Zulu's art

[zuludelta]

Never really considered the Defenders or Champions... the Champions, especially, are pretty much a "thrown-together" team and to me at least, it's hard to come up with a unifying theme to tie them all together visually, whereas the Heroes for Hire, I can easily design them around the concept of street-level martial artist/enforcer types. The Defenders would be interesting, but a little daunting (I've never been satisfied with any Namor or Dr. Strange designs I've done). Another idea I've considered is doing a Viking/Norse-themed piece, drawing Thor, Valkyrie, and The Warriors Three in a less "superhero" fashion (no capes, real armour)   

Anyways, here's a peek at Shang-Chi doing his best Bruce Lee impression (utilizing the "Game of Death"-inspired design I first used in my Ultimate Shang-Chi piece a few pages back):



His "bones" are peeking through, which is the shorthand I now use instead of sketching things out on paper. I'm not sure if I actually work faster that way... I don't spend any time doing any detail on paper but the ease with which I can construct and modify poses in Photoshop means I spend a lot of time going back and forth between figures.

[zuludelta]

Well, here's Shang-Chi, getting ready to open a sixpack of whoop-arse on some hapless soul:


And here's Misty Knight, showing us her best side  :lol:


I'll probably do Colleen Wing next, I always take more time drawing females (since I can't really refer to myself on the mirror for reference).

[Uncle Yuan]

I've been gone for about a week so I'm a little behind - love the WildC.A.T.S. stuff, even though I was never a fan.  The wallpaper is very nice - I love the way the t-p "window" looks against a black background.  I'm also really enjoying your style - I'd love to see some sequential panels done up.  I know it'd probably be a pain to do a whole comic, but a page or two of something would be really awesome!

On the Misty Knight, I think her legs are too short by a foot length at least - maybe more.  She looks very stubby legged to me.  I like her colors though!  And Shang -Chi looks a little too lean, he could stand to be a touch heavier through the shoulders and chest.  I'm not saying he should be a mass of muscle, but he looks too adolescent to me right now.

[zuludelta]

On the Misty Knight, I think her legs are too short by a foot length at least - maybe more.  She looks very stubby legged to me... And Shang -Chi looks a little too lean, he could stand to be a touch heavier through the shoulders and chest.

Actually, the legs are the appropriate length (if you check where her left arm ends against her thigh)... I think the reason you perceive her legs to be shorter than they are is the fact that the point where the individual legs appear to diverge from each other is pretty low, since I didn't use any black lines to differentiate the legs at the point where the "buttcrack" (can't think of a better phrase... gluteal split?) ends and the thighs start. I'll see if I can add some shading to make the distinction between the legs more evident. As for Shang-Chi... I dunno, I'm basing his look on images of Bruce Lee (who was probably leaner than anybody except Gandhi), so in that respect, I don't think I'll be changing his build (thanks for the suggestions though).

I'd love to see some sequential panels done up.  I know it'd probably be a pain to do a whole comic, but a page or two of something would be really awesome!

I've been working on and off on a short story, nothing superhero-related though, it's more along the lines of Pekar's American Splendor. I'm just slogging through the writing but I've got the first three pages laid out:


I'm also working with one of our fellow FRers on a little project, but everything's still in a pretty preliminary stage.

Thanks again for the suggestions and comments, I really appreciate it when you guys take the time to offer your thoughts on what I'm doing.

EDIT: here's the updated Misty Knight pic with the extra shadow added:

[Uncle Yuan]

since I didn't use any black lines to differentiate the legs at the point where the "buttcrack" (can't think of a better phrase... gluteal split?) ends and the thighs start. I'll see if I can add some shading to make the distinction between the legs more evident.

Close.  Gluteal cleft.  :D

[zuludelta]

Close.  Gluteal cleft.  :D

Hah! My anatomy instructor's probably turning in his grave right now  :lol:

Anyway, here's my take on Colleen Wing:


One of my pet peeves in comics is when creators take a character of obvious ethnicity and make careless mistakes regarding their background, which sort of ruins the whole suspension of disbelief thing (even though I'm pretty sure most writers and artists mean well when they create minority characters in comics). Colleen Wing is a perfect example. Her dad's name is Lee Wing (a Chinese name), so you'd expect her last name to be Lee (i.e., Colleen Lee), and not Wing (since Chinese names always have the surname first). With this redesign, I ditched the whole samurai motif (it's a little cliché at this point, and a little too Kill Bill) and went with a wushu/taiji sword style (makes for more interesting stances, too). I also made her hair colour black, I always thought it was odd that she has always been portrayed as a brunette/redhead. It's never been confirmed if her dad was actually ethnic Chinese, since he was always drawn as a Caucasian in his few appearances, but with a Japanese mother, I figured it wouldn't be too much of a departure. 

[Uncle Yuan]

Close.  Gluteal cleft.  :D

Hah! My anatomy instructor's probably turning in his grave right now  :lol:

What?  That is the correct anatomical term.  :unsure: 
Gluteal Cleft

[zuludelta]

Close.  Gluteal cleft.  :D

Hah! My anatomy instructor's probably turning in his grave right now  :lol:

What?  That is the correct anatomical term.  :unsure: 
Gluteal Cleft

You misunderstand me...  I was referring to the fact that my anatomy instructor would be so disappointed in my forgetting the actual term, it's one of those things that you'd think would stick.

[zuludelta]

I've hit a bit of a creative roadblock with Iron Fist and Luke Cage... I'm thinking I might let these guys go for a while and move on to a different project. I like how Misty Knight and Colleen Wing look as a single image though:

[zuludelta]

Idle late-night doodling led to these two Thundercats-inspired pieces:



Maybe I'll flesh them out in future.

[psychopanda]

Very nice ZD. Liono looks great.  :thumbup:

[MJB]

Thundercats... HO!

*is a nerd*

Unfinished or not they look good.

-MJB

[UnkoMan]

For some reason Tigra is giving off a Panthro vibe to me. Probably just the flatness of the head, though, as opposed to his usual Wolverine-esque hairdo.

Still, very cool. You should definately do more, man. Redesign them before the movie comes out, at least.

[Night Dragon]

Thundercats... HO!

Yes Thundercats, it's true... and EmJay can be yours for the low, low price of....



A buck-fitty.

[zuludelta]

Thanks for all the comments guys!

I never really saw myself completing the Lion-O and Tigra images but here we are:

Lion-O as a barbarian type:


Tigra as a warrior-monk (swapped out his whip for a length of mystical beads that he can control telekinetically)

[psychopanda]

Nice work. I'm getting giddy for Saturday morning cartoons again!  :lol:

[Uncle Yuan]

Awesome new stuff!  Now all we need is Cheetara as a pole dancer and my life will be complete! (rrrowr!)

[zuludelta]

Now all we need is Cheetara as a pole dancer and my life will be complete! (rrrowr!)

Ha ha, a real Thundercats HO!  :lol:

Nice work. I'm getting giddy for Saturday morning cartoons again!  :lol:

Don't really remember much of the cartoon... I was much more into The Galaxy Rangers (no guts no glory!) and Voltes V as far as Saturday morning cartoon fare was concerned. I remember the animation in the early Thundercats episodes to be real good, though, rivaling that of the Marvel/Sunbow GI Joe cartoons.

[UnkoMan]

Oh neat. They are so contrasing with each other... I like Lion-O's hand that I always thought was retarded being turned into him wearing an animal's claw. Looks a tad "bear-ish" though, due to the darker brown armour. But it's good.

The change in Tigro's weapon is a unique idea, too, and the green works with the orange.

[zuludelta]

Looks a tad "bear-ish" though, due to the darker brown armour. But it's good.

Yeah, I initially had it coloured in a tone similar to his fur/skin, but it ended up looking like he had some weird hairy tumour growing out of his forearm.

A quick-ish Daredevil:

[zuludelta]

I've been putting off doing a Fantastic Four image for a while now, it took a fortuitously-timed request from one of the posters at the Comic Book Resources Forums for me to finally start work on it. Here's Ben Grimm, a.k.a. The Thing:


I went for his more classic build (and the classic black and blue knickers and the Kirby cigar), where he's slightly short and squat-looking, I'm not really too fond of the modern interpretations where he's this hulking orange mass with pseudo-musculature... it turns him into just another muscular strong guy (and I hate it when artists give him the exaggerated jutting lower jaw... it looks like he's got a freaking soup bowl for a mandible)

[UnkoMan]

I like a little jaw on my Thing. Sort of Hellboy style. But I do like the squat look more than hyper muscled.

This Thing looks great... But suffers a bit of weirdness due to your outlining style. Namely, that cigar. It looks to almost be floating. Why outline it in black? Why not use darker shades of the colours it actually is? Maybe even all a darker brown. The same goes for the black line on the bottom of his trunks, but it's less noticable there.

The cigar though, as is, stands out too much and becomes the centre of attention.

Can't wait to see the rest of the F4. And hey... you really only have to draw three of them.

[psychopanda]

I was noticing the same thing, except for me, the trunks were floating in space. The cigar didn't bother me as much.

I agree with ZD on the jaw. He ends up looking like Bedrock (from Image's Youngblood comic) who in turn is a copy of some cartoony character that I forget right now.

The Thing looks great and I'm glad you took him back to his base. My favorite artists on the Thing are Jack Kirby and John Byrne. Byrne really impressed me with the way he drew the lumpy Thing. Which is pretty much the same shape as yours, but a different texture.

Looking forward to more F4. :)

[Tortuga]

I really like the shape of The Thing, zulu.  I am kinda missing more black though, which would help ground the cigar and his shorts.

[zuludelta]

Thanks for the suggestions guys, you make excellent points. I think most of the problems come from the fact that I worked in a much higher resolution (1250 x 2500 in 300 dpi) and then shrunk it down to 300 x 600. I've noticed that stroke lines around large area layers tend not scale down as well as other details and end up looking a lot thicker than they do on the original PSD file. Another factor that caused the shorts to "pop out" and look like it was floating on top of the image is the fact that I used a gray background... the inherently strong contrast between the gray and the blue made it look even more pronounced than I wanted. With that in mind, I used a couple of workarounds to minimize that distortion, hopefully it looks better this time around:

[TigerStyle]

I agree with ZD on the jaw. He ends up looking like Bedrock (from Image's Youngblood comic) who in turn is a copy of some cartoony character that I forget right now.

Actually, I think his name was Badrock (not an improvement, I know) and the less the Thing has to do with that character, the better.  Although I think Badrock was just Liefled copying the Thing to begin with. 

Love the work ZD.  I could definitely picture Zealot fighting her way through Columbia and the rest of your characterizations are well thought out.  I love the style you're using too. 

[zuludelta]

I agree with ZD on the jaw. He ends up looking like Bedrock (from Image's Youngblood comic) who in turn is a copy of some cartoony character that I forget right now.

Actually, I think his name was Badrock (not an improvement, I know) and the less the Thing has to do with that character, the better.  Although I think Badrock was just Liefled copying the Thing to begin with.

If I remember my Image Comics history, Liefeld's character was indeed originally named "Bedrock", but wary of a possible copyright infringement suit from the Hanna-Barbera Flintstones people, Liefeld changed the name to "Badrock" (a horrible horrible pun, by the way) at some point during or immediately after the first Youngblood mini-series. And no, I didn't buy the books, honest, I just read my classmate's copies (although I did break down and buy Youngblood #0... probably the last thing I ever bought with Liefeld's name attached to it).

[psychopanda]

I wish I could say I was *hip* and knew his name was originally "Bedrock", but actually I goofed!  :lol:

Nice changes on The Thing, ZD. Now it looks like he's wearng boxers instead of briefs. Intentional or no?

[zuludelta]

Nice changes on The Thing, ZD. Now it looks like he's wearng boxers instead of briefs. Intentional or no?

Definitely intentional... I'm drawing on his earlier appearances for reference, and it always seemed to me that he wore either "leggy" briefs or super-short shorts back in the day. That being said, I think the short shorts look would only work for The Thing... could you imagine Namor with one of those on? He'd be like the love-child of Mr. Spock and Magnum, PI!

[GhostMachine]

Zd, do you have any interests at all in kaiju (giant monsters) or pulp\old school type heroes? For some reason, I'd love to see you tackle some Godzilla or It the Living Colossus type monsters, or heroes like the Phantom and the Shadow.