SKETCH A DAY 234: DREAM

Even though I have already drawn Dream (Sandman) before, I felt like doing a new sketch of him to fit in with all the other Endless. I tried to do something a little different with him while at the same time making him look like he fits in with the others. He was fun to draw.

SKETCH A DAY: 230 - 233: THE ENDLESS

Here's the remaining siblings of the Endless; Destiny, Desire, Delirium and Destruction. I tried a little different style with these, quicker and looser. I think some of them turned out okay. I wasn't wild about the choice of background on some of these. But that's just me, lol.

SKETCH A DAY 229: DESPAIR

A while back, I drew Death from Sandman/The Endless and I've been meaning to getting back and drawing the entire family. I started with the gross and dark sister, Despair. I don't know why, but I decided to have her smiling. Of course, I know that as someone named Despair, she shouldn't really be happy. But I figured she's hanging with her pet rats and is feeling a little good for once, lol. She was a blast to draw. I don't know why but I have the most fun drawing odd or funny looking characters.

SERPENTA BY MICHAEL WOOD

I've known Mike Wood for a few years now and every year I see him doing amazing sketch after sketch at the Cons. I can't believe that I didn't have anything by him in my book. Well, thankfully, now I do. Mike was nice enough to do this sketch of Serpenta during his busy time at the Con. I really like Mike's style, it has a nice smooth flow to it and his use of bold colors only enhances it. His line work is super clean too. Learn more about Michael at http://www.myspace.com/12786459 .

HARLETTE BY CHRIS MORENO

One of my favorite artists at conventions has got to be Chris Moreno. I first met Chris last year and he drew a kickass rendition of Hamlet (one of the villains from SENTINELS) in my sketch book. Since then, I've been waiting until we were at a convention together again to get some more art from him. Chris was at the Pittsburgh Comic Con (along with the lovely Lauren Perry! Hola!) and I went to him first thing. I gave him a copy of SENTINELS Book 4 and asked him to draw whoever he liked. He decided on Harlette and I can't tell you how awesome I think this sketch is. I love it. So much so, that I got another sketch from the next day, lol. Check out more of Chris's work at http://chrismoreno.deviantart.com/.

SKETCH A DAY 228: BAT-MITE

Every time I see this character I get taken back to my childhood and remember watching the Batman & Robin cartoon in reruns. He's a funny character and it gave me something different to draw for a change.

SKETCH A DAY 227: WASP

I'd been meaning to try to draw Wasp from the Avengers for a while now, but keep forgetting to. She's a fun character who I never really got in to. What I like about her most is her history with the Avengers. I'm sure she'll be back soon even though she supposedly met her end in Secret Invasion.

SKETCH A DAY 213- 226: THE JUSTICE LEAGUE

I haven't had a chance to post many of the new sketches I've done for my "sketch a day" project, so here's a few in one. This time I decided to draw almost all the members of the classic JLA team. I didn't draw Red Tornado or Atom. I've already done Red tornado once and didn't think I had anything unique to say about him in a headshot and the Atom I think works better if I draw him full body and not a headshot. I'm pretty happy with the way these came out. Some are better than others, but for the most part they felt good to draw.

ELECTRON BY MIKE MCKONE

Here's the first of the bunch of sketches I got at the 2009 Pittsburgh Comic Con. This sketch of Electron was done by the incredible Mike McKone. Mike has draw a ton of books for both DC and Marvel. Most noticeably, Exiles, Spiderman and Teen Titans. It was his work on Teen Titans that got my attention (even though I remember him on some Justice League books in the 90s). I think his style is unique as his characters truly look three dimensional. I feel very lucky to have gotten this sketch by Mike and also a little bit shocked. At the Con, Mike was totally open with no waiting list. I couldn't believe it. I always wanted to get a sketch from him, but he was always booked up at other shows. Who'd have thought it. About an hour after I gave him my book, Mike was finished with this awesome portrait of Electron. Easily one of my favs.

PITTSBURGH COMIC CON REPORT

This past weekend's Pittsburgh Comic Con was a blast! I travel up there with Jamie Fay and Rey Arzeno on Thursday. It was a looooong drive, that I had to do by myself, but we got there in one piece. Thursday night, our buddy, Al Dorantes, had his usual party for his company Lucador Enterprises. Al's a great guy and always invites everyone to stop by. This year, he and Glenn Barbis had a new art project for everyone. In effort to help raise money for the Saturday night "Make-A-Wish" charity auction, Al and Glenn bought a ton of white plates and had permanent markers there for everyone to draw one (some people did more then one, lol). There were a lot of great pieces of art created. Jamie and Rey's plates sold for quite a bit at the auction. And Jamie even got to draw on the special Stan Lee autographed plate that was auctioned off for a few hundred.

Friday at the Con was a little slow for me, but Jamie and Rey were both drawing like crazy and had a ton of commissions. Also, Jamie did the artwork for the back cover of the convention program, so tons of people were getting him to sign it there. Friday night was a fun night out at the bar catching up with old friends and new ones. The highlight of which was everyone gathering around playing raunchy rounds of photo hunt, lol. I laughed way too hard and my face actually hurt. I blame Rob Reilly and Lauren Perry for that. And Sean McKeever was a riot too. I'm ashamed to admit how well we did on certain games, lol.

Saturday was a good day as the crowd was huge due to Stan Lee being there. Lots of new folks and I sold a good amount of Sentinels as well as a bunch of my sketches. Who'd have thought people would buy sketches of mine? lol. But they did. Jamie was presented with an autographed copy of the program signed by Stan Lee. Very cool!

Saturday night was a blur and went by way to fast. A wedding party at the bar almost caused some chaos between everyone as the drunk groom and groomsmen were trying to egg us on by saying "Spiderman sucks". One look from Big Al though and they shut up.

Finally, Sunday came. Our buddy, Keefer finally showed up and we got to catch up a little. I sold a bunch of books again that day and quite a few sketches. Jamie and Rey did a few more sketches each and before we knew it, we were on the road heading home. The ride home seemed even longer then getting there, but it was all worth it when I think about how much fun we had.

Overall, the Con went really well and I'm looking forward to returning in April for the next one. We have some BIG plans for the show and I can't wait to get to work on everything! I also got a ton of GREAT sketches at the Con and will be posting them over the next month. They are truly the best bunch I've gotten and all were either super cheap or free. More soon!

PITTSBURGH COMIC CON!

This weekend I'll be at the Pittsburgh Comic Con along with Jamie Fay and Rey Arzeno. I'm really looking forward to seeing old friends and meeting people. Jamie and Rey will be doing kickass commissions for very reasonable prices. And I decided that this year, along with selling all five SENTINELS books, I will be doing sketches. I'll only be doing headshots sketches, but they will only be $5. I'll also be selling any of my "sketch a day" drawings at the con. I sold 42 at Wizard World Philly a few months ago, so I'm curious as to how I'll sell here. If I sell just one I'll be happy. Stop by the Con and say hi. We'll be in Artists Alley!

SKETCH A DAY 212: BLACK WIDOW

This will be the last sketch I post before heading out to the Pittsburgh Comic Con. I'd been wanting to draw Black Widow for a while now, but was a little afraid to. I wanted to be able to do her justice, but I'm not very good with hands or guns. And when I think of Black Widow, I see her with a gun of some kind. Having drawn so much by now, I figured I'd just give it a try and hope it would turn out okay. Surprisingly, I actually really like the way this sketch looks. It's one of my favs I've done.

SKETCH A DAY 211: ROCKETEER

The Rocketeer is an Indie character that a lot of people know about thanks to the movie that was made in the early 90s. I always liked the character and LOVED the art on the series, so I figured I try my hand at drawing him. Surprisingly, he wasn't as hard as I thought he was going to be to draw. The toughest part was the jacket. I was happy with the way this sketch turned out.

SKETCH A DAY 210: BATMAN

I realized this weekend that I haven't drawn Batman yet as part of my "sketch a day" project. Crazy , huh? At first I was going to do a really dark and brooding Batman. But then I decided I've been doing so many classic looking versions of the iconic characters that I'd draw him the same as them. Maybe later I'll do a cool darker version, but for now, this is it, lol.

SKETCH A DAY 209: SHAZAM

Captain Marvel! Or the big red cheese as they call him. And he is kind of cheesy, lol. I like the concept for him. The only problem I always have with Shazam is that he is a kid who changes into an adult body when he is powered up. There's only so much you can do with that. And any kind of love interest would seem odd while he's in one form or the other. Supposedly, there is a movie planned soon and I think if they do it right, it could be a lot of fun.

SKETCH A DAY 208: LIONO

Thunder! Thunder! Thundercats! Hoooooo! Lol, okay, had to do that. I've been meaning to try to draw Liono for a while now, but just didn't get to him. I not sure I love the way this sketch came out, but I like parts of it. I decided not to draw the facial marks on him (he has lighter colored skin around the eyes and mouth) because when I had them on there in pencil, the mouth part made him look like Homer Simpson. Doh! So, just think of them as being there and if he ever gets colored they'll be visible.

SKETCH A DAY 207: WITCHBLADE

Been a weird day today, lol. Can't wait for the weekend! But anyway, this sketch of Witchblade was done on the fly. I have a bunch of other sketches all pencilled out and I meant to finish one of those last night since they were already half done. But I was in the mood to draw another character I've never drawn and suddenly sketched out Witchblade instead. I was really happy with the pencilled version, but as I inked, I think I over did it and messed her up. I still like the pose here, but I find the finished version a little blah.

SKETCH A DAY 206: SPIDERMAN

I can't believe that I've NEVER drawn Spiderman before. Seriously, not even a doodle. I just never attempted to draw him. I don't know why. But I figured it was about time though and decided to try a different angle for him. I'm pretty happy with the results, especially since this was my first try at him.

SKETCH A DAY 190 - 205: TITANS

It took a little longer to post these Titan sketches then I planned to, but here they are finally. I mainly went with the more popular characters and then ones that I liked. Overall, I'm pretty happy with how they turned out. The Titans used to be my favorite team book, but over the years I've gotten sick of them doing the same stories over and over and over and over and over again. Traitors, disbanding and death is what they seem to do best now. Maybe someday someone will come in and save this group and return it to it's Wolfman/Perez heyday.