Comics is re-launching 52 new titles, starting at #1s for all of them. And this week was the end of one and the start of something new. So for this week, I’m just going to look at Justice League #1.


This book has heavy hitters on it, creatively speaking. Geoff Johns is probably DC biggest writer, and is important enough that he’s been promoted to Chief Creative Officers or something like that. Jim Lee is a legend, and one of the best pencillers in the business. and personally speaking, he represents an evolutionary step in my comic reading, when I discovered his work on X-Men in the early nineties, and brought me into reading Marvel comics. So expectations are high. And Justice League is DC’s big hitters, characters wise. I mean look who’s on the cover, Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman are probably three of the most recognizable comic characters in the western world. And if you’re a bit more familiar with comics then you’d probably recognize Green Lantern, Flash and Aquaman. I find it a bit odd that Cyborg is in the mix, but whatever. Anyway, what I’m saying is, this team, both creatively and the actual team, bring big expectations, and it’s a new number one, launching a whole new chapter in DC’s publishing history, so that’s an awful lot of expectation for one little comic to bear. So what did I think?
Well, I really liked it. I’ve already read it a couple of times, and I imagine I might read it again. And the thing that’s got me coming back is the characters. We get to meet four of the seven from the cover in this issue, but we mainly spend most of the comic with Batman and Green Lantern. And this is their first time they’ve met. They’ve heard of each other, but this is the first time they’ve actually met, and the interactions between them is pretty enjoyable. You’ve got Batman being Batman, confident, slightly cocky, very aware of what he’s doing and experienced, and then you’ve got Green Lantern, who seems younger, more cocky and self-assured, but not necessarily with the experience to back it up. Which leads to some nice interactions between them. These are a couple of my favourites.



So this is very early on in everybody’s respective careers, they are not a known quantity yet, the band hasn’t gotten together. So this first series is going to be getting the band together, obviously having to deal with the threat that is being set up in this issue. And it works. We get to know the characters as they get to know each other. And I can’t wait to get to know them more. It was pretty smart not to start this series with Batman meeting Superman, it makes us hungry for next issue, It was also smart to start with Batman, who I think it could be argued is the most popular and recognizable character in DC history.
Anyway, I’ve talked enough about the story, kind of, what about the art? As I said earlier, Jim Lee’s art had a big impact on my comic reading life. His art sucked me in and is still some of my favourite stuff I’ve read. But, as time progressed and he moved over to Image Comics, I feel like it lost a little something along the way, and it was never as good as in the golden time I discovered him in X-Men. Except for his Deathblow work, that I really liked. So I was curious to see how I would react to this Jim Lee, since it’s kind of rare to get actual page content out of him these days. Well, I wasn’t disappointed. Certain panels leap out at me, some images are have a certain iconicness to them. Take this panel for example.


It’s a great shot of Batman, but it’s not as ostentatious as another shot of him just about 10 cm to the left. He’s not as large in the panel, there’s not as much detail, but I really like it. I think it shows him in motion, that kind of use of speed-lines in the background and in the lower half of his body. Also, being zipped through the flames adds a nice dynamic touch to it, and adds a bit of colour to it.
Anyway, let me just show you a couple more of my favourite panels, which I think are good examples of Jim’s art and Geoff’s characterisations of them.

Return Of The Jedi Panel Of The Week