Drawing the Dead!

 Whew! I say again...Whew! I have been long absent from my blog. Work just piled up over the end of the year. It hasn't quite let up but it has lessened. Even with all the work I doodled a lot, mostly while taking breaks and watching my favourite shows on the telly. As you may have already guessed I drew these while watching the Walking Dead! I love Michonne - but who doesn't.
I've also started a Tumblr for photographs that inspire or that I just dig. Occasionally I'll post drawings of the images. I'll try to post them on my blog as well as on my Tumblr.

best,
j.

Cheesecake Doodling!

Just a few warm-up sketches. Working in my arm before I draw more Rocketeer!

True Patriot!

A bunch of Canadians are raising funds for TRUE PATRIOT, a Canadian Superhero book project and we need your help! Although the stories are about Canadian superheroes the stories are universal! Galactic, even! COSMOLOGICAL!! It's gonna be good.

My story is The Golden Owl vs. Bigfoot! I've been sketching up ol' squatchie, trying to make him all mysterious and friendly/creepy! I'm looking forward to drawing the story and to seeing the other stories being put together by the super talented artists involved in the book. So check out the link above and see if there are any perks you'd dig and help us reach our goal of $10,000 this weekend. We're only days away from the end of the campaign and want to make this happen for YOU!

Thanking you in advance.

j. bone

Mars Attacks! Miss Fury!

 This past weekend was New York Comic Con, with many projects announced. One I'm going to be keepin an eye on (just for all the pre-publication hoopla surrounding it) is SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN by Dan Slott and crew. Spidey's my favourite superhero ever but I long ago let go of any "ownership" of what happened to him. Sometimes he's in something I like, sometimes not. That's comics!
Anyway, an announcement I was part of was IDW's news that in 2013 the popular MARS ATTACKS license will invade several of their books. I was asked to draw a variant cover with MARS ATTACKS MISS FURY. Though I'd seen Miss Fury before I'm not all that familiar with the character. Basically she looks like Catwoman in a cape. And in fact her costume is made of black leopardskin. Fuzzy.
I nabbed that cover image from the CBR website

These are the rough drawings I submitted. I liked the giant Martian head on the top two, but also liked the idea of Miss Fury blowing up Martian saucers and parachuting elegantly back to her palatial estate. 

Next up: I'm redesigning Spidey's costume. Stay Spidey-tuned!

j.

Go, CANADA!

 Hey everyone! If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook you might have heard that I'm part of a new anthology project called TRUE PATRIOT! Today our IndieGoGo campaign went live and we're offering up some wicked fun perks for donations. You can get copies of the book, postcards, desktop wallpapers and fancier stuff like a portfolio review with me!
Click any of the links above to find out about the project. And follow J.Torres at his blog and on Twitter (because he's masterminding this whole thing).

The Golden Owl is the character I'll be writing and drawing for the anthology. You may have seen him before in the pages of OWL magazine...I've given him a slight makeover for TRUE PATRIOT! He's gonna be kicking some Bigfoot butt!

Check out the IndieGoGo video. Feel free to comment any thoughts here or Tweet at any of the creators!

j.

Hangin' With The Super Friends!

After drawing Michelle Obama as Wonder Woman I recalled that I'd drawn Barack Obama hanging with the Super Friends way back in 2009, not long after he became President. It was something just for fun, because I love drawing the Super Friends.
Well, I inked and colored it and here it is!

To my American friends, whatever your politics, don't forget to get out and vote!

Politickin' done.
J.

Wonder Woman!

I'm not a very political person. Really. Unless I hear speeches that are incredibly ignorant (the current Mayor of Toronto is not exactly my favourite person) or especially rousing! Michelle Obama's recent opening speech at the Democratic Convention was one of those exciting moments to which I actually paid attention. Politics aside I like the Obama's. Watching her speech I imagined Michelle as the NEW Wonder Woman!

j.

Burlesque Beauty - Dolly Berlin!

Golly! I thought I'd posted this drawing already! This is from the August 2011 Dr. Sketchy's Session with Dolly Berlin. I got some good drawings out of that session that I'll post later. In the meantime this 1920s costume inspired this sepia pic. Dolly also donned a Marie Antoinette wig and costume that was really tough to draw but looked amazing! Check out the Dr. Sketchy's Toronto site with photos by Brynne Kennedy.

j.

One Hot Summer!

This summer has been incredibly humid here in Toronto. I've been to the pool a couple of times just to try to cool off. I wish I carried business cards with me because sometimes I just want to ask someone I spot to pose for me. Unfortunately I have no business card holder in my swim trunks and I have to settle for taking a mental snapshot and drawing the inspiration later. In this case the "model" was a gorgeous young black woman wearing a white hat and white bikini. The contrast from her skin tone and fabric and the fact that she was wearing a large circular hat made her really easy to remember when I sat down to my drawing table. She was very much a living drawing.

j.

Catwoman!

Technically the inspiration for this drawing is from a dude, based as it is on RuPaul Drag Race contestant Sonique and her gorgeous Catwoman outfit. I would totally draw a comic book with Catwoman wearing this!

j.

Maid of La Mer!

I've been messing about with Illustrator and Vector drawings again lately and worked up a little mermaid image. The beginnings of this drawing came from a cool tattoo I saw on the arm of Burlesquer Dolly Berlin. I drew Dolly at a Dr. Sketchy's session last summer (goodness, how time flies). The hardest part about drawing in Illustrator, I find, is getting some life into the drawing. I'm so used to my ink lines and relying on light and dark that to draw in colour takes a different kind of thinking.

If I ever got a tattoo I'm pretty sure it would be of a mermaid.

j.

Miss Roxi D'Lite!

Mmm, Roxi! Looking to do some warm up drawings one summer day I opened up the homepage of Roxi D'Lite and filled a page with doodles. I've seen Roxi perform a number of times and she never ceases to amaze. I would even use the completely made-up word "BESHMOZZLE".
Just a few short weeks ago, for instance, I saw Roxi at the Toronto Burlesque festival - she performed in a pink latex cat-suit, lounging on a divan, stripping down to her tassels and thong before bathing in a dish of warm milk. I can tell you that afterwards I happened to find myself backstage in the vicinity of Miss D'Lite (okay, I carried her luggage to her car because I am just that sort of gentleman :) and Roxi smelled exactly of vanilla ice cream. I just about melted.

If Roxi D'Lite is performing in a town near you I highly recommend that you check her out. She wasn't The Reigning Queen of Burlesque, Miss Exotic World 2010 for nothin'!

j.

The Saviors!

This past weekend was San Diego Comic Con and beyond the awesome announcement that Ramon Perez won THREE Eisner's for his brilliant adaptation of a Jim Henson story TALE OF SAND -- there was a little bit of J.Bone news. At the Image Comics panel writer James Robinson announced a project he and I are working on called THE SAVIORS. It's an alien invasion, horror comic. I've been wanting to try my hand at horror, drawn in my style, and James came up with a terrific story that hits my love of sci-fi and monsters.

Can't wait to start sharing more of the art here. In the meantime the Toronto Burlesque festival is coming up and I'll be drawing the heck out of the performers and posting some Cheesecake! :)

j.

Cold Summer Days!

 We're in the middle of another heat wave here in Toronto...all the more reason to draw some frosty snow queens to cool things down. I drew these ladies in Photoshop on my Wacom - all digital. I've been messing around with digital art now, just a little. I still love inking traditionally but I can play with color more when I work on the computer.

Hope you're all having a good summer, or winter if you're on the other side of the World!
best,
j.bone

The Amazing Rocketman!

I drew this after finally catching up on all my Rocketeer Adventures comics by IDW! What a fun character that you can do so much with! For some reason I feel like the movie didn't get a good rap, but I think it served the original Dave Stevens comic well! In fact the casting was spot on! Bill Campbell and Jennifer Connelly? Hot!

TCAF (Toronto Comic Arts Festival) was this past weekend. Next post I'll write about the wicked comics I picked up.

j.

Go, Go, GOBUKAN!

Hello! I have multiple pieces of GOBUKAN related updates to relate. One is that the first complete long form adventure of GOBUKAN is now...complete. And you can read it all HERE. And also read even more comics at Saturday Morning Webtoons

Two - I've started a GOBUKAN CafePress shop with t-shirts and a journal (aka A Diary). I write all kinds of secrets in my diary.  I'll be adding more images and items as I build the shop. Let me know if there are any of my non-licensed images you'd like to see on a shirt, mousepad, coffee mug, or keychain.

Third - If you're in Toronto May 5th and 6th I'll be at TCAF, though not officially set up at any one table, with postcards available. I'll be on a Saturday Morning Webtoons panel which is tentatively scheduled for Saturday at noon. We tried for a morning time slot but everyone one was still eating cereal in their pjs and reading Saturday Morning Webtoons.

And now, before I annoy you with all my GOBUKAN excitement (too late) I bid you adieu and have a pleasant day.
J.Bone

Super Best Friends Forever!

Does Batgirl want her own Super Best Friends Forever comic book series?
I LOVE the new Super Best Friends Forever (aka SBFF) DC Nation shorts. Of course, I don't have television so I have to watch the shorts on YouTube (and so can you). They're so adorable! I wasn't familiar with Lauren Faust before (although I knew her designs...I just didn't know who she was). Check out her brilliant Galaxy Girls designs!

I've been sketching the girls, Batgirl mostly, in between drawing jobs. I really want to draw the DC comic book that really, really should be made for the SBFF!

j.

John Carter of Awesome!

I finally got out to see John Carter (of Mars) and boy did I ever love it! If you haven't seen it yet, or haven't seen it because the trailers looked stupid, I encourage you to go. When I left the theater I immediately wanted a) a Tars Tarkas action figure b) to see the movie again and c) to draw! It fired up my imagination in a way that no movie has for quite a while (probably the last time I wanted to draw right after seeing a movie was when I saw the Incredibles).

I mean, I always want to draw...but I wanted to draw stuff from this movie. It's a way of having the movie continue outside of the theater.

I wish John Carter (of Mars) had done better in theaters so that we'd get a sequel.

j.

Batman: Full of Bats!

"It can be truly said that I have a bat in my belfry!"So, September of last year I did a little joke drawing of Batman. The idea was to put as many bats on him as the new Wonder Woman costume had "WWs" (Five). Though I forgot to scallop his gloves with bat ears and wings, I managed to do it. I thought I was being all clever and stuff and then the Earth 2 Batman costume design by Jim Lee was released. Jim outdid himself on this one. It's got SIX bats that I can see (7 if you count his cowl). Mine only has five. I would have had seven if I'd done his gloves, dammit.

Maybe I'll see what I can do with Martian Manhunter and his Mars logo.

j.

Gaga for Girls!

A few drawings of Lady Gaga from her TELEPHONE music video and sketches of the gorgeous Katherine Piro. I've added costuming and details to the drawings of Katherine -- as it was pointed out to me that she would never wear a heart print bikini :)

j.