IllustrationFriday - Survival

For some mysterious reason, I recieved the topic again, so here's something about survival. Me surviving without paper that is. Inking in Manga Studio and coloring in Photoshop.

Still torturing myself with the Wacom, I also made this april fool cover in digital

still struggling with the Wacom as a pro.

 Here's another insomnia exercise with Wacom intuos, Manga Studio inking and photoshop textures coloring.

I recently did a test for a publishing company that needed hundreds of sketches for a language teaching book.

 It needed to go fast so I first experimented with pen and paper,

(colors by the very talented Tanja Cinna)

then decided to switch to manga studio to obtain a slicker stroke and work the characters in digital only.

I've been bitten in the backside now since I passed the test, not for the hundreds of small character drawings, but for potentially dozens of elaborate perspective views and characters; I might be playing out of my league as far as digital drawing skills are involved.

But it is a refreshing exercise to pass time before I jump on another automotive comic book about the 24h of Le Mans. See you this summer on a race track somewhere.

another random exercice

I wonder why this wacom exercise is so conveniently shaped as a facebook header.

I've been trying to mix pen inking with watercolours grey shading AND digital colours effect, I reckon the final product isn't all bad. I hope I can "exploit" this soon in a new comic book.

This is so much NOT my usual universe, it proved a painful yet interesting exercise.


On the work front, our latest book "Alpine" seemed to have gain a lot of attention and against all odds could be our biggest success based on the first 3 weeks only ! We're going into reprint already ! I still try to understand when and how things went from no luck no respect no issue I'm gonna die a delivery boy to considerable commercial success with a book that at first I did'nt really want to work on.  Maybe I'm just not so good at picking jobs.



It would be nice if the money could start to be decent now tho.

our next book will be out in about a month (yes, it has been a long and busy 10 month) and it will probably sell on its title alone, and a 20th death anniversary, and it was written by a personal friend of the main character and french specialist of the matter. It will probably be available soon in dutch and italian, maybe my french publisher will find a way to close a deal on another english version and finally get us all invited to goodwood. That would be swell. 

In the mean time, I use the few days of freedom between projects to try to remember who I used to be as an author and launch new and more intimate projects where doing things in a traditional way of showing off technical know how in a shiny and pompous way is less important than a kind of immediate sensation. Who knows.

No one.

And by the way, 2014 is NOT a leap year.

trimestrial update

Here's a little candy I did as a recreational wacom exercise waiting for the soup to heat in the microwave.

This winter will be spent in my workshop. I have a new book coming out tomorrow January 29th, and another scheduled for early may, shrinking a reasonable 5 or 6 month of work into only 3, as a book in libraries in may has to be delivered on march 1rst. Good thing 2014 is a leap year. :)

This month's book is a demand from our publisher and tells the story of french car make Alpine-Renault. Unlike our series Chapman, I doubt that it will ever be translated into any other language than french and flemish due to its limited interest outside the french market.

Spring and summer should be spent riding the Triumph around europe to present and sign the books in comic conventions and classic race meetings  At least that's the plan. Signings and presentations dates can be found on my regular website, starting next week February 7 in Paris.

Happy new year everyone.

See you in 2014. or not.

Oh wow, 5 month (winter update)

I really neglected this place. Mostly because I stopped the Illo Friday routine, when I DID receive the topics every other week, they were usually something that I had already illustrated the past years, in a group in which I never fit anyway.

Also because I had a tremendous amount of work and stopped being obsess with the wacom and digital painting in my daily activity. I took on old school pen and ink, after years of using only brushes and industrial roll point markers (Mitsubishi's uni-ball). It gave me greater accuracy, and the possibility to sculpt details easier than with a thick brush stroke that requires almost a single gesture, and yet gives a more living line than a metal roll pen.

Currently working on another automotive comic book for french publisher Glenat.

Our Chapman Biography in english has received excellent reviews, even if this kind of product is very far from the english habits and runs the risk to stay confined to petrol heads.

 C'mon, buy it on amazon, give me your money, you know you want to.

 And our next book in french will be out next month, it will be my 6th full comic book since I got fired 3 years ago, not counting the commercial jobs and translations. There are a lot of wonderful people that I am thankful to, and some of that old days that can go ... well, revise their judgement to put it that way.

out January 29th

There are still plenty of digital work done on those traditional pen on paper graphic books, but mostly, I try to use the wacom with Manga Studio for inking and Photoshop for coloring only for commercial work, where a very sleek and soft design is needed.

Here is my latest attempt, for our good friends at tailgatecafe , Canada, maker of leather bags, musics ... and crêpes !

 The first Draft is made on paper with pencil and roll-pen

See you in a couple of weeks for the annual Season greetings cards, those will also be made in digital painting, for the challenge.

making money with the wacom

Here is a picture that I did for one of our regular customers, I wanted to ink it with the wacom to have a really smooth and silky line.

First draft during the brainstorming

First accurate layout, pen on paper.

the pencil drawing, as precise as possible is scanned

Inking in Manga Studio with a slight auto-stabilisation.

crude photoshop colors

 and then effects and volumes

Ready to be composed with the text and sent to the customer through the interweb.