Christmas Eve- Before you say goodbye

Merry Christmas gang

TD Garden

panel 1 of page 17 so for all those boston sports fans issue one features not only the home of the red sox (fenway park) but also the home of the Boston Bruins and Celtics (TD bank north garden)

page 16

4:45 mins and counting

enjoying some canned fruit as I close in on finishing this page.

5pm

panel 3 was finished before hand. 11 hours to go

cant have FW day with out snow

its a strange day in november, its beautiful outside its like spring out. So this will not do so I took matters into my own hands and bought some snow.

the countdown is on

forever winter day Live

Well this weekend is the last for me as christmas card season beckons and soon I'll be working the voluntary mandatory overtime up until xmas. This saturday my sister will be leaving for a cruise and both my parents and my brother have already left on cruises meaning that as of saturday morning I will be home alone with the crazy dogs.

You take all of these factors and you have the makings of the first ever Forever winter day! I will be drawing and hopefully getting some pages down in a marathon session from 4pm- 4am.

This isn't a 24 hour deal where I will attempt to get a certain amount done or anything but hopefully I'll be able to get a couple of pages done, I've already thumb nailed the remaining pages of the first issue and so excited to finally put this bad boy to bed.

I'll be updating the goings on here as Best I can and also on twitter

away we go

panel from page Currently strapped down to my drawing board. hoping to wrap this page up tonight during my weekly drawing chat with my friends

Happy Halloween!

Kry sketch night

finished this during a weekly chat I have with some of my former Classmates at the kubert school. We all talk over the magic of the internets and try and get some work done.

cover stage 5

added in some more tones with a charcoal pencil. Then the fun part going in and adding in all the snow. This entire thing was inked with a brush, with charcoal pencil for the tones and a toothbrush for the snow effect. The next step is I give the file to a talented friend and let them color it.

cover stage 4

Cover stage 3

ok so been a couple hours working on this thing. since I ink myself I leave things a little more loose then I would normally, the snow and stuff would really drive me crazy to pencil really tight before inking it. After seeing the black bars in photoshop I actually went a head and put them on the board as well, Not needed but I like to see the original be as close to the finished piece as possible.




I use the strathmore sequential art pages. Bristol Smooth. this is the 200 series which features the blue lines, I use these for pinups and covers. I prefer to rule up my own when I do actually pages so I switch to the 300 series which has no blue lines.


other tools I used on this piece.




Pentel 0.5 Mechanical pencil or alvin draftline .5 mechanical pencil- Both are pretty much exactly the same, the draftline I get at an art store near my house. The Pentel I pick up every-time I go into the city at dick blick near fenway. I rock it cause its green. no really. Both are my main weapon of choice. I like 0.5 the best, 0.7 I smear around like a mad man and it makes a real mess. 0.3 pencils are super expensive and the lead breaks so easy and it seems to jam constantly.

Staedler HB pencil- I use this to rough in shadows or fill in black spots. Really good for roughing in all the snow really fast.

ruler- all my perspective stuff I use a ruler in the penciling phase, even though I ink all of it free hand (but I'll talk more about that next time)

circle templates- They have nice rounded edges so I used them to round of the edges of the signs. I seem to lose circle templates more then anything else.

Kneaded eraser- actually scratch that, erasers might be the thing I lose the most, as you can tell by the tiny piece of kneaded eraser I was using. I also love the erasers on the drafting pencils but once you wear them down and have to move them up to keep using them it seems like they always end up falling out and disappearing.

sea lion? probably best to just avoid that.

next onto inking. see you then.

-Joel

Cover stage 2

I went back to the drawing board a little bit on the background for this piece. I didn't think I captured The heading into Boston vibe in the first highway backdrop. Bean town has some really crazy highways as you head in to different parts of the city. A lot of big looping around over passes dipping down and going into underground tunnels. tightened up the main figure a little bit, but went back and erased his legs (they seemed really long)

the black bars along the top and bottom might stay I like the widescreen effect it gives and will leave me space for the logo and all that fun stuff.

more to come on this stay tuned.

cover stage 1

after much delay I've started to draw a cover for the first issue of forever winter. This is about an hour in, really loose pencils. I'm going to be showing the stages of this bad boy, but I already screwed the pooch cause again this is about an hour in and I had no rough for it. stay tuned.

-Joel-

Page 14 finished and 15 rough

so after much time, here is page 14 the finished pencils





diving right back in here is my rough layout for Page 15.

still alive

been awhile hasn't it? yeah I know, but the lack of updates at least has a pretty cool reason this time around. I've actually been working on a couple of paid pages for a proposed anthology book. These will be coming to a close in the next couple of days and be sent off to my friend scott ewen to be inked, at which point I'm going to be hitting Forever winter with a vengeance. so stay tuned because big things are about to happen in the world of FW!*

-Joel-


legal note
*big things not guaranteed and in fact are very unlikely.

record player

more for the sketchbook I may or may not be making.

sketchbook cover

been thinking of putting together a small forever winter sketch book. If I do, this will be the cover for it.

stat panel

Page 1

finished this panel last night Page one Panel one how exciting.

Influences

An artist I follow on DA posted this on the site and urged people to list their influences. I had a lot of fun filling this in. The bigger squares are supposed to be your bigger influences






Boston- Growing up outside of Boston its hard not to list it as one of my biggest influences. I love the city. I love taking the train in and just kicking it in the city, hitting up Harvard square in Cambridge, My brothers band playing dive bars, watching the Bruins at the garden. I can't imagine ever living any place else.

Cowboy Bebop-I don't know what to say about bebop other then its my favorite anime of all time.

The films of Sam Peckinpah- I think I was influenced by sam's films before I even saw any of them. The wild Bunch, Alfredo Garcia, The getaway. His movies always start off with such a simple premise and its amazing to watch as it spirals into madness and bloodshed. The wild bunch ranks up there with my favorite westerns of all time along with others are huge influences on FW

Samurai- yep

LOST- I may not have enjoyed everything that they did or how they did it, But its hard not to give them credit when its do. The way that the writers handled the back stories of the characters and the arcs over the course of the series, really rounding them up and making them all feel real.

Ryan Ottley and Invincible- If I'm ever feeling the need for inspiration while at the drawing table A go to book is invincible, kirkman's writing with Ottley's art work makes For my money the best book being published today.

Chris Bachelo- I've loved his work for years. really inspiring.

The art of cory walker- One of the best artist working today, his blog and sketchbook are a go to for inspiration

sean murphy- I have three pages of his original art haning up in my room. Awe inspiring. sometimes I think he sold his soul at the crossroads for the ability to draw anything. His inking inspired my to pick up a brush and really give it a try.

Japan- Love Japan, I will get there someday.

Coheed and Cambria- My favorite Band. chances are if I'm working, Coheed is blaring out of some speakers somewhere.

updated panel

finished the background and tightened up the rest of the snow cat panel. Pretty happy with it. I'll add in the snow in the inking stage.

updated logo

snow cat 2010

another work in progress panel from the page I'm currently working on.

Abby

panel from page 14 currently being worked on. while inking others. keeping busy for sure.

Abby has been in every draft of forever winter since the beginning and has remained almost completely unchanged.

back

scanner is back up and running. A panel from the first page of the book currently being inked. I filmed myself inking but can't speed up the video yet.

apologies

sorry for the lack of updates, which considering the fact the blog is only a month old is pretty sad. My all in one printer/scanner is currently not working, so scanning things isn't really a possibility. Buying a new scanner is also out of the question because I'am poor. I'll be posting something soon and hopefully will be back on a regular schedule for updates in a couple of weeks.

-Joel-

Year book 3

my printer/scanner is currently not working. So for a lack of any real updates, I give you year book 3.


Good ol' Tornoe.

He did this for me at the end of third year. I have no idea who the crazy guy in the foreground is supposed to be but I think legally I own him. Since school Tornoe has gone on to be a political cartoonist check out his blog at

http://tornoe.blogspot.com/

page 13

you serious?!

Yesterday

Katherine and James going through some records and kicking some sweet tunes, in a simpler time.

Katherine is holding: The beatles "Help"
James is Holding: Atmosphere " when life hands you lemons paint that S**t gold"

both albums contain songs called "yesterday"

other albums in the clutter. in no real order.

Funeral for a friend " Hours"
Johnny Cash "American IV the man comes around"
Beatles "Let it be"
Gorrillaz "demon days"
Flogging Molly "Swagger"
Coheed and Cambria "second stage turbine blade"
coheed and cambria "Good apollo I'm burning star IV volume one: from fear through the eyes of madness."
The way of the gun soundtrack
rolling stones "let it bleed"
20th century Masters-The millennium collection motown 1970's vol 1
Thrice "the artist in the ambulance"
Thursday "war all the time"
cowboy bebop "CD-box"
Metallica "death magnetic"

Lansdowne st.

Year Book II

good Old Karl Slominski.

I didn't really get to know Karl until the second year at The Kubert school. Both of us kind of had story ideas that we wanted to work on, a lot of brainstorming was done on lunch breaks over Buffalo chicken pizza at MS 2. Slommy was always willing to hear what ever crazy idea I had, or new characters, or just how the little pieces of the puzzle I was trying to fit together were coming together. To be honest, he still does, I email him all the time with these long scripts filled with typos or pages of notes for stuff I won't get to for years. Karl has read more crazy outlines and long story arcs for forever winter then probably anybody. A couple of years ago when I approached Karl to do a short story, he jumped all over it....you can see it below, in short the dude is awesome.

Karl is all over the internets I suggest you start with...

http://slomotionart.blogspot.com/

Karl was nice enough to knock out two forever winter sketches for me. One during second year and one during third.

James remixed

wanted to pay tribute to the first Forever winter drawing with this remixed version. Seven years is a long time.

Hungry Kry

Inked with a brush and colored with a mix of prismacolors and copics

Year Book

At the kubert school there is a tradition that everyone (almost everyone) has what they call a "year book" In which classmates draw in a sketchbook for you. They get passed around like a new fish in prison...

it was around second year that friends of fine were cool enough to start drawing forever winter characters in the thing. Since I started out this week with old Kubert school work I figured I might as well Post some more "from the vault stuff", embarrass some of my friends by posting older art and stall because the Ink is still drying on the thing I want to post later this week.

here are a few, more to be posted at a date To be determined.


Fabio Redivo got the whole thing started when He came out of the gates Guns blazing to start the second year section of my year book. As for his message to keep dodging balls? our class started a massive dodgeball movement and we would play every thursday. It's also important to note the original title of "the last ronin" Forever winter was originally the subtitle.

Fabio is a teacher at the kubert school now and more of his awesome work can be seen at...

http://fabioredivo.deviantart.com/




This one is also from Second year done by Eric Butt. Eric got nervous about "not being able to find work" "starving to death" That he let sal pressure him into the animation program. Still he was kind enough to do this up for me. even if he got the start time for JAG wrong, Nobodies perfect.

Eric was drafted and killed in Vietnam Or he works for volition inc, the video game co. that made Red Faction Guerrilla I can't remember.

http://www.volition-inc.com/Staff/EricButt



Jumping to the start of third year now, The killah Rian Millah dropped a bombshell, a double Page spread. This one remains one of my favorites in the entire year book, not only because its awesome but also because when asked why James had been shot with arrows, rian replied "I figured if there were people running around with swords, there must be bows and arrows." The man makes a good point.

More of rians work can be seen (including the brilliant MAN-GULL) at.

http://larq2525.deviantart.com/




Last but not least with have evil robo's Eric Schock. Eric was one of the first people I met at the Kubert school, I remember hanging out on the porch of the mansion talking shop with eric the first weekend we moved in. The Kubert school dorm is kind of a crazy place that first weekend, its kind of like the wild west, 30 something guys from around the country (world! big ups to brazil!) crammed into the "mansion" portfolios and sketch books flying around as everyone sizes everyone up...racing to claim studio space and building desk. its madness. The kind of wonderful madness I would do again tomorrow if I could.

schock is a cool dude and always very supportive of me and my work. So much in fact he was kind enough to give me five pages of space in the latest issue of "ash tray comics" Schock knocked this one out for me towards the end of third year.

for more on eric and ash tray comics. the place to be is...

evilrobo.com




thats it for now. I still have more of these to post. if you drew one and its not up here you still have time to bribe me.

from the vault.

This ladies and gentlemen was the very first piece of Forever winter related artwork. Finished (well as finished as poor inks and some lazy marker work can be considered) for One of Alec steven's classes my first year at the kubert school back in 03, the assignment was using a mathematical equation to rule out and place objects for the viewer.

quick google search I believe its called the "golden mean" or the golden ratio. thanks google.


there was no story at this point Just a dude with a sword walking in the snow, but look at that sweet cape...


till next time

-Joel-

ps. I almost drank my dirty ink water twice as I was typing this.

Killing on Mute.

Killing on Mute is a short five page forever winter story written by myself and drawn by the amazing Karl slominski. Karl is an awesome artist and a good friend whose work can be seen at http://slomotionart.blogspot.com/ tell him Joel sent you...or not. Karl finished this story a long time ago and I just haven't found a place for Until now! right here on the Hungry samurai I present for the first time....KIlling on Mute.