Doing some catch up

Hi everyone. Happy Holidays!

I hope you all are having a good end of the year. I had a pretty darn good (though very busy) X-mas myself. Got to spend some great time with both families and watch my daughter be the cutest thing ever!

But I wanted to get some sketches that I had done previously up onto the blog. I'll try to get some more done this week while I'm on vacation.

I have a few ideas of sketches I'd like to do. So we'll just see if I'll have time to get them down on paper or pixels.

In the meantime, enjoy these sketches and I'll see you back here shortly.

Some random sketches

Good evening everyone.

I hope you all had a great weekend. I had a fantastic time with the GF and my daughter. Lots of smiles and laughter, which is always a good thing.

I'm going to warn you all, this is going to be a crazy busy week for me. Both at work and outside of work. So if I don't get a post up on time, please forgive me. I'm trying my best to get one done a day. Even if the posting doesn't happen until the day after.

I already had a mildly late night at work today, then had to come home and dig up some papers related to the condo situation. Busy, busy, busy.

But I'm getting Monday's sketch up on time(ish). Today's sketch is just a bunch of random warm up sketches. Nothing too serious, just getting the hand moving on the paper again. Oddly enough, my favorite sketches are the very loose Shorinji Kempo fighters at the bottom of the page. I've always thought this martial art was fun to watch. And I would love to practice it sometime in the future. Plus, come on, the dan rank robes and rope belt are friggin sweet! How bad@$$ do those look!

And the dark, sorceress at the left of the page was inspired by this animated short about D&D 4th Edition. The animator for these shorts is really darn good. He's got some really stellar animations on YouTube. You should check them out.

Anyway. I'm pretty tired, so I'm going to go to bed now. See you all back online tomorrow.

New digital sketch

Happy Friday. Hope you all are having a great day and will have a fun filled weekend.

I managed to get a digital sketch done today. Nothing in particular. I just started sketching looking at some other sketches and ended up with this guy with a shield in a toga. I guess I've been listening to the Percy Jackson audio books a little too often.

Oh well, at least it wasn't another sketch of Aaru right?

Anyway, it was done in CS3 on my MacBook with my Bamboo tablet. Which gave me no problems today.

Hope you get a kick out of it and I'll see you all back here on Monday.

Taking the day off...

Hi everyone. I know you were looking forward to a posting from me today. But I've decided to take the day off.

I've had a pretty heavy day, so I'm gonna try and get warm and fall asleep soon.

I'll whip up a new sketch tomorrow. I plomise. In the meantime enjoy this fairly old sketch of Miho from Sin City.

Anyway, stay warm and I'll see you all tomorrow.

A page of random

Hi everyone. I hope you all had a good weekend. I had a pretty darn good one myself. I got to play some more D&D and furthered the (miss)adventures of the monk Aaru Saa. Needless to say, his story will be one not without humor. I managed to get knocked out 3 times during an 10 hour session. The best of which came from being attacked by a bookshelf.

I s**t you not. A bookshelf. Jumped out and attacked him. He missed both of his attack rolls for his Flury of Blows. And was then knocked out by the shelf's second attack. It'll make for a really damn funny comic.

Anyway, today's sketches are just a pile of random that I did while reading through the Sword and Fist book. A couple are of D&D monks, two are skeleton warriors. And the last is of an old champion with a chainmail hood.

Anyway, I hope ya dig. I'm off to bed now. See you all back here tomorrow for a new sketch.

Postponed by technical problems...

Good morning everyone. Happy Friday.

Due to some technical problems I had to postpone my Thursday update till this morning. I hope you're all able to forgive me.

My phone freaked out and I had to spend some time getting it to behave again, and on top of that, my scanner has decided that it only wants to scan a portion of my sketch. Even though I have nearly the entire page selected as the image it should capture!! Bastard.

Anyway, I was feeling very uninspired last night so I just started sketching and what do you know, I ended up drawing not 1, not 2, but 3 Valiant comics characters.

In order from left to right we have a super loose sketch of X-O Manowar, the warmup sketch of The Eternal Warrior, and a massively cut off sketch of Bloodshot.

I actually liked how the Bloodshot sketch came out. But I guess I'll have to wait for another day to get the entire sketch scanned.

Anyway, I'll do another sketch later today for my Friday update. See you all back here then.

Yet another Aaru sketch...

What can I say. I found a new source of inspiration. I'm having fun trying to figure out what my D&D character Aaru Saa looks like. In today's sketch I'm playing around with his monk's robes a bit more. I'm giving him more of a pronounced (read: oversized) hakama style of pants. I have removed his outer robe to work with his under robes more. I haven't started thinking about a color scheme yet, but I think I'm on the right track with the costume.

Anyway, I hope you're all getting a kick out of him. And I'll see you back here for another sketch tomorrow. And I promise, it will not be an Aaru sketch.

Good night everyone.

Feeling under the weather...

Hi everyone. Apparently I was intended to start December by catching a cold. I managed to start another sketch of my Drow Monk, Aaru Saa. But I didn't finish inking him.

I'm actually thinking I might revise his costume to reflect the shaolin monks more... but I haven't decided yet.

Anyway, the NyQuil is kicking in so I'm off to bed. See you all tomorrow.

A return to active duty

Hi everyone. Did you miss me? I didn't plan on not posting an update for an entire week, but I had to use up some vacation time, and then there was Thanksgiving, and I just didn't have the time to sketch. Let alone update this poor, neglected blog.

But some good news. Yesterday some friends and I got together and finally played the game of D&D that we've been trying to get set up for a month now. It was loads of fun. However, shortly after arriving at the gaming location we found out that the character that I had created previously, wouldn't be able to roll in this game. So I created a new character. He's a Drow Monk named Aaru Saa (that's his monk name).

Anyway, I managed to sneak in a quick character sketch of him last night before bed. Hope you like it.

I'll try to return to my normal posting schedule this week. Need to stay on top of this.

Anyway, have a good evening and I'll see you all back here tomorrow.

A Solar reaction in the sky

Hi everyone. Hope you all had a good Thursday.

I can't really complain. My day was better than it was yesterday. I managed to spend a little bit of time making a little more refined Solar, Man of the Atom sketch.

I wanted to add his 'power glow' around his hands. But I was afraid that if I started trying to do it I would end up making a huge mess and get really frustrated. I'll give it a try some other time.

Which is funny because the valiant style of power that Solar often had glowing from his hands was visually so different than what I was used to seeing in Marvel/DC and I believe Image comics at that time. It was one of the elements that drew me to my first experience of Valiant comics... The Unity trading card set.

My best friend and I bought them whenever we found them. And between the two of us we had them all. The characters were so different. I had to find the comics to read as they were intended. And oddly enough, I never did get any of the Unity books. But my brother and I really got into XO Manowar, Magnus and Solar.

And I owe it all to that first glimpse of an art style that I had never seen before. But was the dose of alternative comics that I was really needing.

Anyway, it's mega cheesy. Has tons of anatomy problems. And really isn't the best thing I've drawn in a while. But hey, it reminds me of those old comics. So I like it. Hope you do too. Have a great evening and I'll see you back here for Friday's sketch.

Solar, rough

Good morning everyone.

I had a rather interesting day. Mostly due to the condo construction. But I did finally get a few minutes this evening to do a very quick rough sketch of Solar, Man of the Atom.

I have been planning on sketching this character for quite some time now. And it seemed that every time I sat down to draw him, the idea either completely slipped my mind, or the technology would prevent me from making it happen. No longer.

I'm probably going to change this composition before it's finished. In the meantime, it'll do as a rough draft. Hope you all dig it.

See you back here for the real Thursday update. Good night everyone.

Flickering lights, and frustration

Hi everyone.

I had every intention of sketching a new drawing this evening, but it appears that my Bamboo tablet and MacBook are fighting again.

Every time I plug the tablet into one of the two USB ports, all I am greeted with are the four blue lights on the hot key buttons flashing. And the inability to use the tablet at all. I wonder if the Bamboo and laptop will ever want to play nice again. Which really sucks, considering that the reason I have the Bamboo is for sketching on the go.

I'm off to bed. Sorry everyone. I'll have to do a new sketch tomorrow at lunch.

Cold Snap

Hi everyone.

I'm sitting here listening to the latest series in the Penny Arcade, PvP, Wil Wheaton Dungeons & Dragons podcasts. As usual the adventures of Acquisitions Incorporated continue to make me want to game again. While at the same time cause me to laugh out loud, multiple times. It would be so much fun to roll dice with these guys.

Anyway, their latest adventure starts in the winter and they have to trek to a dwarven town in the snow. This made me want to do a sketch of a character undergoing a similar voyage. I haven't done a snowy sketch in quite some time. I actually like the way that it turned out. I tried some new tricks in how I colored the image. Some of them I'll end up using again.

Hope you all like it. See you back here for another sketch later today.

Unnamed Wandering Monk

Good evening everyone.

I'm waiting for some laundry to finish drying after spending a great day with the GF and my daughter, so I decided to get a quick sketch in.

This evening's sketch is of the as yet unnamed half-elf monk that I'm preparing to play in an upcoming D&D adventure. It's been many years since the last time I have rolled some dice. And I'm really looking forward to starting this game. Especially since I'm going to be playing a Monk character. I have often been told by previous DMs that they don't allow the Monk class as a playable character as they were far to powerful in their upper levels. Looking at the Monk outlined in D&D 3.5 they do sound very powerful in their higher levels. But to be fair, I don't think that I'll ever reach those levels. Though that would be pretty darn cool.

I'm sure some of the character design will change once we actually start gaming. We'll have to see what happens.

Anyway, have a good evening everyone. And I'll see you back here tomorrow.

Late night...

Hi everyone.

I ended up getting home around midnight. It was a long day at work, and I just realized that I need to go back to write up a weekly report tomorrow before I go pick up the GF and my daughter. Good times.

Anyway, I didn't get a chance to do my sketch today. But I'll try to get at least one done this weekend.

And now if you excuse me my bed is calling me. Good night.

Technical Difficulties

Good evening everyone. This is a little embarrassing, but I'm sad to say that the blog has experienced some technical difficulties regarding tonight's sketch.

I arrived home later than I originally planned. Not in a bad way. My daughter fell asleep on me while the GF was watching her show tonight, and I had to stay and let her sleep. Too cute. But that's neither here, nor there.

I arrived home and after doing some laundry, I attempted to do my sketch of Solar Man of the Atom in my MacBook using my bamboo tablet, only to find that it would not maintain a connection on the MacBook. Fearing that there might be a problem with the tablet, I then spent the next hour or so online looking for any postings with similar problems that I was experiencing. I didn't really find anything like my tablet's symptoms, so I then moved on to my Mac Mini. At that time I found that it does in fact work, but only from a powered USB port. Of which my MacBook only has one that is reliable (so says the internet), but apparently that is starting to fail. So... my laptop is not reliably powering my tablet. This saddens me. So, I guess for the remainder of my time updating this blog, when I do a digital sketch I'll have to use one of my powered USB hubs.

But it's too late for me to do a sketch right now. I have to get some sleep. I'm sorry for the lack of an update. I really wanted to do my Solar sketch. But I'll have to wait till tomorrow to get one done. See you all then. Have a good evening, and I hope none of you have any USB problems anytime soon.

Take 2

Good evening everyone. I bring to you a slightly refined version of the Magnus sketch I posted earlier.

I tightened up the lines a little bit. Added some rendering to the robots. And decided to add some color to make it a little more interesting.

I am thinking that I'll finish up the week doing sketches of other Valiant characters. Who will be next? Eternal Warrior? Solar? X-O Manowar? Harbinger? We'll have to wait and see.

Again, this was completed in CS3 on my MacBook using my Bamboo (which is having some problems maintaining a connection... not sure what that's about). Have a good night everyone and I'll see you back here tomorrow.

Magnus Robot Fighter

Hi all. Yup, I missed the on-time update for Tuesday. I ended up having a pretty busy day, then I stayed up at the grandparent's with the GF and my daughter, so I didn't get a chance to post my rough sketch.

I was able to do a rough layout for my sketch of Magnus Robot Fighter yesterday. I've wanted to draw him for a long time. He was one of my favorite Valiant characters. I loved the fact that he would dispatch violent robots with a shuto uchi attack. After I got into Karate, I had a new appreciation for Magnus using that strike. It makes the most sense to attack those robots with that attack. The small area of contact means that he's able to shatter the metal of the bots, as well as sever the internal wires and hardware with a greatly reduced risk of his hand getting stuck.

Or at least, that's the conclusion I came up with.

Anyway, hope you all dig the rough sketch. I'll be getting an updated sketch done tonight. See you all later.

Percy Jackson. Or, Why You Should Listen to Your Mother

Hi everyone. Here's something that you might find surprising. An actual update. With a sketch. I know, I know. Some of you are probably thinking that hell might be making snow cones. Or that right now a flight inbound to your local airport is receiving their final approach update from a voice that sounds oddly like a pig.

But yes. I bring to you a sketch. I've been listening to the audio book for The Lightning Thief. I am surprised that the book is pretty darn entertaining. I wasn't expecting much, not because it's a book written for kids. I enjoy reading children's novels. However, I have not been impressed by a lot of them recently. I loved the Lemony Snicket books. I thought they were clever, and while being very dark, they weren't too overly scary for children. Too bad the people making the movie didn't get the same idea.

But I do love greek mythology, and I also enjoyed the fact that Percy isn't a kid who's been beat down, despite him being good and honest. Percy's a troubled kid. In a way he reminds me of a 12 year old Kaneda from Otomo's Akira. The rogue who becomes the unlikely hero.

But anyway, I also really got into the book as while I've been driving around listening to it, it's been raining as well. So I really felt like I was experiencing the portion of the book where the Minotaur is encountered for the first time. As a result, I decided that I'd sketch Percy after that encounter.

It was done in CS3 on my MacBook using my trusty Bamboo tablet. I hope ya digs. See you back here tomorrow. I plan on doing another Valiant comic character tomorrow. But you'll have to tune in to see who it will be.

Good night everyone.

A Quick Barbarian

Good evening everybody. Welcome back for another (slightly delayed) sketch-a-day update.

This sketch is another of those, I just want to sketch the first thing that came to my head, sketches. And apparently a Barbarian with an axe was what wandered into my imagination. I've got nothing.

And once again it was sketched on printer paper with a 2B pencil, due to the fact that I left my Bamboo tablet at work. I really need to do a digital sketch tomorrow before I completely forget how to sketch digitally.

Anyway, I'm gonna get to bed now. I hope you like the sketch and I'll see you back here tomorrow. Yeah, yeah, I mean later today.

Playing with a Stacked Deck

Hi everyone. Hope you all had a good Tuesday, and are having a wonderful evening.

Tonight's sketch is a departure for me. Mostly because I decided to draw something I've never drawn before.

I bring you, Gambit.

I've had a love hate relationship with this character since the early 90s. I couldn't stand his 'character'. How he was so cocky, and an instigator of almost unparalleled finesse. And yet, he has one of the coolest super powers I've ever come across. As much as I hated to read his dialog, I always loved to see his fights.

He's a master of the bo staff, and is very capable in hand to hand as well. But his true magic always came through when he was playing with a full deck of cards. Even though when he first appeared in comics, he was throwing mini blades. Almost like scalpels. But the charged cards were hands down the coolest weapon he would utilize.

So I decided to do a sketch of this cajun badass. I did it in pencil mostly because I left my Bamboo tablet at work. But I also felt like doing a traditional sketch anyway.

Hope you all enjoy it and have a great night. See you back here tomorrow for another new sketch.

Farewell old friend...

Hi everyone.

As you probably noticed, I didn't get a new sketch done last night. And for once I don't feel bad about that.

I got home late, and I decided to say good bye to an old friend of mine. We have had lots of great times. She was there for me when I was feeling blue, or worse. She helped me to make so many people laugh at parties. We wrote some good songs, and played some better ones over the years. She was an absolute pleasure to get to know and have around.

But it's time for the next chapter in our lives, and sadly, that means we are going our separate ways. But I'm sure she will always be making beautiful music, no matter where she's at.

So long old friend. God speed.

PS: No the GF and I didn't break up. I'm selling my acoustic after work.

The Hero Forgotten

Hi everyone. It's that time again. Yes, that's right, it's time for a rather late sketch-a-day posting.

Tonight's sketch is of one of my favorite characters that seems to have been lost to time. When I was in middle school, Valiant Comics jumped into the public eye moving from the modestly popular alternative comics press in thanks to two media vehicles that I was aware of. The first was that they released a trading card set for their Unity story line. And the second is that Wizard magazine really fell in love with their comics and started covering them quite heavily.

The books were super hero books, but they were real people. The art wasn't the super, over the top drawings that the major publishers were putting out at the time. But the art was as honest as their stories. And while everyone else was moving to use computers to color their books, Valiant continued to use traditional ink washes for their colors.

And their books were stunning. Solar. X-O Manowar. Rai. The Eternal Warrior. Archer & Armstrong. The list goes on.

Rai was a character that stuck in my head. The Rai that the comic series followed was the most recent bearer of the Rai mantle, and huge weight on his shoulders of being Japan's protector. Now, Japan is now a city built on the back of a giant dragon robot and has left earth. And the biggest twist is that, every time Rai tried to save people, they always end up attacking him vocally calling him a menace instead of a hero. It's a really moving story to see a character try to help a country that he loves so much, but they in turn hate him. And seeing how he goes on.

If you've never read any Valiant comics, get online and hunt down the trade paperbacks for Rai, X-O Manowar or Harbinger. These books are outstanding and if you're feeling really up for a read, hunt down the multiple Unity TPBs and that way you are introduced to every major character in their universe at the time.

Well, I'm off to bed. See you online tomorrow everyone.

Matthias, finally realized...

Hi everyone, and welcome back to an all new sketch-a-day. Once again I decided to do another pencil on paper sketch.

I wanted to try my hand at drawing Brian Jacques' character Matthias again. I had sketched out a humanistic mouse character around 4 years ago in a sketchbook, and I found that sketch recently. Which seems to be good timing, as I've been thinking about the Redwall books lately. They were such wonderfully crafted stories, with vivid characters, and you could tell that the author really loved the world he was creating.

I had the opportunity to meet Brian Jacques when I was in middle school. I had a friend able to go to his presentation, due to the fact that he was in honors english. Actually, I believe the rest of the kids that attended the presentation were in honors classes as well. I was bummed out a little, as his bio sounded interesting and I had a strange feeling like I had seen his books before. And that's when I heard the intercom in my Science room turn on and ask my teacher if I was there. He said I was, and the squakbox on the wall then said that I was to be released for the Brian Jacques presentation. At that time I realized that my mother, who was a lunch duty at my middle school and working on getting into the Special Education department as an aid, pulled some strings and got me into something that she thought I'd really enjoy. I never really thanked her for that. And I think I will the next time I see her.

He was utterly charming. His british accent was so real. His jokes were so dry. But he loved being there, talking to us. It was refreshing to listen to an adult talking to a room of 6th graders, and it was clear that he honestly loved talking to us and telling us about being a writer.

I started reading his books that day and kept reading them for a full year. Maybe more. And it's because of that I wanted to try my hand at drawing his character Matthias. Hope you all enjoy it, and if you get the chance please read Redwall. You won't regret it.

An older sketch to avoid another lackluster week

Hi everyone. Since I didn't get around to doing a sketch today (I had a business lunch and a condo board meeting after work that went rather late) so instead I bring to you a page of complete random. It was from quite a few years ago. Maybe 2004, 2005?

As you can tell it started with a sketch of The Who's famous child savant Tommy. Which made me think of another remarkable blind guy, so I drew a very anatomically incorrect Daredevil.

And to complete the page, a girl. And Batman.

Like I said, it's completely random. Hope it makes you giggle a little. I'll get a new sketch done tomorrow for sure. Till then, have a good night.

Bod and Silas

Good evening everyone. Here is that sketch I promised yesterday. I managed to get some rough pencils over my layout sketches earlier today, and I'm fairly happy with how it came out. I am reading through The Graveyard Book again and I must say, Neil is one heck of a storyteller.

People often tend to label him as a writer, or a novelist. And while those are both very true descriptions of what he does for a living, but the truth of the matter is that he is a storyteller. His books never read like a typical novel. They have a life of their own, and the narration is as fluid and easy going as someone reading it to you when you're tucked into bed. Or sitting by a camp fire. Or in the dark with a flashlight. Or just with someone that you can listen to for hours.

Even though I bought the book in hardcover when it first came out, I'm really tempted to purchase the audio book as well since he is reading it himself. If you haven't had the chance to listen to him read his own stories aloud, you are missing out on something fantastic. I could listen to him read an entry on wikipedia (so long as he wrote the original posting that is, otherwise it would seriously lack his humor and subtleties).

At any rate, this is a sketch of his young character Bod and his guardian Silas. I hope you all like it and I'll get another posting up tomorrow. I double dog promise. Whatever that means.

Good night everyone.

Gonna pass out now...

Hi there. I have a sketch started. But I'm feeling really crummy, so I'm gonna take a shot of NyQuil and get a good, hard sleep.

I will scan in the new picture inspired by Neil Gaiman's amazing novel The Graveyard Book. And I'll probably have another sketch inspired by karate as well, as I watched part of the UFC 104 preview tonight and damnit if Machida doesn't make me want to put on the old gi and run through my katas (well, those that I still remember that is). It all depends on if the construction workers need access to my unit or not. We'll see what happens.

Good night everyone. Be well, and I'll see you tomorrow.

Where's Ninjaboy?

Hi everyone.

I can't believe it's Wednesday already. And yes, no updates since Thursday. What gives?

Well, I'm on vacation this week. And wouldn't you know it the three of us (girlfriend, daughter and I) caught a cold over the weekend. And on top of that construction has started up on my building once again. I'll try to get some sketches made today, since I'm just hanging out at the condo, pounding tea and OJ and resting up to kick this bug. Oh yeah, and possibly interacting with construction workers coming in and tearing out some windows as well.

Not exactly what I had in mind for my vacation. But hey, I'll take what I can get. I hope to have some nifty sketches for you all to see later this evening.

Till then, stay healthy and warm.

The Witching Hour

Welcome back for a Thursday edition of ninjaboy's sketch-a-day. Pencil on paper week continues with a sketch inspired by one of my favorite three issue mini-series. The Witching Hour, by Jeph Loeb and Chris Bachalo. It came out while I was attending the Art Institute, and I remember the day I bought the first issue. My roomie and I walked to Zanadu Comics and it started raining pretty hard. But we still had to run an errand up to a local print shop to pick up some work for a class. The entire time we were walking around I was doing my best to make sure that our newly purchased comics were staying dry. And we succeeded. They remained nice and dry, while we were completely drenched.

We returned to the apartment with the class work unharmed, and began reading our new funny books.

I loved the tone of the first issue. I hadn't read anything like it in quite some time. And it was honestly my first encounter with Loeb's writing. Little would I know that he would become one of my favorite comic writers. And Bachalo's art was just outstanding. His use of screen tones as a filter, more than a shading tool was so unique. I'd never seen anything like it.

And it never fails, every year when Halloween grows near I have the sudden desire to read those books again. But since they are buried underneath everything in the condo as we prepare for the rest of the construction on the building, I decided to do a sketch of the main character. Ms White.

Hope you all like it, and I'll see you back here tomorrow for the last traditional sketch of the week.

Tuesday, on a Wednesday

Good evening everybody. Once again I bring you another in a week long series of traditional media sketches.

This evening's sketch is of an older friend. One we haven't seen, since a sudden defeat in the Octagon. Ladies and Gentlemen, please put your hands together for Tuesday Sketch!

We finally get a glimpse of what he has been up to since his defeat a couple of months ago. And that is training, training, training. There's no denying that Tuesday has some powerful hands. He staggered his opponent with a straight right that opened up a cut over his eye. But his ground work was a little lacking. So he's decided to begin studying Jujutsu honestly and legitimately. I'm not at liberty to divulge the dojo/outfit that he's training in right now, but I can say that he has been working very hard and is about to test for his green belt. His instructors have all said that his determination, and work ethic are incredible and he has come a long way in a short amount of time. The word off the mat is that he'll be a fierce contender when he returns to the octagon. He is still under contract, but no official fight has been announced at this time.

Stay tuned in and I'm sure we'll see this promising fighter under the bright lights again soon.

What'll it be?

Hi everyone. Welcome back to another version of pencil on paper sketch-a-day.

I often find it amusing to see what I end up drawing when I sit down without an agenda. I mean, I was watching some Bizzare World, and UFC, and what do I sketch? An old fashioned bartender. I often have the urge to find an old bar, with deep lighting, a well worn counter and a bartender wearing the button up shirt, vest and slacks as seen in the old black and white movies. I entertain notions of ordering a scotch on the rocks, telling the barkeep about my day as he listens on without being either fully invested in the conversation, nor disregarding it. Then retiring to a booth upholstered in leather that has aged into the most comfortable seating that you could ever ask for.

While there I work in my sketchbook, being inspired by the undeniable ambience from the surroundings.

Man, I would love to find a bar like that. Oh well. In the meantime, I'll just have to create it for myself in sketch form.

Hope you all get a kick out of this. And I'll see you back here tomorrow.

It may be late, but it's still Monday

Hi everyone. Hope you all had a great Monday.

I didn't get a chance to do my daily sketch during lunch today, and I forgot to bring home my Bamboo tablet, so tonight's sketch(es) are done the traditional way. Pencil on paper. In this case, cover stock.

And it really makes me realize that I have to do more traditional sketching. So much so that I may make this week, pencil on paper week to hone my chops again.

I was spending the evening watching Bizzare World and No Reservations, looking in an old sketchbook and remembering some really good ideas (that I plan on revisiting on this blog) and looking at the late, great Mike Wieringo's deviantart page with a sheaf of paper on my lap and a few pencils in hand. And you know what? I had a great time. It took me back to when I graduated from the Art Institute.

Anyway, Wieringo inspired the first sketch. It is of a 'space girl' venturing out onto another strange, alien landscape. What will she find? Who will she encounter?

And the next page of sketches actually is me recreating a page from an old sketchbook. A grizzled, sailor/dockworker and the younger version of a character that I created back in 20001. I wanted to do a story of a young boy who becomes adopted by a famous martial arts instructor, who also happens to be a ninja to a Daimyo. Something bad happens, and the boy is forced to grow up very quickly, then we flash forward quite a few years and we encounter him as a grown man and a notorious ninja himself.

This sketch is of him training as a boy, under the strict (and often times humorous) watch of his sensei.

Anyway, I'm off to bed. Hope you all enjoy the sketches and I'll see you again tomorrow.

She'll cut you quick...

Hi everyone. Yes, it's the Friday edition of ninjaboy's sketch-a-day.

Today's sketch is another one of Sin City's little kunoichi, Miho. I only had a few minutes for a sketch today, and as soon as I started putting my digital pen to digital tablet apparently I wanted to sketch Miho.

She is one of my favorite characters in the Sin City books. Like so many other fans of the series I'm sure. Without her, Dwight would have had a very short story indeed.

This time I decided to sketch her about to dish out some Old Town justice on a poor sap who didn't know the rules with the girls. Or if he did, he (stupidly) thought that he would be able to handle whatever the girls decided to dish out.

The sketch was done in CS3 on my MacBook using the trusty Bamboo tablet. Hope you all dig it and I'll see you back here next week.

Empty Hand

Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Thursday installment of sketch-a-day.

Today's sketch is of a karateka. I wanted to do a very loose sketch, with heavy black lines to try and emulate a brush loaded with black ink. I felt that this style of freeform sketching really lends it's self well to martial arts sketches.

The inspiration for the sketch actually came from watching the commercial for the upcoming UFC 104 featuring Loyoto "the Dragon" Machida defending his belt. I didn't really know much about Machida, I had been out of the UFC scene for a while while he was making a name for himself but he became a name to follow for me when I heard that he knocked out Rashad Evans. But more importantly, that he has a karate background. It should be no surprise that I tend to navigate more to the Okinowan arts, and their practitioners, but I remember thinking "allright, a karateka just knocked out the Light Heavyweight champion. Time to give karate a little more respect MMA."

And during the commercial for 104 it shows Machida practicing some forms and kicks in his karate gi. After seeing that three or four times while watching TUF episode 4, I ended up looking Machida up online and found out some very interesting facts about him. He comes from a very famous karate family, and not only is he excellent at karate, but he also started practicing, and competing in Sumo and Jiujutsu as well! How awesome is that! Sumo!

The Dragon is now a fighter that I will be following a lot more closely.

Anyway, one of the stances he was in during the commercial reminded me of a Kyokushin stance, so I decided to draw this sketch based of that imagery. It was created in CS3 on my MacBook using my Bamboo tablet.

Hope you all dig it, and I'll see you back here tomorrow for yet another Friday sketch.

Here's Mud in Your Eye

Why, hello there everyone. Welcome back to the Wednesday edition of ninjaboy's sketch-a-day.

Today's sketch is of Gotham City's Dark Knight, engaged in battle with Clayface. I remember some of the first Batman books that my brother and I really got into were a series of Detective Comics when Batman was trying to hunt down Clayface and some people who have the same body as his.

We got these issues as part of either a Christmas present, or maybe a birthday present. The gift was a giant 'grab bag' of comics. Most of which were DC books. Actually, now that I think about it, they were all DC books. There was a handful of almost all of the major titles at that time. And the Batman books that really grabbed our attention were these Mud Pack issues, as well as a series of comics where Batman was trying to apprehend a much darker version of the Riddler.

These were easily the reason why Batman became one of my favorite comic book characters of all time. I remember reading them and feeling, nervous, scared even. These were books to read in a dimly light room. Following the caped crusader through the gritty and violent city of Gotham as he uses his detective skills to track his prey.

Anyway, I hope you all get a kick out of today's sketch. I know I had fun drawing it. As usual it was created in CS3 on the good ol' MacBook using my Bamboo tablet.

See you all back here tomorrow for another new sketch.

A double shot of Gung Fu

Hi everyone. Welcome to another installment of barely in time sketch-a-day.

Today I present to you two very loose sketches inspired by Gung Fu. In particular, the staff forms of Gung Fu. While I did enjoy practicing the Bo forms in the Karate style I practiced, as well as the Jo movements I learned from friends who have dan ranks in Aikido, watching the staff movements from various Gung Fu styles and movies is hands down more entertaining. The staff is almost a perfect representation of the martial arts. It's movements are fast and fluid. Weaving natural patterns and lines around the practitioner. All while delivering incredible force and strength with each strike.

Both the Gung Fu staff and spear movements are incredible to watch, and I can imagine, practice as well.

Some of my favorite Gung Fu spear fighting seen in film is at the beginning of The Drunken Master 2. The sword & spear fight that takes place under and around the train car (part of which can be seen at the end of this video clip) is just fantastic. One of the many reasons why that is my favorite Jackie Chan movie.

Anyway, I hope you all get a kick (no pun intended) out of these, very rough, sketches. Both of which were created in CS3 on my MacBook using the good ol' Bamboo.

PS: Yes, I'm aware that I didn't get these in before midnight. So I guess you'll all just get a tripple shot Wednesday.

Two minutes to go...

Hi everyone. Super fast post today. I have 2 minutes to get my Monday sketch up before it becomes Tuesday and thusly, a day late.

Anyway to(night)day's sketch is of everyone's favorite princess saving, dungeon crawling hero. Link.

We join Link as he is looking over his map (probably just after clearing a new room and has just finished updating it).

Hope you all dig it. See you back here for Tuesday's sketch.

Samurai

Hi everyone. It's Friday. Let's all get out of here for a good weekend.

Today's sketch is another character one shot. This time of a Samurai. It is a very fast sketch, that came together in much the same way that yesterday's sketch emerged onto the digital page. I started as a rough gesture for a figure, then built on top of that using layers.

This time, I decided to add more than just a flat color I decided to use an actual kimono pattern for the background frame.

In hindsight, I probably should have used a less busy pattern since it takes the attention away from the character. Then again, the character isn't exactly well rendered so I guess I don't mind anyway.

Oh well. Hope you all get a kick out of it, and I'll see you back here on Monday with a new sketch.

Chinese Character Sketch

Hi everyone. Welcome back to ninjaboy's sketch-a-day. Thursday edition.

I'm not exactly sure why I decided to draw a chinese 'period piece' styled character. I was looking at some Sean Galloway sketches and for some reason decided to do a character sketch in a similar style.

But this time I decided to return to a sketching style I was using a couple of months ago, and have since completely forgotten about. I laid out a rough character gesture on a layer, then went in on top of it, fleshing out the character. I'm surprised that I stopped doing this as it really let me get work done faster than I have been. I'll have to employ this tactic more often.

anyway, the character pose and some of the lines were inspired by how Sean draws his characters and costumes. I love how his costumes have such weight on a figure, while staying completely cartoony at the same time. Just awesome.

Anyway, hope you all dig and I'll see you back here tomorrow for another Friday sketch.

Later gaters.