Taken from Jim Smith Blog May 29th 2015 for Archival Purposes.
When Jim Smith did an interior cover for "Wrestlers in Space" #1 by Nathanael Hopkins-Smith
Original Post : http://jimsmithcartoons.blogspot.com/2015/05/creating-finished-illustration-for.html
This a an illustration done recently for a comic book to be released later this year by a company called www.thevagabondcomic.com in Australia. It will be used as a splash page type poster to go along with a story called "Wrestlers in Space"
When asked to do an illustration for hire, the first step is a rough pencil sketch from the client's reference material (if provided).
When the rough pencil is approved by the client, I will do the finished drawing and get that approved.
Next, a rough color comp is done using markers. This can be a small thumbnail size sketch indicating the basic color scheme.
After getting approval of the rough color, the finished drawing is scanned into the computer and transferred into photoshop. Using the Cintiq, I trace over the scan on a new layer with a brush tip that tapers giving the thick and thin look, much like old comic book style.
Then on a new layer under the ink layer, the flat colors are painted. As you can see, I mistakenly started shading on the flat color layer. It wasn't a problem so I left it instead of doing that part over.
After the flat color is done, the background is drawn with color brush and paint is filled in. As a final touch, I used a marker brush in photoshop to shade the characters and when all the layers are put together, the result is the finished piece you see at the top.
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