Draw #36 by TwoMorrows Publishing

#36

WINTER 2020 $9.95 in the US

The Professional “How-To” Magazine on Comics, Cartooning and Animation Contains nudity for figure-drawing instruction; suggested for Mature Readers Only

FEATURING DEADPOOL & INFINITY COUNTDOWN ARTIST

82658 00363 1

Deadpool TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

MIKE HAWTHORNE

YANICK PAQUETTE

ARTIST OF SWAMP THING & WONDER WOMAN: EARTH ONE MIKE MANLEY AND BRET BLEVINS’

PLUS! REGULAR COLUMNISTS

JERRY ORDWAY & JAMAR NICHOLAS

DRAW! (edited by MIKE MANLEY) is the professional “HOW-TO” magazine on comics, cartooning, and animation. Each issue features in-depth INTERVIEWS and DEMOS from top pros on all aspects of graphic storytelling, as well as such skills as layout, penciling, inking, lettering, coloring, Photoshop techniques, plus web guides, tips, tricks, and a handy reference source—this magazine has it all! NOTE: Some issues contain nudity for figure drawing instruction. INTENDED FOR MATURE READERS.

Other issues available, & an ULTIMATE BUNDLE with all issues at HALF-PRICE!

DRAW! #27

DRAW! #28

DIEDGITIIOTANSL BLE

AVAILA

DRAW! #24

DRAW! #25

DRAW! #26

GLEN ORBIK demos how he creates his painted noir paperback and comic covers, ROBERT VALLEY discusses animating “The Beatles: Rock Band” music video and Tron: Uprising, plus Comic Art Bootcamp on “Dramatic Lighting” with MIKE MANLEY and BRET BLEVINS, Crusty Critic JAMAR NICHOLAS reviews art supplies, BOB McCLOUD gives a Rough Critique of a newcomer’s work, and more!

LEE WEEKS (Daredevil, Incredible Hulk) gives insight into the artform, YILDIRAY ÇINAR (Noble Causes, Fury of the Firestorms) interview and demo, inker JOE RUBINSTEIN shows how he works, “Comic Art Bootcamp” with MIKE MANLEY and BRET BLEVINS, “Rough Critique” of a newcomer by BOB McLEOD, “Crusty Critic” JAMAR NICHOLAS reviews art supplies and software!

JOE JUSKO shows how he creates his amazing fantasy art, JAMAR NICHOLAS interviews artist JIMM RUGG (Street Angel, Afrodisiac, The P.L.A.I.N. Janes and Janes in Love, One Model Nation, and The Guild), new regular contributor JERRY ORDWAY on his behind-the-scenes working process, Comic Art Bootcamp with MIKE MANLEY and BRET BLEVINS, reviews of artist materials, and more!

(84-page magazine with COLOR) $7.95 (Digital Edition) $4.95

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $4.95

DRAW! #29

DRAW! #30

DRAW! #31

Top comics cover artist DAVE JOHNSON demos his creative process, STEPHEN SILVER shows how he designs characters for top animated series, plus new columnist JERRY ORDWAY presents “The Right Way, the Wrong Way, and the ORDWAY!”, “Crusty Critic” JAMAR NICHOLAS reviews art supplies, and hit “Comic Art Bootcamp” with Draw editor MIKE MANLEY and BRET BLEVINS!

FAREL DALRYMPLE shows how he produces Meathaus and Pop Gun War, director and storyboard/comics artist DAVE BULLOCK dissects his own work, columnist JERRY ORDWAY draws on his years of experience to show readers the Ord-way of creating comics, JAMAR NICHOLAS reviews the latest art supplies, plus more Comic Art Bootcamp by BRET BLEVINS and editor MIKE MANLEY! Mature readers only.

DAVE DORMAN demonstrates his painting techniques for sci-fi, fantasy, and comic book cover, LeSEAN THOMAS (character designer and co-director of The Boondocks and Black Dynamite: The Animated Series) gives advice on today’s animation industry, new columnist JERRY ORDWAY shows his working process, plus more Comic Art Bootcamp by BRET BLEVINS and Draw! editor MIKE MANLEY! Mature readers only.

We focus the radar on Daredevil artist CHRIS SAMNEE (Agents of Atlas, Batman, Avengers, Captain America) with a how-to interview, comics veteran JACKSON GUICE (Captain America, Superman, Ruse, Thor) talks about his creative process and his new series Winter World, columnist JERRY ORDWAY shows his working process, plus more Comic Art Bootcamp by BRET BLEVINS and editor MIKE MANLEY! Mature readers only.

How-to demos & interviews with Philadelphia artists JG JONES (52, Final Crisis, Wanted, Batman and Robin) and KHOI PHAM (The Mighty Avengers, The Astonishing Spider-Man, The Mighty World of Marvel), JAMAR NICHOLAS reviews of art supplies, JERRY ORDWAY demos the “ORD-way” or drawing, and Comic Art Bootcamp by MIKE MANLEY and BRET BLEVINS! JG Jones cover! Mature readers only.

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $4.95

TwoMorrows. The Future of Comics History.

DRAW! #32

DRAW! #33

DRAW #34

DRAW #35

Super-star DC penciler HOWARD PORTER demos his creative process, and JAMAL IGLE discusses everything from storyboarding to penciling as he gives a breakdown of his working methods. Plus there’s Crusty Critic JAMAR NICHOLAS reviewing art supplies, JERRY ORDWAY showing the Ord-Way of doing comics, and Comic Art Bootcamp lessons with BRET BLEVINS and Draw! editor MIKE MANLEY! Mature readers only.

Interview and demo by Electra: Assassin and Stray Toasters superstar BILL SIENKIEWICZ, a look at THE WATTS ATELIER OF THE ARTS (one of the best training grounds for students to gain the skills they need to get the jobs they want), JERRY ORDWAY’s Ord-Way of drawing, JAMAR NICHOLAS reviews the latest art supplies, and BRET BLEVINS and Draw! editor MIKE MANLEY’S Comic Art Bootcamp. Mature readers only.

GREG HILDEBRANDT (of the Hildebrandt Brothers) reveals his working methods, BRAD WALKER (Aquaman, Guardians of the Galaxy, Birds of Prey, Legends of the Dark Knight) gives a how-to interview and demo, regular columnist JERRY ORDWAY, JAMAR NICHOLAS reviews the latest art supplies, and BRET BLEVINS and Draw! editor MIKE MANLEY’s Comic Art Bootcamp!

Fantasy/sci-fi illustrator DONATO GIANCOLA (Game of Thrones) demos his artistic process, GEORGE PRATT (Enemy Ace: War Idyll, Batman: Harvest Breed) discusses his work as comic book artist, illustrator, fine artist, and teacher, Crusty Critic JAMAR NICHOLAS, JERRY ORDWAY’S regular column, and MIKE MANLEY and BRET BLEVINS’ “Comic Art Bootcamp.” Mature Readers Only.

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $4.95

TwoMorrows Publishing 10407 Bedfordtown Drive Raleigh, NC 27614 USA 919-449-0344 E-mail:

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

WINTER 2020, VOL. 1, #36 Editor-in-Chief • Michael Manley Managing Editor and Designer • Eric Nolen-Weathington Publisher • John Morrow Logo Design • John Costanza Front Cover • Mike Hawthorne with color by Mimi Simon DRAW! Winter 2020, Vol. 1, No. 36 was produced by Action Planet, Inc. and published by Two-Morrows Publishing. Michael Manley, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Editorial address: DRAW! Magazine, c/o Michael Manley, 430 Spruce Ave., Upper Darby, PA 19082. Subscription Address: TwoMorrows Publishing, 10407 Bedfordtown Dr., Raleigh, NC 27614. DRAW! and its logo are trademarks of Action Planet, Inc. All contributions herein are copyright 2019 by their respective contributors. Views expressed here by contributors and interviewees are not necessarily those of Action Planet, Inc., TwoMorrows Publishing, or its editors.

MIKE HAWTHORNE REDUX Mike Hawthorne returns to DRAW! to update Mike Manley on his career and his approach to making comics.

Action Planet, Inc. and TwoMorrows Publishing accept no responsibility for unsolicited submissions. All artwork herein is copyright the year of production, its creator (if work-for-hire, the entity which contracted said artwork); the characters featured in said artwork are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners; and said artwork or other trademarked material is printed in these pages with the consent of the copyright holder and/or for journalistic, educational, or historical purposes with no infringement intended or implied.

This entire issue is ©2019 Action Planet, Inc. and TwoMorrows Publishing and may not be reprinted or retransmitted without written permission of the copyright holders. ISSN 1932-6882. Printed in China. FIRST PRINTING.

RIGHT WAY, WRONG WAY—ORDWAY! How to use photo reference the Ordway.

YANICK PAQUETTE

The artist takes us from Montreal to Earth One and back on his quest for artistic balance.

COMIC ART BOOTCAMP This month’s installment: Sparking your imagination!

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THE CRUSTY CRITIC

The Crusty Critic reviews the tools of the trade. This month: The ultimate art marker smackdown!

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DRAW! WINTER 2020

-ING AHEAD

his issue was a while forming and coming together, but well worth the wait, I think. In the time since the last issue of DRAW! I have also started a podcast with Bret and Jamar called Pencil-to-Pencil. It’s a continuation of what I have been doing for close to 20 years on DRAW!, interviewing artists from the fields of comics, illustration, and animation. You can take a listen at Penciltopencil.com or listen via iTunes and Stitcher. I’d like to thank this issue’s interviewees, Mike Hawthorne and Yanick Paquette, for taking the time to share their process with us all. I’d also thanks Jamar, Bret, and John, and of course Eric for putting this whole thing together—I couldn’t do it without my team! Since you will all be reading this in late 2019, I want to say that this time of the year is busy and also rich with traditions, holidays, schools starting back up, etc. Take some time to look around, appreciate what you see, and share and draw it, make a note of it visually. Photography is great, but I feel drawings are more intimate and personal, because they take time to craft. They are also a chronicle of events or images edited by the personality that created them—that’s something a photo can’t really do. Share art, share your passions in these trying times. It will make you feel better, and the people you share it with feel better too! Best, Caricature by Bret Blevins

THE WORLD OF TWOMORROWS 25 ANNIVERSARY BOOK TH

In 1994, amidst the boom-&-bust of comic book speculators, THE JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR #1 was published for true fans of the medium. That modest labor of love spawned TwoMorrows Publishing, today’s premier purveyor of publications about comics and pop culture. Celebrate our 25th anniversary with this special retrospective look at the company that changed fandom forever! Co-edited by and featuring publisher JOHN MORROW and COMIC BOOK ARTIST/ COMIC BOOK CREATOR magazine’s JON B. COOKE, it gives the inside story and behind-thescenes details of a quarter-century of looking at the past in a whole new way. Also included are BACK ISSUE magazine’s MICHAEL EURY, ALTER EGO’s ROY THOMAS, GEORGE KHOURY (author of KIMOTA!, EXTRAORDINARY WORKS OF ALAN MOORE, and other books), MIKE MANLEY (DRAW! magazine), ERIC NOLEN-WEATHINGTON (MODERN MASTERS), and a host of other comics luminaries who’ve contributed to TwoMorrows’ output over the years. From their first Eisner Award-winning book STREETWISE, through their BRICKJOURNAL LEGO® magazine, up to today’s RETROFAN magazine, every major TwoMorrows publication and contributor is covered with the same detail and affection the company gives to its books and magazines. With an Introduction by MARK EVANIER, Foreword by ALEX ROSS, Afterword by PAUL LEVITZ, and a new cover by TOM McWEENEY! SHIPS DECEMBER 2019! (224-page FULL-COLOR Trade Paperback) $37.95 • (Digital Edition) $15.95 ISBN: 978-1-60549-092-2 (240-page ULTRA-LIMITED HARDCOVER) $75 • RESERVE YOURS NOW! Only 125 copies available for sale, with a 16-page bonus Memory Album! HARDCOVER NOT AVAILABLE THROUGH DIAMOND—DIRECT FROM TWOMORROWS ONLY!

TwoMorrows. The Future of Comics History. Phone: 919-449-0344 E-mail: store@twomorrows.com Web: www.twomorrows.com

TwoMorrows Publishing • 10407 Bedfordtown Drive • Raleigh, NC 27614 USA

MIKE HAWTHORNE

ANATOMY OF AN ARTIST IN MOTION Interview by Mike Manley Transcribed by Eric Nolen-Weathington DRAW!: Hey, Mike, how are you? MIKE HAWTHORNE: Hey, Mike! Good! I can’t complain. How’ve you been? DRAW!: Good, busy, same like you. MH: Yeah, man. You’re probably substantially busier than me. It looks like you’re doing four or five things at once half of the time. DRAW!: Well, isn’t every artist sort of doing that? MH: I’m trying not to, but yeah. [laughs] DRAW!: I mean, you’re still teaching, you’re doing the Marvel book, and then you, I’m sure, have some other backburner thing, right? MH: [laughs] You’re right. I just did a little 16-page Kickstarter horror comic, and then I finally resold the graphic novel I did for Vertigo years back, and I want to beef it up. DRAW!: Which was that? MH: It was St. Michael’s Promise, but we’ve changed the title recently. I guess let’s call it my auto-bio book. I don’t know if you remember it. It was a long time ago, back when the New 52 kicked in [2011], and they were going to close down Vertigo. They didn’t put out the book, and I had to fight

a little bit to get the rights back. So it’s been a long time, and I just didn’t sell it. I sat on it for years. I tried to get an agent on it—I showed to maybe half a dozen agents. The last one to pass on it literally told me it looked too good so he couldn’t sell it. DRAW!: What!?! MH: I know, dude. I came full circle. I went from not being able to get gigs because I wasn’t good enough to now I can’t get gigs because I draw too well. [laughs] I couldn’t believe it. DRAW!: How does that even make sense? MH: I think what it is, in the bookstore market, they see graphic novels as kind of primitive. Even though my book was 128 pages, all drawn, agents would still talk in terms of, “Maybe if we can make the art like this or like that.” I was like, “That’s not happening. I’m not doing that.” DRAW!: So you have a book that’s already done, it looks good, DC was going to publish it…. MH: I’m adding another 20 pages to it. DRAW!: So he wanted it to have that “shoegazer” quality to it—that indie vibe. MH: Ha! Yeah. You know what I think it is, Mike? These people are all writer-centric, and the art itself is a little like if you give somebody a hamburger. They could care less about the bread; it’s just a way to deliver the meat to their mouth.

DRAW! WINTER 2020

We’re sort of the bread. The meat, to them, is the writing, and I think they almost like it better when the art is more primitive because it somehow makes it more “serious” than the mainstream comics. DRAW!: That’s such a poser idea. Would you want to eat a hamburger that has bugs in it? No.

MH: Exactly, or stale bread. It’s ridiculous. So I could not get an agent on that book. I had to sell it on my own, which is ironic. Even to the tried and true comics publishers—I tried to sell it to a more independently minded publisher who turned me down within 30 minutes. I don’t think people knew how to approach a book that was—whether I succeeded or not is not up for me to decide, but I genuinely tried to make it beautiful. And I think that is not a thing they know how to relate to. DRAW!: If it looks like an English major who decided to do a graphic novel, but didn’t really know how to draw, that’s okay, because they would prefer to make it a movie or TV show, and the comic is the lowest delivery form they can use. MH: I guess. Or if you take the same metaphor and use it for a novel—I think either one is interchangeable for them. It’s like, “Wait, the graphic novel market is growing, so I’ll take my crappy novel and put some ugly pictures to it and take advantage of that, then I’ll cash in on the exciting market that is graphic novels.” DRAW!: To me, the effectiveness of the prose in a novel is completely separate from the effectiveness of the prose in a graphic novel, because if the storytelling is not clear, and the pictures are not easy to follow, irrespective of style—it could be any style—if the narrative is not crafted, then you’re not actually doing a service to telling a good story. MH: Amen. I’m with you 100%. I’ve had this fight for years now. I also happen to think, to a lot of these folks, what is comics to them are the newspaper funnies. And let’s face it, most of them don’t look that good. They’re not going to the trouble you are with your strips to make the thing beautiful day in and day out. Most of the comic strips in the newspaper are rushed. DRAW!: You know who Jules Feiffer is, right? A couple of years ago at the Baltimore Comic-Con, he was there for the Harvey Awards or something, and I sat next to him. I introduced myself and told him what I did, and he goes, “Oh, I never look at the newspaper strips. They’re all crap!” [laughter] “Oh, thanks a lot, Mr. Feiffer. Nice meeting you.” MH: What you’re doing is like a whole other species of comic strip. The point is, that primitive drawing is all they can relate to when it comes to any kind of narrative art medium. It’s so short-sighted. The average audience can see if something is well drawn and if it’s appealing to them. I don’t think anybody’s going to look at my book and say, “I would really enjoy this book if the drawing was ten times worse,” you know? [laughs]

Mike’s inks for a variant cover of Black Science #32. Black Science © Rick Remender and Matteo Scalera

DRAW! WINTER 2020

DRAW!: Why do you think all the animated films today, in America at least, are still modeled after the

Inks for pages 4 and 5 of Mike’s auto-biographical graphic novel, as yet to be renamed. Artwork © Mike Hawthorne

rules of appeal that Disney established decades ago? You can tweak it a little bit, but the consumer of anything wants to be able to look at it and enjoy it. Ten, fifteen years ago, you still had the Love & Rockets style indie look. Now the market has changed quite a bit, and it’s actually broadened even more. MH: I agree. DRAW!: But they feel they should have some homegrown look to it. Like, back when record stores used to matter, you had Easy Listening and Adult Contemporary. What’s the difference between them? Where do you put Kenny G? Does he go in Adult Contemporary or Easy Listening? I think it’s because much of the editorial depth and experience just isn’t deep enough. They think it has to be drawn in a certain way or their audience will think, “That’s too macho,” or, “That’s too commercial” or something. I don’t think the mass audience cares about that. They just want something that looks good. MH: These guys don’t know what’s going to sell, they only know what’s sold in the past. They’re trying to find something that looks like the last thing that sold, and if we go by them and their tastes, we will only be making derivative books. I just can’t trust their opinions. Not that I don’t respect what they’re able to do, work out better deals and such. I’m all for representation at this point in my career, but when the representation becomes the dictator of style and taste, I just can’t trust them.

DRAW!: It’s like fashion trends. Whatever is hot this year, everyone tries to copy, but the next year, if that doesn’t sell, then anything that looks like that must not be good. MH: Absolutely. My goal at this point, if this book does well, the next time I approach an agent I’m going to go sort of the opposite route. I’m going to say, “You were short-sighted in wanting to sell only these ugly books. Here’s what this book could do by not going for the lowest common denominator visually, and here’s more of that kind of thing.” Maybe I’m just stupid, but I don’t think people have given up on beautiful art. And like you said, we have narrative tools these primitive artists don’t necessarily have, so I can walk you through a story in a more clear, concise way. This book is only 128 pages, but it’s denser than the last half-dozen autobiographical books I’ve seen, because I don’t need four pages to tell you something I can tell you in one. You’re going to understand everything, and hopefully have some nice pictures to look at to boot. My suspicion is that if this book goes well, I’ll be able to turn agents down, and pick one that makes me happy. That’s my hope. DRAW!: I talked with Jamar when he was pitching Leon. “You’ve gone out and done your Kickstarter, and you’ve made your book a success, and now you’ve got people coming up and telling you, ‘Well, that’s nice, but let’s not make him a superhero, and let’s not make him a kid, and let’s not

DRAW! WINTER 2020

then he did the Moebius stuff, and eventually he sort of married the two sometimes. MH: When I did the French book, he was heavily in the back of my mind, and it was by design. I decided, since I was doing this weird, futuristic book, that I wanted to nod to Moebius, and then to Frank Stella’s paintings, the kind of weird, abstract shapes, and to some Frank Gehry architecture. I thought, “I’m going to make a style board of these three artists to reference.” And you’ll see all the influence there, but above all of them was Moebius, and the French picked up on it immediately, and they appreciated it, which was cool. That, to them, is so old school. I got the impression sometimes when doing interview that it would be like a modern artist channeling Kirby or Toth. It was like, “Whoa! We love this guy, but we didn’t think anybody”—I shouldn’t say they didn’t think anybody was into it, but I just got that impression.

Turnaround design of Mucaro, a character from Mike’s Hysteria. Hysteria © Mike Hawthorne

DRAW!: Moebius crosses generations. You have 60-yearolds who love his stuff, and 15-year-olds who are just finding his work and having their minds blown. MH: Yeah, everybody loves that guy. DRAW!: In the case of somebody like Kirby, if you grew up with him, you get it. If you didn’t grow up with him you go, “This stuff is weird looking.” I see that with a lot of the students. I just absorbed it before I got to that point where you think, “I like this more than this.” As a kid I just read comics, and I liked his Jimmy Olsen because he drew weird monsters and stuff, and there was that story where Superman’s running with the atomic reactor over his head and throwing it down a hole, and to me, that was awesome. But if I showed it to a 15-year-old today, they might go, “That’s kind of abstract and weird.” They’re coming from that anime world, where there’s nothing that aggressive. Because anime is not aggressive.

DRAW! WINTER 2020

MH: You’re totally right. DRAW!: And Kirby is very brutal and aggressive. When [Joe] Sinnott inked him, he kind of smoothed it all out, but when [Mike] Royer inked him, it would be more aggressive. Even when I show it to my assistants, sometimes they’ll say, “Well, I like the designs of the machines, but that dude’s head is really weird.” MH: It’s funny you used the word “brutal”, because it made me think of brutalism in architecture, and those big, blocky, ugly buildings that got the job done, but looked like they wanted to kill you, and that’s kind of what you got from those Kirby villains. And you’re right, it took me years to understand what I was looking at with him. I would always hear from artists I respected how great Kirby was, and I’d be like, “Man, I just don’t get this.” [laughter] I started to pick up the Kirby Collector, and thought, “I’m going to figure this guy out, because I don’t know what I’m missing.” I might have inked a half-dozen pencil drawings printed in the magazine, and I think it was something about having my hand go over his lines where I was like, “Wait a minute, this guy wasn’t interested in how it looked, he was interested in how it felt.” And that’s not that far removed from the far-out anime and manga you might be into. Plus, he was older when he did all that stuff. Wasn’t he in his 40s when he did Fantastic Four? DRAW!: Yeah, he was middle-aged. MH: So I got this sense of, “Holy crap, I need to haul ass, because I have a lot of stories in me still.” The other thing with Kirby, I’ve heard this quote—which is usually attributed to Einstein, but part of me wonders if that’s made up—where he said he only had one original idea, and that true genius is creativity, or something to that effect. And that’s sort of the same idea that came to me with Kirby. Yes, I am classically trained, and got my BFA in Painting. All it got me was that I can draw a clavicle correctly. This guy had hundreds and hundreds of characters that poured out of him and that decades later we’re still infatuated with, and I don’t have that. That’s the magic of Kirby. He comes up with the Silver Surfer? Think about how crazy a thing that is. I love drawing Silver Surfer. I got to draw an event book he was in, and I was sitting there thinking, “I cannot imagine pitching something like this even now. ‘He’s an all silver dude who flies around the cosmos on a surfboard.’” It’s bonkers. DRAW!: People would say, “What are you smoking?” But here’s this middle-aged guy who moves out to California, sees some people surfing, and thinks, “Silver Surfer.” Or Arnim Zola, a guy with a head in the middle of his chest. MH: I just had to draw him recently, and I’m thinking, “Christ, this is still a compelling character, even though it’s a

Mike’s design drawings for a Venom-merged Wolverine for Marvel’s Venom crossover event. Venom, Wolverine © Marvel Characters, Inc.

head in a TV screen in a robot body.” [laughter] It’s fantastic stuff, and that’s the thing we can’t train for, and I don’t know if any level of beautiful drawing can make up that difference. I will probably never come up with a tenth of the crazy stuff he did. He experimented like hell, like with those crazy pastedup backgrounds he did in some books. It took me a while to figure out, but the guy is still untouchable. We can all pretend, but none of us will ever—and forget just comics culture, but American culture in general. It’s gotten so big now, that kids today are infatuated with characters this guy dreamt up. DRAW!: It’s fun to play with those toys, but do you feel the compulsion to become your own Kirby? MH: Oh, all the time. I always do a creator-owned book while I’m doing a mainstream book, it’s just nobody ever reads the creator-owned stuff. [laughs] Hysteria was that for me. There was so much more that never got published. I have a halfdrawn issue, I have all these bonkers characters I never got to use. And one of the things Marvel often comes to me for is character designs. I’ve probably designed 25, 30 different characters for them. It scratches that itch. If it were up to me, I’d make up new characters every issue to be frank. I think it’s cool they have this deep bench we can choose all these differ-

ent characters from and do cool stuff with, but if it were up to me I’d be making up new characters all the time. DRAW!: But wouldn’t it be better to be making them up for yourself rather than for them? MH: Sure, but the thing is, I’d be happy making them up both ways. I understand that making characters up for them, you don’t have any ownership and all that, but I don’t know. I feel, at least visually, like I could make up a new character every issue and not feel like I’m running out of ideas. I’ve gotten to create whole cloth a handful of characters for Marvel—the Machine Team characters, one of which they used in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. It was just a dude. That particular character wasn’t very exciting, but recently I got to create a new Wolverine villain, and I was on cloud nine. I went way above what I should have done with the designs. I kept going with it because it’s just something I enjoy doing. Usually though, it’s just a redesign. You have a character that already exists, and then you come up with something new. I did a handful of designs for the Venom event. They would say, “What if Wolverine and Rocket Raccoon combined with a symbiote? What would they look like?” And I love that stuff. I know it’s probably cheesy, but I love it.

DRAW! WINTER 2020

JACK KIRBY’S DINGBAT LOVE

In cooperation with DC COMICS, TwoMorrows compiles a tempestuous trio of never-seen 1970s Kirby projects! These are the final complete, unpublished Jack Kirby stories in existence, presented here for the first time! Included are: Two unused DINGBATS OF DANGER STREET tales (Kirby’s final Kid Gang group, inked by MIKE ROYER and D. BRUCE BERRY, and newly colored for this book)! TRUE-LIFE DIVORCE, the abandoned newsstand magazine that was too hot for its time (reproduced from Jack’s pencil art—and as a bonus, we’ve commissioned MIKE ROYER to ink one of the stories)! And SOUL LOVE, the unseen ’70s romance book so funky, even a jive turkey will dig the unretouched inks by VINCE COLLETTA and TONY DeZUNIGA. PLUS: There’s Kirby historian JOHN MORROW’s in-depth examination of why these projects got left back, concept art and uninked pencils from DINGBATS, and a Foreword by former 1970s Kirby assistant MARK EVANIER! SHIPS DECEMBER 2019! (160-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $39.95 (Digital Edition) $14.95 ISBN: 978-1-60549-091-5

ctive owne their respe All characte

In the latest volume, KURT MITCHELL and ROY THOMAS document the 1940-44 “Golden Age” of comics, a period that featured the earliest adventures of BATMAN, CAPTAIN MARVEL, SUPERMAN, and WONDER WOMAN. It was a time when America’s entry into World War II was presaged Look for the 1945-49 volume by the arrival of such patriotic do-gooders as WILL EISNER’s Uncle Sam, HARRY SHORTEN and in 2020! IRV NOVICK’s The Shield, and JOE SIMON and JACK KIRBY’s Captain America—and teenage culture found expression in a fumbling red-haired high school student named Archie Andrews. But most of all, it was the age of “packagers” like HARRY A CHESLER, and EISNER and JERRY IGER, who churned out material for the entire gamut of genres, from funny animal stories and crime tales, to jungle sagas and science-fiction adventures. Watch the history of comics begin! NOW SHIPPING!

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MAC RABOY Master of the Comics

Beginning with his WPA etchings during the 1930s, MAC RABOY struggled to survive the Great Depression and eventually found his way into the comic book sweatshops of America. In that world of four-color panels, he perfected his art style on such creations as DR. VOODOO, ZORO the MYSTERY MAN, BULLETMAN, SPY SMASHER, GREEN LAMA, and his crowning achievement, CAPTAIN MARVEL JR. Raboy went on to illustrate the FLASH GORDON Sunday newspaper strip, and left behind a legacy of meticulous perfection. Through extensive research and interviews with son DAVID RABOY, and assistants who worked with the artist during the Golden Age of Comics, author ROGER HILL brings Mac Raboy, the man and the artist, into focus for historians to savor and enjoy. This FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER includes never-before-seen photos, a wealth of rare and unpublished artwork, and the first definitive biography of a true Master of the Comics! Introduction by ROY THOMAS! ISBN: 978-1-60549-090-8 • NOW SHIPPING! (160-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $39.95 • (Digital Edition) $14.95 Roger Hill’s 2017 biography of REED CRANDALL sold out just months after its release—don’t let this one pass you by!Pre-order now!

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THE RIGHT WAY, THE WRONG WAY, AND THE

ORDWAY ! REFERENCE POINTS by JERRY ORDWAY

Caricature by Rachel Ordway

ell, here we are, time for another hopefully help- had to draw some recognizable features to identify the setful segment on drawing comic book pages. I will ting, rather than a flat, devastated plain full of debris. While take you through the various steps I went through this story was one of several in the comic, I had no visuals on drawing a Firestorm story (“Last what the other features looked like, Christmas”) for DC’s Nuclear Winor how they handled the level of ter Special, which was published in destruction. I could have asked the December of 2018. editor, but I wanted to fully “own” I haven’t drawn the character my little corner of the future postof Firestorm much, if at all, in my nuclear world! many years doing comic books, but I I started out pulling theme park was offered the chance to work with reference I had collected over the a writer I had not previously worked years from my file folder reference with, Paul Dini, and I jumped at it. cabinets (see top of next page), and Paul is one of the best, and while I then checked out Paul Dini’s web knew the story was only eight pages, links. Once I saw what environment I figured it’d be a decent experience. settings he needed, I did my own He managed to do a heartfelt story web search on my iPad, saving phoabout a family of robot killers out tos I thought would help. I always to kill Firestorm before their power gather much more than I need, sources ran out. because it’s easier to copy reference My editor supplied me with a few when you first find it, rather than images of the current incarnation of thinking later, “I wish I had grabbed Firestorm and Professor Stein, with that shot. Where did I find that?” I whom he shares the Firestorm entity have already read through the script with. The script included some helpa few times by this point, so there ful web source links for specific are no surprises later, plus I can try reference, including theme park feato grab reference for later pages as tures such as a “house of the future” well, to be more prepared. from the 1960s. The story setting DC’s Nuclear Winter Special #1, with cover art by In drawing my super-loose Yanick Paquette, featured elsewhere in this issue. is a post-nuclear devastated theme thumbnails on the script, I am giving myself a template for the page, park, which needed to be my own All characters © DC Comics invention to prevent any legal issues. This was the most diffi- meaning, how many panels, how many dialogue balloons cult part of the assignment for me, wrapping my head around there are, and basic camera angles. With a script that includes what the place looked like. I had to cheat reality a bit, as I the dialogue balloons like this, it’s my key job to make sure

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A few examples of the exterior photographs Jerry dug up in his search for theme park reference material, and page one of the “Firestorm” script. All images © their respective owners

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(above) Some of Jerry’s reference for 1950s-era modern architecture and style, which helped him build the exterior and interior of his “Home of Tomorrow”. The retro postcard (and Jerry’s childhood memories) provided the inspiration for the Nuclear Family’s fireplace and silver tinsel Christmas tree in panel four. (right) Jerry’s preliminary pencils (with some marker inking) for page one of “Last Christmas”. Firestorm, Nuclear Family © DC Comics. All reference images © their respective owners.

I allow enough space to fit it all into each panel. Lettering can be reduced slightly, but it still takes up “real estate” on a page. A panel like the first one, with three twolines-each captions on it, has to be sized right. In looking at many current comics, it bothers me to see bad balloon placements, but it bothers me more when I see that the artist did not allot enough space for the dialogue. It’s an important skill, to be able to approximate the space covered by the dialogue on a panel. When in doubt, leave more than you think you need! As you will see later, the order of characters in a panel is often dictated by the dialogue in that panel. On the prelim I drew for page one (see above right), I worked in pencil first, and then refined the drawing with a fine-tipped marker. This is kind of like inking, and many think it’s an extra step, but it allows me to be very loose in my pencilling stage, and refining with the marker gives me a clear line quality that translates into an easy to read blueline printout on my two-ply drawing paper. Panel one is me map-

ping out the area the story takes place in. It’s an establishing shot for the reader, but also for me as well. I will build the environment off of this for the whole story. Panel three shows the house in the distance, which is also used many times in the story, so it’s good to know what you’re drawing, and get as much figured out early on. The last panel establishes the villains, who are called the Nuclear Family, and have appeared many times before in various comic books. The background establishes much of the main elements of the interior, with a 1950s modern design, specified by Paul in the script. I am old enough to understand the visuals, because my childhood memories of Christmas included that silver tinsel artificial tree!

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YANICK PAQUETTE

Living in Paradise Interview conducted by Mike Manley Transcribed by Eric Nolen-Weathington DRAW!: Are you in Toronto? YANICK PAQUETTE: No, I’m in Montreal. DRAW!: What are you working on today? YP: I’m doing a Superman special with Brian Bendis. So far I know it’s called Superman Giant-Size Special. Beyond that I don’t know what it’s for. It’s not part of Action or Superman that he does; it’s a prelude to something else. Beyond that I

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can’t really comment. But I’m doing 22 pages of that, and I’m almost done. So that’s what’s on the program today, and by the beginning of February I’ll switch to Tom King’s Batman. DRAW!: Will you be doing Batman monthly for a while, or are you jumping around from project to project? YP: It’s a strange year for me. For the past four years almost, I was working on Wonder Woman: Earth One with Grant Morrison. It’s on a deadline, but it’s a very long-term type of deadline, like most of the Earth One books. So that was my life for a long time, but this year and part of 2018, I’ve been

trying to get into the fold of the proper DCU and do, not monthly, I’m getting too old for that, but almost monthly, producing three or four pages a week. DRAW!: Are you working seven days a week? YP: Well, I try to avoid working on the weekend, and sometimes I’m a good boy and I do all the work I need to do and don’t have to work on the weekend. But especially during Christmas time, things get messed up. I took a solid two weeks off at Christmas, which was nice, but now I’m paying for that, and I need to work on the weekend once and a while. By mid-February I’ll be done paying my debt, and I’ll go back to having an almost normal life. DRAW!: Is that something you thought about at the beginning? Nobody in comics works a normal nine-to-five, but to have some time off on the weekend for other things? YP: The plan was to work a lot less. I would say that my intention from the beginning was to get paid more to do less work. The ultimate goal would be to do one page a year and get paid a fortune for it. [laughter] I’ve never been really attached to the monthly structure. It requires so many artistic trade-offs and cutting corners to make sure stuff’s out on time. Because I’ve grown up in the European market where people will take two years to draw 44 pages, the monthly structure of the American industry has always felt weird. When I got to do the Earth One books, it allowed me to live a normal life, or at least closer to my aspiration. But starting last year and this year, I’m trying to Finished inks for page 75 of Wonder Woman: Earth One, vol. 1. be more productive. In a way, the Earth Wonder Woman © DC Comics One books were great artistically, but drawing one book for months, years at a time, I almost disap- they were just mind-bogglingly great! They were awesome. He peared from the map. This year I will try to have much more was not doing a monthly book, still he was on the map just of a presence on the shelf. by once in a while doing these massively grandiose annuals. I thought, “This is the type of path that fits what I want to do. DRAW!: So at the beginning of your career, you were think- I’d prefer to be Arthur Adams, putting all I can on one book a ing more of working in the European model, where they do year, than to do a monthly or more and become a star that way.” one album a year or every two years. At that time you could take the path of someone like Ron Lim, YP: Yes, the European model was the beginning of it, but I who you could rely on to do tons of good books every year, or remember Arthur Adams would put out an X-Men Annual once you could be someone like Mike Mignola, who would do grana year, and that book would just rock everybody. X-Men Annual diose books, but would not put out that much in a year. And I #10, #12, “The Evolutionary War”, Mojo—those issues. And felt that made more sense to me, artistically at least.

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DRAW!: The other side of that, of course, is that you not only have to budget your time, but budget your finances. YP: Yeah, because I’m Canadian, I guess, there’s a little less pressure in terms of making ends meet. I’ve always worked, I’ve just never felt the stress of, “Oh, I need to produce a lot of books.” The first five or six years of my career, I was doing monthly books, and I was putting books out there I was not totally satisfied with, but I made a living out of it. As I shifted towards my aspirations of doing less, but doing it a little better, as it turned out, it somehow paid for itself. I was getting higher page rates and more special projects. It added value to the work from an editorial point of view, and the map balanced out at some point.

DRAW!: You can set out to take more time and do a more intense job, but sometimes you get offered an opportunity, and it always seems, especially at the beginning of your career, like you’re a fireman. You have to run in and do whatever you have to do to get the job done. YP: Yeah. Very early on I was telling people I was not willing to do books between deadlines. They were asking for my time, but I would just not take the job. It’s a weird thing. Many people who were less secure might would have taken the job anyway, and eventually over the years they would get typecast as an artist who can do a book in two weeks, and that would be their thing. But because I was foolish enough to refuse work, even at the beginning, it somehow forced the editors to say, “Okay, we can try to find something with a schedule that fits you better,” and slowly I got to do more of those—the Earth One, for instance, which took me two years to draw 120 pages, which is very slow. Or even when I did Swamp Thing, that was one book every two months. It was a very luxurious type of drawing. But I’m convinced I would never have gotten to that point if I hadn’t said from the very start, “I’m not going to do books that require a monthly schedule.” Once in a while I’ll work fast to save the day, but it’s on my own end. I’ll negotiate a good deadline, but then paint myself into a corner and be forced to work very fast to make up for lost time. But that’s because of my own mismanagement of time, or because I went to a convention or on a vacation. DRAW!: Do you find that you tend to work faster on a project as you go along and build a head of steam? YP: Oh, yeah, totally. I’ve been doing this a long time, so I don’t get nervous when I find the first five pages taking forever to draw. I always start out, “I want to do the best I can,” and it just slows everything down. But by the time I finish ten pages of any project, I’ll be moving along pretty fast. If I take long breaks—I have kids, so I like to take breaks in the summer and at Christmas—it takes me a while to get back up to full speed. It’s like a long train that needs to build momentum, and when I get that momentum, I need to keep working uninterrupted as long as I can, day after day, so I can get the work done, taking advantage of the moment.

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DRAW!: Working in the European style, do you have a stage at the beginning where you do development art, sketch, gather material, and figure out your approach?

This two-page spread from Swamp Thing #7 was done relatively early in Yanick’s transition to working full-digital, yet it still feels organic. Wonder Woman © DC Comics

YP: No. I try to be aware of what they want from me, and I read the script a few weeks before I do anything, and then just let it grow on me. But I’m not doing the research stage at that point. I’ll do research as I do my pages. If I need something, I’ll spend some time on the internet before I work on those pages, but I don’t do pure research that often. For a bigger project, like Wonder Woman: Earth One, I would read what I got from Grant, then I would take a month just to mature the idea of what direction to take graphically. Sometimes I’ll take a walk and see something on the street, and think, “Oh, this will be useful for the project I’m going to be working on down the road.” DRAW!: Do you do layouts for the project all at once, or do you take it page by page, or in sections? YP: I do layout sessions—well, it depends on the book. For the Bendis project, I’m doing maybe ten pages of layouts. I try to finish a scene in the layouts when I can. I need to see the entire sequence done. And then I guess I just get too excited to draw, [laughs] and I have to draw a little. My layouts are very vague. I’ve seen some layouts on the internet where people

do these wonderful drawings that just need to be finished in ink. If I died halfway though a book, no one would be able to finish it. [laughter] It’s abstractions. Even me! If I’m doing 20 pages and it takes a month and I need to look back at my layouts, sometimes I just have no idea what I was planning to do. DRAW!: What size do you draw your layouts? Do draw them directly on the board? YP: I work digitally, so size doesn’t matter anymore. If anything, I might lower the resolution slightly so it’s easier to move around and there’s no lag. Then I crank up the resolution to what I work at, which is a very arbitrary 840 dpi. [laughter] A few years ago—I was on Swamp Thing, I think—I wanted to work at the highest resolution possible, because when I was drawing pages, I would reduce them to 120 dpi to send to the editor [for approval], and I preferred the drawings at that size. I liked that it would simplify some of the rendering and muddy some of the detail. It was cleaner and smoother. So it was, “How can I get that smoothing effect in the printed material?” which is printed at 400 dpi. I decided that instead of working at 400 dpi, I’d work at the highest number I could,

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