This illustration was done for the TRDL R3 Illustration Jam, the subject being NINJA!. You can see the jam and all the entries, as well as view or contribute to other jams here.

Given my time constraints AND my love of revisiting earlier work, when I have an opportunity to pull something out of the process drawer for one of the jams, I take it. This piece started life as a potential piece for one of the 80′s Ladies Calendar projects from a few years back, if I remember correctly. I put some work into trying to get the physique lean and muscular and in working out the details of one of those triathalon-type athletic swimsuits, so I saved it for a future opportunity just like this. The jam this week originally sent me down a different path, but when I was going through my sketch folder over the weekend I found this piece and remembered that Jinx was a ninja in the G.I. Joe world. Sure, she’s a red-cloaked, exotic-weaponed, garishly-decorated ninja, but hey. She’s just THAT GOOD. The concept here is that she dove down to a Cobra sub that is lurking under the surface, and is preparing to get up IN there and wreak havok.

Please enjoy!
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You can find a larger version here.

You can see this illustration herein the TRDL Tribute Gallery.

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Process Notes:

This is Jinx as she appeared on her action figure blister pack. This was after I stopped collecting the figures, so it’s all based on internet research. While I’ve seen lots of fan art and the comic interpretations of the character, I started from scratch, using this as a loose reference, in terms of the red, the very dark eyeliner and the dragon motif.

Here’s the … Read on for more awesome…

Related posts:

1. TRDL Tribute – Stature 2
2. New TRDL Ninja Spotted, Therefore Weak in Skillz
3. TRDL Tribute: Ninja Can man!

This illustration was done for the R3 Jam on TRDL’s R3 Forum. Artists can participate in any open jams by heading here. The subject this time: ‘Insect Characters’

I went through about 5 or 6 different ideas in my head once the jam subject was determined this week. Many options! Even if you don’t include arachnid imagery, as some of our participating artists did. But as I often enjoy doing, I decided to go back to the inspiration of my youth, those glorious Marvel Handbooks. I didn’t even get to pulling them out… I just thought about them while laying in bed on Sunday night (well, early Monday morning, as the baby was awake and upset) and remembered Mantis, whom I have never drawn but always thought was kind of a fun cross between Marvel’s space fantasy business of the 70s and a Polynesian hula skirt situation. So, once settled on Mantis, I did a little research, and discovered how far they took that character later on… skin color, ‘celestial madonna’, and so on. Nope, I was sticking with the original look.

In this one, I was working from my imagination on the pose, but i think I got a pretty classic pin-up thing going on. The alien flower in her hair was a good prop, and also a nod to both her xenoflora powers she developed over time, and the spacy nature of the character herself. I was planning on spending some time tricking out the skirt, which was almost a separate project in and of itself, so I had to ink the pieces distinctly and composite them in Photoshop, much the way I do my sequential art work. I’m pretty pleased with the results…

Please enjoy.

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You can find a larger version here.

You can also … Read on for more awesome…

Related posts:

1. Third Rail Thrills 46 – Victoria Hand Pin-Up
2. Third Rail Thrills 42 – She-Hulk Pin-Up
3. Third Rail Thrills No. 60 – Star Sapphire

This TRDL pin-up is actually a modification of a NSFW commission done for a client. When I do commissions that are reasonably tame, but not necessarily all-audiences, or PG-13, friendly, I try and create a variant that is more mellow, so that I can share it more broadly. This piece was of an age-appropriate interpretation of Hermione. The client wanted her in her Hogwarts uniform, in her room, etc, with a bit of teasery going on. Since TRDL is a family affair, more or less, I made sure this version was adequately covered…. So there you are! Nice woman, legs crossed, contemplating the arrival of an exciting friend! Now, that said, read on for a variant…

You can find a larger version here.

After this version (the NSFW one) I was asked to explore a bit of a leg-kick, like someone just had their shoe removed, or is having one put on, let’s say. This variant went in that direction, though was ultimately not the finished selection.

You can find a larger version here.

Anyway, please enjoy. I was proud of the uniform pattern and her expression and her nutty, curly hair, so I shared…

You can see this illustration herein the TRDL Tribute Gallery.

Follow this topic in the R3 Forum
here!… Read on for more awesome…

Related posts:

1. TRDL Tribute: Tula [Pirates of Darkwater]
2. TRDL Tribute – Toni Hogan from Go Dorito’s Iron legion!
3. TRDL Tribute: Enchantress [2009]

This illustration is the second in my series of sketches based on real people I see around, riding bikes and looking awesome.

I saw this girl months and months and months ago, locking her bike up downtown. The bike was an unidentifiable tarcke bike, kind looked like a factory fixie, but the bars and saddle looked older. I was struck by her big puffy parka hood with the hair creeping out. Dodgy in summer, but I guess perhaps not here in the bay area. She was some sort of an Asian mix, and yes, pink belt and all, that’s an accurate interpretation of her outfit. Sadly, no helmet that I saw.

Drawing bikes is exhausting!

Please enjoy.

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You can find a larger version here.

You can see this illustration herein the TRDL Tribute Gallery.

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Process Notes:

Original pencils, alternate bars!

This was the original inks for the piece. As you can see, i sketched in the wonky bike in a wonky way but didn’t know what to do with that second hand…

Here was some digital correction on the hand holding the lock, which needed some work. Half-mast!

I was really taken by the look of her hair and face peeking out of the giant hood. I think I nailed it.

She was wearing those largely opaque leggings, which is kind of hard to render, much different than nylons…

The final bike represents an approximation of what she was riding, but the details were murky. I was otherwise focused…

UPDATE:
I found the source sketch I did after seeing the subject. Pretty loose, but it locked the details into memory…

Follow this topic in the R3 Forum
here!… Read on for more awesome…

Related posts:

1. TRDL Tribute: Team Lope Bike Grrl Seen: Star
2. TRDL Special Project: Team Lope AIDS Fundraiser 2010
3. AIDS LifeCycle 9, Now Featuring the Team Lope Tyre Clubbe

This was a commission done for a longtime client, basically an African-American, female interpretation of Thor. We played around with references and ideas for awhile: he was into a particular Valkrye costume, plus some colors from another character that pushed to black and yellow. What I tried to do was make her built, tall and powerful. The dreads have a bunch of little jewelry tchotchkes in them that plays against the stars nicely. We looked at a few accent colors for the cape, and one change he asked for was a new symbol for the belt, now shown as being the norse rune for ‘D’. I did a version with a staff for a weapon, but he preferred weapon-free, with an outstretched hand receiving lightning.

Please enjoy.

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You can find a larger version here.

You can see this illustration herein the TRDL Tribute Gallery.

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Process Notes:

Here’s the inks, ready for colors, including weapon. I tried a mace first, then the staff.

I played with skintones for quite awhile. In some schemes I was going very dark, which was powerful and awesome, but I thought, given the darks in the costume, it would be better to have a warmer, richer skin tone to work against.

After skin and hair, I moved onto the gold details and the leather, so I could then play against them with the grays, blues and blacks of the nominal black of the costume.

Black here is really a dark blue/gray, but you get the detail this way.

This was the cape study… the client ultimately chose red, which was my strong favorite as well…

I thought the staff was pretty cool, but I appreciate the raw power of an outstretched hand, so the revised version that made it to the final … Read on for more awesome…

Related posts:

1. TRDL Tribute – Red Robin
2. TRDL’s Wrongrobot’s Rudiments Pinup No. 3 – Batgirl
3. TRDL Tribute – Firestorm + Firehawk

This illustration was done for the R3 Jam on TRDL’s R3 Forum. Artists can participate in any open jams by heading here. The subject this time: Rainmaker, from Gen-13.

I actually read a fair amount of Gen-13 when it first came out. I liked the focus on four teenagers with powers on the run, the fairly contemporary designs for the time, and the attempt at characterization. It seems awkward to describe the series that way today, as it devolved into T&A aimed at teenage readers without much sophistication in the storylines, but it was what it was, and at the time, I kinda liked it. Tell you what I didn’t like though: Rainmaker’s costume. It was ALMOST cool. But it featured one bare leg up to the leotard line, and one covered leg. I’ve never understood such things. Just try and visualize that. Anyway, when I set out to do this pic, I was looking around at the iterations of the character that came after I stopped reading the series in the 90s, and discovered this version of her, which is fairly recent. I really liked the colors, the mix of athletic wear and tribal motif, and the symmetry. So, that was the costume I was going to do, no question. In thinking about the story for the illustration, obviously it’s hard to get around the really obvious tropes surrounding this character as written in the comics: she’s lesbian, an activist, and native american, and each of those are thrown at you in bold type. I wanted to focus on none of those things when preparing the propaganda art poster, settling on Rainmaker Hydroponics as a fictional company.

The pic above is the Third Rail Thrills variant. Most of my pin-ups get this treatment now as well, for the … Read on for more awesome…

Related posts:

1. Third Rail Thrills 43 – Dr. Girlfriend Pin-Up
2. Third Rail Thrills 44 – Wonder Woman Pin-Up
3. Third Rail Thrills 38 – Brandy Pin-Up

This commission was done for one of my long-term clients, featuring Silver Surfer and the androgynous character Stardust. I think Stardust is naked, but I’m not entirely sure. That’s a giant Galactus head, there, for obvious reasons! I have to say, until this pic, I’d never drawn a person piggy-backing a ride on a surfboard before, let alone a celestial one. Also, I always imagined the Silver Surfer to be slippery. HOLD ON!

Here’s a medium-rez pic:
http://www.thirdraildesignlab.com/devia … _alt_a.jpg

Here’s a high-rez pic:
http://www.thirdraildesignlab.com/devia … _alt_z.jpg

Follow this topic in the R3 Forum
here!… Read on for more awesome…

Related posts:

1. TRDL Tribute: Silver Surfer [New Years 09]
2. TRDL Tribute: Silver Sable
3. TRDL Tribute: Silver Samurai

This illustration was done for the R3 Jam on TRDL’s R3 Forum. Artists can participate in any open jams by heading here. The subject this time: Frank Cho’s Liberty Meadows.

I always enjoyed Cho’s strip for his busty, curvy rendition of the girls of Liberty Meadows. I admit, the juxtaposition of these comic-style figures and the cartoon-strip characters with which they share the strip never caught on with me personally, but hey, he got a dual following, both cartoon strip readers AND comic fans that followed him to his work on mainstream books thereafter. What struck me, in all of the cool Liberty meadows covers, were the themes. In some ways, he did a pin-up nod on several of them the way I do in this TRDL Pin-Up Series set of pics, so I was inspired by that. I don’t know how I fell into the idea of making it a Slave Leia cosplay pic, but it was kind of a way to hit a few birds with a single stone. Plus, the idea of those little guys in big Stormtrooper helmets cracked me up. Then again, I’m under the weather, so a lot of things have that affect on me right now.

The pic above is the Third Rail Thrills variant. Most of my pin-ups get this treatment now as well, for the collection. Here’s the propaganda poster version, which is described in more detail int he progress notes below:

Please enjoy.

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You can find a larger version here.

You can see this illustration herein the TRDL Tribute Gallery.

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Process Notes:

I started by looking at several of the Liberty Meadows collection covers, trying to get a sense of not only how those animal characters really looked, but the colors. His style on them … Read on for more awesome…

Related posts:

1. Third Rail Thrills No. 54 – Wasp [And Ant-Man]
2. Third Rail Thrills 43 – Dr. Girlfriend Pin-Up
3. Third Rail Thrills 39 – Rainmaker Pin-Up