my website riqart.com and my Redeemer comic at The Weekly Revolver.

Friday, July 31, 2009

Finally Finished.


I put the last bit of paint on this two days ago.. This was a fun picture to paint, and it was on of those cases where at times it painted itself..

I ended up using a lot of opaque acrylics( gouache-y like approach) for the BG characters.. That was not my plan, but Igave the the very controlled tonal range I wanted there.

The Cylclops is mainly done with transparent washes, which is my usual modus-operendi with acrylics.

On the next piece I'd like to experiment with ptting some oils on top of the transparent acrylic wash.. We'll see how that turns out..

I'll be making prints of this in the next few weeks.

BTW, the web has a way of washing out the color.. To see a more accurate version of this drag the file to you desktop and view there..

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Moving Along


Still cleaning up details in this painting.. I've already repainted White Queens face and hair, so that leaves adding Storms hair.. and from there just tightening up all of the details, eyes and whatnot.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

About Face


Did this illustration for my old employer.. All of the people are part of a team that puts on a yearly conference for their dealers..

This project squeezed a lot out of me. There was one likeness that I could't get right. In the end I found a happy resolution, but I never "zinged" it..

I also did the BG.. Since caricatures was my first job EVER, I gues these should be nice easy milk runs, but I was burnt out on caricatures years ago, but sometime you gotta pay bills. And besides most of the people on that card are friends.

I even put in the prelim sketch too.

MMA Caricature.



This was done for a client that wanted to parody the MMA lifestyle.. I guess the ideas of these "big, bad, and mean" with a scowl and really "phat" tatoos..

Well anyway this client considers MMA to be the lowest rung of sports fighting.. He really wanted to caricature the cauliflower ears and the tatooed coolness of MMA fighters..

On his highest totem of the sport fighting, I think would be traditional martial arts..

I definitely tried to channel a bit of Mort Drucker in my approach to this.. He is one of my favorite caricature and comic artists.

I'm posting all of the steps up to the final.

Friday, July 17, 2009

Nightcrawler - just a small detour



I took a moment and pulled out a Marvel Masterpiece card I did last year.. Nightwcrawler.. I liked this one.. I fixed the hand on it- it was looking kinda wonky before.

Wolvie at his best OR fun with pens.


Just tearin' stuff up.. This was today's warm up drawin'..

Thursday, July 16, 2009

More X-men process



put down the darkest darks on cyclops and the other characters. Next I'll start the highlights and refinements.. Definitely not happy with the BG faces, so I'll probably end up doing a lot of opaque paint overs..

Stay tuned.

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Xmen. in process


Working on the xmen painting.. Just a scan of the stage I"m in now.. Lot's more to do..

Friday, July 10, 2009

Cap Squared


Just a small sketch I did to start off the creativity today..

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Vixen.


This was kind of a warm up for my X-men painting.

I really wanted to try out a certain style, kinda Ashely "Woodsey".. I wanted to get some of his spontaneity more than his style.. I love the idea of slinging paint on the paper and just making it work as I go along.. I started with no ref and just built things up as I went.. I did it with goauche so I can re-wet wipe away some areas if need be.. I'll probably do more work on this in the future.. I didn't reveal the whole picture because I want to finish some things off more before sharing...

I plan to do more of these in the future.

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Conquest Color


Colored him up. That's it for today.. Working out an X-men panting, hope to have something by Friday.. But I'll keep updating with sketches between then.

Monday, July 6, 2009

Conquest..




I don't read Invincible.. But whenever I peek into the comic it always had a load of awesomeness going on.. The writing and the art are always ON..

I got wind of the Conquest storyline recently and got sucked in..

So I did a "quick " Conquest sketch. If you notice one is a mirror image of the other.. The less finished Conquest I thought felt a little too moody, when I think onslaught is always "stuck up" as he's destroying a planet.. So I flipped the paper and redid it, and polished it up a bit too.

I forgot to give him his robo hand, so I spliced it on in pshop.


**I called him Onslaught instead of the correct Conquest... went in and changed that.. :)

Saturday, July 4, 2009

Color Study


Here's a color study for and Xmen painting I'm doing.. Just to pad the portfolio..

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Goodbye MJ.


I don't think this need explanation.. I'm just drawing him way I remember him from my childhood when he was the absolute coolest artist. And I wanted one of those zipper jackets- and not the one's with the fake zipper.. I wanted all of my useless zippers to work and be authentic. Never got one...