Hellion Cross Cover Art?

Here's the cover I drew for issue one of Hellion Cross.

What do you mean those worms are phallic?

Now... I'm on the fence here, but I might do a different one and use this for the back cover. My reason is simple: I made this one as suggestive as possible without making it actually erotic.

This is not an erotic piece of art. This is a woman locked in a fight with a worm monster. Worms are phallic. I drew the worms the way I picture worms to be in my head. I didn't actually look up any worm images because they're gross and it wasn't necessary for the piece. I drew Fawn in a way that suggests she is nude (she is) but isn't overt about nudity (it isn't). She isn't having fun, obviously, and the worm monster isn't having fun either, obviously. It's a battle.

But god dammit, that's a lot of phallic stuff she's holding in her hands, right?

I'm such a bad, bad man.

Anyway, the comic is done except for any changes I might make in deciding the cover art. I'm on the fence. I'm not sure if this is the image I want on the cover. It might end up on the back cover instead.

Hellion Cross Pages

The interior of Hellion Cross is done! I'm rather pleased with myself because I haven't done a serious, long form comic book in years. And by serious I mean with jokes and worm monsters.

I started working on this comic around June 10 without much of a plan. I essentially wrote it as I went along, trying to tackle it page by page. I completed 25 pages by August 3. For me, that's lightning speed.

I attribute this to the fact that I refused to lock myself into a long-term trajectory, keeping the story moving along as quickly as possible and choosing to draw what I wanted to draw. See... I know my own worst habits. If I lock myself in, I get locked in... I can't seem to move forward. Keeping it loose works for me.

Black Pudding is loose. The reason I was able to do 8 issues at all was because I left myself tons of room in each issue to do whatever I wanted (within the scope of old school roleplaying).

Now that the interior is finished, I've been working on the cover (see previous post). More later.

 

Hellion Cross Cover WIP

The interior pages are finished... now time to do the cover art!

I struggled with an idea for this cover that made sense and was still visually interesting to me. It's a sci-fantasy with space ships, so I thought I would feature the primary ship of the issue, the SS Motorbreath. But my main character, Fawn Rainchild, is basically nude through most of the comic. How to show her on the cover without making the cover itself fully rated R?

In a sense... it doesn't matter. I don't suspect this comic book will ever grace Previews magazine or anything like that. This is a straight-from-me-to-you labor of love. I can show whatever I want to show on the cover.

So naturally I went with the perfectly normal option: woman fighting a worm monster. Right?

What we have here is the Worm Witch, also called K'lixtra, one of the members of the Pan-Gea pantheon. She's the goddess responsible for destroying the Isle of Gea, home to the mother goddess and all her daughters, the Princesses of Gea... of which Fawn is the youngest. When I started drawing this issue I had no idea where it would go. I didn't even know Fawn would be in it, but she very quickly inserted herself into the story (page 2) and took over as the protagonist. And her auntie, the Worm Witch, quickly asserted herself as Fawn's chief nemesis, just as she was in the previous Pan-Gea comics.

As I type this, the inking is finished and it turned out very nice, I think. I'm moving on to colors now.

I'm not sure how to promote the comic other than posting about it on social media and offering it for sale. My plan is to print 100 copies, each one signed and numbered. Stay tuned.

Artists I Like: Goran Gligović

Here's an entry into this series that I probably should have got to sooner. Goran Gligović is one of those currently active, ass-kicking artists I know from social media and some of the books he's worked on... but I don't know much more about him than that.

One thing you'll notice... if you visit Goran's social media looking for Goran artwork... you'll find it, but you'll also find a metric TON of reposts of work by other artists. Get comfortable when you do this because Goran is a great curator of talent, I think. Spending a few minutes scrolling through his page leads me to many creators I didn't know or didn't pay attention to before. I love it when artists are generous with their time and their space, giving room for others.

Goran's work is picture book gothic. That's kind of how I describe it. Design-heavy, a bit psychedelic, and, to my eyes at least, very rich in a 70s aesthetic that I adore. This is work that would elevate Metal Hurlant.

Hoofnar's Return?

Since I'm in such a comic book mood lately I really ought to dust off this guy and actually draw this comic book. I keep threatening to do it year after year. Will 2024 be the year it actually happens? Mayhap by Marduck's steely bill it will be so!

 

Cara

You probably heard there's a new social media game in town called Cara. Now, I'm very cynical about these things. But I tend to use all the major socmed doodads such as Twitter, FB, Insta, etc. I also use Bluesky and Mastodon. But I'm inconsistent. I probably post the most to FB because that's where most of my pals are and I get more interaction there. It's a hell world, I just live in it.

Anyway, Cara is all for art. Specifically, it is all for non-AI art. And I appreciate that, so I post there. Not a lot of interaction yet, but it's got potential. Lots and lots of artists over there, so go check it out. 

Artists I Like: Frank Thorne

Another entry in this series... this time a man whose famous rendition of Red Sonja strongly influenced basically my entire artistic journey. And yet I know very little about this guy.

I'm talking about Frank Thorne.

This guy got started doing comics in 1948 at the age of 18 and drew comics basically until his death at age 90. Talk about a life of comics! The first time I saw his work and knew his name was with the 1970s Red Sonja series, which he drew most of the issues of. Striking covers and beautiful interiors, lush with fantastic imagery and the bodacious chainmail bikini itself. This iconic image stuck in my head as part of my DNA.

It is strange to think that Thorne spent the first 28 years of his comics career drawing things like Tomahawk and Perry Mason... good solid work, but not the kind of bombastic stuff I know him for. Something happened in 1976 when he took over drawing Red Sonja. After that... it was GAME ON and the rest of his life was spent drawing beautiful women kicking ass. And we're all richer for it.

Artists I Like: Philipe Druillet

Philipe Druillet is now 80 years old. That's amazing. I hope I live to see 80.

I did not know of Druillet when I was younger, though having some access to Heavy Metal Magazine means I most likely saw something of his work without actually knowing it. Once I finally actually looked at his work and paid attention, of course I was wowed and blown away.

This French artist was famous before I picked up my first funny book. He was one of the founders behind the French adult comics magazine Métal hurlant (Howling Metal!). The success of that magazine lead directly to the American version we all know and love, Heavy Metal.

It was only very recently (this week) that I actually picked up my first Druillet books. I got the hardback editions of Vuzz and the first three Loan Sloane books from Titan Comics and Statix Press. These are nice books, roughly 9.75" x 12.75" inches... which isn't an American standard and it's not a A size either (A5, A4, etc.). So maybe it's a European thing.

So I sat down and said "Let me read a Druillet for the first time." And I popped open Vuzz... holy fuck.

Vuzz is a single volume about a single character, Vuzz. It opens with a series of 8 pages tales, often silent or nearly wordless. They are all done in exquisite line art... perhaps with a dip pen and/or brush. I'm not sure. The printing is dark blue, not black. Looks great.

Later in the book we get La-Bas, which is a much longer narrative, perhaps 48 pages or something. Then the book ends with a short gallery of covers from the original comic series.

Ok... Vuzz is fucked up.

This is a rather ugly character, both in appearance and attitude. Roughly described, he is a loner warrior/rogue type... a Conan but weirder. He is not smart. He is not eloquent or wise. He seems handy with a sword, but the stories don't describe or depict him as having any greater prowess than other warriors, though he does come to lead a large gang of them in La-Bas, so it is inferred that he's a cut above the rest.

Vuzz is one nasty, amoral motherfucker. The back of the book sums up his character: he needs to fight, eat, and make love. That's it. And by "make love", they mean rape the shit out of women. Because that's what he does... over and over. Eats, rapes, kills. Usually in that order.

He dwells in a savage post-apocalyptic world of magic and weirdness. I would describe the aesthetic as very "Heavy Metal" but... ouroboros and all that. Anyway, Vuzz is the scum of the earth.

SPOILER ALERT...

Vuzz kills a lot of people, many or most of them not necessarily deserving, he rapes a lot, he steals. He's nasty. Then he dies in the end (he chooses death, actually... felt like Druillet said "enough of this guy, I want him dead").

OK, enough about Vuzz. It's a beautiful book, visually, as are the Loan Sloane books that preceded it. Well worth checking out. This guy is a legend. I don't need to sing his praises. His comic pages often look like psychedelic posters.

Get That Label Off Me

Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Waterson, but you knew that already.

I strongly dislike labels. And yet I recognize their incredible utility.

If I go into a video store (in the past..) and I know I want something cool and fantastic, I can go to the sci-fi and/or fantasy and/or horror sections to find it. I won't find it in the drama section. This is very useful because I'm not in the mood to watch 2 hours about a fucked up romance. I wanna see monsters and shit.

But it's also unfortunate because those labels are boxes that we put ourselves into. Without them, we might explore more territory and be more wildly creative. If I know I'm doing a sci-fi thing then I know I need to check off a few boxes. Maybe that alone is enough to stifle my creativity a little bit.

I dunno.

Here's a label I hate: Gen X.

I'm part of Gen X. But nobody called us that until at least the 90s and I honestly don't remember hearing that term until much later. Nobody talked like that back when I was young. Today... that's all the fuck you hear. It causes us to divide up into boxes based on the year we were born... which smacks of some kinda astrological bullshit if you ask me.

Social mores and pop trends change over time and we can broadly classify them into categories if we want. But there's no bright line between Gen X and Millennials and none between Millennials and whoever comes next. The overlap is staggering, huge.

Until you TELL people which category they belong in. Then suddenly some of them start modifying their behavior to fit it. Suddenly we're being sold products and ideas created by corporations, based on the definitions they've carved out for us. We're corralling ourselves into these dumb, stupid, silly boxes that are useful only for data mining, not for living fulfilled lives.

Here's a label you might know: OSR.

This one is very useful for one big, shiny, obvious reason. It's because Dungeons & Dragons is a trademark. We can't go around putting D&D on the cover of our RPG books, even though they are 100% part of that lineage. So, for better or worse, this label "OSR" has become the stand-in. And that does serve a handy purpose. But it still means we box ourselves in.

And yeah, I know, I know. OSR doesn't just mean D&D. But cool your heels... look around at all the game books with OSR labels on them and tell me how many are NOT part of the D&D lineage, in many cases being entirely compatible with that game. Just because you use OSR to just mean "like older games" doesn't mean the rest of the fuckin' world isn't using it to mean "this is off brand D&D".

Anyway... I feel this boxed in lack of air lately. It's probably why I've slowed down to a crawl with Black Pudding, which has always been an explicitly B/X D&D-based RPG zine... OSR. I'm in a creative head space right now where I don't want to make stuff for D&D. Not at this moment. I have other things I wanna do.

Speaking of... I do have the entire Heavy Helping Vol 2 completed and have had it completed for months. The only stumbling block has been some issues with getting it ready to go up on DTRPG. I'll try to focus and sort that out soon. I know I've promised it to a lot of people. 

Artists I Like: Mark Bodé

I probably saw Mark Bodé's work for the first time in an issue of his 80s comic Miami Mice. But I'm not sure. I know I saw his work later in his 90s Tundra comic Cobalt 60, which was a massive expansion of his father's original 1960s comic Cobalt 60.

His father. So, for most artists, you can talk about their influences and maybe they draw a lot like so-and-so. In the case of Mark Bodé, he is in fact carrying on a family tradition. His father, Vaughn, died far too young in 1975 while Mark was still a child. Mark would very soon become a great cartoonist in his own right, taking up the mantle of the great cartoon universe started by Vaughn.

But it isn't correct to say Mark is just doing what his dad did. He's doing his own thing, just in that strong and unique Bodé tradition. He is the Bodé.

He got started early doing comics like Miami Mice, working with Kevin Eastman and others, and becoming both a tattoo artist and a graffiti artist. An amazing life of art. If you can get your hands on it, I recommend his Big Book of Bodé Tattoos.