This year I participated in the annual 24 Hour Comic. The challenge is to create 24 pages of comic book with in 24 hours. This was the second time I’ve done it. I really had a great time doing it too. At times it felt like I wasn’t going to finish, but i did…..with 3 minutes to spare (WhaZa!). It has been a very popular and fun exercise for both writers and artists. The idea is to come with not preconceived ideas of what your going to create, and make a 24 page comic!

So here it is, my 24 Hour Comic entitled “infiltration” written, penciled, and inked by me Ralph Contreras in 24 hours and 57 minutes on October 3rd to 4th, for the 2009 24 Hour Comics Day! I did my pages with widescreen panels, I think it adds a great element to the storytelling.

The Half Way Point!
Participating in 24 Hour Comics Day. Here I am 12 hours into the challenge. Not as far ahead as I had planned. But still having fun. I originally planned to have the comic done within the 1st 12 hours. I’m actually on page 6 and 7 at this point. Not even the half way mark. I honestly didn’t think I would finish, but I new I wasn’t going to give up. (I did finish the 24 hour comic, at exactly 11:57am…. with 3 minutes to spare. Shazam!)

As I started to fall back on the pages and the time was moving forward, I thought what can I do to catch up and finish. I decided to work on the pages very similar to Marvel Comics new format of widescreen comics. That’s where you place your panels stretched out through 2 pages. Like several widescreen shots. Marvel’s title Dark Avengers is very well know for this.

Once I decided to use this technique I was able to catch up. It gave me the great opportunity to create some very dynamic angle shots. Once I gained my confidence that I could finish the comic the story just flowed out of me. It’s full of action and fight scenes. It was really a fun comic to do. The story ends up with solders, ninjas, villains and even a giant monster.

My progress was posted on a few sites during the event. On both the local and national 24 Hour comic blog sites. Here are the links to these sites. 24 Hours from New Mexico Blog – Hours 14 through 18 from New Mexico Official Nation 24 Hour Comic Book Blog – Hours 14 through 18 from New Mexico

This year I participated in 24 Hour Comics Day again. It was held on October Saturday the 3rd to 4th. I had such a blast with it last year there was no question I would do it again. The goal is to create 24 comic pages in 24 hours. It’s a very challenging exercise. You come to the table with no idea of what you are going to write and draw, from there you create  a 24 page story.

Last year there was a place to participate in 24 Hour Comic in Santa Fe NM (that’s where I live right now), but this year the closest place was in Albuquerque, NM. I decided to stay home and work on the 24 hour comic in my drawing table. I was committed to participate no matter where I did it.

The first few hours were tough, the year before I created my 24 hour comic with the help of my girlfriend as my inker. This year I was working completely solo. I was finding it hard to find a fast rhythm. I was really digging what I was coming up with, but I was just a little slower then I originally wanted to be.

My girlfriend helped me out by updating my Twitter, Facebook & Flickr pages. One of the Twitter updates caught the attention of the group in Albuquerque. They were updating their blog dedicate to the 24 Hour comic and told me to send them some photos of my stuff. You can check out the 1st of 2 post showing my work progress during the event. 24 Hours from New Mexico blog (Hour 13 1/2 from New Mexico). What was cool is the blog post was picked up by the Official Nation 24 Hour Comic Book Blog too. – (Hour 13 1/2 from New Mexico)

I’ve wanted to be a comic book artist as long as I’ve been reading comics. To be able to play with the heroes I read about. Like most aspiring artists I looked to books to show me the right way to draw comics. How the comic figure is drawn and how to create those awesome fight scenes. I’ve bought and read so many “How to Draw Comic” books I’ve completely lost count. The very first “How to Draw Comics” book I every bought was How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way.

How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way is a great introduction book to the world of comic book drawing.  Written by Stan Lee and comic artist John Buscema.  This book teaches you the tools and terms used when creating a comic book. From drafting table, pencils, erasers, inking to the definition of a worms eye view.

It covers basic perspective drawing techniques for object, characters, and composition. Probably one of the best books that teaches how to draw characters with 8 half heads. This book has great explanations of the importance of figure exaggeration when drawing action and normal conversation between figures.

The most important lesson I learning from this book was how to draw sequential art, that is how to tell a story through pictures.  It shows the wrong way and the right way, what’s great about these examples is it shows you different ways to tell the same story though panel drawings.

If you are interested in learning how to create a comic book, the basics of comic book drawing or know some one who does I would totally recommend How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way.

I give this book a 5 out of 5 pencils rating:

With the original Batman’s death in Final Crises there were many theories of who would take on the mantel. With the conclusion of Battle for the Cowl we learn that Dick Grayson officially become the new Batman. Grayson is the original Robin who has been going by the the name of Nightwing for over 20 years now. In the new ongoing comic Batman and Robin “Batman: Reborn” written by Grant Morrison we get to see Grayson as the new Batman with Bruce Wayne’s son Damian as the new Robin.

A few months ago I did a character redesign of Batman. It was for an on-line contest by Project Rooftop tilted Batman 2.0: The Dynamic Do-Over. Check out the contest winners.  I’ve communicated with a few of the other contestants by Twitter, Deviant art and personal blogs. Although my redesign didn’t place I had a real blast with this project.

I posted my final redesign in a previous post. I’ve decided to post my sketches and show the stages of my work for fun.

These were my initial sketches of the redesign. I was looking for a way to incorporate Dick Graysons’ personality form his Nightwing costume into his new Batman costume. Playing with the bat symbol going across his chest, the colors of the suit and adding more compartments for the bat gadgets on his boots and gloves.

Here is my final pencil drawing. I had a lot of fun with this adding shadows and highlights.

This is my actual first digital inking of a comic character I’ve ever done. You’d think I would have done it before being a graphic designer for over 10 years. But I always seemed to keep my computer design skills and my comic penciling separate. For this project I decided to go for it and try inking in photoshop. It was fun and I think I did a good job. I’ve actually started digitally inking in Illustrator now. I like working with vector because the  inking never loses sharpness.

With the inking done I moved on to creating grey tone flats. Flats are done to help the digital coloring of the peice. this way you can select a whole area and color it quickly. For fun I tried different color schemes for Batman’s new look.

This is the final stage of my Batman 2.0 character redesign. Again this was my first comic digital coloring. So I’m very proud of how it came out. The drawing is competently colored with shadows and highlights.

I learned alot with this project, but most importantly I had alot of fun.  – Shazam!

Thor - digital inks of my pencils

Here are my digital inks of Thor, the God of Thunder. He’s one of  Marvel Comics main characters. A founding member of the Avengers and actually in the very first comic book I ever read. This is his new costume he’s wearing in his new monthly title.

This was a pencil drawing of Thor I did last week. It was a quick drawing using an HB wood-less Ebony pencil.  I traditionally use an H6 pencil for light tight penciling. For this I actually was able to achieve good detail with the softer lead. It’s good to get out of your comfort zone and try different drawing tools.

I inked this drawing digitally using Adobe Illustrator. I didn’t do it in one sitting. I took my time and did it in small spurts during the week. (Usually watching a Netflix movie on the side). I’ve only just recently started inking my drawings on the computer, which is ironic because being a Graphic Designer for over 10 years you’d think I would have done it years ago.

I like using Adobe Illustrator for inking, I know a lot of people use photoshop which is a great software too. The reason I use illustrator is because I like saving my inks as a vector image. Vector images are great because there’s no worries about pixelation. They are always super high resolution even if it’s reduced or enlarged.

For this inking I only used the pen tool with my mouse or Wacom tablet. It helps to give me the look I want to achieve. I like the sharp edges and thick to thin lines I get with it. There’s an amount of control I feel I have with the pen tool. I think in my next digital inking I will use only the bush tool. Like I said earlier it’s always good to try different tool. I plan on coloring this inks in the near future using Photoshop.

This years 24 Comic was great! I was able to create a 24 page comic in 23 hours. With the help of my wonderful girlfriend Consuelo. The best inker around! It was organized by 7000 BC and True Believers the local comic shop here in Santa Fe, NM. After 23 hours we created a fully inked comic book titled “Aliens and Heroes”. This was truly a great test of creativity. There was a great turn out here in Santa Fe. Over 25 fellow comic artists. I met a lot of cool people. After producing 24 pages in as many hours I feel a higher sense of confidence in my comic creating ability.

Check out my Flickr page with photos of me at 24 Hour Comic

http://www. flickr. com/photos/rafaelcontreras/sets/72157608194210278/

Here some links covering 24 Hour Comic here in Santa Fe. I’m even mentioned in one.

http://24hcd.blogspot.com/2008/10/santa-fe-just-about-wrapped-up.html

http://www. baaadasssscomics. com/