I spent a quiet Thursday at Philadelphia’s Comic Con in Artist Alley. After talking to a group of very kind, friendly artists, I decided to walk around and ask them where they find their creativity and also about their creative process. I talked to people like Brahm Revel, who discussed his new project Guerrillas, Agnes Garbowska, artist for My Little Pony, and Arthur Suydam of Marvel Zombies and Walking Dead fame. I even got to talk to Mark Pingatore, an artist for Garbage Pail Kids. Here are some highlights from the chats:
Brahm Revel: Guerillas, Marvel Knight’s X-Men
“Inspiration just comes from everywhere; it’s how you see the world and see juxtapositions and match up what you like. I just try to stay open to what my mind’s doing or thinking. I try to take lots of notes. When I think something’s cool I jot down in my little notebook so I don’t forget it. I just try to be aware all the time of what I’m thinking about when I see something that I like that I think would be a good idea I jot it down so I have it for the next project.
As for my creative process, things just happen. Guerillas is about a platoon of chimps in Vietnam and about the one human that’s with them. It’s like Tarzan meets Platoon. It’s a human who kind of learns to become a man through fighting in a war with apes. The way I got that idea was I was watching a war movie and the way the platoon of humans were walking through a bombed out landscape reminded me of the way chimps walk in a line together when patrolling their turf, and it linked up and I had an idea for a comic.”
Agnes Garbowska: My Little Pony
“I’ve always loved drawing. I’m an immigrant from Poland and live in Canada now, and when I first came to the country I didn’t speak any English and I couldn’t go to school because I didn’t have my paperwork yet, so I watched a lot of cartoons. They were what inspired me to get into art because I was so hypnotized by all these characters on the screen that I started drawing them…and drawing them and drawing them every single day. And what turned into a hobby and passion of mine as a kid made me realize this was what I wanted to do as an adult so I started looking at traditional artists, comic artists, storyboard artists, an artist I could get my hands on. Everything around me inspired me and I started growing as an artist I went back to school started started practicing different techniques and now I draw ponies!
The shows I loved were Care Bears, the original My Little Pony, Captain Planet, Carmen Sandiego, so many cartoons inspired me. Then later on it was Powerpuff Girls, Fairly Oddparents.
I actually have an interesting creative process. When I start I do all my layouts digitally…once I have all my pencils completed, I print them out and light box and ink them traditionally. After they’re inked I watercolor them traditionally by only watercolor that tones. So basically I watercolor the shadows of the image. So that way I can scan it back into the computer, and then in Photoshop I can add the final digital colors. That way, I have the bright copy digital colors that still have that watercolor feel because underneath they have the watercolors, so the texture of the watercolors comes out, and that’s really the style I’m known for.”
Jeff Hewitt: The Ends
“The storyline [for The Ends] started as a role playing game about 25 years ago. My best friends and I did this game, and over the years we created a lot of source material, so I took all that and shaped it into a story that I wanted to tell.
I do photo manipulation, so the first thing I do is photography. I work out of a bank of five, six thousand photos, I cast people in parts, and then I sit down and pull from those [photos] and I write the book page by page and panel by panel.”
Chris Ehnot: Fallen
“When I get a project, such as a cover, there’s generally a theme that we have to work around, and creatively I’ll come up with a process that’s more concept art to come around that theme, after that I move onto the pencil stage. Once approved, I move onto the final piece and inking form.
When I’m doing my own project I usually go back and forth to get the final project done. When it’s personal it’s easier to work with, because once you come up with an idea, it’s easier to go to pencil and paper rather than just trying to solve what your client is trying to interpret from their own description.”
Mark Pingitore: Garbage Pail Kids
“I collected the Garbage Pail Kids cards when I was younger, so I usually try to think back to the original spirit of the cards and try to capture that, but I also think of pop culture, sports and everyday life as an influence. I basically capture anything people can relate to.
I start out by roughing out quick sketches to get an idea down. I don’t get too detailed at first until I know that it’s going to go somewhere. Usually it’s rough at first.”
Arthur Suydam: Marvel Zombies, Walking Dead, Deadpool
“There are two guys who have all of the zombie stuff going on. Myself and Robert Kirkman got the whole zombies thing kicked off again.
There are essentially two of us [in the zombie business] who are classically trained, and I’m one of them. My training comes from The New York Academy of Figurative Art that was created based on note from Michelangelo, Raphael and Leonardo da Vinci and based on their notes from that period they rebuilt that same school in New York. I went there and the curriculum was 99% anatomy. You have to do a lot of autopsies on cadavers. I had to sculpt them, paint them and draw them and make casts of them. Put that together with watching horror movies, and I love comic books. Put that all together and this is what you get. Zombies.
I paint with everything traditional. I love wash, I love oils, pen and ink, and I think they should get rid of acrylics altogether, it’s a terrible paint and I don’t like charcoal because it gets all over the place. I get more of it on me than I do on the paper.
My family came over in the 16th century from Holland to open up a trading post, fought the Indian Wars on the Hudson because that’s where the trading post was, and that became New Amsterdam, which eventually became New York. Two of my great uncles, James and Henry, were both Hudson River painters. There’s a collection of about a dozen painters who after the civil war were American artists who got world recognition for the first time. After them there was another, who became known as an American architectural artist, and his work is hanging in the White House, there’s an entire wing devoted to him in a museum in New York and I’m the latest, and I do zombies.”
Dawn Griffin: Abby’s Adventures, Zorphbert & Fred
“My inspiration comes from anything, from animated movies, cartoons, TV shows, sitcoms, I’m quirky and funny, it’s kind of my schtick, so I think anything to have to do with cute and funny quick-type humor fits right in.
I used to work with a fountain pen, and I would scan it in and color it that way. But since I purchased a Gateway convertible laptop, it’s actually 100% digital at this point.”
Kurt Lehner: artist, Marvel, DC Comics, Designer of Disney’s Gargoyles, creator of Franklin the Turtle
“My inspiration comes mostly from my childhood, growing up as a fan. Basically loving everything we love about this business of superheroes and cartoons. My inspiration is the fans. I try to create pieces where the fans say “Oh my gosh I would really love to have that.” Stuff that you don’t see anymore. I’m more of a retro artist. I incorporate a lot of retro flavor into my pieces so that whether you’re a kid, adult or grandparent there’s something for everyone in my work because it has a modern flavor yet it’s old school.”
Coming up later in the week, I’ll be doing an in-depth interview with My Little Pony artist Agnes Garbowska, a story/interview with Tom Cook, who was an animator for pretty much every 80s cartoon you loved, an overview of a panel discussion with Marv Wolfman (writer of Fantastic Four, Blade and more) and will be posting some fun Cosplay photos. Stay Tuned! (Yes, Cook animated the cartoon parts of that film as well.)
