Ink and Bullet holes

LOOKOUT! Its that one guy!

2010-11-29T22:10:00.000-08:00

Hey there again friends and fiends! Im sorry for the absence, but Im in the middle of quite a few projects right now!

For the sake of sharing something, here's a short 2 page warm-up I drew. Zangeif vs Sakura. Apologies for the low quality, I had to scan it in pieces.

If I get the time, I'll scan a few more penciled pages soon. As of right now I'm unsure when I'll have the time to ink everything!

until next time!

MOUSTACHE BY FIRE.

2010-09-29T23:50:00.000-07:00

Hey there friends and fiends. Here's a little preview of the next long comic I'm gonna be working on for class.

Now is the time of Stache.

Walk Among Us!

2010-09-20T21:01:00.000-07:00

Hey, just a small update to show off the new banner.

For one class I have this semester I'm supposed to fill a sketchbook page a day. I just bought a new travel book, so im having some fun with inking stuff like this!

I'll post some more of these inked doodles as I make them.

Like a Lithium Flower

2010-09-14T00:16:00.000-07:00

Lilith over the years

Oi oi.

I meant to make an entry about this a couple days ago, haha.. Sorry, I just finished my 2nd week of senior classes, and it's already a handful. The good news though is that I'll have a TON of new comics completed along the way.

but anyway. before I moved back into my dorm room, I went digging through my old folders and sketchbooks and found a couple old character design sheets for Lilith, including my very first drawing of her! So I thought it would be interesting to create this timeline showing her development over the last 4+ years.

Surprisingly, for as much thats changed about her, I've found that there's just as much thats remained the same from the first day I scribbled her onto paper!

I think I had originally intended her to be a sort of throw-away assassin character. An antagonist to some boring generic hero character from a story I've long since scrapped. Funny how she wound up taking the starring role for herself! I had created Asphodel earlier, as the generic "girl" to pair up with that generic main character guy, but Lilith stole her too! I paired the two up sometime in 2007 and loved them as a duo.

here's a closeup of the first drawing placed next to one from 2009 that I recently touched up

Why was everything I drew back then so angular? haha..

You can read the first 2 chapters of the LILITH comic here on my DeviantArt gallery.

who knows what the future holds for Lilith...

Cobalt Blue

2010-08-30T18:05:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!

Summer's coming to a close. I didn't really manage to get everything done that I wanted, but I have made some progress on a number of things. Mainly a new comic that I hope to start as soon as I can polish up the script. It's a revised version of my first college thesis script, which I scrapped when I realized it would take too long to do.

For now, I'll show some of the character designs. A few I'm still tweaking, so they aren't all 100% set.

EDIT: haha, oops. The image shrank a lot more than I thought it would. Sorry about that!

I also haven't decided on the names for a few of them. I'll say now though that the main character (the 1st) is named "Cobalt Blue", the tall robot is "Promethium", the girl with the glasses (next to the small robot) is "Pandora" (the 2nd isn't a twin, just an alternate outfit), and the really big guy at the end is known as "Iron-King Jupiter"

Other than that, I managed to get to a few conventions this summer, including AnimeNEXT, AX, and Otakon. All of which were pretty successful! Thank you to any and everyone who stopped by my tables! The next convention I'll be at is New York Anime Fest/ NYCC in October, followed shortly by MangaNEXT.

Here are some illustrations I've completed recently for sale at conventions:

And some sticker/button designs I plan to print up for NYCC/NYAF:

Thanks for reading! I'm sure I'll have much more to post as classes start!

Lilith #03 preview!

2010-06-08T16:17:00.000-07:00

So I've begun working on the Lilith comic again. Though for now it's on the side while I work on some illustrations and finish some scripts for a few other comics.

I thought I would treat the followers of my Blog to a preview of the first four pages, So here they are. I'm thinking of adding some color to them too, but that'll have to wait for now.

On the subject of comics, I still haven't submitted my thesis comics "No One Lives Forever" anywhere online... I'm still thinking about how to do that though. It's pretty long. Almost 30 pages. I might just wait until my website is back up and try to figure out how to put it together in one of those web-comic viewing programs.

anyway..

Thanks for reading!

Back!

2010-05-17T22:08:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! I'm done with classes, so you know what that means? Time to be a lot more productive than when I'm actually in art classes. Haha... irony.

But seriously, right now I'm working on I think like 10 different projects on and off. I'm also working on organizing these projects so that some actually get done....

One in particular is getting my website back up and working! And this is where maybe someone out there can help me. I can edit and update the pages on my own, but I'd like to eliminate the home page and instead use my blog for that. (its much easier to make updates here) But the problem is, I haven't the slightest knowledge of how to customize a blog page. I don't understand the coding involved at all... But if anyone out there thinks they can help me do that, Please get in contact with me! Any help would be greatly appreciated, and I would owe you a favor.

Aside from that, I've completed my Junior Year Thesis comic, "No One Lives Forever", and it was hung up in a gallery in NYC. The webpage is still up. I probably could have/should have made an entry about it... But I was displayed in the first room right by the wall. That's pretty cool.

I'm still deciding on how to submit the pages on the web. I may wait until my website is up and keep most of the pages on there. But until then, Here's the cover. (which didnt make it into the show, haha...)

and here's a progress shot I put together

I have some more W.I.P. stuff to show too

This is some concept art for a comic I want to try and get started over the summer... I keep stopping myself though, because I want to be really careful with the character design. The story and script are comic along okay, but I'm not crazy about the character designs.

Im working on some con-prints too for the summer convention rush

Here's what I have so far of a Cowboy Bebop print. The conventions I'm planning on going to are AnimeNEXT (hopefully), AnimeExpo, and Otakon. NYAF/NYCC in October may be out...

And here's the rest!

Im drawing a short Lilith comic for a western steampunk mini-comic collection. It's mostly nonsense though. I think I may try coloring it too.

Until next time!

Into the woods and to the Witch's house.

2010-02-24T17:57:00.000-08:00

Hey, like I promised, here's some more Hansel and Gretel stuff.

The rough sketches for the Woods/city...

And the Witch's house.

Unfortunately for me, the teacher chose to cancel the Witch design part of the project... and I dont wanna trash the ideas I had planned for that, so now I'm gonna have to do that on my own time. Here are some sketches though.

The idea behind the designs was that she'd appear as an old goofy lady, then transform at night. The giant frog is her pet, and she intends to feed it Hansel and Gretel. I may not get to making polished drawings of them for a while now...

Also here's a tiny peak at my Thesis comic. I'll get to scanning what I have done some other time.

Until next time!

Katsucon Commissions and Yoko

2010-02-22T20:42:00.000-08:00

Hey, Katsucon has passed, so I thought I'd share some of the drawings I did while working my Artist's table there.

My prints didn't sell too well, however I wound up with so many Commissions that I had to start turning people away. Overall I would call the convention a success, and for whatever convention I can get to next, I know what to prepare for.

Everyone who ordered one was really happy with the result, which always makes me happy as well. I still have a few to mail out though. I took too many orders!

And here's a print I made exclusively for Katsucon...... that didn't sell at all. LMAO. I'll have to try pushing all the copies I made at other conventions

As for what other conventions I'm making plans for, they are:

Definitely-

MoCCA in NYC
OTAKON in Baltimore
AnimeEXpo in LA

And Maybe possibly-

AnimeBoston in Boston
AnimeNEXT in New Jersey.
NY Comic-Con/ NY Anime Fest (at the... same time?)

I thought about A-Kon in Texas too, however the tables for that sold a long time ago..

Next post I'll have some more Hansel and Gretel stuff, and maybe a sneak peak at my thesis comic!

Hansel And Gretel

2010-02-08T18:14:00.000-08:00

Oi Oi

I've been soooooo busy lately. I plunged into my thesis comic and drew every page (instead of going through the 3-4 pages every 2 weeks pace), and on top of that I've been preparing for the upcoming Katsucon this Weekend, where me and my friend Steve Yurko will be sharing a Table at the Artist's Alley.

Other than that though, I've started a pretty long project for my Sci-Fi class, part 2. The Assignment for the entire first half of the semester is to make concept art for the story of Hansel and Gretel, as if it were to be turned into a video game or a movie.

So far I've only gotten as far as the character illustrations for Hansel and Gretel.
And just for the heck of it here's the 2 together:
Some Detail shots: (click for large view)
And the inked sketches:

Next will be some scenery for the "Woods" (an mostly urban environment for me) and the Witch's House. So look forward to seeing those.

XMAS 2009!

2009-12-25T19:19:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas! Or whatever it is you do around December.

Here's a quick holiday pinup of Lilith and Asphodel to celebrate freedom for the holiday break. Too bad it didn't come sooner or I could have made some gift art... maybe I could still do that late.

Materials:
- Copic Multiliners - White Gel Pen - Copic Cool Gray, Warm Gray, R27, and YG95 markers - Some Photoshop touch-ups. -

Progress City

2009-12-21T07:59:00.000-08:00

I've made some progress on the "CITY" image from my previous entry, and seeing as how it's due tonight, It'll (for the most part) be finished within the next couple of hours.

ASTEROID(finished) and CITY progress

2009-12-16T13:57:00.000-08:00

Hey, sorry for disappearing. Thesis work snuck up and distracted me.

I've finished the "Kiss your asteroid goodbye" piece

As I think I mentioned in a previous entry, this is based off a Supergirl image by Adam Hughes, and the title was one of a few to select from for a digital illustration class.

Here are some detail shots:
I've also finished the other picture from my previous image,"LAST MAN", however, I'm not really... content with the finished image. I think I may scrap all of it and try again. Since finishing, I've had some ideas of how to make it a much stronger image. Starting by giving her a much more original looking design.

Here's the next and last image for my Sci-fi illustration class. Based on CITY by Clifford D. Simak.

And some rough sketches and thumbnails

I start winter break from college soon, so that means some time to catch up on thesis and draw non school related assignments. I'll post some glimpses of my thesis once my break begins! And I'll also hopefully be able to start and finish some Prints for the upcoming Katsucon in February.

Thanks for reading!

More progress

2009-11-13T20:05:00.000-08:00

Here I am lost in Photoshop hell.

While I find my way out, have some more W.I.P progress shots. I've been trying a new process inspired by a tutorial from Omar Dogan.

Asteroids:
If you can't tell, this is inspired by a piece by Adam Hughes, which features Supergirl riding a meteor in a very similar way. Its been pretty good brush and effect practice.

LAST MAN:
Im having some trouble with the figures in the background (removed from this image)... I'll hopefully have them sorted out soon...

Spaced

2009-11-09T08:16:00.000-08:00

Hey, nothing finished to show, but I'd still like to hold up to my promise of an entry a week. Maybe I should scan things from my sketchbook...

anyway, here are some W.I.P.s of 2 digital pieces I'm working on.

First, The progress I've made on the "LAST MAN" picture:

And second, the lineart for the next project in my Digital illustration class. The assignment was to make a tabloid cover or illustration based on one out of a list of weird tabloid headlines. The one I chose was "Kiss your Asteroid goodbye!", and I'm not doing a typical tabloid page because those are hideous.

It feels nice to draw Lilith again.

Its got that new god smell

2009-11-02T07:14:00.000-08:00

Hey, what do you know, I actually finished that image from yesterday. That's oddly... productive of me. I may have gone overboard with the glowy stuff though...

Anyway, I'm turning the assignment in soon, but here's the (for now) finished image. I'll tweak it if the teacher suggests anything, and for any/everyone reading, please feel free to critique it and suggest things too.

Here are some Detail shots:

Krishna WIP

2009-11-01T14:39:00.000-08:00

Hey, not much progress has been made on the "Last Man" image since my last entry, but I promised to make a post a week showing something...

So here's some W.I.P on another image for another class. The class is general digital illustration (that's not the name of the course though... the actual name is kind of dumb and misleading.)

The Assignment was to take a myth (out of a pile of random ones he provided) and make an illustration in photoshop using a hand drawn lineart to start. (Not a problem for me, since that's how I usually work anyway.) The myth I selected was something about the god Krishna kidnapping a woman at a fountain surrounded by birds of paradise... I don't really remember the rest, but it wasn't required for the illustration to be a literal interpretation of the myth.

Here's the progress I've made with coloring it. It's been a long while since I've seriously attempted digital coloring, so I'm a bit rusty. I'm trying some new effects, while also brushing up on things I've kind of forgotten...

And here's the lineart (drawn over two pieces of Bristol board (I wanted to work larger than I usually do)

Space girl, colors, thumbnails, and etc...

2009-10-23T17:55:00.000-07:00

Hey, I'm sorry for disappearing again, Blogger refuses to keep me logged in, so its a bit of a hassle to sign in to check updates and post my own entries...

College has been keeping me more than busy so far. I hardly have any free time, let alone any time to work on non class related art. I've mostly been working on my Thesis comic project . The theme for my year is "Modern (Greek) Mythology", and I've chosen to do a futuristic steampunk adaptation of Prometheus. I'll post some of the character designs some other time after I'm done writing the script.

For now though, I have some other art in progress. Its from my Sci-Fi Illustration class, taught by Donato Giancola. The Assignment was "Last Man On Earth".

These are 6 color studies for the final piece. I'm still working on the lineart parts, but I'm trying to decide on how to color it beforehand. 2 was My first idea I had while doing the sketch, but now I'm leaning mostly towards 1, 3, 4, and 6. Please fel free to leave an opinion if any of these 6 stands out to you. I'd love to hear any feedback on this image.

This was the Preliminary Sketch. He didn't like the skull-robot in the back being centered, so he asked me to go back to what I had in the thumbnail where there were 2 of them. At this point he also suggested I change the lightning from the hands to wavy spirals of energy, as seen in the color studies.

These were my thumbnails. You can see which one I chose to stick with, and what elements from the other snuck their way back into the one I chose, but I may make one or two more of these sometime in the future if I find the time. I tried to avoid the obvious zombie interpretation for this assignment.

I'll keep updating progress on this image, as well as other assignments, continues. Hopefully I'll manage to make a post a week!

Time and Space prt.2

2009-07-19T17:23:00.000-07:00

Hey, sorry to anyone who actually wanted to follow my progress on the Shaun of the Dead comic. I was having trouble uploading photos from my camera... so this is way late.

From my last step, I opened the scanned thumbnails in photoshop, upped the contrast to make the pencil lines much darker, then printed them out the size of a 8.5x11 page. Then I lightboxed them roughly and continued to tightly pencil over the roughs;

Its all inked, lettered, and even printed now, so the only thing left to do is maybe fix up the cover and submit the pages online. But I think I'll do all of that after San-Diego Comic con. I leave for it in 2 days now, and I'll have a number of copies of this Comic as well as the latest Lilith comic. If you find me walking around somewhere, stop me and I can maybe give you a copy of either for free.

Follow me on a journey through time and space...

2009-07-04T23:51:00.000-07:00

Sorry, this entry has absolutely nothing to do with the Mighty Boosh. Though I do really wanna draw Howard and Vince. But I'll have to do that some other time because I'm busy as hell right now...

First of all, My website has been down for a while, and I need to renew it... For the time being, the Domain name MikeLuckas.com will redirect to here. Whenever I do manage to get my website back up, I'm thinking of editing the layout of this blog to use it as the homepage.

Second, Ive started another comic! Because of some problems with SVA that I dont want to get into right now, I'm currently taking a summer class to make up some missing credits. The Class is about the Horror Film genre, and theres absolutely no work besides the final, which is to make a piece of art related to the horror film genre and our major.

So I chose to do a comic obviously (and maybe some extra covers if I get the time). And I decided to make the comic an excerpt from one of my favorite horror/comedy movies, Shaun Of the Dead! (I know theres a full comic that exists of it, and im trying to steer away from copying it, but there are going to be some similarities that are unavoidable...) And I thought I'd share my progress here, step by step, since I dont update this thing nearly enough.

Step 1;
I grabbed a photo off google and tryed sketching Ed and Shaun. I'm very happy with how Ed came out, but I really think I need to work on Shaun. Which surprised me, since I thought it'd be the opposite. Shauns hair throws me off though...
Step 2:
Then I decided on a scene; The one where Ed and Shaun throw shit at the zombies in their backyard. Always worth a laugh. I popped in the DVD and watched the scene a few times and ran some panel layouts through my head and thubnailed them out. I was pretty satisfied with what I layed out on the first or second go, which is very rare for me... so this is much cleaner than my usual panel layouts are (plus I only drew in one of the panels because the images were clearer in my head). The pages came out to 6 (ugh ive got less than 2 weeks to get this shit done.)
Step 3:
Then I drew up my 'real' thumbnails and began tweaking the layout and thumbnailing the content inside the panels. I had to freezeframe and screencap the scene a LOT to get these how I wanted them. Page 5 has 2 layouts. I think I'll be going with the 2nd. Picking what to include, what to omit, what to abridge, and what to make look like a shot right out of the movie is difficult... (sorry if you cant tell what the hell is going on in any of these. My thumbnails are sloppy)

Since I spent a decent amout of time on these to make sure they're exactly what i want, the next step is to print these out full-size (about 8.5x11 is the size ill be working at) Then I can lightbox the roughs in and tight pencil the rest from there. I have no idea if I'll get all the way through inks by the time this is due.... but we'll find out as I update some more. At the least Im aiming to get the tight pencils done. Those could be reproduced.

thanks for reading!

--MIKE!

Grand Line!

2009-06-27T16:37:00.000-07:00

So.. One-Piece fanart. Why? I don't really know. I was just doodling and it turned into Nami. Then I made a Nico Robin to go with it.

I havent read/watched One Piece in a while. I've been meaning to catch up though. Its one of those animes that drags on and on, but its still pretty great. Oda is insane.

here it is at wallpaper size:

Anyway, I have a ton of other things in progress at the moment, and I took photos of a lot of it, but I cant seem to get my camera to connect to my computer... so, I might just have to scan them.

Oh! And San-Diego Comic-Con is soon! I cant wait!

More Timm stuff...

2009-05-27T20:22:00.000-07:00

So, Ive been playing around some more with Bruce Timms style like in my last post;

First Some sketches not on my DeviantArt page;

Some Nude sketches of Lilith and Rita (since Bruce Timm loves to draw naked women, lol)Helmetless Samus. Not easy to simplify that suit.

Some Harley Quinn Sketches

Harley Quinn Pinup with lineart
Some more sketches Of Lilith in this style
and finally, a pinup of Lilith

haha, its really fun to draw in that style, though I think I'm done for now. I have some other things I should really be getting done! Ive learned a lot just from these drawings though. A lot I think I can apply to my own way of drawing. Mostly I think I just need to be looser!

Puddin'

2009-05-23T01:16:00.000-07:00

I bought a book all about the production of the old Batman animated series

Ive been doing lot of this now
god I love Bruce Timm's style.

Expect more.

Alive!

2009-05-19T20:58:00.000-07:00

Im still alive!

though ive probably been off of this thing so long that nobody gives a damn anymore, haha..... ha. :|

Anyway, I've finished my sophomore year at SVA and this year was much much better than the first. The classes were actually about comics/cartooning and the teachers were all nice. I cant wait for next year (though I am glad to have a bit of free time for the moment).

Im gonna try and rework this blog to make it nicer. Maybe I could give it a western looking theme. I'm also planning on reworking my website as well. Though Im unsure of how I want it to look... if anyone has suggestions feel free to tell me. (so far the biggest thing I plan to do to it is add a new gallery system to make it much easier to update with current artwork)

In other news Ive been up to a lot of drawing since my last update. Ive got a bunch of comic pages and illustrations done, including the next "Lilith" comic (the previous one being here).

heres some of what ive been up to;

Comic work;

LILITH #02! The rest can be found here; LILITH @Devinatart

MOUSTACHE VS TENTACLE! I may follow this up someday.

Some Ink work;

Some Marker work and watercolor;

The Scott pilgrim cards were even featured in a photo with Brian Lee O'Malley! (here);

To face the Challenge of Everyday Life!

2008-10-11T18:41:00.000-07:00

Hey! I should use this thing more if I'm gonna keep pointing people in its direction...

anyway, here're some drawings!

This ones based more on the comic/cartoon joker. I like this a lot more than the Heath ledger pic I did.

THE JUSTICE FRIENDS! One of the best parts of my favorite cartoon, Dexter's Lab. I'm definitely gonna make a big awesome picture of the couch thing.

I watched Fullmetal Alchemist on adult swim the other week and ha a bit of a nostalgic urge to draw this. That show wouldnt be so terrible if it werent for the god-awful fanbase and bits of cliche "anime moments". The world its set in is pretty cool. Kind of steampunk-y.

These were some assignments for my Inking class at college. I'm really liking brush inking and inkwash a lot! I'll definitely be using these techniques in the future.

SLACKJAWS!!

2008-09-20T00:29:00.000-07:00

I'll just leave this here for now.

I should reaaaaaaally be finishing other things first.

I should also be making more posts on this thing. Maybe I'll write my opinion on The Watchmen later.

Skortch bork.

2008-08-31T20:46:00.000-07:00

So Ive been drawing a lot lately. Im trying to get as much drawing done as I can before I have to go back to my college classes on tuesday. I was too lazy to properly scan anything, so excuse the poor quality images.

Here's some of the drawings;

This is a drawing of the heath ledger joker I did for my Mom's birthday. Shes a huge batman fan. The heath ledger joker is fun to draw.

A more cartoon/comic looking joker. It came out looking a lot like the version in "The Killing Joke". Definitely gonna finish this one. It was a lot of fun to ink.

My mom asked me if I could draw spiderman for a birthday card for my sisters boyfriend. He's a nice guy, so I agreed and began drawing. I got a little too into it though. You might not be able to see it clearly, but I began on a background as well. I think Ill call it done for now for the card, but then go back to it later, ink the back, and properly color/shade it in photoshop.

These are some studies of Iguanas for a character of mine. He's a bandit who's been mutated into an iguana man. I plan on making a few comics with him as the focus. Hes smarter than he looks. Also in the first picture is a failed attempt of a Bruce-Timm-style Lilith that I did from memory.

Savvy Bastard complete!

2008-08-25T19:57:00.000-07:00

Here's my short comic "Savvy Bastard" all colored and toned. Enjoy!

Original script written by Zach Bellissimo
Characters and art © Mike Luckas 2008

I think I'll put up some sketches next post.

Savvy Bastard!

2008-08-19T15:23:00.000-07:00

So hey, heres that comic I've been talking about in my journal entries. Or the cover at least. Its about Lilith, big surprise. Its a short story written by Zach and tweaked by me.

I'll be doing more short stories like this one, but they all wont be about Lilith. I have a bunch of other characters I want to make comics about too, all in the same world. Each character has their own origin and story to follow, but theres no real main story, so, theres no "main character" either, but, the characters all live in the same world and may occasionally cross paths.

more on that some other time, for now, here's the first Lilith comic "Savvy Bastard"

I procrastinated too much on this cover. Yes, Lilith has lots of mascle. I may have exaggerated them a bit though.. eh whatever. Ignore the Issue # and the 10 cent thing. That's just me playing pretend.

Page 1 of the Lilith short story "Savvy Bastard"!

Color looks good. But I think I'll avoid doing it too often. It was just such a pain in the ass D:

It'll get to the point soon enough.

I think I was originally gonna submit like 1 or 2 pages a week, but eh. I really just did this comic for fun. So I'll submit the rest whenever the hell I feel like it.

the fatguy was fun to draw, but the manager looked like colonel sanders in black and white.

Original script written by Zach Bellissimo
Characters and art © Mike Luckas 2008

New Blog! WHY SO CEREAL???

2008-08-11T22:29:00.001-07:00

AHHAHhahhaHAHAhahhahHAhAhhahahHAHhHAhhHAhhHAHAHAAA!

...ahem

err. So Zach and Tara bugged me during San Diego Comic Con to make a blog.

So here it is!

I'll be using this blog rather than my website's front page for Detailed updates. I guess I can post personal movie reviews and opinions on other crap as well.

As far as anything interesting right now, there's this;

I went to a diner last night with some friends before seeing "Pineapple Express" (great movie, definitely worth seeing at least once) So I stole some crayons and drew this on a napkin. The waitress liked it.

yep.

I'm working on a much bigger and better joker picture as well. Expect that Soonish.