Christian Ward

Christian Ward is another artist who creates illustrations for comics that stands out well.




His work often involve different patterns, shapes and textures that aren't seen that often around comics. Defined black lines and bright colours set the atmosphere well it make the pieces even more interesting.


He also has a very good sense of composition to help lead the viewer's eye exactly where it is intended to go. Negative space is important in a lot of his work, helping to define the busier parts of the image and avoid distracting from the designs, patterns and colours. This kind of thinking outside the box is something that I could definitely work on.

Kevin Wada

Kevin Wada is an illustrator that I really admire. Work like his is not seen often in comics, as he uses water colour and puts more of a fashion illustration spin on things. He mostly does commissions and comic book covers, meaning that he gets to draw a wide range of characters, which sounds great.



Marvel reach out to work with him not long after he sold a print of a fashion piece that he created of the X-Men. His inspirations include Tom Ford, Alexander McQueen and Givenchy among others,



He often paints a lot more queer and non-white characters in Marvel which is one of the things that helps his work stand out, especially in the world of mostly straight white male comics.



Looking at fashion and fashion illustration would be a good way to further my skills, and creating things for a medium like comics in a way that hasn't been done before is definitely a good way to get noticed.

Printing

I wanted to have a look at some printing companies in Manchester that could be useful if I make prints to be sold online or at conventions. I am also considering the possibility of looking for employment at somewhere like this as it might help me to learn more about printing and quality.

The main things I am looking at from a printing service is first of all good quality - good colours and good paper. Things should be printed well, not wonky, and no scuffs or scratches on the product. They also need to be fast and fairly inexpensive. Ideally, it would be easy to get both small and large batches of images printed.

I plan to try out some of these places in the near future so that I know where would be best to get my art printed.

Manchester Printing
https://www.manchesterprinting.com/manchester-printing-services-about-us/

Appleyard Press
https://www.appleyardpress.com/

We Are Creation
http://www.wearecreation.co.uk/print/

Manchester Printers
http://www.manchesterprinters.com/

Claire Hummel

Claire Hummel is an artist that I have been following for years, after finding her through Harry Potter fanart. Her art always has a lot of character, despite often having simple lines and colouring. She is now a production designer, after creating concept art and illustrations for different companies, so I looked at her blog and some interviews to look at what she considers to be most important when thinking about design.

- Illustration at RISD (Rhode Island School of Design)
focusing on rendering, design, storytelling etc

Quote from interview - "My process always starts with an idea or a prompt I want to work with- sometimes it’s brought on by some amazing reference I’ve stumbled across, but I usually want some intent or purpose to motivate my character design process. Who is this character? What’s their role, social standing, personality, career, genre, and universe? What do I want to get out of this piece?"

- Trust your instincts, know the rules before you break them, get a LOT of research and reference images. Some quick studies from reference before designing to internalise it and learn about it. Integrates reference into loose thumbnails and ideas before tightening up and adding details, thinking about silhouette. B&W is less distracting and helps to get the design and value structure down - "an early character sketch for a pitch meeting is going to be much looser than a fully-painted turntable that I’m going to pass off to a modeler."

Bioshock Infinite designs, illustration and concept at Neopets, character and costume work for Sunset Overdrive.

Is currently a production designer at HBO Digital Products.