Parka Blogs: January 2009

Friday, January 30, 2009

Photos from Massive Black Workshop Jan 2008

Irene Gallo just recently blogged about the Massive Black workshop held in Seattle in Jan 2009 and has provided tons of great photos from the event.

Great stuff.

Massive Black Seattle Workshop Jan 2009

Book Review: The Art of Porco Rosso

Porco Rosso, the movie, is actually based on a 15-page water-coloured manga by Hayao Miyazaki. Included in the book are 3 pages from that manga and they look really fantastic.

The only one thing I don't like about the book is there are too much screenshots from the movie. The concept art consists of character designs, airplane designs, publicity posters and storyboards. I love that they included the film ending credit illustrations. Overall, the amount of concept art is still overwhelmed by the film stills.

Right at the end, there are over 60 pages of the screenplay, broken down to story beats with captions. There are also 5 full black and white pages from the original manga.

There's also not much writeup except to explain a little history on the story.

This book is still good just that it's not as great compared to the art-of books released for later movies.

If you like this book, you might also want to check out the other art-of books I have reviewed for Studio Ghibli's movies.

Visit the link beside to read more reviews on Amazon. If you buy from the link, I get a little commission that helps me get more books for review.

Country-specific Amazon links for this book:
Amazon.com | Amazon.ca | Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.fr | Amazon.de

Thursday, January 29, 2009

ArtOrder - Blog of Jon Schindehette

Today's featuring art blog, ArtOrder, belongs to Jon Schindehette.

He's the Wizards of the Coast’s senior Dungeons and Dragons art director.

I found the blog from ConceptArt, where Irene Gallo posted a link to an interview she did with Joe Schindehette.

So check out ArtOrder! There are lots of fantastic art featured there. Oh, he has a Flickr photostream as well.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Book Review: How to Draw Noir Comics

Shawn Martinbrough has illustrated comics for DC Comics, Vertigo, and Marvel Comics, ranging from Batman, Superman, and X-Men, to King James, based on superstar athlete Lebron James. He's an accomplished artist and it's great he shares his tips on drawing noir comics with this book.

Everything in the book is explained simply and clearly with lots of personal examples. He tries to address the many approaches to creating noir comics and does them well. For example when explaining the tools he used, he would talk on the type of ink to buy (fade and erase-proof), how to maintain them and choosing the right tools for the job.

The main bulk of the book deals with comic creation specific to noir style. He explains the ways to create mood, lighting and texture to aid the story. And also touches the comic creation part like paneling, pacing, creating drama, choosing backgrounds, using references and more. All the examples included are well caption to emphasis the techniques reviewed.

At the end of the book is a 16-page noir style graphic novel to show readers the finished product.

This book is a great introduction to noir comics and serves as a great reference.

You can view more of Shawn Martinbrough's work at Verge Entertainment, which is a company he founded with his partners.

Thanks to Kelvin Chan for providing the book for this short review.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Book Review: The Masters of Illusions

Here's another interesting book on optical illusions. It's sort of a catalog book that presents the illustrations page after page. The illustrations are only accompanied by a short caption on the facing page, which explains the illusions. There's also a short section on sculptures.

It's a visually entertaining book that will bring a smile of awe and wonder on the face.

If you like optical illusions, also check out Masters of Deception.

Monday, January 26, 2009

Comic & art book releases 27-28 Jan 2009

Here are some comics and art book releases coming up.

Among this seemingly random list you might spot the Massive Black Vol 1 art book. It's going for US$55 on Amazon via a third party comic book seller.

I encourage readers to support their local comic retailers whenever possible. Visiting comic shops is cool.

Sunday, January 25, 2009

For a war movie Rescue Dawn has almost no conflicts

I've just finished watching Rescue Dawn a few days ago. A few of my colleagues also watched it. Some liked it, others not too much.

For a war movie based in Vietnam, somehow I just can't feel the conflict and the OMG-what-are-they-going-to-do moments. While Christian Bale was tortured continuously, at no time did I think he was going to die. When he decides to escape, one of his prisoner friends threatens to tell on him. That's the only conflict in the movie. There was no tension anywhere else.

This is a very strange movie, especially when it's rated at 90% on rottentomatoes.

Saturday, January 24, 2009

Book Review: Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative

This is one of the three instructional books written by Will Eisner. The other two are Comics and Sequential Art and Expressive Anatomy for Comics and Narrative.

Telling a good story is an incredibly difficult. In this book, Will Eisner shares with readers some of things to be aware of when tackling storytelling using comics.

He talks about techniques to use to help build a more convincing story. This would include comic tools like lettering, building momentum, using visual clues and writing. Examples include how props (i.e. guns) are held to reveal human characteristics.

There are lessons on how to engage readers, how readers think and mistakes to avoid. These are followed with lots of comic strip examples — including a selection from different comic artists. Unfortunately, they aren't captioned page by page like it was done on his other books. The comic examples are great, you know it but you don't know why they work.

The book doesn't really go in depth into all aspects of storytelling. There's no talk on character development, story arcs, conflict management and specific story elements and tools.

Overall, this is still a very useful book for anyone who's just starting out and thinking of drawing their own comics.

Will Eisner Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative

Book Review: Comics and Sequential Art

This is one of the three instructional books written by Will Eisner. The other two are Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative and Expressive Anatomy for Comics and Narrative.

The book focuses on the creation of comics and the various techniques one can use. Specifically, it talks about the why the techniques work and the concepts behind. The various lessons touch on timing, framing, composition, expressive anatomy, writing for comics and other application of comics.

Every page of comics included that serve as examples come with captions. They explain the effect to achieve on readers. One example would be to tilt a composition of a moving train to simulate the rocking on the tracks.

How Will Eisner uses his panels and framing is amazing. He can use doorways or windows on a plane as frames, and he can so easily blend his panels together using the environment. Paneling and pacing when done right really just enhances the story. You'll see and understand why it works. It's all explained.

This book will serve as a very good introduction to comic artists. Professionals might learn some new ways of doing things too.